What's Love Got to Do With It? Jewish War Brides After the Holocaust

Join historian Robin Judd in conversation with her son, Jesse Steinman, about her award-winning and family-inspired book, Between Two Worlds: Jewish War Brides after the Holocaust. Between Two Worlds explores the stories of European Jewish women who lived through genocide and went on to wed American, Canadian, and British military personnel after the war. Judd, whose own grandmother survived the Holocaust and married an American soldier after liberation, offers an intimate portrait of how these unions emerged and developed—from meeting and courtship to marriage and immigration—and shows how they helped shape the postwar world. Throughout the conversation, we will explore stories that vividly capture how the exhilaration of the brides' early romances coexisted with survivor's guilt, grief, and the apprehension at the challenges of starting a new life in a new land.

Robin Judd is a Distinguished Professor of History at The Ohio State University where she teaches courses in Holocaust Studies, the history of antisemitism, and the history of leadership. She also serves as the Director of Ohio State's Hoffman Leaders and Leadership Program in History. Judd is the author of Contested Rituals: Circumcision, Kosher Butchering, and German-Jewish Political Life in Germany, 1843-1933 and Between Two Worlds: Jewish War Brides After the Holocaust, which has garnered two National Jewish Book Awards and was named a finalist for the 2024 Ohioana nonfiction award. She has served on Ohio’s Holocaust and Genocide Memorial and Education Commission since 2021. She serves as Chair of the Leo Baeck Institute’s Faculty Advisory Board and as past President of the Association for Jewish Studies. She has received seven teaching awards and three service awards.

Jesse Steinman is the Manager of Teen Community & Engagement at the Shalom Hartman Institute of North America. Previously he served as Boston University Hillel’s Springboard Innovation Fellow for 2 years. Originally from Columbus, Ohio, Jesse graduated from Emory University with a double major in History and German Studies. As a resident of Moishe House - Boston, Kendall Square, Jesse received the Michael H K Cohen Award for outstanding leadership from Mem Global.

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