Survivor's Memories
(Mrs. Giulia Hine)
Boxes of Letters
Dr.Oldson's
Introduction
Portrait
Gallery
Paul Hasterlik's
Descendents
Database
of Letters
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Welcome to the Institute on
World War II and the Human Experience’s Hine Holocaust site. Florida State
University has had the unequaled good fortune to have been the recipient of
this extended family’s documents covering its development from the late
eighteenth century through the occupation after World War II. These papers
provide, among valuable vignettes, an unusually perceptive glimpse into the
atmosphere of Vienna’s intellectual circles between the two world wars.
Besides her extraordinary generosity in making some 5,000 letters and other
documents available to the students and researchers working at FSU, Mrs.
Giulia Hine has labored for years to organize and translate this rich trove
of information from German into English. Without her exceptionally capable
assistance few in this country would have been able to decipher the often
illegible handwriting involved. Those researchers who have struggled to
use the holdings of archives in Central and Eastern Europe will be delighted
with the resources Mrs. Hine and her family have donated. With only the
effort of delving down several layers in the software, the serious
researcher will come upon letter after letter detailing the evolution of
this clan from its Czech Jewish origins to Viennese Roman Catholicism to a
profound sentiment of Central European liberalism. The Institute on World
War II and the Human Experience is particularly grateful for the sense of
human context and place which this collection provides for the study of the
Holocaust. Here, as is seldom the case, the student of the period can see in
both detail and generous scope the human element of those tragic events.
While Florida State University at this time is placing on the Internet
only Mrs. Hine’s translations, those with sufficient linguistic abilities
are invited to visit the World War II Institute to use the German language
originals. Once again through the effort of Giulia Hine and with the
singular organizational talents of Ms. Barbara Hass, research librarian
extraordinaire, the letters and documents of this unique collection are
easily employable for major research projects. In addition to their purely
historical value, these letters will encourage immensely worthwhile
endeavors ranging across the intellectual spectrum from music to literature
to science.
William O. Oldson
Director, Institute on World War II & the Human Experience
Rintels Professor of Humanity
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