The Yiddish Book Center's

Wexler Oral History Project

A growing collection of in-depth interviews with people of all ages and backgrounds, whose stories about the legacy and changing nature of Yiddish language and culture offer a rich and complex chronicle of Jewish identity.

Marina Vaysberg's Oral History

Marina Vaysberg, reference librarian at the College of Saint Rose, was interviewed by Danielle Winter on April 28, 2014 at the Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, Massachusetts.

This interview was conducted in English.

Marina Vaysberg was born in Kiev, Ukraine in 1962.

Jump to map

Video highlights from this oral history

The Endless Room: My Early Memories Of Being Raised By My Grandparents

4 min 59 sec

Eating Jewishly in the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic

2 min 57 sec

Growing Up in Kyiv's Besarabka Neighborhood

2 min 35 sec

He Believed in Revolution: My Grandfather, the Communist Party Leader

2 min 27 sec

The Reopening of Kyiv's Podil Synagogue

2 min 7 sec

My Family's First Attempt to Emigrate From Russia

2 min 52 sec

Through the Iron Curtain: How My Family in Israel and America Reached Out to Us

1 min 57 sec

Flying Souls: My Grandparents' Legacy

1 min 46 sec

Artifacts related to this oral history

Marina Vaysberg Photograph - Great grandparents Mayer and Shayna

Marina Vaysberg Photograph - Photo of grandmother's parents, grandmother, her sister Manya, her brother Yosef taken in shtetl Buki

Marina Vaysberg Grandmother's pharmacist documentation

Marina Vaysberg Document confirming family's relationship to army officer (grandfather) to receive assistance during WWII

Marina Vaysberg Document confirming grandmother was officer's wife to receive rations in WWII

Marina Vaysberg Grandmother's birth certificate

Marina Vaysberg Photograph Grandmother Rosa with her brother Yosef

Marina Vaysberg Photograph - Grandmother early years of being a pharmacist, with other pharmacists in front of her pharmacy

Marina Vaysberg Photograph - Photo of Grandparents Avram and Rachel

Marina Vaysberg Photograph - Photo of grandparents in late 1930s

Marina Vaysberg Photograph - Overjoyed baby Marina Vaysberg with her grandparents

Marina Vaysberg Photograph - Grandmother Rosa with her distinctive long braids and other pharmacists in her pharmacy

Marina Vaysberg Photograph - Grandfather before being sent to a gulag

More information about this oral history

Themes:

Listen later:

Download as an mp3 audio file for free

For other download options:

View the full Internet Archive record