The Plan to Bring Jewish Refugees to Alaska From Nazi Germany
Alaska Dispatch News
November 20, 2015
In a world troubled by refugee crisis after refugee crisis, Alaska has played only a minor role, taking in a hundred or so immigrants every year from countries beset by war and oppression. Alaskans are now debating whether they should expand that role, in some small way, by welcoming refugees fleeing the violence in Syria.
But for several years leading up to World War II, Alaska was at the heart of the biggest refugee crisis of the 20th century: the effort by European Jews to escape the onslaught of Nazi Germany.
In 1999, the Anchorage Daily News told the story in a four-part series. The stories, by former Daily News reporter Tom Kizzia, chronicled the efforts of a handful of German Jewish families to reach Alaska.
A special immigration program had been proposed by the federal government for the Alaska territory.
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