Join the Jewish Historical Society of Greater New Haven for their Second Annual Judith Ann Schiff Women’s History Program at the New Haven Museum. This year's program honors Laurel Fox Vlock, a television producer best known for her contributions to the field of Holocaust video testimony.

The lecture is dedicated to the memory of Judith Ann Schiff, founder of the Jewish Historical Society of Greater New Haven and the Ethnic Heritage Center, and Yale archivist and historian dedicated to women’s, ethnic, and New Haven history.

Vlock is best known for creating the collection that became the Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies at Yale University. Born and raised in New Haven, Vlock began her journalism career in 1964 with a WYBC-FM radio program taped and broadcast to New Haven public school students, “Your Community Speaks.” She interviewed local, national, and international personalities on a weekly public-affairs program, “Dialogue with Laurel Vlock,” on WTNH. While focusing largely on the local Jewish community, Vlock interviewed many other important leaders, including Golda Meir and Hillary Clinton.

In 1979, Vlock and Dori Laub, a psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor, founded the New Haven-based Holocaust Survivors Film Project. The then-new technology of video allowed them to capture the full effect of survivors’ memories. The Fortunoff Video Archive at Yale now includes over 4,400 testimonies. In 1981, Vlock received an Emmy Award for a documentary about survivors, “Forever Yesterday,” filmed for WNEW-TV in New York.

The New Haven Museum program will include video clips of Vlock’s interviews, and remembrances of her life by colleagues and family members. Photographs, publications, and objects related to Vlock will be on view in the Community Case in the Museum’s rotunda throughout March 2023.