Our Collections

The OJA’s records span all segments of Ontario’s Jewish community. We have records from businesses, families, labour unions, organizations, and synagogues. These records date from the community’s earliest days to its present. What’s more, they come from all over Ontario and in every format you can think of. If you were to lay out all of our boxes, they would stretch from the foot of Yonge Street to Dundas Square!

Below you can find highlights from our newest acquisitions as well as collections that have recently been processed and added to our website search.

Do you have records to donate to the OJA? Click here to learn how.

Acquisition of the Month

March 2023

In March, Judith "Jay" Nefsky, the first professional archivist of the Canadian Jewish Congress National Archives, donated records documenting her research into her extended family. As one might expect for an archivist, the records were logically arranged, which made the task of accessioning them rather straightforward. Shown here is a letter—logically filed in a folder titled Correspondence—to Judith from Stanley Everett. In the letter, Stanley discusses his interest in genealogy, his research into his mother's family, and the methods he has been using to conduct his research. Apart from providing information about the author's background, the letter affords us a window into the motivations that lie behind genealogical research. No doubt many of the researchers who come to the OJA for the purpose of conducting genealogical research can relate to at least a few of Stanley's remarks. 

Apart from correspondence, Judith's donation also consists of a small number of photographs plus some documents and publications pertaining to Sudbury, Ontario.