This project started when a Jewish museum discovered a letter and dress designs from a man trying to sponsor his wife as refugees fleeing Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia. Through 5 years of research, the museum learned more about Hedy Strnad and her husband Paul. The museum collaborated with an university to create a digital exhibit honoring Hedy's memory. The exhibit features 5 sections walking through the discovery of the remnants and stitching together Hedy's story. It uses maps, documents, and Hedy's dress designs to personalize her experience and make Holocaust history more accessible and impactful.

1. Midterm Lightening Talk Presentation -- Taylor Hein
Stitching History from the Holocaust

2. Background and Purpose
This project started with a letter and eight dress designs--the desperate plea of a
man trying to convince a family in America to sponsor he and his wife as refugees
as they tried to escape Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia during the Holocaust.
Upon its discovery in the 1990s in the family’s attic and subsequent donation to the
Jewish Museum Milwaukee, JMM was desperate to know more about the story of
Hedy Strnad and her husband, Paul.
So, with the goal of honoring Hedy’s memory, five years of research yielded more
insight to her life that prompted a digital exhibit, archive, as well as a traveling
exhibit that featured her posthumous fashion line.

3. Quick Facts
When? Who?
• Project was started in 2014 by the Jewish Museum Milwaukee.
• They enlisted the collaborative help of the University of Wisconsin-
Milwaukee, which included their History and English departments, Digital
Libraries Collections, Digital Humanities Lab, as well as their community and
museum programs.
• This project exemplifies the significance of collaboration in digital
humanities, requiring the help of scholars and faculty from a diverse range
of fields.
Audience?
• Accessible language and simple historical contextualization.
• Project invites the average individual, welcoming the public audience to
experience the exhibit.
Funders?
• Funded primarily by an award in 2015 from AASLH, the American Association
for State and Local History.

4. Form and Features
How does it work?
• Digital exhibit curated in 5 sections:
1. Finding the Remnants (letters and dress designs)
2. Stitching the Pieces (use of Yad Vashem database)
3. Looking for Patterns (maps of Europe and historical context)
4. Bringing the Designs to Life (Hedy’s dresses)
5. Imagining (outreach to Milwaukee community)
What are the technical features and how do they connect to our
course?
• Digitization of letters, affidavits, and dress designs integrated
with textual narration and media features for a multi-modal
delivery of engaging content.
• Use of impactful Esri Story Map to convey the construction of the
project through graphical visualization.
• Impactfulness of digital storytelling not possible without
collaborative, interdisciplinary efforts.

5. Why is this project important?
Now more than ever, we live in an age where the teaching of Holocaust history needs to
be reformed to combat the rise in antisemitism across the world with an engaging and
impactful education.
So, although Stitching History from the Holocaust isn’t necessarily a scholarly tool or a
technical interface, the significance of this Omeka project lies in the success of the
exhibition as a model for teaching as well as for collaborative partnerships in the digital
humanities.
It focuses on the experiences of individuals, personalizing Hedy and Paul’s story through
digital storytelling. It is a perfect example of historical accessibility that is needed for
Holocaust education.