New York Man Returns Overdue Holocaust Book to Library — 42 Years Late
Graphic by Angelie Zaslavsky
A New York man returned a library book about the Holocaust to his home town library in Fall River, Mass. more than 40 years after he checked it out.
Shimon Pepper returned “While Six Million Died,” by Arthur Morse to the Fall River Public Library last week, the Herald News reported. Its due date was June 19, 1971.
Pepper had visited his home town to retrieve Torah scrolls and religious books from his boyhood synagogue, which no longer used the religious objects, in order to donate them to synagogues in Israel, New York and New Jersey.
“I saw it last night and said ‘This is the time,’” said Pepper, a Fall River native and 1968 graduate of B.M.C. Durfee High School, who returned to the city last week to rescue some sacred books from the former synagogue on Robeson Street.
At the 1971 rate of 2 cents a day, Pepper owed about $271 in fines, though the library allowed borrowers to pay $50 for a lost book. Pepper made a donation to the library, which could not track the book since it did not have bar codes in the 70s, according to the newspaper.
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover. All donations are being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
