Tagged: History

A foundation seeking to expand the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail will have its headquarters in Omaha.

National Park Service officials on Thursday announced the formation of the Lewis and Clark Trust. Meriwether Lewis and William Clark’s two-year expedition from Illinois to Washington is documented along what is now the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail.

Herbert Karliner, Philip Freud, Hans Fisher and Sol Messinger will present a special lecture at the Durham Museum on Friday morning at 10:30.

The four men are survivors of the tragic 1939 voyage of the SS St. Louis.  After trying to dock in several countries, including the U.S., the ship was forced to return to Europe.  

Many passengers subsequently found themselves under Nazi rule, and many died as a result. The majority of the passengers that were granted refuge in Great Britain survived the ordeal.  Shawna Forsberg is Director of Marketing for the Durham.

In honor of Holocaust Remembrance Day Thursday, Creighton University in collaboration with the Omaha Jewish Community, will present the original docudrama, “The Trial of Franklin D. Roosevelt.” The docudrama is about the 1939 voyage of the SS St. Louis. 900 Jewish men, women and children were adrift at sea for 30 days and were denied entrance into the U.S.  

The passengers were told the United States had reached its immigrant quota, so they were sent back to Germany and other European countries, many of them occupied by Germany.  

A series of events this month in Omaha highlight the contributions women have made to Nebraska.

March is Womens History Month. The Omaha Public Library branches are hosting lectures on the role of women in politics, history, and civil liberties.

OPL executive director Gary Wasdin says one presentation, scheduled for March 22nd at the library’s Florence Branch, will focus on the role of women pioneers in the 1870s and 1880s.  

Federal judge Laurie Smith Camp will speak at the downtown branch on March 25th about women and civil liberties.