A new photo gallery documenting how Hungarian refugees were treated from their arrival to their eventual resettlement is now available on our Hungarian Refugees in 1956 website.
A second photo gallery specifically dedicated to honoring the tireless work of Gary Filerman and his colleagues in Camp Kilmer, NJ has also been published. In early 1957, Filerman headed the effort to process 1600 Hungarian students and by the end of March succeeded in obtaining scholarships for 800 of them at one of the 600 American universities participating in the World University Service (WUS). This was an extraordinary achievement, considering that in some cases the students’ full academic records were not available from Hungary, and many of them had language or other initial handicaps.
In the late 1970s, Filerman was among the founders of the American Refugee Committee, an international non-profit and non-sectarian relief organization, and served on its board for many years. In 2011, he donated his archives on the Hungarian Refugee Student Program to the Blinken OSA.
These photographs, now part of OSA's collection, document the daily activities of Gary L. Filerman, a true friend of Hungarian refugee students, and his colleagues in Camp Kilmer.
Our Hungarian Refugees in 1956 project was also the topic of OSA's very first podcast.