New Jersey is the Garden State and as the name implies, we have a rich history of agriculture that has helped define our state. An important group of people who contributed to this history were European Jews who emigrated here during the Twentieth Century, particularly Holocaust survivors after World War 2. In celebration of Jewish Heritage Month, please join author Seth Stern as he discusses his work “Speaking Yiddish to Chickens: Holocaust Survivors on South Jersey Poultry Farms,” the first book to chronicle how roughly 1,000 Holocaust survivors – including the author’s grandparents – found an unlikely refuge and gateway to new lives as poultry farmers in southern New Jersey. This book relies on interviews with dozens of these refugee farmers and their children, as well as oral histories and archival records. This is their remarkable story of loss, renewal, and perseverance in the most unexpected of settings.

Seth Stern is a legal journalist and editor at Bloomberg Industry Group. He previously reported for Bloomberg News, Congressional Quarterly, and the Christian Science Monitor. He co-authored Justice Brennan: Liberal Champion (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2010). He is a graduate of Harvard Law School, the Harvard Kennedy School, and Cornell University.

This author talk is presented by the New Jersey State Library. To register for the event, please click here.