Eastern Europe [1919-1939]

4 episodes, 60 minutes each
Source: PBS Video

This collection tells the epic story of the rise of Christianity. Through interviews with twelve scholars—New Testament theologians, archaeologists, and historians—the series explores the lives of Jesus and the early Christians.

50 minutes
Source: Facets

These rare films capture the spirit of Jewish life in pre-World War II Poland. The five short travelogues, narrated in Yiddish with English subtitles, were shot in 1938 and 1939 and present us with the important images of daily life in Jewish communities as it was before the Nazi invasion. The cities and towns represented are Warsaw, Bialystok, Cracow, Lvov, and Vilna.

25 minutes
Source: Armenian Film Foundation

This documentary incorporates recently discovered archival footage of Major General James G. Harbord's mission to Armenia in 1919. Professor Richard G. Hovannisian introduces and narrates this documentary about the mission in which Harbord, at the request of President Wilson, was investigating the feasibility of the United States becoming a protectorate power over the newly established Republic of Armenia and the Armenian provinces of Turkey.

by Samuel Bak

(Indiana University Press)

In Painted in Words internationally renowned artist Samuel Bak sets aside his brushes to narrate the stories of his life--as a child in Nazi-occupied Vilna, as a youth in European refugee camps, and as a maturing artist in Israel, France, Italy, Switzerland, and the United States. Lovingly, he evokes his departed parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles, along with their households and employees, to create a vital gallery of dramatic, lyrical, epic, and sometimes absurd heroes.