About the Museum

Legacy Museum

History of the Dallas Holocaust Museum/Center for Education and Tolerance 1984-2019

The Holocaust Survivors who, with great determination and spirit, founded this Museum over 40 years ago, did so to honor beloved family members who did not survive and also to teach the history of the Holocaust. The founders of the Museum wanted to teach the lessons of the Holocaust. They added “never again” to their motivation for creating the Museum.

1977 - Dallas-area Holocaust survivors gather to discuss
memorializing their families and educating future
generations about the Holocaust.

1983 - Survivors break ground for the new Dallas Memorial Center for Holocaust Studies.
The Honorable Florence Shapiro (second from left) is pictured with
Mike Jacobs (middle) with Geri Alperin Patterson and two others.

1983 - Max Glauben (far left), Elie Wiesel (third from left),
and Mike Jacobs (second from right) examine plans for the new Center.

1983 - Mike and Ginger Jacobs bring a boxcar from Belgium to Dallas.
This is the first Holocaust-era boxcar to be displayed in a Museum anywhere in the world.

1984 - The Dallas Memorial Center for Holocaust Studies opens on April 15, 1984.
Thousands of school children tour the memorial room, boxcar, and small educational exhibit
at the JCC. While the Center is successful, the Survivors dream of building a permanent museum.

2005-2019 - The Dallas Holocaust Museum/Center for Education and Tolerance
increases its impact on the
community, teaching several hundred thousand visitors of all ages about the Holocaust.
This photo is of docent Nate Levine with students from Levine Academy.

2005-2019 - As the Dallas Holocaust Museum grows and expands its mission,
more and more staff join the team! This staff photo was taken in December 2016.

2017 - In 2017, survivors join the community to break ground for the new
Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum after launching a capital campaign in 2014.

September 18, 2019 - The Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum opens!
Image from Austin industries via FB.

THE FIRST NAZI-ERA BOXCAR TO BE INSTALLED IN A HOLOCAUST MUSEUM

Survivor Mike Jacobs, was instrumental in the creation of the Museum that was originally located on the ground floor of the Jewish Community Center in Dallas. He had a vision to install an authentic Nazi-era boxcar from Europe so that visitors could better understand the inhumanity of the deportation of Jews across the continent by boxcar. His tenacity paid off and the Holocaust Memorial Center became the first Holocaust museum to share the horrors of a boxcar in this manner with its visitors.

ONE DAY DURING THE HOLOCAUST

The permanent exhibition of the original Dallas Holocaust Museum answered a key question in the minds of most visitors. How could the Holocaust happen? The primary exhibition addressed the question by detailing three events that occurred on April 19, 1943. The exhibition also introduced visitors to Upstanders, bystanders, victims, and perpetrators.

Take a virtual tour of the Dallas Holocaust Museum/Center for Education and Tolerance's core exhibition.

GOOGLE 360 VIDEO TOUR