Renee Miller: May Her Memory Be For A Blessing

On May 24, 2019, Renee Miller, volunteer archivist and a treasured and beloved member of YIVO’s family, passed away after battling cancer.

Renee became a volunteer at YIVO the late 1980s, after a career in the New York State Civil Service as regional head of the New York State Department of Workmen's Compensation. Her thirty years of work as an archivist made her the most senior volunteer in the YIVO Archives.

During her extraordinarily productive years in the YIVO Archives she was responsible for the bulk of electronic and manual photo cataloging. Her work included databases for the following photographic collections:

• RG 120 Territorial Collection of Photographs – United States
• RG 1270 Alter Kacyzne Photo Collection
• RG 380 ORT Photo Collection
• RG 122 Postcards
• RG 121 Photographs of Personalities-Series Groups
• RG 100 YIVO Institute for Jewish Research New York – Photographs 

At the time of her passing, Renee was still at work on the cataloging of the photographs of the large Bund collection. But this is not an exhaustive list of the many collections that Renee cataloged, making them accessible to thousands of people worldwide.

Harder to describe is the way that Renee was the heart and soul of the YIVO Archives volunteer community and how respected she was by the professional archivists with whom she worked. Neither old age nor illness kept her long from her important work at YIVO. She remains an inspiration and role model for aging with dignity, grace, and beauty.

Renee is survived by her husband Otto, two children, and grandchildren.

May her memory be for a blessing and may her personal and professional legacy live on in our hearts and in our YIVO tradition.

This obituary is based on information provided by Fruma Mohrer.