The study was carried out by Prof. Stephen H. Norwood and presented yesterday (Sunday) at a Boston University conference sponsored by the David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies. The research uncovers the close relationships forged between the president of Harvard University and senior Nazi officials. It also examines close ties with Nazi-controlled universities, as well as individual cases of anti-Semitism, such as the president convincing a major corporation not to hire a scientist who was a Jewish refugee from Germany. Norwood's study even examined private correspondence of the former Harvard President, finding it rife with anti-Semitic comments.
Norwood, who is a professor of History and Judaic Studies at the University of Oklahoma, described Harvard president James Conant's warm reception of Ernst PutziHanfstangl, Adolf Hitler's foreign press chief, when Hanfstangl attended his 25th class reunion in 1934. Hanfstangl had graduated from Harvard in 1909, returning to Germany to help bankroll Hitler's rise to power. When he arrived for the reunion, The Harvard Crimson, Harvard's student newspaper urged that Hanfstangl be awarded an honorary degree.
Harvard also hosted visits to the campus in 1934 and 1935 by Hitler's ambassador to the U.S., Hans Luther, and the Nazi consul-general in Boston, Baron Kurt Von Tippelskirch. In 1934, when the Nazi warship Karlsruhe visited Boston, its officers and crew were entertained as honored guests at Harvard. The following year, the Nazi consul, accompanied by Nazi German professors who were teaching at Harvard, was invited to place a swastika wreath in the Harvard Chapel, to honor Harvard students who fought for Germany in World War I.
In 1936, Harvard sent a representative to celebrations at the University of Heidelberg which, like all German universities at that time, had expelled all its Jewish professors and changed its curriculum to reflect Nazi ideology. Harvard also cultivated friendly ties with another Nazi German university, Gottingen.
The Harvard president also urged the DuPont corporation to refrain from hiring a prominent German Jewish refugee on the grounds that the chemist was "certainly very definitely of the Jewish type--rather heavy."
Harvard was not the only prominent American institution to have its past scrutinized at the Wyman Institute conference. Professor Laurel Leff, of Northeastern University, discussed the New York Times' slanted coverage of the Holocaust, which is the subject of her forthcoming book, 'Buried by the Times: The Holocaust and America's Most Important Newspaper.' Prof. Leff described how the Times consistently placed news about the Holocaust in less prominent places of the newspaper and downplayed the Jewish identity of the victims.
One of the current editors of The Harvard Crimson, Elisabeth Theodore, participated in the conference and, after hearing Prof. Norwood's remarks lamented The Crimson's articles about Hanfstangl, calling them "regrettable and abhorrent."
Norwood, who is a professor of History and Judaic Studies at the University of Oklahoma, described Harvard president James Conant's warm reception of Ernst PutziHanfstangl, Adolf Hitler's foreign press chief, when Hanfstangl attended his 25th class reunion in 1934. Hanfstangl had graduated from Harvard in 1909, returning to Germany to help bankroll Hitler's rise to power. When he arrived for the reunion, The Harvard Crimson, Harvard's student newspaper urged that Hanfstangl be awarded an honorary degree.
Harvard also hosted visits to the campus in 1934 and 1935 by Hitler's ambassador to the U.S., Hans Luther, and the Nazi consul-general in Boston, Baron Kurt Von Tippelskirch. In 1934, when the Nazi warship Karlsruhe visited Boston, its officers and crew were entertained as honored guests at Harvard. The following year, the Nazi consul, accompanied by Nazi German professors who were teaching at Harvard, was invited to place a swastika wreath in the Harvard Chapel, to honor Harvard students who fought for Germany in World War I.
In 1936, Harvard sent a representative to celebrations at the University of Heidelberg which, like all German universities at that time, had expelled all its Jewish professors and changed its curriculum to reflect Nazi ideology. Harvard also cultivated friendly ties with another Nazi German university, Gottingen.
The Harvard president also urged the DuPont corporation to refrain from hiring a prominent German Jewish refugee on the grounds that the chemist was "certainly very definitely of the Jewish type--rather heavy."
Harvard was not the only prominent American institution to have its past scrutinized at the Wyman Institute conference. Professor Laurel Leff, of Northeastern University, discussed the New York Times' slanted coverage of the Holocaust, which is the subject of her forthcoming book, 'Buried by the Times: The Holocaust and America's Most Important Newspaper.' Prof. Leff described how the Times consistently placed news about the Holocaust in less prominent places of the newspaper and downplayed the Jewish identity of the victims.
One of the current editors of The Harvard Crimson, Elisabeth Theodore, participated in the conference and, after hearing Prof. Norwood's remarks lamented The Crimson's articles about Hanfstangl, calling them "regrettable and abhorrent."