Helga Freeman McNair photographs
Extent and Medium
oversize folder
1
Creator(s)
- Helga McNair
Biographical History
Helga Freeman McNair (1915-1997) was born on 1 October 1915 in St. Paul, Minnesota. She went on to attend Vassar College and graduated with a degree in art history in 1938. After graduation, Helga and a friend volunteered to serve with the Red Cross in Europe. Helga's first deployment was to England where she experienced the VI-VII rocket attacks. Later Helga was appointed to work in the canteen that served Patton’s 3rd Army. While with the Red Cross Helga participated in and photographed relief work that followed the advance of Allied forces, including at Buchenwald following liberation. After the war Helga traveled between the United States and Europe for several years. Later Helga married H. Harvey McNair who was himself a veteran of WWII. The couple settled in Minnesota and raised a family.
Archival History
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Acquisition
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of the Estate of Helga Freeman McNair
Donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2017 by Henry McNair, son of Helga Freeman McNair.
Scope and Content
Consists of two loose album pages of photographs depicting Germany in the immediate postwar period, including scenes of Buchenwald shortly after liberation, German prisoners of war, and civilians.
System of Arrangement
The Helga Freeman McNair photographs are arranged as a single series.
Corporate Bodies
- Buchenwald (Concentration camp)
- Red Cross and Red Crescent
Subjects
- Weimar (Thuringia, Germany)
- World War, 1939-1945--Concentration camps--Liberation.
- World War, 1939-1945--Civilian relief--Europe.
- Prisoners of war--Germany.
- World War, 1939-1945--Children.
- Concentration camp inmates--Germany--Buchenwald.
Genre
- Photographs.
- Document