Podcast
Episode II
Episode II
Service of Intellectual Assistance to Prisoners of War during WWII
11 December 2025
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We seek in these episodes to tell stories about the rich history of the IBE, but in so doing also highlighting the personal elements of these narratives – where we see individual storylines greeting the universal themes promoted by the IBE since its inception in 1925. As you have enjoyed the collections of the Documentation Center, we invite you to enjoy the voices that bring those same collections to life.
In part 2 of Episode II, we explore further the practical and political complexities of sending a half a million books to prisoners of war throughout Europe, to prisoners behind both sides of enemy lines. And we learn more about an American soldier caught in a Romanian POW camp, a young airman from Illinois who kept a diary while interned and wrote of the books he read and the transformational impact the books and his experience in the camp had on his worldview.