As the Nazi’s power grew in the early 1930s, a Jewish librarian living in Frankfurt published a catalogue of of 15,000 books he’d collected.
When the war hit, large portions of the collections disappeared, a frighteningly common occurrence with Jewish literature and writing in Germany just before and during World War II. Yet somehow many of these books made their way to America, to the shelves of the Leo Baeck Institute where they were recently re-discovered.
Nazis stole many libraries
The Nazis stole many libraries across Europe, and much of their loot ended up in the US. The Wehrgeologenstellen, or Military Geology Unit, stole geological maps and books and reports from the libraries. homes and offices in occupied countries, that ended up at the US Geological Survey Library.
See an account at: http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA496551