A Joint social worker with an elderly client

The conflicts and pogroms that took place during and after World War I brought disease, famine, and dislocation to hundreds of thousands of Jews in Central and Eastern Europe, especially in Poland. In response, the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (“the Joint”), established soup kitchens, reconstructed and equipped hospitals, supported orphanages, and dispatched delegations of doctors, public health experts, and social workers to hundreds of towns and villages in Poland.