Prof. Kevin Ostoyich was a Visiting Fellow at AGI during the summers of 2017 and 2018. He is Professor of History at Valparaiso University, where he served as the chair of the history department from 2015 to 2019. He is also Guest Professor at the Center for Applied Policy Research at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich and Historian for the Florence and Laurence Spungen Family Foundation. Prior to moving to Valparaiso, he taught at the University of Montana. He has served as a Guest Professor at the Institute of Bavarian History at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Fellow at the Käte Hamburger Kolleg at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Eadington Fellow at University of Nevada Las Vegas, Fellow at the Center for Advanced Studies at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Distinguished Guest Professor at Shanghai University, Senior Fellow at the German Historical Institute Pacific Regional Office/University of California, Berkeley, Research Associate at the Harvard Business School, and Erasmus Fellow at the University of Notre Dame. He currently is an associate of the Center for East Asian Studies of the University of Chicago, a board member of the Sino-Judaic Institute, and an inaugural member of the Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum International Advisory Board. He has published on German migration, German-American history, the Holocaust, and the history of the Shanghai Jews. He holds his BA from the University of Pennsylvania and his AM and PhD from Harvard University.
While at AGI, Prof. Ostoyich conducted research on his project, “The Wounds of History, the Wounds of Today: The Shanghai Jews and the Morality of Refugee Crises.” The Shanghai Jews were refugees from Nazi Europe who found haven in Shanghai and thus escaped the Holocaust. For this project Ostoyich interviewed many former Shanghai Jewish refugees and conducted research at the National Archives at College Park, MD, and United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. At Valparaiso University he co-teaches a course titled “Historical Theatre: The Shanghai Jews,” which fuses the disciplines of history and theatre. To date, he has written and produced four original plays with university students based on the history of the Shanghai Jewish refugee community: Knocking on the Doors of History: The Shanghai Jews (2016), Shanghai Carousel: What Tomorrow Will Be (2019), The Singer of Shanghai (2020), and Lyrics and Laughter from Shanghai: A Relevant Cabaret Evening with Historical Commentary (2025). He has been involved in the creation of two films: Gary’s Letter (2024) and Three Girls of Shanghai (2024).
Click here for an article by Ostoyich on the Shanghai Jews.
He is currently trying to interview as many former Shanghailanders as possible. If you would like to be interviewed or know someone who might want to be interviewed, please contact Professor Ostoyich at kevin.ostoyich@valpo.edu.
Far Beyond a Name
Peter Arthur Gray’s Search for Identity and Trust Peter Arthur Gray has gone by many names over the years. When asked to identify himself at the beginning of an interview …
Toy Maker 2: Journeys
On June 20, 2018, the article “The Story of Bert Reiner, the Toy Maker, or: An Appreciation for the Individual Experiences of Former Shanghai Jewish Refugees” was published by the …
The Entertainer: Mark Newton’s Raison d’être
When the door opens at Mark Newton’s condominium in Yardley, Pennsylvania, it is as if a curtain has been drawn back from the stage. One is immediately met with movie …
Lucky Soldiers
Part Four of Rubble Child’s World: Stories from Bremen’s Ruins Introduction George H. Jordan, Jr. did not like the movie Commando.[1] He made this clear to me as the Arnold …
Up from the Cellars
Part Three of Rubble Child’s World: Stories from Bremen’s Ruins Introduction In the Introduction to her outstanding work of oral history of German women who lived during the Second World …
Education for Boys
Part Two of Rubble Child’s World: Stories from Bremen’s Ruins Introduction Rand Paul was frustrated. During a hearing of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, the Republican Senator …
Rubble Girls
Part One of Rubble Child’s World: Stories from Bremen’s Ruins Prelude: The End of the War Experience of a Seven-Year Old Girl I spent my seventh birthday on April 25 …
Hidden in Plain Sight: The Life and Message of Raymonde Fiol
A Call from the Past It was a Saturday in 2007. Raymonde Fiol was sitting on a sofa in her home in Las Vegas. The phone rang. She answered. The …
The Unbroken Past: From Germany to Shanghai to San Francisco
Kurt and Jeannette Nothenberg lived comfortably in the middle class in Germany raising their only child, Rudy. Following Kristallnacht, Kurt was arrested and sent to Buchenwald, but was later released …
The Dealer’s Cards: How Gary Sternberg Has Made the Best of Them
Gerd “Gary” Sternberg was dealt a tricky hand. Born the son of a Protestant mother and a Jewish father in Cuxhaven, Germany on August 25, 1931, he experienced discrimination firsthand …
A Doctor’s Mission: The Life and Work of Ernst Kisch
Read the stories of other Shanghai Jews Dr. Ernst Kisch was an opera-loving Viennese physician who was imprisoned in Dachau and Buchenwald for being Jewish. Upon his release from Buchenwald, …
Mothers: Remembering Three Women on the 80th Anniversary of Kristallnacht
Ida was terrified. She figured she would never see either her husband or brother ever again. For several days she fretted, not knowing what to do. While desperately trying to …
