Collections : [Columbia University Archives]

The Margaret Kimmel travel diary recounts her struggle, and that of other American tourists, to return to the US as Germany launched its attack on Poland on September 1, 1939. Written mostly in pencil, the leather-bound, pocket-sized diary includes entries related to her everyday affairs (sights, meals, weather), the growing signs of war, and the complicated logistics for the return to New York. It includes an address book in the back with the names of Kimmel's new acquientances and, for many, how much she had borrowed and had to repay upon her return.