Albright College will present the lecture "Prelude to Vichy: Anti-Semitism in France during the 1930s" by Dr. Vicki Caron on Monday, April 3, 2006 at 8 p.m . The event, which is free and open to the public, will be held in the Campus Center South Lounge.

Caron, professor of Modern Jewish Studies at Cornell University, will examine how French politics and attitudes towards Jewish refugees departed from treatment of other foreigners living in France.

Caron's publications include Uneasy Asylum: France and the Jewish Refugee Crisis, which won the Fraenkel Prize in Contemporary History in 1997; Between France and Germany: The Jews of Alsace- Lorraine, 1871-1918; and co-wrote the book Jewish Emancipation Reconsidered: The French and German Models.

She was the recipient of fellowships from the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies; the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation; the National Endowment for Humanities; the Fulbright Foundation; The Institute for Advanced Studies in Princeton; and the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture. She also served as the 2004-2005 J.B. and Maurice C. Shapiro Senior Scholar-in-Residence at the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Richard J. Yashek, for whom the lecture is named, was born in Luebeck, Germany in 1929. In 1941, the Yashek family was deported to Latvia and in March 1942, the family was separated. Richard stayed with his family while his brother went with his mother. He never saw his mother and brother again. In October 1944, his father was separated from him and never seen again.

Yashek survived and eventually came to the United States where he attended high school in Pottsville, Pa., served in the U.S. Army from 1951-1953, and completed his high school GED while in service. After his tour of duty, he went to work for J.C Ehrlich Co., Inc. as a technician, and retired as vice president of the company in 1999. He died in April 2005, leaving a wife, the former Rosalye Levine; two daughters, Linda and Kimberly; and three grandchildren.

The lecture is presented by Albright's Holocaust Studies Program.

The South Lounge is located in the Campus Center on the Albright College campus at 13 th and Bern Streets, Reading. Free parking is available in the main lot located off of Bern Street. For more information or disability assistance, call John Incledon at 610-921-7689.

Founded in 1856, Albright College celebrates its Sesquicentennial in 2006. Albright is a nationally ranked, private college with a rigorous liberal arts curriculum with an interdisciplinary focus. The College's hallmarks are connecting fields of learning, collaborative teaching and learning, and a flexible curriculum that allows students to create an individualized education. Albright College enrolls 1,650 undergraduates in traditional programs, and another 500 adult students in accelerated degree and graduate programs.