International Jewish Correspondence (IJC) was sponsored by Canadian Jewish Congress. The objective of IJC was to link Jews in Canada with pen-pals in every other part of the world.
History
IJC was founded in 1978 in Montreal by Barry Simon (a high school teacher in Montreal, Canada). Since its inception, IJC received hundreds of letters from individuals and families while others sent IJC the names and addresses of their students, their friends or members of their class or youth group. Once in a while, a friend or family member of someone living in an Arab or Soviet Bloc country sent an address so that IJC could let them know that the Jews of the world were interested in their plight. At times, Jewish prisoners were given the IJC address so that they could write to others while behind bars. Amongst those who wrote over the years were are youngsters aged 7 and retired persons. Many of the letters IJC received came from professional and business persons. The group which sent the largest number of letters were students of university and secondary school age.
The majority of the letters are in English while others are written in French, Hebrew, Spanish and Yiddish. Jewish populations, close to 20 countries have participated in IJC, including some with dwinding Jewish populations. In addition, IJC has in its files the addresses of Jewish organizations and the Jewish press in over 50 countries from Burma to Monaco.
IJC became less active as the Internet gained in popularity, and consequently ceased operations in 2002.