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"People often think that something a parent or grandparent is holding on to or has bequeathed to them is only of personal value," an Agudath Israel spokesman said. Even small things "can carry important historical value for, if nothing else, the light they shed on ordinary life in extraordinary times."

The search yielded some interesting items.

One survivor submitted patches from the Buchenwald concentration camp. Another turned in an admission ticket to the Nuremberg trials.

One item saved was a "piece of currency" from the Theresienstadt ghetto in Czechoslovakia that bears a picture of Moses and was used by the Germans as a public relations ploy. When inspectors from the Red Cross and other groups visited, the "money" was shown as an example of "normalcy."

Other objects submitted for the project include birth certificates, marriage licenses, diaries and photographs.

Of the recovery efforts, the spokesman said, "This is truly a historic opportunity, one that we knew we could not allow to pass without seizing the chance."