Holocaust Museum digitizing letters from Anne Frank’s father

YARMOUTH, Mass. (AP) — A Massachusetts man who struck a friendship with Anne Frank’s father has donated a trove of letters and mementos he received from Otto Frank to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum ahead of the 90th anniversary of the young Holocaust victim’s birth.

Museum historian Edna Friedberg says the pen pal letters exchanged between Ryan Cooper and Otto Frank from 1972 until Frank’s death in 1980 show how Frank worked tirelessly to spread his late daughter’s legacy.

Otto Frank was the only person in his family to survive the Holocaust. He had his daughter’s now-famous diary published after the war.

The Washington museum says the letters will be made available online and the artifacts possibly displayed later. They include Otto Frank’s coin purse and a family photo of Anne.