This small collection of papers is composed of duplicate material in the possession of Mendel Heilig. Primary interest is a scanned and printed photograph of a family gathering that occurred around 1911. Heilig's grandparents, parents, aunts, uncles, and cousins are each identified. In addition, his papers include two newspaper articles - one from the Baltimore Sun (Sunday, May 10, 1998, Perspectives section) and the other from The Daily Times (Saturday, April 13, 1996, Religion section) which discuss Jewish life on the Delmarva Peninsula. Correspondence written by Mendel Heilig in response to the Daily Times article and two maps indicating where the Heilig family immigrated from (Shavil and Urvalis, Lithuania) are also included.

Mendel L. Heilig was born in Baltimore July 8, 1929 to Marion and Minnie Levin Heilig. Marion (1895-1989) and Minnie (1898-1990), both from Baltimore, had met in Pocomoke, where each had family at the time. They settled in Salisbury.  

Mendel is the youngest of their three children: the eldest his sister Evalyn, followed by his brother Phillip. Originally an owner of a men's clothing store that folded with the Depression, Marion Heilig worked most of his life for his younger brother Simon at the Pokomoke Provision Company, a slaughterhouse and meat packing plant left to Simon by their father, Faivel Heilig. Marion worked for the company until the early 1970's, at which time he retired and became self-employed as an independent livestock dealer.

Mendel Heilig has been employed as an Assistant Professor of History at Hampton Institute (now University), a professor of History and Political Science with the University of Maryland's overseas's instruction program and educator at St. Joseph's Teacher's College (now McGill) in Canada.                         
Evalyn and Mendel currently live in Salisbury; Phillip in Montreal.

Heilig's family is of particular importance to the development of the Jewish community on the Peninsula. According to Ann Miller's article, "A Jewish Way of Life on the Shore" appearing in the May 10th issue of The Baltimore Sun, at the turn of the century a number of Jewish families relocated from Baltimore and Philadelphia to the Shore, particularly Pocomoke, Salisbury and Easton. Faivel Heilig and his wife Ida Dora (Mendel's grandparents) were one such family. 

Faivel opened a butcher shop and served as the source for Kosher meat for Jewish families living on the Peninsula. Faivel's family, like most Jewish families in the region, struggled to maintain a religious community. Jewish life on the Peninsula was marked by a congregation rotating from house to house for worship until synagogues could be built (Faivel built the first in Pocomoke, a one-room brick building).

 Ardous trips from Salisbury to Philadelphia and Baltimore before the construction of the Bay Bridge for Kosher goods such as animal-product free candles was commonplace. Heilig's family, along with the Finklesteins, Klaffs and Feldmans form the foundation of the Peninsula's small, but diverse Jewish population.