Exiles Memorial Centre - Estoril

Preserving the memory and life stories of refugees.

The Exiles Memorial Centre researches, preserves and interprets the memories and life stories of the refugees who found in Cascais throughout the 20^th century, and in particular in the context of Nazi persecution.

Within the context of Jewish memory, refugees that came through the teritory included famous individuals such as writer Franz Werfel and his wife Alma Mahler, as well as anonymous families who found a moment of respite in Cascais during their exodus.

The Exiles Memorial Centre rotates exhibits of documents, photographs and objects that tell the stories of live and families. It has a specialized non-borrowing library, and provides acess to researches to national and international online databases and research materials.

In addition, it holds an intense and diverse schedule of public programes focusing on the history of the period, refugee rights and issues, and Jewish life.

order to study the presence of these refugees, the work focuses especially on the systematization of tens of thousands of refugees files that were sent by local hotels to the political police of the regime, and that have been preserved until the present time.

Its main primary source are the thousand of lodging bulletins for foreign guest, sent by hotels, guesthouses and private accommodation to the political police during that period.