This Day, February 22, In Jewish History by Mitchell A and Deb Levin Z"L
February 22 1290
BCE: The coronation of Ramses II, who, according to some, is the Pharaoh
of the Exodus. Since the Bible does not mention the Pharaoh by name, Ramses is
not the only candidate. In addition to which, there is some debate…
February 22
1290
BCE: The coronation of Ramses II, who, according to some, is the Pharaoh
of the Exodus. Since the Bible does not mention the Pharaoh by name, Ramses is
not the only candidate. In addition to which, there is some debate among
Egyptologist as to when Ramses actually came to power. According to some,
his reign began in 1297 BCE.
1040: On the secular calendar birthdate of Rashi ישר, an acronym for Rabbi Solomon ben Isaac or Shlomo
Yitzchaki. Rashi was one of the greatest commentators on the TaNaCh and
the Talmud. Rashi was born at Troyes, Champagne, northern France, in 1040 and
died there in 1104 or 1105. He was reputedly descended from the Davidic line
with lineage to the royal house of King David. He studied at Worms under Yaakov
ben Yakar, and at Mainz under Isaac ben Judah. He returned to Troyes at age 25,
probably serving as Rabbi and “religious judge.” According to the Dictionary
of Jewish Biography, as a judge and a rabbi, “he was unpaid…and he earned
his living from the vineyards that he is reported to have owned.” [Editor’s
note: Like Maimonides, Rashi followed the admonitions that he who makes a spade
of the Torah shall perish and calling upon people to work for a living as well
as studying Torah.] About 1070 he founded a Yeshiva which attracted many
disciples. According to tradition Rashi earned his living as a vintner and/or
as a wine merchant. Although there are many legends about his travels, Rashi
likely never went farther than from the Seine to the Rhine - the utmost limit
of his travels was the Yeshivot of Lorraine. Rashi had no sons, only three
daughters, Yocheved, Miriam and Rachel, all of whom married scholars. Yocheved
married Meir ben Samuel, Miriam married Judah ben Nathan (see above), and
Rachel married (and divorced) Eliezer ben Shemiah. Yocheved and Meir's four
sons were the tosafists Shmuel (Rashbam), Yaakov (Rabbeinu Tam), Yitzchak
(Ribbam), and the grammarian Shlomo; one of their daughters, Channah, wrote a
responsum explaining the ritual and blessing for the Shabbat lights. Besides
minor works, such as an edition of the Siddur (Prayer-Book), Rashi wrote two
great commentaries on which his fame rests. These were the commentaries on the
whole of the TaNaCh (Hebrew Bible) and on about thirty tractates of the Talmud.
Rashi's works are so well respected that he is often cited simply as "the
Commentator." His commentaries are of interest to secular scholars because
he tended to translate unfamilar words into the spoken French of his day. As
such, his commentaries offer an interesting insight into the vocabulary and
pronunciation of Old French. The authors of the Dictionary of Jewish
Biography and The New Encyclopedia of Judaism agree that “although
Troyes (Rashi’s city of residence) was untouched by the First Crusade of
1096…the last years of his life were saddened by the devastation that the
Crusaders brought to bear on “defenseless Jewish communities of the Rhineland”
in general and “the disasters which had befallen his own colleagues.
Commentary on the TaNaCh
Rashi's commentary on the TaNaCh is very thorough, and is used to
understand both the plain meaning of the TaNaCh and the interpretation of the
medieval rabbis. His commentary is often used in basic, intermediate, and
advanced studies of the TaNaCh. There are a small number of commentaries that
bear his name that were not authored by him, but by his students. Rashi's
commentary on the Torah has become an indispensable part of the framework of
Orthodox Judaism - tens of thousands, men and women alike, daily study
"Chumash with Rashi" (Chumash = Pentateuch + corresponding portions
from the Prophets) in reviewing the Parsha to be read on the next Shabbat.
Rashi's explanation of Chumash, clarifies the "simple" meaning of the
text so that a bright child of five could understand it. At the same time, it
is the crucial foundation of some of the most profound legal analysis and
mystical discourses that came after it. Since its publication, this commentary
has been included as a standard in almost all Chumashim produced within
the Orthodox community. Supercommentaries on this work include Gur Aryeh
by Rabbi Judah Loew (Maharal), Sefer ha-Mizrachi by Rabbi Elijah
Mizrachi (Re'em) and Yeri'ot Shlomo by Rabbi Solomon Luria (Maharshal).
Almost all later commentaries will discuss Rashi either bringing His view as a
support or debating it
Commentary of the Talmud
Rashi also wrote the first comprehensive commentary of the Talmud.
His commentary attempts to provide a full explanation of the words, and of the
logical structure of each Talmudic passage. Unlike other commentators, Rashi
does not paraphrase or exclude any part of the text, but carefully elucidates
the whole of the text. He also exerted a decisive influence on establishing the
correct text of the Talmud. He compared different manuscripts and determined
which readings should be preferred. His work became such a standard that it is
included in all printed versions of the Talmud.
Rashi's Talmud commentary is always situated towards the middle of
the opened book display; i.e. on the side of the page closest to the binding.
The semi-cursive font in which the commentaries are printed is often referred
to as "Rashi script." This does not mean that Rashi himself used such
a script, only that the printers standardly employ it for commentaries. Daniel
Bomberg, a Christian printer from Venice, introduced "Rashi script"
in his publication of Rashi's commentary on the Tanakh in 1517. Rashi's commentary,
which covers almost all of the Babylonian Talmud, has been printed in every
version of the Talmud since the first Italian printings. Rashi did not compose
commentaries for every tractate of the Babylonian Talmud. Some of the printed
commentaries which are attributed to him were composed by others, primarily his
students. In some commentaries, the text indicates that Rashi died before
completing the tractate, and that it was completed by a student. This is true
of the tractate Makkot, the concluding portions of which were composed
by his son-in-law Rabbi Judah ben Nathan and of Bava Batra finished (in
a more detailed style) by his grandson, Rabbi Samuel ben Meir (also known as
the Rashbam), one of the prominent contributors to the Tosafot.
“Rashi’s responsa (replies to inquiries on matters of Jewish law)
…are characterized by liberality and humility…He ruled that it is permissible
to interrupt the grace after meals to fee ones animals, basing the decision
other scriptural injunction for a man to feed his animals before himself.
On one occasion he told his questioner, ‘I was asked this question before but I
realize that my answer then was wrong and I welcome the opportunity to correct
my mistake.’” There are places in his commentaries where admits that he
does not understand the meaning. “Of this I do not know.”
Rashi in his own words:
“Any plan formulated in a hurry is foolish.”
“Be sure to ask your teacher his reasons and his sources.”
“Teachers learn from their student’s discussions.”
“A student of laws who does not understand their meaning or cannot
explain their contradictions is just a basket full of books.”
“Do not rebuke your fellow man so as to shame him in public.”
“To obey out of love is better than to obey out of fear.”
“”All the 613 commandments are included in the Decalogue.”
1217(6th
of Adar, 4977): Judah ben Samuel of Regensburg passed away. Born in 1140 in
Speyer, he was also called He-Hasid or 'the Pious' in Hebrew and was the
initiator of the Chassidei Ashkenaz, a movement of Jewish mysticism in Germany.
“This movement is considered different from kabbalistic mysticism because it
emphasizes specific prayer and moral conduct. Judah settled in Regensburg in
1195. He wrote Sefer Hasidim (Book of the Pious) and Sefer
Hakavod (Book of Glory). The latter has been lost and is only known
by quotations that other authors have made from it. His most prominent students
were Elazar Rokeach and Moses ben Jacob of Coucy.
1288:
Papacy of Nicholas IV began. Like many medieval popes, Nicholas IV displayed a
mixed attitude toward the Jews. On the one hand, he issued various instructions
(1288) to the inquisitors to proceed against *Conversos and he renewed earlier
legislation concerning the Jews in Portugal, compelling them to wear a *badge.
On the other hand, he specifically protected the Jews of Rome from being
molested by Christians (January 1291). He wrote to Emperor Rudolph requesting
the release of *Meir b. Baruch of Rothenburg from prison. There is a belief
that he enlisted the services of the Jewish physician and scholar Isaac b.
Mordecai Maestro Gaio, who also attended Boniface VIII and who was the first of
the Italian Jewish papal physicians. (As described in the Jewish Virtual
Library)
1349:
In Zurich, Switzerland, the town council tried to protect the Jews of the town,
they were forced to give in to the mob, resulting in the murder of many of the
Jewish inhabitants. The Jews were then forced to leave.
1455:
Birthdate of Johann Von Reuchlin the German linguist who came to the defense of
the Jews when Dominican Friars led by Johann Pfefferkorn sought imperial
support to destroy a vast array of Jewish books.
1475:
The first known Hebrew book, a copy of the TaNaCh, was printed in Italy.
1495:
King Charles VIII of France enters Naples to claim the city's throne.
Following the expulsion from Spain, Jews had found refuge in Naples thanks to
King Ferdinand of Naples. When Ferdinand died his son Alfonso replaced
him on the throne. Charles deposed Alfonso. During his short lived
reign over the Italian city, the situation of the Jews worsened.
Fortunately, a mixed bag of political and religious leaders drove Charles back
to France. Unfortunately, the Jews of Naples would be expelled from their
Italian haven in 1510.
1501:
On this day and the following day, two tremendous auto-de-fe's took place in
Toledo. A woman prophet and over 100 of her followers were burned. The woman
envisioned those Jews who had previously died as martyrs were taken to heaven,
and the Jewish Messiah was speedily going to return the Jews to the Promised
Land.
1520:
Birthdate of Moses Isserles, the Ashkenazic rabbi from Cracow best known for
writing HaMapah (The Table Cloth) a “gloss” on The Shulchan Aruch (Set Table)
of Joseph Karo. Karo relied primarily on Sephardic sources. Isserles used
Ashkenazic sources to create a table cloth that would cover the set table thus
making Caro’s work viable for the large number of Jews living in Northern and
Eastern Europe.
1530:
Coronation in Italy of Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor who provided Josel of
Rosheim with “a charter or letter of protection from for the whole of German
Jewry but who also “issued a proclamation again the Jews who had not been
baptized” which may have applied to the Jews he ruled as King of Spain.
1590:
Archduke Maximilian granted the Jews of Mergentheim, Markelsheim,
Igersheim and Unterbalbach the right to continue to bury their dead above the
village of Unterbalbach for an annual payment of 16 Gulden to the Monastery of
Mergentheim
1618(27th
of Shevat): Rabbi Tanhum Ha-Kohen of Cracow passed away today.
1656:
The Jews in New Amsterdam are granted, "A little hook of land situate
[sic] outside of this city for a burial place." This cemetery land was
located by the Bowery, near Oliver Street in what is now lower Manhattan. It
would be another month before Jews were granted the right to own real
estate. Public Jewish worship would not be an accepted matter of
fact until the turn of the century. The establishment of a
burial society and cemetery is a matter of major importance for any Jewish
community. It was sign of permanence and belonging. Following
the defeat of the Dutch by the English in 1664, New Amsterdam would become New
York.
1730:
Pope Benedict XIII who is confused with
the 14th century anti-Pope Benedict XIII who worked at a mass
conversion of the Jews passed away today.
1732: At
Pope’s Creek in Westmorland County, VA, Augustine and Mary Ball Washington gave
birth to George Washington. Several Jew’s served with Washington during the
Revolutionary War. When Washington was elected President, he sent
amicable letters to different Jewish communities assuring them that Jews were
welcome in the United States. The tone set by Washington helped to make
the American experience different for the Jews than anything they had known in
their history. As he said in his famous letter written to the Jews of Newport,
“May the children of the stock of Abraham who dwell in this land continue to
merit and enjoy the good will of the other inhabitants--while everyone shall
sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree and there shall be none to make
him afraid.”
1753:
Birthdate of Boston native Rachel Andrews, the daughter of Abraham Andrews and
the wife of Myer Moses with whom she had six children – Priscilla, Eleanor,
Myer, Isaac, Esther and Bella – who later became Rachel Andrews Woolf when she
married Solomon Woolf.
1755:
Benedict XIV issued Beatus Andreas a Papal Bull that confirmed the blood libel as factual. ”The Bull reviewed the
cases of ritual murder by Jews, which it explicitly upholds as a fact, and
establishes the beatification but not the canonization of Andreas of Rinn and
Simon of Trent.”
1755:
In New York, Sarah Nunes Navaro and Aaron Nunez Cardozo gave birth to Moses
Nunez Cardozo, the husband of Gitlah Moses.
1758(14th of
Adar I, 5518): Purim Katan
1775:
The Jews were expelled from outskirts of Warsaw, Poland.
1776:
The SC Second Provincial Congress, under pressure from the Continental
establishment, resolved "That a regiment of expert Rifle-men, to take rank
as the fifth regiment, under proper field and other officers, be immediately
raised, to consist of seven companies; each company to consist of one Captain,
two Lieutenants, one Ensign, and one hundred men, including four Sergeants, and
four Corporals which led to Abraham Alexander St., the London born son of
Judith and Raphael Alexander and father of Abraham Alexander Jr., the Chazan of
Congregation Beth Elohim, receiving a commission of lieutenant in the
Revolutionary Army.
1781:
During the American Revolution Isaac Franks, who had been serving as
“forage-master” at West Point, was commissioned as an ensign in the 7th
Massachusetts Regiment today and he served in that capacity until 1782 when he
resigned due to health problems.
1783:
In Bonfeld, Germany, Schoenle Lazarus and Lazarus Ruben gave birth to Samuel
Ottenheimer, the husband of Judith Jacobs and father of Jette Ottenheimer who
later married Amalie Wimpfheimer with whom he had one son – Lazarus
Ottenheimer.
1785:
Philadelphia born Miriam Simon and German born Michael Gratz gave birth to
Joseph Gratz sixteen years after they had been married in Lancaster, PA.
1788:
Birthdate of German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer who has nothing to positive
to say about human existence. For him, life is harsh and cruel. If
this is so obvious, Schopenhauer asks why there are any optimists in the world.
Schopenhauer argues that ‘the aggressively optimistic philosophers of the
Western World have fallen victim to a vulgar buoyancy which is rooted in the
Jewish Tradition!” In his most famous work, The World as Will and Idea
the philosopher says Jewish traditional optimism reflects "a
self-congratulatory human egoism, which is blind to all except our (own) all
too frail human goals and aspirations."
1790:
As Alexander Hamilton, who may have been born out of wedlock to a Jewish woman
and attended a Jewish school in the British colony of Nevis, enjoyed a victory
in his attempts to place the newly formed government of the United States on a
firm footing, saw a bill introduced by James Madison that would have undermined
these efforts defeated today.
1791:
Lilie Marx and Samuel Strauss gave birth to Jitle Strauss.
1793:
Birthdate of Isaak Markus Jost, the native of Bernburg who overcame poverty and
the loss of his father while still a child to become one of the early creators
of modern Jewish historical writing.
1800(27th
of Shevat, 5560): Parashat Mishpatim; Shabbat Shekalim observed for the first
time in the 19th century.
1812:
Birthdate of Moses (Moyses) Baruch Auerbach who gained fame as poet and author
Berthold Auerbach whose early efforts included a biography about Spinoza and a
text entitled Judaism and Recent Literature.
1814:
Birthdate of Bavaria native Dr. Sigismund Waterman who came to the United
States in the 1830’s where he graduated from Yale and who was the father of
Helena (Wolf) Waterman and the father of Dr. Moses W. Waterman.
1816:
In St. Thomas, French native Jacob Baiz and Leah Baiz gave birth to Hannah
Nanette Henriquez Moron, the wife of Jacob Henriquez Moron today.
1817:
Birthdate of Berlin native Karl Wilhelm Borchardt, the Konigsberg educated
mathematician who studied in Paris before becoming “privat-docent at the
University of Berlin.”
1818:
Birthdate of Copenhagen, Denmark native Amalia Monies, the wife of Stockholm
native Charles Kann and the mother of Albert, Ellen, Jenny and Ellen Kann.
1818:
Philadelphia native Benjamin Jonas Phillips and Abigail Seixas who had married
in 1804 gave birth to Rebecca Phillips.
1819:
The United States of America and Spain signed the Florida Purchase Treaty which
gave the United States complete control over what is now the Sunshine
State. Within 2 years, records show that 30 to 40 Jews lived in northern
Florida including Moses Levy a Moroccan born lumber dealer who built a Jewish
colony in an area that is now home to the University of Florida. Abraham
Myers, a West Pointer who served during the Seminole Wars was one of the first
Jews to live in south Florida.
1819:
Colonel Isaac Franks, the New York City born son of Moses and Sarah Franks who
was “a brave and dedicated soldier in the Continental army and consequently
enjoyed the personal friendship of George Washington” wrote a letter today in
Philadelphia describing “the progress of his military career” which was
intended “to help support his application for a government permission…”
1820:
In New York, Phoebe Magnus and Abraham David Cohen gave birth to Elizabeth D.
A. Cohen the Philadelphia College of Medicine trained physician and husband of
Aaron Cohen, who was the first practicing female physician in Louisiana and who
was buried in the Gates of Prayer Cemetery in New Orleans, the city in which
she served as a doctor.
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/cohen-elizabeth-da
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/elizabeth-d-a-magnus-cohen
1821:
In Hamburg, Germany Dr. David Assing and Rosa Maria Assing gave birth to
authoress Ludmilla Assing.
1828:
The final letter of correspondence between Lazarus Jacob Riesser and his son
Gabriel was written today.
1828:
In Vilnius, Abraham Bar Lebensohn and his wife gave birth to the Hebrew poet
Micah Joseph Lebensohn. His brother-in-law Joshua Steinberg who was an author
in his own right and functionary in the Russian government translated some of
his Hebrew works into German.
1834:
Lucas and Hannah Friedman Lederman gave birth to New Yorker David Lederman, the
husband of Helena Bien Lederman with whom he had three children – Claire, Moses
and Mattie.
1835:
At Esquiline Hill in Columbus, GA Ralph Jacob Moses, the Charleston, SC bon son
Deborah and Israel Moses and gave birth to Sarah Matilda Moses and his wife
Eliza Matilda Moses gave birth to Sarah Matilda Moses who died twenty days
before her third birthday.
1837:
Nathan Lewis married Harriette Moses at the Great Synagogue today.
1839:
In Hamburg, Kalmar Calman and Betty Friedburg gave birth Adolf Calman who
served as a rabbi at several New York congregations including Beth Israel Bikur
Cholim and Etz Chaim of Yorkville.
1840:
Birthdate of Smorgon, Belarus native Robert Brudno who moved to England in 1867
and then to Dublin, Ireland where he gained fame as Robert Bradlaw, the dentist
known as the “prince of immigrants” who founded a “new chera kadisha and
Cemetery Dolphin’s Barn” and a new synagogue after the Dublin Hebrew
Congregation “had reportedly denied him membership.
1840:
Birthdate of August Bebel, a German social democrat and founder of the Social
Democrat Party of Germany. The non-Jewish Bebel was committed to the
concept of the brotherhood of man and one of his famous statements was,
"Anti-Semitism is the socialism of fools."
1843:
In Hamburg, Germany, Joseph Luebke and his wife gave birth to M.J. Luebek who
after serving as rabbi “Congregation Bikur Cholim and Gates of Prayer, became
the “Cantor and Lecturer at Shaare Zedek in Brooklyn, NY.
1845(15th
of Adar I, 5605): Parashat Tetzaveh; Shushan Purim Katan
1847:
In Germany, M.A. and Sophia Stern gave birth to Louis Stern. After the
family moved to Albany, Louis was sent to Petersburg, W. Va. “to learn the
rudiments of merchandizing in the small store of any uncle after which he moved
to New York where he and his brothers – Isaac, Bernard and Benjamin - opened
the dry goods store that became known as Stern Brothers, that classier than
Wanamakers and B. Altman’s but never quite reached the level of Lord and Taylor
or Bonwit Teller.
1848:
Beginning of the “The Third French Revolution” which replaced Citizen King
Louis Philippe with the Second Republic.
1850:
In New Orleans, Bernard and Sophie Bernstein Kowalski gave birth to future
Texas resident Louis Kowalski, the husband of Amelia Campbell Kowalski whom he
married in 1876.
1850:
In Bavaria, Meier Rice and Fanny Sohn gave birth to Columbia trained attorney
Isaac Leopold Rice, the husband of Julia Hynemann Barrnett, the Columbia
lecturer and namesake for Rice Stadium who as a businessman played a key role
in the development of submarines and was a famous chess player known as the
inventor of the Rice Gambit.
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/rice-isaac-leopold
1851:
Birthdate date of Julius Harburger, the Tammany political leader who served as
Coroner of New York County and Sheriff of New York County.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1914/11/10/100112819.html?pageNumber=11
1852:
Martin Beir, the secretary and treasurer of the Milton Clark Company, an
insurance agency in Rochester, NY married 17-year-old Clara Hirsch, the
daughter of Wolf and Eva Hirsch. (Clara passed away at the age of 39 and Beir
never remarried. In 1898, he was chosen to head B’nai B’rith for the
state of New York.
1852:
Solomon Isaacs married Esther Hart today at the Great Synagouge.
1853:
Founding of Eliot Seminary in St. Louis which would become Washington
University. According to recently published figures Wash U has 2,000 Jewish
undergraduates who are 33% of the student population. This helps to rank it as
number 11 on a list of the 30 private schools Jews choose.
1854(24
Shevat, 5614): Austria Rabbi Abraham Neuda, the native of Moravia who was the
son of Rabbi Aaron Neuda of Loštice, and the nephew of Rabbi Jacob Neuda of
Lomnitz (Lomnice), Moravia and the husband of author Fanny Schmiedl passed away
today.
1854:
One day after he had passed away, 61-year-old Abraham Harris was buried today a
the “Brompton (Fulham Road) Jewish Cemetery.”
1855:
The New York Times reported that a concert designed to raise funds for
the Hebrew Benevolent Society is scheduled to be held at the Dodsworth Academy.
1855:
Pennsylvania State University is founded. Today Penn State has approximately
4,000 Jewish undergraduate and graduate students out of a total student
population of over 40,000. The university offers approximately 45 Jewish
Studies courses. Penn State offers both a major and a minor in Jewish
studies.
1856:
The Republican Party holds its first national meeting in Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania. Early Jewish Republican supporters included Sabato Morais,
Rabbi of Philadelphia’s Mikveh Israel Congregation; Moritz Pinner, a German
born editor of an abolitionist paper who would fight in the Union Army during
the Civil War; Louis Naphtali Dembitz, a Louisville lawyer whose nephew would
become the first Jewish Supreme Court Justice. Jews were drawn to the
Republican Party because of its anti-Slavery stance. Ironically, another
group drawn to the Republican Party were members of the short-lived American
Party, also called “The Know-Nothing” Party. The Know-Nothings were
natavist who were opposed to the swelling tide of immigration, a belief that
included more than just a whiff of anti-Semitism.
1857:
Birthdate German born physicist Heinrich Hertz. He was the first one to
broadcast and receive radio waves. The unit of measure “hertz” is named
for him. Hertz was born into a Jewish family that converted to
Christianity. The German Jewish community was devastated two times: first
by conversions in the 19th century and then by the Final Solution in
the 20th century. One wonders how many of those who perished
in the latter were from families who had participated in the former.
1859:
Ephraim Alex, the Overseer of the Great Synagogue secured the adoption of the
following resolutions designed to help “the strange and foreign poor”:
(1)
That it is highly expedient that the relief of the strange poor be managed by a
Board of Guardians constituted of delegates from the three City Uniting
Congregations.
(2)
That the following gentlemen be appointed the delegates of this Board with
power to meet the delegates appointed by the other two congregations and make
such arrangements with them for one year as shall seem most desirable to effect
the desired object, viz., Messrs. E. Alex, Samuel Moses, Lewis Jacobs, S. A.
Jonas, Joseph Lazarus, Jacob Waley, M.A., and Lionel L. Cohen.
(3)
That £220 be placed at the disposal of such Board of Guardians for one year to
be paid in monthly instalments.
(4)
That the Secretary of the Synagogue do attend the meetings of the Board of
Guardians when requested and finish all information, books or documents bearing
on the relief of the strange poor.
1860:
The New York Times reported that “The community of Kingston, which is
composed chiefly of Jews, have been making contributions for the relief of
their suffering brethren of Morocco. They have managed to collect large sums in
spite of the prevailing poverty.”
1861:
Bell and Daly announced the upcoming publication of The Spirit of Hebrew
Poetry, by Isaac Taylor
1861:
According to reports sent from Paris today, the arrest of Jules Mires has
threatened the stability of the Credit Mobilier. It is expected that when
word of his arrest reaches Constantinople, ruinous panic will set in since
investors there hold a glut of paper tied to his financial activities.
1864:
In Russia, Abraam Markovich Wilenkin and Rachel Wilenkin gave birth to lawyer
and diplomat Gregory Wilinken who served as personal secretary to Count Witte,
“the first Jewish member of the Russian diplomatic corps and the attaché at the
Russian embassies in Washington and Tokyo who was the husband of Irma Sara
Wilenkin.
1865:
The Richmond Examiner described the condition of Charleston, SC when it
fell to Union forces under the command of General Sherman. According to the Examiner,
all that the Yankees found was “the abandoned hull of Charleston” inhabited by
“a few Jews” and “some telegraph operators.”
1866:
Alexander Cuza, considered to be one of the founders of the Romanian state “and
who tried to prepare for the emancipation of the Jews” was forced to abdicate
today and leave the country.
1867:
In New York, Frank Rothschild, the German born son of Henriette and Isack
Rothschild and his wife Amanda Anna Rothschild gave birth to Harry Rotschild
1868:
In Amsterdam, Marianne Smit and diamond cutter Mozes Polake gave birth to Henri
Polak the founder of the Dutch Social Democratic Workers’ Party and longtime
President of the General Diamond Workers’ Union of the Netherlands who died of
pneumonia before the Nazis could ship him to a concentration camp in 1943.
https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/12233-polak-henri
1868:
Birthdate of Charles Pearce Coady, a Democrat who served as a Congressman from
Maryland’s Third District and was one of the opening speakers at the 13th
annual convention of the Order of Brith Shalom in Baltimore.
1868:
In New York City, Elizabeth Fournier and Myron Baruch gave birth Emanuel
Barcuh, the graduate of Columbia University who served as Professor
Bacteriology and Pathology at the Flower Hospital and Medical College.
1869:
In Suisun City, CA, Lena and Meier “Moses” Dinkelspiel gave birth to Henry
George Washington Dinkselspiel, the husband of Estella Dinkelspiel who may be
related to attorney Lloyd Dinnelspiel.
1869:
In Kaiserslautern, thirty-five-year-old Abraham Weil, the German born son of
Salomon Weil and Helena Lea Meyer married Berta Seligmann, a native of France
1871:
In Kovno, pharmacist Lazar Aronstam and his wife gave birth Modest Aronstam,
who gained as American illustrator and anarchist Modest Stein, the husband of
photographer Marcia Mishkin and father of Luba Stein who in 1888 came to the
United States were he joined his cousin Alexander Berkman as a member of
the “Jewish anarchist group, the
Pioneers of Liberty” before becoming “a successful pen and ink artist for the
New York World, New York Sun, and other New York newspapers” and finding “even
greater success as an illustrator for periodicals such as Argosy, and drew
numerous covers for other pulp magazines including The Cavalier, All-Story
Weekly, and People's Favorite Magazine.”
1871:
Dr. Henry W. Schneeberger received his formal rabbinical ordination from Dr.
Hildesheimer. In the document of ordination Dr. Hildesheimer testified to
Henry’s high moral character and to his devotion to Judaism. He also wrote, “He
is worthy to be crowned with the crown of Morenu Horav [Our Teacher, the
Rabbi].” “Thus equipped with the rabbinic title and with the university degree,
he lost no time and hurried home to try out for a rabbinical post. Only three
weeks after his ordination in Berlin, he preached at the synagogue where he had
delivered his very first sermon, at the Rodeph Shalom Synagogue on Clinton
Street in New York City.” Rabbi Dr. Henry W) Schneeberger was the First
American Born, University- Educated, Orthodox Ordained Rabbi in America (As
reported by Dr. Yitzchok Levine).
1872:
“Galicia’s Demands” published today described conditions in this portion of
Austria that became part of the empire as a result of the partition of
Poland. According to the article, the Poles are in the majority.
However, the Germans and the Jews, who are in the minority “are far ahead of
the Poles” “in money and intelligence.” Due to the electoral system, the Poles
are the dominate force and the Germans and the Jews are underrepresented in the
Diet.
1873:
“Joseph Litten, the president of the Jewish community in Konigsberg” and his
wife gave birth to professor and jurist Friedrich Julius Litten who became a
Lutheran “in order to further his career” but who was also the father of Hans
Litten, the lawyer who defended opponents of the Nazis and died at Dachau.
1874:
In Alytaus, Lithuania, “Jacob and Rebecca Fritz Chase” gave birth to Edward Max
Chase,( Reb Azriel Mordecai son of Reb Yaakov) the Lewiston, ME educated
president of E.M. Chase Company of Manchester where his civic activities
included founding the “Chase Memorial and Manchester Hebrew Free Loan
Association,” serving as “state treasurer of all drives for Jewish war
sufferers and state chairman of the Jewish Welfare Board” while being married
to Dora Samplin Chase with whom he had four children – Jasper, Eleanor, Helene
and Clara Chase.
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/172295897/edward-max-chase
1875(17th
of Adar I, 5635): Jansje Izaak van der Sluis, the Amsterdam born daughter of
Isaak Levy van der Sluis and Lena Levy passed away today in the Netherlands.
1875: In Poltava, Russia, Fanny Husik and Marcus
Seltzer gave birth University of Pennsylvania graduate and publisher Thomas
Seltzer the editor of “Best Russian Stories” in the Modern Library series and
husband of Adele Szold.
1876:
In New York City, a Polish Jew was arraigned on charges of cruelty to
animals. According to the arresting officer, Siwaski roasted a rat after
he had caught in a wire cage trap.
1876:
Johns Hopkins University was founded in Baltimore, Maryland. Today, the
elite school has approximately 750 Jewish students out of a student population
of 6,500. The university offers 45 courses in Jewish Studies and a major
in Jewish Studies.
1878:
It was reported today that Rabbi Maruice Treichenberg, who had served as the
spiritual leader for the Greene-Street Synagogue, has passed away in Denver,
Colorado.
1880:
In Mason, TN, “Michael and Bettie (Lyons) Cohn gave birth to Saidie Cohn the
Little Rock High School and Stone’s Business College graduate who became
married Ephriam Eichenabaum, becoming Sadie Cohen Eichenbaum, the mother of
Charles and Howard Samuel Eichenbaum who was President of the Little Rock
Section of the Council of Jewish Women and “one of the first four women to
serve on the Board of Tempe B’nai Israel, Little Rock’s Reform congregation.
1880:
In New York, a meeting is scheduled to be held this afternoon at the Sons of
Israel Synagogue to evaluate charges by Jewish butchers that they are being
forced to violate Halachah by the wholesalers who employ them. According
to the butchers, the wholesalers are having them keep meat for a period longer
than that allowed by law, and they are not allowed to warn their customers
about this. The wholesalers deny the allegations.
1880:
Professor Felix Adler delivered a lecture today on the subject of “Catholicism
and Liberty” in which he took issue with the view of Cardinal Manning. Speaking
on behalf of the Church, Manning has taken issue with the concept of the
equality of man and the theory that government’s authority is derived from the
will of the people.
1881(23rd
of Adar I, 5641): In Jersey, eighty-eight-year-old Mary Asher, the widow of
Benjamin Asher and the mother of Asher Asher passed away today.
1882:
The SS Illinois a ship carrying Jewish refugees from Russia is expected to
arrive in Philadelphia, PA today. The 50 Jewish families are escaping the
violent attacks now going on the Czar’s domain. A committee of prominent
Christians including the Mayor and leading Jews has developed plans to care for
the refugees including lodging, food and job placement.
1882:
Philadelphia’s May King received an offer today from Calvin Jones of Charlotte,
NC, offering 40 acres to each of the 50 Jewish refugee families. The land is
located in Alexander and Wilkes counties and is described as well watered and
suited for growing wheat, corn and tobacco.
1882:
In London, Sir Alexander T. Galt, the Resident Minister in Great Britain of the
Dominion of Canada, recommended that Russian Jews immigrate to Manitoba while
he was attending a meeting of the Lord Mayor’s Jewish Fund Committee.
1883(15th
of Adar I, 5643): Shushan Purim Katan
1883:
Calude-Joseph Montefiore assumed by Royal License bearing today’s date the
“surname of Goldsmid in addition to and before that of Montefiore and the arms
of Goldsmid quarterly.”
1883:
In Vienna, Rabbi Rahmiel Eibshutz and his wife gave birth to Nathan Eibshutz,
“a descendant of Baron Jonathan Eybes Eyeschutz, author and chief rabbi of
Hamburg, Prague and Metz” who in the 1890’s came to the United States where he
eventually became president of the Night and Day Press, a printing business,
and married Monya W. Tepperman after the death of his first wife Celia Friedman
and who was active in many Jewish organizations including the Central Jewish
Institute, Temple Israel of Long Beach, Long Island and Israel Zion Hospital.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1948/08/11/85304588.pdf?pdf_redirect
1884:
In what was then part of the Kingdom of Hungary, “Mendel Gottesman and Sarah
Fischgrund gave birth to David Samuel Gottesman who in 1885 came to the United
States where he later went to work in his father’s paper-making business,
organized the Central National Bank and contributed to numerous organizations
including Yeshiva University.
1884:
Birthdate of boxing Hall of Famer Abraham “Abe” Attell. Known as “The
Little Hebrew,” Attell was Featherweight Champion from 1901 until 1912.
He gained additional notoriety and ignominy as one of the figures alleged to
have fixed the 1919 World Series. Supposedly Attell was the one who
actually passed the ten thousand dollars to several White Sox players to
guarantee that they would throw the Fall Classic.
1885:
Jacob Henry Adler married Barbara Milhauser Adler today in New York after which
they had nine children – Jesse, Abraham, Frances, Sara, Arthur, Estelle,
Beatrice, Lillian and Herbert.
1885:
In Munkacs which at the time part of the kingdom of Hungary Mendel Gottesman
and Sarah Fishgrund gave birth to American businessman and philanthropist, the
husband of Jeanne Regina Gottesman and father of patron of the arts Celeste
Ruth Gottesman.
1886:
In Kiev, peddler Isaac Saposnik and Shima Erevsky Saposnik gave birth to
University of Wisconsin trained economist Dr. David J. Saposs, who held several
government post, wrote both Left Wing Unionism and Communism in American
Politics while raising two daughters with his wife Bertha Tigay Saposs.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1968/11/16/76907905.html?pageNumber=37
1887:
The Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society opened a new facility “for infants and
boys over six years old” at 11th Avenue between 150th and
151st Street in New York.
1887:
Birthdate of Ksawery Tartakower, the native of Rostov-on-Don who gained famed
as Polish and French chess grandmaster Savielly Tartakower.
1887:
Henry M. Stanley who had been designated as the leader of the expedition
charged with rescuing the apostate Jew Emin Pasha arrived at Zanzibar.
1888:
In Detroit, MI, Phillip and Lotta (Kahn) Jaffe Jewish immigrants from Lithuania
gave birth to Durham (NC) High School and Trinity College graduate Louis Isaac
Jaffe, the WW I veteran and Pulitzer Prize winning editor of The
Virginian-Pilot.
https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/jaffe-louis-i-ca-1888-1950/
1888:
Birthdate of future Los Angeles resident Max Isackman Eisman, the husband of
Fannie Marcus Eisman and the father of Evelyn and Sadie Isackman Eisman.
1889
In New York, Annie and Maurice Mordechai Mohrn gave birth to Jessie Mohr, who
became Jessie Mohr Danz when she married John Danz and went on to Seattle where
she served as an “officer of the Jewish Welfare Society” and the National
Council of Women.
1889:
In New York, Morris and Sara (Schnitman) Slotkin gave birth to University of
Buffalo trained physician George E. Slotkin, the urologist who was Chief of the
Venereal Disease Division of the Health Department in Buffalo, NY>
1890:
Tonight’s celebration of Washington’s Birthday sponsored by the Young Men’s
Hebrew Association which will take place at the Hebrew Free School Building
will include a speech by Rabbi Rudolph Grossman.
1890:
Birthdate of Ukrainian born British pianist Benno Moiseiwitsch.
1890:
Menachem Ussishkin, one of the originators of BILU and a future President of
the Jewish National Fund, founded the Odessa Committee which was dedicated to
the practical exponent of the Hovevei Zion movement, in establishing
agricultural settlements in Eretz-Israel.
1891(14th
of Adar I, 5651): Purim Katan
1891:
Two days after she had passed away, Rebecca Pollitzer, the Hackney, London born
daughter of Michael Coleman and Harriett Phillips, the wife of Sigmund
Pollitzer and the mother of Julia, Violetta, Frank and William Pollitzer was
buried today at the “Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery.”
1892:
As New York City dealt with an outbreak of Tyhus that had been traced to recent
arriving immigrants thirty-two-year-old Solomon Zabalzki and forty-two yeard
old Rachel Hesselberg were among those who taken to North Brother Island where
those thought to be infected were kept under quarantine.
1892:
Sixty-year-old Esther Goodman, Robert Goodman and Sarah Goodman were rescued by
firemen when a fire broke out this morning at their apartment in Brooklyn, NY,
1892:
It was reported today that “the Berlin, Hamburg, Frankfort and Konigsberg
Jewish Relief Committees” will be meeting “to consider the refusal of America
to receive Russian Jewish immigrants brought by North German Lloyd steamers.”
1892:
In Brest-Litvosk, bakery owners Shaina Wyshengrad and Bezalel Dobnievski gave
birth to David Isaac Dobnievski who gained fame as David Dubuinksy who began working the United States in 1911
as a cloak cutter and two decades later he had risen to the presidency of the
International Ladies Garment Union which was a force for social and labor
progress that helped end sweatshops and improve the lot of American workers
https://jwa.org/teach/livingthelegacy/biographies/dubinsky-david
1893”
In Paris, the famous Alfred Dreyfus and Luciene Eugenie Hadamard gave birth to
Jeanne Dreyfus, who became Jeanne Levy when she married Pierre-Paul Louis Levy
with whom she had five children.
1893:
Birthdate of “Polish born circus performer and vaudeville strongman” Siegmund
Breitbart who was billed as “The Superman of the Ages” when he toured the
United States in 1923.
1894:
The 14th annual reception sponsored by the Hebrew Sheltering
Guardian Society was held at the asylum’s facility on 151st Street.
1894:
Two days after she had passed away, Caroline Magnus, the daughter of Joel
Barnett and Sarah Moss and the wife of Jacob Magnus with whom she had had five
children was buried today at the “Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery.”
1895(28th
of Shevat, 5655): Sixty-seven-year-old Virginius Jenkins Tobias, the Savannah,
GA born son of Isabella Bowen and Isaac Tobias who were wed in 1824 passed away
tody.
1895:
Captain Dreyfus began the journey that would take him to prison in French
Guyana
1895:
Birthdate of Newcastle, PA native and graduate of Columbia’s College of
Physicians and Surgeons, Dr. Alvan L. Barach, “a pioneer in respiratory therapy
and developer of the first practical oxygen tent” who was the husband of “the
former Frderica Pisek” with whom he had two sons, “Jeffrey and John Paul.”
https://www.nytimes.com/1977/12/14/archives/dr-alvan-barach-breathing-expert.html
1896:
Birthdate of Ukraine native Joseph K. Alliger who in 1898 came to the United
States where he became a “real-estate man and mortgage-investment” banker who
was active in the UJA, JNF and HIAS while raising his “two son Martin and
Howard” with “his wife, the former Gladys Scheirer.”
https://www.nytimes.com/1978/06/21/archives/obituary-3-no-title.html
1897:
Amos J. Cummings will deliver a lecture today on “Horace Greeley” as part of
the free lecture course offered at the Hebrew Institute.
1897:
The Young Ladies and Gentlemen’s League will host a reception today in honor of
George Washington’s Birthday at the Montefiore Home.
1897:
The Jewish Alliance will host a reception today at Temple Emanu-El on 5th
Avenue in honor George Washington’ Birthday.
1897:
“Lehman Gift Accepted” published today provided details of the decision of the
Board of Trustees of the Hebrew Benevolent and Orphan Asylum Society to accept
the gift of $100,000 from Emanuel Lehmnan that will serve as an endowment for a
fund that will benefit those who had been under the care of the society and
were now out on their own.
1898:
Seventy-seven-year-old Heungseon Daewongun, the Regent of Korea whom German
Jewish businessman Ernst Jakob Oppert attempted to blackmail in an attempt to
remove “Korean trading barriers” passed away today.
1898:
The managers of the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society will host their annual
reception in honor of George Washington’s Birthday between 3 and 5 this
afternoon.
1898:
The Young Ladies’ and Gentlemen’s League of the Montefiore Home will host their
fourth annual reception this afternoon in honor of George Washington’s
Birthday.
1900:
The honorary degree of Doctor of Laws was conferred today on Oscar S. Straus
today during the exercises marking the dedication of the new law school at the
University of Pennsylvania.
1901(3rd
of Adar, 5661): Eighty-nine-year-old Virginia Russell, the daughter of Perla
Sheftal and Isaac Russell who were married in 1808 in Savannah and the wife of
Mordecai Sheftall) who should not be confused with Georgia merchant and
Revolutionary War officer) with whom she had eight children passed away today
in Savannah.
1901:
On Manhattan’s Lower East Side, Leah (née Goldstein) and Mordecai Marcus gave
birth to David Daniel “Mickey” Marcus the West Point graduate and attorney who
was the first “Aluf” of the IDF and built the “secret” road to Jerusalem that
meant that the ancient city of David would be part of the modern state of
Israel.
http://www.zionism-israel.com/bio/Mickey_Marcus.htm
1901:
Over the next three days, Herzl writes letters to Zionists in France, Italy,
England and America for parliamentary intervention against immigration
restrictions in Palestine. He considers transferring the center of his action
to London but drops the plan because he does not want to separate from his
parents.
1902:
Herzl travels to Munich and meets the banker Reitlinger. Herzl proposes the
Turkish suggestion of Jewish immigration to Asia Minor and Mesopotamia and the
exploitation of mines. Reitlinger considers the matter too costly, risky and
unsafe.
1902:
Birthdate of Jacob Sack, the Pittsburgh native who played lineman for the Pitt
Panthers before going to play professional ball for the nascent NFL.
1902:
In Lodz, Poland, Morris and Freida (Alpert) Abbell gave birth to Maxell Abbell,
who 1905 came to the United States where he graduated magna cum laude from
Harvard, earned an MBA from Northwestern and after a career in social work
developed the a real estate empire that included the Abell Hotel Chain while
serving as the president of the United Synagogue of American, the Vice
President of the American Palestine Trading Corporation and raising a family of
five children with his wife Fannie.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/07/10/90823629.pdf
https://www.geni.com/people/Maxwell-Abbell/6000000002129626095
https://prabook.com/web/maxwell.abbell/1054805
1903:
Birthdate of Brooklyn native and Junior Lightweight boxer Joe Glick who
twenty-three year career “included over two hundred bouts” two of which were
fights for the Junior Lightweight Title which he lost.
1903:
Boutros Ghali writes the conditions for the Jewish settlement in Sinai.
1903:
“The annual reception for all members of the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian
Society” is scheduled to be held this afternoon at the Orphan Asylum on
Broadway.
1904:
Dr. Joseph Silverman delivered an address this evening on “The Jew as a
Patriot” at 147th meeting and “banquet of the New York Universalist
Club at the St. Denis Hotel during which he said that “We are Jews only in our
form of worship” but “we are Americans in thought and feeling.”
1905:
It was reported today that leading Jews in Montreal have repudiated the
utterances of Moses Vineberg, “said to be head of Russian revolutionary band in
New York who is holding meetings with Russian Jews where he rejoices over the”
recent assassination of Grand Duke Sergius.
1906:
“The tenements at 27 and 29 Goerck Street” in New York have been sold by
Hurwitz and Rabinowitz.
1907:
In Manhattan, Anna Levit and Frank Bershard gave birth to Syracuse University
graduate Sheldon Leonard Bershard who gained fame as actor, director and
producer Sheldon Leonard.
https://www.nytimes.com/1997/01/13/movies/sheldon-leonard-film-actor-and-tv-producer-dies-at-89.html
1907:
In Omaha, Nebraska, Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Maisal gave birth to Zena Maisel who
married Sidney E. Pollack and as Zena Maisel Pollack served as the
administrative director of the Jewish Guild for the Blind.
1908(20th
of Adar I, 5668): Parsahat Ki Tasa
1908:
It was reported today, that while give a speech on “Co-Operation of Business
Organization with Governmental Agencies for Promoting the Commerce of the
Country” to a group of Boston businessmen, Oscar S. Straus, the Secretary of
Commerce and Labor said “the power of the ‘big stick’ is needed because there
are big abuses to be corrected and big lawbreakers to be checked.”
1909(1st
of Adar I, 5669): Rosh Chodesh Adar I
1909:
In New York, “Joseph M. and Augusta Stadler Levin” gave birth to Plainfield, NJ
raised and Rutgers Law School graduate Philip Jerome Levin, the “president and
chief operating officer of the Madison Square Garden Corporation and husband of
Janice Hoffman Levin, the daughter of Samuel and Rene Hoffman.
https://www.nytimes.com/1971/08/04/archives/philip-levinhead-of-madison-squaregarden-diesi.html
1909(1st
of Adar 1, 5669): Sixty-seven-year-old chess champion Eugene Delmar passed away
today.
1910:
Birthdate of Sophie Melvin, the native of the Ukraine who gained fame as social
activist Sophie Gerson (As reported by Deborah Gerson and Tim Wheeler)
http://jwa.org/weremember/gerson-sophie
1911:
In Cleveland, OH, Russian Jewish immigrants Mary Axelrod and Peter Axelrod, the
founder of The Cleveland Dairy and the grand-nephew of Pavel Borisovich
Axelrod, the founder of Pravda gave birth to Western Reserve University trained
attorney and WW II Army veteran Max M. Axelrod, the founder of the Cleveland
Concession Company and reform minded chairman of the Cleveland Boxing
Commission whose activities in the Jewish community included founding Lake
Forest Country because the other clubs did not manage Jews and the found of the
Cleveland Jewish News.(Editor’s note—in the spirit of full disclosure, the
on-line edition of the Cleveland Jewish News was one of the earliest to publish
This Day…In Jewish History)
1911:
Twenty-six-year-old Frank Rosenblatt, the Russian born son of Benjamin and
Bessie (Reichberg) Rosenblatt and the holder of a Ph. D from Columbia married
Katherine Golding today in New York City.
1912(4th
of Adar, 5672): Seventy-four old Bertha Eppstein, the wife of Max Eppstein and
the mother of Seraphine Eppstein Pisko, the secretary of National Jewish
Hospital for Consumptives, passed away today in Denver, CO.
1913(8th
of Adar I, 5673): Parashat Tetzaveh
1913:
Dr. Gerson B. Levi is scheduled to officiate at Saturday morning services at
B’nai Sholom-Temple Israel in Chicago.
1913:
Rabbi Joseph Stoltz is scheduled to deliver a sermon on “Washington and the
Jews” this mornings at Isaiah Temple.
1913:
Rabbi Abraham Hirshberg is scheduled to deliver a talk at this afternoon’s
children service at the Chicago Hebrew Institute.
1913:
Judge Huge Pam is scheduled to deliver a lecture this evening on “Municipal
Government to the Welfare of the Nation and People” at the Chicago Hebrew
Institute.
1913:
It was reported today that “Samuel Littman, a sergeant of Company B, 47th
Regiment of the New York National Guard has resigned” because he claimed that
he was not promoted to lieutenant because he was Jewish – a charge that
Governor Sulzer has asked to be thoroughly investigated.
1914(26th
of Shevat, 5674): Fifty-year old Joseph Fles, the Virginia born son of Lazarus
Fels and Sus an Freiberg and husband of Iowan Mollie Fels who was the owner of
the soap manufacturing that bears his name and advocate of Henry George’s
single tax philosophy passed away today in Philadelphia.
https://hsp.org/sites/default/files/legacy_files/migrated/findingaid1953fels.pdf
https://www.geni.com/people/Joseph-Fels/6000000002501814590
1914:
Birthdate of Dr. Renato Dulbecco, the Italian born virologist who shared a
Nobel Prize in 1975 for his role in drawing a link between genetic mutations
and cancer. During World War II, Dulbecco served as a medical officer in the
Italian Army. When the train taking him to the Russian front “stopped in
Warsaw, he saw railway laborers wearing yellow stars. When he asked about them,
he was told that the workers were Jews who would be killed when their work was
done. He was horrified.” According to him seeing this was a life changing
moment which may account for the fact that he deserted from the Italian Army
and spent the rest of the war providing medical assistance to the resistance
fighters in and around Torino. (As reported by Denise Gellene)
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/21/us/dr-renato-dulbecco-nobel-laureate-dies-at-97.html?_r=1&hpw
1915:
The second day of the 23rd annual meeting of the American Jewish
Historical Society will include another series of literary presentations and a
business meeting that will include the election of officers.
1915:
Birthdate of New York native Jules Munshin, “the song and dance man” whose
credits including “Easter Parade” and “On the Town.”
1915:
Georgia Solicitor General Hugh M. Dorse and State Attorney General Warren Grice
are scheduled to file their brief in the U.S. Supreme that will deny a writ of
Habeas Corpus in the case of Leo Frank who is scheduled to be hung after a
trial held in the midst of an orgy of anti-Semitism.
1915:
Eighteen-year-old Charles Pores won a weather-shortened version of the
Brooklyn-to-Sea Gate Marathon.
1915:
Following the failure of the Ottoman attack on Allied forces in Egypt, the
Arabs have expressed their bitterness and “their determination not to fight in
the future” on the side of the Turks.
1915:
It was reported today that Djemal Pasha, the Ottoman Minister of Marine
“clearly see the utter futility of further military operations against Egypt”
and has gone north to Damascus” where he plans on resigning. (Reading this, one
would not suspect that it will take the British another two years to finally
get to Jerusalem and more than three years to finally complete their conquest
of Palestine and Syria)
1916:
Elinor “Ellie” Fatman the daughter of Morris and Settie Fatman who had been
teaching at the Henry Street Settlement House since 1913 proposed to Henry
Morgenthau, Jr. in Central Park.(As reported by Edna S. Friedberg)
1916:
In Amsterdam, Levie Van Praag and Sabiena Cohen, both of whom were killed in
Sobibor, gave birth Jacques Van Praag who was murdered at Birkenau.
1916:
In Washington, D.C., at today’s meeting of the Executive Committee of the
American Federation of Labor, Samuel Gompers is scheduled to raise “the
question of Jewish rights in the belligerent countries.
1916:
Dr. Nathan Syrkin and Rabbi Stephen S. Wise addressed a convention chaired by
Judge Sanders of the Jewish organizations of Manhattan held at Arlington Hall
where plans were discussed for the upcoming Jewish conference to be held in
Philadelphia in March.
1916: After two years and four months serving in
Constantinople, American Ambassador Henry Morgenthau arrived in New York aboard
the steamship Frederick VIII to start a 60 day vacation.
1917(30th
of Shevat, 5677): Rosh Chodesh Adar
1917:
As of today, Frederic C. Penfield, the United States Ambassador to
Austria-Hungary “has turned over $25,000 to the Vienna Jewish Association to be
used for the relief of Jews in the occupied districts of Rumania and Serbia.
1918:
In Dixon, CA, Otto Oscar Dannenberg and Iceophine Elsie Zimmerman Dannenberg
gave birth to Mary Ottie Dannenberg, who became Mary Ottie Dannenberg Zacharia
when she married Ellsworth Jack Zacharias
1918:
A report today from Zurich stated that Jewish deputies succeed in persuading
the Austrian Government to abolish the prohibition against Yiddish
correspondence.
1918:
Colonel John Henry Patterson led the Jewish Legion, the unit he commanded on
parade down Whitechapel Road.
1919(22nd
of Adar I, 5679): Seventy-eight-year-old French neurologist Hippolyte Bernheim
passed away today in Paris.
1919(22nd
of Adar I, 5679): Royal Army Service Corps Private John Isaacs, the son of
Rosetta and Isaac Isaacs and the wife of Elizabeth Davis whom he had married at
the East London Synagogue in 1911 passed away today as a result of influenza.
1920:
Sculptor Frederick Victor Guinzburg, the New York City born son of Etta
Kleinert and Victor Guinzburg who was a member of the Federation of Jewish
Philanthropic Societies and Temple Emanu-El married Ruth Lev today.
1920:
The New Orleans Times-Picayune published an interview with Elizabeth
D.A. Cohen, the first practicing female physician in Louisiana, her 100th
birthday.
1921(14th
of Adar I, 5681): Purim Katan observed for the first time under President
Warren G. Harding.
1921:
The Tikvath Israel Society hosted “junior activities” at the center on Sumner
Avenue at the corner of Van Buren Street.
1921:
Soprano Mina Elman, the sister of Mischa Elman made her first appearance at
Aeolian Hall today giving a concert in which she sang songs in English, French,
Italian, German and Yiddish some of which were created “by her celebrated
brother.”
1922:
William Weinstone completed a stint as the executive Secretary as the Communist
Party of America which had begun in October of 1921 during which he used “he
pseudonym G.Lewis.”
1922:
In the South Bronx, Solomon and Lillian Baumol, Jewish immigrants from Eastern
Europe gave birth to economist William J. Baumol. (As reported by Patricia
Cohen)
1922:
Birthdate of Sammy Hershkovitz, the Romanian born Jew who made Aliyah at the
age of 2 and gained fame as Sammy Ofer, the Israeli international shipping
magnate, philanthropist and art collector who headed a family ranked as the
richest in Israel. (As reported by Isabel Kershner)
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/05/world/middleeast/05ofer.html?_r=0
1922
(24th of Shevat, 5682): Aaron David (A.D.) Gordon passed away. Gordon, a Hebrew
writer and philosopher of the “religion of Labor,” was considered the
ideological pillar of the kibbutz movement. Born in 1856 in Russia he only came
to Eretz Israel at the age of 48. Neither his age nor health impeded his drive
to work in agriculture. He helped found Kibbutz Degania in 1909. Gordon's
philosophy included a call to a return to “Nature.” He believed that the
self-improvement of each individual rather than external changes such as
espoused by Marxism was the way to change Jewish destiny.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/ad_gordon.html
1923:
“Earth Spirit” a silent film produced by Richard Oswald and written by Carl
Mayer was released in Germany today.
1923:
In Chicago, Max and Bertha Goldsmith gave birth real estate developer Bram
Goldsmith who “served as the chief executive of National City Bank from 1975 to
1995.”
1924:
It was reported today, King Hussein has appointed Dr. Faud Shatra who had
appeared before Congress during the debate on the British mandate for Palestine
as the representative of the anti-Zionist National Palestine League and
“protested against approval of the Palestine mandate” as his representative in
Washington.
1925:
In Pittsburgh, PA, Harry and Ida Barch Stern, Jewish immigrants from Poland and
Ukraine, gave birth to American poet Gerald Stern whose works have been
published The Pineys, Leaving Another Kingdom, and Odd Mercy
and who while married to Patricia Miller gave birth to a daughter Rachel, “a
nutrition therapist” and David, “an architect.”
http://digital.library.pitt.edu/islandora/object/pitt:US-PPiU-sc200704
1925(28th of Shevat, 5685):
Seventy-eight-year-old jeweler turned political leader Simeon Phillips, the son
of Solomon and Caroline Phillips who served in the legislature and as Mayor of
Dubbo and was the husband of Rosetta Phillips passed away today in his native
New South Wales, Australia.
1925(28th
of Shevat, 5685): Poet and author Mrs. Radcliffe N. Salomon (Nina David) passed
away
1926:
“In Washington, Pa, near Pittsburgh,” jewelry store owner Maurice York “and the
former Jesse Sachs, an aunt of David O. Selznick gave birth to Alan David
Yorkin who gained fame as director, producer and write Bud Yorkin who teamed up
with Norm Lear to form Tandem Productions which gave us many cutting-edge
sit-coms including All in the Family, Maude and Sanford and Son.
1926:
In Great Britain, a “well-known play producer” was reported to have “said he
judged his play not by first-night receptions, but by the attitude of Saturday
night audiences, which he estimated were nearly 75 per cent Jewish” and that
“the Jewish population of London were keen dramatic critics” who “had been of
tremendous service to the modern British drama.”
1926:
Ross Sterling, the owner and publisher of the Houston Post Dispatch, who is not
Jewish was reported today to have been donor of an unsolicited give of $5,000
gift to the United Jewish Campaign which is trying to raise fifteen million
dollars to alleviate the suffering of Jews living “in foreign lands.”
1926:
As of today, the new officers of the National Council of the Palestine
Foundation Fund were Samuel Untermyer, President; Morris Rothenberg, Chairman
of the directors and Rabbi Aaron M. Ashinsky of Pittsburgh, Vice Chairman of
the board.
1926:
“The United Jewish Campaign received word” today at its headquarter in the
Pershing Square building that a $50,000 quota for the $15,000,000 overseas
chest had been accepted a committee of Jews from North Dakota. (That’s right –
Jews in North Dakota!)
1926:
Pledges totaling $300,000 for the relief of Jews in Poland were made” today “at
a conference in the HIAS Building called by the Federation of Polish Jews in
America” whose President, Benjamin Winter “blamed the policy of the Polish
Government for the present distress among the Polish Jews.”
1927:
Birthdate of Franz Reheinberger who would be executed at the age of 17 for his
part in anti-Nazi activities.
1927:
In what became a minor scandal, Ivor Montagu, the grandson Samuel Montagu,
founder of the bank Samuel Montagu and Company and the son of Baron Louis
Montagu, married “Eileen – A Jewish divorced mother of one who went by the
nickname ‘Hell’” today.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/how-the-queen-of-england-got-involved-in-a-secret-jewish-wedding/
1927:
Birthdate of Inge Fisherova, who was deported from Prague in 1942 and was
eventually murdered in Auschwitz.
1928:
“To preserve the sanctity of orthodox Jewish burials, Senator A. Spencer Feld
and Assemblyman Harry A. Samberg, Democrats, of New York City, announced today
that they would introduce a bill banning” the requirement that would prevent
cemetery authorities from demanding that they receive 24 hour notice of a
burial.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1928/02/23/109854583.html?pageNumber=3
1928:
Isidore M. Knauer, alias Abraham Berger, 40 years old, married and a
naturalized citizen of the United States, returned yesterday on the French
liner Paris from Vienna in the custody of John P. Donlon, secretary of District
Attorney Banton, and Detective James L. Leech of the New York Police
Department.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1928/02/23/109854664.html?pageNumber=10
1929:
In New York City, “Rachel Gutman and real estate attorney Judah Wattenberg”
gave birth to Rebecca Ann Wattenberg, the sister of Ben J. Wattenberg “aunt of
journalist Daniel Wattenberg” who gained famed as actress Rebecca Schull, the
wife of Gene Schull.
1930:
U.S. premiere of “Slightly Scarlet,” a comedy direct by Edwin H. Knopf with a
script co-authored by Joseph L. Mankiewicz.
1930:
In Vienna, “Salomon Mischel, a businessman, and Lola Lea (Schreck) Mischel, who
ran the household gave birth to Walter Mishel, whose “family fled the Nazis in
1938” and settled in the United Sates, the ground-breaking psychologist. (As
reported by Benedict Carey)
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/14/obituaries/walter-mischel-dead.html
1931(5th
of Adar): Poet and novelist Menahem Mendel Dolitzky passed away today.
1932:
The United States marked the bicentennial of the birth of George Washington who
Rabbi de Sola Pool of the Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue had “praised” as “a
great liberator” and whom Rabbi Samuel Schulman while addressing his
congregation had “referred to a statement made in a treaty between the United
States and Tripoli in 1796 and signed by Washington that ‘the Government of the
United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion.”
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1932/02/23/105785489.html?pageNumber=20
1932:
“With Chief Judge Benjamin N. Cardozo of the Court of Appeals assured of
confirmation as an associate justice of the United States” the Governor of New
York “indicated tonight that he would promptly fill the vacancy on the State
bench.”
1932:
As America celebrates the 200th anniversary of the birth of George
Washington members of the Jewish National Fund of American are scheduled to
meet tonight at the Hotel Pennsylvania in New York “to hear speakers pay
tribute to Washington and to hear speakers discuss” plans for creating “an
evergreen memorial of 500,000 pine and eucalyptus trees” which “will be planted
in Palestine as a living tribute” by “the Jews of America to the first
President.”
1932:
In New York, Chief Judge Benjamin N. Cardozo is scheduled to speak on
“Washington, the Constitution Builder” during the Bicentennial celebration at
Chancellor’s Hall.
1933:
Birthdate of Gideon Patt, a Sabra who served in the Nahal Brigade, earned a BA
from NYU before pursuing a career in politics that included service in the
Knesset and several cabinet posts.
1933:
Adolf Hitler made his private para-military units, the SS and the SS, part of
Germany’s police force.
1934:
U.S premiere of “It Happened One Night” an all-time classic comedy written by
Robert Riskin for which he won the Oscar and co-produced Harry Cohn
1934:
During his eulogy today at the funeral of Rabbi Hyman Gerson Enelow in Chicago,
David Philipson said, “If there was one trait that characterized Hymen G.
Enelow above all other, it was his love of learning for its own sake.
1934:
“The Jewish newspaper IF” published a photograph by Herbert Sonnenfeld of “a
model portraying two different periods in Eretz Israel: a typical home in Tel
Aviv in 1934, and ten years earlier.”
http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/this_month/february/02.asp
1934:
Bishop Hermann Wilhelm Berning of Osnabrück ordered all churches in his diocese
to display the Nazi’s swastika flag on patriotic occasions alongside standard
church flags.
1935:
“The Whole Town’s Talk” a crime comedy written by Jo Swerling and Robert Riskin
and starring Edward G. Robinson was released in the United States today.
1935:
“After Office Hours” directed by Robert Z. Leonard who co-produced the film
with Bernard H. Hyman which was written by Herman J. Mankiewicz was released
today in the United States.
1936(29th
of Shevat, 5695): Parashat Mishpatim and Shabbat Shekalim
1936:
“The third annual observance of Brotherhood Day” sponsored by the Conference of
Jews and Christians began today.
1936:
It was announced today that 27 undergraduates have been appointed second
lieutenants in the City College R.O.T.C. unit including Leonard Aaronson,
Irving Levitan and Lester S. Perlman.
1936:
It was reported today that in Poland Senators “suggested that the government
should communicate with international Zionist organizations and arrange an
immigration quota for Poland” which would be a way of ridding the country of
one million of its three and one half million Jews.
1936:
This morning Arturo Toscanini accepted an invitation to conduct the opening
concert of the newly organized Palestine Symphony Orchestra on next October 24
at Tel-Aviv.
1937(11th
of Adar, 5697): Seventy-three-year-old Dr. Maxmillian Reiner, “a founder of the
Czech-Jewish Movement” and an active member of “Sokol, the national gymnastic
and educational organization” passed away today in Prague.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1937/02/24/99107164.pdf
1937(11th
of Adar, 5697): Sixty-seven-year-old Astronomer J. Ernest G. Yalden who spent
25 years directing a “trade school funded by the Trustees of the Baron de
Hirsch Fund passed away
1938:
“After warning that he would be ‘tactless’ in his remarks, Stanley M. Isaacs,
Borough President of Manhattan, told 1,750 teachers attending the 11th
anniversary of the Jewish Teachers Association at the Hotel Commodore” today
“that he could see no reason for the existence of their organization”
1939:
As part of the annual observance of Brotherhood Week, “ceremonies honoring the
memory of Roger Williams the founder of Rhode Island” and one of “the first to
preach the gospel of tolerance in the New World” were held in front of his bust
in the Hall of Fame on the campus of NYU by members of Zeta Beta Tau, which
included an address by B. Leo Schwartz, a benediction by Rabbi Augustus Loeb
and wreath laying by James R. Katzman.
1940:
During the period known as “The Phony War” Jean Giraudoux, the Commissioner of
Information warned the French people in a radio talk tonight that Germany does
not ask for colonies in Asia and Africa because she wants to colonize her
neighbors in Europe which means that if the Germans are victorious, France will
share the fate of Poland.
1940:
General Maxime Weygand, the head of French forces in the Near East, and General
Sir Archibald P. Wavell, the head of French forces in the Near East, met in
Palestine today to discuss how to coordinate efforts with the Turkish
Government which is neutral in the war between the Allies and the Axis.
1940:
It was reported today that “Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt has consented to head of
special advisory committee for the youth Aliyah movement represented in the
United States by Hadassah,” the women’s Zionist organization led by its
President, Mrs. David de Sola Pool who has the support of Mrs. Herbert H.
Lehman, Mrs. Roger W. Straus and Mrs. Felix M. Warburg in the formation of this
committee.
1941(27th
of Shevat, 5701): Parashat Mishpatim; Shabbat Shekalim
1941:
In Paris, Theodore Dannecker, the SS officer in charge of bringing the Final
Solution to France reported approvingly that “The French inspectors formed and
instructed in collaboration with our section for Jewish affairs today
constitute an elite body as well as training cadres for Frenchmen to be drafted
in the future to the anti-Jewish police.” The “French inspectors” worked
for the agency that “transferred” the over 20,000 Jewish businesses into the
hands of Frenchmen sympathetic to the Third Reich. “The anti-Jewish
police” referred to the Frenchmen who would round up French Jews and ship them
off to the death camps.
1941:
The Nazi SS began rounding up Jews of Amsterdam.
1941:
Today’s New Yorker magazine called stockbroker and New York Stock Exchange
Member James B. “Jimmie” Seligman “one of the wittiest men on the Floor.”
1942(5th
of Adar, 5702): In Brazil, author Stefan Zwieg and his second wife Lotte (née
Charlotte Elisabeth Altmann) committed suicide together in Petrópolis using the
barbiturate Verol. Filled with a sense of despair at the future of Europe and
its culture, he wrote, "I think it better to conclude in good time and in
erect bearing a life in which intellectual labor meant the purest joy and
personal freedom the highest good on earth."
http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-features/1.637453
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive/pdf?res=9802E4DB113BE33BBC4C51DFB4668389659EDE
1942: Wanda Landowska performed Bach's Goldberg
Variations at New York City's Town Hall. It was the first 20th-century
performance of this work on the harpsichord. The Polish born Jewess who sought
refuge from the Nazis first in France and then the United States is credited
with reviving harpsichord music in the 20th century,
1942:
U.S. premiere of “The Adventures of Martin Eden,” the cinema version of the
novel Martin Eden produced by Samuel Bronston and B.P. Schulberg.
1942:
Lord Moyne completed his service as Secretary of State for the Colonies. Moyne
was a close personal friend of Churchill, who as Deputy Resident Minister of
State in Cairo took part in the interrogation of Joel Brand when a response was
being crafted to Eichmann’s “Blood for Truck” proposal. Moyne would be
murdered by Lehi in 1944.
1943(17th
of Adar 1, 5703): At Auschwitz, the Nazis murdered Communist Party member and
anti-Fascist fighter Dagobert Biermann, the father of singer-song writer Karl
Wolf Bierman.
1943:
For the next six days, 10,000 more Jews were deported to Chelmno. All were
gassed to death.
1943:
“An agreement was signed between the special Nazi envoy sent to facilitate the
deportations, Theodor Dannecker and the Bulgarian Commissar for Jewish Affairs,
Alexander Belev for the deportation of 20,000 Jews (12,000 from Macedonia and
Thrace and 8,000 – from the old territory of Bulgaria).”
1943:
Bulgaria agreed to allow the Germans to deport 11,000 Jews. Horrible
overcrowding conditions existed in the 20 trains that would transport them.
Each day the trains stopped to dump the bodies of those who died during the
journey.
1943:
Italians countermanded German orders to deport French Jews. Three days later
Ribbentrop complained to Mussolini that "Italian military circles . . . lacked a
proper understanding of the Jewish question."
1943:
“Sophie Scholl, her brother Hans and their friend Christoph Probst were found
guilty of treason and condemned to death by head judge of the court Roland
Freisler. They were beheaded by executioner Johann Reichhart in the
Munich-Stadelheim prison only a few hours later at 17:00. The execution was
supervised by Dr. Walter Roemer who was the enforcement chief of the Munich
district court. Prison officials emphasized the courage with which she walked
to her execution.” This trio was part of a small number of genuine anti-Nazi
Germans who had worked to bring down the regime.
1943:
“Allied military forces marched through the crowded streets of Jerusalem, Tel
Aviv and Haifa today as part of the celebrations of Red Army Day.” [The Red
Army referred to is the Soviet Army which was doing the brunt of the fighting
against the Germans.]
1943:
Birthdate of Elliot Rabinowitz who gained fame as music manager and businessman
Elliot Roberts who partnered with David Geffen to “create Asylum Records.”
1944:
Professor Selig Brodestky, president of the Board of British Jews led a
delegation that met with the Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs with whom they
discussed “the possibility of Britain establishing a War Refugee Board similar
to that recently created by President Roosevelt.”
1944:
Dr. Leonardo De Benedetti, Physician and Surgeon and Dr. Primo Levi, Chemist
“left the concentration camp at Fossoli di Carpi with a convoy of 650 Jews of
both sexes and all ages. They did not know that the trip would end four days
later in Auschwitz.
1945(9th
of Adar, 5705): Osip Maksimovich Brik “a Russian Avant Garde writer and
literary critic, who was one of the most important members of the Russian
formalist school, though he also identified himself as one of the Futurists,”
passed away.
1945:
In Boston, businessman Samuel Tannenbaum and the former Gertrude Leaman gave
birth to Rena Meryl Tannenbaum who gained fame as publisher Rena Wolner.
1945(9th
of Adar, 5705): Seventy-two-year-old engineer Abel Morris Bienenfeld, the San
Francisco born son of Bertha Kunreuther and Elias Bienenfeld and the husband of
Adelheid Bienenfeld who, before and during the Spanish-American War “engaged in
the reconstruction of warships subsequently were used by Admiral Dewey at
Manila” and who was engaged in the construction of railroads in California,
Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, passed away today.
1946:
The Palmach attacked the Police Tegart fort at Shefa 'Amr with a 200-pound
bomb; in the firefight that followed, the Palmach suffered casualties
1946:
The British said today that three members of armed Jewish bands had been killed
during the series of night attacks on Palestine mobile police camps in which
dynamite charges damaged several buildings, vehicles and other facilities last
night.
1947:
Birthdate of Israeli man of letters Yehonatan Geffen, the native of Nhalal who
is the nephew of Moshe Dayan and the father of Aviv, Shira and Natasha Geffen.
1948
As the conflict over the coming partition of Palestine grew, three car bombs
arranged by Arab irregulars exploded on Ben Yehudah Street killing 52 Jewish
civilians and leaving 123 injured. This was part of the war waged by the Arabs
between the partition vote in November, 1947 and the end of the Mandate in
1948. In the meantime, the international community did nothing then or
later to enforce its decision to make Jerusalem a city to be governed by an
international body.
1948:
The Golani Brigade, one of Israeli’s most elite infantry brigades was
formed.
1949:
“The executive committee of the United Palestine Appeal voted tonight, after
five hours of debate, to set up a committee that is to meet in a few days with
Henry Morgenthau Jr. in an effort to reach a settlement of the issue caused by
the opposition of one element to the designation of Henry Montor as executive
director of the 1949 United Jewish Appeal.”
1949:
On the Isle of Rhodes, “an especially well-informed source declared tonight”
that “the success or failure of the Egyptian-Israeli armistice negotiations
hangs entirely on the fate of Beersheba
1950: “A major
trade showing of imported giftwares made in handicraft shops in Israel”
“sponsored by the Palestine Galleries for Arts and Crafts” continued for a
third day the Pierre Hotel in New York City
1951:
Birthdate of Ellen Greene, the Brooklyn born daughter of a guidance counselor
and dentist who has enjoyed a multi-dimensional career performing in
nightclubs, on Broadway, in films and television programs including Law and
Order, The X Files and Miami Vice.
1952:
“The Belle of New York” produced by Arthur Freed was released in the United
States today.
1955:
“State Department spokesman Robert McCloskey declined to comment today on
Egyptian press reports that President Nasser…has threated a preventive war
against Israel if Israel tested a nuclear weapon” on the same day that U.S.
State Department officials greeted a delegation led by Anwar El Sadat, speaker
of the Egyptian National Assembly at Dulles International Airport. (As reported by JTA)
1958:
Egypt and Syria announced that they were joining together in a new nation, The
United Arab Republic. The UAR was supposed to be the first step in the
creation of giant Pan Arab Nation. The Israelis were concerned because
the two enemies now were going to have a one military command which made
coordinated military actions against the Jewish state a potentially destructive
reality. The UAR would collapse three years later as the Syrians grew
disgusted with the Egyptian attempts to dominate the relationship. This
would not be the first or last time that charismatic leader would try to form a
Super Arab and/or Super Moslem state.
1958:
In East Meadow, New York, Leon Greenberg, “an executive for New York’s Century
Theatres movie chain” and his wife Shirley gave birth to playwright Richard
Greenberg who won the Tony Award in 2003 for “Take Me Out.”
1958(2nd
of Adar, 5718): Parashat Terumah
1958(2nd
of Adar, 5718): Seventy-five-year-old Russian native Harry Shulman, the
merchant who in 1905 came to Chicago after which he moved to Iowa City passed
away today after which he was buried at the Agudas Achim cemetery which was the
final resting place for his wife Anna.
https://peoplelegacy.com/harry_shulman-6b5b6F
1959(14th
of Adar I, 5719): Purim Katan
1959:
At the Pilgrim Church of New York, Reverend John Walter Houck preached his last
sermon at service during with “a gift was presented to him by the Bronx County
Council of Jewish War Veterans in commemoration of his work in furthering the
cause of Americanism in New York City” and at which “Rabbi Maurice J. Bloom of
Tremont Temple pronounced the
benediction for a clergyman known for his “successful struggle against the
cancer of intolerance and discrimination…”
TimesMachine: February 23, 1959 - NYTimes.com
1959:
Tonight, in Los Angeles, Mrs. Moishe S Cahan of New Orleans, the head of the
National Council of Jewish Women, “urged the government to stimulate employment
and economic growth by expanding it socially valuable activities in education,
housing, welfare and recreation.”
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1959/02/23/89155289.html?pageNumber=14
1960:
David Susskind produced “A Very Special Baby” this week’s “Play of the Week”
co-starring Marion Winters as “Anna” and Larry Blyden as “Joey.”
1961:
“Come Blow Your Horn” Neil Simon’s first play opened “on Broadway at the Brooks
Atkinson Theatre.
1964:
Final performance of “The Passion of Josef D.” written by Paddy Chayefsky at
the Ethel Barrymore Theatre.
1964(9th
of Adar I, 5724): Ninety-year-old Samuel Earl “Ike” Samuels who played briefly
for the St. Louis Browns before pursuing a career in dentistry and insurance
sales passed away today in New York City.
1964:
In Camden, London, economist Sam Aranovitch and his wife gave birth toe to
author and screenwriter Ben Dylan Aaronovitch, the brother of actor Owen
Aaronvitch and journalist David Aaronovitch.
1965(20th
of Adar I, 5725): Felix Frankfurter, Supreme Court Justice passed away.
Born in 1882, Frankfurter was involved in various liberal and unpopular causes
including the defense of Sacco and Venzeti. He was a professor at Harvard
Law School. Many of his students went to work in FDR’s new deal and they
were known as “Frankfurters” (for their teacher not the hot dog). When
FDR appointed him to the bench, Frankfurter was the third Jew to serve on the
High Court.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/frankfurter.html
1966:
“Promise Her Anything” directed by Arthur Hiller with a title song by Burt
Bacharach and Hal David which had been released in the previous November in the
United Kingdom was released today in the United States.
1968(23rd
of Shevat, 5728): Sixty-two year old Hoboken, NJ, born and Columbia trained
attorney Burton A Zorn, a labor lawyer, partner in the prestigious law firm of
Proskauer, Rose, Goetz and Mendelsohn and “chairman of the American Jewish
Committee’s civil rights section who raised two children – Stephen and Karen –
with his wife Fay passed away today.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1968/02/23/77172613.pdf
1969(4th
of Adar, 5729): Parashat Terumah
1969(4th
of Adar, 5729): Seventy-two-year-old WW I U.S. Navy veteran and NYU Law school
grad, Benjamin Jacob Rabin, the U.S. Congressman and Justice of the New York
Supreme Court who was the husband of Syd Sobel Rabin passed away today in
Florida.
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/benjamin-rabin
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/6423725/benjamin-j_-rabin
1970(16th
of Adar I, 5730): Sixty-eight-year-old Vilna native and Brooklyn Law School
graduate Charles Abrams who became a major force in the field of urban planning
passed away today.
1971(27th
of Shevat, 5731): Fifty-six year old New York native David “Dynamite Dave”
Smulker the all-star Temple University fullback who as a member of the NFL’s
Philadelphia Eagles played in the first televised professional game in 1939
passed away today.
1971:
Birthdate of Arnon Grunberg, the Dutch born author of Blue Mondays which won
the Dutch prize “for the best debut novel” and whose mother survived Auschwitz
1972:
Paul Grüninger, the Swiss police official who save thousands of Jews following
the Anschluss died in poverty today.
http://www.jfr.org/pages/rescuer-support/stories/switzerland-/-paul-gruninger
http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/righteous/stories/grueninger.asp
1973:
In New York, premiere of “Charlotte’s Web” an animated feature film version of
a children’s novel by the same time with music by Richard M. and Robert B.
Sherman and sons by Irwin Kostal.
1973:
“Walking Tall,” a biopic with music by Walter Scharft and directed by Phil
Karlson whose father was Jewish was released in the United States today.
1974:
Today “Jewish activists Mark Abramovich and Yakov Schwartzman (Kishinev),
Leonid Bendersky (Tiraspol) and Sender Levinson (Bendery) were arrested in
Kishinev after staging a hunger strike near the Central Post Office.”
1975(11th
of Adar I, 5735): Fifty-six-year-old Samuel Bihari, one of the four brothers
who founded Modern Records and helped to create a “sanitized” form of rock and
roll for the mass market of the 1950’s passed away today.
1977(4th
of Adar, 5737): Sixty-two-year-old Avery Berlow, the Boston born holder of
Columbia Ph.D. and author of eight books passed away today while serving as a
“professor of finance at the University of North Carolina” in Chapel Hill, NC.
https://www.nytimes.com/1977/02/23/archives/avery-berlow-cohan-62-a-professor-of-finance.html
1981(18th
of Adar I, 5741): Eighty-one-year-old Curtis Bernhardt who worked as movie
director in Germany under the name of Kurt Bernhardt before fleeing Nazi
Germany and pursuing his career in France, England and finally the United
States, passed away today.
1981(18th
of Adar I, 5741): Seventy-five-year-old Austrian born American historian Saul
K. Padover whose works include biographies on Karl Marx, Joseph II of Austria,
Louis XVI, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and Thomas Jefferson passed away
today.
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/02/24/obituaries/dr-saul-k-padover-author-dead-at-75.html
1982:
New York City Mayor Ed Koch announced his plans to run for governor of New
York. The campaign would be a failure.
1982(29th
of Shevat): Legendary DJ Murray "the K" Kaufman, called the 5th
Beatle by some, passed away at the age of 60.
1984(19th
of Adar I, 5744): Eighty-seven year old mathematician and WW II codebreaker
Maxwell Herman Alexander “Max” Newman passed away today in Cambridge.
http://history.computer.org/pioneers/newman-mha.html
1985(1st
of Adar, 5745): Rosh Chodesh
1985
(1st of Adar, 5745): Violinist Efrem A Zimbalist passed away at the
age of 95.. Born in Russia, Zimbalist was one of long line of violin
virtuosos that included Jascha Heifitz, Yehudi Menuhin and Isaac
Stern. Many of you may recognize this name with the word
"Junior" after it. Zimbalist’s son was a minor matinee idol in
television and movies who was not Jewish. (As reported by Tim Page)
http://www.nytimes.com/1985/02/23/arts/efrem-zimbalist-violinist-dies-at-94.html?pagewanted=print
1986(13th
of Adar I, 5746): Soviet Poet Boris Slutsky passed away.
http://forward.com/articles/143708/more-moses-than-job/
1987(23rd
of Shevat): David Susskind passed away at the age of 66. Susskind is best
remembered for his pioneering role in late night television. Susskind
hosted a show called Open End, where guests from a variety of walks of life
actually discussed issues of the day without a script and with
civility. (As reported by Robert D. McFadden)
1988:
It was reported today that 28 year old “Cheryl Bentov, the American-born wife
of a former major in Israeli military intelligence” is “the mysterious blond
woman who lured former Israeli nuclear technician Mordechai Vanunu out of
Britain in September 1986 to eventually face trial for espionage and treason in
Jerusalem.”
1989:
At a benefit for the Dance Library of Israel, an international dance library
and archive in Tel Aviv, Marge Champion presented an award to Agnes de Mille.
The presentation took place at a dinner that preceded a benefit performance of
“Jerome Robbin’s Broadway.”
1989:
“Different Trains,” a three-movement piece for string quartet and tape written
by Steve Reich in 1988 won a Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Classical
Composition.
1990:
A funeral is scheduled to be held this evening in Manhattan for fifty-nine year
old Kenyon College graduate and producer Gabriel Katzka, the Brooklyn born son
of attorney and Broadway show backer Emil Katzka.
1991:
"Underground," a new work by the Israeli playwright Joshua Sobol,
directed by Adrian Hall, has its world premiere at the Yale Repertory Theater
today, co-directed by Adrian Hall.
1991:
“He Said, She Said,” a comedy directed by Marisa Silver was released in the
United States today,
1992(18th
of Adar I 5752): Avot Yeshurun, an Israeli poet who wove Arabic and Yiddish
idiom into a unique and influential form of Hebrew verse, passed away today at
the age of 88. No cause of death was given by his family, which announced his
death. Born in Ukraine as Yehiel Perlmutter, Mr. Yeshurun made aliyah in 1925,
worked as a laborer and began publishing poetry. His family perished in the
Holocaust. After Israel was established in 1948, Mr. Yeshurun was one of its
first literary figures to acknowledge the plight of the uprooted Palestinians.
He saw the Palestinians and the Jews of Europe as having endured a common
tragedy, and sought to fuse their experience in the language of his poetry.
Although long ignored by the establishment, Mr. Yeshurun was highly regarded by
younger poets. His stature was formally recognized a month ago when he was
awarded the Israel Prize.
1992:
Barry Diller resigns as CEO of FOX Television Network.
1992:
American diplomat Josiah W. Bennett who as a member of the Foreign Service
headed the United States Information Service in Tel Aviv passed away.
(Bennett was not Jewish)
1993:
Journalist Ken Auletta, the son of
an Italian-American father and a Jewish-American mother, was among the first to
popularize the idea of the so-called "information superhighway" with
today’s New Yorker profile of Barry
Diller, in which he described how Diller, the San Francisco born Jewish media
mogul, used his Apple PowerBook to anticipate the advent of the Internet and
our digital future.
1993:
New York Judge Judith Kaye is nominated by then-governor Mario Cuomo to become
the first female Chief Judge of the New York State Court of Appeals.
1997(15th
of Adar I, 5757): Parashat Tetzaveh
1997(15th
of Adar I, 5757): Sixty-eight-year-old Albert Shanker the New York born,
University Illinois trained math teacher who became an increasingly aggressive
proponent for teachers and public education as he went from the Presidency of
the United Federation of Teachers and to the leadership of the American
Federation of Teachers.
1998:
The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of
special interest to Jewish readers including the recently released paperback
editions of Love Invents Us by Amy Bloom and Ira Gershwin: The Art of
the Lyricist by Philip Furia.
1998(26th
of Shevat, 5758): Distinguished Democratic politician and government official,
Abraham Ribicoff passed away. Ribicoff was Governor of Connecticut,
Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare under John Kennedy and U.S. Senator
from 1963 until 1981.
1999(6th
of Adar, 5759): Nobel Prize winner Gertrude Elion passed away.
http://www.achievement.org/autodoc/page/eli0bio-1
1999(6th
of Adar, 5759): Nine days after his 81st birthday Wisconsin native
Lewis B. “Lew” Hamity, the University of Chicago and Chicago Bears running back
who “served in the U.S. Armed Services during World War II and then became a
salesman for Phil Maid Lingerie before purchasing Mapes and Sprowl Steel,
serving first as president, then as chairman” passed away today.
2000:
The Jewish Museum San Francisco unveiled a design by the Berlin-based architect
Daniel Libeskind who is best known creating the new Jewish Museum in Berlin.
2001:
Funeral services are scheduled to be held today for Eva H. Meyer, the wife of
Manfred Meyer and mother of David and Paulette Meyer whose support of Yeshiva
University included providing funds for the publication of a biography about
her father Rabbi Jacob Hoffman z’l that included a description of the
development of the religious Zionist movement in pre-war Germany.
2002(20th
of Adar I, 5762): A Fatah terrorist murdered 45-year-old Valery Ahmir “in a
drive-by shooting.”
2002:
Today, University of Toledo basketball and baseball player Murray Guttman “was
inducted into the schools Varity ‘T’ Hall of Fame.”
https://utrockets.com/hof.aspx?hof=83
https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=guttma001mur
2003(20th
of Adar I, 5763): Ninety-year-old Oscar winning screenwriter Daniel Taradash
passed away today.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/27/obituaries/27TARA.html
2003:
An International Conference hosted by the Dubnow Institute on “Transforming
Religious and Ethnic Emblematics of Judaism and Jewishness” began today.
2004(30th
of Shevat, 5764): Rosh Chodesh Adar
2004(30th
of Shevat, 5764): Israel Ilan Avisidris, 41, of Jerusalem; Lior Azulai, 18, of
Jerusalem; Yaffa Ben-Shimol, 57, of Jerusalem; Rahamim Doga, 38, of Mevasseret
Zion; Yehuda Haim, 48, of Givat Ze'ev;Netanel Havshush, 20, of Jerusalem; Yuval
Ozana, 32, of Jerusalem and Benaya Yehonatan Zuckerman, 18, of Jerusalem were
murdered today and 60 other people were injured when an Arab terrorist blew up
Egged bus #14 in Jerusalem during the Second Intifada.
2004: A suicide bomber
attacked a bus in the center of Jerusalem, killing 8 people and wounding 70.
The Palestinian terrorist group Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades claimed
responsibility.
2005(13th
of Adar I, 5765): Ninety-six-year-old Trude Rittman, the German-Jewish American
arranger of Broadway hits including Carousel and Sound of Music passed away
today. (As reported by Wolfgang Saxon)
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B04EFD6163CF933A25750C0A9639C8B63
http://articles.latimes.com/2005/mar/12/local/me-passings12.3
2005(13th
Adar I, 5765): Ninety-four-year-old French film actress Simone Simon who was
“the daughter of Henri Louis Firmin Champmoynat, a French Jewish engineer and
airplane pilot in World War II, who died in a concentration camp” passed away
today.
http://www.altfg.com/blog/actors/simone-simon/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/4291269.stm
2006:
The Liberal Party appointed Irwin Cotler Critic for Public Safety and Emergency
Preparedness in the opposition shadow cabinet for the 39th Canadian Parliament.
“Cotler's wife, Ariela, is a native of Jerusalem and worked as a legislative
assistant to the Likud members of the Israeli Knesset from 1967 to 1979.”
2006:
French President Jacques Chirac and his prime minister attended a synagogue
memorial ceremony for a Jewish man who was kidnapped, tortured and killed.
2006(24th
of Shevat, 5766): Hilde Palm (née Löwenstein) the daughter of German Jewish
lawyer Eugene Lowenstein, who wrote under the pseudonym Hilde Domin creating
such works as the poetry anthology “The Tree Blossoms Nevertheless” passed away
today.
2006(24th
of Shevat, 5766): Bernie Weisberg, former
national director of Young Judea and the Labor Zionist Alliance, passed away at
the age of 82 (As reported by Anthony Weiss)
http://forward.com/articles/1108/bernie-weisberg-labor-zionist/
2007:
“Israel's prime minister, Ehud Olmert,” said “that the Iranians, though not
where they wanted to be, were much farther down the path to learning how to
make bomb-grade uranium than Israel was comfortable with” while dodging
“questions concerning the point at which Israel might lean toward military
action, a step American officials have said that they are trying to discourage
2008:
The Jerusalem Post reported that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has
established an unprecedented high-level government task force charged with
fundamentally altering the Israel-Diaspora relationship.
2008:
Israeli officials rejected Arab complaints that they are not committed to a
two-state solution for Israel and Palestine. Furthermore, these officials
stated that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert had responded positively to the Arab
League initiative as a basis for negotiations.
2008:
Sarah Chayes, the daughter of Abram Chayes and award winning reporter for
National Public Radio “was a guest on PBS's Bill Moyers Journal” today.
2009:
In a move intended to improve its relationship with the new wave of Jewish
immigrants from the former Soviet Union, the Hebrew Free Burial Association
hosted a Russian-Jewish Community event. Established in 1888, HFBA is one of
the oldest and largest free burial associations serving the New York Jewish
Community.
2009: Music of the Sephardic Diaspora is the focus of a
concert in the new Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center when celebrated viola da
gambist Jordi Savall and early music ensemble Hespèrion XXI present Diáspora
Sefardí: From Medieval Spain to the Eastern Mediterranean.
2009: Agudas Achim conducts the first ever Early Passover Pallet Sale
in eastern Iowa making it possible for those living in the Iowa City-Cedar
Rapids Corridor to buy unique “Kosher for Passover “items including Chocolate
Seder Plates, at “discount prices.”
2009:
The New York Times features a review of A Hidden Life: A Memoir of August 1969 by Johanna Reiss
who had won a Newberry Award a quarter of a century ago for The Upstairs
Room, her story of survival as a ten-year-old hiding from the Nazis in
occupied Holland.
2009:
The now-daily rocket attacks by Gaza terrorists against southern Israel
resumed today with the launch of a Kassam rocket at the Sha'ar HaNegev
region and a mortar attack fired at IDF troops near the Kissufim Crossing
2009:
Duke Blue Devil guard Jon Scheyer scored a then-career-high 30 points against
Wake Forest
2009(28th
of Shevat, 5769): Howard Zieff, the commercial
director and ad photographer who stuffed an actor with spicy meatballs in a
memorable Alka-Seltzer spot and used an American Indian in print ads to
convince people “You don’t have to be Jewish to love Levy’s real Jewish Rye,”
then went on to direct movie comedies, passed away today at the age of 81. (As
reported by Dennis Hevesi)
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/25/movies/25zieff.html
2010:
The Knesset "approved a law instructing the Israeli Government to protect
the rights of Jewish refugees from Arab counties in all forthcoming peace
negotiations; the first Israeli law to recognize Jews as coming to Israel not
only to fulfill Zionist aspirations, but as refugees
2010:
The Jewish Studies Program at Tulane University
under the leadership of Dr. Brian Horowitz and the Center for Cultural Judaism
are scheduled to present a program entitled “The Jewish Question as the Arab
Question: The Lost Voice of Simon Rawidowicz” at Tulane’s Uptown Campus in New
Orleans, LA.
2010:
National police headquarters issued an order today
to cease the delivery of mail throughout Israel following the discovery of what
is believed to be a package bomb at a post office in Migdal Haemek
2010:
Army Radio reported today that The Palestinian
Authority handed a Kassam rocket made in a West Bank village to Israeli
authorities last week. According to the report, PA security forces found the
rocket ready to be launched towards central Israel.
2010:
Israel's ice dancing team at the Winter Olympics
finished in 10th place. Roman and Alexandra Zaretsky performed to music from
"Schindler's List" in the free dance tonight at the Pacific Coliseum
in Vancouver, Canada. The brother-and-sister duo earned a score of 90.64 in the
free dance, and a score of 180.26 over-all. The music was chosen in part as a
tribute to 27 family members that died in Minsk, Belarus during the Holocaust,
the Jewish Chronicle reported.
2010:
Israeli archaeologists said today that they've
discovered an unusually shaped 1,400-year-old wine press that was exceptionally
large and advanced for its time. The octagonal press measures 21 feet by 54
feet (6.5 by 16.5 meters) and was discovered in southern Israel, about 40
kilometers south of both Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.
2010(8th of Adar, 5770): Rabbi Menachem
Porush, a long-serving Knesset member and father of current Deputy Education
Minister Meir Porush, died in Jerusalem today at the age of 94. Porush, a
seventh generation descendent of Lithuanian immigrants, sat in the Knesset for
35 years until 1994 and remained politically active until his death. The son of
a deputy mayor of Jerusalem, Porush entered politics through journalism,
working as a writer and editor for religious newspapers for two decades until
his election to the Knesset in 1959. "He was a great Jew. He was like one
of the stone of the Wailing Wall in the Holy City, Jerusalem," President
Shimon Peres said. "Menachem my friend, you were full of vision and hope
for the future of the Jewish nation. You loved the nation and worked to unify
it. You stood as a bridge between its parts.
2010(8th of Adar, 5770): Steffi
Sidney-Splaver, who began a career as an actress and then gave up acting to
become a Hollywood writer, publicist and producer, passed away today at the age
of 74.
2011:
Member of Knesset Danny Danon. The Deputy Knesset
Speaker, Chairman of the Immigration, Absorption and Diaspora Affairs Committee
and of World Likud is scheduled to give an address at The OU Israel Center in
Jerusalem.
2011: The Round Up, a “drama that
tackles the controversial subject of French collusion in the atrocities of the
Holocaust” is scheduled to be shown at the Atlanta Jewish Film Festival.
2011: At the Jerusalem International Book Fair, Galaade Editions
and ITHl are scheduled to present: “Sisters, not enemies: Telling the story of
Jews and Arabs in Israel in another voice.”
2011: Israel Philharmonic Orchestra is scheduled to perform at
Carnegie Hall.
2011:
Israel conducted a successful test of the Arrow 2
ballistic missile defense system off the coast of California early this
morning, when it destroyed a target simulating an Iranian ballistic missile
2011: Rham Emanuel was elected Mayor of Chicago today, making
him the first Jew to hold this position.
2011:
Montreal's city council has condemned the boycott
campaign against a local shoe store that sells footwear made in Israel. A
council motion deploring the campaign, proposed and supported by Mayor Gerard
Tremblay, passed today by a vote of 38 to 16. (As reported by JTA)
2011(18th of Adar, 5771): George
Einstein, a cousin, contemporary and occasional companion of Albert Einstein
who was a successful inventor and businessman in his own right passed away at
the age of 91.
http://www.nwfdailynews.com/articles/sandestin-38619-dies-wednesday.html
2011: Sue Fishkoff described the role of the Jewish community in
the conflict between Wisconsin’s Governor Walker and public sector employees.
2011:
Nearly 100 orthodox North American rabbis signed a
letter demanding of Interior Minister Eli Yishai to “rectify the injustice
being done to our converts, ourselves and the Jewish people” and “insure that
those individuals whom we convert will automatically be eligible for aliyah as
they have been in the past.”
2011:
In an effort to curb the trend of Orthodox converts
from abroad not being recognized by Israel for citizenship, the Jewish Agency
today appealed the Interior Ministry for a more dominant role in identifying
established Diaspora communities as such.
2012: “Ahead of Time: The Extraordinary Journey of Ruth Gruber” is
scheduled to be shown at Temple Beth Sholom Idelson Library in Sarasota, FL.
2012: In London, Chochana Boukhobza is scheduled to discuss “The
Third Day” a novel about two cellists who travel to Jerusalem for a concert, as
part of Jewish Book Week.
2012: In London, Rod Arad is scheduled to talk about his passion
for marrying unconventional forms with unexpected functions and the sources of
his unbridled creativity during Jewish Book Week.
2012: Publication of “The Jewish Community of Harbin, China”
http://audreyfm.wordpress.com/tag/prof-dan-ben-canaan/
2012:
Iran may develop inter-continental missiles that can
reach the east coast of the United States in two to three years, Finance
Minister Yuval Steinitz said in a CNBC interview today
2012: Israel Beiteinu will propose an alternative to the Tal Law
by which "everyone will serve the state," Foreign Minister Avigdor
Liberman said today.
2012(29th of Shevat, 5772): Eighty-six-year-old Mark
Shulman the husband of Margaret Shulman
2013:
The Israeli Opera’s Meitar Opera Studio is scheduled to present The Operas of
Donizetti at the Eden Tamir Music Center
2013:
In Springfield, VA, Congregation Adat Reyim is scheduled to host a wine and
cheese reception along with a Shabbat Folk Service “celebrating the anniversary
of Debbie Friedman’s birth.”
2013:
Palestinian protests in Jerusalem and the West Bank turned violent today, with
demonstrators throwing stones at Israeli security forces at several locations.
2013:
After nine seasons and 197 original episodes CBS broadcast the last episode of
CSI:NY, a cerebral crime fighting program created by Carol Mendelsohn and for which Jerry Bruckheimer served as
executive producer.
2014:
In Iowa City, Hillel under the leadership of Director Jerry Sorkin, is
scheduled to host its annual fundraising concert featuring University of Iowa
School of Music faculty members, Kenneth Tse (saxophone), Alan Huckleberry
(piano), and Scott Conklin (violin), along with a quartet of School of Music
graduate students.
2014:
The DPJCC's 14th Annual Jewish Film Festival is scheduled to close with the
showing of “Orchestra of Exiles.”
2014:
Friends and family of Cyndie Birchansky, whose accomplishments include three
really neat children, look forward to celebrating her natal day.
2014:
The Red Door is scheduled to host “Waiting Room” an evening curated by Leah
Wolff and Guy Ben-Ari.
2014:
The Jewish Agency will extend immediate emergency assistance to the Jewish
community of Ukraine and will help secure Jewish institutions in the country,
the Chairman of the Executive of The Jewish Agency for Israel Natan Sharansky
announced today.
2015:
The New York Times features books by Jewish authors and/or of special
interest to Jewish readers including Lies, First Person by Gail Hareven,
Khirbet Khizeh by S. Yizhar, Lucky Alan and Other Stories by
Jonathan Lethem, Mark Twain’s America by Harry L. Katz and Huck
Finn’s America by Andrew Levy.
2015:
In New Orleans, Rabbi Edward Paul Cohn is scheduled to officiate at the
graveside services Martha Blackman who was the widow of Murray Blackman, of
blessed memory, the longtime Rabbi at Temple Sinai.
2015:
“Laureen Nussbaum, Anne Frank scholar and Holocaust survivor, is scheduled to
speak on Holocaust history and the legacy of Anne Frank's work during this
afternoon’s lecture at the Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust
Education.
2015:
“Mexican-Jewish cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki accepted the Academy Award for
“Birdman,” repeating his victory last year for “Gravity.”
2015:
An exhibition “Through Soviet Jewish Eyes: Photography, War and the Holocaust”
is scheduled to open at the Illinois Holocaust Museum.
http://www.ilholocaustmuseum.org/pages/exhibitions/special-exhibitions/upcoming-special-exhibitions/
2015:
“Ida,” a “Polish moved that traces the evolution of a young novitiate in
Catholic convent, who, about to take her vows, learns that she is the daughter
of Jewish parents killed in the Holocaust” won the Oscar for best
foreign-language film. (As reported by JTA and Times of Israel)
2015:
“The evening’s “In Memoriam” segment of the Oscars devoted to film industry
notables who have passed away over the past year, included, among others,
Israeli filmmaker Menachem Golan, director Mike Nichols, and legendary film
actress Lauren Bacall.”
2015:
Israel’s losing streak at the Oscars continued, as the short film “Aya,”
cowritten and codirected by Mihal Brezis and Oded Binnun and starring Sarah
Adler, failed to win for Best Short Film.
2015:
As the world is scheduled to watch the Academy Award ceremonies tonight there
are those who remember that Hollywood columnist Sidney Skolsky “claimed to have
been the first to call the Academy Award Statuette ‘Oscar.’”
2015:
Lewis Black is scheduled to appear at the Vonnegut Fundraiser in Indianapolis,
Indiana
2015:
The Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington is scheduled to host a
“1-hour workshop that will include a series of activities designed to get”
people “thinking, taking and sharing ideas to help in planning for a new
regional museum projected to open in 2020.
2015:
In Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Barnes & Noble is scheduled to host a book
reading and signing featuring Boris Fishman, author of A Replacement Life.
2015:
“Fragile” an exhibition by Tel Aviv native Tal Eshed is scheduled to open at
the Klemens & Tanja Grunert Gallery.
2016:
The American Sephardi Federation is scheduled to host “a new class exploring
the Baqashot (‘Songs of Seeking’ in Edwin Seroussi’s wonderful translation), a
musical tradition whose roots are in Andalusian Spain.”
2016:
284th anniversary of the birth of George Washington whose welcoming
tone expressed to the Jews of the United States helped to make the American
Jewish experience unique from its inception down to the 21st
century.
2017:
“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel was warmly welcomed at Sydney
today by his Australian counterpart, Malcolm Turnbull, with the Israeli leader
promoting the two countries’ growing ties as Israel faces rising international
criticism over its settlement policy in the West Bank.” (As reported by
Jacqueline Williams and Gerry Mullany)
2017:
Meir Weinstein, “founder and leader of the Jewish Defence League of Canada”
filed a hate crime complaint “with Toronto police against a downtown mosque
whose imam allegedly called for killing Jews.” (As reported by Ron Csillag)
2017:
The Jewish Museum celebrated its annual Purim Ball today at the cavernous Park
Avenue Armory, which was decorated with a ceiling-to-floor installation of
multicolored streamers and shapes, eliciting oohs and ahhs from the more than
700 festive guests who included former Mayor Michael Bloomberg as they mingled
with dancing giant anthropomorphic Purim Puppets on stilts. (As reported by
Masha Leon)
2017:
The Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington is scheduled to host a
focus group opened to the public to receive an exclusive sneak peek and provide
feedback on stories and historic artifacts for the new Jewish museum being
built in the Washington Metropolitan Area.
2017:
As “the climate conversation heats up,” The Temple Emanu-El Streicker Center is
scheduled to present “An Evening With Al Gore.”
2017:
The JDC Archives and The Center For Jewish History are scheduled to host “Town
Fools, Beggars and Other Outcasts: Bringing the Margins to the Center in East
European Jewish History” during Nata Meir will examine “Jewish social outcasts
in prewar Eastern European history and offer insights into the changing
mentalities of Jewish society.”
2018:
The Steicker Center is scheduled to host “Love and Death in Italian Ghettos in
the Time of the Plague” during which a panel of experts “using original
documents from Italian archives…will explore the everyday lives of Roman,
Mantuan, Venetian and Florentine Jews during exceptionally trying times,
addressing how Europe’s Jewish communities coped with plagues and pestilence.
2018:
JW3 is scheduled to host the final screening of “Scaffolding” in London.
2018:
JW3 is scheduled to host the first screening of “Shalom Bollywood: The Untold
Story of Indian Cinema.”
2018:
The New Orleans JCC is scheduled to host a screening of “The 90 Minutes War” as
part of the Cathy and Morris Bart Jewish Cultural Arts Series.
2018:
MusicTalks and Yeshiva University’s Center for Israel Studies are scheduled to
present a celebration of “the music and life of Arik Einstein, “the voice of
Israel” and a pioneer of Israeli rock music, through a live performance by Elad
Kabilio and an ensemble of musicians from MusicTalks.”
2018:
Two hundred eighty-sixth anniversary of the birth of George Washington who
signed a treaty between the United States and Tripoli in 1796 that said “the
Government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian
religion” which meant that “Washington did not intend to disparage the
Christian religion” but “he did mean to say that no claim in the future would
justified that Christianity was …the foundation of the Government of the United
States.”
2019:
More than 35,000 runners are scheduled to participate in events surround the
Tel Aviv Marathon which starts at the Tel Aviv Convention Center and continues
“to the boardwalk and along the Mediterranean shore.”
2019:
In Coralville, IA, Congregation Agudas Achim is scheduled to host a “Sephardic
Dinner and Musical Service.”
2019:
At the UC Berkley School of Law, is scheduled to host “Judaism and the #MeToo
Movement” in which “theologian, feminist and HUC professor Rachel Adler
discusses reconciling Jewish law with gender justice.”
2019:
In Cedar Rapids, the record snow finally is scheduled to start to finally start
melting, friends and family of Shlomo Levi and Cyndie Birchansky bask in the
warmth of their birthday celebrations.
2019:
Anniversary of George Washington’s birthday which used to be the federal
holiday Washington’s Birthday when Jews could remember the words of his letter
to the Newport congregation which set the tone for what Lincoln called the
“last best hope of man.”
https://www.tourosynagogue.org/history-learning/gw-letter
2020(27th
of Shevat, 5780): Parashat Mishpatim; Shabbat Shekalim for more see http://downhomedavartorah.blogspot.com/
2020(27th
of Shevat, 5780): Calendar Coincidence -
on the civil calendar today marks the 980th anniversary of the birth
of Rashi and the anniversary of the birth of George Washington whose welcoming
attitude set the tone for the acceptance of Jews in the United States from its
birth which have made the American - Jewish experience unique, at least through
the first decade of the 21st century.
2020:
In San Francisco, the Davies Symphony Hall is scheduled to be the venue for
“Violins of Hope, “a S.F. Chamber Music performance of five pieces, three of
which were written by prisoners at Terezin.
2020:
The Greater Phoenix Jewish Film Festival is scheduled to host a screening of
“The Art of Waiting.”
2020:
The Nevada Democratic caucuses are scheduled to take place today with Bernie
Sanders, who has been told this week that he is getting “help from the
Russians” who are trying to interfere in the 2020 election process and who has
no problem with this important electoral event being held on Shabbat, is the
favorite to win at a least a plurality of the vote.
2021:
The Highgate Synagogue is scheduled to host the of a five-part “Bar Mitzvah
Programme” via Zoom.
2021:
U.S. Secretary of the Treasuring Janet Yellin and Steve Ballmer are among those
scheduled to discuss “the priorities that have the best chance at moving the
country — and the world — forward” with the DealBook Team.
2021:
The Kaufman Music Center is scheduled to present a concert with pianist Orli
Shaham.
2021:
As part of the “This Is What Jewish Looks Like” series, the Steicker Center is
schedule to host a presentation online with Avishai Mekonen, “a photographer
and filmmaker born into the Beta Israel community, who ”chronicled his journey
from Ethiopia to Israel as part of Operation Moses and on to the United States
in the documentary film 400 Miles to Freedom, which explores racism and
diversity in the Jewish community in the United States, Israel and beyond.”
2021:
The Jewish Community Center of Youngstown is scheduled to a meeting of the book
club via Zoom where attendees will discuss A Bookshop in Berlin by
Francoise Frenkel.
2021:
The first online auction sponsored by The Jewish Heritage Museum of Monmouth
Count is scheduled to come to an end today.
2021:
In addition to dealing with terrorists and the pandemic, Israelis must not face
the threat that “the massive oil spill that polluted the majority of Israel’s
beaches with enormous amounts of tar over the weekend has caused enormous
damage to the country's marine life,” which
experts say will take decades to repair.
2021:
JWA is scheduled to host via Zoom “Let’s Talk about the Jewish Teen Hookup
Culture.”
2021:
The Maine Jewish Film Festival is scheduled to host the final screening
“Rosenwald.”
2022:
The Jewish Community Library is scheduled to present online “Dybbuks, Robots
and Golems: Exploring Jewish Science Fiction and Fantasy” during which Valerie
Estelle Frankel will discuss the roles that science fiction and fantasy have
played for Jews in expressing emotions and conflicts of different eras.
2022:
The Robbins Collection and Research Center is scheduled to present this year’s
annual lecture in Jewish Law, Thought and Identity, “Reimagining Diversity and
Jewish Belonging: A Journey Through Genesis” delivered by Dr. Amanda
Beckenstein Mbuvi, the Vice President for Academic Affair at the
Reconstructionist Rabbinical College.
2022:
The American Sephardi Federation is scheduled to present a lecture by Ruben
Shimonov on “the histories and cultures of Bukharian, Kavkazi (Mountain), and
Georgian Jews which are situated at the unique intersection of Sephardic,
Mizrahi, and Russian-Speaking Jewish (RSJ) identities/”
2022:
JWI, Denver is scheduled to host “Sweeten Your Relationships with Dr. Andrea
Liner.
2022:
The Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Boston is scheduled to
present an online conversation with David Baddiel who will discuss his latest
book Jews Don’t Count.
2022:
As war clouds continue to form over Ukraine, in Odessa, Jewish leaders are reportedly
preparing for the worst: hiring security guards, scoping out bomb shelters and
making plans to evacuate if Russia invades the country.” (As reported by
Michael Schwritz)
2023: In Abu Dabi, as a sign of the changing
dynamics in the Middle East, the International Defense Exhibition which
features the first ever national pavilion from Israel is scheduled to continue today.
2023: The Museum at Eldridge Street is
scheduled to host over Zoom a discussion with Lucy Shahar and The Automat
director Lisa Hurwitz who will give an exclusive behind-the-scenes account of
the making of this beloved and acclaimed documentary film.
2023
Anniversary of the birth of George Washington who counted among his
comrades-in-arms Colone Isaac Franks, sought the help of Jewish physician when
his step-daughter feel ill and who most importantly of all welcomed Jews as
citizens of the United States in a manner not known during the European
experience.
2023: The Striecker is scheduled to host a
presentation on “Presumed Superiority” with Pulitzer Prize winning
African-American author Isabel Wilkerson.
2023: The Jerusalem Post is scheduled to host
its Women Leaders Summit.
2023: The JDC Archives is scheduled to host a
webinar on Aiding Their “Unfortunate Brethren”: The JDC’s Activities on Behalf
of Eastern European Jewish Children, 1919-1929.
2023: Israelis are scheduled to awaken to a
shekel that has decreased 2% in value since yesterday in response to the
passage of the first reading of the Judiciary reform bill.
2023(1st of Adar, 5783): Rosh
Chodesh Adar.
2024: Celebration of the birth of George
Washington who used a Jewish doctor to care for his sick step-daughter,
supported Colonel Franks when Benedict Arnold committed treason and who wrote
the welcoming words to the Jews of Newport which establish the fact that
anti-Semitism has no place in the United States, “May the children of the stock
of Abraham who dwell in this land continue to merit and enjoy the good will of
the other inhabitants--while everyone shall sit in safety under his own vine
and fig tree and there shall be none to make him afraid.”
2024: Lockdown University is scheduled to host
a lecture by Trudy Gold on “Hollywood: Billy Wilder.”
2024: At Temple Judea, Cantor Abbie Strauss is
scheduled to double duty leading the morning minyan and leading “music sharing”
in the evening.
2024: The American JDC is scheduled to host a
special global briefing on “The Ukraine Crisis – 2 years later.
2024: The JNFuture Volunteer Mission is
scheduled to come to an end.
2024: Allen Packwood is scheduled to deliver
the second lecture in the series “Churchill’s D-Day” at the Sir Martin Gilbert
Centre in London.
2024: As part of the Cathy and Morris Bart
Jewish Cultural Art Series, the Uptown (New Orleans) and Metairie JCCs are
scheduled to host a screening of “Call Me Dancer.”
2024: The
Illinois Holocaust Museum is scheduled to host online “When Hate Becomes A
Crime.”
2024: As
February 22nd begins in Israel, the Hamas held
hostages begin day 139 in captivity.
(Editor’s note: this situation is too fluid for this blog to cover so we
are just providing a snapshot as of the posting at midnight Israeli time.)
1290
BCE: The coronation of Ramses II, who, according to some, is the Pharaoh
of the Exodus. Since the Bible does not mention the Pharaoh by name, Ramses is
not the only candidate. In addition to which, there is some debate among
Egyptologist as to when Ramses actually came to power. According to some,
his reign began in 1297 BCE.
1040: On the secular calendar birthdate of Rashi ישר, an acronym for Rabbi Solomon ben Isaac or Shlomo
Yitzchaki. Rashi was one of the greatest commentators on the TaNaCh and
the Talmud. Rashi was born at Troyes, Champagne, northern France, in 1040 and
died there in 1104 or 1105. He was reputedly descended from the Davidic line
with lineage to the royal house of King David. He studied at Worms under Yaakov
ben Yakar, and at Mainz under Isaac ben Judah. He returned to Troyes at age 25,
probably serving as Rabbi and “religious judge.” According to the Dictionary
of Jewish Biography, as a judge and a rabbi, “he was unpaid…and he earned
his living from the vineyards that he is reported to have owned.” [Editor’s
note: Like Maimonides, Rashi followed the admonitions that he who makes a spade
of the Torah shall perish and calling upon people to work for a living as well
as studying Torah.] About 1070 he founded a Yeshiva which attracted many
disciples. According to tradition Rashi earned his living as a vintner and/or
as a wine merchant. Although there are many legends about his travels, Rashi
likely never went farther than from the Seine to the Rhine - the utmost limit
of his travels was the Yeshivot of Lorraine. Rashi had no sons, only three
daughters, Yocheved, Miriam and Rachel, all of whom married scholars. Yocheved
married Meir ben Samuel, Miriam married Judah ben Nathan (see above), and
Rachel married (and divorced) Eliezer ben Shemiah. Yocheved and Meir's four
sons were the tosafists Shmuel (Rashbam), Yaakov (Rabbeinu Tam), Yitzchak
(Ribbam), and the grammarian Shlomo; one of their daughters, Channah, wrote a
responsum explaining the ritual and blessing for the Shabbat lights. Besides
minor works, such as an edition of the Siddur (Prayer-Book), Rashi wrote two
great commentaries on which his fame rests. These were the commentaries on the
whole of the TaNaCh (Hebrew Bible) and on about thirty tractates of the Talmud.
Rashi's works are so well respected that he is often cited simply as "the
Commentator." His commentaries are of interest to secular scholars because
he tended to translate unfamilar words into the spoken French of his day. As
such, his commentaries offer an interesting insight into the vocabulary and
pronunciation of Old French. The authors of the Dictionary of Jewish
Biography and The New Encyclopedia of Judaism agree that “although
Troyes (Rashi’s city of residence) was untouched by the First Crusade of
1096…the last years of his life were saddened by the devastation that the
Crusaders brought to bear on “defenseless Jewish communities of the Rhineland”
in general and “the disasters which had befallen his own colleagues.
Commentary on the TaNaCh
Rashi's commentary on the TaNaCh is very thorough, and is used to
understand both the plain meaning of the TaNaCh and the interpretation of the
medieval rabbis. His commentary is often used in basic, intermediate, and
advanced studies of the TaNaCh. There are a small number of commentaries that
bear his name that were not authored by him, but by his students. Rashi's
commentary on the Torah has become an indispensable part of the framework of
Orthodox Judaism - tens of thousands, men and women alike, daily study
"Chumash with Rashi" (Chumash = Pentateuch + corresponding portions
from the Prophets) in reviewing the Parsha to be read on the next Shabbat.
Rashi's explanation of Chumash, clarifies the "simple" meaning of the
text so that a bright child of five could understand it. At the same time, it
is the crucial foundation of some of the most profound legal analysis and
mystical discourses that came after it. Since its publication, this commentary
has been included as a standard in almost all Chumashim produced within
the Orthodox community. Supercommentaries on this work include Gur Aryeh
by Rabbi Judah Loew (Maharal), Sefer ha-Mizrachi by Rabbi Elijah
Mizrachi (Re'em) and Yeri'ot Shlomo by Rabbi Solomon Luria (Maharshal).
Almost all later commentaries will discuss Rashi either bringing His view as a
support or debating it
Commentary of the Talmud
Rashi also wrote the first comprehensive commentary of the Talmud.
His commentary attempts to provide a full explanation of the words, and of the
logical structure of each Talmudic passage. Unlike other commentators, Rashi
does not paraphrase or exclude any part of the text, but carefully elucidates
the whole of the text. He also exerted a decisive influence on establishing the
correct text of the Talmud. He compared different manuscripts and determined
which readings should be preferred. His work became such a standard that it is
included in all printed versions of the Talmud.
Rashi's Talmud commentary is always situated towards the middle of
the opened book display; i.e. on the side of the page closest to the binding.
The semi-cursive font in which the commentaries are printed is often referred
to as "Rashi script." This does not mean that Rashi himself used such
a script, only that the printers standardly employ it for commentaries. Daniel
Bomberg, a Christian printer from Venice, introduced "Rashi script"
in his publication of Rashi's commentary on the Tanakh in 1517. Rashi's commentary,
which covers almost all of the Babylonian Talmud, has been printed in every
version of the Talmud since the first Italian printings. Rashi did not compose
commentaries for every tractate of the Babylonian Talmud. Some of the printed
commentaries which are attributed to him were composed by others, primarily his
students. In some commentaries, the text indicates that Rashi died before
completing the tractate, and that it was completed by a student. This is true
of the tractate Makkot, the concluding portions of which were composed
by his son-in-law Rabbi Judah ben Nathan and of Bava Batra finished (in
a more detailed style) by his grandson, Rabbi Samuel ben Meir (also known as
the Rashbam), one of the prominent contributors to the Tosafot.
“Rashi’s responsa (replies to inquiries on matters of Jewish law)
…are characterized by liberality and humility…He ruled that it is permissible
to interrupt the grace after meals to fee ones animals, basing the decision
other scriptural injunction for a man to feed his animals before himself.
On one occasion he told his questioner, ‘I was asked this question before but I
realize that my answer then was wrong and I welcome the opportunity to correct
my mistake.’” There are places in his commentaries where admits that he
does not understand the meaning. “Of this I do not know.”
Rashi in his own words:
“Any plan formulated in a hurry is foolish.”
“Be sure to ask your teacher his reasons and his sources.”
“Teachers learn from their student’s discussions.”
“A student of laws who does not understand their meaning or cannot
explain their contradictions is just a basket full of books.”
“Do not rebuke your fellow man so as to shame him in public.”
“To obey out of love is better than to obey out of fear.”
“”All the 613 commandments are included in the Decalogue.”
1217(6th
of Adar, 4977): Judah ben Samuel of Regensburg passed away. Born in 1140 in
Speyer, he was also called He-Hasid or 'the Pious' in Hebrew and was the
initiator of the Chassidei Ashkenaz, a movement of Jewish mysticism in Germany.
“This movement is considered different from kabbalistic mysticism because it
emphasizes specific prayer and moral conduct. Judah settled in Regensburg in
1195. He wrote Sefer Hasidim (Book of the Pious) and Sefer
Hakavod (Book of Glory). The latter has been lost and is only known
by quotations that other authors have made from it. His most prominent students
were Elazar Rokeach and Moses ben Jacob of Coucy.
1288:
Papacy of Nicholas IV began. Like many medieval popes, Nicholas IV displayed a
mixed attitude toward the Jews. On the one hand, he issued various instructions
(1288) to the inquisitors to proceed against *Conversos and he renewed earlier
legislation concerning the Jews in Portugal, compelling them to wear a *badge.
On the other hand, he specifically protected the Jews of Rome from being
molested by Christians (January 1291). He wrote to Emperor Rudolph requesting
the release of *Meir b. Baruch of Rothenburg from prison. There is a belief
that he enlisted the services of the Jewish physician and scholar Isaac b.
Mordecai Maestro Gaio, who also attended Boniface VIII and who was the first of
the Italian Jewish papal physicians. (As described in the Jewish Virtual
Library)
1349:
In Zurich, Switzerland, the town council tried to protect the Jews of the town,
they were forced to give in to the mob, resulting in the murder of many of the
Jewish inhabitants. The Jews were then forced to leave.
1455:
Birthdate of Johann Von Reuchlin the German linguist who came to the defense of
the Jews when Dominican Friars led by Johann Pfefferkorn sought imperial
support to destroy a vast array of Jewish books.
1475:
The first known Hebrew book, a copy of the TaNaCh, was printed in Italy.
1495:
King Charles VIII of France enters Naples to claim the city's throne.
Following the expulsion from Spain, Jews had found refuge in Naples thanks to
King Ferdinand of Naples. When Ferdinand died his son Alfonso replaced
him on the throne. Charles deposed Alfonso. During his short lived
reign over the Italian city, the situation of the Jews worsened.
Fortunately, a mixed bag of political and religious leaders drove Charles back
to France. Unfortunately, the Jews of Naples would be expelled from their
Italian haven in 1510.
1501:
On this day and the following day, two tremendous auto-de-fe's took place in
Toledo. A woman prophet and over 100 of her followers were burned. The woman
envisioned those Jews who had previously died as martyrs were taken to heaven,
and the Jewish Messiah was speedily going to return the Jews to the Promised
Land.
1520:
Birthdate of Moses Isserles, the Ashkenazic rabbi from Cracow best known for
writing HaMapah (The Table Cloth) a “gloss” on The Shulchan Aruch (Set Table)
of Joseph Karo. Karo relied primarily on Sephardic sources. Isserles used
Ashkenazic sources to create a table cloth that would cover the set table thus
making Caro’s work viable for the large number of Jews living in Northern and
Eastern Europe.
1530:
Coronation in Italy of Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor who provided Josel of
Rosheim with “a charter or letter of protection from for the whole of German
Jewry but who also “issued a proclamation again the Jews who had not been
baptized” which may have applied to the Jews he ruled as King of Spain.
1590:
Archduke Maximilian granted the Jews of Mergentheim, Markelsheim,
Igersheim and Unterbalbach the right to continue to bury their dead above the
village of Unterbalbach for an annual payment of 16 Gulden to the Monastery of
Mergentheim
1618(27th
of Shevat): Rabbi Tanhum Ha-Kohen of Cracow passed away today.
1656:
The Jews in New Amsterdam are granted, "A little hook of land situate
[sic] outside of this city for a burial place." This cemetery land was
located by the Bowery, near Oliver Street in what is now lower Manhattan. It
would be another month before Jews were granted the right to own real
estate. Public Jewish worship would not be an accepted matter of
fact until the turn of the century. The establishment of a
burial society and cemetery is a matter of major importance for any Jewish
community. It was sign of permanence and belonging. Following
the defeat of the Dutch by the English in 1664, New Amsterdam would become New
York.
1730:
Pope Benedict XIII who is confused with
the 14th century anti-Pope Benedict XIII who worked at a mass
conversion of the Jews passed away today.
1732: At
Pope’s Creek in Westmorland County, VA, Augustine and Mary Ball Washington gave
birth to George Washington. Several Jew’s served with Washington during the
Revolutionary War. When Washington was elected President, he sent
amicable letters to different Jewish communities assuring them that Jews were
welcome in the United States. The tone set by Washington helped to make
the American experience different for the Jews than anything they had known in
their history. As he said in his famous letter written to the Jews of Newport,
“May the children of the stock of Abraham who dwell in this land continue to
merit and enjoy the good will of the other inhabitants--while everyone shall
sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree and there shall be none to make
him afraid.”
1753:
Birthdate of Boston native Rachel Andrews, the daughter of Abraham Andrews and
the wife of Myer Moses with whom she had six children – Priscilla, Eleanor,
Myer, Isaac, Esther and Bella – who later became Rachel Andrews Woolf when she
married Solomon Woolf.
1755:
Benedict XIV issued Beatus Andreas a Papal Bull that confirmed the blood libel as factual. ”The Bull reviewed the
cases of ritual murder by Jews, which it explicitly upholds as a fact, and
establishes the beatification but not the canonization of Andreas of Rinn and
Simon of Trent.”
1755:
In New York, Sarah Nunes Navaro and Aaron Nunez Cardozo gave birth to Moses
Nunez Cardozo, the husband of Gitlah Moses.
1758(14th of
Adar I, 5518): Purim Katan
1775:
The Jews were expelled from outskirts of Warsaw, Poland.
1776:
The SC Second Provincial Congress, under pressure from the Continental
establishment, resolved "That a regiment of expert Rifle-men, to take rank
as the fifth regiment, under proper field and other officers, be immediately
raised, to consist of seven companies; each company to consist of one Captain,
two Lieutenants, one Ensign, and one hundred men, including four Sergeants, and
four Corporals which led to Abraham Alexander St., the London born son of
Judith and Raphael Alexander and father of Abraham Alexander Jr., the Chazan of
Congregation Beth Elohim, receiving a commission of lieutenant in the
Revolutionary Army.
1781:
During the American Revolution Isaac Franks, who had been serving as
“forage-master” at West Point, was commissioned as an ensign in the 7th
Massachusetts Regiment today and he served in that capacity until 1782 when he
resigned due to health problems.
1783:
In Bonfeld, Germany, Schoenle Lazarus and Lazarus Ruben gave birth to Samuel
Ottenheimer, the husband of Judith Jacobs and father of Jette Ottenheimer who
later married Amalie Wimpfheimer with whom he had one son – Lazarus
Ottenheimer.
1785:
Philadelphia born Miriam Simon and German born Michael Gratz gave birth to
Joseph Gratz sixteen years after they had been married in Lancaster, PA.
1788:
Birthdate of German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer who has nothing to positive
to say about human existence. For him, life is harsh and cruel. If
this is so obvious, Schopenhauer asks why there are any optimists in the world.
Schopenhauer argues that ‘the aggressively optimistic philosophers of the
Western World have fallen victim to a vulgar buoyancy which is rooted in the
Jewish Tradition!” In his most famous work, The World as Will and Idea
the philosopher says Jewish traditional optimism reflects "a
self-congratulatory human egoism, which is blind to all except our (own) all
too frail human goals and aspirations."
1790:
As Alexander Hamilton, who may have been born out of wedlock to a Jewish woman
and attended a Jewish school in the British colony of Nevis, enjoyed a victory
in his attempts to place the newly formed government of the United States on a
firm footing, saw a bill introduced by James Madison that would have undermined
these efforts defeated today.
1791:
Lilie Marx and Samuel Strauss gave birth to Jitle Strauss.
1793:
Birthdate of Isaak Markus Jost, the native of Bernburg who overcame poverty and
the loss of his father while still a child to become one of the early creators
of modern Jewish historical writing.
1800(27th
of Shevat, 5560): Parashat Mishpatim; Shabbat Shekalim observed for the first
time in the 19th century.
1812:
Birthdate of Moses (Moyses) Baruch Auerbach who gained fame as poet and author
Berthold Auerbach whose early efforts included a biography about Spinoza and a
text entitled Judaism and Recent Literature.
1814:
Birthdate of Bavaria native Dr. Sigismund Waterman who came to the United
States in the 1830’s where he graduated from Yale and who was the father of
Helena (Wolf) Waterman and the father of Dr. Moses W. Waterman.
1816:
In St. Thomas, French native Jacob Baiz and Leah Baiz gave birth to Hannah
Nanette Henriquez Moron, the wife of Jacob Henriquez Moron today.
1817:
Birthdate of Berlin native Karl Wilhelm Borchardt, the Konigsberg educated
mathematician who studied in Paris before becoming “privat-docent at the
University of Berlin.”
1818:
Birthdate of Copenhagen, Denmark native Amalia Monies, the wife of Stockholm
native Charles Kann and the mother of Albert, Ellen, Jenny and Ellen Kann.
1818:
Philadelphia native Benjamin Jonas Phillips and Abigail Seixas who had married
in 1804 gave birth to Rebecca Phillips.
1819:
The United States of America and Spain signed the Florida Purchase Treaty which
gave the United States complete control over what is now the Sunshine
State. Within 2 years, records show that 30 to 40 Jews lived in northern
Florida including Moses Levy a Moroccan born lumber dealer who built a Jewish
colony in an area that is now home to the University of Florida. Abraham
Myers, a West Pointer who served during the Seminole Wars was one of the first
Jews to live in south Florida.
1819:
Colonel Isaac Franks, the New York City born son of Moses and Sarah Franks who
was “a brave and dedicated soldier in the Continental army and consequently
enjoyed the personal friendship of George Washington” wrote a letter today in
Philadelphia describing “the progress of his military career” which was
intended “to help support his application for a government permission…”
1820:
In New York, Phoebe Magnus and Abraham David Cohen gave birth to Elizabeth D.
A. Cohen the Philadelphia College of Medicine trained physician and husband of
Aaron Cohen, who was the first practicing female physician in Louisiana and who
was buried in the Gates of Prayer Cemetery in New Orleans, the city in which
she served as a doctor.
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/cohen-elizabeth-da
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/elizabeth-d-a-magnus-cohen
1821:
In Hamburg, Germany Dr. David Assing and Rosa Maria Assing gave birth to
authoress Ludmilla Assing.
1828:
The final letter of correspondence between Lazarus Jacob Riesser and his son
Gabriel was written today.
1828:
In Vilnius, Abraham Bar Lebensohn and his wife gave birth to the Hebrew poet
Micah Joseph Lebensohn. His brother-in-law Joshua Steinberg who was an author
in his own right and functionary in the Russian government translated some of
his Hebrew works into German.
1834:
Lucas and Hannah Friedman Lederman gave birth to New Yorker David Lederman, the
husband of Helena Bien Lederman with whom he had three children – Claire, Moses
and Mattie.
1835:
At Esquiline Hill in Columbus, GA Ralph Jacob Moses, the Charleston, SC bon son
Deborah and Israel Moses and gave birth to Sarah Matilda Moses and his wife
Eliza Matilda Moses gave birth to Sarah Matilda Moses who died twenty days
before her third birthday.
1837:
Nathan Lewis married Harriette Moses at the Great Synagogue today.
1839:
In Hamburg, Kalmar Calman and Betty Friedburg gave birth Adolf Calman who
served as a rabbi at several New York congregations including Beth Israel Bikur
Cholim and Etz Chaim of Yorkville.
1840:
Birthdate of Smorgon, Belarus native Robert Brudno who moved to England in 1867
and then to Dublin, Ireland where he gained fame as Robert Bradlaw, the dentist
known as the “prince of immigrants” who founded a “new chera kadisha and
Cemetery Dolphin’s Barn” and a new synagogue after the Dublin Hebrew
Congregation “had reportedly denied him membership.
1840:
Birthdate of August Bebel, a German social democrat and founder of the Social
Democrat Party of Germany. The non-Jewish Bebel was committed to the
concept of the brotherhood of man and one of his famous statements was,
"Anti-Semitism is the socialism of fools."
1843:
In Hamburg, Germany, Joseph Luebke and his wife gave birth to M.J. Luebek who
after serving as rabbi “Congregation Bikur Cholim and Gates of Prayer, became
the “Cantor and Lecturer at Shaare Zedek in Brooklyn, NY.
1845(15th
of Adar I, 5605): Parashat Tetzaveh; Shushan Purim Katan
1847:
In Germany, M.A. and Sophia Stern gave birth to Louis Stern. After the
family moved to Albany, Louis was sent to Petersburg, W. Va. “to learn the
rudiments of merchandizing in the small store of any uncle after which he moved
to New York where he and his brothers – Isaac, Bernard and Benjamin - opened
the dry goods store that became known as Stern Brothers, that classier than
Wanamakers and B. Altman’s but never quite reached the level of Lord and Taylor
or Bonwit Teller.
1848:
Beginning of the “The Third French Revolution” which replaced Citizen King
Louis Philippe with the Second Republic.
1850:
In New Orleans, Bernard and Sophie Bernstein Kowalski gave birth to future
Texas resident Louis Kowalski, the husband of Amelia Campbell Kowalski whom he
married in 1876.
1850:
In Bavaria, Meier Rice and Fanny Sohn gave birth to Columbia trained attorney
Isaac Leopold Rice, the husband of Julia Hynemann Barrnett, the Columbia
lecturer and namesake for Rice Stadium who as a businessman played a key role
in the development of submarines and was a famous chess player known as the
inventor of the Rice Gambit.
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/rice-isaac-leopold
1851:
Birthdate date of Julius Harburger, the Tammany political leader who served as
Coroner of New York County and Sheriff of New York County.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1914/11/10/100112819.html?pageNumber=11
1852:
Martin Beir, the secretary and treasurer of the Milton Clark Company, an
insurance agency in Rochester, NY married 17-year-old Clara Hirsch, the
daughter of Wolf and Eva Hirsch. (Clara passed away at the age of 39 and Beir
never remarried. In 1898, he was chosen to head B’nai B’rith for the
state of New York.
1852:
Solomon Isaacs married Esther Hart today at the Great Synagouge.
1853:
Founding of Eliot Seminary in St. Louis which would become Washington
University. According to recently published figures Wash U has 2,000 Jewish
undergraduates who are 33% of the student population. This helps to rank it as
number 11 on a list of the 30 private schools Jews choose.
1854(24
Shevat, 5614): Austria Rabbi Abraham Neuda, the native of Moravia who was the
son of Rabbi Aaron Neuda of Loštice, and the nephew of Rabbi Jacob Neuda of
Lomnitz (Lomnice), Moravia and the husband of author Fanny Schmiedl passed away
today.
1854:
One day after he had passed away, 61-year-old Abraham Harris was buried today a
the “Brompton (Fulham Road) Jewish Cemetery.”
1855:
The New York Times reported that a concert designed to raise funds for
the Hebrew Benevolent Society is scheduled to be held at the Dodsworth Academy.
1855:
Pennsylvania State University is founded. Today Penn State has approximately
4,000 Jewish undergraduate and graduate students out of a total student
population of over 40,000. The university offers approximately 45 Jewish
Studies courses. Penn State offers both a major and a minor in Jewish
studies.
1856:
The Republican Party holds its first national meeting in Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania. Early Jewish Republican supporters included Sabato Morais,
Rabbi of Philadelphia’s Mikveh Israel Congregation; Moritz Pinner, a German
born editor of an abolitionist paper who would fight in the Union Army during
the Civil War; Louis Naphtali Dembitz, a Louisville lawyer whose nephew would
become the first Jewish Supreme Court Justice. Jews were drawn to the
Republican Party because of its anti-Slavery stance. Ironically, another
group drawn to the Republican Party were members of the short-lived American
Party, also called “The Know-Nothing” Party. The Know-Nothings were
natavist who were opposed to the swelling tide of immigration, a belief that
included more than just a whiff of anti-Semitism.
1857:
Birthdate German born physicist Heinrich Hertz. He was the first one to
broadcast and receive radio waves. The unit of measure “hertz” is named
for him. Hertz was born into a Jewish family that converted to
Christianity. The German Jewish community was devastated two times: first
by conversions in the 19th century and then by the Final Solution in
the 20th century. One wonders how many of those who perished
in the latter were from families who had participated in the former.
1859:
Ephraim Alex, the Overseer of the Great Synagogue secured the adoption of the
following resolutions designed to help “the strange and foreign poor”:
(1)
That it is highly expedient that the relief of the strange poor be managed by a
Board of Guardians constituted of delegates from the three City Uniting
Congregations.
(2)
That the following gentlemen be appointed the delegates of this Board with
power to meet the delegates appointed by the other two congregations and make
such arrangements with them for one year as shall seem most desirable to effect
the desired object, viz., Messrs. E. Alex, Samuel Moses, Lewis Jacobs, S. A.
Jonas, Joseph Lazarus, Jacob Waley, M.A., and Lionel L. Cohen.
(3)
That £220 be placed at the disposal of such Board of Guardians for one year to
be paid in monthly instalments.
(4)
That the Secretary of the Synagogue do attend the meetings of the Board of
Guardians when requested and finish all information, books or documents bearing
on the relief of the strange poor.
1860:
The New York Times reported that “The community of Kingston, which is
composed chiefly of Jews, have been making contributions for the relief of
their suffering brethren of Morocco. They have managed to collect large sums in
spite of the prevailing poverty.”
1861:
Bell and Daly announced the upcoming publication of The Spirit of Hebrew
Poetry, by Isaac Taylor
1861:
According to reports sent from Paris today, the arrest of Jules Mires has
threatened the stability of the Credit Mobilier. It is expected that when
word of his arrest reaches Constantinople, ruinous panic will set in since
investors there hold a glut of paper tied to his financial activities.
1864:
In Russia, Abraam Markovich Wilenkin and Rachel Wilenkin gave birth to lawyer
and diplomat Gregory Wilinken who served as personal secretary to Count Witte,
“the first Jewish member of the Russian diplomatic corps and the attaché at the
Russian embassies in Washington and Tokyo who was the husband of Irma Sara
Wilenkin.
1865:
The Richmond Examiner described the condition of Charleston, SC when it
fell to Union forces under the command of General Sherman. According to the Examiner,
all that the Yankees found was “the abandoned hull of Charleston” inhabited by
“a few Jews” and “some telegraph operators.”
1866:
Alexander Cuza, considered to be one of the founders of the Romanian state “and
who tried to prepare for the emancipation of the Jews” was forced to abdicate
today and leave the country.
1867:
In New York, Frank Rothschild, the German born son of Henriette and Isack
Rothschild and his wife Amanda Anna Rothschild gave birth to Harry Rotschild
1868:
In Amsterdam, Marianne Smit and diamond cutter Mozes Polake gave birth to Henri
Polak the founder of the Dutch Social Democratic Workers’ Party and longtime
President of the General Diamond Workers’ Union of the Netherlands who died of
pneumonia before the Nazis could ship him to a concentration camp in 1943.
https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/12233-polak-henri
1868:
Birthdate of Charles Pearce Coady, a Democrat who served as a Congressman from
Maryland’s Third District and was one of the opening speakers at the 13th
annual convention of the Order of Brith Shalom in Baltimore.
1868:
In New York City, Elizabeth Fournier and Myron Baruch gave birth Emanuel
Barcuh, the graduate of Columbia University who served as Professor
Bacteriology and Pathology at the Flower Hospital and Medical College.
1869:
In Suisun City, CA, Lena and Meier “Moses” Dinkelspiel gave birth to Henry
George Washington Dinkselspiel, the husband of Estella Dinkelspiel who may be
related to attorney Lloyd Dinnelspiel.
1869:
In Kaiserslautern, thirty-five-year-old Abraham Weil, the German born son of
Salomon Weil and Helena Lea Meyer married Berta Seligmann, a native of France
1871:
In Kovno, pharmacist Lazar Aronstam and his wife gave birth Modest Aronstam,
who gained as American illustrator and anarchist Modest Stein, the husband of
photographer Marcia Mishkin and father of Luba Stein who in 1888 came to the
United States were he joined his cousin Alexander Berkman as a member of
the “Jewish anarchist group, the
Pioneers of Liberty” before becoming “a successful pen and ink artist for the
New York World, New York Sun, and other New York newspapers” and finding “even
greater success as an illustrator for periodicals such as Argosy, and drew
numerous covers for other pulp magazines including The Cavalier, All-Story
Weekly, and People's Favorite Magazine.”
1871:
Dr. Henry W. Schneeberger received his formal rabbinical ordination from Dr.
Hildesheimer. In the document of ordination Dr. Hildesheimer testified to
Henry’s high moral character and to his devotion to Judaism. He also wrote, “He
is worthy to be crowned with the crown of Morenu Horav [Our Teacher, the
Rabbi].” “Thus equipped with the rabbinic title and with the university degree,
he lost no time and hurried home to try out for a rabbinical post. Only three
weeks after his ordination in Berlin, he preached at the synagogue where he had
delivered his very first sermon, at the Rodeph Shalom Synagogue on Clinton
Street in New York City.” Rabbi Dr. Henry W) Schneeberger was the First
American Born, University- Educated, Orthodox Ordained Rabbi in America (As
reported by Dr. Yitzchok Levine).
1872:
“Galicia’s Demands” published today described conditions in this portion of
Austria that became part of the empire as a result of the partition of
Poland. According to the article, the Poles are in the majority.
However, the Germans and the Jews, who are in the minority “are far ahead of
the Poles” “in money and intelligence.” Due to the electoral system, the Poles
are the dominate force and the Germans and the Jews are underrepresented in the
Diet.
1873:
“Joseph Litten, the president of the Jewish community in Konigsberg” and his
wife gave birth to professor and jurist Friedrich Julius Litten who became a
Lutheran “in order to further his career” but who was also the father of Hans
Litten, the lawyer who defended opponents of the Nazis and died at Dachau.
1874:
In Alytaus, Lithuania, “Jacob and Rebecca Fritz Chase” gave birth to Edward Max
Chase,( Reb Azriel Mordecai son of Reb Yaakov) the Lewiston, ME educated
president of E.M. Chase Company of Manchester where his civic activities
included founding the “Chase Memorial and Manchester Hebrew Free Loan
Association,” serving as “state treasurer of all drives for Jewish war
sufferers and state chairman of the Jewish Welfare Board” while being married
to Dora Samplin Chase with whom he had four children – Jasper, Eleanor, Helene
and Clara Chase.
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/172295897/edward-max-chase
1875(17th
of Adar I, 5635): Jansje Izaak van der Sluis, the Amsterdam born daughter of
Isaak Levy van der Sluis and Lena Levy passed away today in the Netherlands.
1875: In Poltava, Russia, Fanny Husik and Marcus
Seltzer gave birth University of Pennsylvania graduate and publisher Thomas
Seltzer the editor of “Best Russian Stories” in the Modern Library series and
husband of Adele Szold.
1876:
In New York City, a Polish Jew was arraigned on charges of cruelty to
animals. According to the arresting officer, Siwaski roasted a rat after
he had caught in a wire cage trap.
1876:
Johns Hopkins University was founded in Baltimore, Maryland. Today, the
elite school has approximately 750 Jewish students out of a student population
of 6,500. The university offers 45 courses in Jewish Studies and a major
in Jewish Studies.
1878:
It was reported today that Rabbi Maruice Treichenberg, who had served as the
spiritual leader for the Greene-Street Synagogue, has passed away in Denver,
Colorado.
1880:
In Mason, TN, “Michael and Bettie (Lyons) Cohn gave birth to Saidie Cohn the
Little Rock High School and Stone’s Business College graduate who became
married Ephriam Eichenabaum, becoming Sadie Cohen Eichenbaum, the mother of
Charles and Howard Samuel Eichenbaum who was President of the Little Rock
Section of the Council of Jewish Women and “one of the first four women to
serve on the Board of Tempe B’nai Israel, Little Rock’s Reform congregation.
1880:
In New York, a meeting is scheduled to be held this afternoon at the Sons of
Israel Synagogue to evaluate charges by Jewish butchers that they are being
forced to violate Halachah by the wholesalers who employ them. According
to the butchers, the wholesalers are having them keep meat for a period longer
than that allowed by law, and they are not allowed to warn their customers
about this. The wholesalers deny the allegations.
1880:
Professor Felix Adler delivered a lecture today on the subject of “Catholicism
and Liberty” in which he took issue with the view of Cardinal Manning. Speaking
on behalf of the Church, Manning has taken issue with the concept of the
equality of man and the theory that government’s authority is derived from the
will of the people.
1881(23rd
of Adar I, 5641): In Jersey, eighty-eight-year-old Mary Asher, the widow of
Benjamin Asher and the mother of Asher Asher passed away today.
1882:
The SS Illinois a ship carrying Jewish refugees from Russia is expected to
arrive in Philadelphia, PA today. The 50 Jewish families are escaping the
violent attacks now going on the Czar’s domain. A committee of prominent
Christians including the Mayor and leading Jews has developed plans to care for
the refugees including lodging, food and job placement.
1882:
Philadelphia’s May King received an offer today from Calvin Jones of Charlotte,
NC, offering 40 acres to each of the 50 Jewish refugee families. The land is
located in Alexander and Wilkes counties and is described as well watered and
suited for growing wheat, corn and tobacco.
1882:
In London, Sir Alexander T. Galt, the Resident Minister in Great Britain of the
Dominion of Canada, recommended that Russian Jews immigrate to Manitoba while
he was attending a meeting of the Lord Mayor’s Jewish Fund Committee.
1883(15th
of Adar I, 5643): Shushan Purim Katan
1883:
Calude-Joseph Montefiore assumed by Royal License bearing today’s date the
“surname of Goldsmid in addition to and before that of Montefiore and the arms
of Goldsmid quarterly.”
1883:
In Vienna, Rabbi Rahmiel Eibshutz and his wife gave birth to Nathan Eibshutz,
“a descendant of Baron Jonathan Eybes Eyeschutz, author and chief rabbi of
Hamburg, Prague and Metz” who in the 1890’s came to the United States where he
eventually became president of the Night and Day Press, a printing business,
and married Monya W. Tepperman after the death of his first wife Celia Friedman
and who was active in many Jewish organizations including the Central Jewish
Institute, Temple Israel of Long Beach, Long Island and Israel Zion Hospital.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1948/08/11/85304588.pdf?pdf_redirect
1884:
In what was then part of the Kingdom of Hungary, “Mendel Gottesman and Sarah
Fischgrund gave birth to David Samuel Gottesman who in 1885 came to the United
States where he later went to work in his father’s paper-making business,
organized the Central National Bank and contributed to numerous organizations
including Yeshiva University.
1884:
Birthdate of boxing Hall of Famer Abraham “Abe” Attell. Known as “The
Little Hebrew,” Attell was Featherweight Champion from 1901 until 1912.
He gained additional notoriety and ignominy as one of the figures alleged to
have fixed the 1919 World Series. Supposedly Attell was the one who
actually passed the ten thousand dollars to several White Sox players to
guarantee that they would throw the Fall Classic.
1885:
Jacob Henry Adler married Barbara Milhauser Adler today in New York after which
they had nine children – Jesse, Abraham, Frances, Sara, Arthur, Estelle,
Beatrice, Lillian and Herbert.
1885:
In Munkacs which at the time part of the kingdom of Hungary Mendel Gottesman
and Sarah Fishgrund gave birth to American businessman and philanthropist, the
husband of Jeanne Regina Gottesman and father of patron of the arts Celeste
Ruth Gottesman.
1886:
In Kiev, peddler Isaac Saposnik and Shima Erevsky Saposnik gave birth to
University of Wisconsin trained economist Dr. David J. Saposs, who held several
government post, wrote both Left Wing Unionism and Communism in American
Politics while raising two daughters with his wife Bertha Tigay Saposs.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1968/11/16/76907905.html?pageNumber=37
1887:
The Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society opened a new facility “for infants and
boys over six years old” at 11th Avenue between 150th and
151st Street in New York.
1887:
Birthdate of Ksawery Tartakower, the native of Rostov-on-Don who gained famed
as Polish and French chess grandmaster Savielly Tartakower.
1887:
Henry M. Stanley who had been designated as the leader of the expedition
charged with rescuing the apostate Jew Emin Pasha arrived at Zanzibar.
1888:
In Detroit, MI, Phillip and Lotta (Kahn) Jaffe Jewish immigrants from Lithuania
gave birth to Durham (NC) High School and Trinity College graduate Louis Isaac
Jaffe, the WW I veteran and Pulitzer Prize winning editor of The
Virginian-Pilot.
https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/jaffe-louis-i-ca-1888-1950/
1888:
Birthdate of future Los Angeles resident Max Isackman Eisman, the husband of
Fannie Marcus Eisman and the father of Evelyn and Sadie Isackman Eisman.
1889
In New York, Annie and Maurice Mordechai Mohrn gave birth to Jessie Mohr, who
became Jessie Mohr Danz when she married John Danz and went on to Seattle where
she served as an “officer of the Jewish Welfare Society” and the National
Council of Women.
1889:
In New York, Morris and Sara (Schnitman) Slotkin gave birth to University of
Buffalo trained physician George E. Slotkin, the urologist who was Chief of the
Venereal Disease Division of the Health Department in Buffalo, NY>
1890:
Tonight’s celebration of Washington’s Birthday sponsored by the Young Men’s
Hebrew Association which will take place at the Hebrew Free School Building
will include a speech by Rabbi Rudolph Grossman.
1890:
Birthdate of Ukrainian born British pianist Benno Moiseiwitsch.
1890:
Menachem Ussishkin, one of the originators of BILU and a future President of
the Jewish National Fund, founded the Odessa Committee which was dedicated to
the practical exponent of the Hovevei Zion movement, in establishing
agricultural settlements in Eretz-Israel.
1891(14th
of Adar I, 5651): Purim Katan
1891:
Two days after she had passed away, Rebecca Pollitzer, the Hackney, London born
daughter of Michael Coleman and Harriett Phillips, the wife of Sigmund
Pollitzer and the mother of Julia, Violetta, Frank and William Pollitzer was
buried today at the “Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery.”
1892:
As New York City dealt with an outbreak of Tyhus that had been traced to recent
arriving immigrants thirty-two-year-old Solomon Zabalzki and forty-two yeard
old Rachel Hesselberg were among those who taken to North Brother Island where
those thought to be infected were kept under quarantine.
1892:
Sixty-year-old Esther Goodman, Robert Goodman and Sarah Goodman were rescued by
firemen when a fire broke out this morning at their apartment in Brooklyn, NY,
1892:
It was reported today that “the Berlin, Hamburg, Frankfort and Konigsberg
Jewish Relief Committees” will be meeting “to consider the refusal of America
to receive Russian Jewish immigrants brought by North German Lloyd steamers.”
1892:
In Brest-Litvosk, bakery owners Shaina Wyshengrad and Bezalel Dobnievski gave
birth to David Isaac Dobnievski who gained fame as David Dubuinksy who began working the United States in 1911
as a cloak cutter and two decades later he had risen to the presidency of the
International Ladies Garment Union which was a force for social and labor
progress that helped end sweatshops and improve the lot of American workers
https://jwa.org/teach/livingthelegacy/biographies/dubinsky-david
1893”
In Paris, the famous Alfred Dreyfus and Luciene Eugenie Hadamard gave birth to
Jeanne Dreyfus, who became Jeanne Levy when she married Pierre-Paul Louis Levy
with whom she had five children.
1893:
Birthdate of “Polish born circus performer and vaudeville strongman” Siegmund
Breitbart who was billed as “The Superman of the Ages” when he toured the
United States in 1923.
1894:
The 14th annual reception sponsored by the Hebrew Sheltering
Guardian Society was held at the asylum’s facility on 151st Street.
1894:
Two days after she had passed away, Caroline Magnus, the daughter of Joel
Barnett and Sarah Moss and the wife of Jacob Magnus with whom she had had five
children was buried today at the “Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery.”
1895(28th
of Shevat, 5655): Sixty-seven-year-old Virginius Jenkins Tobias, the Savannah,
GA born son of Isabella Bowen and Isaac Tobias who were wed in 1824 passed away
tody.
1895:
Captain Dreyfus began the journey that would take him to prison in French
Guyana
1895:
Birthdate of Newcastle, PA native and graduate of Columbia’s College of
Physicians and Surgeons, Dr. Alvan L. Barach, “a pioneer in respiratory therapy
and developer of the first practical oxygen tent” who was the husband of “the
former Frderica Pisek” with whom he had two sons, “Jeffrey and John Paul.”
https://www.nytimes.com/1977/12/14/archives/dr-alvan-barach-breathing-expert.html
1896:
Birthdate of Ukraine native Joseph K. Alliger who in 1898 came to the United
States where he became a “real-estate man and mortgage-investment” banker who
was active in the UJA, JNF and HIAS while raising his “two son Martin and
Howard” with “his wife, the former Gladys Scheirer.”
https://www.nytimes.com/1978/06/21/archives/obituary-3-no-title.html
1897:
Amos J. Cummings will deliver a lecture today on “Horace Greeley” as part of
the free lecture course offered at the Hebrew Institute.
1897:
The Young Ladies and Gentlemen’s League will host a reception today in honor of
George Washington’s Birthday at the Montefiore Home.
1897:
The Jewish Alliance will host a reception today at Temple Emanu-El on 5th
Avenue in honor George Washington’ Birthday.
1897:
“Lehman Gift Accepted” published today provided details of the decision of the
Board of Trustees of the Hebrew Benevolent and Orphan Asylum Society to accept
the gift of $100,000 from Emanuel Lehmnan that will serve as an endowment for a
fund that will benefit those who had been under the care of the society and
were now out on their own.
1898:
Seventy-seven-year-old Heungseon Daewongun, the Regent of Korea whom German
Jewish businessman Ernst Jakob Oppert attempted to blackmail in an attempt to
remove “Korean trading barriers” passed away today.
1898:
The managers of the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society will host their annual
reception in honor of George Washington’s Birthday between 3 and 5 this
afternoon.
1898:
The Young Ladies’ and Gentlemen’s League of the Montefiore Home will host their
fourth annual reception this afternoon in honor of George Washington’s
Birthday.
1900:
The honorary degree of Doctor of Laws was conferred today on Oscar S. Straus
today during the exercises marking the dedication of the new law school at the
University of Pennsylvania.
1901(3rd
of Adar, 5661): Eighty-nine-year-old Virginia Russell, the daughter of Perla
Sheftal and Isaac Russell who were married in 1808 in Savannah and the wife of
Mordecai Sheftall) who should not be confused with Georgia merchant and
Revolutionary War officer) with whom she had eight children passed away today
in Savannah.
1901:
On Manhattan’s Lower East Side, Leah (née Goldstein) and Mordecai Marcus gave
birth to David Daniel “Mickey” Marcus the West Point graduate and attorney who
was the first “Aluf” of the IDF and built the “secret” road to Jerusalem that
meant that the ancient city of David would be part of the modern state of
Israel.
http://www.zionism-israel.com/bio/Mickey_Marcus.htm
1901:
Over the next three days, Herzl writes letters to Zionists in France, Italy,
England and America for parliamentary intervention against immigration
restrictions in Palestine. He considers transferring the center of his action
to London but drops the plan because he does not want to separate from his
parents.
1902:
Herzl travels to Munich and meets the banker Reitlinger. Herzl proposes the
Turkish suggestion of Jewish immigration to Asia Minor and Mesopotamia and the
exploitation of mines. Reitlinger considers the matter too costly, risky and
unsafe.
1902:
Birthdate of Jacob Sack, the Pittsburgh native who played lineman for the Pitt
Panthers before going to play professional ball for the nascent NFL.
1902:
In Lodz, Poland, Morris and Freida (Alpert) Abbell gave birth to Maxell Abbell,
who 1905 came to the United States where he graduated magna cum laude from
Harvard, earned an MBA from Northwestern and after a career in social work
developed the a real estate empire that included the Abell Hotel Chain while
serving as the president of the United Synagogue of American, the Vice
President of the American Palestine Trading Corporation and raising a family of
five children with his wife Fannie.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1957/07/10/90823629.pdf
https://www.geni.com/people/Maxwell-Abbell/6000000002129626095
https://prabook.com/web/maxwell.abbell/1054805
1903:
Birthdate of Brooklyn native and Junior Lightweight boxer Joe Glick who
twenty-three year career “included over two hundred bouts” two of which were
fights for the Junior Lightweight Title which he lost.
1903:
Boutros Ghali writes the conditions for the Jewish settlement in Sinai.
1903:
“The annual reception for all members of the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian
Society” is scheduled to be held this afternoon at the Orphan Asylum on
Broadway.
1904:
Dr. Joseph Silverman delivered an address this evening on “The Jew as a
Patriot” at 147th meeting and “banquet of the New York Universalist
Club at the St. Denis Hotel during which he said that “We are Jews only in our
form of worship” but “we are Americans in thought and feeling.”
1905:
It was reported today that leading Jews in Montreal have repudiated the
utterances of Moses Vineberg, “said to be head of Russian revolutionary band in
New York who is holding meetings with Russian Jews where he rejoices over the”
recent assassination of Grand Duke Sergius.
1906:
“The tenements at 27 and 29 Goerck Street” in New York have been sold by
Hurwitz and Rabinowitz.
1907:
In Manhattan, Anna Levit and Frank Bershard gave birth to Syracuse University
graduate Sheldon Leonard Bershard who gained fame as actor, director and
producer Sheldon Leonard.
https://www.nytimes.com/1997/01/13/movies/sheldon-leonard-film-actor-and-tv-producer-dies-at-89.html
1907:
In Omaha, Nebraska, Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Maisal gave birth to Zena Maisel who
married Sidney E. Pollack and as Zena Maisel Pollack served as the
administrative director of the Jewish Guild for the Blind.
1908(20th
of Adar I, 5668): Parsahat Ki Tasa
1908:
It was reported today, that while give a speech on “Co-Operation of Business
Organization with Governmental Agencies for Promoting the Commerce of the
Country” to a group of Boston businessmen, Oscar S. Straus, the Secretary of
Commerce and Labor said “the power of the ‘big stick’ is needed because there
are big abuses to be corrected and big lawbreakers to be checked.”
1909(1st
of Adar I, 5669): Rosh Chodesh Adar I
1909:
In New York, “Joseph M. and Augusta Stadler Levin” gave birth to Plainfield, NJ
raised and Rutgers Law School graduate Philip Jerome Levin, the “president and
chief operating officer of the Madison Square Garden Corporation and husband of
Janice Hoffman Levin, the daughter of Samuel and Rene Hoffman.
https://www.nytimes.com/1971/08/04/archives/philip-levinhead-of-madison-squaregarden-diesi.html
1909(1st
of Adar 1, 5669): Sixty-seven-year-old chess champion Eugene Delmar passed away
today.
1910:
Birthdate of Sophie Melvin, the native of the Ukraine who gained fame as social
activist Sophie Gerson (As reported by Deborah Gerson and Tim Wheeler)
http://jwa.org/weremember/gerson-sophie
1911:
In Cleveland, OH, Russian Jewish immigrants Mary Axelrod and Peter Axelrod, the
founder of The Cleveland Dairy and the grand-nephew of Pavel Borisovich
Axelrod, the founder of Pravda gave birth to Western Reserve University trained
attorney and WW II Army veteran Max M. Axelrod, the founder of the Cleveland
Concession Company and reform minded chairman of the Cleveland Boxing
Commission whose activities in the Jewish community included founding Lake
Forest Country because the other clubs did not manage Jews and the found of the
Cleveland Jewish News.(Editor’s note—in the spirit of full disclosure, the
on-line edition of the Cleveland Jewish News was one of the earliest to publish
This Day…In Jewish History)
1911:
Twenty-six-year-old Frank Rosenblatt, the Russian born son of Benjamin and
Bessie (Reichberg) Rosenblatt and the holder of a Ph. D from Columbia married
Katherine Golding today in New York City.
1912(4th
of Adar, 5672): Seventy-four old Bertha Eppstein, the wife of Max Eppstein and
the mother of Seraphine Eppstein Pisko, the secretary of National Jewish
Hospital for Consumptives, passed away today in Denver, CO.
1913(8th
of Adar I, 5673): Parashat Tetzaveh
1913:
Dr. Gerson B. Levi is scheduled to officiate at Saturday morning services at
B’nai Sholom-Temple Israel in Chicago.
1913:
Rabbi Joseph Stoltz is scheduled to deliver a sermon on “Washington and the
Jews” this mornings at Isaiah Temple.
1913:
Rabbi Abraham Hirshberg is scheduled to deliver a talk at this afternoon’s
children service at the Chicago Hebrew Institute.
1913:
Judge Huge Pam is scheduled to deliver a lecture this evening on “Municipal
Government to the Welfare of the Nation and People” at the Chicago Hebrew
Institute.
1913:
It was reported today that “Samuel Littman, a sergeant of Company B, 47th
Regiment of the New York National Guard has resigned” because he claimed that
he was not promoted to lieutenant because he was Jewish – a charge that
Governor Sulzer has asked to be thoroughly investigated.
1914(26th
of Shevat, 5674): Fifty-year old Joseph Fles, the Virginia born son of Lazarus
Fels and Sus an Freiberg and husband of Iowan Mollie Fels who was the owner of
the soap manufacturing that bears his name and advocate of Henry George’s
single tax philosophy passed away today in Philadelphia.
https://hsp.org/sites/default/files/legacy_files/migrated/findingaid1953fels.pdf
https://www.geni.com/people/Joseph-Fels/6000000002501814590
1914:
Birthdate of Dr. Renato Dulbecco, the Italian born virologist who shared a
Nobel Prize in 1975 for his role in drawing a link between genetic mutations
and cancer. During World War II, Dulbecco served as a medical officer in the
Italian Army. When the train taking him to the Russian front “stopped in
Warsaw, he saw railway laborers wearing yellow stars. When he asked about them,
he was told that the workers were Jews who would be killed when their work was
done. He was horrified.” According to him seeing this was a life changing
moment which may account for the fact that he deserted from the Italian Army
and spent the rest of the war providing medical assistance to the resistance
fighters in and around Torino. (As reported by Denise Gellene)
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/21/us/dr-renato-dulbecco-nobel-laureate-dies-at-97.html?_r=1&hpw
1915:
The second day of the 23rd annual meeting of the American Jewish
Historical Society will include another series of literary presentations and a
business meeting that will include the election of officers.
1915:
Birthdate of New York native Jules Munshin, “the song and dance man” whose
credits including “Easter Parade” and “On the Town.”
1915:
Georgia Solicitor General Hugh M. Dorse and State Attorney General Warren Grice
are scheduled to file their brief in the U.S. Supreme that will deny a writ of
Habeas Corpus in the case of Leo Frank who is scheduled to be hung after a
trial held in the midst of an orgy of anti-Semitism.
1915:
Eighteen-year-old Charles Pores won a weather-shortened version of the
Brooklyn-to-Sea Gate Marathon.
1915:
Following the failure of the Ottoman attack on Allied forces in Egypt, the
Arabs have expressed their bitterness and “their determination not to fight in
the future” on the side of the Turks.
1915:
It was reported today that Djemal Pasha, the Ottoman Minister of Marine
“clearly see the utter futility of further military operations against Egypt”
and has gone north to Damascus” where he plans on resigning. (Reading this, one
would not suspect that it will take the British another two years to finally
get to Jerusalem and more than three years to finally complete their conquest
of Palestine and Syria)
1916:
Elinor “Ellie” Fatman the daughter of Morris and Settie Fatman who had been
teaching at the Henry Street Settlement House since 1913 proposed to Henry
Morgenthau, Jr. in Central Park.(As reported by Edna S. Friedberg)
1916:
In Amsterdam, Levie Van Praag and Sabiena Cohen, both of whom were killed in
Sobibor, gave birth Jacques Van Praag who was murdered at Birkenau.
1916:
In Washington, D.C., at today’s meeting of the Executive Committee of the
American Federation of Labor, Samuel Gompers is scheduled to raise “the
question of Jewish rights in the belligerent countries.
1916:
Dr. Nathan Syrkin and Rabbi Stephen S. Wise addressed a convention chaired by
Judge Sanders of the Jewish organizations of Manhattan held at Arlington Hall
where plans were discussed for the upcoming Jewish conference to be held in
Philadelphia in March.
1916: After two years and four months serving in
Constantinople, American Ambassador Henry Morgenthau arrived in New York aboard
the steamship Frederick VIII to start a 60 day vacation.
1917(30th
of Shevat, 5677): Rosh Chodesh Adar
1917:
As of today, Frederic C. Penfield, the United States Ambassador to
Austria-Hungary “has turned over $25,000 to the Vienna Jewish Association to be
used for the relief of Jews in the occupied districts of Rumania and Serbia.
1918:
In Dixon, CA, Otto Oscar Dannenberg and Iceophine Elsie Zimmerman Dannenberg
gave birth to Mary Ottie Dannenberg, who became Mary Ottie Dannenberg Zacharia
when she married Ellsworth Jack Zacharias
1918:
A report today from Zurich stated that Jewish deputies succeed in persuading
the Austrian Government to abolish the prohibition against Yiddish
correspondence.
1918:
Colonel John Henry Patterson led the Jewish Legion, the unit he commanded on
parade down Whitechapel Road.
1919(22nd
of Adar I, 5679): Seventy-eight-year-old French neurologist Hippolyte Bernheim
passed away today in Paris.
1919(22nd
of Adar I, 5679): Royal Army Service Corps Private John Isaacs, the son of
Rosetta and Isaac Isaacs and the wife of Elizabeth Davis whom he had married at
the East London Synagogue in 1911 passed away today as a result of influenza.
1920:
Sculptor Frederick Victor Guinzburg, the New York City born son of Etta
Kleinert and Victor Guinzburg who was a member of the Federation of Jewish
Philanthropic Societies and Temple Emanu-El married Ruth Lev today.
1920:
The New Orleans Times-Picayune published an interview with Elizabeth
D.A. Cohen, the first practicing female physician in Louisiana, her 100th
birthday.
1921(14th
of Adar I, 5681): Purim Katan observed for the first time under President
Warren G. Harding.
1921:
The Tikvath Israel Society hosted “junior activities” at the center on Sumner
Avenue at the corner of Van Buren Street.
1921:
Soprano Mina Elman, the sister of Mischa Elman made her first appearance at
Aeolian Hall today giving a concert in which she sang songs in English, French,
Italian, German and Yiddish some of which were created “by her celebrated
brother.”
1922:
William Weinstone completed a stint as the executive Secretary as the Communist
Party of America which had begun in October of 1921 during which he used “he
pseudonym G.Lewis.”
1922:
In the South Bronx, Solomon and Lillian Baumol, Jewish immigrants from Eastern
Europe gave birth to economist William J. Baumol. (As reported by Patricia
Cohen)
1922:
Birthdate of Sammy Hershkovitz, the Romanian born Jew who made Aliyah at the
age of 2 and gained fame as Sammy Ofer, the Israeli international shipping
magnate, philanthropist and art collector who headed a family ranked as the
richest in Israel. (As reported by Isabel Kershner)
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/05/world/middleeast/05ofer.html?_r=0
1922
(24th of Shevat, 5682): Aaron David (A.D.) Gordon passed away. Gordon, a Hebrew
writer and philosopher of the “religion of Labor,” was considered the
ideological pillar of the kibbutz movement. Born in 1856 in Russia he only came
to Eretz Israel at the age of 48. Neither his age nor health impeded his drive
to work in agriculture. He helped found Kibbutz Degania in 1909. Gordon's
philosophy included a call to a return to “Nature.” He believed that the
self-improvement of each individual rather than external changes such as
espoused by Marxism was the way to change Jewish destiny.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/ad_gordon.html
1923:
“Earth Spirit” a silent film produced by Richard Oswald and written by Carl
Mayer was released in Germany today.
1923:
In Chicago, Max and Bertha Goldsmith gave birth real estate developer Bram
Goldsmith who “served as the chief executive of National City Bank from 1975 to
1995.”
1924:
It was reported today, King Hussein has appointed Dr. Faud Shatra who had
appeared before Congress during the debate on the British mandate for Palestine
as the representative of the anti-Zionist National Palestine League and
“protested against approval of the Palestine mandate” as his representative in
Washington.
1925:
In Pittsburgh, PA, Harry and Ida Barch Stern, Jewish immigrants from Poland and
Ukraine, gave birth to American poet Gerald Stern whose works have been
published The Pineys, Leaving Another Kingdom, and Odd Mercy
and who while married to Patricia Miller gave birth to a daughter Rachel, “a
nutrition therapist” and David, “an architect.”
http://digital.library.pitt.edu/islandora/object/pitt:US-PPiU-sc200704
1925(28th of Shevat, 5685):
Seventy-eight-year-old jeweler turned political leader Simeon Phillips, the son
of Solomon and Caroline Phillips who served in the legislature and as Mayor of
Dubbo and was the husband of Rosetta Phillips passed away today in his native
New South Wales, Australia.
1925(28th
of Shevat, 5685): Poet and author Mrs. Radcliffe N. Salomon (Nina David) passed
away
1926:
“In Washington, Pa, near Pittsburgh,” jewelry store owner Maurice York “and the
former Jesse Sachs, an aunt of David O. Selznick gave birth to Alan David
Yorkin who gained fame as director, producer and write Bud Yorkin who teamed up
with Norm Lear to form Tandem Productions which gave us many cutting-edge
sit-coms including All in the Family, Maude and Sanford and Son.
1926:
In Great Britain, a “well-known play producer” was reported to have “said he
judged his play not by first-night receptions, but by the attitude of Saturday
night audiences, which he estimated were nearly 75 per cent Jewish” and that
“the Jewish population of London were keen dramatic critics” who “had been of
tremendous service to the modern British drama.”
1926:
Ross Sterling, the owner and publisher of the Houston Post Dispatch, who is not
Jewish was reported today to have been donor of an unsolicited give of $5,000
gift to the United Jewish Campaign which is trying to raise fifteen million
dollars to alleviate the suffering of Jews living “in foreign lands.”
1926:
As of today, the new officers of the National Council of the Palestine
Foundation Fund were Samuel Untermyer, President; Morris Rothenberg, Chairman
of the directors and Rabbi Aaron M. Ashinsky of Pittsburgh, Vice Chairman of
the board.
1926:
“The United Jewish Campaign received word” today at its headquarter in the
Pershing Square building that a $50,000 quota for the $15,000,000 overseas
chest had been accepted a committee of Jews from North Dakota. (That’s right –
Jews in North Dakota!)
1926:
Pledges totaling $300,000 for the relief of Jews in Poland were made” today “at
a conference in the HIAS Building called by the Federation of Polish Jews in
America” whose President, Benjamin Winter “blamed the policy of the Polish
Government for the present distress among the Polish Jews.”
1927:
Birthdate of Franz Reheinberger who would be executed at the age of 17 for his
part in anti-Nazi activities.
1927:
In what became a minor scandal, Ivor Montagu, the grandson Samuel Montagu,
founder of the bank Samuel Montagu and Company and the son of Baron Louis
Montagu, married “Eileen – A Jewish divorced mother of one who went by the
nickname ‘Hell’” today.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/how-the-queen-of-england-got-involved-in-a-secret-jewish-wedding/
1927:
Birthdate of Inge Fisherova, who was deported from Prague in 1942 and was
eventually murdered in Auschwitz.
1928:
“To preserve the sanctity of orthodox Jewish burials, Senator A. Spencer Feld
and Assemblyman Harry A. Samberg, Democrats, of New York City, announced today
that they would introduce a bill banning” the requirement that would prevent
cemetery authorities from demanding that they receive 24 hour notice of a
burial.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1928/02/23/109854583.html?pageNumber=3
1928:
Isidore M. Knauer, alias Abraham Berger, 40 years old, married and a
naturalized citizen of the United States, returned yesterday on the French
liner Paris from Vienna in the custody of John P. Donlon, secretary of District
Attorney Banton, and Detective James L. Leech of the New York Police
Department.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1928/02/23/109854664.html?pageNumber=10
1929:
In New York City, “Rachel Gutman and real estate attorney Judah Wattenberg”
gave birth to Rebecca Ann Wattenberg, the sister of Ben J. Wattenberg “aunt of
journalist Daniel Wattenberg” who gained famed as actress Rebecca Schull, the
wife of Gene Schull.
1930:
U.S. premiere of “Slightly Scarlet,” a comedy direct by Edwin H. Knopf with a
script co-authored by Joseph L. Mankiewicz.
1930:
In Vienna, “Salomon Mischel, a businessman, and Lola Lea (Schreck) Mischel, who
ran the household gave birth to Walter Mishel, whose “family fled the Nazis in
1938” and settled in the United Sates, the ground-breaking psychologist. (As
reported by Benedict Carey)
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/14/obituaries/walter-mischel-dead.html
1931(5th
of Adar): Poet and novelist Menahem Mendel Dolitzky passed away today.
1932:
The United States marked the bicentennial of the birth of George Washington who
Rabbi de Sola Pool of the Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue had “praised” as “a
great liberator” and whom Rabbi Samuel Schulman while addressing his
congregation had “referred to a statement made in a treaty between the United
States and Tripoli in 1796 and signed by Washington that ‘the Government of the
United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion.”
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1932/02/23/105785489.html?pageNumber=20
1932:
“With Chief Judge Benjamin N. Cardozo of the Court of Appeals assured of
confirmation as an associate justice of the United States” the Governor of New
York “indicated tonight that he would promptly fill the vacancy on the State
bench.”
1932:
As America celebrates the 200th anniversary of the birth of George
Washington members of the Jewish National Fund of American are scheduled to
meet tonight at the Hotel Pennsylvania in New York “to hear speakers pay
tribute to Washington and to hear speakers discuss” plans for creating “an
evergreen memorial of 500,000 pine and eucalyptus trees” which “will be planted
in Palestine as a living tribute” by “the Jews of America to the first
President.”
1932:
In New York, Chief Judge Benjamin N. Cardozo is scheduled to speak on
“Washington, the Constitution Builder” during the Bicentennial celebration at
Chancellor’s Hall.
1933:
Birthdate of Gideon Patt, a Sabra who served in the Nahal Brigade, earned a BA
from NYU before pursuing a career in politics that included service in the
Knesset and several cabinet posts.
1933:
Adolf Hitler made his private para-military units, the SS and the SS, part of
Germany’s police force.
1934:
U.S premiere of “It Happened One Night” an all-time classic comedy written by
Robert Riskin for which he won the Oscar and co-produced Harry Cohn
1934:
During his eulogy today at the funeral of Rabbi Hyman Gerson Enelow in Chicago,
David Philipson said, “If there was one trait that characterized Hymen G.
Enelow above all other, it was his love of learning for its own sake.
1934:
“The Jewish newspaper IF” published a photograph by Herbert Sonnenfeld of “a
model portraying two different periods in Eretz Israel: a typical home in Tel
Aviv in 1934, and ten years earlier.”
http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/this_month/february/02.asp
1934:
Bishop Hermann Wilhelm Berning of Osnabrück ordered all churches in his diocese
to display the Nazi’s swastika flag on patriotic occasions alongside standard
church flags.
1935:
“The Whole Town’s Talk” a crime comedy written by Jo Swerling and Robert Riskin
and starring Edward G. Robinson was released in the United States today.
1935:
“After Office Hours” directed by Robert Z. Leonard who co-produced the film
with Bernard H. Hyman which was written by Herman J. Mankiewicz was released
today in the United States.
1936(29th
of Shevat, 5695): Parashat Mishpatim and Shabbat Shekalim
1936:
“The third annual observance of Brotherhood Day” sponsored by the Conference of
Jews and Christians began today.
1936:
It was announced today that 27 undergraduates have been appointed second
lieutenants in the City College R.O.T.C. unit including Leonard Aaronson,
Irving Levitan and Lester S. Perlman.
1936:
It was reported today that in Poland Senators “suggested that the government
should communicate with international Zionist organizations and arrange an
immigration quota for Poland” which would be a way of ridding the country of
one million of its three and one half million Jews.
1936:
This morning Arturo Toscanini accepted an invitation to conduct the opening
concert of the newly organized Palestine Symphony Orchestra on next October 24
at Tel-Aviv.
1937(11th
of Adar, 5697): Seventy-three-year-old Dr. Maxmillian Reiner, “a founder of the
Czech-Jewish Movement” and an active member of “Sokol, the national gymnastic
and educational organization” passed away today in Prague.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1937/02/24/99107164.pdf
1937(11th
of Adar, 5697): Sixty-seven-year-old Astronomer J. Ernest G. Yalden who spent
25 years directing a “trade school funded by the Trustees of the Baron de
Hirsch Fund passed away
1938:
“After warning that he would be ‘tactless’ in his remarks, Stanley M. Isaacs,
Borough President of Manhattan, told 1,750 teachers attending the 11th
anniversary of the Jewish Teachers Association at the Hotel Commodore” today
“that he could see no reason for the existence of their organization”
1939:
As part of the annual observance of Brotherhood Week, “ceremonies honoring the
memory of Roger Williams the founder of Rhode Island” and one of “the first to
preach the gospel of tolerance in the New World” were held in front of his bust
in the Hall of Fame on the campus of NYU by members of Zeta Beta Tau, which
included an address by B. Leo Schwartz, a benediction by Rabbi Augustus Loeb
and wreath laying by James R. Katzman.
1940:
During the period known as “The Phony War” Jean Giraudoux, the Commissioner of
Information warned the French people in a radio talk tonight that Germany does
not ask for colonies in Asia and Africa because she wants to colonize her
neighbors in Europe which means that if the Germans are victorious, France will
share the fate of Poland.
1940:
General Maxime Weygand, the head of French forces in the Near East, and General
Sir Archibald P. Wavell, the head of French forces in the Near East, met in
Palestine today to discuss how to coordinate efforts with the Turkish
Government which is neutral in the war between the Allies and the Axis.
1940:
It was reported today that “Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt has consented to head of
special advisory committee for the youth Aliyah movement represented in the
United States by Hadassah,” the women’s Zionist organization led by its
President, Mrs. David de Sola Pool who has the support of Mrs. Herbert H.
Lehman, Mrs. Roger W. Straus and Mrs. Felix M. Warburg in the formation of this
committee.
1941(27th
of Shevat, 5701): Parashat Mishpatim; Shabbat Shekalim
1941:
In Paris, Theodore Dannecker, the SS officer in charge of bringing the Final
Solution to France reported approvingly that “The French inspectors formed and
instructed in collaboration with our section for Jewish affairs today
constitute an elite body as well as training cadres for Frenchmen to be drafted
in the future to the anti-Jewish police.” The “French inspectors” worked
for the agency that “transferred” the over 20,000 Jewish businesses into the
hands of Frenchmen sympathetic to the Third Reich. “The anti-Jewish
police” referred to the Frenchmen who would round up French Jews and ship them
off to the death camps.
1941:
The Nazi SS began rounding up Jews of Amsterdam.
1941:
Today’s New Yorker magazine called stockbroker and New York Stock Exchange
Member James B. “Jimmie” Seligman “one of the wittiest men on the Floor.”
1942(5th
of Adar, 5702): In Brazil, author Stefan Zwieg and his second wife Lotte (née
Charlotte Elisabeth Altmann) committed suicide together in Petrópolis using the
barbiturate Verol. Filled with a sense of despair at the future of Europe and
its culture, he wrote, "I think it better to conclude in good time and in
erect bearing a life in which intellectual labor meant the purest joy and
personal freedom the highest good on earth."
http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-features/1.637453
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive/pdf?res=9802E4DB113BE33BBC4C51DFB4668389659EDE
1942: Wanda Landowska performed Bach's Goldberg
Variations at New York City's Town Hall. It was the first 20th-century
performance of this work on the harpsichord. The Polish born Jewess who sought
refuge from the Nazis first in France and then the United States is credited
with reviving harpsichord music in the 20th century,
1942:
U.S. premiere of “The Adventures of Martin Eden,” the cinema version of the
novel Martin Eden produced by Samuel Bronston and B.P. Schulberg.
1942:
Lord Moyne completed his service as Secretary of State for the Colonies. Moyne
was a close personal friend of Churchill, who as Deputy Resident Minister of
State in Cairo took part in the interrogation of Joel Brand when a response was
being crafted to Eichmann’s “Blood for Truck” proposal. Moyne would be
murdered by Lehi in 1944.
1943(17th
of Adar 1, 5703): At Auschwitz, the Nazis murdered Communist Party member and
anti-Fascist fighter Dagobert Biermann, the father of singer-song writer Karl
Wolf Bierman.
1943:
For the next six days, 10,000 more Jews were deported to Chelmno. All were
gassed to death.
1943:
“An agreement was signed between the special Nazi envoy sent to facilitate the
deportations, Theodor Dannecker and the Bulgarian Commissar for Jewish Affairs,
Alexander Belev for the deportation of 20,000 Jews (12,000 from Macedonia and
Thrace and 8,000 – from the old territory of Bulgaria).”
1943:
Bulgaria agreed to allow the Germans to deport 11,000 Jews. Horrible
overcrowding conditions existed in the 20 trains that would transport them.
Each day the trains stopped to dump the bodies of those who died during the
journey.
1943:
Italians countermanded German orders to deport French Jews. Three days later
Ribbentrop complained to Mussolini that "Italian military circles . . . lacked a
proper understanding of the Jewish question."
1943:
“Sophie Scholl, her brother Hans and their friend Christoph Probst were found
guilty of treason and condemned to death by head judge of the court Roland
Freisler. They were beheaded by executioner Johann Reichhart in the
Munich-Stadelheim prison only a few hours later at 17:00. The execution was
supervised by Dr. Walter Roemer who was the enforcement chief of the Munich
district court. Prison officials emphasized the courage with which she walked
to her execution.” This trio was part of a small number of genuine anti-Nazi
Germans who had worked to bring down the regime.
1943:
“Allied military forces marched through the crowded streets of Jerusalem, Tel
Aviv and Haifa today as part of the celebrations of Red Army Day.” [The Red
Army referred to is the Soviet Army which was doing the brunt of the fighting
against the Germans.]
1943:
Birthdate of Elliot Rabinowitz who gained fame as music manager and businessman
Elliot Roberts who partnered with David Geffen to “create Asylum Records.”
1944:
Professor Selig Brodestky, president of the Board of British Jews led a
delegation that met with the Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs with whom they
discussed “the possibility of Britain establishing a War Refugee Board similar
to that recently created by President Roosevelt.”
1944:
Dr. Leonardo De Benedetti, Physician and Surgeon and Dr. Primo Levi, Chemist
“left the concentration camp at Fossoli di Carpi with a convoy of 650 Jews of
both sexes and all ages. They did not know that the trip would end four days
later in Auschwitz.
1945(9th
of Adar, 5705): Osip Maksimovich Brik “a Russian Avant Garde writer and
literary critic, who was one of the most important members of the Russian
formalist school, though he also identified himself as one of the Futurists,”
passed away.
1945:
In Boston, businessman Samuel Tannenbaum and the former Gertrude Leaman gave
birth to Rena Meryl Tannenbaum who gained fame as publisher Rena Wolner.
1945(9th
of Adar, 5705): Seventy-two-year-old engineer Abel Morris Bienenfeld, the San
Francisco born son of Bertha Kunreuther and Elias Bienenfeld and the husband of
Adelheid Bienenfeld who, before and during the Spanish-American War “engaged in
the reconstruction of warships subsequently were used by Admiral Dewey at
Manila” and who was engaged in the construction of railroads in California,
Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, passed away today.
1946:
The Palmach attacked the Police Tegart fort at Shefa 'Amr with a 200-pound
bomb; in the firefight that followed, the Palmach suffered casualties
1946:
The British said today that three members of armed Jewish bands had been killed
during the series of night attacks on Palestine mobile police camps in which
dynamite charges damaged several buildings, vehicles and other facilities last
night.
1947:
Birthdate of Israeli man of letters Yehonatan Geffen, the native of Nhalal who
is the nephew of Moshe Dayan and the father of Aviv, Shira and Natasha Geffen.
1948
As the conflict over the coming partition of Palestine grew, three car bombs
arranged by Arab irregulars exploded on Ben Yehudah Street killing 52 Jewish
civilians and leaving 123 injured. This was part of the war waged by the Arabs
between the partition vote in November, 1947 and the end of the Mandate in
1948. In the meantime, the international community did nothing then or
later to enforce its decision to make Jerusalem a city to be governed by an
international body.
1948:
The Golani Brigade, one of Israeli’s most elite infantry brigades was
formed.
1949:
“The executive committee of the United Palestine Appeal voted tonight, after
five hours of debate, to set up a committee that is to meet in a few days with
Henry Morgenthau Jr. in an effort to reach a settlement of the issue caused by
the opposition of one element to the designation of Henry Montor as executive
director of the 1949 United Jewish Appeal.”
1949:
On the Isle of Rhodes, “an especially well-informed source declared tonight”
that “the success or failure of the Egyptian-Israeli armistice negotiations
hangs entirely on the fate of Beersheba
1950: “A major
trade showing of imported giftwares made in handicraft shops in Israel”
“sponsored by the Palestine Galleries for Arts and Crafts” continued for a
third day the Pierre Hotel in New York City
1951:
Birthdate of Ellen Greene, the Brooklyn born daughter of a guidance counselor
and dentist who has enjoyed a multi-dimensional career performing in
nightclubs, on Broadway, in films and television programs including Law and
Order, The X Files and Miami Vice.
1952:
“The Belle of New York” produced by Arthur Freed was released in the United
States today.
1955:
“State Department spokesman Robert McCloskey declined to comment today on
Egyptian press reports that President Nasser…has threated a preventive war
against Israel if Israel tested a nuclear weapon” on the same day that U.S.
State Department officials greeted a delegation led by Anwar El Sadat, speaker
of the Egyptian National Assembly at Dulles International Airport. (As reported by JTA)
1958:
Egypt and Syria announced that they were joining together in a new nation, The
United Arab Republic. The UAR was supposed to be the first step in the
creation of giant Pan Arab Nation. The Israelis were concerned because
the two enemies now were going to have a one military command which made
coordinated military actions against the Jewish state a potentially destructive
reality. The UAR would collapse three years later as the Syrians grew
disgusted with the Egyptian attempts to dominate the relationship. This
would not be the first or last time that charismatic leader would try to form a
Super Arab and/or Super Moslem state.
1958:
In East Meadow, New York, Leon Greenberg, “an executive for New York’s Century
Theatres movie chain” and his wife Shirley gave birth to playwright Richard
Greenberg who won the Tony Award in 2003 for “Take Me Out.”
1958(2nd
of Adar, 5718): Parashat Terumah
1958(2nd
of Adar, 5718): Seventy-five-year-old Russian native Harry Shulman, the
merchant who in 1905 came to Chicago after which he moved to Iowa City passed
away today after which he was buried at the Agudas Achim cemetery which was the
final resting place for his wife Anna.
https://peoplelegacy.com/harry_shulman-6b5b6F
1959(14th
of Adar I, 5719): Purim Katan
1959:
At the Pilgrim Church of New York, Reverend John Walter Houck preached his last
sermon at service during with “a gift was presented to him by the Bronx County
Council of Jewish War Veterans in commemoration of his work in furthering the
cause of Americanism in New York City” and at which “Rabbi Maurice J. Bloom of
Tremont Temple pronounced the
benediction for a clergyman known for his “successful struggle against the
cancer of intolerance and discrimination…”
TimesMachine: February 23, 1959 - NYTimes.com
1959:
Tonight, in Los Angeles, Mrs. Moishe S Cahan of New Orleans, the head of the
National Council of Jewish Women, “urged the government to stimulate employment
and economic growth by expanding it socially valuable activities in education,
housing, welfare and recreation.”
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1959/02/23/89155289.html?pageNumber=14
1960:
David Susskind produced “A Very Special Baby” this week’s “Play of the Week”
co-starring Marion Winters as “Anna” and Larry Blyden as “Joey.”
1961:
“Come Blow Your Horn” Neil Simon’s first play opened “on Broadway at the Brooks
Atkinson Theatre.
1964:
Final performance of “The Passion of Josef D.” written by Paddy Chayefsky at
the Ethel Barrymore Theatre.
1964(9th
of Adar I, 5724): Ninety-year-old Samuel Earl “Ike” Samuels who played briefly
for the St. Louis Browns before pursuing a career in dentistry and insurance
sales passed away today in New York City.
1964:
In Camden, London, economist Sam Aranovitch and his wife gave birth toe to
author and screenwriter Ben Dylan Aaronovitch, the brother of actor Owen
Aaronvitch and journalist David Aaronovitch.
1965(20th
of Adar I, 5725): Felix Frankfurter, Supreme Court Justice passed away.
Born in 1882, Frankfurter was involved in various liberal and unpopular causes
including the defense of Sacco and Venzeti. He was a professor at Harvard
Law School. Many of his students went to work in FDR’s new deal and they
were known as “Frankfurters” (for their teacher not the hot dog). When
FDR appointed him to the bench, Frankfurter was the third Jew to serve on the
High Court.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/frankfurter.html
1966:
“Promise Her Anything” directed by Arthur Hiller with a title song by Burt
Bacharach and Hal David which had been released in the previous November in the
United Kingdom was released today in the United States.
1968(23rd
of Shevat, 5728): Sixty-two year old Hoboken, NJ, born and Columbia trained
attorney Burton A Zorn, a labor lawyer, partner in the prestigious law firm of
Proskauer, Rose, Goetz and Mendelsohn and “chairman of the American Jewish
Committee’s civil rights section who raised two children – Stephen and Karen –
with his wife Fay passed away today.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1968/02/23/77172613.pdf
1969(4th
of Adar, 5729): Parashat Terumah
1969(4th
of Adar, 5729): Seventy-two-year-old WW I U.S. Navy veteran and NYU Law school
grad, Benjamin Jacob Rabin, the U.S. Congressman and Justice of the New York
Supreme Court who was the husband of Syd Sobel Rabin passed away today in
Florida.
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/benjamin-rabin
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/6423725/benjamin-j_-rabin
1970(16th
of Adar I, 5730): Sixty-eight-year-old Vilna native and Brooklyn Law School
graduate Charles Abrams who became a major force in the field of urban planning
passed away today.
1971(27th
of Shevat, 5731): Fifty-six year old New York native David “Dynamite Dave”
Smulker the all-star Temple University fullback who as a member of the NFL’s
Philadelphia Eagles played in the first televised professional game in 1939
passed away today.
1971:
Birthdate of Arnon Grunberg, the Dutch born author of Blue Mondays which won
the Dutch prize “for the best debut novel” and whose mother survived Auschwitz
1972:
Paul Grüninger, the Swiss police official who save thousands of Jews following
the Anschluss died in poverty today.
http://www.jfr.org/pages/rescuer-support/stories/switzerland-/-paul-gruninger
http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/righteous/stories/grueninger.asp
1973:
In New York, premiere of “Charlotte’s Web” an animated feature film version of
a children’s novel by the same time with music by Richard M. and Robert B.
Sherman and sons by Irwin Kostal.
1973:
“Walking Tall,” a biopic with music by Walter Scharft and directed by Phil
Karlson whose father was Jewish was released in the United States today.
1974:
Today “Jewish activists Mark Abramovich and Yakov Schwartzman (Kishinev),
Leonid Bendersky (Tiraspol) and Sender Levinson (Bendery) were arrested in
Kishinev after staging a hunger strike near the Central Post Office.”
1975(11th
of Adar I, 5735): Fifty-six-year-old Samuel Bihari, one of the four brothers
who founded Modern Records and helped to create a “sanitized” form of rock and
roll for the mass market of the 1950’s passed away today.
1977(4th
of Adar, 5737): Sixty-two-year-old Avery Berlow, the Boston born holder of
Columbia Ph.D. and author of eight books passed away today while serving as a
“professor of finance at the University of North Carolina” in Chapel Hill, NC.
https://www.nytimes.com/1977/02/23/archives/avery-berlow-cohan-62-a-professor-of-finance.html
1981(18th
of Adar I, 5741): Eighty-one-year-old Curtis Bernhardt who worked as movie
director in Germany under the name of Kurt Bernhardt before fleeing Nazi
Germany and pursuing his career in France, England and finally the United
States, passed away today.
1981(18th
of Adar I, 5741): Seventy-five-year-old Austrian born American historian Saul
K. Padover whose works include biographies on Karl Marx, Joseph II of Austria,
Louis XVI, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and Thomas Jefferson passed away
today.
http://www.nytimes.com/1981/02/24/obituaries/dr-saul-k-padover-author-dead-at-75.html
1982:
New York City Mayor Ed Koch announced his plans to run for governor of New
York. The campaign would be a failure.
1982(29th
of Shevat): Legendary DJ Murray "the K" Kaufman, called the 5th
Beatle by some, passed away at the age of 60.
1984(19th
of Adar I, 5744): Eighty-seven year old mathematician and WW II codebreaker
Maxwell Herman Alexander “Max” Newman passed away today in Cambridge.
http://history.computer.org/pioneers/newman-mha.html
1985(1st
of Adar, 5745): Rosh Chodesh
1985
(1st of Adar, 5745): Violinist Efrem A Zimbalist passed away at the
age of 95.. Born in Russia, Zimbalist was one of long line of violin
virtuosos that included Jascha Heifitz, Yehudi Menuhin and Isaac
Stern. Many of you may recognize this name with the word
"Junior" after it. Zimbalist’s son was a minor matinee idol in
television and movies who was not Jewish. (As reported by Tim Page)
http://www.nytimes.com/1985/02/23/arts/efrem-zimbalist-violinist-dies-at-94.html?pagewanted=print
1986(13th
of Adar I, 5746): Soviet Poet Boris Slutsky passed away.
http://forward.com/articles/143708/more-moses-than-job/
1987(23rd
of Shevat): David Susskind passed away at the age of 66. Susskind is best
remembered for his pioneering role in late night television. Susskind
hosted a show called Open End, where guests from a variety of walks of life
actually discussed issues of the day without a script and with
civility. (As reported by Robert D. McFadden)
1988:
It was reported today that 28 year old “Cheryl Bentov, the American-born wife
of a former major in Israeli military intelligence” is “the mysterious blond
woman who lured former Israeli nuclear technician Mordechai Vanunu out of
Britain in September 1986 to eventually face trial for espionage and treason in
Jerusalem.”
1989:
At a benefit for the Dance Library of Israel, an international dance library
and archive in Tel Aviv, Marge Champion presented an award to Agnes de Mille.
The presentation took place at a dinner that preceded a benefit performance of
“Jerome Robbin’s Broadway.”
1989:
“Different Trains,” a three-movement piece for string quartet and tape written
by Steve Reich in 1988 won a Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Classical
Composition.
1990:
A funeral is scheduled to be held this evening in Manhattan for fifty-nine year
old Kenyon College graduate and producer Gabriel Katzka, the Brooklyn born son
of attorney and Broadway show backer Emil Katzka.
1991:
"Underground," a new work by the Israeli playwright Joshua Sobol,
directed by Adrian Hall, has its world premiere at the Yale Repertory Theater
today, co-directed by Adrian Hall.
1991:
“He Said, She Said,” a comedy directed by Marisa Silver was released in the
United States today,
1992(18th
of Adar I 5752): Avot Yeshurun, an Israeli poet who wove Arabic and Yiddish
idiom into a unique and influential form of Hebrew verse, passed away today at
the age of 88. No cause of death was given by his family, which announced his
death. Born in Ukraine as Yehiel Perlmutter, Mr. Yeshurun made aliyah in 1925,
worked as a laborer and began publishing poetry. His family perished in the
Holocaust. After Israel was established in 1948, Mr. Yeshurun was one of its
first literary figures to acknowledge the plight of the uprooted Palestinians.
He saw the Palestinians and the Jews of Europe as having endured a common
tragedy, and sought to fuse their experience in the language of his poetry.
Although long ignored by the establishment, Mr. Yeshurun was highly regarded by
younger poets. His stature was formally recognized a month ago when he was
awarded the Israel Prize.
1992:
Barry Diller resigns as CEO of FOX Television Network.
1992:
American diplomat Josiah W. Bennett who as a member of the Foreign Service
headed the United States Information Service in Tel Aviv passed away.
(Bennett was not Jewish)
1993:
Journalist Ken Auletta, the son of
an Italian-American father and a Jewish-American mother, was among the first to
popularize the idea of the so-called "information superhighway" with
today’s New Yorker profile of Barry
Diller, in which he described how Diller, the San Francisco born Jewish media
mogul, used his Apple PowerBook to anticipate the advent of the Internet and
our digital future.
1993:
New York Judge Judith Kaye is nominated by then-governor Mario Cuomo to become
the first female Chief Judge of the New York State Court of Appeals.
1997(15th
of Adar I, 5757): Parashat Tetzaveh
1997(15th
of Adar I, 5757): Sixty-eight-year-old Albert Shanker the New York born,
University Illinois trained math teacher who became an increasingly aggressive
proponent for teachers and public education as he went from the Presidency of
the United Federation of Teachers and to the leadership of the American
Federation of Teachers.
1998:
The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of
special interest to Jewish readers including the recently released paperback
editions of Love Invents Us by Amy Bloom and Ira Gershwin: The Art of
the Lyricist by Philip Furia.
1998(26th
of Shevat, 5758): Distinguished Democratic politician and government official,
Abraham Ribicoff passed away. Ribicoff was Governor of Connecticut,
Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare under John Kennedy and U.S. Senator
from 1963 until 1981.
1999(6th
of Adar, 5759): Nobel Prize winner Gertrude Elion passed away.
http://www.achievement.org/autodoc/page/eli0bio-1
1999(6th
of Adar, 5759): Nine days after his 81st birthday Wisconsin native
Lewis B. “Lew” Hamity, the University of Chicago and Chicago Bears running back
who “served in the U.S. Armed Services during World War II and then became a
salesman for Phil Maid Lingerie before purchasing Mapes and Sprowl Steel,
serving first as president, then as chairman” passed away today.
2000:
The Jewish Museum San Francisco unveiled a design by the Berlin-based architect
Daniel Libeskind who is best known creating the new Jewish Museum in Berlin.
2001:
Funeral services are scheduled to be held today for Eva H. Meyer, the wife of
Manfred Meyer and mother of David and Paulette Meyer whose support of Yeshiva
University included providing funds for the publication of a biography about
her father Rabbi Jacob Hoffman z’l that included a description of the
development of the religious Zionist movement in pre-war Germany.
2002(20th
of Adar I, 5762): A Fatah terrorist murdered 45-year-old Valery Ahmir “in a
drive-by shooting.”
2002:
Today, University of Toledo basketball and baseball player Murray Guttman “was
inducted into the schools Varity ‘T’ Hall of Fame.”
https://utrockets.com/hof.aspx?hof=83
https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=guttma001mur
2003(20th
of Adar I, 5763): Ninety-year-old Oscar winning screenwriter Daniel Taradash
passed away today.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/27/obituaries/27TARA.html
2003:
An International Conference hosted by the Dubnow Institute on “Transforming
Religious and Ethnic Emblematics of Judaism and Jewishness” began today.
2004(30th
of Shevat, 5764): Rosh Chodesh Adar
2004(30th
of Shevat, 5764): Israel Ilan Avisidris, 41, of Jerusalem; Lior Azulai, 18, of
Jerusalem; Yaffa Ben-Shimol, 57, of Jerusalem; Rahamim Doga, 38, of Mevasseret
Zion; Yehuda Haim, 48, of Givat Ze'ev;Netanel Havshush, 20, of Jerusalem; Yuval
Ozana, 32, of Jerusalem and Benaya Yehonatan Zuckerman, 18, of Jerusalem were
murdered today and 60 other people were injured when an Arab terrorist blew up
Egged bus #14 in Jerusalem during the Second Intifada.
2004: A suicide bomber
attacked a bus in the center of Jerusalem, killing 8 people and wounding 70.
The Palestinian terrorist group Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades claimed
responsibility.
2005(13th
of Adar I, 5765): Ninety-six-year-old Trude Rittman, the German-Jewish American
arranger of Broadway hits including Carousel and Sound of Music passed away
today. (As reported by Wolfgang Saxon)
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B04EFD6163CF933A25750C0A9639C8B63
http://articles.latimes.com/2005/mar/12/local/me-passings12.3
2005(13th
Adar I, 5765): Ninety-four-year-old French film actress Simone Simon who was
“the daughter of Henri Louis Firmin Champmoynat, a French Jewish engineer and
airplane pilot in World War II, who died in a concentration camp” passed away
today.
http://www.altfg.com/blog/actors/simone-simon/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/4291269.stm
2006:
The Liberal Party appointed Irwin Cotler Critic for Public Safety and Emergency
Preparedness in the opposition shadow cabinet for the 39th Canadian Parliament.
“Cotler's wife, Ariela, is a native of Jerusalem and worked as a legislative
assistant to the Likud members of the Israeli Knesset from 1967 to 1979.”
2006:
French President Jacques Chirac and his prime minister attended a synagogue
memorial ceremony for a Jewish man who was kidnapped, tortured and killed.
2006(24th
of Shevat, 5766): Hilde Palm (née Löwenstein) the daughter of German Jewish
lawyer Eugene Lowenstein, who wrote under the pseudonym Hilde Domin creating
such works as the poetry anthology “The Tree Blossoms Nevertheless” passed away
today.
2006(24th
of Shevat, 5766): Bernie Weisberg, former
national director of Young Judea and the Labor Zionist Alliance, passed away at
the age of 82 (As reported by Anthony Weiss)
http://forward.com/articles/1108/bernie-weisberg-labor-zionist/
2007:
“Israel's prime minister, Ehud Olmert,” said “that the Iranians, though not
where they wanted to be, were much farther down the path to learning how to
make bomb-grade uranium than Israel was comfortable with” while dodging
“questions concerning the point at which Israel might lean toward military
action, a step American officials have said that they are trying to discourage
2008:
The Jerusalem Post reported that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has
established an unprecedented high-level government task force charged with
fundamentally altering the Israel-Diaspora relationship.
2008:
Israeli officials rejected Arab complaints that they are not committed to a
two-state solution for Israel and Palestine. Furthermore, these officials
stated that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert had responded positively to the Arab
League initiative as a basis for negotiations.
2008:
Sarah Chayes, the daughter of Abram Chayes and award winning reporter for
National Public Radio “was a guest on PBS's Bill Moyers Journal” today.
2009:
In a move intended to improve its relationship with the new wave of Jewish
immigrants from the former Soviet Union, the Hebrew Free Burial Association
hosted a Russian-Jewish Community event. Established in 1888, HFBA is one of
the oldest and largest free burial associations serving the New York Jewish
Community.
2009: Music of the Sephardic Diaspora is the focus of a
concert in the new Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center when celebrated viola da
gambist Jordi Savall and early music ensemble Hespèrion XXI present Diáspora
Sefardí: From Medieval Spain to the Eastern Mediterranean.
2009: Agudas Achim conducts the first ever Early Passover Pallet Sale
in eastern Iowa making it possible for those living in the Iowa City-Cedar
Rapids Corridor to buy unique “Kosher for Passover “items including Chocolate
Seder Plates, at “discount prices.”
2009:
The New York Times features a review of A Hidden Life: A Memoir of August 1969 by Johanna Reiss
who had won a Newberry Award a quarter of a century ago for The Upstairs
Room, her story of survival as a ten-year-old hiding from the Nazis in
occupied Holland.
2009:
The now-daily rocket attacks by Gaza terrorists against southern Israel
resumed today with the launch of a Kassam rocket at the Sha'ar HaNegev
region and a mortar attack fired at IDF troops near the Kissufim Crossing
2009:
Duke Blue Devil guard Jon Scheyer scored a then-career-high 30 points against
Wake Forest
2009(28th
of Shevat, 5769): Howard Zieff, the commercial
director and ad photographer who stuffed an actor with spicy meatballs in a
memorable Alka-Seltzer spot and used an American Indian in print ads to
convince people “You don’t have to be Jewish to love Levy’s real Jewish Rye,”
then went on to direct movie comedies, passed away today at the age of 81. (As
reported by Dennis Hevesi)
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/25/movies/25zieff.html
2010:
The Knesset "approved a law instructing the Israeli Government to protect
the rights of Jewish refugees from Arab counties in all forthcoming peace
negotiations; the first Israeli law to recognize Jews as coming to Israel not
only to fulfill Zionist aspirations, but as refugees
2010:
The Jewish Studies Program at Tulane University
under the leadership of Dr. Brian Horowitz and the Center for Cultural Judaism
are scheduled to present a program entitled “The Jewish Question as the Arab
Question: The Lost Voice of Simon Rawidowicz” at Tulane’s Uptown Campus in New
Orleans, LA.
2010:
National police headquarters issued an order today
to cease the delivery of mail throughout Israel following the discovery of what
is believed to be a package bomb at a post office in Migdal Haemek
2010:
Army Radio reported today that The Palestinian
Authority handed a Kassam rocket made in a West Bank village to Israeli
authorities last week. According to the report, PA security forces found the
rocket ready to be launched towards central Israel.
2010:
Israel's ice dancing team at the Winter Olympics
finished in 10th place. Roman and Alexandra Zaretsky performed to music from
"Schindler's List" in the free dance tonight at the Pacific Coliseum
in Vancouver, Canada. The brother-and-sister duo earned a score of 90.64 in the
free dance, and a score of 180.26 over-all. The music was chosen in part as a
tribute to 27 family members that died in Minsk, Belarus during the Holocaust,
the Jewish Chronicle reported.
2010:
Israeli archaeologists said today that they've
discovered an unusually shaped 1,400-year-old wine press that was exceptionally
large and advanced for its time. The octagonal press measures 21 feet by 54
feet (6.5 by 16.5 meters) and was discovered in southern Israel, about 40
kilometers south of both Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.
2010(8th of Adar, 5770): Rabbi Menachem
Porush, a long-serving Knesset member and father of current Deputy Education
Minister Meir Porush, died in Jerusalem today at the age of 94. Porush, a
seventh generation descendent of Lithuanian immigrants, sat in the Knesset for
35 years until 1994 and remained politically active until his death. The son of
a deputy mayor of Jerusalem, Porush entered politics through journalism,
working as a writer and editor for religious newspapers for two decades until
his election to the Knesset in 1959. "He was a great Jew. He was like one
of the stone of the Wailing Wall in the Holy City, Jerusalem," President
Shimon Peres said. "Menachem my friend, you were full of vision and hope
for the future of the Jewish nation. You loved the nation and worked to unify
it. You stood as a bridge between its parts.
2010(8th of Adar, 5770): Steffi
Sidney-Splaver, who began a career as an actress and then gave up acting to
become a Hollywood writer, publicist and producer, passed away today at the age
of 74.
2011:
Member of Knesset Danny Danon. The Deputy Knesset
Speaker, Chairman of the Immigration, Absorption and Diaspora Affairs Committee
and of World Likud is scheduled to give an address at The OU Israel Center in
Jerusalem.
2011: The Round Up, a “drama that
tackles the controversial subject of French collusion in the atrocities of the
Holocaust” is scheduled to be shown at the Atlanta Jewish Film Festival.
2011: At the Jerusalem International Book Fair, Galaade Editions
and ITHl are scheduled to present: “Sisters, not enemies: Telling the story of
Jews and Arabs in Israel in another voice.”
2011: Israel Philharmonic Orchestra is scheduled to perform at
Carnegie Hall.
2011:
Israel conducted a successful test of the Arrow 2
ballistic missile defense system off the coast of California early this
morning, when it destroyed a target simulating an Iranian ballistic missile
2011: Rham Emanuel was elected Mayor of Chicago today, making
him the first Jew to hold this position.
2011:
Montreal's city council has condemned the boycott
campaign against a local shoe store that sells footwear made in Israel. A
council motion deploring the campaign, proposed and supported by Mayor Gerard
Tremblay, passed today by a vote of 38 to 16. (As reported by JTA)
2011(18th of Adar, 5771): George
Einstein, a cousin, contemporary and occasional companion of Albert Einstein
who was a successful inventor and businessman in his own right passed away at
the age of 91.
http://www.nwfdailynews.com/articles/sandestin-38619-dies-wednesday.html
2011: Sue Fishkoff described the role of the Jewish community in
the conflict between Wisconsin’s Governor Walker and public sector employees.
2011:
Nearly 100 orthodox North American rabbis signed a
letter demanding of Interior Minister Eli Yishai to “rectify the injustice
being done to our converts, ourselves and the Jewish people” and “insure that
those individuals whom we convert will automatically be eligible for aliyah as
they have been in the past.”
2011:
In an effort to curb the trend of Orthodox converts
from abroad not being recognized by Israel for citizenship, the Jewish Agency
today appealed the Interior Ministry for a more dominant role in identifying
established Diaspora communities as such.
2012: “Ahead of Time: The Extraordinary Journey of Ruth Gruber” is
scheduled to be shown at Temple Beth Sholom Idelson Library in Sarasota, FL.
2012: In London, Chochana Boukhobza is scheduled to discuss “The
Third Day” a novel about two cellists who travel to Jerusalem for a concert, as
part of Jewish Book Week.
2012: In London, Rod Arad is scheduled to talk about his passion
for marrying unconventional forms with unexpected functions and the sources of
his unbridled creativity during Jewish Book Week.
2012: Publication of “The Jewish Community of Harbin, China”
http://audreyfm.wordpress.com/tag/prof-dan-ben-canaan/
2012:
Iran may develop inter-continental missiles that can
reach the east coast of the United States in two to three years, Finance
Minister Yuval Steinitz said in a CNBC interview today
2012: Israel Beiteinu will propose an alternative to the Tal Law
by which "everyone will serve the state," Foreign Minister Avigdor
Liberman said today.
2012(29th of Shevat, 5772): Eighty-six-year-old Mark
Shulman the husband of Margaret Shulman
2013:
The Israeli Opera’s Meitar Opera Studio is scheduled to present The Operas of
Donizetti at the Eden Tamir Music Center
2013:
In Springfield, VA, Congregation Adat Reyim is scheduled to host a wine and
cheese reception along with a Shabbat Folk Service “celebrating the anniversary
of Debbie Friedman’s birth.”
2013:
Palestinian protests in Jerusalem and the West Bank turned violent today, with
demonstrators throwing stones at Israeli security forces at several locations.
2013:
After nine seasons and 197 original episodes CBS broadcast the last episode of
CSI:NY, a cerebral crime fighting program created by Carol Mendelsohn and for which Jerry Bruckheimer served as
executive producer.
2014:
In Iowa City, Hillel under the leadership of Director Jerry Sorkin, is
scheduled to host its annual fundraising concert featuring University of Iowa
School of Music faculty members, Kenneth Tse (saxophone), Alan Huckleberry
(piano), and Scott Conklin (violin), along with a quartet of School of Music
graduate students.
2014:
The DPJCC's 14th Annual Jewish Film Festival is scheduled to close with the
showing of “Orchestra of Exiles.”
2014:
Friends and family of Cyndie Birchansky, whose accomplishments include three
really neat children, look forward to celebrating her natal day.
2014:
The Red Door is scheduled to host “Waiting Room” an evening curated by Leah
Wolff and Guy Ben-Ari.
2014:
The Jewish Agency will extend immediate emergency assistance to the Jewish
community of Ukraine and will help secure Jewish institutions in the country,
the Chairman of the Executive of The Jewish Agency for Israel Natan Sharansky
announced today.
2015:
The New York Times features books by Jewish authors and/or of special
interest to Jewish readers including Lies, First Person by Gail Hareven,
Khirbet Khizeh by S. Yizhar, Lucky Alan and Other Stories by
Jonathan Lethem, Mark Twain’s America by Harry L. Katz and Huck
Finn’s America by Andrew Levy.
2015:
In New Orleans, Rabbi Edward Paul Cohn is scheduled to officiate at the
graveside services Martha Blackman who was the widow of Murray Blackman, of
blessed memory, the longtime Rabbi at Temple Sinai.
2015:
“Laureen Nussbaum, Anne Frank scholar and Holocaust survivor, is scheduled to
speak on Holocaust history and the legacy of Anne Frank's work during this
afternoon’s lecture at the Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust
Education.
2015:
“Mexican-Jewish cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki accepted the Academy Award for
“Birdman,” repeating his victory last year for “Gravity.”
2015:
An exhibition “Through Soviet Jewish Eyes: Photography, War and the Holocaust”
is scheduled to open at the Illinois Holocaust Museum.
http://www.ilholocaustmuseum.org/pages/exhibitions/special-exhibitions/upcoming-special-exhibitions/
2015:
“Ida,” a “Polish moved that traces the evolution of a young novitiate in
Catholic convent, who, about to take her vows, learns that she is the daughter
of Jewish parents killed in the Holocaust” won the Oscar for best
foreign-language film. (As reported by JTA and Times of Israel)
2015:
“The evening’s “In Memoriam” segment of the Oscars devoted to film industry
notables who have passed away over the past year, included, among others,
Israeli filmmaker Menachem Golan, director Mike Nichols, and legendary film
actress Lauren Bacall.”
2015:
Israel’s losing streak at the Oscars continued, as the short film “Aya,”
cowritten and codirected by Mihal Brezis and Oded Binnun and starring Sarah
Adler, failed to win for Best Short Film.
2015:
As the world is scheduled to watch the Academy Award ceremonies tonight there
are those who remember that Hollywood columnist Sidney Skolsky “claimed to have
been the first to call the Academy Award Statuette ‘Oscar.’”
2015:
Lewis Black is scheduled to appear at the Vonnegut Fundraiser in Indianapolis,
Indiana
2015:
The Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington is scheduled to host a
“1-hour workshop that will include a series of activities designed to get”
people “thinking, taking and sharing ideas to help in planning for a new
regional museum projected to open in 2020.
2015:
In Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Barnes & Noble is scheduled to host a book
reading and signing featuring Boris Fishman, author of A Replacement Life.
2015:
“Fragile” an exhibition by Tel Aviv native Tal Eshed is scheduled to open at
the Klemens & Tanja Grunert Gallery.
2016:
The American Sephardi Federation is scheduled to host “a new class exploring
the Baqashot (‘Songs of Seeking’ in Edwin Seroussi’s wonderful translation), a
musical tradition whose roots are in Andalusian Spain.”
2016:
284th anniversary of the birth of George Washington whose welcoming
tone expressed to the Jews of the United States helped to make the American
Jewish experience unique from its inception down to the 21st
century.
2017:
“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel was warmly welcomed at Sydney
today by his Australian counterpart, Malcolm Turnbull, with the Israeli leader
promoting the two countries’ growing ties as Israel faces rising international
criticism over its settlement policy in the West Bank.” (As reported by
Jacqueline Williams and Gerry Mullany)
2017:
Meir Weinstein, “founder and leader of the Jewish Defence League of Canada”
filed a hate crime complaint “with Toronto police against a downtown mosque
whose imam allegedly called for killing Jews.” (As reported by Ron Csillag)
2017:
The Jewish Museum celebrated its annual Purim Ball today at the cavernous Park
Avenue Armory, which was decorated with a ceiling-to-floor installation of
multicolored streamers and shapes, eliciting oohs and ahhs from the more than
700 festive guests who included former Mayor Michael Bloomberg as they mingled
with dancing giant anthropomorphic Purim Puppets on stilts. (As reported by
Masha Leon)
2017:
The Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington is scheduled to host a
focus group opened to the public to receive an exclusive sneak peek and provide
feedback on stories and historic artifacts for the new Jewish museum being
built in the Washington Metropolitan Area.
2017:
As “the climate conversation heats up,” The Temple Emanu-El Streicker Center is
scheduled to present “An Evening With Al Gore.”
2017:
The JDC Archives and The Center For Jewish History are scheduled to host “Town
Fools, Beggars and Other Outcasts: Bringing the Margins to the Center in East
European Jewish History” during Nata Meir will examine “Jewish social outcasts
in prewar Eastern European history and offer insights into the changing
mentalities of Jewish society.”
2018:
The Steicker Center is scheduled to host “Love and Death in Italian Ghettos in
the Time of the Plague” during which a panel of experts “using original
documents from Italian archives…will explore the everyday lives of Roman,
Mantuan, Venetian and Florentine Jews during exceptionally trying times,
addressing how Europe’s Jewish communities coped with plagues and pestilence.
2018:
JW3 is scheduled to host the final screening of “Scaffolding” in London.
2018:
JW3 is scheduled to host the first screening of “Shalom Bollywood: The Untold
Story of Indian Cinema.”
2018:
The New Orleans JCC is scheduled to host a screening of “The 90 Minutes War” as
part of the Cathy and Morris Bart Jewish Cultural Arts Series.
2018:
MusicTalks and Yeshiva University’s Center for Israel Studies are scheduled to
present a celebration of “the music and life of Arik Einstein, “the voice of
Israel” and a pioneer of Israeli rock music, through a live performance by Elad
Kabilio and an ensemble of musicians from MusicTalks.”
2018:
Two hundred eighty-sixth anniversary of the birth of George Washington who
signed a treaty between the United States and Tripoli in 1796 that said “the
Government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian
religion” which meant that “Washington did not intend to disparage the
Christian religion” but “he did mean to say that no claim in the future would
justified that Christianity was …the foundation of the Government of the United
States.”
2019:
More than 35,000 runners are scheduled to participate in events surround the
Tel Aviv Marathon which starts at the Tel Aviv Convention Center and continues
“to the boardwalk and along the Mediterranean shore.”
2019:
In Coralville, IA, Congregation Agudas Achim is scheduled to host a “Sephardic
Dinner and Musical Service.”
2019:
At the UC Berkley School of Law, is scheduled to host “Judaism and the #MeToo
Movement” in which “theologian, feminist and HUC professor Rachel Adler
discusses reconciling Jewish law with gender justice.”
2019:
In Cedar Rapids, the record snow finally is scheduled to start to finally start
melting, friends and family of Shlomo Levi and Cyndie Birchansky bask in the
warmth of their birthday celebrations.
2019:
Anniversary of George Washington’s birthday which used to be the federal
holiday Washington’s Birthday when Jews could remember the words of his letter
to the Newport congregation which set the tone for what Lincoln called the
“last best hope of man.”
https://www.tourosynagogue.org/history-learning/gw-letter
2020(27th
of Shevat, 5780): Parashat Mishpatim; Shabbat Shekalim for more see http://downhomedavartorah.blogspot.com/
2020(27th
of Shevat, 5780): Calendar Coincidence -
on the civil calendar today marks the 980th anniversary of the birth
of Rashi and the anniversary of the birth of George Washington whose welcoming
attitude set the tone for the acceptance of Jews in the United States from its
birth which have made the American - Jewish experience unique, at least through
the first decade of the 21st century.
2020:
In San Francisco, the Davies Symphony Hall is scheduled to be the venue for
“Violins of Hope, “a S.F. Chamber Music performance of five pieces, three of
which were written by prisoners at Terezin.
2020:
The Greater Phoenix Jewish Film Festival is scheduled to host a screening of
“The Art of Waiting.”
2020:
The Nevada Democratic caucuses are scheduled to take place today with Bernie
Sanders, who has been told this week that he is getting “help from the
Russians” who are trying to interfere in the 2020 election process and who has
no problem with this important electoral event being held on Shabbat, is the
favorite to win at a least a plurality of the vote.
2021:
The Highgate Synagogue is scheduled to host the of a five-part “Bar Mitzvah
Programme” via Zoom.
2021:
U.S. Secretary of the Treasuring Janet Yellin and Steve Ballmer are among those
scheduled to discuss “the priorities that have the best chance at moving the
country — and the world — forward” with the DealBook Team.
2021:
The Kaufman Music Center is scheduled to present a concert with pianist Orli
Shaham.
2021:
As part of the “This Is What Jewish Looks Like” series, the Steicker Center is
schedule to host a presentation online with Avishai Mekonen, “a photographer
and filmmaker born into the Beta Israel community, who ”chronicled his journey
from Ethiopia to Israel as part of Operation Moses and on to the United States
in the documentary film 400 Miles to Freedom, which explores racism and
diversity in the Jewish community in the United States, Israel and beyond.”
2021:
The Jewish Community Center of Youngstown is scheduled to a meeting of the book
club via Zoom where attendees will discuss A Bookshop in Berlin by
Francoise Frenkel.
2021:
The first online auction sponsored by The Jewish Heritage Museum of Monmouth
Count is scheduled to come to an end today.
2021:
In addition to dealing with terrorists and the pandemic, Israelis must not face
the threat that “the massive oil spill that polluted the majority of Israel’s
beaches with enormous amounts of tar over the weekend has caused enormous
damage to the country's marine life,” which
experts say will take decades to repair.
2021:
JWA is scheduled to host via Zoom “Let’s Talk about the Jewish Teen Hookup
Culture.”
2021:
The Maine Jewish Film Festival is scheduled to host the final screening
“Rosenwald.”
2022:
The Jewish Community Library is scheduled to present online “Dybbuks, Robots
and Golems: Exploring Jewish Science Fiction and Fantasy” during which Valerie
Estelle Frankel will discuss the roles that science fiction and fantasy have
played for Jews in expressing emotions and conflicts of different eras.
2022:
The Robbins Collection and Research Center is scheduled to present this year’s
annual lecture in Jewish Law, Thought and Identity, “Reimagining Diversity and
Jewish Belonging: A Journey Through Genesis” delivered by Dr. Amanda
Beckenstein Mbuvi, the Vice President for Academic Affair at the
Reconstructionist Rabbinical College.
2022:
The American Sephardi Federation is scheduled to present a lecture by Ruben
Shimonov on “the histories and cultures of Bukharian, Kavkazi (Mountain), and
Georgian Jews which are situated at the unique intersection of Sephardic,
Mizrahi, and Russian-Speaking Jewish (RSJ) identities/”
2022:
JWI, Denver is scheduled to host “Sweeten Your Relationships with Dr. Andrea
Liner.
2022:
The Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Boston is scheduled to
present an online conversation with David Baddiel who will discuss his latest
book Jews Don’t Count.
2022:
As war clouds continue to form over Ukraine, in Odessa, Jewish leaders are reportedly
preparing for the worst: hiring security guards, scoping out bomb shelters and
making plans to evacuate if Russia invades the country.” (As reported by
Michael Schwritz)
2023: In Abu Dabi, as a sign of the changing
dynamics in the Middle East, the International Defense Exhibition which
features the first ever national pavilion from Israel is scheduled to continue today.
2023: The Museum at Eldridge Street is
scheduled to host over Zoom a discussion with Lucy Shahar and The Automat
director Lisa Hurwitz who will give an exclusive behind-the-scenes account of
the making of this beloved and acclaimed documentary film.
2023
Anniversary of the birth of George Washington who counted among his
comrades-in-arms Colone Isaac Franks, sought the help of Jewish physician when
his step-daughter feel ill and who most importantly of all welcomed Jews as
citizens of the United States in a manner not known during the European
experience.
2023: The Striecker is scheduled to host a
presentation on “Presumed Superiority” with Pulitzer Prize winning
African-American author Isabel Wilkerson.
2023: The Jerusalem Post is scheduled to host
its Women Leaders Summit.
2023: The JDC Archives is scheduled to host a
webinar on Aiding Their “Unfortunate Brethren”: The JDC’s Activities on Behalf
of Eastern European Jewish Children, 1919-1929.
2023: Israelis are scheduled to awaken to a
shekel that has decreased 2% in value since yesterday in response to the
passage of the first reading of the Judiciary reform bill.
2023(1st of Adar, 5783): Rosh
Chodesh Adar.
2024: Celebration of the birth of George
Washington who used a Jewish doctor to care for his sick step-daughter,
supported Colonel Franks when Benedict Arnold committed treason and who wrote
the welcoming words to the Jews of Newport which establish the fact that
anti-Semitism has no place in the United States, “May the children of the stock
of Abraham who dwell in this land continue to merit and enjoy the good will of
the other inhabitants--while everyone shall sit in safety under his own vine
and fig tree and there shall be none to make him afraid.”
2024: Lockdown University is scheduled to host
a lecture by Trudy Gold on “Hollywood: Billy Wilder.”
2024: At Temple Judea, Cantor Abbie Strauss is
scheduled to double duty leading the morning minyan and leading “music sharing”
in the evening.
2024: The American JDC is scheduled to host a
special global briefing on “The Ukraine Crisis – 2 years later.
2024: The JNFuture Volunteer Mission is
scheduled to come to an end.
2024: Allen Packwood is scheduled to deliver
the second lecture in the series “Churchill’s D-Day” at the Sir Martin Gilbert
Centre in London.
2024: As part of the Cathy and Morris Bart
Jewish Cultural Art Series, the Uptown (New Orleans) and Metairie JCCs are
scheduled to host a screening of “Call Me Dancer.”
2024: The
Illinois Holocaust Museum is scheduled to host online “When Hate Becomes A
Crime.”
2024: As
February 22nd begins in Israel, the Hamas held
hostages begin day 139 in captivity.
(Editor’s note: this situation is too fluid for this blog to cover so we
are just providing a snapshot as of the posting at midnight Israeli time.)
