This Day, July 17, In Jewish History by Mitchell A and Deb Levin Z"L
July 17
1203: The Knights of the Fourth Crusade capture
Constantinople forcing the Byzantine emperor Alexius III Angelus to flee from
his capital into exile. Unlike other
Crusades, the focus of the Fourth Crusade was the Byzantine Empire and its capital
Constantinople rather than Jerusalem.
The Fourth Crusade was really a clash between two different groups of
Christians and a fight over commercial interests. Unlike the other crusades, the Fourth did not
produce any great overt anti-Semitic activities. But it did keep the crusading spirit alive
and subsequent crusades did result in more harm to various Jewish
communities. The most significant lesson
of the Fourth Crusade was that it was a classic example of religion being
manipulated for reasons that had nothing to do with God or His teachings;
something that haunts the Jews of the world down to modern times.
1245: Holy
Roman Emperor Frederick II who refuted the concept of Jewish ritual murders was
found guilty of sacrilege at the First Council of Lyons.
1270: While on
Crusade with the King of France, the English prince Edward Longshanks, who as
King Edward expelled the Jews from England, land at Carthage today.
1272: Pope
Gregory X issued a bull prohibiting accusations of blood-ritual killings
1287: Forty
Jews - men, women and children - were killed by a mob in Oberwesel (Germany)
after a ritual murder accusation. The rioting spread down the Rhineland.
1392: King
Pedro I (1357–67) of Portugal ordered the compliance of the bull of Pope Boniface
IX protecting Jews from forced baptism. He also extended it to Spanish Jewish
Refugees.
1402: Start of
the reign of Chinese Ming Emperor Yongle who bestowed “honors on Jewish
physician, Y’en Ch’eng
1414: A new
edict was issued by the regent in the name of her infant son Don Ferdinand that
offered some slight improvement to the conditions of the Jews of Castile.
1510:
Following testimony by a Christian that he had been hired to steal consecrated hosts, 36 Jews were burned at the
stake today in Berline.
1537: Just
before their marriage, Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn visited the estate now known
as Mote Park which Marcus Samuel, 1st Viscount Bearsted would buy in
1895 and expand and improve in the years prior to WW I and which his son Walter
Samuel, 2nd Viscount Bearsted would sell to the Borough Council in
1929.
1555: Pope
Paul IV issued, Cum Nimis Absurdum (,
"Since it is absurd") the papal bull that ordered the creation of a
Jewish ghetto in Rome, setting its borders near the Rione Sant'Angelo, an area
where large numbers of Jews already resided, and ordering it walled off from
the rest of the city with a single gate, locked every day at sundown, as the
only means of reaching the rest of the city.
1555: 1555,
Paul IV issued one of the most famous papal bulls in Church history. The bull,
Cum Nimis Absurdum (the title stemmed from its opening phrase, "Since it
is absurd") ordered the creation of a Jewish ghetto in Rome. The pope set
its borders near the Rione Sant'Angelo, an area where large numbers of Jews
already resided, and ordered it walled off from the rest of the city. A single
gate, locked every day at sundown, was the only means of reaching the rest of
the city. The Jews themselves were forced to pay all design and construction
costs related to the project, which came to a total of roughly 300 scudi. The
bull restricted Jews in other ways as well. They were forbidden to have more
than one synagogue per city—leading, in Rome alone, to the destruction of seven
"excess" places of worship. All Jews were forced to wear distinctive
yellow hats, especially outside the ghetto, and they were forbidden to trade in
everything but food and secondhand clothes.[9] Christians of all ages were
encouraged to treat the Jews as second-class citizens; for a Jew to defy a
Christian in any way was to invite severe punishment, often at the hands of a
mob. By the end of Paul IV's five-year reign the number of Roman Jews had
dropped by half.[8] Yet his anti-semitic legacy endured for over 300 years: the
ghetto he established ceased to exist only with the dissolution of the Papal
States in 1870. Its walls were torn down in 1888.
1588: Mimar
Sinan, the chief architect and leading civil engineer under Suleiman the Magnificent
passed away today. Suleiman had ordered that fortress-like walls be built
around Jerusalem, walls that can be seen today when one enters “the Old City.”
1549: All Jews
and Marranos were expelled from Ghent, Belgium.
1676: In the
village of De Rijip, Holland Johannes Reland, a Protestant minister, and Aagje
Prins gave birth to Adriaan Reland one of the first of the modern historic
geographers of Palestine whose works included Antiquitates Sacrae veterum Hebraeorum and Palaestina ex monumentis Veteris illustrata
1724(26th
of Tammuz, 5484): Sara Wertheimer the daughter of Samson Wertheimer and Frumet
Brülle who married Moses L. I. zur Kann,
the son of Rabbi Löb Isaak zur Kann passed away today
1762:
Catherine II becomes Tsarina of Russia upon the murder of Peter III of Russia. Known to history as Catherine the Great,
Russia’s ruler participated in the partition of Poland along with Prussia and
Austria. In acquiring her section of
Poland, Catherine acquired a large Jewish population. Although her first reaction to these new
Jewish subjects was restrained but comparatively enlightened, in the last years
of her reign, Catherine took the first measures which would lead to what became
known as the Pale of Settlement.
1763: Birthdate of John Jacob Astor. Born in
Germany he parlayed his role in the fur trade into one of America’s early
fortunes. There is a great deal of debate surrounding Astor’s ethnic origins.
In this case, we will give him the benefit of the doubt.
1764(17th
of Tammuz, 5524): Tzom Tammuz observed the day after 23 year old Czar Ivan VI
whose throne had usurped by his cousin Elizabeth was killed by the guards at
the prison where he had spent most of his life.
1765:
Birthdate of Newport, RI, native Bilhah Elizer, the daughter of Isaac Elizer.
1774(9th
of Av, 5534): Tish’a B’Av is observed for the last by Jews in the thirteen
colonies as subjects of King George.
1779: In
Philadelphia, Eleazar Lyons and his wife gave birth to Judah Lyons the husband
of Mary Levy whom he married in New York, the same city in which he passed
away.
1785(10th of
Av, 5545) Tish'a B'Av (observed)
1786:
Birthdate of Henri Castro, a native of Bayonne, France who brought hundreds of
families to Texas where they settled in an area of west of San Antonio. The town of Castroville, Texas and Castro
County are named after him which attests to his importance.
1789: Sir
Sampson Gideon, “the son of another Sampson Gideon, a Jewish banker in the City
of London who advised the British government in the 1740s and 1750s, “legally
changed his surname to that of Eardley and in the same year he was created an
Irish peer, with the title of Baron Eardley, of Spalding in the County of
Lincoln.”
1789: Sir
Sampson Gideon, the son of Sampson Gideon, “a Jewish banker in the City of
London during the 1740’s and 1750’s” who had married Maria Wilmot in 1768,
“legally changed his surname to that of Eardley” following which “he was
created an Irish peer, with the title of Baron Eardley, of Spalding in the
County of Lincoln.”
1793: Second of the three partitions of Poland
takes place as Russia, Prussia and Austria divide this once proud kingdom home
to one of Europe’s largest Jewish communities.
As a result of the partitions, Russia, which had worked to remain
Jew-free, would find itself home to millions of Jews.
1794:
Birthdate of Oldenberg, Germany native and immigrant to England Lehman Meyer
Gluckstein, the husband of Helena Horn with whom he had nine children.
1794:
Birthdate of (Asher) Lehman Meyer Gluckstein, the native of Oldenberg, Germany
and husband of Helena Horn with whom he had nine children
1799: Emanuel
Joseph married Sarah Solomon Wilks at the Great Synagogue today.
1800:
Birthdate of Abraham Basch, the native of Posen who served as the secretary to
the Mayor of Landsberg and was a Hebrew teach at Weyl’s seminary.
1803: In
London, Samuel Gershon and Elizabeth Kahn gave birth to Rachel Gershon who
became Rachel Solomons when she married Abraham Solomons.
1804(9th
of Av,5563): Tish’a B’Av observed on the same that the Lewis and Clark Expedition
spent the day at a “Bald Plated Prairie” in what would become the state of
Missouri just “below the present-day Iowa border.”
1806: Hyman
Collins and Mary Davis, who were married in the Western Synagogue, gave
birth to Henry Collins.
1806: The last
auto-de-fe ordered by the Inquisition of Peru was held today.
1810: Reform
Judaism was born in the town of Seesen in central Germany with a stated mission
to modernize Judaism and create a bridge between Jewish life and the
surrounding culture.
1811: In
“Spanish Town, Jamaica,” Abraham Quixano Henriques” and Leah Rachel De Leon
gave birth to Jacob Quixano Henriques, the husband of Elizabeth Waley with whom
he had six London born children.
1815: In
France, Napoleon surrenders at Rochefort, Charente-Maritime to British forces.
Napoleon’s final defeat would lead him to permanent exile on St. Helena. His final defeat brought a wave of reaction
as the remnants of the old régime in France and Europe sought to regain their
old power and undo the changes wrought by the French Revolution. This reactionary wave would have a negative
effect on the Jewish people and would be one of the driving forces that led to
next wave of Jewish immigration to the United States.
1820: A day
after she had passed away, 30 year old Ann Davis, the wife of Mordecai Moses
was buried today at the Brady Street Jewish Cemetery.
1823(9th
of Av, 5583): Tish’a B’Av observed on the same day that Simon Bolivar led rebel
troops at the Battle of Ibarra
1835: Today former
Georgia governor and U.S. Senator was “appointed Commissioner to execute the
Cherokee Treaty of 1835” was at time when Dr. Phillip Minis the wife of Dinah
Cohen and Philip Minis, part of the Georgia Jewish Minis clan, was serving as “the
Disbursing Agent of the Indian Department.”
1838: In
London, Nathaniel and Sarah Lindo gave birth to Gabriel Lindo the solicitor
whose many communal activities included serving as Vice President of the
Spanish and Portuguese Jews’ Synagogue and the Jewish Board of Guardians and
who was the husband of Miriam Da Costa, the daughter of Charles M. Da Costa.
1840(16th
of Tammuz, 5600): Isaac Leonini Azulay, author of the Spanish comedy "El
Delinquente Honrado," who “married Bella Friedlaender, a cousin of Chief
Rabbi Herschell” passed away today.
1841(28th of
Tammuz, 5601): On the secular calendar, Rebbe Moshe Teitelbaum of Ujhel, known
as the Yismach Moshe, founder of the Satmar sect, passed away.
1842(10th of
Av, 5602Tish'a B'Av (observed)
1841:
Birthdate of Viennese native and anti-Semitic agitator George Von Schonerer who
“entered the Austrian Diet in 1873.
1843: In
Soulon, France, Polish Jewish émigré Vincent Jastremski and his wife gave birth
to Leon Jastremski, the veteran of the Confederate Army and three term mayor of
Baton Rouge who, to the discredit of the Jewish people wrote “an editorial
noted for its advocacy of racial segregation.
https://www.lib.lsu.edu/sites/default/files/sc/findaid/2951.pdf
1847: Moses
David Hyams, the Charleston, SC born son of Rebecca and David Hyams and his
wife Susanna Hyams gave birth to Augustus M. Hyams.
1848: In
Kovno, Mollie and Lewin Fine gave birth to poet 1930Israel Fine the husband of
Minnie Rakusin and member of both the ZOA and Shearith Israel in Baltimore who was
the founder and owner of the clothing Firm of Israel Fine and Son in Baltimore.
https://jewishmuseummd.pastperfectonline.com/byperson?keyword=Fine%2C%20Israel
1850(8th
of Av, 5610): Erev Tish’a B’Av observed on the same day that “Daniel Webster of
Massachusetts, one of the great political orators of the 19th century,
delivered a farewell address before resigning from a Senate seat he held for 19
years to accept President Millard Fillmore’s offer to become secretary of
state.” (As reported by Andrew Glass)
1854: An excerpt
published today from Little’s Living Age described Doctor Wolff as being
the real Wandering Jew, who is not the melancholy figure “of the poet and
novelist” “but a “fat, jolly Jew for
‘whom the law having a shadow of good things to come.’”
1855: In
Cleveland, OH, Bernard and “Dorothea (Deborah) Weidenthal gave birth to Wooster
University trained medical doctor and pathologist Nathan Weidenthal, the
associate professor of “diseases of children” at the College of Physicians and
Surgeons in Cleveland who was the husband of Ernestine Newman.
1859(15th of
Tammuz, 5619): Fourteen-year old Mary Louisa Levy, the daughter of Dutch native
Martha Ezekiel and Jacob Abraham Levy passed away today in her native Richmond,
VA after which she was buried in the Hebrew Cemetery.
1859: Samuel
Isaac Joseph Schereschewsky, a Lithuanian born Jew was ordained today at St.
George’s Church in New York City.
1860:
Birthdate of Budapest born Hungarian educator and “founding member of the
International Olympic Committee” Ferenc Kemény, whose “original name was Kohn”
which “betrayed” his “Jewish origins” that led him and his wife to commit
suicide in 1944 to escape “the deadly wrath of the Arrow Cross” and being
transported to the death camps.
http://www.jewishsports.net/BioPages/FerencKemeny.htm
1861:
Union forces that would come to include the Cameron Dragoons (officially the 65th
Regiment led by Colonel Max Friedman and which contained a large segment of
Philadelphia Jews) skirmished at Vienna, Virginia, for a second time, as they
made their way to Manassas where they would fight the First Battle of Bull Run.
1862:
Legislation abolishing discrimination against the service of chaplains in the United
States army became a law. In other
words, Rabbis could now serve as Chaplains.
1862: Congress
changed the wording in the law to include the words "religious
denomination" instead of "Christian denomination," and legal
discrimination against Jews ended in the military which led to Rabbi Fischel
finally being commissioned to serve as the chaplain of the 5th Pennsylvania
Cavalry.” (As described by Seymour “Sy” Brody)
1862: At the
request of the Lincoln administration, the chaplain act was amended to provide
for the appointment of Catholic, Protestant and Jewish chaplains.
1863: In
Hungary, Ignacz Braunfeld and his wife gave birth to Julius Branufeld, the
husband of Meta Schroder Braunfeld who served as a cantor at Temple Sinai in
New Orleans after having filled that same position for congregations in
Brooklyn and Milwaukee, WI.
1863(1st of
Av, 5623): Rosh Chodesh Av observed as the Union Army defeated the Rebels at
the Battle of Honey Springs sixty-five miles west of Fort Smith in what is now
Oklahoma.
1864: In New
York City, Moses and Caroline Levy Toch gave birth to Columbia trained
industrial chemist Dr. Maximilian Toch, the “president and chief chemist of
Toch Brothers, Inc. and chairman of Standard Varnish Works “called America’s
first camofleur” for his work in camouflaging the Panama Canal and developing
the gray paint used to “hide” U.S. Navy ships who raised four daughters –
Elain, Constance, Alma and Maxine – with his wife “the former Hermine E. Levy.”
1865: In
Darmstadt in the Grand Duchy of Hesse, “publisher and politician Friedrich
Dernburg,” a member of a distinguished Jewish family who converted to
Lutheranism and his wife Luise Stahl gave birth to banker and political leader
Berhard Dernburg who died in 1937 thus avoiding the effect of the Nuremberg
Laws that would have classified him as a Jew.
1868:
Birthdate of Henri Nathansen, “a Danish writer and stage director, today best
known for the play Inside the Walls (Danish: Indenfor Murene” who passed away
in 1944.
1871(28th
of Tammuz, 5631): Twenty-nine year old Polish born musical prodigy Carl Tausig
passed away today.
1871: In New
York City, “German-American violinist and composer Karl Feininger and American
singer Elizabeth Feininger” gave birth to “caricaturist, comic strip artists”
and “expressionist painter” Lyonel Charles Feininger
1871: Three
days after he had passed away, 28 year old Lionel Pyke, the son of Maurice and
Hannah Pyke was buried today at the West Harm Jewish Cemetery
1871:
Hungarian born German actor Ludwig Barnay convened “the stage-congress at
Weimar” today.
1873(22nd
of Tammuz, 5633): Fifty two year old Babette Stettheimer, a sister of Joseph
Seligman passed away today.
1873(22nd
of Tammuz, 5638): Fifty-seven year old Moritz Ritter von Todesco, the son of
“Austrian financier and philanthropist Hermann Todesco” who was “an association
of the banking firm of Hermann Todesco’s Sons” passed away today.
1874: Adelaide
Neilson, an actress admired by David Belasco, performed for the last time at
the Baldwin Theatre where Belasco was filling several capacities including
“acting as an assistant to the prompter.”
1874: Professor
C. H. Brigham of Ann Arbor, Michigan, read a paper on the “Falacha Language of
Abyssinia” at a convention of linguists meeting in Hartford, Conn. According to Professor Brigham, who based his
paper on the work of Dr. Joseph Haling, “the Flachas are descendants of a tribe
of Jews which settled in Abyssinia…” who have lost their knowledge of Hebrew as
both a written and spoken language. Their literature is based on the
translation of the book of Jonah and “four short prayers.
1875: In
Newellton, LA, “Alexander and Lena Marks Cohn” gave birth to future New Orleans
resident Solomon Lawrence “Sol” Cohn
1876: In
Bialystok, Anna and Moses Wallach, members of “a wealthy Jewish banking family”
gave birth to their second son Max Wallach who gained fame as “Russian revolutionary
and Soviet diplomat Maxim Litvinov.”
1877: During
the Russo-Turkish War, the first Battle of the Shipka where Jewish soldiers
displayed “dauntless courage began today.
1878:
Schedules showing the liabilities and assets of Barnet L. Solomon, Solomon B.
Solomon Judah H. Solomon and Simon Solomon, the owners of B.L Solomon’s Sons,
the major upholstery dealers who recently filed for bankruptcy, were filed in
the Court of Common Pleas. Their assets
totaled $224. 799/31 and their liabilities totaled $1,144,753.88. The firm’s
demise was caused by a combination of poor business conditions and a downturn
in the real estate market.
1879:
Birthdate of Leo I. Samuelson, the native of Illinois who was appointed to West
point in 1888 and who in 1903, as a Second Lieutenant transferred from the 2nd
Infantry Regiment to the 7th Infantry Regiment.
1879:
Birthdate of Seumas O’Sullivan, the Irish poet and author who married Estella Francis Solomons, a leading Irish
artist who was a member of one of Ireland’s oldest and most renowned Jewish
families.
1879: A
concert and festival sponsored by the Young Men’s Hebrew Union is scheduled to
take place at the Terrace Garden
1879(26th of
Tammuz, 5639): Maurycy Gottlieb, Jewish painter who came from a family of
Polish-speaking Galician Jews passed away.
Two of his more famous paintings are “Shylock and Jessica” and “Jews
Praying in the Synagogue on Yom Kippur.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Shylock_e_jessica.jpeg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Gottlieb-Jews_Praying_in_the_Synagogue_on_Yom_Kippur.jpg
1880(9th
of Av, 5640): Parashat Devarim; Erev Tish’a B’Av
1880: In
Hungary, Moishe Schofneld and his wife gave birth to Dr. Lazar Schonfeld, the
husband of “the former Helen Samish” who
served as “chief rabbi of Hungary before coming to the United States in 1925”
where he served “as the rabbi of Beth
David Agudath Achim Synagogue in the Bronx” and as a “broadcaster for the Voice
of America.”
1880: Dr.
Manly Emanuel’s son, Jonathan Manly Emanuel who had been serving in the United
States since 1862 completed three months overseeing the machinery of the
Ironclads, “Ajax, Catskill, Lehigh, Mahopac and Manhattan” were “anchored in
the James River off Brandon, VA.”
1880: Harper’s
Weekly published illustrations depicting scenes from the Seawanhaka tragedy
among whose victims was former 12th District Assemblyman Joseph I.
Stein.
1881: An
English quarterly publication, The Contemporary Review examined the life of the
late Ferdinand Lassalle. Base on the way
he lived his life the epitaph etched on his tomb “Ferdinand Lassalle, thinker and
fighter” was deemed to be quite appropriate.
Lassalle was a rare combination of philosophical think, political
agitator and oddly enough fashion dandy “noted for his dress for dinners and
his addiction for pleasures.”
1882(1st
of Av, 5642): Rosh Chodesh Av
1882: As the
Freight Handler’s Strike entered its fifth week, the workers took steps to keep
“scabs” away from the piers and docks. The Russian Jews have gathered at
Standard Hall on East Broadway where they are being three meals a day: bread
and coffee in the morning; meat and soup at noon; tea and bread in the
evening. The strikers are also providing
them with lodging in a tenement to keep these destitute people from being
“scabs.” Similar efforts are being made
with other immigrant groups.
1882: A report
published today attributed “the incapacity” of Russian Jews to perform manual
labor when compared to their “muscular Irish and German” counterparts to diet.
“A single piece of black bread soaked in water and a banana or tow constitute a
full meal…Occasionally their bill of fare embraces beer and cheese and crackers,
but it is seldom that any of them eat meat or potatoes. The effect of this light diet is plainly
visible in the shrunken forms, the listless actions and lack of endurance that
so plainly distinguish the Russian Jews…from other working men.”
1883: In
Vienna, Camilla Wertheim, the daughter of Dr. Gustav Carl Wertheim and
Wilhelmine Wertheim became Camilla Jellinek when she married thirty-two year
old Prof. Dr. Georg Jellinek today,
1883: Charles
Joseph Cohen and Clotilda Florence Cohen gave birth to Albert Morris Cohen who
served in the United States Navy during WW I.
1884: It was
reported today that Lazarus Lemisch, his wife and five children who had just
arrived in the United States were being sent back to Europe because, by his own
admission, he was destitute with no prospects for financial assistance.
1884: Wolf
Finkelstein, a Russian Jewish immigrant arrived in New York on the SS Bohemia and was immediately sent to
Ward’s Island.
1884: It was
reported today that many of the Russian Jews who fled to Cyprus during the
recent anti-Semitic violence have returned to Odessa. They were not able to support themselves on
the Mediterranean Island which is a British possession. This means that the returning Jews are now
British subject which means the British Consul General in the Russian port city
has to provide them with some sort of assistance.
1885(5th
of Av, 5645): Eighty-nine year old R’David Tebele Bondi, the Frankfurt,
Germany, born son of Bella and “R’Jonas Moshe Bondi” and the “husband of Matele
Bondi” passed away today in Frankfurt.
1885: It was
reported today that in Great Britain, juror was excluded from hearing the case
of De Worms versus Hughes because he was Jewish
1886: “Art To
Be Seen At Rouen” published today described the “stain glass pottery and relics
of old wars” that can be seen at the Museum of Antiquities including a series
of five stain glassed windows that depicts the history of the rich Jew who
bribes a poor woman to bring him a consecrated wafer which he then stabs with a
dagger.” (The myth of Host Desecration
ranked with the Blood Libel as cause for slaughter of Jews during the Middle
Ages)
1887:
Birthdate of Beatrice Fox Auerbach, the
longtime proprietor of the G. Fox & Company department store in Hartford,
Connecticut.[some sources say July 7, 1887]. Auerbach was raised in Hartford,
where her father ran the department store originally founded by and named after
his father, Gerson Fox. In 1911, Auerbach moved to Salt Lake City to help her
new husband run his family's department store there. The couple returned to
Connecticut six years later when the G. Fox & Company building burned.
Beatrice Auerbach's husband became secretary and treasurer of the rebuilt
store, which occupied a twelve-story Art Deco building that dominated
Hartford's Main Street. When her husband died in 1927, Auerbach stepped into
his business roles. She proved so good at running the business that when her
father died in 1938, she became president of G. Fox & Company. Over the
next three decades, Auerbach built G. Fox into the largest privately-held
department store in the United States. Under Auerbach's leadership, the store
was known for excellent service, but it was also remarkable for the benefits
extended to employees. Auerbach was among the first employers to introduce paid
vacations and sick leave, and also among the first to hire African-Americans in
meaningful positions. Auerbach sold G. Fox & Company to the May Company,
owner of Macy's, in 1965, although she remained involved in the day-to-day
operations of the store. The sale allowed Auerbach to increase the charitable
contributions for which she was already well-known in Connecticut. The Service
Bureau for Women's Organizations that she had established in 1945 taught
leadership skills to members of women's groups. She also collaborated with
Connecticut College for Women for over twenty years (1938-1959) in a retailing
program that allowed participants to try out theories in the G. Fox store.
Among the other beneficiaries of Auerbach's philanthropy were Trinity College,
Wesleyan University, the University of Connecticut, and several Hartford-area
cultural organizations. Auerbach died on November 29, 1968. G. Fox &
Company closed permanently in 1992. The building, still a Hartford landmark,
was later converted for use as a community college and retail shops.
1888(9th
of Av, 5648): Tish’a B’Av
1888: In the
Ukraine, Shalom Mordechai Czaczkes and Esther Czaczkes gave birth to Israeli
novelist, Shmuel Agnon. Author of numerous books, including the Day Before
Yesterday, Agnon won the Nobel Prize in 1966.
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1966/agnon-bio.html
1888:
Birthdate of Arch Mandel, the native of Hungary who came to the United States
in 1891 where he earned a bachelor’s degree from CCNY who was active in Russian
War Relief.
1889: “Here is
Comfort for Cantor” published today offered reassurance to State Senator Jacob
Cantor that he should not be bothered by the fact that the Harlem Club is
rejecting him because he was Jewish. “In
the face of this foolish and un-Christian prejudice” he should remember that
the “Blessed Redeemer would be rejected on the same grounds.”
1890: Almost
all of the striking cloak cutters, the vast majority of whom were Jewish,
returned to work this morning with only one outstanding point of contention –
the strikers demanded that all of the replacement workers or “scabs” must be
terminated.
1891:
Thirty-one Jewish immigrants from Russia were not allowed to land at the Barge
Office in New York “on the ground that they were like to become public charges.
1891: As of
today, the Sanitarium for Hebrew Children has received $2,777.12 to help fund
its summer programs.
1891:
Birthdate of Louise M. Lehman Pollak, the wife of Cleveland native Robert M.
Pollak and the mother of Helen Pollak who died in childbirth in 1916.
1892:
“Preparations for the Cholera” published today described the outbreak of the
disease which now has foothold in Odessa and Moscow. The effort to combat Cholera has been
hampered because “throughout Russia a large proportion of the capable
physicians have been driven away because they were Jewish.”
1892: “Summer
Study of Ethics” published today previewed the lectures to be offered The
School of Applied Ethics including a series on the religious ideas of the
Hebrews: “The Prophets” by George Moore that beings with the religion of Israel
before the prophets; “The Religion of Ancient Persia and its Relations to
Judaism by Professor A.V. Williams Jacksons; “The Ritual and Law by Professor
Morris Jastrow; :The Psalter” by Professor John P. Peters; “The Wisdom Books”
by Professor Crawford H. Toy and “The Talmud” by Dr. Emil G. Hirsch.
1892: Arthur
Richard of New York arrived in New London, CT on his way to inspect the Jewish
colony at Chesterfield which is being supported by contributions by the Baron
Hirsch Fund.
1893: Register
Levy, a leader of the Jewish community on New York’s Lower East Side, expressed
his surprise when asked about the derogatory, stereotypically anti-Semitic
remarks attributed to Police Justice John J. Ryan who complained about that the
Hebrews flouted the law, had no fear of policemen and would claim that they
were the victims of religious persecution when they were charged with
crimes. “I have never known him to bear
any malice or prejudice against any co-religionists.”
1893: Police
Justice John J. Ryan claimed today that he had been misquoted and that he had “
no desire to denounce Hebrews” and had in fact “always been their
friends.” Ryan said that all he had
meant to say, and all that he had really said, was that he enforce the law
against all “wrongdoers” including Hebrews regardless of their connections or
pressure from local citizenry. Ryan’s
contention that he had been “misquoted” and that the remarks of others were
wrongly attributed to him, was supported by Mark Alter, the attorney for the
Hebrew Protective Association. [Ed. Note: When taken together, these comments
read like modern day “damage control.”
What is fascinating is that as early as the last decade of the 19th
century, the Jewish population was of a size that New York politicians had to
be cognizant of their feelings and views. This must have come as a shock to
those who arrived in the last ten years from Romania and Russia where the
governments did not even know that Jews had opinions let alone political
rights.]
1893: In New
York City, “Henry and Sarah Scheuer gave birth to Sidney Henry Scheuer, the
“executive director of the Foreign Economics Administration” and a “delegate to
the Inter-American Conference on Problems of War and Peace.”
1893: “The
Jews Fought Desperately” published today described last week’s attack by an
anti-Semitic mob at Yalta during which the Jews fought back even though the mob
“dragged” “dozens of the into the
streets” where they were beaten.
1893:
Birthdate of Salt Lake City native Herbert Maurice Schiller, graduate of the
University of Utah and Harvard Law School who served as a state district court
judge and was active with the National Council of Jewish Federations and
Welfare Funds
1894:
Thirty-one year old London born painter and lithographer Albert Edward Stener
who had moved to the United States in 1881 got married today.
1894: Five
days after she had passed away, 42 year old Annie Abrahams, “the wife of Isaac
Abrahams” was buried today at the West Ham Jewish Cemetery.
1895(25th
of Tammuz, 5655): Forty-three year old Simon M. Ehrlich, the Chief Just of the
City Court in New York, passed away today after battling typhoid fever for the
last three weeks at his summer home in Throgg’s Neck, Long Island. Born in
Boston, at the age of five he moved to New York where he graduated from City
College and Columbia Law School. After passing the bar in 1872, he was elected
to a variety of judicial positions with the support of Tammany Hall.
1897: Birthdate
of Boston native and Harvard alum Abraham Samuel Gutennan, the Boston University
trained attorney.
1897:
Alexander Grossman presided over tonight’s meeting of the Russian-American
Citizens’ League where the candidacy of Seth Low for Mayor of New York was
endorsed by the attendees.
1898:
According to a summary of the tenth
annual report of the Jewish Publication Society of America published today the society has grown from 600 members to
4,790 members 808 of whom live in Pennsylvania and 797 of whom live in New York
state.
1900(20th
of Tammuz, 5660): Seventy-eight year old Elijah Isaacs, the North Carolina born
son of Solomon and Lillian Isaacs and the husband of Sally Isaacs passed away
today after which he was buried in Watauga County, NC.
1901: At the
Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association of the Methodist Episcopal Church Reverend
Davenport delivered a lecture on “Palestine.”
1902: Herzl finishes a journey to London where he
had been seeking support for his plans for a Jewish homeland.
1903:
Birthdate of Hiram "Harry" Bingham IV, a member of distinguished old
New England family who saved the lives of thousands of Jews while serving as
Vice-Consul in Marseille, France.
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/Binghams-List.html
1903:
Birthdate of Josef Moll a member of the Ehrenfeld Group, was hanged in Cologne
for his anti-Nazi resistance activities.
1903: The
Jewish quarter of Ofran, Morocco was pillaged.
1903: In
Vienna, “Drs. Bodenheimer, Marmoerk and Farbstein” attended the opening session
of the convention sponsored by the Committee on the National Fund.
1904:
Eighty-four year old Wilhelm Marr, one of the leaders of the 19th
anti-Semitism of movement passed away today.
1904:
Birthdate of New York native Herman Mantell,, the holder of a B.S. from City
College, and M.A. and Ph.D. from New York University and J.D. from New York Law
School and the husband of the “former Pauline Schwartz, who was a long time school
principal and president of the Council of Jewish Organizations in Civil
Service.
1904(5th
of Av, 5664): Sixty-eight year old Judith Seixas, the daughter of Hortensia and
Jacob Levy Seixas passed away today.
1904: In
response to a message from Dr. Harry Friedemward today, Sunday, memorial
meetings were held in many American cities to mark the passing of Theodor
Herzl.
1905:
Birthdate of Polish born journalist, Yiddish author and Labor Zions Pinhus
Sztejnwaks, who in 1941 came to the United States where he ws a “UN
correspondent and the editor of Tzion Neiss.”
1905(14th
of Tammuz, 5665): Forty-two year old Dr. Gabriel Engelsman, the 1880 graduate
of CCNY who “took post graduate courses at Yale, Harvard “and the Leipsic and
Vienna Universities” and became “an authority on the Comparative Grammar of
Semitic languages respected by “such scholars as Professor Ignaz Goldziher and
Professor Theodor Holdeke passed away today while serving as an instructor at
CCNY and a teacher in the Temple Emanuel Religious School.
1906:
Birthdate of Yitzhak Ben Aharon who when he died in 2006 was the last living
icon of the left-wing of the Israeli Labor Party.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/2006/jun/05/guardianobituaries.israel
1906: Carlos
Pellegrini who was supportive of the idea settling Russian Jews in Argentina
while serving as its President passed away today.
1906: Two days
after she had passed away, 84 year old Rachel Levy, “the widow of Joseph Levy”
was buried at the West Ham Jewish Cemetery.
1907:
Birthdate of Chicago native and University of Chicago
trained attorney David L. Krooth, who served as assistant general counsel of
the old U.S. Housing Authority and general counsel of the Federal Public
Housing Authority and the Defense Homes Corporation during the administrations
of FDT and HST and who raised two children – Dorothy and John – with his wife
Molly.
1907(7th of
Av, 5667): Fifty-four year old geologist, paleontologist and explore Angelo
Heilprin passed away
http://www.jstor.org/stable/198438
1908: Joseph
Horwitz and Bayla Rutsteein gave birth to Dr. Israel Horwitz.
1909(28th
of Tammuz, 5669): Parashat Matot-Masei
1909: In
“Jewish Legends of Bible Times” published today, Dr. Abram S. Isaacs, the
editor of the Jewish Messenger, provided a complete review of The Legend of
the Jews, Volume I by Louis Ginzberg, translated by Henrietta Szold.
1910: Smallpox
epidemic breaks out in Jerusalem.
1911: The
Glasgow Jewish Shopkeepers adopted a resolution today protesting “against
Sunday clauses of Shop Hours Bill” copies of which forwarded to the Home
Secretary, the members of Parliament from Glasgow and the President of the
Board of Deputies for British Jews.
1911(21st
of Tammuz, 5671): Eighty-four year old Jewish author Joshua Levenson passed
away to in Riga.
1912:
Fifty eight year old Henri Poincaré, the French mathematician, known for his
research into deterministic systems that lead to the development of chaos
theory who risked his career when in
1899, and again more successfully in 1904, he intervened in the trials of
Alfred Dreyfus” by attacking the
spurious scientific claims of some of the evidence brought against Dreyfus
passed away today.
1913:
Birthdate of American born architect Bertrand Goldberg who is best known for
the Marina City complex in Chicago, Illinois, the tallest residential concrete
buildings in the world at the time of completion.
1913:”Plea
For Religious Unity” published today described a speech given by Rabbi Stephen
S. Wise of the Free Synagogue in New York at the opening session of the
International Congress on Religious Progress in which he called for the next
meeting of the congress in 1916 to be held in Jerusalem where Christian, Moslem
and Jew would have the “opportunity to show that the most passionate devotion
to a particular faith might combined with the most sympathetic and fraternal
relations with the people of other faiths.”
1913(12th
of Tammuz, 5673): Sixty-five year old Abner Tannenbaum, the native of Schirwind
who pursued a career as “the manager of a wholesale drug business” who
emigrated to New York in 1887 “where he pursued a career as a writer which
included journalistic pursuits as well as writing a History of the Jews in
America published in 1905, passed away today.
1914:
In Oden, Michigan, seventy five Jewish vacationers attended Friday night
services conducted by Rabbi I.E. Marcuson of Charleston South Carolina.
1914:
“After valiant attempt rebelling against press censorship by the Russian
government, Yiddish journalists in Saint Petersburg were forced to shut down
the bi-weekly Undzer Tsayt (Our Times) again, not long after their original
paper, Di Tsayt (The Time), was muzzled in June.”
1914: In
Salonica a campaign against the Jews continued in the newspapers. The dispute
was over Greeks and Jews who worked in a Jewish owned tannery. The dispute
became a violent political discussion all throughout Macedonia. It originated
over Jews wearing the Turkish Fez, which was a symbol of their fondness for the
previous Turkish administration.
1915: William
Green, an inmate at Milledgeville State Penitentiary, tried to kill Leo Frank
by slashing his throat with a butcher knife.
1916(16th
of Tammuz, 5676): During WW I, Lt.
Ernest Emanuel Polack of the 4th Gloucestershire was killed today.
1916: In
Baltimore, MD, Abraham Benjamin Cohn and Hattie Rose Cohn gave birth to Floryne
Eleanor Cohn who became Floryne Eleanor Gorov when she married Jack Gorov.
1916: In “a
desire to restore harmony among the Jews in the United States” who are
campaigning “to demand full political, civil and religious rights for Jews in
all lands where those rights are not enjoyed by them” “a committee of five
members of the Conference of American National Jewish Organizations met with
the Executive Committee of the Jewish Congress Organization” tonight in New
York’s Aeolian Hall.
1917: John
Henry Patterson was made commander of the 38th Battalion of the Royal
Fusiliers, one of three battalions of the Jewish Legion, recruited from British
and foreign Jews. Patterson was promoted to full Colonel. In February of 1918,
Patterson proudly led soldiers of the 38th Fusiliers Battalion, one of the
components of the Legion, in a parade in the Whitechapel Road, before they were
shipped off to Palestine. They met a tumultuous and joyous reception among the
Jews of London, as well as generating amazement among other bystanders, as
related in this article about the parade of the Jewish Legion in London.
[Unlike many British officers, not only was Patterson not anti-Semitic, he was
philo-Semitic numbering many Jews among his friends throughout the rest of his
life and pushing for the creation of the Jewish Brigade during World War II.]
1917: In
Chicago, the alumni of the Cregler School are scheduled to hold a meeting in
the Social Hall of the Chicago Hebrew Institute.
1917: In Lima,
Ohio Frances Ada (née Romshe) and Perry Marcus Driver gave birth to Phyllis Ada
Driver who gained fame as comic Phyllis Diller.
1917: It was
reported today that “the Central Committee of the All-Russian Council of
Workmen’s and Soldiers’ Deputies has sent fifteen representatives” throughout
Russia “to conduct a widespread campaign against the “pogrom propagandists” who
are spreading “anti-Semitic propaganda.”
1917: It was
reported today that “a few Jews were wounded in disorders” following “false
charges that Jewish merchants in Kiev were concealing food supplies” that
“nearly cause a pogrom.”
1917:
Birthdate of all-star shortstop and Cleveland Indian manager, Lou
Boudreau. Boudreau’s mother was
Jewish. But he was adopted by a Roman
Catholic family who raised him in their faith.
1917: In
Hartsdale, New York, advertising executive Harry Lasker and his wife Peggy gave
birth to Edward Morris Lasker, the nephew of Albert and Mary Lasker, who would
be raised by his stepfather, attorney Issac Levy, and who gained famed as
Morris Edward Lasker a federal judge in New York and Massachusetts for four
decades. (As reported by Robert D. McFadden)
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/29/nyregion/29lasker.html?_r=0
1917: At
today’s meeting of the Joint Distribution Committee, Chairman Felix M. Warburg
“expressed the regret of the committee over the death of Samuel I. Hyman who
had been selected by the committee to visit Russia to supervise the relief work
in that country.”
1917: Abram L.
Elkus said today that “the reports received in” the United States “of wholesale
massacres and maltreatment of the Jews in Turkey and Palestine were entirely
unfounded” and that “their situation was as favorable as could be expected.”
1917: In San
Antonio, Texas, David and Riva Rapoport, Jewish immigrants who had fled Russia
after participating in an anti-czarist uprising, gave birth to Bernard
Rapoport, the Jewish businessman “who built an insurance empire and spent his
last decades giving his wealth away to universities, Democratic campaigns and
charitable causes in Israel and his adopted hometown of Waco…” (As reported by
J.B. Smith)
1918: By order
of Lenin, Czar Nicholas II and his family were executed at Yekaterinburg
marking the end of the Romanov dynasty and a turning point in the history of
Russia, Europe and the World.
1918: “Jews To
Broaden Work For Fighters” published today described a meeting of the
Reorganization Committee of the Local Board for Jewish Welfare Work” at New
York’s Hotel Biltmore where it decided to create “a concrete plan” for
centralizing all efforts to aid Jewish soldiers that would include “the
establishment in New York City of a central hospitality house with numerous
branches in different parts of the where enlisted men from all over the country
may stay while on furlough or while passing through the city” which will be
modeled after similar efforts by the Y.M.C.A. and the Knights of Columbus.
1919: Today,
the first step was taken in forming what became the Inter University Jewish
Federation when a conference was where representatives of “Jewish societies
from Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds and Oxford” took place in Manchester,
England.
1919: During the
war with the Russian Bolsheviks, Jewish leaders met with Symon Petlura and
pledged their support for him and the creation of an independent country of
Ukraine.
1920:
Birthdate of physicist Gordon Gould who was among those who claimed credit for
inventing the laser.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9906E7DC1630F933A1575AC0A9639C8B63
1920:
Birthdate of Rabbi Louis Jacobs, the first leader of Masorti Judaism (also
known as Conservative Judaism) in the United Kingdom.
1920: Leon
Kamaiky, “one of the European Commissioners of the Hebrew Sheltering and
Immigrant Aid Society” who has been studying the society’s programs in Europe
and who is preparing a report on changes that will need to be made is scheduled
to sail for America today aboard the SS Aquitania.
1921(11th
of Tammuz, 5681): Sixty-two year old Joseph H. Polak Esquire who had served as
“one of the justices for the county of London and was a member of the Chamber
of Commerce passed away today in London.
1921:
Twenty-seven-year-old NYU trained attorney and JTS ordained rabbi Samuel
Benjamin, the Jerusalem born son of Mordecai and Sarah (Stampfer) Benjamin
married Hannah Mirsky in Cleveland, OH where he was leading Congregation Anshe
Emes in Cleveland.
1921: Birthdate
of Alick Isaacs, the native of Glasgow, Scotland who earned “his Doctor of
Medicine degree from the University of Glasgow” and was one of “the
co-discoverers of interferon.”
1921: In
Hungary, journalist and playwright Béla Szenes and his wife gave birth to
Hannah Szenes the poet who would be murdered while serving behind enemy lines
while serving with the British lines. Her most famous work is probably Eli Eli
(My God, My God”) the poem set to music by David Zahavi.
1922: “After
being detained on Ellis Island Since Saturday morning Jerachmel Amdursky, owner
of two hotels in Jerusalem, who arrived on the Cunarder Mauretania to visit his
son Alexander, a student at Columbia University, was admitted today after
satisfyng the immigration authorities that he had only come to the United
States for the Summer.”
1923: In
Chomutov, Czech Republic, Irma (Kahn) Seligman and Emil Seligman both of whom
were killed during the Holocaust, gave birth to Chanoch (Hans) Seligman)
1924: As of
today, Louis D. Brandies, an associate justice of the United States Supreme, is
one of sixteen men being considered to run on the Progressive ticket which
Senator LaFollete is the presidential
candidate.
1925: It was
reported that in Vienna The Hakenkreusler, the anti-Semitic organization, has held
a mass meeting in protest against the
Zionist World Congress scheduled to take place here in August.
1926(6th
of Av,5686): Parashat Devarim
1926:
According to an official White Paper issued today in London, “the Palestine
Government loan in the amount of $22,500,000 which is to be floated soon by
Government will be guaranteed as to principal and interest by the British
Chancellor of the Exchequer.
1927: “A
slight earthquake shock was felt in Jerusalem at 10:04 this morning” and three
people who were injured were taken to the hospital.
1928: Based on
the results of the monthly meeting of the Board of Jewish Deputies, it was
reported today that “American and British Jews are to cooperate in matters
pertaining to the protection of Jewish rights in Europe and elsewhere, wherever
these rights are endangered or ignored.”
1929: As of
today, Louis Marshall, acting on behalf of Felix Warburg the chairman of an
organizing committee of seven non-Zionist, still has three more delegates to
select who will attend the 16th biennial Zionist Congress meeting on
August 11, having already selected
forty-one other delegates including such well known figures as Dr. Cyrus Adler
and Herbert H. Lehman, the future governor of New York.
1930: In Bucharest
“at a conference held at the Ministry of the Interior today to discuss measures
to prevent a recurrence of the Antisemitic outbreaks of recent months, Dr.
Alexander Vayda-Voevod, the Minister of the Interior, established that the
police and gendarmerie authorities had been guilty of neglect in not having
suppressed the attacks with sufficient firmness.”
1931(3rd
of Av, 5691): Israel L. Treiger, the husband of Ethel Treiger and father of Sam
and Baruch Treiger passed away today in
Seattle after which he was buried in the Seattle Historic Sephardic Cemetery.
1931(3rd
of Av, 5691): Fifty-one year old NYU trained attorney and “assistant to the
attorney general of the United States Bernard Edelhertz, the Russian born “son
of Mordecai and Rebecca (Rubenstein) Edelhertz and husband of Clara Greenberg
with whom he had two children – Mildred and Helen – who visited post-war Poland
to investigate the conditions of the Jews, served as the President of the
Encyclopedia Judaica and publisher of the American
Hebrew Magazine passed away today.
1932: Today “thousands of World War I veterans converged
on Washington, D.C., set up tent camps, and demanded immediate payment of
bonuses due to them according to the World War Adjusted Compensation Act of
1924” in what was the first of the so-called Business Plot, a political
conspiracy in 1933 in the United States to overthrow the government of
President Franklin D. Roosevelt and install a dictator” which one of the
ring-leaders erroneously was supported by Felix Warburg.
1933(23rd
of Tammuz, 5693): Sixty-one year Dr. Isador Abrahamson, the son of Abraham and
Amelia Stein Abrahamson, a graduate of Columbia’s School of Medicine and
husband of the former Stella Heidelberg who was one of New York City’s
“foremost neurologists” and a “founder and director of the Jewish Mental Health
Society” passed away today.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1933/07/19/105401195.pdf
1934: As of
today, “it still seems certain that while Julius Streicher and others like him
retain their power in the Nazi organization no real amelioration of its
anti-Jewish tendencies can be expected.”
1935: Joseph
"Yosky" Toblinsky, a member of the “Yiddish Black Hand,” a Jewish
criminal band active in the first decades of the 20th century was
taken into custody on charges of hijacking a truck filled with pharmaceutical
drugs.
1936: The Palestine Post reported that there
was heavy firing on the Hatikva Quarter in Tel Aviv and the Bayit Vegan Quarter
of Jerusalem. A bomb was found hidden in a shipment of Norwegian cheese. It was
believed that it was inserted while transported from Haifa to Jerusalem. Jacob
Gerzon, victim of a sniper's bullet, succumbed to his wounds. He was the 32nd
Jewish victim of the Arab disturbances which began on April 19. Three new
battalions of British troops arrived in Haifa from Malta. The government
ordered the demolition of the old Jaffa slums and for the construction of two
new roads for the benefit of that quarter and of the town as a whole.
1936: The
Spanish Civil War began as the armed forces, eventually to be led by Francisco
Franco rose up against the recently elected Popular Front Government
1936: “The
Final Hours” a drama featuring Marc Lawrence as “Mike Magellon” was released in
the United States today.
1936: In a
rare degree of solidarity a group of 40,000 demonstrators including Socialists,
Fascists, gentiles and Jews gathered in Warsaw to express opposition to
“granting the demands of the Danzig Nazis.”
1937(9th
of Av, 5679) Parahsat Devraim; Shabbat Chazon; Erev Tish’a B’Av
1937: Hyman
Rickover “reported aboard the minesweeper Finch at Tsingtao, China, and assumed
what would be his only ship-command with additional duty as Commander, Mine
Division Three, Asiatic Fleet.”
1937: Speaking
“on the second day of the art festival inaugurating Munich as ‘the Capital of
German’ as decreed by Chancellor Hitler, Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels
“blamed Jewish art critics for causing art to decline and degenerate” in the
post-war era – a trend he said was reversed by National Socialism “which arose
to banish these false molders of artistic taste.”
1938(18th of
Tammuz, 5698): Tzom Tammuz
1938(18th of
Tammuz, 5698): Three more Jews were killed today – two of them were watchmen at
an orange grove and one was a workman from Tel Aviv. At the same time, “the Jewish owner of watch
factory in Acre was seriously wounded” by Arab attackers.
1938: Credible
reports are circulating in Palestine that some of the attacks on Arabs are
“merely part of Nazi intrigue to gain Arab sympathy and impair British prestige
in the Near East.”
1939(1st of
Av, 5699): Rosh Chodesh Av
1939(1st
of Av, 5699): Seventy-four year old Julius Schnitzler, the Viennese surgeon who
was the laryngologist Johann Schnitzler passed away today.
1940: Because
of a disagreement between Abraham Stern, head of the Irgun’s information
department and David Raziel “the Irgun and LEHI split today.
1940(10th
of Tammuz, 5700): Hauptscharführer Blank murdered Werner Scholem at
Buchenwald. A Jew and a Communist, he
was arrested in 1933 by the Nazis who shipped him to Buchenwald when it was
opened in 1938. He was held there until
he was shot by the Nazi officer. He was
the brother of Gerhard Scholem who gained fame as Gershom Scholem first
Professor of Jewish Mysticism at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
1940: The
Vichy French government issued orders prohibiting employment of aliens (Jews)
not born in France. This is one more example of how eager those at Vichy were
to serve their new Nazi comrades.
1941(22nd of Tammuz, 5701): Twelve hundred Jews are murdered at
Slonim, Belorussia
1941: “The
German occupational authority, the Reichskommissariat Ostland, was created”
today.
1941 Alfred Rosenberg
is appointed Reich minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories to administer
lands seized from the Soviet Union.
1941(22nd of Tammuz, 5701): This marks the first day of the a
fourteen day slaughter of the Jews at Kishinev in the Soviet Union; During
those 14 days over 10,000 Jews would be slaughtered by the Nazis and their
local collaborators
1942: The
2,000 Jews from Holland reached Auschwitz. All but 449 were given their
numbered tattoos. The 449 were gassed.
1942:
Parisians remained silent during the second of “La Grande Rafle” or the Big
Sweep, during which on order from Pierre Laval, the Prime Minister of the Vichy
French government, between 13,000 and 20,000 Jews living in Paris were rounded
up by the French police for deportation.
1942: A
Nazi delegation headed by SS chief Heinrich Himmler tours the death camp at
Auschwitz, where Himmler observes a mass gassing of inmates.
1943:
Birthdate of Shlomo Ben-Ami, the native of Tangiers who made Aliyah in 1955 and
earned a doctorate from Oxford. After
serving as head of the School of History at Tel Aviv University, he served as
Israel’s Ambassador to Spain before pursuing a career in politics.
1943(14th
of Tammuz, 5703): Parashat Balak
1943(14th
of Tammuz, 5703): Yitzhak Wittenberg, a partisan leader who had surrendered to
the Gestapo to prevent the razing of the Vilna (Lithuania) Ghetto yesterday was
murdered today.
1943:
Birthdate of Athalya Brenner the native of Haifa who is “Professor Emerita of
Hebrew Bible/Old Testament at the University of Amsterdam and Professor in
Biblical Studies at Tel Aviv University.
http://humanities.tau.ac.il/segel/abrenner/
1943: Sid
Caesar and Florence Levy were married today.
1943: “Falcon
In Danger” one of a series of “Falcon mysteries” featuring Felix Basch as
“Morley” was released in the United States today.
1944:
“Documents and pictures purporting to show connections between the German-American
Bund and the Ku Klux Klan and to prove that at least one defendant raised the
hint that President Roosevelt is of Jewish ancestry were submitted to the jury
in the mass sedition trial today.”
1944(26th
of Tammuz, 5704): Forty-six year old child prodigy William James Sidis passed
away today.
http://www.sidis.net/Sperling.htm
1945: For the
first time bombers from the US 7th Air Force which had been
attacking Japanese forces in Shanghai since 1944, struck the Hongkou Quarter
which was the de facto Jewish Ghetto in the city.
1945: Today
“Leo Szilard and 69 co-signers at the Manhattan Project "Metallurgical
Laboratory" in Chicago petitioned the President of the United States”
asking “that the United States not resort to the use of atomic bombs in this
war unless the terms which will be imposed upon Japan have been made public in
detail and Japan knowing these terms has refused to surrender; second, that in
such an event the question whether or not to use atomic bombs be decided by you
in light of the considerations presented in this petition as well as all the
other moral responsibilities which are involved.”
1945: The
Potsdam Conference opens in Potsdam, Germany. The leaders of the Big Three,
Harry Truman, Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin with the aim of settling
outstanding issues related to the end of World War II in Europe including the
fate of conquered German and liberated Poland.
It was the first meeting between the U.S. President and the Soviet
leader. It was the last meeting with
Churchill who would be replaced during the conference the new Laborite Prime
Minister Clement Atlee. For public consumption, it appeared that the war time
Allies were committed to punishing Germany for its Nazi atrocities. The relations between Truman and Stalin
soured from this time forward into what became the Cold War. An argument can be made that Truman’s
decision to recognize Israel was a product of this Cold War environment.
1946: Today,
Gen. Draja Mihailovic, 50, and 8 other Chetniks, which began a Yugoslav
resistance movement that included a “Jewish Patriotic Brigade” and then turned
on their Jewish comrades when they began collaborating, were executed by firing
squad in Belgrade.
1947: Viktor
Abakumov, the head of state security, wrote a letter to Foreign Minister Moltov
today “which researchers believe
contains the details of Raoul Wallenberg’s death.”
1947: Mordechai
(Motke) Eldar and his sister arrived at Haifa today but were forced to return
to Hamburg by the British. A year later
he returned aboard the Kedmah and began a thirty year career with the IDF where
he reached the rank of Colonel before retiring.
1947: Supposedly
Raoul Wallenberg died in a Soviet prison on this date. An air of mystery still
surrounds the death of one of the few people who came to the aid of the Jews
during the Holocaust. Since nothing was done to establish the fate of
Ambassador Wallenberg after he was last seen going to the headquarters of the
Red Army in Budapest, nobody really knows if he was shot in Moscow, died in
prison, or lived out a long anguished life in the Gulag.
1948(11th
of Tammuz, 5708): A week before his 75th birthday, Dr. Isador E.
Philo, a native of Cardiff, Wales, the retired rabbi of Rodef Sholom temple,
Youngstown, Ohio, and a former resident of Altoona, PA, who also served the
Temple Beth Israel congregation during several of the World war II years,
passed away today at his home in Youngstown.
1948:
Re-release today of “Dick Tracy Returns”
a film based on the comic strip cop featuring Ned Glass as “Kid Stark”
1948: A
two-pronged attack by Israeli forces designed to drive Arab Legion forces from
the eastern section of Jerusalem failed.
The Old City would remain under Jordanian occupation until 1967. During this time, Jews were barred from the
Old City and no Arabs demanded that the Old City be made the capital of a
Palestinian state.
1948: On the
second day of Operation Death to the Invader, an Israeli military operation
designed to connect settlements in the Negev with the rest of Israel, a series
of Israeli assaults failed in their attempt to take their objectives.
1948: During
Operation Dekel, Israeli forces took the villages of Hittin and Nimrin.
1949: “In a
message prepared for today’s Army Day observance” Brig. Gen. Jacob Dori, the
Chief of State of the Israeli called on his defense forces to increase their
strength as a means of insuring peace for Israel.”
1949: “Immediately
after the War of Independence, the Hero of Israel decoration, or the Medal of
Valor as it is now known, was awarded for the first time for extraordinary
bravery and excellence during the fight for Israel's independence to Yair
Racheli.”
https://www.ynetnews.com/magazine/article/rkarhn0p2
1950: Valerian
Trifa, the Romanian Cleric who hid his role in the fascist, anti-Semitic Iron
Guard, took advantage of the Displace Persons Immigration Law to move to the
United States today. His lies and his role in the Holocaust would eventually be
exposed by Israeli author Zev Goland
1950: “Julius
Rosenberg was arrested while shaving” today.
1951: The Jerusalem Post reported that the
Ministry of Finance denied charges that the Custodian of Enemy Property had
transferred valuable land in Tel Aviv to high government officials and Mapai
and Histadrut leaders, at prices far below the prevailing market valuations.
Minister of Finance Eliezer Kaplan, vigorously denied such charges and intended
to take legal actions against the editor of Haboker, the General Zionist daily,
and the mayor of Tel Aviv, Israel Rokach, for having spread such allegations.
The Knesset Finance Committee asked the State Comptroller to investigate the
whole affair.
1954: In
Baltimore, MD, Freda Sacki Sussman, a pre-war refugee from Nazi Germany and
Charles Sussman, a decorated WW II soldier and an educator in the Baltimore
County Public Schools gave birth to Lance Jonathan Sussman “an historian of
American Jewish History, college professor, Chair of the Board of Governors of
Gratz College, Melrose Park, PA and the senior rabbi at Reform Congregation
Keneseth Israel” and husband of Elizabeth “Liz” Sussman with whom he raised
five children.
1956(9th of
Av, 5716): Tish'a B'Av
1956: “High
Society” produced by Sol C. Siegel was released today in the United States.
1957( 18th
of Tammuz, 5717): Sixty-one-year-old Dr. Leonard Gray, the chief of the
prosthetics department of Beth Israel Hospital in Newark, NJ, the husband of
Miriam Wagner Gray and the father of Norman and Warren Gray passed away
tonight.
1957 “Hatful
of Rain” directed by Fred Zinnemann with music by Bernard Herrmann was released
today in the United States.
1959(11th of
Tammuz, 5719): Eugene Meyer publisher
and owner of the Washington Post
passed away. Meyer is the father of
Katherine Graham. While Graham has
earned a reputation for making the Washington Post into one of the
nation’s leading papers, the process was actually begun by her father who took
over the bankrupt paper and proceeded to vanquish several stout competitors
including the now defunct Times Herald
and Evening Star.
1959:
“American jazz singer and songwriter” Billie Holiday, a lady with a most
unmistakable voice in style who stepped out of her comfort zone when she record
“My Yiddish Mamme” passed away today.
http://www.tabletmag.com/scroll/190122/billie-holidays-cover-of-my-yiddishe-mamme
1959: “The
Mouse that Roard,” a nuclear war era comedy with a script co-authored by
Stanley Mann and co-starring Peter Sellers, a distant relative on his mother’s
side of “pugilist Daniel Mendoza” was released today in the United Kingdom.
1960: Binyamin
Mintz, a member of Agudat Israel Workers, was appointed Minister of Postal
Services by David Ben-Gurion today, serving until his death the following May.
1964: Dr. and
Mrs. Leonard Shapiro have announced the engagement of their daughter Penn alum
June Pamela Shapiro to Wharton School of Finance graduate to Arthur Howard
Blumenthal.
1965(17th
of Tammuz, 5625): Parashat Balak; no fast because of Shabbat
1965: It was
reported today that the order to Senator Jeremiah Bloom from the State Senate Majority
leader Joseph Zaretski directing the Joint Legislative Committee on Banks “to
put our state banks in shape” appeared to be Zaretski reaction to the Chase
Manhattan Bank’s decision to relinquish it 166-year-old state charter and seek
a federal charter.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1965/07/17/94969440.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0
1966: Funeral
services are scheduled to be held today for eighty-four-year-old Columbia
trained attorney Samuel Blumberg, “who represented trade associations and
manufacturers and who “had been Chairman of Congregation B’nai” while being
married to the former Jeannette Kahn, of blessed memory, the former Ruth Alton
Geiger of blessed memory and the former Josephine Harris Kutscher
1966: After
129 performances, the curtain came down on the original Broadway production of
“It's a Bird... It's a Plane... It's Superman,” a musical composed by Charles
Strouse “based on the comic book character Superman created by Jerry Siegel and
Joe Shuster and published by DC Comics.”
1968: “For
Love of Ivy” comedy directed by Daniel Mann and produced by Edgar J. Scherick
and Jay Weston was released by Cinerama Releasing Corporation in the United
States today.
1968: “Every
Bastard a King” (Kol Mamzer Melech) a drama directed by Uri Zohar, produced by
Chaim Topol, and starring Yehoram Gaon was released today in Israel.
1968:
Directors of Avnet, Inc. “elevated Morton D. Weiner to president and chief
operating officer” succeeding Lester F. Avnet “who continues as chairman and
chief executive officer.
1968:
Birthdate of actress Elizabeth Natalie “Bitty” Schram whose acting multi-media
acting skills included two years in the original Broadway production of
“Laughter on the 23rd Floor” two years as “Sharona Flemng” in the
off-beat television crime show “Monk” and a supporting role in the
baseball/feminist film “A League of their Own.”
1969:
Israeli trucks drive through the Sinai heading for the east bank of the Gulf of
Suez. They are carrying the equipment for the commandos who will be attacking
the Green Island, the Egyptian for in the middle of the Gulf of Suez.
1970: At
Temple Beth El in Michigan, funeral services are scheduled to be held for 84
year-old Meyer L. Prentis, the Kovno born son of Samuel and Hannah Prentis and the husband Anna Prentis with whom he had four
daughters who served as treasurer for General Motors for 32 years and who was a
former head of the Jewish Welfare Federation.
1971(24th
of Tammuz, 5731): Parashat Pinchas
1971(24th
of Tammuz, 5731: Sixty-six year old St. Louis, MO, native and Columbia Law
School trained Attorney Phillip W. Haberman, Jr. the WW II veteran of the 8th
Air Force who was active in New York State Republican politics and the husband
of Helen Haberman with whom he raised two children – Charles and Norma – passed
away today.
1972: Avner
Shaki left the cabinet today where he had been serving as Deputy Minister of
Education and Culture.
1974: Hillel
Butman, who was “convicted in the 2nd Leningrad Trial in May of 1971 and who is
serving a 10 year sentence in a Perm labor camp, got 5 months solitary
confinement for going on hunger strike on eve of President Nixon’s visit.”
1974: Five
children of Soviet Jewish activists ended a 3 week campaign for the release of
their parents.
1975(9th
of Av, 5735): Tish’a B’Av
1975:
Birthdate of Israeli actor and comedian Eli Finish.
1976: In Montreal,
opening of the Olympics where Natalia Kushnir led the Soviet Volleyball Team to
a Silver Medal.
1979: Today,
“In her July 17, 1979, speech accepting the presidency of the European
Parliament, Simone Veil said: “Whatever our political beliefs, we are all aware
that this historic step, the election of the European Parliament by universal
suffrage, has been taken at a crucial time for the people of the Community.”
1979:
Birthdate of Nathan B. “Nate” Bruckenthal, the Petty Officer 3rd
Class who became the first Coast Guardsman to be killed in action since the
Viet Nam war when he was killed by suicide bombers during a waterborne assault
on the Khawr Al Amaya oil terminal
1981: In
response to a major rocket attack on northern Israel by the PLO from southern
Lebanon, the AIF launched a massive attack on PLO headquarters in downtown
Beirut. Civilian casualties were
inevitable given the Palestinian military for hiding among non-combatants. The AIF also attacked PLO positions in
southern Lebanon from where the rocket attacks were launched.
1981: Two
girls were wounded in Katyusha bombardments on the Galilee.
1982: A six
month North American tour of the Stephen Sondheim musical “Sweeny Todd” that
began in Wilmington came to an end in Toronto, Canada.
1984(17th
of Tammuz, 5744): Tzom Tammuz
1984(17th
of Tammuz, 5744): Ninety-four year old Edgar Magnin, the grandson of the
founders of I. Magnin Department Store and the long serving rabbi of the
Wilshire Boulevard Temple who was married to Evelyn Magnin with whom he had a
son and a daughter passed away today.
http://digitalassets.lib.berkeley.edu/roho/ucb/text/magnin_edgar.pdf
1984(17th
of Tammuz, 5744): Ninety-two year old Ben Zion Hyman, the Belarus born son of
Esther Bella and Menachem Mendl Hyman, the “husband
of Fanny Feigeh Mindl Konstantynowski” and University of Toronto trained
electrical engineer who founded “Hyman’s Book and Art Shoppe” and the Toronto
Jewish Public Library passed away today in Toronto, Canada.
1984: Final
broadcast of “Second City Television” (SCTV) the comedy sketch series that
helped to launch the career of Rick Mornais.
1988: Today at
the Swan Club, Rabbi D. Posner officiated at the wedding of Linda Jane
Weinstein, a national editor at The Associated Press in New York, and Michael
Carl Barnas, a lawyer for the General Electric Company in Schenectady, N.Y.
1989: Today,
Aaron Lasky, “an Amherst man who had spent more than a decade scrounging in
dumpsters, basements, and attics was awarded a MacArthur Foundation
"genius grant.”
https://www.massmoments.org/moment-details/yiddish-book-rescuer-wins-genius-grant.html
1991: The
Brown Building, the top three floors of which were at one time occupied by the
Triangle Shirtwaist Factory, which was the site of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory
fire that killed 146 garment workers on March 25, 1911 was placed on the U.S.
National Register of Historic Places today.
1991: “Man
Trouble” a comedy directed by Bob Rafelson, co-starring Ellen Barkin and
featuring Saul Rubinek and Paul Mazursky was released by 20th
Century Fox in the United States today.
1992: U.S.
premiere of “Stranger Among Us” directed by Sidney Lumet and co-produced by
Howard Rosenman.
1992: U.S.
premiere of “Honey, I Blew Up the Kid” starring Rick Moranis.
1993(28th
of Tammuz, 5753): Parashat Matot-Maesei – completion of the Book of Numbers or
Bamidbard
1993(28th
of Tammuz, 5753): Seventy-eight year old British journalist and publisher
Harold Harris, the WW II Captain who tracked and arrested Joachim von
Ribbentrop and was the editor for Arthur Kosetler passed away today.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/obituary-harold-harris-1460659.html
1994(9th
of Av, 5754): Tish’a B’Av
1994: Pitcher
Andrew Lorraine made his major league debut with the California Angels.
1996:
Eighty-one year old French collaborator Paul Claude Marie Touvier and
enthusiastic member of the “Milice” who was convicted of “crimes against
humanity” after having been granted a pardon thanks to the efforts of Catholic
Church leaders died today.
http://articles.latimes.com/1994-04-20/news/mn-48236_1_war-crimes
1996: “Walking
and Talking” co-starring Live Schreiber was released today in the United
States.
1997: “Go Milk
a Fruit a Fruit Bat!” published today provided a review of Jared Diamond’s Why
Is Sex Fun? The Evolution of Human Sexuality
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1997/jul/17/go-milk-a-fruit-bat/
2000: “Tens of
thousands of Jewish settlers demonstrated here tonight against the Israeli
government's peace negotiations, capping days of rightist protests against
leaked proposals to cede small Israeli settlements deep in the West Bank and
Gaza to eventual Palestinian control.”
2001(26th
of Tammuz, 5761): Eighty-four year old publisher Katharine Meyer Graham who led
the Washington Post during the
“Watergate Days” passed away today.
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/washington/july01/2001-07-17-graham-dead.htm
2001(26th of
Tammuz, 5761): Yehiel De-Nur, a Polish born Israeli author whose writings often
employed themes based on his time at Auschwitz, passed away.
2001: As the
16th Maccabiah games entered their second day, the Palestinian
Authority condemned yesterday’s suicide attack near a train station in the
northern Israeli town of Binyamina today, which killed two soldiers, critically
wounded a third, and injured several other people while “the Islamic War”
claimed credit for the attack and threatened Israel with more of the same. (As
reported by Joel Greenberg)
2002: “An
11-month old baby, her father and grandmother were among the seven people
killed when Palestinians in Israeli Army
uniforms set off a roadside bomb near a bus approaching a Jewish settlement,
then hurled grenades and raked the vehicle with gunfire” wounding an additional
17 people.
2003(17th of
Tammuz, 5763): Tzom Tammuz
2003: New
York Review of Books features a review Stalin's Last Crime: The Plot Against the Jewish Doctors, 1948–1953 y Jonathan Brent and Vladimir P.
Naumov
2004(28th of Tammuz, 5764): Parashat
Matot-Masei.
2005: Haaretz reported that The
Federal Bureau of Investigation is probing whether two United States citizens
arrested recently planned to carry out an attack on the Israeli consulate in
Los Angeles and a synagogue in the area.
2006:
In accordance with instructions of the Home Front Command, the Carmiel Festival,
scheduled to begin on July 18, 2006 will be postponed until October because of
the Hezbollah attacks on northern Israel.
2007: An
exhibition of manuscripts of scientist Sir Isaac Newton – never before revealed
to the public which opened on June 18, 2007, at the Jewish National and
University Library at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, at an exhibition
opening comes to an end today..For further details about the exhibition, please
visit the following site:
http://jnul.huji.ac.il/dl/mss/newton
2008:
In Kensington, Maryland, Robert Wexler,
a six-term U.S. congressman from Florida, discusses and signs Fire-Breathing Liberal: How I Learned to
Survive (and Thrive) in the Contact Sport of Congress (written with
David Fisher) at Borders Books
2008: The military funerals for Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser
the two Israeli soldiers abducted in 2006 by Hezbollah, whose bodies were
returned yesterday as part of a prisoner swap take place today in their
respective hometowns. Ehud Goldwasser is laid to rest at 10 A.M. in the
military cemetery in Nahariya and Eldad Regev is buried at 2 P.M. in Haifa.
2008: Robert Magnus, who served as the 30th Assistant Commandant
of the Marine Corps from September 8, 2005 to July 2, 2008 retired today after
more than 39 years of service.
2009:
At the18th Maccabiah Games round five in the Chess Competition.
2009: The
Jerusalem Film Festival features a screening “Bar Mitzvah” in which Boris
Thomashefsky plays Israel, a widower whose wife Leah was lost at sea ten years
earlier en route to America. Israel, his new wife Rosalie, his daughter Birdie,
and son Yudele return to Poland for Yudele’s Bar Mitzvah.
2009(25th of
Tammuz, 5769): General Meir Amit passed away at the age of 88. A soldier during
the War for Independence, Amit was commander of the famed Golani Brigade, a
graduate of Columbia and a major general in the IDF. His greatest claim to fame was his service as
head of Mossad during which he managed the activities of Eli Cohen and provided
the intelligence estimates that were helpful in during the Six Day War. When
word of the death of this popular general reached Israeli President Shimon
Peres he said, “Generations of Israelis, entire generations of children, owe
Meir Amit a debt of gratitude for his immense contribution - a large part which
remains secret - in building the strength and deterrence of Israel...He was a
natural leader, whom people trusted, and at the same time he was a visionary
for the state.” Amit’s autobiography, A
Life in Israel's Intelligence Service: An Autobiography, was published a
month after he died.
2010: Israeli
artist Shahar Marcus is scheduled to be the Homecoming Artist as part of The
Art Omi International Artists Residency.
2010: Senior
Fatah member Mohammed Dahlan announced today that the Palestinian Authority
will not hold direct negotiations with Israel at this time. The announcement
followed a meeting between PA leaders and United States envoy George Mitchell.
2010: Nir
Bergman’s Intimate Grammar won the Haggiag Award for Best Full-Length Feature
Film at the 27th Jerusalem Film Festival, which ended tonight.
2011: The
first annual NYC Schlep is scheduled to begin today at 9 a.m. in Battery Park.
2011: The
New York Times includes a review of Lipman Pike: America’s First Home Run King by Richard
Michelson and illustrated by Zachary Pullen, “a short biography of Lip Pike,
credited with being the first paid professional as well as the first Jewish
ball player (a combination that did not always please fans).”
2011: The IDF denied reports that their planes
had struck at Gaza today despite the fact that falling three Qassam rockets had
been fired into southern Israel during the night.
2011(15th of Tammuz,
5771):Ninety-four year old Alex Steinweiss passed away. You may not know his
name, but if you have ever bought an LP or long-playing record you know his
work since he was the designer of the modern LP album cover. (As reported by
Steven Heller)
2012:
“The Flat” is scheduled to be shown as part of the Mizel Summer Film
Series in Denver, Colorado.
2012: The national unity government formed in
Israel two months ago unraveled on today, when the head of the centrist Kadima
Party, Shaul Mofaz, announced that he was withdrawing because of intractable
differences with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Likud Party over a
proposed universal national service law.
2012: The remains of a 2,300-year-old naval
pier have been uncovered in Acre, adding to the coastal city’s long and varied
history by showing it was a substantial port in the Hellenistic period.
2013: Layla
Lavan, “an epic night of Israeli food, drinks and music” is scheduled to
take place at Hudson Station in Manhattan.
2013: In Cedar Rapids, the Hadassah Book Club
is scheduled to discuss The Girl in the Green Sweater by Chrystyna
Chiger.
2013: State Comptroller Joseph Shapira blasted
the absence of criminal investigations into illegal settler building and the
loss of millions of shekels in uncollected property fees in the West Bank, in a
section of the 63rd annual report he submitted to Knesset Speaker Yuli
Edelstein this morning. (As reported by Tovah Lazaroff
2013: Bulgaria's interior minister said today
that his country has received additional evidence implicating Hezbollah in the
2012 bus bombing in Burgas that killed five Israeli tourists and their
Bulgarian bus driver, Sofia News Agency reported.
2014: The Illinois Holocaust Museum and
Education Center and AJC Chicago’s Latin American Task Force are scheduled to
host “a special program recognizing the 20th Anniversary of the attack on the
AMIA Jewish Community Center in Buenos Aires that killed 85 and injured
hundreds.”
2014: The Historic 6th & I
Synagogue is scheduled to host “Jewish Daughter Diaries – Book Club”
facilitated by author Rachel Ament.
2014: U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is
scheduled to deliver the Jewish Primary Day School of the Nation’s Capital
Yitzhak Rabin Memorial Lecture.
2015(1st of Av, 5775): Rosh Chodesh
Av
2015: Two months after premiering at the Cannes
Film Festival, “Irrational Man,” film written and directed by Woody Allen,
co-produced by sister Letty Aronson and featuring Ben Rosenfield was released
today in the United States today.
2015: In “Abraham Foxman to Retire After 28
Years of Fighting Anti-Semitism” published today, Joseph Bergman provides a
portrait of the retiring head of the Anti-Defamation League.
2015: “Egyptian show that’s flattering to Jews
is a surprise hit among Palestinians” published today described the impact of
Haret al-Yahud,” or “The Jewish Quarter,” “the steamy Egyptian soap that tells
a Romeo and Juliet tale of a beautiful daughter of a well-to-do Jewish merchant
and a dashing Muslim army commander falling in and out and in love again in old
Cairo during the earth-shaking 1948 Arab-Israeli war and its aftermath.”
2015: “When Marnie Was There” and “Under
Electric Clouds” are scheduled to be shown at the Jerusalem Film Festival.
2015: Rachel Cohen a member of Women of the
Wall was arrested while holding her Torah, interrogated and later released
today. (Historically, what have we called it when police arrest Jews trying to
pray?)
2015: The Yiddish Art Trio - clarinetist
Michael Winograd, double-bassist and singer Benjy Fox-Rosen, and accordionist
Patrick Farrell – a rising new star in the firmament of Klezmer music is
scheduled to perform before at the Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, MA.
2015: In Atlanta, Timothy Frilingos, the Breman
Museum’s Director of Exhibitions is scheduled to lead a special tour of the
museum’s latest Southern Jewish History Exhibition Eighteen Artifacts: A Story
of Jewish Atlanta.
2016: “A War” and “The Death of Louis XIV” are
scheduled to be shown on the final night of the Jerusalem Film Festival.
2016(11th of Tammuz, 5776): “Sgt.
Shlomo Rindenow, 20, and Staff Sgt. Hussam Tafesh, 24, of the 601st Combat
Engineering Battalion were killed when a grenade Tafesh had been “playing with”
detonated at an army post on the Golan Heights, according to a military
official.” where three others were also wounded.
2016: In Israel today, “the cabinet approved a
proposal to all the treasury, for the first time, to advance a two-year budget”
which Zionist Union MK Eitan Cabel, who called “economic terror attack”
2016: In Coralville, Iowa, as a testament to
the ongoing vitality of small town Judaism, the Sisterhood at Agudas Achim is
scheduled to host the Annual Mitzvah Fund Brunch.
2016: The Illinois Holocaust Museum and
Education Center is scheduled to host “Role Camera…Music,” a performance by Dr.
Marvin Berman of the sounds we think of when we see such classics as “Sophie’s
Choice” and Schindler’s List.”
2016: The New York Times features
reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers
including Collected Poems: 1950-2012 by Adrienne Rich, the editor of Bridges: A Journal for Jewish Feminists and
Our Friends, The Way To The Spring: Life and Death in Palestine in
Ben Ehrenreich, Critics, Monsters, Fanatics and Other Literary Essays by
Cynthia Ozick, A None’s Story: Searching for Meaning Inside Christianity,
Judaism, Buddhism and Islam by Corinna Nicolaou and Putting God Second:
How to Save Religion by Donniel Hartman.
2016: “With Passion” an exhibition curated by
Naomi Lev is scheduled to close at the SLAG Gallery.
http://www.slaggallery.com/exhibitions/82
2016: The final performance of “Another Way
Home” presented by Theatre J is scheduled to take place today in Washington,
DC.
2017: A ceremony is scheduled to take place
this evening at Latrun celebrating the accomplishments of all the athletes at
the Maccabiah.
2017: JW3 is scheduled to host a screening of
“Norman: The Moderate Rise and Tragic Fall of a New York Fixer” in London.
2017: “Becoming Cary Grant” and “The Cakemaker”
are scheduled to be shown at the Jerusalem Film Festival.
2018: JW3 is scheduled to host two screening of
“Keep the Change” in London.
2018: The Dana Ruttenberg Dance Group is
scheduled to perform for the last time at the North Carolina Museum of Art in
Raleigh, NC.
2018: While Hamas claims to want a “ceasefire”
according Elior Levy sending “incendiary kits and balloons into Israeli
communities” would seem to show that the terrorists are performing a different
agenda.
2019: As mid-summer heat begins to grip the
United States, The Addison-Penzack JCC in Los Gatos, CA is scheduled to host a
“Float Night Pool Party and BBQ.”
2019: In San Francisco, AL’s Deli, which will
offer chef Aaron London’s spins on Israeli street food and Jewish deli” is
scheduled to open today.
2019: As Americans celebrate the 50th
anniversary of the accomplishment of Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins and Buzz
Aldren, in San Francisco, the Commonwealth Club is scheduled to host “noted
astronomer Andrew Frankoi” as he “discusses the 50th anniversary of
the first moon landing.”
2019: The Workmen’s Circle is scheduled to host
the opening session of “The Beginnings of Modern Jewish Literature” with Eugene
Orenstein.
2019: In London, JW3 is scheduled to host a
screening of “Why the Jews?” a documentary that looks as the statistically
disproportionate number of Jewish Nobel prize winners as well the
“accomplishment of Jews in literate, film and the arts.” (Editor’s note: Apparently, the creators of the film did not
look at business, finance, or sexual abuse in the latter case of which there
has been an apparently disproportionate Jewish involvement from the point of
view of statistics.)
2020: The Jewish Heritage Museum of Monmouth
County is scheduled to a free children’s music class on Zoom with
“award-winning songwriter Carol Lester.”
2020: On Instragam Live, Aliza Sikolow, a “food
stylist and photographer based in Los Angeles is scheduled to demonstrate her
culinary skills with “a challah-baking workshop.”
2020: The Jewish Film Institute is scheduled to
host day 2 of Cinegogue Summer Days” festival is scheduled to includes world
premiere screening of 2020 documentary “IRMI”. followed by Q&A with
filmmakers and a screening of “Shiva Baby,” a 2020 comedy about a college
student.
2020: The Eden Tamir Center is scheduled to
present a young composers’ concert with pieces “by Ayal Lifshitz, Assaf Brown
and Bracha Bdil” which will be scheduled live on Kan Kol Hamusika.
2020: In Cedar Rapids, at Temple Judah Rabbi
Todd Thalblum is scheduled to lead Kabbalah Shabbat Services live streamed on
Zoom where we call to mind Rabbi Ed Chessman Z”L who served this community for
several years.
2021: In Jerusalem, the Eden-Tamir is scheduled
to host “The Best of Chamber Music” with the Millennium Ensemble.
2021: In Cedar Rapids, IA, the National Czech
and Slovak Museum is scheduled to host the first production of “The Golem of
Prague: A Story of Danger, Bravery and a Little Magic” a play by Darrin Crow
which is set in sixteenth century Prague.
2021: As part of the “Klezmer-Jazz Project”
“Pianist Alon Nechushtan, a world-class musician and leader of multicultural
Jewish band Talat,” is scheduled to appear “in concert with a jazz quartet” in
San Francisco.
2021: Jewish Silicon Valley is scheduled to
join with local synagogues to present an outdoor, socially distanced service
and a reading of the Book of Lamentations.
2021: This evening, the Boston Synagogue is
scheduled to host an online Tish’a B’Av Discussion
2021(8th of Av, 5781): Shabbat Chazon – The
Sabbath before Tish’a B’Av
Parashat Devarim (Words)
2022: The New York Times features reviews of books
by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including 21st
Century Monetary Policy: The Federal Reserve From the Great Inflation to
Covid-19 by Ben S. Bernake.
2022: As part of its “Her Majesty’s Kingdom”
series, the National Library of Israel is scheduled to present online “A Tour
of Anglo-Jewish History, 1656 to the Present” with Professor Todd M. Endelman
2022: CenterStage Theatre at the JCC (AJT
Member Theatre in Rochester, NY) is scheduled to host the last performance
“Rise.”
2022: Based on yesterday’s rocket attacks from
Gaza which came “hours after President Biden ended his visit to Israel, the
“new” Middle East today looks suspiciously like the “old” Middle East.
2022: The Jewish Language Project of Hebrew College is
scheduled to host a conversation with Distinguished Professor of Jewish Studies
at Rutgers University, Jeffrey Shandler about his latest book, Biography of
a Language: Yiddish.
2022(18th of Tammuz, 5782): Fast of the 17th of
Tammuz observed since the 17th fell on Shabbat.
2023: The Agnon House is scheduled to host the
new online lecture series "Autobiography and Memoir", during which “we
will examine, together with the best lecturers, the development of
autobiographical writing in world literature and Hebrew literature, from
antiquity to modern literature.”
2023: The Teaching the Holocaust Summer
Institute sponsored by the Iowa Jewish Historical Society is scheduled to begin
today.
2023: In Pittsburgh, the final phase of the trial of
the trial of Robert Bowers who has been found guilty of murdering 11 Jews at
the Tree of Life Synagogue is scheduled to begin today as the jury decides
whether he gets the death penalty of life imprisonment.