This Day, October 18, In Jewish History by Mitchell A and Deb Levin Z"L
OCTOBER 18
67 CE:
Roman soldiers captured Gamla, a fortress in Israel's Golan region, and killed
all its inhabitants. The ancient historian Josephus Flavius, a leader of the
Jewish revolt against Rome, fortified Gamla as a main stronghold in 66 CE. The
Romans attempted to take the city by means of a siege ramp, but were turned
back by the defenders; only on the second attempt did they succeed in
penetrating the fortifications and conquering the city. Thousands of
inhabitants were slaughtered, while others chose to jump to their deaths from
the top of the cliff. The location of ancient Gamla was discovered in
archeological excavations during the 1970s; the remains have been preserved as
a national park (As reported by Aish)
http://www.aish.com/dijh/Tishrei_23.html
323: Constantine the Great decisively defeats
Licinius in the Battle of Chrysopolis, establishing Constantine's sole control
over the Roman Empire. Constantine is perhaps best known for being the first
Roman Emperor to endorse Christianity.
To put it mildly, Constantine tipped the scales in favor of Christianity
and helped begin a downward spiral for European Jewry for an extended period of
time. This is an example of the fact
that Christianity owes its dominant position to the power of the state. As one author has pointed out in a recent
bestseller, the Sword of Constantine was the vehicle for empowering the Cross
of the Church.
412: Cyril was made Pope or Patriarch of Alexandria. Two years
later, he “incited the Greeks to kill or expel the Jews. He forced his way into
the synagogue at the head of a mob, expelled the Jews and gave their property
to the crowd. The Prefect Orestes, who refused to condone this behavior, was
set upon and almost stoned to death. Only one Jew, Adamanlius, agreed to be
baptized. Within a few years Jews were allowed to return, but a majority of
them returned only after the Mohammedans conquered Egypt.”
614: Today
the fifth Council of Paris “prohibited the Jews from asking or from exercising
civic or administrative rights.”
629: The
reign of Chlothar II who “convoked the Council of Paris and promulgated the
Edict of Paris, which reserved many rights to the Frankish nobles while it
excluded Jews from all civil employment for the Crown” came to an end today.
1009: The
Church of the Holy Sepulcher, a Christian church in Jerusalem, is completely
destroyed by the Fatimid caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah, who hacks the Church's
foundations down to bedrock. His treatment of a Christian shrine provides an
insight as to how Islam treated the holy sites of other religions. In other words, Islam’s current claims to the
Temple Mount are consistent with a pattern of usurpation and destruction.
1035:
Sancho III, King of Navarre, called by some, the Great, was assassinated during
a revolt. Four officials and sixty Jews were put to death during that revolt,
because the locals considered Jews to be "property" of the crown.
1210: Pope Innocent III excommunicated German
leader Otto IV. This was part of Innocent’s drive to become the dominant power
in Europe. Jews will recognize him as
the true father of the Inquisition and the driving force behind the Fourth
Lateran Council that served to demean the Jewish people and force them to live
a life isolated from their Christian neighbors which would ensure their
impoverishment.
1270: The Last Crusade ended. The
Crusades began in 1095 with the People’s Crusade. These first Crusaders moved through Central
Europe like a giant wave attacking the local Jewish communities as they moved
toward the Holy Land. There were eight
crusades, the last two led by the French King, Louis IX known as St.
Louis. St. Louis actually died of the
plague in 1270 in Tunis thus failing to reach the Holy Land. Many historians see the Crusades as a
negative in Jewish History. The
slaughter of the Jews in Europe by the Crusaders on their way to the Holy Land
and the slaughter of the Jews of Jerusalem by the Crusaders once they got there
are two examples for this view. The fact
that the Crusaders lost out boded well for the Jews since Islamic dominated
societies at this time provided better treatment for the Jewish citizens.
1356:
Basel, Switzerland was destroyed by an earthquake which was the most
significant historic seismological event north of the Alps. In all likelihood, no Jews died in the
earthquake since the Jewish community in Basel had been dissolved in 1349 when
600 adults were burned to death and the children were forcibly baptized in
response to claims that the Jews were well-poisoners who were responsible for
the Black Death.
1503: Pope
Pius III passed away. The Papacy of Pius III was one of the shortest in history
since it had begun on September 22, 0f 1503.
He was a compromise Pope who was preceded by Alexander VI and followed
by Julius II, two the Medici popes who showed some sympathy for the Jews and
otherwise left them alone while they pursued other, more worldly interests.
There are those who think that Pius may have died as the victim of sort of
Medici induced plot.
1571: In Mexico, an
inquisition was set up that remained in force until the end of the eighteenth
century.
1592:
Queen’s musician Alfonso Lanier married Aemilia Bassano who as Emilia Lanier
became “the first woman to assert herself as a professional poet through her
volume Salve Deus Rex Judaeroum (Hail God, King of the Jews).
1624(15th
of Cheshvan, 5385): “According to Kayserling” David de Caceres passed away
today in Amsterdam.
1633:
Today, Charles 1 reissued the Book of Sports as “The King's Majesty's
declaration to his subjects concerning lawful sports to be used” which
William Prynne, the Puritan leader who
opposed the return of the Jews to the British Isles claimed was written by William
Laud, the new Archbishop of Canterbury.
1635: Urban
VIII issued “Cum sicut acceptimus” a papal bull dealing with the requirement to
feed poor Jews imprisoned for failure to pay their debts.
1704:
“Lewis Gomez and Nathan Simpson testified today that they were well acquainted
with Joseph Nunes who had died on October 9th.
1739(16th of Tishrei, 5500): António José da Silva, a Portuguese-Brazilian dramatist,
known as "the Jew" (O Judeu) fell victim to the Inquisition suffering
death in an auto-da-fé.
1747: In London, establishment
of the Sephardi Jews’ Hospital (Beth Holim).
1747: Three Jewish doctors, Jacob de Castro Sarmento, Dr.
Phillip de la Cour and Dr. Joseph Vaz de Silva offered their services to the
newly opened Beth Holim - The Sephardi Jewish Hospital.
1748:
Signing of the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle ends the War of the Austrian
Succession. The Jews of Silesia would now live under Prussian rule instead of
Austrian governance. Silesia would
eventually become part of Poland. This
is an excellent example of how the Jews never moved; the nations of Europe kept
redrawing their boundaries so that a Jew, depending upon the time period could
be an Austrian, a German or a Pole.
Breslau, which at one time was home to a significant Jewish community,
is located in Silesia.
1752:
Sixty-four-year-old Saxon theologian and
student of Hebrew Christian Reineccius the author of a polyglot bible that
“contains Hebrews with Masoretic notes” passed away today.
1761:
Birthdate of Rabbi Wolff Kalusner
1762:
Birthdate of Lazarus Bendavid, the native of Berlin who became a leading
mathematician and philosopher.
1763: Uriah
and Eva Hendricks gave birth to Rachel Hendricks, the wife of Abraham Gomez and
the mother of Ernest Gomez.
1764: Eve
Esther Gomez and Uriah Hendricks gave birth to Rebecca Hendricks Levy of
Manhattan
1769(17th
of Tishrei, 5530): Third Day of Sukkoth observed as Captain Cook explores the
coast of New Zealand, a land mass here-to-for unknown to Europeans.
1779: The
combined Franco-American forces ended the Siege of Savannah during which Philip
Minis, a member of a prominent Jewish family served as guide and helped the
attackers find the best landing place for their forces.
1780(19th
of Tishrei, 5541): Fifth Day of Sukkoth observed on the same day the
Continental Congress issued a proclamation establishing “December 7, 1780 as a
day of ‘public thanksgiving and prayer.’”
1780: In
London, Daniel Cohen D’Azevedo, the f Haham Moses Cohen d'Azevedo and Sara de
Haham Moses Cohen D'Azevedo and his wife Ester Rodriques Cohen D'Azevedo gave
birth to Sarah Naar, the wife of Hazan Joshua Naar.
1786: “Feis
Moses Fraenkel” and “Kehla Fraenkel” residents of “Schopfloch, Germany gave
birth to Moses Feiss Fraenkel.”
1788(17th
of Tishrei, 5549): Shabbat Shel Sukkoth observed on the day after future President of the United States James
Madison wrote to future President of the United States Thomas Jefferson on
numerous subjects including the ratification of the Constitution.
1788(17th
of Tishrei, 5549): Naphtali Hart-Myers, the London born son of Joseph Myers, the
“husband of Hester Thackrah/ Tharkrah (Moses) and father of Rebecca Cohen;
Faybes Myers; Dr. Joseph Hart-Myers and Simon Hart Myers passed away today.
1790:
German philosopher Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling, who counted among his
adherents Sekl Loeb Wormser, the German rabbi, Talmudist and kabbalist, “was
granted permission to enroll at the Tübinger Stift (seminary of the
Evangelical-Lutheran Church in Württemberg), despite not having yet reached the
normal enrollment age of 20.
1796(16th
of Tishrei, 5557): Second of Sukkot observed for the last time during the
Presidency of George Washington.
1804: Sarah
Mocatta and David Abarbanel Lindo gave birth to Jacob David Lindo.
1807(16th
of Tishrei, 5568): Second Day of Sukkoth
1816: Jacob
Weil delivered a speech in the chapel of the Jewish school (Philanthropin) of
Frankfort where he would become an instructor two years later, in which “he
expressed the hope that the new era would bring the emancipation of his” fellow
Jews.
1817: In
the book burning at the Wartburg festival today, Saul Asher's writing "Die
Germanomanie" ("The Germano Mania") was burned.”
1818:
Inauguration of The Hamburg Temple, “the first reform synagogue in Germany.”
1818: “On
the anniversary of the Battle of Nations near Leipzig, the members of the New
Israelite Temple Society inaugurated their first synagogue in a rented building
in the courtyard between Erste Brunnenstraße and Alter Steinweg in Hamburg's
Neustadt quarter which was called the Hamburg Temple “the first reform
synagogue in Germany” and was led by Dr. Eduard Kley and Dr. Gotthold Salomon.
1823: In
Gibraltar. Solomon Benoliel, the “son of Don Judah Benoliel and Esther Benoliel
and his wife Judith Benoliel” gave birth to London resident Judah Benoliel.
1825: “Anglo-Jewish
pugilist Samuel Evans,” known as Young Dutch Sam” defeated Hary Jones today at
Sheremere Bedfordshire.
1829(21st
of Tishrei, 5590): Hoshana Raba observed for the last time during the reign of
King George IV.
1829: In Jebenhausen,
Landkreis Göppingen, Baden-Württemberg, Germany, Juda and Mirjam Einstein
Lindauer gave birth to Baltimore resident Max Lindau, the husband of Henrietta
Ullman Lindauer and the father of Bertha, Sophie, Jacob, Jules, Albert,
Clementine and Solomon Lindau.
1831: In
London, stockbroker Frederick Harrison and his wife Jane” gave birth to the
British jurist and historian Frederic Harrison who in 1920 expressed his
opposition to the creation of aJewish
homeland in Palestine writing that “the idea of creating in” Palestine “a new
Jewish Nation is nonsense” and that Jews may be a race of a sect” but “they are
not a nation.”
1834(15th
of Tishrei, 5595): First Day of Sukkoth and Shabbat observed for the last time
during the tenure of John Marshall as Chief Justice of the United States
1835: Moses
Norman Nathans and Benvenida Valentina Nathans gave birth to Isaiah Moses Nathans,
the “husband of Georgiana Nathans and Anna M. (Sarah) Nathans and father of
Philip Samuel Nathans; David Nathans; Benvenida Valentina Nathans; Isaac Leeser
Nathans; Meta Nathans; Horace Augustus Nathans, II; Helen Virginia Cadbury and Anna
Nathans.”
1835:
Lipman Levy married Hannah Jones at the Great Synagogue.
1835:
Benvenida Valentina Nathans, the Wilmington, Delaware born daughter of Sarah
Helen Solis and Daniel da Silva Solis and her husband Moses Nathans gave birth
to Isaiah Moses Nathans
1837: Meyer
Hartog Silver married Rachel David Blok in Amsterdam today.
1839: In
London, Elizabeth Solomon and Naphtali Hart gave birth to Sarah Abigail Hart.
1839: Two
days after her death, Gittle Rinkel Friedlander, the wife of Joseph
Friedlander, the daughter of Joseph Rinkel and the mother of Henriette
Friedlandler Munk was buried today at the Old Jewish Cemetery in Dresden.
1840: In
Bavaria, Sigismund Adler and his wife gave birth to Sigismund Adler who gained
fame as New Haven, CT resident Max
Adler, the husband of Esther Meyers and director of the Hebrew Benevolent
Society, General Hospital Society of Connecticut, First National Bank and the
Mercantile Safe Deposit Company who was the Vice President of Congregation
Mishkan Israel and the commissioner from Connecticut to the Atlanta Exposition
in 1895.
1842: In
Hambrug, the cornerstone was laid for the new house of worship to be used by
the city’s Reform Jews.
1844:
“Under the editorship of Joseph Mitchell,” The Jewish Chronicle “tool the title
of The Jewish Chronicle and Working Man’s Friend.”
1845(17th
of Tishrei, 5606): For the first time the approximately 100 Jews living in the newly
minted state of Florida observe Shabbat Shel Sukkot
1846:
Birthdate of Kovno native Isaac Rabinowitz who lived in Telshi where he met his
wife for 22 years before eventually settling in New York where he tried to
continue he vocation of writing songs and translating novels into Yiddish.
1848: In
New York, Temple-Emanuel “organized an elementary school” which “was maintained
until 1854” when it was replaced by “a religious school” that had over 500
students as of December 1870.
1849:
Birthdate of Waco, TX resident Hannah Heller Sanger, the wife of Samuel Sanger
whom she married in 1867 and with whom she had five children – Charles, Asher,
Alex, Eli and Carrie.
1850:
Birthdate of Alsace native and future resident of Buffalo, NY Louis Weill, the
husband of Emelia Desbecker Weill whom he married in 1873 and with whom he had
two children, Alfred and Bertram Weill.
1851(22nd
of Tishrei, 5612): Shemini Atzeret
1851: The New
York Times began publishing. Contrary to popular misconception the paper
was not founded by Jews. Nicknamed "The Gray Lady" or The
Times, the newspaper was founded as The New-York Daily Times by
Henry J. Raymond and George Jones as a sober alternative to the more partisan
newspapers that dominated the New York journalism of the time. In 1896, the times was purchased by Adolph Simon Ochs, an American Jewish
reporter of Bavarian background who rescued it from near oblivion, increasing
its readership from 9,000 at the time of his purchase to 780,000 by the 1920s.
His daughter, Iphigene Bertha Ochs, married Arthur Hays Sulzberger, who became
publisher of the Times after his father-in-law. Her son Arthur Ochs
"Punch" Sulzberger also became publisher of the Times.
The Times may be owned by Jews but it sure is not a Jewish newspaper.
1853(16th
of Tishrei, 5614): Second Day of Sukkoth observed for the first time during the
Crimean War.
1854: In
New York City, Henry Waldstein and his wife gave birth to chemist Martin E.
Waldstein who earned a Ph.D. in 1875 at Heidelberg after studying at the
Columbia College of Schools of Mines and who became the “head of Atlanta
Chemical Works.”
1855: Marx
E. and Armida Harby Cohen gave birth to South Carolinian Armida Cohen Emanuel,
the wife of Solomon Emanuel whom she married in 1880.
1855: In
Krojana, Germany David J. and Esther Marks Meyerhardt gave birth to Max
Mayerhardt who practiced law in Rome, GA for forty years. (Editor’s note – some
sources show his birthdate as 1855
1856:
Birthdate German native and future resident of Ft. Worth, TX ,Louis Weltman.
The husband of Louise Weltman with whom he had four children – Hattie, Flora,
Leon and Margueritte.
1857(30th
of Tishrei, 5618): Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan observed as New Yorkers deal with the
fact that banks have been closed for five days during what became known as the
Panic of 1857, a 18th century of The Great Depression.
1859(20th
of Tishrei, 5620) Sixth Day of Sukkoth
1859: In
Paris, pianist Michal Bergson and Katherin Levison, the daughter of an English
doctor gave birth to French philosopher, author and recipient of the Nobel
Prize for Literature Henri Bergson.
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/henri-louis-bergson
1860: In
Pittsburgh, PA, Louis Berkowitz and Henrietta Jaros Berkowitz gave birth to
William J. Berkowitz the Kansas City, MO businessman, founder of Berkowitz and
Company Printers and a “delegate to the National Conference of Jewish Charities
and the Union of American Hebrew Congregations” who married Emilie Block with
whom he had three children – Eugene, Estelle and Walter.
https://postalmuseum.si.edu/americasmailingindustry/Tension-Corporation.html
1861:
“Rabbi Wolff Klausner…celebrated his one-hundredth anniversary today.
1862:
During the Civil War, Philadelphian Joseph L. Moss began serving in the 113th
Regiment with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel.
1862: In
Philadelphia, Eva Goldsmith and Aaron Gerson gave birth to civil engineering
student turned journalist Felix Napoleon Gerson who wrote for the Jewish
Exponent and the Philadelphia Public Ledger while serving a member of the
publishing committee of the Jewish Publication Jewish Society.
https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/6625-gerson-felix-napoleon
1863(22nd
of Tishrei, 5764): Shemini Atzeret observed as Union forces raid Fort Brooke,
near Tampa, FL
1863: Over
150 members of the Harmonie Club which had been by founded German Jews who had
been rejected for membership in the Union Club celebrated the organizations
tenth anniversary “with a banquet and a ball” this evening.
1864: In
Manhattan, the founding of the Progress Club at Fifth Avenue and 63rd
Street whose members included Levi Samuels, Jesse S. Epstein, Henry Goodman and
Charles M. Eisig.
http://daytoninmanhattan.blogspot.com/2014/05/the-lost-progress-club-5th-avenue-and.html
1865: Lord Palmerston who
while serving as of Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs during which tinw
the British blockaded the port of Piraeus as part of the response to
Greece’s abuse of David Pacifico, whom Palmerston defended as this “man of
Jewish persuasion” and on whose behalf he “made a celebrated speech which
concluded that all British subjects ought to be able to say, as did citizens of
ancient Rome, "Civis Romanus sum" ("I am a citizen of
Rome"), and thereby receive protection from the British government”
completed his service as Prime Minister today.
1865(28th of
Tishrei, 5626):Thirty-nine-year-old Bavaria born Pauline “Lena” Stix, the wife
of Henry Stix whom she married in1853 and the mother of Solomon Henry, Bertha,
Adele, Helen Dorothy, Walter Henry Stix passed away today after which she was
buried in the Walnut Hills Jewish Cemetery in Evanston, OH.
1867(19th
of Tishrei, 5628): Fifth Day of Sukkoth
1867:
Birthdate of Adolf Büchler “a Hungarian-Austrian rabbi, historian and
theologian. In 1887 he began his theological studies at the Rabbinical Seminary
of Budapest, and at the same time studied in the department of philosophy of
the university under Ignác Goldziher and Moritz Kármán. Büchler continued his
studies at the Breslau Seminary, and in 1890 graduated as PhD at Leipzig
University, his dissertation being Zur Entstehung der Hebräischen Accente,
which was afterward published in the Sitzungsberichte der Wiener Akademie der
Wissenschaften of 1891. Büchler returned to Budapest to finish his theological
studies, and was graduated as rabbi in 1892. He then went to Oxford for 1 year,
where he worked under the direction of his uncle, Adolf Neubauer, and published
an essay, "The Reading of the Law and Prophets in a Triennial Cycle".
The same year he accepted a call as instructor at the Vienna Jewish Theological
Seminary, teaching Jewish history, Bible, and Talmud. He became Principal of
Jews' College in London, in 1906. He passed away in 1939.
1869: In
Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Temple Emanu-El was formed under the leadership of David
Adler and Herny Friend.
1871: It
was reported today that 800 buildings have been burned by arsonists in Boguslav
who are described as “fanatical oppressors of the Jews.” [Boguslav is a city in the Kiev district of
the Ukraine which at that time was part of the Russian Empire. The Ukraine was
the scene of periodic spasm of anti-Semitism from the 17th century
through the 20th century.]
1872: In
“Plzeňský, Česká republika,” Lazar and Therese Sucharipa Epstein gave birth to
Adalbert Epstein, the husband of Emma Epstein with whom he had two sons –
Friedrich and Wilhelm.
1873: “Explorations in the East” published today
examines recent archaeological discoveries including the Stone of Moab which
was uncovered five years ago. Questions still remain about its
authenticity. There is a thriving
traffic in fake ancient antiques some of which are attributed to Professor
Shapira a noted Orientalist living in Jerusalem. [Moses Shapira would be
involved in several cases where he was accused of forging or creating
relics. These charges would contribute
to his death in 1884. Shapira was born a
Jew but became an Anglican while living in Palestine.]
1873: Based
on information that first appeared in Germany’s Cologne Gazette, it was
reported today that the Kingdom of Poland has a total population of six million
people, over 800,000 of whom are Jews meaning that they make up about 13 per
cent of the total. Since 1816, the
Jewish population has quadrupled. The eastern districts of the kingdom have the
largest proportions of Jewish citizens while the western districts have a
larger proportion of Germans in their population.
1875(19th
of Tishrei, 5636): Fifth Day of Sukkoth
1875:
Birthdate of Lawrence, Kansas native Bella Ney Cahn Printz who was first
married to Louis Coahn with whom she had two children and then was married to
Bert Printz.
1878(21st
of Tishrei, 5639): Hoshana Raba
1878: A
meeting of property owners was held tonight at the Young Men’s Hebrew
Association at #110 West 42nd Street to protest the construction of
a horse-railroad at this location. The
protesting property owners include Jews and non-Jews who are united in a desire
to protect their aggregate investment of $1,730,000
1878: It
was reported today that Italy, France and the United Kingdom have informed the
government at Belgrade that they will not recognize Serbian independence until
the civil and political of its Jewish citizens is guaranteed.
1879: At
tonight’s meeting of St. Luke’s Hospital in New York City, the report of the
house physician stated that in the past fiscal year, the hospital treated 1,216
patients two of whom were Jews.
1880: Five days after she had passed away, Elizabeth (nee Moses)
Leverson, the wife of Montague Leverson whom she had married in 1815, was
buried today at the “Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery.”
1880: In the past six months the Jews of Newcastle-upon-Tyne have
purchased beef from 15 different shipments from the United States. This is an
indication that American meat is gaining in acceptability among the British
since the “the Jews are the most particular race of people upon the face of the
earth grading the wholesome state of their butcher’s meat.”
1881: It was reported today that 131 Russian Jewish immigrants
were on board the SS Italy when it
docked at Castle Garden.
1881: It was reported at tonight’s annual meeting of the Society
of St. Luke’s Hospital that the Episcopal institution had treated 1,665
patients in the past year, seven of whom were Jewish.
1881: “Mr. Jacobsohn’s Grievance” published today described the
suit that Adolph Jacobsohn has brought against Moses Keniger. The Plaintiff claims that the Respondent has
defamed him by claiming that he “failed to fast and pray on Yom Kippur” and
that, instead, he had gone to Connecticut “to purchase goods.” Jacobsohn is seeking two thousand dollars in
damages because he claims that his fellow Orthodox Jews have refused to do business
with him.
1882: In New York City, a concert sponsored by the Young Men’s
Hebrew Association will be held in Chickering Hall this evening.
1882: Louis Seigman Ehrich
and Cornelia C. Sampson Ehrich gave birth to South Carolinian Louis Seigman
Ehrich.
1882: Birthdate of San Antonio, TX native and Purdue trained
electrical engineer Samuel Kahn “who head the Market Street Railway” in San
Francisco from 1927 until 1944.
1883: There were several families of Russian Jewish immigrants
aboard the SS Canada when it arrived
in New York today.
1883(17th of Tishrei, 5644): Third Day of Sukkoth
1883: Henry J. Greenberg, a thirty-year-old Jewish peddler from
Huntingdon County, PA, registered at Hartman’s Hotel in the Bowery.
1884:Dr. Kaufmann Kohler, the rabbi at New York’s Temple Beth-El
will deliver the address at the centenary birthday celebration being sponsored
by the Young Men’s Hebrew Association tonight.
1884: An
“informal celebration” marking the 100th birthday of Sir Moses
Montefiore was held “in the last chapel of the Five Points House of
Industry. N.W. Platzek, President of the
Young Men’s Hebrew Association provided the opening remarks to the standing
room only crowd during which he praised Montefiore and introduced the evening’s
main speaker, Dr. Kohler, Rabbi of Temple Bethel. Kohler, who began his speech in English, but
switched to German so that all assembled could understand spoke glowing of Montefiore’s
efforts including those alleviate the suffering of the Jews of Russia.
1884:
Birthdate of Emmanuel “Manny” Shinwell, the British trade unionist who would
become a member of Clement Attlee’s government – the first Labour government in
British history.
1885: “A
Magazine Library” published today provides a look at various traditions and
tales based on folklore including The Merchant of Venice which Shakespeare
seemed to have completely twisted from its Italian origins. “According to an authority from 131 years, in
the time of Pope Sixtus, Paul Sedchi insured his ships with Samson Ceneda, a
Jewish underwriter…” It was the gentile
Secchi who bet the pound of flesh meaning that when his ships were lost he was
the one who “insisted on taking his pound” from Ceneda, the Jew. In response to all of these the Pope said:
“Go ahead Secchi carve your meat rare; but we wold advise you to careful it you
cut a scruple more or less than is due you shall certainly be hanged.” (Editor’s
Note: The Pope would be “Sixtus” not Sextus. In terms of the reference to
Shakespeare it might be a reference to Sixtus V, one of the Popes issued a bull
against the Blood Libel since the only other Sixtus it could be was Sixtus IV
who instituted the Inquisition)
1885:
Concert pianist Fannie Bloomfield became Fannie Bloomfield Zeisler today when
“she married her second cousin Sigmund Zeisler, the defense lawyer for
anarchist accused of violence in the Haymarket Riots with whom she had two sons
– Paul and Ernest
1886: A
bail of $300 was set yesterday in the Essex Market Police Court for Wolf Bloom
a 26-year-old Russian Jew who is charged with violating the Sunday “closing
laws.”
1886:
Henry L. Sayles is scheduled to go on trial in the Court of General Sessions
for his role of alleged financial improprieties surrounding the Broadway
Surface Railroad in New York.
1888:
Attendance at Poole Theatre fell off markedly tonight following the withdrawal
of support of the production by the Jewish Order of the Harp of David,
1888:
Hungarian native and Chicago resident Bernatt Edelman who owned a cigar shop
became a naturalized United States citizen today.
1889(23rd
of Tishrei, 5650): Simchat Torah
1889:
In Hamilton, Ohio, Rose and Samuel Hurst gave birth to Fannie Hurst, the St.
Louis educated novelist who wrote Imitation Of Life
1890:
Mayor Grant responded to a request by a committee led by Samuel Roeder for the
appointment of Coroner Ferdinand Levy to one of the vacant Police Justiceships
by expressing doubt that such a vacancy existed but adding that even if one did
he would not fill it until after the elections had been held.
1891:
It was reported today that “Count Koffsky, the Cossack Chief of Police whose
brutalities in evicting the poor Jews of Moscow last March shocked the whole
world has been” accused of being part of a forgery ring involving 200,000
rubles.
1891:
In New York, Albert Loeb, “ a successful investment banker with Kuhn, Loeb and
Company” and his wife Rose, a cousin of Peggy Guggenheim, gave birth to
American author Harold Albert Loeb, “the founding editor of ‘Broom,’ an
international literary and art magazine.”
1893:
“Otto Irving Wise’s Candidacy” published today provided background information
on the Republican nominee for the Assemblyman in the 21st District
including the fact that he is the son of Dr. Aaron Wise, the rabbi at Rodolph
Shalom, the brother of Stephen S. Wise, the rabbi at Madison Avenue Synagogue
and the editor of The Hebrew World
1894:
The Jockey Club purchased Baron Hirsch's three-year-old English horse
Matchbox for 18,000 English pounds
1894:
The Lexow Committee which had already heard testimony from Senator Cantor and
from Jewish soda water peddlers on the Lower East Side, continued its hearings
into charges of corruption in the New York City Police Department.
1894:
A circular printed in Hebrew advertising a meeting of Republicans in New Haven
to be held tonight when translated revealed “a bitter attack on the Irish and
requesting the Russians to turn out to the mass meeting and denounce the
Irish.” (The Republicans canceled the meeting for fear of trouble.)
1896:
German Lutheran missionary Johann Ludwig Schneller, the founder of Jerusalem’s
Schneller Orphanage passed away
1896:
In London, operetta composer Victor Hollaender and his wife gave birth to
German-American film composer Friedrich Hollaender “who worked on more than 200
films” including one of my all-time favorites, the original version “Sabrina”
the 1954 romantic comedy.
1897(22nd
of Tishrei, 5658): Shmini Atzeret
1897:
Today in London, “the wife of E.A. Joseph” gave birth to a son.
1897:
The Hambro Synagogue is scheduled to hold services this evening at Bonn’s Hall
in London.
1897:
In Warsaw, Adolph and Natalia Lieberman gave birth to Maxim Lieberman, the WW I
U.S. Army veteran, literary agent and Soviet Spy.
1898:
Birthdate of Viennese singer and actress, the non-Jewish wife of Kurt Weil who
left Germany after the rise of the Nazis came to power.
1898(2nd
of Cheshvan, 5659): David Levi, who fought in the Italian wars of independence
and whose literary efforts included “Il Profeta,” a five-act drama set in the
final days of the First Temple, passed away today.
1898(2nd
of Cheshvan, 5659): Eighty-nine-year-old Ralph Disraeli, the son Isaac
D’Israeli passed away today in Yorkshire.
1898: Herzl has an audience with Wilhelm II in Constantinople.
1898: Louis
Selig, Director of the Hebrew Charities in Detroit is scheduled to be one of
the speakers at the Civic-Philanthropic Conference that opens today in Battle
Creek, Michigan.
1898: Two
days after he had passed away, 74 year old Leopold Mohr was buried today at the
“Plashet Jewish Cemetery in London.”
1898:
United States took possession of Puerto Rico.
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/puerto-rico-virtual-jewish-history-tour
1900: The
Wright Brothers, whose airplanes would be promoted by Hart Berg and whose test
pilots included Arthur Welsh, began “their first untethered glider flights
today at Kitty Hawk, N.C.
1901: The
real feature at the Speedway this afternoon included a race featuring “the
famous pacer, Robert J driven by his owner Nathan Straus.
1902:
Herzl begins his trip to London in search of support for the Jewish homeland.
1902: Inaugural service
of the Jewish Religious Union which led to the formation of the Liberal Jewish
Movement.
1902(17th
of Tishrei, 5663): Shabbat Chol HaMoed Sukkoth
1902(17th
of Tishrei, 5663):
Reuben Asher Braudes, the Wilna born Hebrew author
whose novels included The Repentant, Religion and Life and The
Morning Light and editor of the Yiddish weekly Yedhudit passed away today in Vienna.
1903: Hedwig Bergman, the
daughter of Rabbi Adolf Rosenzweig and Rabbi Juda Bergman gave birth to
physicist Ernst David Bergman, “the father of the Israeli nuclear program.”
1903:
Birthdate of Zygmund William Birnbaum a native of Lwów, Austria-Hungary who
gain fame as Bill Birnbaum, Professor of mathematics and statistics at the
University of Washington in Seattle, Washington.
1904: In
New York, Anna Adelson Stone, a Jewess from San Francisco and her husband,
Joseph Liebling a Jewish immigrant from
Austria working in the fur industry gave birth journalist A.J. (Albert Joseph) Liebling whom the New York Times described as “a
critic of the daily press, a chronicler of the prize ring, an epicure and a
biographer of such diverse personages as the late Gov. Earl Long of Louisiana
and Col. John R. Stingo” and whom Sports Illustrated said was “pound-for-pound
the top boxing writer of all time” when naming his The Sweet Science at the top
of its list of “The Top 100 Sports Books of All Time.”
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/liebling-a-j
https://vault.si.com/vault/2002/12/16/the-top-100-sports-books-of-all-time
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2004/08/worshipping-at-the-church-of-liebling.html
1904: Birthdate of Chaim Shirman an Israeli scholar of medieval
Spanish Jewish poetry who passed away in 1981.
1904: In Charleston, SC, Rabbi Simenhoff officiated at the wedding
of Sam H. Baron and Jennie Widelitz.
1904: Birthdate of screenwriter Hans Wilhelm “who was forced to
emigrate after the Nazi takeover in 1933” because of his “Jewish heritage.”
1904: Birthdate of Russian native Zalmon Yauneh, who in 1922 came
to the United States where he served as “cantor and composer of liturgical
music.”
1905(19th of Tishrei, 5666): Fifth Day of Sukkoth
1905: Birthdate of New York native and CCNY graduate Samuel
Perlman who served as a Rabbi in Bayonne, NJ and Quincy, MA and the Director of
the Hebrew Home for Orphans and Aged of Hudson County before passing away in
1975.
1905: This marked the first day of what was the blackest week in
Russian Jewish history until the Holocaust. The Black Hundreds and other bands
of reactionary, anti-Semites were formed during and after the Russian
Revolution of 1905. They alleged that
the Jews were responsible for Russia’s many military, economic and political
ills. These government sanctioned militias killed hundreds of Jews and injured
thousands more. Over forty thousand homes and shops were destroyed in one week
of rioting.
1905: Start
of a Pogrom in Rostov.
1906: “In
response to a request sent to him by the publishers of the Jewish Daily News
Oscar S. Straus has written a letter giving his views of the candidates”
including his support of Republican Charles Evans Hughes “ which the Republican
State Committee gave out today and which will be widely circulated on the east
side which has a large Jewish population.
1907: In
Frankfurt am Main, Amalia Margarethe Mandello, (Seligsohn) a teacher; and
Herrmann Mandello, who worked in
a department store gave birth to Johanna Mandello Mandello who gained fame as photographer Jeanne
Mandello.
1908(23rd
of Tishrei, 5669): Simchat Torah
1908: “Hiding
from friends who overwhelmed them with telegraphic messages of congratulation
and with flowers, Jesse Lewisohn” the son of Hamburg born Jewish merchant
Leonard Lewison and Rosalie Jacobs “and Miss Edna McCauley, an actress, issued
emphatic denials at the Hotel Shelburne of their reported engagement and
purpose to be married here to-day.”
1908: In
Boston, Hyman Fingold and his wife gave birth to Suffolk Law School trained
attorney, George Fingold, the Attorney General of Massachusetts and Republican
candidate for Governor of Massachusetts, and the wife of Evelyn Fingold
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1958/09/01/79460434.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0
1908: After
Jews had gathered at the gates of the jail in Bialystok follow a government
spread rumor that prisoners were to be released, soldiers fired into the crow
killing twenty-two of the JewsBorukh-Mikhal bar Asher ROGAL, 53.
Moshe bar
Yakov SACHARNI, 28.
Shmuel-Hersh
bar Eliezar MARGOLIUS, 34.
Moshe bar
Nisen FAJNSZTAJN, 50.
Golde-Sura
bas [daughter of] Mordekhai PASTRIGACZ, 70.
Chaya bas
Moshe CHWOROWSKI, 50.
Feygl bas
Yitzhak TICHOWSKI, 38.
Hindl-Bayle[4]
25.
Ester bas
Shmuel BARTINOWSKI, 17.
Szprinca
bas Avraham WAJNBERG, 54
Leib bar
Tzwi-Hirsh LIBERMAN, 17.
Guta-Freyda
bas Mordekhai KAPLAN, 20.
Freyda bas
Yitzhak KOPICER, 56.
Chana bas
Dovid Zalman KAPLAN, 60.
Khisa bas
Moshe Zev PINONZNIK, 40
Tzipora bas
Benimin KOHEN, 70.
Beyla bas
Moshe LIBERMAN, 32.
Chaya bas
Ahron KOHEN, 19.
Rywka
LEWIN, 30.
Chashe bas
Yitzhak MOSKOWSKI, 20.
Chava bas
Yehoshua Haim LIBERMAN, 21.
Ester bas
Yakob-Leib KURAN, 21.
1908: When
Israel Zangwill’s “The Melting Pot” opened today in Chicago it was declared an
“immediate success” and ran for three weeks.
1909: In
China, “Mr. and Mrs. N. Blumenthal gave birth to Bessie Blumenthal who was
buried in the Happy Valley Jewish Cemetery in Hong Kong after she had passed
away at the age of one month.
1910(15th
of Tishrei, 5671): Sukkoth
1910:
Birthdate of Morris Kertzer, the Canadian born rabbi who earned a bronze start
for bravery during the Battle of Anzio and who became an active leader in the
move to improve relations between Christians and Jews after the war.
http://americanjewisharchives.org/collections/ms0709/
1911: It
was reported today that
“James Loeb, the banker, who retired from the firm of
Kuhn, Loeb Co, a few years ago, has made arrangements for the translation into
English and publication at his own expense of the classical authors of all
periods.” The volumes in question were
originally written in Latin or Greek. Professor Salomon Reinach, the French
archaeologist and intellectual (who happens to be Jewish) brought the need for
this project to Mr. Loeb’s attention.
Details are not available at this time because Mr. Loeb is traveling.
1911(26th
of Tishrei, 5672): Michael Cadison a native of Lithuania and the son of Joseph
Ezra Cadison and Ida Yenta Kadison and the husband of Fannie Anne (Frume
Sheina) Cadison passed away today in Pittsburgh, PA.
1912(1st
of Cheshvan, 5673): Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan and Shabbat
1912: It
was reported today the there will be a large mural painting by A.J. Bogdanova
in the new administration building of
the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society at Pleasantville, NY which was presented
by architect Harry Allan Jacobs.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1912/10/18/100553215.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0
1912:
Fifty-four year old Mobile, Alabama merchant Abraham H. Spira passed away
today.
1912(1st
of Cheshvan, 5673): “Communal worker” Levin Fredman passed away today
1912: When
the Turco-Italian War came to an end today the Italians were effectively in
control of Libya whose Jewish community dates back to the first century before
the Common Era according to archeological evidence at Benghazi.
1913(17th
of Tishrei, 5674): Third Day of Sukkoth
1913: “The
Girl from Utah” a Paul Rubens’ musical “opened at the Adelphi Theatre in
London” today where it “had an initial run of 195 performances” after which
Charles Frohman would produce a successful American version in 1914.
1913:
Today, The New York Review, “noted that” “The Tik-Tok Man of Oz,” a play with
music by Louis Gottschalk, “was to close for a two week for practical
reconstruction of the sets” after which it was reportedly to open this winter
“in one of the three largest Eastern cities.”
1914:
During World War I, The Yorkshire Herald,
an English newspaper, reported on the Czar’s awarding the Cross of St.
George to a Jewish soldier named Leo Osnas by that his display of bravery “has
won freedom for the Jews in Russia; he has gained for his race the right to
become officers in the Russian army and navy, hitherto denied them, and he has
so delighted the Russian government that it has since proclaimed that
henceforth Jews in the Empire shall enjoy the full rights of citizenship. Surely no man’s winning the Victoria Cross
ever resulted in such magnificent results for a subject people as this.” As Martin Gilbert points, the Herald went a
bit too far in its praise since under the Czars the Jews never attained full
citizenship nor did the persecution ever stop.
1915:
“Wilson’s Pledge to Jews” published today quotes Simon Wolfe as saying that “he
had” a letter from Woodrow Wilson “in which the President said that when the
time should come for the making of another treaty with Russia ‘none shall be
granted by the Government of which I am President unless the Jews are given
full rights.’”
1915: It
was reported today that Dr. Samuel Bettelheim, the editor and proprietor of the
Hungarian Jewish News of Budapest
said he had “come to New York because it is the biggest and greatest Jewish
center in all history” and “it is here that a world-wide movement should start”
that will guarantee the rights of the Jews of Rumania and Russia after the war,
as well as ensuring the growth of the Jewish community in Palestine.
1915:
“Lashes Atlanta Churches” published today described the farewell sermon Dean
John R. Atkinson who has resigned from St. Philip’s Episcopal Cathedral spoke
disparagingly of the houses of worship in Atlanta say that the “Jews” were “the
most people” he met while in the city.
1915: It
was reported today that Rabbi Stephen S. Wise told those attending a mass
meeting held to protest the Ottoman treatment of the Armenians that he was
there “not an opponent of Turkey nor as a champion of Armenia but to protest
against inhumanity, whether committed by Germans against Belgians, by Russians
against Jews or by Turks against Armenians.” Instead he was there to call upon
Germany and Austria to work to end “the Armenian atrocities.”
1915: “All
Europe Crave Peace Says Bernstein” published today included the first-hand
report by Herman Bernstein of conditions in the war zone including the
observation that he “found that the Jewish people was the most tragic victim of
the war. In Russia the Jews were
crucified during the war in Russian fashion.
For their military defeats on the battlefield the Russian authorities
made military pogroms against their own peaceful Jewish population. In Austria,
where the Jews even though economically wretched, enjoyed equal rights and
freedom, where the Jews have fought bravely and loyally, they have now been
deprived of many of their rights.”
1916:
“Rabbi Rudolph Grossman, President of the New York Board of Hewish Ministers
and Rabbi Bernard Drachman, President of the Union of Orthodox Jewish
Congregations…issued statements” today “denouncing Meyer London for his attack”
on “ex-Judge Leon Sanders, his opponent for Congress in the Twelfth District”
in which London reportedly referred to his opponent as a “cheap Tammany
kosher-ham sandwich politician.”
1917: One
day after she had passed away, Sarah Bernstein, the Russian born wife of Elias
Bernstein with whom she had six children, was buried today at the “Brady Street
Burial Ground.”
1917: It
was reported today that in giving their consent to hold the upcoming Special
Assembly of Jews In America at the Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue, the
Trustees were breaking traditions that had existed for 250 years which is
further proof that “this special assembly is the most important national
gathering of Jews since the European war began and the most important event to
Jewry since the entry of the United States entry into the war.”
1918: The
Assistant Minister of the Interior was told today that using a knowledge of
Polish as a criterion for resettling those who had fled during the war “was
harsh” because under Russian rule the Czars had worked to keep the Jews from
studying Polish and because the documents issued by the Russians “contained no
proof of permanence in any given city.”
1918:
Sergeant Abraham Blaustein was part of the 165th Regiment which
forced the Germans to retreat from Somerance and the surrounding ridges.
1919:
Birthdate of New York native Arthur “Artie” Marpet who played basketball for
three years at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.
1919:
Samuel Charney, “one of the most note Jewish writers and critics in the world,”
his wife and two children were among the passengers who arrived today from
Bordeaux on the French liner Chicago and were greeted “his brother Alderman B.
Charney Vladeck who is also a manger of the Jewish Daily Forward.
1919: In
Fort Dodge, Iowa, Samuel and Daisy Lumelsky Rabiner gave birth to France E.
“Francie” Cohen.
1919: A
pogrom began at Ivankiv, a town the Ukrainian district of Kiev. This was part
of a series of pogroms that racked the Ukraine during 1919 during the Civil War
that found the Whites, the Cossacks and the Reds battling for control of what
had been the Russian Empire.
1920:
Birthdate of actress and political activist Melina Mercouri, the wife of movie
director Jules Dassin who was a victim of the infamous Hollywood Blacklist.
1921: “The
Poisoned Stream” a German silent movie filmed by cinematographer Mutz Greenbaum
was released today in Germany.
1921: “The
Demi-Virgin,” a three-act play produced by Albert Herman Woods whose name was
Aladore Herman when his parents brought him from Budapest to New York’s Lower
East Side, opened on Broadway at the Times Square Theatre.
1921:President
Warren Harding wrote a letter today to “Lee Baumgarten, President of the
Washington Hebrew Congregation, expressing his regret that on account of his
Southern journey he will not be able to attend the special service of the
congregation on October in honor of the eighty-fifth birthday of Simon Wolf,
one of Washington’s foremost Jewish citizens.”
1922:
“Robin Hood” produced by, written by and starring Douglas Fairbanks, who was
born Douglas Elton Thomas Ullman the son of German Jewish immigration Ellie
Marsh and Hezekiah Charles Ullman was released in the United States today.
1923:
Birthdate of Ukrainian born American director Boris Sagal
1924(20th
of Tishrei, 5685): Shabbat shel Sukkoth
1924: In
Cuba there are now five thousand Jews en route from foreign countries to the
United States, but who are unable to come here because of the immigration
restrictions according to an announcement made today by the Emergency Committee
on Jewish Refugees which is attempting to find a solution for the stranded
refugee problem.”
1925:
“Memorial services for Dr. Israel Abrahams, the noted Hebrew scholar who died
in Cambridge, England on October 6 were conducted tonight in the Jewish
Institute of Religion in Manhattan.
1925: It
was reported today that this week the coming
week marks the fiftieth anniversary of Hebrew Union College of Cincinnati,
established by Isaac M. Wise, the founder of liberal Judaism in this country,
which is supported by the Reformed Jewish Congregations in America, and from
which came the first rabbis trained in the United States, and large number of
its 256 graduate occupy leading Jewish pulpits throughout the country.
1926: In Paris, Sholom Schwartzbard goes on trial for allegedly
having assassinated Symon Petliura the Ukrainian leader who played a leading
role in the pogroms during which Schwartzbard’s family was wiped out. Despite the fact that Schwartzbard had in
fact shot him, a jury would acquit him after an eight day trial.
1926: U.S.
premiere of “The Eagle of the Sea,” a silent film produced by B.P. Schulberg
and co-starring Florence Vidor, the future wife of Jascha Heifitz.
1927(22nd
of Tishrei, 5688): Shemini Atzert
1927:
Sholem Schwartzbar is scheduled go on trial in Paris today for the
assassination of General Simon Petlura
who was responsible for the slaughter in Kiev in 1919 that claimed the lives of
50,000 Jews.
1927: Columbia Broadcasting System went on the air.
This radio network lost money in its first year, and two years later it was
purchased by William S. Paley, the son of Jewish cigar manufacturer from
Philadelphia.
1927:
Birthdate of Marvin Joseph Rotblatt, a left-handed relief pitcher who toiled
for the Chicago White Sox for “three seasons in the late 1940s and early
1950’s” (As reported by Richard Goldstein)
1928:
Birthdate of Jack Weinstein the native of Saint Francis, Kansas who was award
the Medal of Honor “for courageous actions during combat operations in Kumsong,
South Korea, on October 19, 1951.”
1928:
Nathan Sweedler who “was counsel for the three Jewish interns who were hazed at
the Kings County Hospital last Summer” complained today “that the Lay Board of
Kings County Hospital of which he is chairman has been unable to function since
its organization five months ago back of a lack of cooperation on the part of
those who created it.”1929: Birthdate of New Jersey state Democratic political
leader Byron Baer who passed away in June, 2007. “In 2005, shortly before he
retired from the Senate, the New Jersey Association of Jewish Federations
presented Baer with the Shem Tov and Distinguished Service awards. Jeffrey
Maas, then executive director of the association, said Baer was responsible for
making sure Jewish community centers, nursing homes, and social service
agencies received extensive state funding.”
1929: Seventy-five-year-old
architect John Hemenway Duncan, the designer of a mansion for Jewish investment
banker Philip Lehman which gained famed as the “Philip Lehman Mansion” which
was “designated as a New York landmark in 1981” passed away today.
1929:
Birthdate of Erasmus High alum Hillard (Hilly) Elkins the award producer who
worked in theatre, the large screen and the small screen and who may be best
remembered for “Oh! Calcutta!”
https://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/07/theater/07elkins.html
1930(26th
of Tishrei, 5691): Parsahat Bereshit – the cycle begins again
1930: Northwestern
University led by Guard Hyman “Hy” Crizevsky defeated Illinois in its third
straight win of the season.
1930:
Birthdate of Wilno, Poland native Esther Rudomin who gained fame as award
winning author Esther R. Hautzig, the wife of “concert pianist Walter Hautzig
with whom she had two children – Deborah and David.
https://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/03/books/03hautzig.html
1930(26th
of Tishrei, 5691): Forty-two-year-old Bialystok born conductor and composer
Josiah Zuro who collaborated with his father Louis, passed away today in
California.
http://www.vipfaq.com/Josiah%20Zuro.html
1931: “Keep
Banks Open, Dr. Palyi Advises” published today described the view of Dr.
Melchoir Palyi, the economic advisor to the Deutsche Bank, “the largest
commercial bank in Germany” that now is not the time to close the banks because
such a move punishes the whole community turning “a minor panic into a major
one” but rather it is the time to extend liberal credits and then punish the
banks when the panic is over. (Editor’s
Note – Palyi was a Jewish convert to Roman Catholicism who would seek refuge in
the United States after the Nazis came to power.)
1931: JNF,
the American branch of the Keren Kayemeth Le Israel chose its new board of
directors at meeting at the Hotel Pennsylvania presided over by Emanuel
Neumann, the retiring president of the fund.
1932: “Gov.
Meier For Hoover” published today included the views of Julius Meier, the
Governor of Oregon on the upcoming election in which he wrote that “to exchange
the tried and successful leadership of President Hoover now for the new,
untried and untrained leadership of the Democratic Presidential nominee would,
in my opinion, not only defer for years the return of prosperity but might
plunge the country into another crisis.”
1933(28th
of Tishrei, 5694): “Rabbi Jacob Mayer Kahan” passed away today at “Far
Rockaway, NY.”
1933: The Mortimer L. Schiff Scout Reservation was officially
dedicated today. “The Mortimer L. Schiff Scout Reservation, located in central
New Jersey, was a major Boy Scout training facility for almost 50 years. It was
named after Mortimer L. Schiff, the father of John M. Schiff; both of whom were
World Scout Committee members and notable early Boy Scouts of America (BSA)
leaders. The land was purchased for the BSA by Mrs. Jacob Schiff in
memory of her son, Mortimer, who died while President of the BSA in 1931…
When the Mortimer L. Schiff Scout Reservation was
closed, Nassau County Council's Camp Wauwepex in Wading River, New York was
renamed as the John M. Schiff Scout Reservation, in honor of Moritmer's son,
John.”
1933:
Birthdate of Irwin Mark Jacobs the Cornell University electrical engineer who
co-founded Qualcomm.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/qualcomm-founder-a-fan-long-before-start-up-nation/
1934: U.S.
premiere of “Man of Aran,” a “British fictional documentary” produced by
Michael Balcon.
1934: “An
exchange agreement to facilitate the importation of Palestinian oranges into
Germany has been devised by the Anglo-Palestine Bank of London and Tel Aviv and
the banking firm of M.M. Warburg & Co. in Hamburg.” The agreement will “enable Germany to buy
about three million dollars worth of Jaffa oranges during the coming year…”
1935(21st
of Tishrei, 5696): Hoshana Raba
1935(21st
of Tishrei, 5696): Seventy-two-year-old Lt. General Milton J. Foreman whose
service in the Spanish American War, the First World War and the post-war
period earned him a Distinguished Service Cross, the Silver star and
decorations from Belgium and France passed away today.
http://knowlescollection.blogspot.com/2011/11/lt-gen-milton-j-foreman-military-hero.html
http://seymourbrody.com/generals/gen-adm5.htm
1935: The German government introduces the anti-Semitic Law for
the Protection of the Hereditary Health of the German People.
1936: “A
Detroit all-star soccer team…held the Maccabees of Tel Aviv…to a 2 to 2 tie
before 10,000 spectators at the University of Detroit stadium.”
1936: At
the Free Synagogue, meeting in Carnegie Hall, Rabbi Stephen S. Wise is
scheduled to deliver a sermon on “The Truth About Palestine: Britain, Arab,
Jew.”
1936: In
“Berdyaev’s Philosophy of Human Destiny” published today John Cournos provided
a reviews of The Meaning of History by Nicolas Berdyaev the Christian
philosopher who “credits the Jews with being the first people to contribute the
concept of ‘historical’ to world history” saying that the Jews not only
“grasped the significance of the past present; they were also the first people
to link these up with the future” as can be seen “in Daniel’s
interpretation of Nebuchadnezzar’s
dream” which “Berdyaev sees as the first attempt in the history of mankind to
attribute a design to history…”
1936: At
the Jewish Science Society, Rabbi Morris Lichtenstein is scheduled to deliver a
sermon on “How to Banish Fear” this morning.
1936:
“Between the beginning of 1933 and July 1, 1936, the Jewish population of
Germany decreased from approximately 517,000 persons to about 405,000 persons
according to figures sent by Michael Traub of Berlin, director of the Palestine
Foundation Fund of Germany, to the United States Appeal’ and made public today.
1936: In
Philadelphia “An appeal to this country
to be on guard ‘against those who would pit one religious or racial group
against another’ was voiced tonight by the Governor of Pennsylvania who spoke
at the opening session of the annual convention of Hadassah” which is being
attended by 1,200 delegates and “several hundred guests’
1936: The
SS Excalibur of the American Exports line unloaded it cargo at Tel Aviv, making
it the first American ship to use the newly built port facilities at the first
“all Jewish metropolis”
1937, The Palestine Post
reported that renewed Arab terror claimed three more Jewish victims, while
violence continued throughout the country. One Arab assailant was killed in the
Old City of Jerusalem. In Ness Ziona an 11-year-old Yemenite boy, Eliahu
Sherabi, was fatally shot in the head while sleeping in his house. Jewish buses
were shot at and armed Arabs attacked workers of the Palestine Quarries near
Motza. Arabs had also attacked Kibbutz Ramat Rahel, where the children's house
became their main target. In Jerusalem, an Orthodox Jew, Shmuel Guttman, was
stabbed five times in the Mea She' street, near the Sheller compound, by an
Arab who escaped. The town was under night curfew for more than a week.
1937: Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt delivered an address on “Problems of
Youth” at a luncheon at the Hotel Astor.
The luncheon is the opening event of a campaign by the Women’s League
for Palestine to raise $100,000 to build “a home for immigrant girls in
Jerusalem.” Mayor La Guardia will also
address the gathering while Dr. Stephen S. Wise and Rabbi Israel H. Leinthal
will open the drive.
1937: As Arab violence continued to grow, a gang of terroirsts attacked
the Jewish settlement at Artuf in southern Palestine and a band of twenty armed
Arabs “attacked the Baharieh police post between Hebron and Beersheba” and made
off with weapons belonging to the British police.
1938(23rd of Tishrei, 5699): Simchat Torah
1938: During his third visit to Germany, Charles Lindbergh attends a
dinner at the U.S. embassy in Berlin. Hermann Göring presents him with the
Service Cross of the German Eagle with Star, also known as the Order of the
German Eagle (Verdienstorden vom Deutschen Adler).Personally created by Adolf
Hitler, this is the highest honor which the Nazi government can give to a
foreigner and was last presented to Henry Ford two months earlier.
1938: “The German government expeled 12,000 Polish Jews living in
Germany; the Polish government accepts 4,000 and refuses admittance to the
remaining 8,000, who are forced to live in the no-man's land on the
German-Polish frontier.
1938: With Jerusalem under a virtual state of siege because of the worst
outbreak of Arab violence since 1929, the British declared a state of virtual
martial law and sent troops into the Old City aimed at driving out the “rebel
bands.” “The Mufti of Jerusalem, leader
of the rebellious Moslems, declared from exile in Syria, that the Arab peace
terms included an independent Ara state and an end to Jewish immigration into
Palestine.
1939: In Poland, Arthur Weissmann, the brother of Holocaust survivor and
author Gerda Weissmann complied with the German summons to register for
military service and was never seen again.
1940(16th of Tishrei, 5701): Second Day of Sukkoth
1940: In Rome, “the Ministry of the Interior announced tonight that all
Jews, including those enjoying special privileges hence-worth will be banned
from publicity jobs connected with the hotel business.”
1941(27th of Tishrei, 5702): Parashat Bereshit
1941: When it appeared that the Germans might defeat the Red Army outside
Moscow, Chaim Kaplan the director of Hebrew school in Warsaw wrote in his
diary, “a Nazi victory means complete annihilation, morally and materially, for
all the Jews of Europe.”
1941: Mass executions of Soviet Jews in
Borisov, Byelorussia, 50 miles east of Minsk, Byelorussia, are carried out by
an Einsatzkommando (special killing
squads) following a night of celebration by German troops.
1942(7th
of Cheshvan, 5703): Sixty-seven-year-old Moses Moritz Speier who had been
deported from Fankfurt am Main in August was murdered today at Terezin.
1942: The Nazis gassed 1,594 deportees from Holland at Auschwitz.
1943: “A
sonata for a piano duet and string quartet” was premiered in a concert today in
Seattle, Washington
1943: Pope
Pius explained his failure to speak out against the Nazi deportation of the
Jews of Rome. He told Harold Tittman,
the United States representative to the Vatican that a “demonstrative censure”
might provoke a class with the SS “that could benefit only the Communists.”
1944(1st of
Cheshvan, 5705): Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan
1944:
Eighteen-year-old photojournalist Simpson Kalisher, the Bronx born son of Ben
and Sheva Kalisher was drafte today during WW II.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/26/arts/simpson-kalisher-dead.html
1944: Seven
hundred Plaszów, Poland, camp deportees are sent from the Gross-Rosen, Germany,
camp to Brünnlitz in the Sudetenland. Oskar Schindler, owner of a newly opened
munitions factory in Brünnlitz, persuades the SS to give him all 700 Jews for
use as workers. Schindler also makes arrangements to have 300 Jewish women
transferred from Auschwitz to his factory.
1944: As
the Red Army drives toward Berlin, the Soviet Union invades Czechoslovakia.
This would help to lead to Soviet control of Czechoslovakia after the war; a
fact that proved oddly beneficial to Israel when it was fighting for its
independence. The Israelis had no
aircraft. There was a store of surplus
ME-109’s in Czechoslovakia. The Soviets gave the Czechs permission to sell the
planes to the Jews which meant that the first fighter craft flown by the
Israelis in May of 1948 were planes left over from the Luftwaffe.
1944(1st of
Cheshvan, 5705): Eva Heyman and Gisi
Fleischmann, head of the women's Zionist movement in pre-war Slovakia were
murdered at Birkenau.
1944(1st of Cheshvan, 5705): Forty-six-year-old composer,
conductor and pianist Viktor Ullman was gassed today at Auschwitz-Birkenau
http://www.viktorullmannfoundation.org.uk/
http://orelfoundation.org/index.php/composers/article/viktor_ullmann/
1944: “The Master Race” a film about post-war plans to continue the Nazi
dream directed and written by Herbert Biberman was released to ay RKO.
1945: “The Seventh Veil” a “melodrama” with music by Benjamin Frankel was
released in the United Kingdom today.
1945: Nazi war crimes trials opened in Nuremberg, Germany. This week
marked the appearance of The Nuremberg Interviews edited by Robert
Gellately. The book is a collection of the interviews conducted by a Dr. Leon
Goldensohn, a U.S. Army psychiatrist. He
was assigned by the Army to interview the defendants and the witnesses at the Nuremberg
War Crime Trials. His detailed notes
which have been annotated and edited by Professor Gellately provide a chilling
window into the minds of those who made the Holocaust.
1946: In
Toronto, Bernice (née Ash) and Mac Shore gave birth to Oscar winning composer
Howard Leslie Shore.
1946: In
Jerusalem, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef and his wife gave birth to Rabbi and MK Ya’akov
Yosef.
1947: In
three separate incidents seen as part of the work of Jewish fighters seeking to
end British rule in Palestine, a British army truck “was blow up by a mine just
west of Petah Tikva injuring two soldiers, “another army truck hit two mines
near Benyaminia” without any casualties and an RAF jeep “ran over a mine on the
road near Hadera wrecking the Jeep” without any casualties.
1947:
Birthdate of songwriter Laura Nyro who passed away in 1997.
1947: The
University of Michigan, led by Dan Dworsky who played “linebacker, fullback and
center” defeated Northwestern for their fourth straight win of the season
1947:
“Several …banners with legends such as ‘Don’t dissect our country’ and
‘Remember the Warsaw ghetto’ went up on the wire in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem this
afternoon.”
1948: Today
at the British Embassy in The Hague, Rachel "Didi" Harel a member of
the Dutch Resistance during WW II who “pretended to be a Christian” which
enabled to help hide Jews and Dutch conscientious objector and who refused to
reveal the names of her comrades when she was shot, captured and interrogated
by the Nazis, “was awarded the United Kingdom King's Medal for Courage in the
Cause of Freedom.”
1948(15th
of Tishrei, 5709): For the first time in almost 2,000 years Jews celebrate
Sukkoth in their own country.
1948:
During Israel’s War for Independence “Givati succeeded in capturing Kawkaba and
Bayt Tima.”
1948: Gertrude Berg made her television
debut as Bronx housewife Molly Goldberg on NBC's Chevrolet on Broadway
in 1948. The Goldbergs began running as a comedy series on NBC radio in
1929 and became one of television's earliest and most popular situation
comedies beginning in 1949. Berg produced and scripted the shows and portrayed
Molly Goldberg, the family matriarch. Each show offered audiences a pleasant,
often comical portrayal of the life of a second-generation Jewish American
family. Assimilation into American culture was a prominent theme throughout the
series with the last season incorporating the family's move from their Bronx
apartment to a fictitious suburb. After the series' cancellation in 1955, Berg
went on to win a Tony Award in 1959 for her work in the Broadway comedy A
Majority of One by Leonard Spigelgass (As reported by the Jewish Women’s
Archives)
1949:
“Books of the Times” featured Orville Prescott’s lengthy reviews Promise and
Fulfilment: Palestine 1917-1949 by Arthur Kosetler.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1949/10/18/84225845.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0
https://www.nytimes.com/1949/10/18/archives/books-of-the-times.html?searchResultPosition=5
1949:
“As the paths of the candidates in New York's Senatorial race crossed at three
points today, Senator John Foster Dulles renewed his challenge to Herbert H.
Lehman, his Democratic-Liberal opponent, to meet him face to face in debate”
1949:
Finance Minister Eliezer Kapland told the UJA emergency mission visiting Israel
that 150,000 immigrants were expected to arrive in Israel next year which meant
the country need forty-two million dollars “to erect 53,000 housing units.”
1950:
Today, “Burning Bright” “produced by Rodgers and Hammerstein opened on Broadway
at the Broadhurst Theatre.
1950: In
Brooklyn Lola (née Liska) Schleifer and textile manufacturer Morris Wasserstein
gave birth to Tony Award winning playwright Wendy Wasserstein, the author of
“The Heidi Chronicles.”
1951(18th
of Tishrei, 5712): David Cohen, the husband of Eva Cohen and the father of
Aaron Cohen passed away today after which he was buried in the Ahavas Sholom
Congregation Cemetery in Baltimore County, MD.
1952: In
New York City Robert Levine and his wife gave birth Charles Michael Levine, the
State University of New York drop-out who gained fame Chuck Lorre the creator
of numerous successful sitcoms including “Two and a Half Men,” “The Big Bang
Theory” and “Young Sheldon.”
1953: This
morning funeral services are scheduled to be held at the Riverside for Bertha
Friedman, the wife of the late Dr. Phillip J. Friedman a member of Unity No. 6
U.O.T.S.
1954(21st
of Tishrei, 5715): Hoshana Raba
1954: “A
committee of Hadassah members, headed by Mrs. Maxwell Kaufman, is scheduled to
decorate the House of Hospitality auditorium for the annual United Nations
Dinner sponsored by the American Association for the U.N., San Diego Chapter,
this evening.
1954: In
Flushing, NY diamond cutter Max Weinstein and the former Miriam Postel gave
birth to producer Robert Weinstein, the brother of Harvey Weinstein.
1954: Texas
Instruments introduces the first transistor radio. “The transistor was invented and patented in the 1920s by Julius Edgar
Lilienfeld. Its re-invention some twenty years later earned Bell Telephone
Laboratories the Nobel Prize, but Bell Labs was forced to abandon all patent
claims to the field-effect transistor (which completely dominates modern
electronics) because of Lilienfeld's prior work.”
1954: "The Week in Religion" aired for the last time over
Dumont television. First broadcast in March 1952, this ecumenical Sunday
evening panel show divided the hour into 20-minute segments each for
Protestant, Catholic and Jewish news.
1954:
George Pirkis Kidd began serving as the first Canadian Ambassador to Israel.
1956:
Birthdate of Leningrad native Yevgeny Arkadievich Yelchin who gained fame as
Eugene Yelchin, the illustrator and author children’s books including the
Newbery award winning Breaking Stalin’s Nose.
1958(4th
of Cheshvan, 5719): Parashat Noach
1958:
Birthdate of New Jersey native Leon Calvin Murray, the Ohio State University
and NFL running back who converted to Judaism.
http://www.aish.com/sp/so/From-Rose-Bowl-to-Rashi-My-Unique-Journey-to-Judaism.html?s=mm
1960: In
Los Angeles Judith Deborah Feldman and producer Jack Schwartzman who was Jewish
gave birth to cinematographer John Leonard Schwartzman, the stepson of Talia
Shire who “received an Oscar nomination for Best Cinematography for his work on
the horse epic “Seabiscuit.”
1960:
According to a report issued today in New York by the National Council of
Churches, “the United States now has 4,709 synagogues and Temples” and based on
figures supplied by the Synagogue Council of America, 4,400,000 Jews are
affiliated with synagogues and temples and there are 3,965 Jewish “clergymen”
currently in the United States
1961: Six
months after premiering in Italy, “The Golden Hours” with music by Stanley
Black was released today in the United States.
1962(20th
of Tishrei, 5723): Sixth Day of Sukkoth
1962: Over
10,000 people, most of them Chasidic Jews living in Williamsburg gather for funeral
services held today for 55-year-old Rabbi Bernard Eisendorfer who had been beaten
to death on October 15th (17th of Tishrei 5723) which was
the third day of Sukkot.
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/goldmark-pauline
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1962/10/20/90550112.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0
1963(30th
of Tishrei, 5724): Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan
1964: Ed
Sullivan alleged that Jewish comedian had given him the finger during tonight’s
show – a claim that Mason denied and which led to his ban from the leading
variety show and a lawsuit which Mason won.
1965(22nd
of Tishrei, 5726): Shmini Atzeret
1965(22nd
of Tishrei, 5726): Eighty-nine-year-old Budapest born actor Oscar Beregi (born
Oszkár Bereg), victim of Hungarian antisemitism and the father of Lea and Oscar
Beregi, Jr. who began his American movie careers in the 1920’s passed away
today.
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0073472/
https://thelegendofisadora.blogspot.com/2014/10/oscar-beregi-24-january-1876-18-october.html
1965: Al
Silverman, editor of Sport magazine was the master of ceremonies at today’s
luncheon at Cavanaugh’s Restaurant where Sandy Koufax was awarded the Corvette
the “magazine presents each year to the outstanding performer in the World
Series.”
1966: “The
Apple Tree, “ “a series of three musical playlets with music by Jerry Bock and
lyrics Sheldon Harnick” who collaborated together on “the book” featuring Larry
Blyden “opened on Broadway today at the Schubert Theatre.
1967(14th
of Tishrei, 5728): Erev Sukkoth
1967: MGM
released “Far from the Madding Crowd” directed by John Schlesinger with a
script by Frederic Raphael.
1967: Funeral services were held today for attorney
Edwin Otterbourg two days after he had passed away at the age of 82.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1967/10/18/83636558.pdf
1968: Sixty-six-year-old Harvard graduate and
management consultant Arthur Deutz, the President of Arthur Deutz, Inc and
husband of Natalie Rubenstein Deutz passed away today after having suffered a
fatal heart attack 24 years before.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1968/10/19/76894568.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0
1968(26th
of Tishrei, 5729): Forty-seven-year-old Julius Bahr Kahn, Jr., the son of Leona
and Julius Bahr Kahn, the husband of Carol Kahn and University of Chicago
educated pharmacologist passed away today.
http://jpet.aspetjournals.org/content/jpet/165/2/local/front-matter.pdf
1969(6th
of Cheshvan, 5730): Parashat Noach
1970(18th
of Tishrei, 5731): Fourth Day of Sukkoth
1970(18th
of Tishrei, 5731): Ninety-two-year-old Louis Fishbein, the Kishinev born son of
Eva Geller and Joseph Fishbein, the husband of Sarah Miller Fishbein with whom
he had eight children and the owner of the Louis I. Fishbein Construction
Company as well as the founder of Temple Beth Shalom passed away today after which he was buried in
the Lincoln Park Cemetery in Warwick, RI.
1970: Final
performance of “Steambath,” “second play by Bruce Jay Friedman that had opened
“off-broadway at the Truck and Warehouse Theatre in June of 1970.
1973 (22nd
of Tishrei, 5734): Shemini Atzeres
1973 (22nd of Tishrei, 5734): Seventy-four-year German-born American
philosopher, Leo Strauss, passed away.
https://leostrausscenter.uchicago.edu/
http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/993329.html
https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/on-leo-strauss/
1973:
Major Asa Kadmoni was awarded the Medal of Valor for the extraordinary courage
he displayed “fought a large enemy force while surrounded in the Sinai” today.
1973:
During the Yom Kippur War, the Israelis were able to finally put a
pre-fabricated bridge across the Suez Canal.
Moving the bridge into position and actually using it to span the Canal
was a costly operation. One hundred IDF
soldiers died in the attempt with forty-one dying in a single night. The bridge made it easier to move tanks
across the Canal but there was no lightening quick strike as had been seen in
1956 and 1967. In fact, if the Egyptians
had pressed home their advantage while the bridge was being put in place, the
whole plan would have ended in failure.
This is another example of how much the Yom Kippur War was “a near run
thing.”
1973: Guri
Palter and Itzhak Bar’am were taken prisoner after ejecting from their F-4E
Phantom Jet that had fallen victim to an Egyptian SAM.
1973: Doron
Shalev and Yosef Lev-Ari were taken prisoner after ejecting from their F-4E
Phantom Jet that had fallen victim to an Egyptian SAM.
1973: The half-track in
which Eliezer Kalina was riding was hit by Syrian
gunfire killing the two other occupants and leaving Kalina so gravely wounded
that his leg had to be amputated. He overcame adversity to form a volleyball
team which he led to three gold medals and one silver medal at the Paralympic
Games.
1973:
During the Yom Kippur war, Colonel Giora "Hawkeye" Epstein went on a two-day
spree in which he downed 17 enemy aircraft.
1973: The
Mad Adventures of Rabbi Jacob (Les
Aventures de Rabbi Jacob) a French-Italian comedy film directed by Gérard
Oury was released today in France and Italy.
1974: After
two years of negotiations over the proposed Jackson-Vanick Amendment, Secretary
Henry Kissinger and Senator Henry Jackson exchanged a series of letters that
would pave the way for Jews to leave the Soviet Union in large numbers with
relatively little impediment.
1974:
“Airport 1975” a sequel to the 1970 disaster movie featuring Norman Fell, Jerry
Stiller, Sid Caesar, and Larry Storch was released today.
1976:
Refusniks who had been detained after staging a sit-in demonstration in the
Supreme Soviet “were taken into the woods and released” this evening.
1981:
Publication of “How Clifford Odets Spent His Last Desperate Days” by Margaret
Brenman-Gibson
1981: ABC
broadcast the first episode of season 4 of Taxi created by James L. Brooks and
Ed Weinberger and co-starring Judd Hirsch and Andy Kaufman.
1982(1st of
Cheshvan, 5743): Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan
1982(1st of
Cheshvan, 5743): French political leader and former Premier, Pierre Mendès France passed away. Political accomplishments aside, Mendes
France may be best remembered for his choice of beverages. Convinced that the French drank too much wine,
Mendes France made a point of drinking milk in public. When he first appeared on the American news
program Meet the Press, a class of milk was prominently placed next to the
French leader much to the delight of the interviewers.
1982(1st of Cheshvan, 5743): Eighty-five-year-old Abraham
Isaac Shindeling, the Menominee, Michigan born son or Dora and Moses Shindeling
and the husband of Helen Shindeling passed away today in Albuquerque, N.M.
1984(22nd of Tishrei, 5745): Shemini Atzeret
1985(3rd of Cheshvan, 5746): Sixty-two-year-old Maurice
Cerier, United Jewish Appeal’s assistant vice president for major gifts, died
of a brain tumor” today.
https://www.jta.org/1985/10/23/archive/maurice-cerier-dead-at-62
1985(3rd of Cheshvan, 5746): Ninety-seven-year-old Romania
born Yetta “Yettie” Leffner Wexler, the wife of Isadore Wexler and the mother Louis,
Joe, Ralph, David and Morris and Savannah optometrist Dr. William Wexler passed
away today in San Mateo, CA.
1986(15th of Tishrei): Sukkoth
1987(25th of Tishrei, 5748): Eighty-seven-year-old Philip Levine, the
renowned pathologist who is the namesake of the “Philip Levine Award” passed
away today.(As reported by Peter Flint)
1987: “In Jerusalem of the
1800’s” published today which is excerpted below, Nitza Rosovsky, curator of
the exhibits at the Harvard Semitic Museum and author of Jerusalem Walks
provides a virtual walking of Jerusalem highlighting the history of the city by
referencing various architectural gems
“In Jerusalem, a city first settled some 5,000 years ago, little at
tention was paid to 19th-century architecture until a few years ago, when
several historically important buildings were torn down by developers.
Suddenly, the charm of those century-old structures was recognized, and now
many of them have been renovated and turned into galleries and restaurants and
even a small theater. The architecture of the 19th century tells the history of
the era, when the great European powers were anxiously watching over the
crumbling Ottoman Empire while competing for a foothold in the Holy Land, and
when Jews were arriving in Jerusalem in ever increasing numbers. Until the
1860's, all Jerusalem residents lived within the walls of the Old City. The
walls were built in the 16th century by Suleiman the Magnificent, Sultan of the
Ottoman Empire, secure in the knowledge that the city gates were locked from
sunset to sunrise and that residents were protected from marauding Bedouins.
But as Jerusalem's population grew from 9,000 to 18,000 in the first half of
the 19th century, new houses spilled outside the walls, and the one-square-
mile inside. Two seminal building projects were started in the early 1860's:
the Jews began a modest apartment complex, Mishkenot Sha'ananim, southeast of
the Old City, and the Russians erected an enormous compound just north of the
wall consisting of a church, a consultate and several hostels. A visit today to
Mishkenot Sha'ananim begins a few hundred yards southeast of the King David
Hotel, at Sir Moses Montefiore's windmill, built in 1857 by the philanthropist
to provide cheap flour for needy Jews. On the slope of the Valley of Hinnom,
just below the windmill, is Mishkenot Sha'ananim, a low row of residences
conceived by Sir Moses and financed through a bequest by Judah Truro, an
American who also helped build the Bunker Hill Monument in Boston. Mishkenot
was viewed suspiciously by its first low-income residents, who had been
encouraged to live there (the story goes that many returned to the safety of
the Old City at night). Today, Mishkenot is used by Jerusalem as a guesthouse
for distinguished visitors. Its unusual features, the handiwork of British
architect E. W. Smith, include a crenellated roofline that mirrors the Old City
wall across the valley. The roughly hewn stone facade, on the downhill side of
the building, is enhanced by arched window and door frames that use alternating
short and long blocks of fine masonry. South of Mishkenot and up Hebron Road is
the Jerusalem Cinematheque. Despite renovations, traces of 19th-century
architecture can still be detected in the the stone-framed windows with the
protruding keystones. A settlement of impoverished Jews lived here at the end
of the 19th century, but the buildings were badly damaged in the 1948
Arab-Israeli war and have since been torn down. Wim and Lia Van Leer, who
established the first film club in Israel 30 years ago, opened the
Cinematheque, or film library, in Jerusalem in 1981. Films by directors ranging
from D. W. Griffith and Sergei Eisenstein to Ingmar Bergman, Federico Fellini
and Woody Allen are part of the archives, which contain over 6,000 films. The
three buildings above the Cinematheque - 15 Hebron Road, the Mount Zion Hotel
and No. 12 across the way - were all part of the British Ophthalmic Hospital,
founded by the Order of St. John in the last two decades of the 19th century to
combat trachoma, the blinding and contagious eye disease that is still
prevalent in the Middle East. The Jerusalem history of the Knights of St. John
goes back to Crusader times, when they provided protection and shelter to
Christian pilgrims in the Holy Land. The building at 15 Hebron Road and the
Mount Zion Hotel form a continuous architectural unit, connected by a broad
terrace. The multistoried buildings cling to the slope of the hill. They appear
modest from the roadside, as the British were respectful of the Old City's
skyline. Coats-of-arms appear on the outer white stone walls, in memory of the
Knights of St. John; ogee arches (with their S-shaped curves), stained-glass
oculi (or eyes) nicely framed in stone and pronounced quoins (the large,
squared stones on the corners) adorn the buildings. The same courtyard also
leads to the Cable Car Museum where, in 1948, a small military observation post
was situated. Just a few days before the creation of the State of Israel in May
of that year, Mount Zion was captured by a unit of the Palmach (the elite
''striking force'' of the Haganah, the Jewish underground self-defense
organization in Palestine) in an attempt to break into the besieged Jewish
Quarter in the Old City. Arab snipers, sitting just a few yards away on top of
the ramparts, made it nearly impossible to provide supplies for the isolated
soldiers on the mount. Secretly, a cable was stretched from the observation
post across the valley to Mount Zion. At night, with the help of a manually
operated crank, food and ammunition were ferried across in a long box; wounded
soldiers were evacuated on the return trip. During the day, the cable lay 150
below, and unseen, at the bottom of the Hinnom Valley. From the museum's window
one can still see the cable stretching to Mount Zion and the coffin-like supply
box. Inside are the crank, a stretcher, photographs and guns. Across a broad
terrace is the Mount Zion Hotel which a century ago served as the hospital. The
building was almost torn down in the late 1970's, before protests began to be
heard over the destruction of historic buildings. Extensive renovations have
preserved the original character of the building as it changed from hospital to
hotel; only the southern wing with the main lobby is new. At No. 12 across
Hebron Road is the House of Quality, where textiles, pottery, glass, enamel,
woodwork, jewelry and ritual objects by Jerusalem artists are on display,
selected by a board of experts who award the ''Seal of Quality. A right turn at
the traffic light a few steps up Hebron Road leads to the now-closed Jerusalem
train station. Built symmetrically in Italian Renaissance style, with arched
doors accented by delicate masonry work, the station was opened in 1892. Across
the square on the way to what is now the Khan Theater one passes the highest
point of the rocky hill, where Pompeii and his Roman legions camped in 63 B.C.
before their siege of the city. In the late 19th century a khan - an inn with a
large central court, where caravans stopped for the night - was built here to
store train cargos. Like other khans, it features a tall entryway and an inner
courtyard where camels rested. The ground floor was for storage, the second for
traders. Back down Hebron Road and past Mishkenot is the Mitchell Garden, where
the Sultan's pool used to be, a reservoir that probably dates to Herod the
Great. The area, part of the Hinnom Valley, is now used to stage open-air
concerts. At the northern edge of the park, closest to the Jaffa Gate of the
Old City, is Hutzot Hayotzer, the Street of the Craftsman in Hebrew. The
grinding stones near the edge of the two parallel rows of shops are from the
Berman Bakery flour mill, which stood nearby in the 1890's. It was part of a
neighborhood where a mixture of working-class Jews, Christians and Arabs lived.
From 1948 to 1967, the whole valley was part of a no man's land, filled with
war-torn houses, barbed wire and rubble. Hutzot Hayotzer, which was renovated
in the early 1970's, dates to the late 19th century. It is not really a street
but a lane of broad steps with stores on either side - art galleries, a
tapestry weaver, a stained-glass maker, a lapidary and many silversmiths. A walk
past Jaffa Road to the northwestern corner of the Old City wall brings one to
Notre Dame de France. Its construction started in 1884 and continued for 20
years, when the huge building was crowned with the statue of Our Lady. Great
care was taken to make sure that the head of the Virgin was taller than the
domes of the Russian church nearby. The architecture of Notre Dame is a good
example of contemporary European notions about what was appropriate for
Jerusalem. The calm grandeur of the building is in the best neo- Classical
traditional of the period; arcaded porticoes and crenellated rooflines add an
Oriental touch. West of Notre Dame and parallel to Jaffa Road lies Yohanan
Megush Halav, a narrow lane that leads to the Russian compound. The compound, 32
acres of choice real estate, where construction began in 1860, was so big that
the Arabs dubbed it El Moscoobiya. Dominating the area is the Cathedral of St.
Trinity, a 16th-century Moscow baroque style building - snow white with 10
green domes topped by gilded crosses. Most other buildings were hostels.
Visitors stopped coming after the Russian Revolution, and the empty buildings
were soon taken over by the British at the end of World War I. The Israelis
then inherited the buildings, which the British had turned into a police
station and a court of law. In addition, the Russian women's hospice became a
prison. The hospice is now a museum called Hechal Hagvurah, the Hall of Heroism
dedicated to the history the Jewish underground resistance to the British. Many
underground members were imprisoned here, but the British executed prisoners
elsewhere, fearing riots in predominantly Jewish Jerusalem. Not far from the
Russian compound, at the corner of Harav Kook Street and Dr. Avraham Ticho
Lane, is Beit David, built in 1874 to house needy Jewish students. Although it
is not open to the public, a peek into the courtyard reveals the building's
plan, a prototype for later Jewish residential neighborhoods. All doors open
onto the inner court, and there is no access to the street except through the
gate, which was locked at night; living outside the Old City was still
dangerous in the 1870's. At the end of the lane is the Ticho House, named for
Dr. Ticho, who resided and operated an eye clinic and hospital here from 1912
until his death in 1960, and for his wife, Anna, an artist who remained in the
house and continued to paint pictures of Jerusalem's environs until she died in
1980. Anna Ticho bequeathed the house to the people of her city, and today one
can wander through the extensive garden and into the house where her work is
displayed and where Dr. Ticho's papers, photographs and collection of Hanukkah
lamps can be seen in the former living room. The Ticho house is a small oasis
in the heart of downtown Jerusalem. It is pleasant to sit on the terrace and
contemplate the time when the house stood in splendid isolation, one of the
first private residences outside the Old City and a good example of Arab
construction. Private Arab villas were financed in part by the sale of land to
Jews, who were building modest residential neighborhoods to ease the crowded
conditions in the Old City's Jewish Quarter. The European powers, meanwhile,
were erecting edifices for God and country. The building activities of the
Arabs, the Jews and the Europeans continued throughout the last years of the
19th century and up to World War I, which ended Ottoman rule in the Holy Land
and marked the beginning of a new era. “
1988: Israel's supreme court upheld the ban on Meir Kahane`s Kach Party
as racist.
1988 ((7 Cheshvan 5749): Bar Mitzvah of Aharon Mordechai Rokeach the only child and heir of the
current Rebbe of Belz, Rabbi Yissachar Dov Rokeach. Born in Jerusalem, Israel,
he was named after his father's uncle, Rabbi Aharon Rokeach, the fourth Belzer
Rebbe, and his father's father, Rabbi Mordechai of Bilgorai.
1988: In Waterford, CT, premiere of “Italian American
Reconciliation” co-starring Helen Hanft.
1988: ABC broadcast the first episode of “Roseanne,” starring
Roseanne Barr.
1990:
"O you beloved Spain, ‘mother’ we call you, and throughout our lives we
will not forget your sweet language. Even though you have expelled us as a
stepmother from your womb, we have not stopped loving you as our holy ground,
where our ancestors are buried and where the ashes of thousands of tormented
and burned still lie..." Haham Solomon Gaon quoted at the ceremony of the
Prince of Asturias Concord Award, Oviedo, Spain.
1990: “Once
on This Island” “a one-act musical with a book and lyrics by Lynn Ahrens”
opened on Broadway today at the Booth Theatre.
1992(21st
of Tishrei, 5753): Hoshana Raba
1992: Seventy-six-year-old
Abraham Manie “Abe” Adelstein the son of Jews from Latvia who became the Chief
Medical Statistician of the UK passed away today.
http://munksroll.rcplondon.ac.uk/Biography/Details/31
1992(21s of
Tishrei, 5753):
Yoram Ben-Porath, the president of Hebrew University
of Jerusalem and a leading Israeli economist, died today in an automobile
accident. He was 55 years old. Also killed in the accident near the town of
Eilat were his wife, Yael Cohen Ben-Porath, 42, a lecturer in the university's
philosophy department, and their 5-year-old son, Yahali. Mr. Ben-Porath was
named president of Hebrew University, Israel's largest and oldest, in 1990. He
had previously served as its rector. He received his doctorate from Harvard and
was known for his research on surveys and random sampling. During the 1980's he
was active in the Israeli political movement Peace Now, which favors
conciliation with the Arabs.
1994:
“Shrunken Heads” a horror film directed by Richard Elfman with music by Danny
Elfman was released in the United States today.
1996:
“Swingers” a comedy-drama directed and filmed Doug Liman was released today in
the United States.
1998: The
New York Times book section
included a review of The Microsoft File: The Secret Case Against Bill Gates
by Jewish author Wendy Goldman Rohm.
1999(8thof
Cheshvan, 5760): Eighty-five-year-old San Francisco children’s rights advocate
Jean Jacobs, the widow of Tevis Jacobs and an active member of Congregation
Emanu-El passed away today.
2000(19th
of Tishrei, 5761): Fifth Day of Sukkoth
2000(19th
of Tishrei, 5761): Seventy-four-year-old Julie London, the actress and jazz
singer with the unique silky voice passed away today.
http://www.musicianguide.com/biographies/1608002890/Julie-London.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2000/10/19/us/julie-london-74-sultry-singer-and-actress-of-50-s.html
2001: After
premiering at the Seattle International Film Festival, “Ghost World,” with a
script by Daniel Clowes who had a Jewish mother and Terry Zwigoff, the son of
dairy farmers who also served as director was released today in Germany.
2001: U.S.
premiere of “The Grey Zone,” a film based on Auschwitz: A Doctor's
Eyewitness Account written by Dr. Miklós Nyiszli co-starring Harvey Keitel
and produced by Avi Lerner.
2002(12th
of Cheshvan, 5763): Eighty-eight-year-old producer Frank Rosenbeg passed away
today. (As reported by Elaine Woo)
http://articles.latimes.com/2002/nov/02/local/me-rosenberg2
2002: Congregation Har Sinai, a congregation that
traces its origins to pre-Civil War Baltimore began the dedication of its new
facility in Owings Mills, MD
2003(22nd
of Tishrei, 5764): Shemini Atzeret
2003: A
revised version of “Mourning Becomes Electra
“an opera in 3 acts by composer Marvin David Levy” “premiered at the
Seattle Opera today.
2004:
The New York Times book section
features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jews
including Chain of Command: The Road
From 9/11 to Abu Ghraib by
Seymour M. Hersh and The Five Books of Moses: A Translation With Commentary by Robert Alter
2004: The Jewish Women's Archive joined
with National Women's Philanthropy of the United Jewish Communities for an
historic celebration of 350 years of American Jewish community.
2005: Matt Bloom
unsuccessfully challenged Satoshi Kojima for the AJPW Triple Crown Heavyweight
Championship.
2005:
American Israeli professional basketball player Amar;e Stoudermire underwent
mircrofacture surgery today while playing for the Phoenix Suns.
2005: The Icon
Festival, a celebration of science fiction and the imagination is held yearly
during the Hol Hamoed period of Sukkoth began today at the Tel Aviv
Cinematheque.
2006: The exhibition
"Israel - Art and Life 1906-2006," curated by Amnon Barzel, opens at
the Palazzo Reale in Milan. Much like the exhibition "The New
Hebrews," curated by Dorit Levita around a year ago in Berlin, this
exhibition also attempts to survey 100 years of Israeli art. The exhibition
features the works of 35 artists from the Bezalel era through the young
generation of contemporary artists.
2006: French Jewish
director’s O Jerusalem a film version
of the history written thirty years ago by Collins and Lapierre premiered in
Paris, France.
2006: Edah HaChareidis
organized this evening’s demonstration in Jerusalem that was a protest against
the upcoming “Gay Pride” parade.
2006: The Magpie
Murders by Anthony Horowitz was not released to the public today as
previously announced.
2007: The Center for Jewish History presents a screening of the
documentary On My Way to Fathers Land a
1995 Hebrew Language film with English subtitles directed by Aner Preminger
2007(6th of
Cheshvan, 5768): Sixty-nine-year-old British writer and satirist Alan Coren
whose children Giles, born in 1969 and Victoria born in 1973 followed in his
professional footsteps, passed away today.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1566736/Alan-Coren.html
2007: Limmud FSU, the
largest Jewish studies and cultural event ever to take place in Russia opened
in Moscow
2008: On the fifth day
of the 24th Haifa International Film festival, screenings of a
variety of films including “A Jumpin Night in the Garden of Eden,” a 1980’s
film that was the first cinematic effort to document the American Kletzmer
revival.
2009 (30 Tishrei, 5770): Rosh Chodesh
Cheshvan I
2009:
This afternoon the Open Door Reading Series at the
Writer's Center in Bethesda, MD presents a reading by Gail Collins from
"Words that Burn Within Me: Faith, Values, Survival," a book of
poetry and prose by the late Hilda Stern Cohen. Werner Cohen, Hilda Cohen's
widower, will offer a preface to the event relating his discovery of his wife's
journal after her death.
2009: The Los Angeles Times features reviews of books by
Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including “Chronic
City” by Jonathan Lethem and an hitherto unpublished short story by Kurt
Vonnegut appearing in his latest work "Look at the Birdie"
2009: The New York Times features reviews of books by
Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including “Worse
Than War: Genocide, Eliminationism, and the Ongoing Assault on Humanity” by
Daniel Jonah Goldhagen and “Manhood For Amateurs” by Michael Chabon and the
recently released paperback edition of “Writing In The Dark” a collection
essays by David Grossman, the Israeli novelist and peace advocate who defends
the necessity of literature in a violent world.
2009: The Washington Post features reviews of books by
Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including “Enemies
of the People:
My Family's Journey to America” by Kati Marton
2009: Dr. T. Alan
Hurwitz was “selected as the 10th President of Gallaudet
University.”
2009: In Washington
D.C., opening night of Hyman S. & Freda Bernstein Jewish Literary Festival
2009: In an opinion
piece published today in The Times and Democrat newspaper, Bamberg
County GOP Chairman Edwin Merwin and Orangeburg County Chairman James Ulmer
defended the fiscal policies of U.S. Senator Jim DeMint, by saying he was
"like Jews who are wealthy got that way not by watching dollars, but
instead by taking care of the pennies and the dollars taking care of
themselves."
2010: In an interview
published today, author Stacy Schiff talked about growing up in Adams,
Massachusetts.
http://blog.timesunion.com/berkshires/stacy-shiffs-memories-of-adams/813/
2010: Israeli author
Michal Govrin, author of Hold on to the Sun is scheduled to appear at
the Library of Congress as part of the Hyman S. & Freda Bernstein Jewish
Literary Festival in Washington, DC.
2010: In “Confessions
of An Agent” published today in Sports Illustrated, Josh Luchs “a dyslexic
Jewish kid” tells how he used $2,500 of his bar mitzvah money to pay a college
player in violation of NCAA rules in hopes that he would become a client of
Luchs. In the article Luchs gives
detailed accounts of the various players he would illegally pay during his twenty-year
career.
2010: General Staff
Forum members gathered this morning at the Rabin Center to mark 15 years since
the assassination of former Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.
2010: The New York
Times featured a review of Claude Levi-Strauss: The Poet in His
Laboratory by Patrick Wilcken
2010: A memorial
service honoring the late William Coblentz one San Francisco’s most ardent
champions of major civic projects and one of its most
influential attorneys is scheduled to be held at the Herbst Theatre.
2010: A website
providing information on over 20,000 works of art stolen by the Nazis from
their Jewish owners during the 1930s and 1940s was launched today.
2011(20th of
Tishrei, 5772): Chol Hamoed Sukkoth
2011(20th of
Tishrei, 5772): Eight-nine-year-old Ruby Cohn, the academic who was the leading
authority on Samuel Beckett, passed away today. (As reported by Bruce Weber)
2011(20th of
Tishrei, 5772): Norman Corwin, a producer and dramatist from the golden age of
radio passed away today at the age of 101. (As reported by William Grimes)
2011: The Jewish
Historical Society of Greater Washington is scheduled to co-sponsor a screening
of “The People v Leo Rank,” a film that “is both a…murder mystery and an
insightful look at racial, religious, regional and class prejudices in the
early years of the 20th century.”
2011: The Ballad of
Shoe Dependency: Nan Goldin Shoots a New Ad Campaign for Jimmy Choo published
today
2011:
Rabbi Ita Paskind, the Assistant Rabbi of Olam Tikvah in Fairfax, Virginia, is
scheduled to deliver the first in a series of lectures on “Aggadah's Influence
in Development of Law in the Torah.”
2011:
Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh called the release of over 1,000
Palestinian prisoners in exchange for the return of Israeli soldier Gilad
Shalit today a strategic turning point in Hamas’s struggle against Israel..
2012:
The 96th Hadassah Convention is scheduled to come to an end in
Jerusalem.
2012:
Hayehudim, considered one of the most successful Rock bands in Israel, is
scheduled to perform at B.B. King Blues Club & Grill
2012:
Pianist Jeanne Golan is scheduled to perform the piano sonatas of Viktor Ullman
under the sponsorship of the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center
2012:
YIVO Institute for Jewish Research is scheduled to present a screening of “Everything
is illuminated.”
2012:
President Shimon Peres said today that the people of Iran should be encouraged
to overthrow their government.
2012:
A new centrist “super party,” bringing together former prime minister Ehud
Olmert, former Kadima chair Tzipi Livni and popular political newcomer Yair
Lapid, “is not going to happen,” Lapid said today.
2013:
A screening of “Ghosts of the Third Reich” which “documents the stories of the
descendants of the Nazis who confront their family’s past and communicate their
most profound feelings of guilt by inheritance” is scheduled to take place
today at the Library of Congress.
2013:
In the UK, The Wiener Library is scheduled to present “Hitler’s Helpers: The
Female Administrators of the Holocaust”
2013:
Today Rachel Lichtenstein reviewed No Place Like Home, “Judah Passow’s
affectionate yet unsentimental collection of photographs documenting the
diversity of Jewish life in Britain today.”
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/oct/18/no-place-home-judah-passow-review
http://www.judahpassow.com/pm/pages/user.public.details.php?uid=5
2013:
Folk/Reggae/songwriting Rabbi Jack Gabriel is scheduled to lead a special
Kabbalat Shabbat service at Kol Ami in Arlington, VA.
2013:
“German Chancellor Angela Merkel called on Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to
slow down settlement construction today. (As
reported by JP staff)
2013: Scattered showers fell in northern Israel
this morning, eventually making their way to Tel Aviv in the early afternoon.
Temperatures fell considerably on Friday and the rain was accompanied by strong
winds in some areas of the country.
2013(14th
of Cheshvan, 5774): Ninety-one-year-old airline victims advocate Hans
Ephraimson-Abt passed away today. (As reported by Margalit Fox)
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/27/us/hans-ephraimson-abt-air-crash-victims-crusader-dies-at-91.html
2013(14th
of Cheshvan, 5774): Seventy-year-old Norman Geras, Professor Emeritus of
Politics at the University of Manchester and husband of Jerusalem born
children’s author Adèle Geras passed away today.
http://socialistreview.org.uk/385/norman-geras-1943-2013
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/oct/20/norman-geras
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/politics-obituaries/10495887/Norman-Geras-obituary.html
2014(24th
of Tishrei, 5775): On Shabbat the cycle is scheduled to begin again with
“Bereshit.”
2014:
Ninety-eight-year-old Chinese translator Stanley Shapiro passed away.
http://forward.com/news/breaking-news/207609/sidney-shapiro-chinas-jewish-translator-dies-aged/
2014:
Four-time Tony nominee Tovah Feldshuh is scheduled to recreate her
award-winning performance as Golda Meir in “Golda’s Balcony” at the Victoria
Theatre.
2014:
“Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman called Jews visiting the Temple Mount a
"herd of cattle” today.” (As reported by Tova Dvorin)
2014:
“Dozens of Israeli trekkers stranded by avalanches and snowstorms which killed
at least 29 people — including three Israelis — in the Himalayas this week will
be airlifted from the mountainous region of Annapurna today.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/dozens-of-israelis-to-be-airlifted-from-himalaya-disaster-zone/
2014:
“A senior Palestinian official called today for Washington to develop a
strategy to simultaneously combat radical Islamism while working to resolve the
Israeli-Palestinian dispute – following US secretary of state's remarks on the
link between the two ongoing conflicts.”
2014:
Louis Black is scheduled to appear the Seneca Allegany Casino in Salamanca, NY.
2015:
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 The Impossible Exile:
Stefan Zweig at the End of the World by George Prochnick and PRO:
Reclaiming Abortion Rights by Katha Pollit
2015:
“Valley,” the first full length feature directed by French born Israeli Sophie
Artus, is scheduled to be shown as the closing film at the 3rd
Chelsea Film Festival.
2015:
The Jewish Museum of London is scheduled to host a “Walking Tour of the Old
Jewish East End including a visit to Sandys Row Synagogue.
2015:
The Nebraska Jewish Historical Society is scheduled to host its annual meeting
“The Boomer Years” this afternoon.
2015:
The Jewish Genealogy Society of Greater Washington is scheduled to host Leon
Taranto speaking on the “History and Genealogy of the Jews of Rhodes and their
Diaspora.”
2015: Still Engines, a conference
scheduled to be held at Mishkenot Sha’ananim today, will address the subject of
freedom of speech and public discourse
2015:
“Thousands of people demonstrated in Rome, Paris and Madrid today in solidarity
with Israel, as the Jewish state experiences weeks of escalating violence and
daily terror attacks” including “the Chairman of the Italian Parliament’s
Foreign Relations Committee” who “said that it is a moral duty to stand by
Israel
2015:
The ever-popular Maccabeates are scheduled to return to the JCCNV today for two
performances.
2016(16th
of Tishrei, 5777): Second Day of Sukkoth
2016:
“The CIC (Chinese in Iowa City) is scheduled to join members of the University
of Iowa Hillel chapter to discuss autumn traditions.”
2016:
The Israel Museum is scheduled to host its annual kite festival including
“kite-making workshops and kite flying with the help of kite experts.”
2016:
Today, “it was announced that Beanie Feldstein would playing Minnie in the 2017
Broadway production alongside Bette Midler.”
2016:
A revival of “Fiddler on the Roof” “featuring new movement and dance routines
by Israeli choreographer Hofesh Schecter is scheduled to be performed at the
Broadway Theatre.
2017:
The Temple Emanu-El Streicker Center is scheduled to host CNN’s Ana Navarro
discussing “the new age of alternative facts”
2017:
“Likud MK Sharren Haskel, Yesh Atid MK Haim Jelin, Zionist Union MKs Yossi
Yonah and Nachman Shai, and Knesset Secretary Yardena Meller-Horowitz
complained about mistreatment at the Inter-Parliament Union assembly in Saint
Petersburg, Russia, including being heckled while trying to speak at the event
today.”
2017:
In Atlanta, as part of its Historic Jewish Atlanta Tour seies, the Breman
Museum is scheduled to host a visit to “historic Oakland Cemetery” where
attendees will “explore the history, burial customs, and symbolism found
throughout the Jewish Grounds of this powerful city landmark.”
2017: At the Bard Graduate Center, Andrea M Berlin is
scheduled to present “Reading, Writing and Jewish Daily Life through Graffiti”
which is part of the Leon Levy Foundation Lectures.
2017: The YIVO Institute for Jewish Research is scheduled
to host a lecture by Wojciech Tworek, a postdoctoral fellow at the Anne
Tanenbaum Centre for Jewish Studies at the University of Toronto on “Mystic,
Teacher, Troublemaker: Shimon Engel and the Challenges of Hasidic Yeshiva
Education in Interwar Poland.”
2017: Yeshiva University Museum, Center for Jewish History
and the American Sephardi Federation are scheduled to host Paula Fredriksen on
“A Tale of Two Cities: Rome and Jerusalem” in which she will explore Rome’s
role in building as well as destroying the Jewish capital.”
2018: In Ann Arbor, Michigan, Allison Schachter of
Vanderbilt University is scheduled to give a lecture titled, “Madame Bovary in
the Jewish Provinces: Fradel Shtok’s Modernist Yiddish Prose” during which
she will discuss Fradel Shtok, a celebrated
poet credited with writing the first sonnet in Yiddish and focus on her life
after she published a collection of her lesser-known prose writings in 1919,
which were dismissed by critics at the time as too similar to Gustave Flaubert,
a French novelist and leader in literary realism, and too dissimilar compared
to prominent Yiddish author and playwright Sholem Aleichem.
2018:
In Des Moines, IA, The Iowa Jewish Senior Life Center is scheduled to host its
Fall Fundraiser completing with a “silent auction, wine tasting and
appetizers.”
2018:
The American Jewish Historical Society is scheduled to host a “staged reading
feat” in which Alysia Reiner and David Basche will reading the wartime letters
from newlyweds Lenny and Diana Miller found in We Are Going to be Lucky.
http://ajhs.org/we-are-going-be-lucky#overlay-context=restoring-tomorrow
2018:
At Coe College in Cedar Rapids, IA, “Steve Feller, the B.D. Silliman Professor
of Physics, is scheduled to lead the third of the Thursday Forums where
attendees will discuss the novels of Leon Uris.
2018:
In Jerusalem, Mercaz Hatarbuyot is scheduled to host an evening of classical
and Klezmer Music featuring concert pianist Eliah Zabaly and clarinetist Ira
Goyfeld.
2019(18th
of Tishrei, 5780): Fifth Day of Sukkoth
2019:
“GALLIMasters with Bosmat Nossan,” “an Israeli independent choreographer…and
former dance with the Bat Sheva Dance Company and the Inbal Pinto and Avshalom
Polak Dance Company” is scheduled to begin this morning at 10:00 am.
2019:
“Where’s My Roy Cohn?” “a documentary about the Jewish lawyer who served as
Senator Joseph McCarthy’s chief counsel and Donald Trump’s personal attorney,”
is scheduled to be released at theatres throughout the United States.
2019(19th of Tishrei, 5780): Fifth Day of Sukkoth
2020(30th of Tishrei, 5781): Rosh Chodesh
Cheshvan
2020: The ADL’s Walk Against Hate is scheduled to take
place today.
2020: Mayyim Hayyim is scheduled to present online
“Beneath the Surface: Mother/Daughter Pre-Bat Mitzvah Experience.
2020: The Jewish Community Library is scheduled to presnt
Aaron Gross, a past president of Society for Jewish Ethics, talking about food,
Jewish traditions, food in the age of Covid and the new book he co-edited with
Jody Meyers and Jordan Rosenblum, “Feasting and Fasting.”
2020: The Ohio State University’s Center for Slavic and
East European Studies and the Wexner Center for the Arts in Columbus are
scheduled to host a screening Eric Bednarski’s 2019 documentary “Warsaw: A City
Divided”
2020: In Bexley, OH. Tifterth Israel is scheduled to host
“Cantor Chomsky’s Opus: honoring Cantor Jack Chomsky’s 38 years of Music,
Service, & Leadership.”
2020: the Hebrew Program in the Skirball Department of
Hebrew and Judaic Studies at NYU and the Office of Cultural Affairs of the
Consulate General of Israel, in collaboration with NYU's Taub Center for Israel
Studies and Global Academic Center at Tel Aviv are scheduled to host a
conversation with Director Oren Gerner about his debut film,
"Africa," moderated by Dr. Dan Chyutin of Tel Aviv University.
2020: The Illinois Holocaust Museum is scheduled to
present “Presidential Perspectives: An Online Conversation with the descendants
of Harry S. Truman, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and Franklin D. Roosevelt, hosted by
NPR's Ari Shapiro,” a Donald and Sue Pritzker Voice of Conscience Lecture.
2020: The Jewish Heritage Museum of Monmouth County is
scheduled to present on Zoom, “The Jewish Calcutta through Music and Memory:
The Personal Story of a Baghdadi Jewish Family.”
2020: In New Orleans, is Hadassah is scheduled to host its
Virtual Gala.
2020: The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors
and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Wagnerism: Art and
Politics in the Shadow of Music by Alex Ross, God’s Shadow: Sultan Selim, His
Ottoman Empire, and the Making of the Modern World by Alan Mikhail and One
Billion Americans: The Case for Thinking Bigger by Matthew Yglesias
2021: The second online auction of the Jewish Heritage
Museum of Monmouth County is scheduled to come to an end today.
2021: The Jewish Federation of Greater Des Moines is
scheduled to host a Virtual Mission to Latin America via zoom.
2021: The Streiker Center’s culinary trip to Israel is
scheduled to come to an end today.
2022: At Berkley, CA, the Magnes is scheduled to host the
book launch for Anatomy of Torture: Testmonies from the Berkley Archive, “Ron
Hassner’s exploration on efficacy/morality of torture that analyzes original
writings with details of the persecution of Jews during Spanish Inquisition.”
2022: The Center for Christian-Jewish Learning at Boston College
is scheduled to present “Music and the Holocaust in the Terezin Ghetto” during
which Mark Ludwig, the executive director of the Terezin Music Foundation
who will speak on his new book Our Will
to Live, about music and the Holocaust in the Terezin Ghetto
2022: The JCCSF is scheduled to host Rock historian Richie
Unterberger as he presents and discusses film clips of iconic Doors’
performances of their hit songs, many written by Jewish guitarist Robby
Krieger.
2022: The celebration of Simchat Torah takes on a special
meaning at Tulane University, home of the Tulane Hillel, Tulane Chabad and the
Tulane Jewish Studies Department where for the first time in forever, the
football team was ranked in the Top 25 this week.
2022(23rd of Tishrei, 5783): Simchat Torah
2023: Sixty-six-year-old Rostov-on-Don born native and
holder of doctorate in economics Yaakov Mortov
a resident of Ofakim who worked at the Beit Hayotzer – ADI
Ofakim employment center, where he assembled electronic circuits for “Flex”
smart home devices and who was murdered by Hamas terrorists in Sderot on
October 7 was “buried today in Ofakim.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/yaakov-mortov-66-russian-immigrant-who-worked-as-an-engineer/
2023:JWI is scheduled to host a briefing “on a pivotal
upcoming Supreme Court gun violence case.”
2023: Lockdown University is scheduled to host a lecture
by Trudy Gold on “The Jews of Shavli and the Surrounding Regions: A Lost
Culture.”
2023: The rededication the Iowa Holocaust Memorial is
scheduled to take place in Des Moines on the Iowa State Capitol Grounds.
2023: As part of the “Jewish Values and Strategy in
Wartime” program the Tikvah Center is scheduled to lecture by Rabbi David Wolpe
on “King David: Lessons in Leadership.”
2023: The Nashville Jewish Film is scheduled to open today
with an opening dinner that includes special guest Aviva Kempner followed by a
screening of “A Pocketful Full of Miracles.”
2023: Lockdown University is scheduled to host a lecture
by Jeremy Rose on “Making Sense of the Bible: Can It’s Ancient Text be Relevant
Today?”
2023: President Biden is scheduled to travel to Israel
today.
2024(16th
of Tishrei, 5785):
Second
Day of Sukkot; for more see Weekly Torah Reading / Weekly Torah Portion
(downhomedavartorah.blogspot.com)
2024: In Newton, MA, Temple Emanuel is scheduled to host “a
fabulous musical Shabbat Alive” followed by “an epic Shabbat dinner under the
stars.”
2024: In Palto Alto, CA the Oshman Family JCC is scheduled
to host a “joyful dinner in the sukkah with music and dancing”
2024: As October 18 begins in Israel, the world wonders if
the elimination of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar will bring the hostages home as
Gil Dickman, the cousin of murdered hostage Carmel Gat called for.
2024:
As October 18th begins in Israel, an unprecedented wave of anti-Semitism that
has included Hamas supporters calling for Zionist passengers on a New York
subway to raise their hands, sweeps the United States and the Hamas held
hostages begin day 378 in captivity while Jerusalem braces for more rocket
attacks by Hezbollah (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)
