This Day, December 4, In Jewish History by Mitchell A and Deb Levin Z"L
771: King Carloman
dies, leaving his brother Charlemagne King of the entire Frankish Kingdom. Following the death of their father, King
Pepin the Short, the two brothers had each ruled a portion of the realm. The sharing was not a peaceful process. For once the consolidation of political power
in the hands of one monarch worked to the advantage of the Jewish people since
Charlemagne was favorably disposed to his Jewish subjects even to the point of
willingly defying the edicts of powerful prelates.
1075: Anno II, the
Archbishop of Cologne passed away, an event reported to have been lamented by
the Jews who lived in a Jewish Quarter first mentioned during his episcopate.
1110: The Syrian harbor city of Saida (Sidon) surrendered
to Crusaders. The Crusader success would
prove to be only temporary. Sidon was one of the original Phoenician trading
cities and it is the same Sidon from which Hezbollah launched rockets into
Israel in the summer of 2006.
1197: During the Third Crusade, the wife and
daughters of Rabbi Eleazar ben Judah ben Kalonymous of Worms were murdered and
his was mortally wounded. Born in 1165
in Germany, Rabbi Eleazar was “a Kabbalist, Halachic scholar and religious
poet. In Sefer ha Hokhmah (The Book of Wisdom) he described the
loneliness he felt after the death of his family and his teacher Judah
he-Hasid. He passed away in 1230,
leaving behind a body of writings that has influenced Kabbalists down to our
own times.
1259: Kings Louis IX of
France and Henry III of England agreed to the Treaty of Paris, in which Henry
renounces his claims to French-controlled territory on continental Europe
(including Normandy) in exchange for Louis withdrawing his support for English
rebels. There was nothing positive in this for the Jews in this. Louis IX attacked the financial well-being of
his Jewish subjects, going so far as to expel them as a way of financing the
Seventh Crusade. He also burnt 12,000 Jewish books including copies of the
Talmud. Henry also attacked the
financial well-being of his Jewish subjects, milking them for all they were
worth. When the Jews sought to leave his
kingdom, he stopped them as a way of protecting a valued source of tax revenue.
1334: John XXII, the second of the Avignon Popes passed
away. Sangisa, the sister of John XXII,
urged her brother to ban the Jews from Rome.
At first he ignored her. But
finally, in 1321, He gave in and issued an order of expulsion. The Jews
responded with fasting and “fervent prayers.
At a more practical level, they turned to King of Robert of Naples for
support and sent a delegation to Avignon with 20,000 ducats for the Pope. This combination of divine and temporal
intervention worked since the Jews were allowed to remain in Rome.
1489: The Spanish army captured Baza from the Moors.
The Battle of Baza was part of the lengthy conflict between the Catholics and
the Moors. Slowly but surely, they were
driving the Moslems of Spain back across the Mediterranean to North Africa from
whence they had come over seven hundred years before. Within 3 years, the Moors would be driven
from the Iberian Peninsula and Spain would be united as a Catholic Kingdom. This would lead to the expulsion of the Jews
from Spain.
1539(13th of Kislev, 5300): On December 4, the Ottoman Sultan known
as Suleiman the Magnificent occupied Baghdad which meant an improvement for the
condition of the Jews who had suffered during the Mongol period. During his
reign Suleiman welcomed the Jews fleeing from the effects of expulsion from
Spain and Portugal and encouraged them to settle in Palestine. His
rebuilding program in Jerusalem showed a sympathy and respect for Jewish
history and culture. His willingness to employ a Jew as his personal
physician and to use Don Joseph Nasi and Gracia Mendes Nasi as
advisors demonstrated the extent to which Jews had found a haven and home in
the lands of Suleiman, who for the Jews, was truly magnificent.
1567(22nd of Kislev, 5328): Seble Wongel who became Empress of Ethiopia
after her marriage to Emperor Lebna Dengel in 1512 or 1513 passed away today.
https://jwa.org/thisweek/dec/04/1567/death-empress-ethiopia-seble-wongel
1629(29th of Kislev, 5390): Madeira
Island native Jacob Israel Belmont, who along with “Jacob Tirado and Solomon
Palache” was “one of the founders of the Portuguese-Jewish Community of
Amsterdam and husband of “Simḥah
(Gimar) Vaz” passed away today,
1642: Cardinal Richelieu, the “power behind the
throne” during the reigns of Louis XIII and Louis XIV passed away. The decrees issued in their name were
probably the product of this churchman turned “chancellor” including Louis XIII
reaffirmation issued in April, 1615 of the ban on Jews living in France and
Louis XIV’s declaration granting the Jews of Metz the right to conduct business
after the French took the city in 1632.
1647(17th of Kislev, 5408): Madeira
Island native Jacob Israel Belmont, the husband of Simha (Gimar) Vaz and the
father of Moses Belmont who came to Amsterdam in 1614 where he helped to found
the Portuguese Jewish community with Jacob Tirado and Solomon Palache passed
away today.
https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/2840-belmonte-jacob-israel
1655:
Today, “following the arrival in London of Rabbi Menasseh ben Israel from
Amsterdam and his petition to the Council of State on behalf of the ‘Hebrew
Nation,’ a conference was begun at Whitehall to discuss the readmission of Jews
to England after a supposed absence of 365 years.”
1655:
Oliver Cromwell convened a gathering of English notables at Whitehall to decide
if the Jews should be readmitted to England.
Cromwell was a strong proponent of readmission as were most of
Cromwell’s military and government leaders. Members of the Millenarian and
Sabbatarian sects also favored readmission.
Opposition came from the merchants and the mainline Christian clergy.
When realized that he would be unable to gain the complete support for his plan
to readmit the Jews to England, so he dissolved the Council rather than suffer
defeat. The conferees did agree that
that there was no legal reason not to re-admit the Jews since they had been
expelled by royal decree and not by an act of Parliament. In the meantime,
Cromwell accomplished his goals through a round-about manner and by 1657 there
were enough Jews in London who felt confident in being able to practice their
faith in public that they purchased a private home to be used as a synagogue.
1655: Middelburg, Netherlands forbade the building of
a synagogue.
1674: French Jesuit missionary Jacques Marquette
erected a mission on the shores of Lake Michigan, in present-day Illinois. His
log cabin became the first building of a settlement that afterward grew to
become the city of Chicago. Chicago is
of course, the home of one this country’s largest and most vibrant Jewish
communities as well as some of the finest Jewish families around including that
of my aunt and uncle, Dr. Jacob and Betty Levin and that renowned photographer
and alum of the College of Jewish Studies, Harvey Luber and his wife. Just
think, if it had not been for Marquette, there would not have been a home for
Chagall’s Windows (the Art Institute) Sarah Lee Bakery or a Crate & Barrel
(the latter two were founded by Jews in Chicago).
1679: Thomas Hobbes, English philosopher,
passed away. Born in 1588, “Thomas Hobbes was foremost among the seventeenth
century political philosophers who led the Western world across the fault line
separating classical from modern political philosophy. In doing so, he, like
his other colleagues, had to confront not only classical political philosophy
but the Bible. From the first of his writings to the last he consistently
confronted Scripture. Reading Hobbes reveals both the ambiguity and the
ambivalence of his confrontation with the Bible. Hobbes wished to assault
orthodox or conventional Christian belief but at the same time is drawn to the
Hebrew Scriptures, not only because it is necessary for him to confront it for
the sake of his argument or because of the Bible's own elemental and compelling
power. His struggle foreshadows and is even paradigmatic of that of modern man.
The most neglected aspect of Hobbes's attempt to solve the
theological-political problem is his reliance on divine punishment of the iniquitous
sovereign.” He uses the murder of Uriah
by King David to discuss this part of his political philosophy. In his
writings, Hobbes elaborates a conception of the Messiah in his political
treatises that is unusual because it seems to combine Jewish and Christian
elements. He asserts that Jesus is the Messiah in the sense of being the
earthly king of the Jews as well as the Son of God and king of heaven. To
clarify Hobbes's position and to highlight its strangeness, it is compared with
the views of Moses Maimonides and Blaise Pascal. Hobbes emerges from this
comparison as a spokesman for a kind of "Jewish Christianity," whose
purpose is not to return to the early Jewish sects that embraced Jesus as a new
Moses but to humanize the Messiah and to redefine Christianity for a new age of
secular happiness. Hobbes thereby inaugurates a new kind of biblical criticism
which the Deists of the enlightenment era developed and which continues today.
This incomplete entry about Hobbes reinforces the many different ways in which
Jewish Culture as opposed to Jewish people influenced the development of
Western Civilization.
1748: Birthdate of German native Judith
Haimann, the wife of Moyses Einstein and the mother of Basilika, Elias,
Vernoika, Leopold and Simon Einstein.
1750: Birthdate of Henri Grégoire who as Abbé
Grégoire who was “considered a friend of the Jews” because during the French
Revolution “he argued that in this anti-Semitic society the supposed degeneracy
of Jews was not inherent but rather a result of their circumstances.”
1755(30th of Kislev, 5516): Rosh
Chodesh Kislev; Sixth Day of Chanukah
1762: Catherine
II of Russia permitted foreigners to settle and travel in Russia
"Kromye Zhydov." However, Jews were still forbidden to settle there.
Catherine II may have been the Great to some Russian nobles, but she certainly
was certainly not great to anyone else according to the Russian history at Tulane
University.
1768(24th of Kislev, 5529): Kindle
the first Channukah candle on the same day a southeast rainstorm accompanied
by a violent gale struck the New England coast that was so violent that a
brigantine belonging to the port, of Boston, Thomas Morton, master, being
inward bound from the West Indies, was driven on the rocks near the lighthouse
in Boston harbor, and instantly dashed to pieces, four or five vessels at the
New Haven Long wharf parted their
cables, and two of them were driven ashore, and at At Guilford, a ship
commanded by Captain Landon, which had arrived but a short time before from
Liverpool, went ashore, having parted its cables.”
1771(27th of Kislev, 5532): Third
day of Chanukah observed on the same day “a bill was introduced in the
November-December session of the General Assembly to build a courthouse in
Salisbury, North Carolina.”
1772(OS): Birthdate of Dov Ber of Mezeritch,
known as the Maggid, the leading disciple of the Baal Shem Tov and his
successor as leader Chassidic Judaism.
1773: Reyna Levy and Isaac Moses gave birth to
Moses Levy Moses who passed away in New York in 1843.
1779(25th of Kislev, 5540):
Parsashat Vayeshev; First Day of Chanukah observed as the British prepare send
a task force from New York that includes 8,500
to attack Charleston SC during the American Revolution.
1787: Reyna Levy and Isaac Moses gave birth to
Sarah (Sally) Moses, the sister of Moses Levy Moses
1790(27th of Kislev, 5551): Parashat
Miktetz and Shabbat Shel Chanukah
1790: The citizens of Trnava, addressed a
petition to the Diet in Hungary at the same time as the Jews did asking that
their rights be upheld. The Diet
approved the petition of the Jews and sent word to King Leopold II.
1791: In
London, the first edition of The Observer, the world's first Sunday
newspaper was published. In 1891, Rachel Sasoon Beer, the granddaughter of
David Sasoon and daughter of Sasoon David Sasoon was named editor of the
Observer making her the first female editor of a national newspaper. During
her tenure as editor “The Observer achieved one of its greatest
exclusives: the admission by Count Esterhazy that he had forged the letters
that condemned innocent Jewish officer Captain Dreyfus to Devil's Island. The
story provoked an international outcry and led to the release and pardon of
Dreyfus and court martial of Esterhazy.”
1795: One
day after he had passed away, 52 year old “Jacob Yechiel” was buried today at
the “Lauriston Road Jewish Cemetery.”
1798(26th
of 5559 Kislev): Second Day of Chanukah
1800:
Solomon Levien married Harriet Salomons at the Hambro Synagogue today.
1802: In
Bavaria, “Jacob Hirsch Kann and Jetta Kann gave birth to Jennette Kann who
became Jeannette Goldschmidt when she married Benedict Hayim Salomon
Goldschmidt.
1804:
Birthdate of London native Elias Mocatta who married Rachel Goldsmid after the
death of Augusta Goldsmid the mother of Constance August Mocatta.
1804:
Birthdate of Prussian native Joseph Aub, one of the first “liberal rabbis” in
Germany who delivered his sermons in German and whose rabbinic career led him
to Berlin where he served from 1865 until 1880.
1805(13th
of Kislev, 5566): Sixty-two-year-old German banker Philipp Samson, the founder
of the Samson School in Wolfenbuttel passed away today.
1809(26th of Kislev, 5570): Second Day of Chanukah
1810: In Charleston, SC, David and Rachel Benjamin Lewis gave birth to
future St. Louis resident Alexander Lewis, the husband of Rebecca Lewis and
Esther Philipson Lewis.
1811 (18th
of Kislev, 5572): Rabbi Baruch Mezhibuzher the son of Rabbi Israel Baal Shem
Tov’s daughter, Adel, and her husband, Rabbi Yechiel Ashkenazi passed away. He
was born in 1753 in Mezhibuz, the town from which his illustrious grandfather
led the Chassidic Movement. He was one of the Rebbes (Chassidic masters) in the
3rd generation of Chassidism and had thousands of followers.
1816: Three
days after he had passed away. “Nachman bar Aaron” was buried today at the
“Colby Gate Jewish Burial Ground in Great Yarmouth.”
1817(25th
of Kislev, 5578): Chanukah
1825(24th
of Kislev, 5586): The First Chanukah Candle was kindled for the first time
during the right of Czar Nicholas I.
1826: In
London Frances Cohen and Joel Benjamin gave birth to George Benjamin.
1828(28th
of Kislev, 5589: Fourth Day of Chanukah observed the day after electors cast
their votes in their respective state capitals during the highly contentious
election between John Q Adams and Andrew Jackson
1828: In
Germany Nanette and Sigismund Baruc gave birth to future New Yorker Bernard S.
Baruc, the “husband of Mathilda Rebecca Baruc and father of Nannie Baruch;
Emmie Baruc; Rachel Baruc; Kate Baruc; Catherine O. Menke; and Mathilda Rebecca
Baruc.”
1829: A
fired destroyed the building housing Congregation Mikveh Israel in Savannah,
Georgia. The building had been
consecrated in 1820 making it the first synagogue to be built in “The Peachtree
State.” Fortunately, the congregation’s Torah Scrolls were saved from the fire.
1830; “The
Alsatian Deputy Pierre Andre stated that before the Revolution had not been
allowed to open vocational schools” – a statement that was challenged by those
who said that “before the Revolution…Berr-Isaac Berr of Nancy had founded
agricultural colonies in order to mitigate the charge that Jews were not
productive.”
1836(25th
of Kislev, 5597): Chanukah is celebrated for the last time during the
Presidency of Andrew Jackson.
1836: Two
days after he had passed away, “Alexander Schomberg” was buried at the
“Brompton (Fulham Road) Jewish Cemetery” today.
1839: Moses
Joseph married Esther Samuel at the Great Synagogue today.
1839: In
Charleston, SC, Jacob I. Moses of Columbus, GA married Rina Ottolengui, the
daughter of Abraham Ottolengui.
1840:
Frances and Horatio Etting gave birth to Edward Johnson Etting II, the husband
of Maria Etting and the father of Thomas Etting and Frances Marx Landreth
1846” In
Furth, Bavaria, Louis Loew Leopold Affelder, the Bavarian born son of Samuel
Lazarus Affelder and Nanni Affelder, and his wife Regine Rosalia Affelder gave
birth to Moritz Affelder
1847(26th
of Kislev, 5608): Parashat Vayeshev; Shabbat shel Channukah
1847: In
New York, Abigail and Asher Kursheedt gave birth to Grace Eloise Kursheedt.
1847: In
London, Hester and L.M. Rothschild gave birth to Emma Dinah Rothschild, the
wife of Ludwig Goldschmidt.
1849: In
Canterbury, Fanny Nathan and Joel Abrahams gave birth to Benjamin Abrahams.
1850(29th
of Kislev, 5611) Fifth Day of Chanukah
1852:
Today’s edition of the Times of London devoted sixteen columns to the
speech given by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Benjamin Disraeli, on the
subject of taxation. The speech, which
was well received, contained proposals to change the Tea Duties and the Income
Tax. The lengthy article also included copies of the tables that Mr. Disraeli
used.
1852: On
his 48th birthday, Joseph Aub “joined the rabbinate in Mainz” today
where, when the community split he led the liberal congregation that used an
organ and where sermons were delivered in German.
1853: The "Shaare Zedek Hebrew
National School," erected in the rear of the Henry-street Jewish
Synagogue, was consecrated this afternoon. The congregation to which the School
is attached has been in existence about sixteen years. The ceremonies began at
3 pm with religious services that included a sermon by Rabbi H.A. Henry who has
been chosen to serve as the school’s superintendent. Services were followed by
a “banquet” in one of the school’s room. Mr. Mendel Joseph, President of the
Building Committee, addressed the attendees. The meal included the recitation
of the proper Hebrew prayers both before and after eating.
1853: In Podzelve
(Želva), nine miles from Vilna R. Aba-Elyahu,
an itinerant teacher and for a certain time rabbi in Sviadoshtsh
(Svedasai) and his wife gave birth to author TSVI-NISN (ZVI-NISSAN, HIRSH-NISN)
GOLOMB who began his career in Vilan and whose “last treatise, apparently
left unpublished, was Ḥevel haneviim (Sorrow of the Prophets), concerned with
twenty-eight lost religious texts which are mentioned in Tanakh.”
1854(13th
of Kislev, 5615): Sixty-four-year-old Hetty (Esther) Seixas, the Newport, RI
born daughter of Jochabed Levy and Moses Mendes Seixas passed away today in New
York.
1855(24th
of Kislev, 5616): The first Chanukah Candle is kindled as the Governor of
Kansas received a communication from Col. Edwin Sumner, the command of Ft.
Leavenworth “to us all power under his command to enforce the laws” in dealing
with pro-slavery forces during the Wakarusa War.
1855: In
Lancaster, PA, Yetta Gump and Simon Erlanger gave birth to “clothing merchant” Abraham Erlanger, the
President of the Society of the Jewish Deaf” and a supporter of the National
Farm School who had begun his career in 1869 as “a clerk in Iowa.”
1858: A
crowd of 2,500 Christians and Jews gathered tonight in New York City to express
their indignation over what has come to be called the Mortara Affiar. The event was chaired by Jonas Phillips, the
ex-President of the Board of Common Councilmen. Among the resolutions passed
were ones that recalled the response of the United States government to the
Damascus Affair in 1840. The speakers
all separated the actions of those involved in taking of the Mortara family
from the Roman Catholic religion and stated their respect for their fellow
citizens who were adherents of that religion. Among those in attendance was Mr.
A.M. Phillips Levi from Montreal who had traveled from Canada to express that
Jewish community’s solidarity with the other Jewish communities that had
expressed their outrage and called for a return of the Mortara child to his
parents. The speakers included leaders of the Jewish community as well as
prominent non-Jews including Chauncey Shaffer, Esq. and Reverend Blair, a
Methodist clergyman.
1860:
Birthdate of actress and singer Lillian Russell, the native of Iowa who married
the Anglo-Jewish composer Edward Solomon in 1884, two years before he was
arrested for bigamy.
1861(1st of
Tevet, 5622): Rosh Chodesh Tevet
1861:
Today, Sir George Grey, who hired Samuel Joseph, an Anglo-Jew from London as
his interpreter” began serving his second term as Governor of New Zealand
1862: Rosa
Gottschalk, the Stuttgart, Germany born daughter of Joseph and Sarah Ullman,
and her husband Albert Gottschalk gave birth to
Lillie Gottschalk, who became Lillie Fleischmann when she married Ernst
Fleischmann with whom she had two son – Edwin and Albert.
1864: Romanian Jews were forbidden to practice law.
1864: A meeting was held today in Philadelphia,
PA that resulted in the establishment of Maimonides College, “the first Jewish
theological seminary in” the United States. The school which was designed to
train rabbis for the numerous synagogues opening this country began operating
in 1867. It closed its doors 6 years
later in 1873 due to a lack of support.
1865:In New York City, Seligmann (Simon)
Davidson and Julia (Julie) Davidson (Rosenbaum) gave birth to Lena Oppenheimer,
the “wife of Henry Edward Oppenheimer and mother of Julie Adelaide Oppenheimer
Levine; Matilda Oppenheimer; Harry Edward Ogden (Henry Oppenheimer) and Edward
Davidson Oppenheimer.”
1865: Birthdate of Edith Louisa Cavell, the
British nurse who was defended by Sadi Kirschen when the Germans arrested her
and charged her with treason. There was
little that her Jewish defense lawyer, who would flee the Nazis when they
invaded Belgium in 1940, could do for her since she confessed to helping
British and French soldiers escape and the Kaiser’s army was in no mood to show
leniency.
1866(26th of Kislev, 5627): Second
Day of Chanukah
1866(26th of Kislev, 5627: Evelina Gertrude de Rothschild passed away during childbirth. She was a member of the prominent
Rothschild banking family of England. Her father Lionel assumed sponsorship of
the first school for girls in Israel, opened in Jerusalem in 1864, renaming it
the Evelina de Rothschild School.
1868: Two days after he had passed way,
93-year-old “Henry Mordecai,” the father of “David Mordecai,” was buried today
at the “Lauriston Road Jewish Cemetery.”
1869(30th of Kislev, 5630): Shabbat
shel Channukah; Rosh Chodesh Tevet; Parsahat Miketz all observed for the first
time during the presidency of U.S. Grant.
1871: In New York, Isaac Ottenberg, the son of
Rosina and Meyer Ottenberg and his wife Regina Ottenberg gave birth to Henry
Ottenberg, the future resident of Los Angeles.
1873: It was reported today that last month’s
overflow of the Tiber River created a novel situation in Rome. Some of the Jews whose homes were flooded
have been temporarily lodged in the Covent of Ara Caeli one of the religious
orders recently disbanded by the new, republican government of Italy. In the new Italy, including the formal Papal
States, there is no distinction of citizenship based on religion.
1875: Mr. Emanuel B. Hart appeared before a
special meeting of the Board of Police to request that anti-lottery laws not be
enforced in matters pertaining to the Hebrew Benevolent Fair. Hart told the board that if the laws were
strictly enforced the fair would not be able to raise the funds to support
local charities. The members of the
Board denied the request saying that the police would halt any drawing that
violated the lottery laws.
1876: Three days after she had passed away,
“Priscilla Rees,” the daughter of Moses and Phoebe Davis and the wife of Daniel
Rees was buried today at the “Brompton (Fulham Road) Jewish Cemetery.
1876: Today twenty-two-year-old Moses
Alexander, the German born son of Emma and Nathan Alexander Moses who in 1878
came to the United States where he served as a member of the city council and
Mayor of Chillicothe, MO, the Mayor of Boise and Governor of Idaho married Helena Kaestner Alexander, the father of Leah
Alexander Spiro and a member of the B’nai B’rith in Boise, Idaho.
https://www.idahostatesman.com/news/northwest/idaho/history/article195798964.html
http://americanjewisharchives.org/education/timeline/alex_moses.html
1877(28th of Kislev, 5638): Fourth
Day of Channukah
1877: Birthdate of Morris Alexander, the
Cambridge University educated native of Zinn, Germany who was “admitted to
practice as an Advocate of the Supreme Court of Cape Colony where lectured on
law, served on the city council and participated in Jewish communal life as an
officer of the New Cape Town Congregation and the Jewish Philanthropic Society.
1878: Birthdate of Dr. Alwin M. (Max) Pappenheimer the Columbia
trained pathologist who was on the faculty at Columbia and who was the father
of Dr. Anne P. Forbes, Dr. John R. Pappenheimer and Dr. Alwin M. Pappenheimer,
Jr. of NYU who followed in his father’s footsteps.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1955/02/22/96627378.pdf
1878(8th of Kislev, 5639): Fifty-two-year-old
Danish banker and political leader David Baruch Adler was a partner in Martin
Levin & Adler in London and D.B.Adler & Company in Copenhagen as well
as the husband of Jenny Raphael the daughter of banker John Raphael, passed
away today.
1878: It was reported today that Romanian
leaders continue to oppose granting Jews full rights as citizens as promised by
the Treaty of Berlin. As non-citizens,
Jews are not allowed to own land which means Romanian nobles can borrow money
from Jews without fear of losing their estates when they default on the
loans. If Jews were citizens were made
citizens, the nobles could no longer swindle them out of the money owed.
1879(19th of Kislev, 5640): Aron
Kaufmann, the Koblenz, Germany born son of Gutel and Salomon Kaufmann and his
wife Jeanette Kaufmann gave birth to Benjamin Kaufmann, the husband of Pearl
Kaufmann and the “father of Saul Bernard Kaufmann; Irving G. Kaufmann and
Marvin D. Kaufmann” who passed away in Florida in 1957 at the age of 77.
1880: It was reported today that in Germany,
“The Jewish question continues to attract much public attention. Newspapers are debating it, pamphlets are
pouring forth, tumults are taking place among the students and an occasional
fracas still occurs in the streets.”
1880: It was reported from Berlin that in light
of the wave anti-Semitic agitation sweeping German, a large number of “eminent
Jews” are meeting to consider ways of defending themselves including the
establishment of a newspaper to support their position.
1880: It was reported that an article published
in the Grenzboten seeks to refute
that Chancellor Bismarck is sympathetic to the anti-Semitic movement championed
by Court Chaplain Stoecker.
1880: Sarah Bernhardt is scheduled to give her
last two performance in New York – a matinee during which “Hermani” will be
repeated followed by an evening featuring “Frou-Frou,” “La Dame aux Camelias”
and “En Passant.”
1880: In Chicago, Adolph Loeb, the German born
son of Ester and Jakob Loeb and his wife Johanna Loeb gave birth to Eva Lawton,
the wife of Samuel Tilden Lawton
1881: The first edition of the Los Angeles Times is published. Sam Zell
bought the Tribune Company, including the LA Times, in 2007 making him the
first Jewish owner of the paper.
1881: For unknown reason, the fair sponsored by
Temple Israel in Brooklyn which opened on November 30 was scheduled to be
closed this evening and to reopened tomorrow.
1882: U.S. Army Major Alfred Mordecai, Jr. a
West Point graduate and hero of the Civil War was promoted to the permanent
rank of Lt. Colonel. He was brevetted to
the rank of Lt. Colonel in the last months of the Civil War “for distinguished
served in the field…” For those of you who know anything about the U.S. Army,
this means the rank was “temporary” and that for official purposes he returned
to the rank of Major when peace arrived. Promotion in the peace time army was
much slower. This promotion does reflect
the high esteem in which Mordecai was held as will be seen when reaches the
rank of full Colonel.
1882(23rd of Kislev, 5643):
Twenty-three-year-old Mortiz Zuckerman, a Jewish immigrant from Russia, hanged
himself today apparently because he had lost his job and was unemployed.
1882: In Aurich, German, Moses Jakob Cohen and
Minkel Minka Cohen gave birth to Jakob Moses Cohen, the husband of Hanna Cohen
with whom he had five children and who died in the Minks Ghetto during the
Holocaust.
1883: Near Kiev, Anna Smelianski and Jacob
Levitzki gave birth to University of Kiev graduate and holder of a Ph.D. from
Columbia Lewis Lorwin the economist and author and husband of Rose Strunsky who
began his academic career at Columbia, Wellesley and the University of Montana before
eventually become a member of the staff of the Institute of Economics in Washington
starting in 1925 while writing several articles including “Labor movement in
France,” and “The Women’s Garment Workers.”
1884: Mrs. Mandelbaum, the “fence” who
disappeared from New York arrived at Oelan at three o’clock this afternoon with
a package of lace that she tried to sell to several local “rich people.”
1884(16th of Kislev, 5645): An
unidentified 5’9” Jew approximately 48 year in age committed suicide at 7 p.m.
when he shot himself while sitting on a bench near the Farragut monument.
1885(24th of Kislev, 5616): Kindle
the first Chanukah Candle
1885: Birthdate of New York City native and
CCNY graduate Nathaniel Altholz, the husband of “the former Gertrude Simpson,
with whom he had two children – Edgard and Helen – and the director of
commercial education in the New York City School System from 1929 to 1952.”
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1959/09/16/88821519.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0
1886(7th of Kislev, 5647) Parashat
Vayetzie
1886: Rabbi Leon Harrison who was installed
yesterday evening, is scheduled to lead Sabbath services this morning at The
Temple Israel “which claims to be the only unorthodox synagogue in this
city."
1887: In Lezajsk, Austria, Jane Drillman and
Schneier Fasten gave birth to CCNY undergrade and holders of a Ph.D. from the
University of Wisconsin, Professor Nathan Fasten, the husband of Frieda Mayer
and after many stops along the way, the Professor and head of department of
zoology and physiology at the Oregon Agricultural College starting in 1921 “who
wrote numerous articles on zoology, biology and physiology who also published ‘The
Jew in Science,’ ‘Where O Israel,’ and ‘The Attitude of Judaism Towards Modern
Science’.”
1888(30th of Kislev, 5649): Sixth
Day of Chanukah and Rosh Chodesh Tevet
1888: In Romania, the lower house of the
legislature defeated the bill which would have granted citizenship to
businessman, banker and philanthropist Jacob Noisotz.
1888: Aline Caroline, daughter of Gustave
Samuel de Rothschild and Sir Edward Albert Sassoon gave birth to Sir Philip Albert Gustave
David Sassoon, 3rd Baronet, the grandson of Albert Abdullah David Sassoon.
1888: In Brooklyn the weeklong fair that is a
fundraiser for the Hebrew Orphan Asylum is scheduled to come to an end this
evening.
1889: Commissioner Hermann von
Wissmann, the leading German official in East Africa met the Emin Pasha Relief
Expedition and took it to Bagamoyo where a banquet of welcome was held. Emin
Pasha was a Silesian born Jew named Isaac Edward Schnitzer who converted to
Christianity and then to Islam so that he could further his career in the
Ottoman Empire.
1889: In Nevada, MO, Alex S. and Rose
(Levy) Greditzer gave birth to Washington University Medical trained urologist
Harry G. Urologist who lived in University City, MO with his wife Rae Pereira
while pursuing a career in St. Louis that saw him serving as the assistant
urologist at the New Jewish Hospital and serving as an instructor at his alma
mater.
1889: In Johannesburg, Solomon Barnato
Joel and Ellen (Nellie) Ridley gave birth to Doris Irene Kathleen Joel the wife
of Arthur Walter.
1889: Members of a party of fifty Jews
passing through Pittsburgh on its way to Jerusalem would not comment on the
possible outcome of their “pilgrimage, saying that the future depends entirely
upon the laws of the country, concessions which may be secured” and the desire
for future settlement.
1890(22nd of Kislev, 5651):
Fifty-six-year-old Isaac Shapira, the husband of Beyla Shapira and the son of
Joshua Shapira passed away today in Petah Tikva.
1891: In Budapest, merchant Michael
Amar and Regina Strakosch, who came from North Macedonia. Gave birth to prize
winning violinist Licco Amar who was forced to flee to France when the Nazis
came to power before settling in Turkey.
1891: The Jaffa-Jerusalem Railway line reached Deir Aban
(today's Beit Shemesh) as it made its way from the seacoast to the City of
David.
1892: It was reported today that the Monetary
Conference at Brussels is debating the plan presented by Albert de Rothschild.
1892: It was reported today that Charles
Frohman will not be producing Lady Windermere’s Fan “the play of the season
last year in London and has transferred it to another production company.
1892: It was reported today that those Jews who
convert to Greek Orthodoxy in compliance with the Moscow Chamber of Commerce’s
requirement for them to be able to do business in the city “will still be
placed on probation for three years” and required to live in village five miles
from Moscow.
1892: Birthdate of Francisco Franco. Whatever
his other short-comings, Franco has a surprisingly positive record when it
comes to the Holocaust. For most of the
war, he did not close the border with France to escaping Jews. He did not return Jewish refugees to the
Nazis and allowed many of his foreign legations to provide letters of transit
making it possible for thousands to escape Hitler’s Henchmen.
1893(25th of Kislev, 5654): Chanukah
1893: It was reported today that Hebrew will be
one of the languages the Professor Hughes will be teaching at the University of
New York in a class “especially designed for missionaries intending to go to
Turkey.”
1893: It was reported today that the German
chancellor said that “anti-Semitism was the most dangerous form of Socialism”
because “while pretending to attack only Jewish capitalists, it would menace eventually
all capitalists.
1893: It was reported today that in Germany,
Dr. Foerster interrupted a debate on the budget “to say that Anti-Semitism is
not a passing phenomenon and would endure as long as the Hebrew race.”
1894: Alderman “Silver Dollar” Smith was
arrested between 2 or 3 o’clock this morning on charges that he had attacked a
saloonkeeper named August J. Gloisten. During his arraignment this morning
Smith said that he had been born in Germany at which time he was named Charles
Finkelstone. He got his nickname of “Silver Dollar” came from the fact that
1,000 silver dollar pieces were embeeded in the floor of his saloon at Essex
Street. “Silver Dollar” Smith was
Charles R. Solomon a Tammany Hall leader of the 10th District. His saloon “was one of the sites of operation
for the Eastman Gang, run by Jewish gang leader Monk Eastman…and a member of
the Max Hochstim Association, also known as the Essex Market Court Gang.”
Besides the silver dollars, Smith was known for hosting Passover celebrations
at the saloon.
1894: In New Orleans, Leo Levi of Galveston
delivered the annual oration “at today’s meeting of the American Hebrew
Congregations.
1894: “Among the passengers on the steamship
Spree which is due here today is the noted German anti-Semitic agitator Dr.
Ahlwardt of Berlin.”
1894: “Assaulted In Open Daylight” published
today described an attack by a group of boys who beat up Benjamin Rosenthal on
Fifth Avenue who hollered anti-Semitic epithets as they beat him.
1895: Birthdate of Syracuse, NY native Nathan
Wesley Markson, the husband of “Maybelle Grody Markson” and the father of Lois
and Audrey Markson who served as the “director of the Jewish Home for the
Aged.”
1895: Reverend Henry Yates Saterlee, who in
1903 delivered a sermon in which he said, “The Jews are preserving the home and family better than we
Christians are doing” and that while “I do not know how to account for this,
but I do know it to be fact” was elected to serve as the First Episcopal Bishop
of Washington.
1897: Today, at Temple Israel of Harlem, Rabbi
Maurice H. Harris delivered a sermon that responded to the negative sermon
delivered by Dr. Savage in which he attacked the “Old Testament” in general and
“the God of the Old Testament” in particular.
1897: The merit examination for the position of
official Supreme Court reporter in the First Judicial District, which requires
a fluency in “Hebrew jargon” is scheduled to be given today. (Hebrew jargon
refers to Yiddish)
1898: The Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Orphan
Asylum Band is scheduled to perform a fund raiser sponsored by the Ladies Aid
Society at the Lexington Avenue Opera House.
1899: Dr. Isaac M. Wise, President of the
Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati praised the late Baron Hirsch as ranking
“among the greatest philanthropists of the century equaled only by his wife
Baroness Hirsh. He did all the good one
millionaire could possible do, or ever did do, for the poor, neglected and
persecuted.” Wise was speaking in
support of plans to build a statue in New York honoring Baron Hirsch.
1899(2nd of Tevet, 5660): Eighth of
Chanukah, the end of the last celebration of the holiday during the 19th
century.
1899: In Silesia, elementary school teacher Westphalia
native future resident of Eretz Israel Simon Grunwald and Klara Ostheimer gave
birth to WW I veteran and holder of a doctorate from the University of Breslau Rabbi
Max Grünewald, the husband of Hedwig Horovitz, daughter of his teacher Saul
Horovitz and a practicing physician as
well as the mother of two sons who after the Nazis came to power eventually
settled in Millburn, NJ where he served as a rabbi for a quarter of a century and
ho co-founder and president of the Leo Beck Institute as well “chairman of the
American Federation of Jews from Central Europe from 1952 to 1962 and one of
the presidents of the Gustav Wurzweiler Foundation from 1954 to 1985.”
1899(2nd of Tevet, 5660): Seventy-three-year-old
Leopold Ullstein the founder and publisher of several successful German
newspapers, including B.Z. am Mittag and Berliner Morgenpost passed away
today. The Nazis would take over his
publishing empire in 1934 and his son Hermman Ullstein would flee the country
in December of 1938.
1900: Birthdate of Waldemar Levy Cardoso, the
Algerian-Moroccan Jew born in Rio de Jenerio who became a Field Marshall in the
Brazilian Army.
1900: Forty-seven-year-old Jacob Treiber, the
German born son of Morris Trieber and the former Blume Brodek was nominated “to
a seat on the United States District Court for the Eastern District of
Arkansas” by President McKinley.
1901: “The last Broadway production to be
staged in New York’s Lyceum of which Gustave Froman was one of the builders,
began its run.
1902: The “dean of the New York dance teachers”
Louis H. Chalif who was “ballet master of the Government Theatre in Odessa”
before coming to the U.S. in 1905 and founding the Chalif Normal of School
while raising six children – Edward, Selmer, Amos, Vitalis, Helen and Frances –
with his wife, former Sarah Katzhof of Odessa whom he married today.
https://timenote.info/en/Louis-Harvy-Chalif
1902(4th of Kislev, 5663): Eighty-one-year-old
Austrian Poet Heinrich Landesmann whose “first important literary production,
Abdul, the Mohammedan Faust legend, in five cantos” was completed in 1843 and
who was the brother-in-law of Berthold Auberbach, passed away today at Brno.
1903: Herzl reports in his diary: "The Russian members of
the A. C., particularly Usshiskin, Jacobson, etc. are in open rebellion."
1903: In New York, Rabbi M.H. Harris preached a
Friday night sermon on “Zionism and East Africa.”
1903(15th of Kislev, 5664):
Sixty-seven-year-old Alfred L. Cohen passed away today in London.
1903: Birthdate of New York native Aaron
Siskind, the schoolteacher turned documentary photographer.
http://m.theartstory.org/artist-siskind-aaron.htm
1904(26th of Kislev, 5665): Second
Day of Chanukah observed on the same day that Arthur Balfour, of “Balfour
Declaration” fame completed his services as Prime Minster of the United
Kingdom.
1904: In Jacksonville, FL, Clare Water Bernstein and Emil
Bernstein a partner in the “Stuart Bernstein Company which sold hats,
clothing and furnishing goods in the Benedict Building on 14 West Bay Street”
gave birth to decorated Naval Academy graduate Henry Emil Bernstein.
1905: “The New York Board of Jewish Ministers
and the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of the United States and Canada
have set aside” today “as a day of general mourning for the Jewish victims of
the massacres in Russia.”
1905: Rabbi Joseph Silverman, Rabbi F. de Sola
Mendes, Rabbi M.H. Harris, Rabbi Rudolph Grossman, Oscar S. Straus and Louis
Marshall are scheduled to speak tonight at the memorial service being held at
Temple Emanu-El.
1905: Rabbi Samuel Greenfield, Rabbi Henry S.
Morais and Albert Lucas are scheduled to speak at tonight’s memorial service at
Congregation Mount Zion on East 113th Street.
1905: Rabbis Joseph M. Asher, Bernard Drachman
and M.M. Kaplan are scheduled to speak at the memorial service at Congregation
Kehilath Jeshurun on East 85th Street.
1905: The Cantors’ Association of Mount Zion
Congregation and Congregation Mickveh Israel are scheduled to take part in
services held to honor the Jews who have been murdered in Russia.
1905: Rabbis Phillip Klein, H. Periera Mendes,
Harris Maslinasky and Isidor Herschield are scheduled to speak at the memorial
service being held at Congregation Ohav Zedek on Norfolk Street.
1905: The parade organized by the Jewish
Defense Association in memory of the Jews murdered in Odessa is scheduled to
start at noon today with Joseph Barondess serving as Marshall.
1905: Services memorializing the Jews who have
perished in the Russian Massacres are scheduled to take place this afternoon
and this evening at several locations on the Lower East Side.
1905: In Camden, NJ, Rabbi Gordon of
Philadelphia and William spoke at the memorial services “for the murdered Jews
of Russia” being held at the Synagogue of the Sons of Israel.
1905: Because the reports of the massacres of
the Jews Russia have underestimated the suffering of their co-religionists,
those attending a meeting a Temple Emanu-El tonight decided to issue an appeal
for an additional million dollars in aid to go along with the one million
dollars already raised.
1906: Birthdate of Manchester, UK native Sir
Maurice Pariser, the Solicitor, WW II veteran and Laborite member of the
Manchester City who was vice president of the Institute of the Jewish Studies
and Knighted in 1965.
1906: It was reported today that while the
Educational Alliance “contemplated a loss of $15,575 for the coming year,” it’s
Women’s Auxiliary “had been able to return $3, 500 from its funds.
1907(28th of Kislev, 5668): Fourth
Day of Chanukah
1907: It was reported today that Professor
Franklin Giddings of Columbia had told a group attending a lecture at the
People’s Institute in Cooper Union that he favors “the recent movement by the
Jews to keep Christian ceremonies out of the public schools” and that while “he
favored the Zionist movement, he feared that could not be made attractive to
the Jews to be successful.
1908: Birthdate of Alfred Hershey, an American biologist who,
along with Max Delbrück and Salvador Luria, won the Nobel Prize for Physiology
or Medicine in 1969. The prize was given for research done on viruses that
infect bacteria. This was the famous "blender experiment" (1956).
Hershey used an isotope- labeled phage to infect a bacterial colony and begin
to inject their genetic material into the host cells. Then he whirred them in a
blender to tear the phage particles from the bacterial walls without rupturing
the bacteria. Upon examining the bacteria, Hershey found that only phage
1908: “Report Jews’ Land Seized” published
today reported that the Government of Ekaternoslav, a province in Russia has
confiscated the farm land which Jews who were moving to Argentina had sold to
their co-religionist in violation of the land law passed in 1840.
1909(21st of Kislev, 5670) Parashat
Vayeshev
1909(21st of Kislev, 5670): Sixty-seven-year-old
Italian attorney and political leader who was the first Jewish Prime Minister
of Italy passed away today.
1910: The
New York Times features a review of The Life of Benjamin Disraeli: The
Earl of Beaconsfield by William Money.
This is the first volume of a multi-volume work covering the years 1804
through 1837. The book sold for three
dollars.
1910: In Chester, PA, Russian Jewish immigrants
Jesse North, a blacksmith and Baila North, a grocery store owner gave birth to
WW II veteran Isadore Soifer who gained famed as Alex North, the often Oscar
nominated composer who wrote scores for such films as Spartacus and “A
Streetcar Named Desire.”
1911: The trial of the owner’s Triangle Waist
Company, Max Blanck and Issac Harris who were represented by Max Steuer on
charges of First and Second Degree Manslaughter began today.
1911: Today, In Barbrowitz, Russia Isaac and
Hannah Eidelman gave birth to Youngstown, OH businessman Morris M. Eidelman who
came to the United States in 1891, became a cotton spinner at mills in New
Jersey and Connecticut before opening a meat market in Youngstown married Frume
Stern the mother of their two children Harold and Pearl while living the life
of an observant Jew who “performs his prayers three times a day” and belongs to
B’nai B’rith and Congregation Emanu El
1912(24th of Kislev, 5673): In the
evening, kindle the first Chanukah light
1912: Birthdate of Brooklyn native Edward
Fields, the Manhattan rug designer and manufacturer.
1912: Fifty-year old Archibald Gracie IV, the
last survivor to leave the Titanic who spent much of his time on the cruise
discussing the Civil War with Isidor Strauss passed away today.
1912: Jacob A. Cantor of New York City was a
delegate to the Ninth Convention of Rivers and Harbors Congress opening today
in Washington, DC.
1912:
Birthdate of David Amato, second son of Abraham Amato and father of Leah Amato
Franco. A graduate of George Washington University, Amato had a
successful career the U.S. Department of Labor and the National Board
before accepting a position with the American diplomatic corps to help the
Mexican government in the field of vocational rehabilitation.
1913: Birthdate of Mark Robson the Montreal native who
began his career as an editor in Citizen Kane and went on to direct thirty-four
films including two war movies with a strange twist – The Bridges at Toko-Ri
and Von Ryan’s Express.
1913: Birthdate of journalist Jesse Zel Lurie who wrote for
the Palestine Post and the Jerusalem Post before spending 35 years as the
editor of Hadassah Magazine “turning it from an 8 page newsletter into a
nationally known Jewish” publication.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/jesse-lurie-longtime-hadassah-magazine-editor-dies-at-103/
1914: U.S. State Department informs American Jewish
Committee that it will not expel Russian Jews who sought refuge in Turkey, but
will permit them to become naturalized citizens.
1914: According to a report supplied by “Dr. Arthur Levy, a
rabbi serving with the German Army,” this evening during Friday evening Sabbath
services, the Russian “Governor appeared in Petrikau (Piortikow) with the
police, ordered that the Scrolls of the Law be removed from the Holy Ark, and
the Ark be searched for secret telephones which the Jews were charged with
hiding there.”
1914: “Victim of Yellow Journalism” published today
provided the views of the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle of the case of Leo
M. Frank of which it said “the state of public feeling being what it was he
never had a chance for a fair trial. His
case was for all practical purposes tried in the newspapers anda verdict of
guilty assured before the first witness was sworn.”
1914: “In Glescow, 150 Jews were arrested as spies and
dragged to Warsaw” by Russian authorities.
1915: It was reported today that “a new Jewish theological
seminary” which will train Orthodox rabbis, making it the first of its kind in
the United States will be opening in Manhattan.
1915: Lt. Hugo Gutmann was awarded the Iron Cross 1st
Class today.
1915(27th of Kislev, 5676): Third Day of
Chanukah; Parashat Miketz
1915(27th of Kislev, 5676): Fifty-five-year-old
New York political leader Andrew Freedman passed away today.
1915: In Bayonne, NJ, The Bayonne Zionist is scheduled to
hold a Chanukah Ball this evening at the Bayonne Opera House Hall, “the
proceeds of which will be used to build up the Zionist library.
1916: It was reported today that an additional $2,500 has
been raised “for further work at the Hebrew National Orphan House” on Seventh
Street with an annex on St. Mark’s Place.
1916: In New York, architect Ely Jacques Kahn and his wife
gave birth to Harvard educated writer Ely Jacques Kahn whose first byline
appeared in the New Yorker for 1937 and would run for five decades and who was
the husband of Eleanor Munro and the sister of mystery editor Joan Kahn.
1916: Judge Julian W. Mack’s description of the success
enjoyed by the Federation plan used by the Jewish community in Chicago for the
last 17 years was published today.
1917: British forces under General Allenby “launched an
assault on Turkish positions all around Jerusalem.”
1917: Birthdate of Olympic fencing champion Daniel Bukantz,
the decorated WW II combat veteran who also had a successful career as a
dentist and who was one the five members on the U.S. foil team at the 1956
Olympics which was made up entirely of Jews
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/31/sports/olympics/31bukantz.html
1917: The Jewish Ministers’ Association of American which
was organized in March and is led by President Aaron Yudelowitz of Boston held
the opening session of its first annual convention in New York City.
1917: A total of $389, 941.50 was raised today on the
“second day of the campaign to raise five million dollars for Jewish war relief
and welfare work in the army and navy” meaning that in just two days, the
campaign had raised $1,509,910.00.
1917: Today, while addressing “an assembly of Orthodox
rabbis at the convention of the Jewish Minister’s Association of America the
Young Men’s Hebrew Association Building, Nathan Strauss “condemned a resolution
adopted by the rabbis in which they had expressed their gratitude to the
British Government for ‘publicly declaring its sympathy with the Zionist
movement and pledging itself to use it best endeavors to facilitate the
establishment of a Jewish homeland in Palestine” because he feared that “any Zionist
agitation at the present time would tend to stimulate antagonism against Jews
in any of the enemy countries” i.e. Germany and the Ottoman Empire
1917(19th of Kislev, 5678): Seventy-one-year-old Rabbi
Jacob David Kallen passed away in Roxbury, MA.
1918: In Atlantic City, NJ, Rhea and Alfred Ettigner, 2
immigrant Jews, gave birth to Robert Chester Wilson Ettinger, a science fiction
writer and physics instructor whose idea of freezing the dead for future
reanimation repelled most scientists…and persuaded at least 105 game humans to
pay $28,000 each to have their bodies preserved in liquid nitrogen at his
Cryonics Institute in suburban Detroit…” (As reported by Paul Vitello)
1918: Birthdate of Milton Charles Calechman, the “brother
of Harold Calechman.”
1919(12th of Kislev, 5680): In Chicago, Paul
Bittermann, the husband of Jessie Bitterman and the father of Pauline and
Dorothy Bitterman passed away today.
1920(23rd of Kislev, 5681): Parashat Vayeshev
1920: “The Palestine Department of Antiquities, which has
charge of the exploration work being carried out in the city of Ashkelon
announces the discovery of some huge marble pillars and statutes says a
dispatch from Jerusalem today.”
1921: It was reported today that Dr. Maurice H. Harris who
has been the rabbi at Temple Israel for forty years of the fifty-year-old
congregation said that he hoped his desire to see the new building fully paid
for would not be seen as a lack of humility on his part but rather as what he
would consider “the crowning glory” of his four decades of service.
1922: Birthdate of Isaac Neuman, the native of Zdunska
Wola, Poland who survived the Holocaust who served as the rabbi at Sinai Temple
in Champaign, Illinois and served as “spiritual leader for the Jewish community
for 40 years.
1922(14th of Kislev, 5683): Centenarian Abraham Manning
“the oldest Jewish resident of” Utica New York and a 25 year veteran of “the
Russian Army” who “gained the unusual distinction of being made a member of the
Russian Emperor’s body guard” passed away today.
1923(26th of Kislev, 5684): Second Day of
Chanukah
1923(26th of Kislev, 5684: Sixty-eight-year-old
Rachel Cardozo, the unmarried daughter
of Sarah Moor Paixotto and Abraham Hart Cardozo passed away today after
which she was buried at the Beth Olom Cemetery in Ridgewood, NY.
1923: Sixty-one-year-old anti-Semitic journalist
August-Maurice Barres who wrote “That Dreyfus is guilty I deduce not from the
facts themselves but from his race” passed away today.
1923: Premiere of Cecil B DeMille’s original version of the
"Ten Commandments."
1923: The Eveready Hour, which starred Nathaniel Shilkret
as the conductor premiered today.
1924: “I’ll See You in My Dreams,” a popular song with
lyrics by Gus Kahn was recorded today.
1924: “Greed” a silent film directed and co-produced by
Erich von Stroheim who also co-authored the script and also co-produced by
Irving Thalberg was released in the United States today.
1924: In the Bronx, “Harry Weinberg and Helen Jordon
Weinberg” gave birth to Melvin Weinberg, the conman who was a key player in the
Abscam Scandal. (As reported by Robert D. McFadden)
1925(17th of Kislev, 5686): One day before his
104th birthday, Aaron Rochinger who had been a resident of the
Brooklyn Hebrew Home and Hospital for the last 11 years and who was the father
of two surviving daughters, Mrs. Jennie Wudendahl and Mrs. Gussie Rochlinger,
passed away today.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1925/12/05/98843277.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0
1925: It was reported today that Mary C. Van Cott who had
died on November 19 left a bequest of $1,000 to the Hebrew Orphan Asylum
1925(17th of Kislev, 5686): Polish born peddler
Harry Miller, husband of Raizel Miller and the father of Sarah Miller Fishbein
and the father-in-law of Louis Fishbein passed away today after which he was
buried at the Agudath Achim Cemetery in Woburn, MA.
1926: Einstein sent Max Born a letter today in which he
said, Quantum mechanics is certainly imposing. But an inner voice tells me that
it is not yet the real thing. The theory says a lot, but does not really bring
us any closer to the secret of the 'old one'. I, at any rate, am convinced that
He is not playing at dice” (This is often paraphrased as “God does not play
dice)
1927: Birthdate of John McCandlish Phillips Jr, The New York Times reporter who wrote
one of the most famous articles in the newspaper’s history — exposing the
Orthodox Jewish background of a senior Ku Klux Klan official, Daniel Burros.
(As reported by Margalit Fox)
1927: In Poughkeepsie, NY, “Philip Morowitz, a newspaper
and magazine distributor, and the former Anna Levine” gave birth to
biophysicist Harold Joseph Morowitz. (As reported by Sam Roberts)
1927: Birthdate of Parisian native Leo Narva who was
shipped to Auschwitz in 1943.
1928, Goldman Sachs launched the Goldman Sachs Trading
Corp. a closed-end fund with characteristics similar to that of a Ponzi scheme.
“The fund failed as a result of the Stock Market Crash of 1929, hurting the
firm's reputation for several years afterward.
1928: Walter
Donaldson and Gus Kahn's musical "Whoopee" premiered in New
York. Kahn was one of a number of Jewish
lyricists who created hit songs for Broadway and Hollywood
1928: Members of "Kvuzat HaHugim" and
members of "Tnuat HaMahanot HaOlim" from Haifa and Jerusalem founded
Beit HaShita, the kibbutz named after the biblical town of the same name, where the Midianites fled
after being beaten by Gideon. Eleven
members of this idyllic Jewish community were killed during the Yom Kippur War
meaning it lost “the largest number as a percentage of the population than any
other community in Israel.”
1929: It was announced
today that “The annual Who's Who issue of the American Hebrew, which will
appear tomorrow, will include four Christians among those listed as having
performed outstanding work for the Jewish people in 1929 and will account for
public benefactions by Jews amounting to about $51,000,000 this year…”
1929: In Winnipeg, Manitoba, Jesse Judah
Oppenheimer, the Vancouver born son of Cecilia and August Isaac Oppenheimer
gave birth to Lawrence Edwin Oppenheimer
1929: Dr. Berkovitch, “a prominent member of
the Hadassah physicians’ group” who “is the sixth Jewish physician wounded
since the riots in August” ais reported to be in serious condition after having
been “fired upon” yesterday “by Arabs.”
1930: “Charging that Jews
are being discriminated against in the granting of permits for sacramental
wine, rabbis representing virtually all the orthodox Jewish congregations in
New York today asked for a revision of the present system of distribution.”
1930: It was reported
today that after a wedding trip to Europe the former Barbara Wechsler Schiff
and Mason Mack will live in New York.
1930: Today Eddie Cantor
is appearing in Flo Ziegfeld and Sam Goldwyn’s “Whoopee’ at the Loew’s Wonder
Theatres
1931(24th of
Kislev, 5692): Kindle the first Chanukah Candle
1931: It was reported
today that annual “Who’ Who” list selected by the American Hebrew that listed
127 New Yorkers included Alfred Goldsmith, Carl Laemmle and Louis Weitzenkorn
from the Motion Picture Industry and Musicians and Composers, Jerome Kern, Yehudi
Menuhin and George Gershwin.
1931: Montefiore Kahn was
indicted today “on a charge of embezzlement of $100,000 from Oil Shares, Inc.
of Jersey City of which he was vice president.
1932(5th of
Kislev, 5693): Eighty-year-old “Spanish physician and
liberal politician” Angel Pulido Fernandez who “vowed to rebuild the links
between and the Sephardi Jews, descendant of those expelled from the Iberian
Peninsula in the late 15th century” and who “coined the expression españoles sin
patria (Spaniards without a homeland) to refer to Sephardi” passed away today.
1932: “Flying Gold,” a
crime film directed by Steve Sekely who moved to Hollywood to escape the rise
of fascism in his native country, was released today in Hungary.
1933(15th of Kislev, 5694): Emile Meyerson
passed away. Born in 1859, Meyerson was
Polish-born French chemist and philosopher of science whose concepts of
rational understanding based on realism and causalism were popular among
scientific theorists in the 1930s. An anti-positivist, he argued, for example
in Identity and Reality (1908) that scientific knowledge attempts to reach
beyond mere descriptive and predictive laws to an understanding of the nature
of the reality beyond appearances. The human mind seeks the permanent behind
phenomenal change, the identity within diversity as exemplified in conservation
laws, such as the law of inertia and the law of conservation of energy. And yet
this identity which our reason apprehends (or perhaps constructs) cannot
embrace the totality of reality, for there is also change.
1934(27th of Kislev, 5695): Third
Day of Chanukah
1934(27th of Kislev, 5695): Simon
Pincus who as a nineteen-year-old was shot in the right leg at the Battle of
Fredericksburg which resulted in the amputation of his leg in 1930 passed away
today.
1935: “With the implementation of the Nuremberg
Laws,” eighty-five-year-old historian Ernst Bernheim lost his German
citizenship today.
1936: The
Palestine Post reported on the daily work of the Peel Commission and
included the rumor that one or two of the Commissioners were starting to feel
the pressure of their continuous and
arduous work.
1936: “A list of 650 legal books by Jewish
authors which are to be removed from all libraries in Germany and boycotted in
the future has been withdrawn” because “several authors listed as Jews were
found to be members of the National Socialist party” and “many writers who are
really Jewish were not included.”
1937: In Norwich, CN, Asher and Annette Libo
gave birth to Kenneth Harold Libo “a historian of Jewish immigration who, as a
graduate student working for Irving Howe in the 1960s and ’70s, unearthed
historical documentation that informed and shaped “World of Our Fathers,” Mr.
Howe’s landmark 1976 history of the East European Jewish migration to America”
(As reported by Paul Vitello)
1938(11th of Kislev, 5699):
Fifty-three-year-old Morton James Luchs, the son of Fanny and Joseph Luch, the
husband of Ernestine Luchs and father of Frank Joseph Luchs who 1906 was the
co-founder of Shannon and Luchs one of the leading real estate firms in the Washington
metropolitan area in the 20th century passed away today.
1938: Ghalib Budairi, a member of a prominent
Arab family was found by British troops tonight lying wounded on a street in
Jaffa, the apparent victim of Arabs who, as part of their uprising, have been
attacking Jews, Englishman and Arabs who are not supporting their efforts.
1938: Father Charles Coughlin gave a national radio address in
which he attacked the "Jewish international banking houses." (As
reported by Austin Cline)
1938: Tehilla Lichtenstein first took the
pulpit as the leader of the Society of Jewish Science in New York City, giving
a sermon entitled “The Power of Thought.”
1939: In Washington, DC, “the creation of an
army of 200,000 Jews to be recruited in the United States, Palestine and other
countries was urged tonight in a series of resolutions adopted at a conference
called by Dr. Samuel Harden Church president of the Carnegie Institute and
chairman of the new committee for a Jewish Army.”
1940: August Marian Kowalczyk was arrested today while trying to
cross the border with Czechoslovakia so he could join the Polish Army in France
and sent to Auschwitz. (He would become the last survivor of the breakout
attempt from that camp in June of 1942.
1941: Nazi ordinances placed the Jews of Poland
outside protection of courts
1941: Himmler issued strict instructions to
Frederich Jeckeln that no mass murders of deported German Jews were to occur
without his express orders: "The Jews deported into the territory of the
Ostland are to be dealt with only according to the guideline given by me and
the Reich Security Main Office acting on my behalf. I will punish unilateral
acts and violations.
1941: Betty Warner, the daughter of movie mogul
Harry Warner and Milton Sperling gave birth to their first child Susan, today.
1942(25th of Kislev, 5703): Chanukah
1942(25th of Kislev, 5703): Fifty-nine-year-old
Austrian “librettist, lyricist and writer” Fritz Löhner-Beda was murdered in
Auschwitz III Monowitz concentration camp
http://holocaustmusic.ort.org/places/camps/central-europe/buchenwald/lhner-bedafritz/
1942: During the Holocaust, two Christian
women, Zofia Kossak and Wanda Filipowicz risked their lives by setting up the Council for the Assistance of the Jews in
Warsaw.
1942: “Thunder Rock” a movie version of the
1939 play of the same name featuring Lilli Palmer with music by Mutz Greenbaum
was released today in the United Kingdom today.
1943: During World War II, in Yugoslavia,
resistance leader Marshal Tito proclaims a provisional democratic Yugoslav
government in-exile. Originally there had been two resistance movements in
Yugoslavia – Tito’s which was multi-ethnic and included Jewish partisans and
the Chetniks, led by a Serbian named Draza Mihailovich who would become an ally
of the Axis and a practitioner of ethnic cleansing.
1943: In Manhattan, the former Bernice Landau
and her husband, both of whom were “Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe” gave
birth to Paul Jonathan Novograd the last owner of New York’s Claremont Riding
Academy.
1943: Star and Garter a 1942 American musical revue starring
comedian produced by Mike Todd which opened at Broadway's Music Box Theatre closed
today after 609 performances.
1944: The Kasztner transport carrying 1,361
Jews left Bergen Belsen heading for the Swiss border. For more see Gaylen Ross’
“Killing Kasztner” http://www.killingkasztner.com/
1945: By a vote of 65 to 7, the United States
Senate approves United States participation in the United Nations. This was a sign that the United States would
not retreat into Isolationism as it had at the end of World War I. More importantly, by joining the UN, the
United States was able to support measures that ended the British Mandate in
Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel.
1945(29th of Kislev, 5706): Forty-seven-year-old
Philadelphia born lawyer Sylvan Hobson Hirsch, the holder of BS in economic
from the University of Pennsylvania where he was the head cheerleader in 1919
who was a member of the USNR and the husband of Ruth Bulter, the daughter of
Mr. and Mrs. Hyman Henry Butler passed away today.
1946: Guy M. Gillette, the former U.S. Senator
from Iowa who is president of the pro-Zionist American League for a Free
Palestine, denied charges by Rabbi Judah Magnes that “A Flag Is Born,” a play
sponsored by the league, “makes an open appeal for funds for the purchase of
arms for terrorist groups in Palestine.”
Gillette insisted that all funds raised by the Ben Hecht play go the
Reparation Fund chaired by Hecht, Will Rogers, Jr. and Louis Bromfield.
1947: “The Judges' Trial ended in Nuremberg”
with “10 of the 15 German jurists and lawyers on trial being found guilty of
Nazi war crimes and given prison sentences of varying lengths, including life
for four of them.”
1947: “The Egyptian government banned public
demonstrations in Cairo after police clashed with 15,000 marchers protesting
against the partition of Palestine.”
1948: The UN General Assembly Political and Security Committee
passes a British-Canadian plan for a council commission on Palestine to
negotiate a final peace settlement. The plan calls for (1) commission members
to be appointed by Big Five; (2) an international Jerusalem; (3) a small UN
guard to protect commission; and (4) aid to refugees. (The plan will be dead on
arrival since it does not recognize the realities on the ground and the
continued unwillingness of the Arabs to accept the creation of the Jewish
state,)
1949(13th
of Kislev, 5710): Seventy-four-year-old English born David D. Doniger, the
founder and President of David D. Doniger & Co, manufacturers of McGregor
Sportswear and a co-founder of ZOA who with his wife Florence raised two sons a
daughter passed away today.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1949/12/05/85658494.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0
1949: “Aubrey S. Eban, permanent delegate of
Israeli to the United Nations, declared today that the economy of Israel was
basically sound, otherwise it never could have sustained the simultaneous
burdens of military defense and mass immigration.
1949: In Norwalk, CT, Barbara Freedman Berg and
Dick Berg gave birth to Pulitzer Prize winning biographer Andrew Scott Berg.
1950(25th of Kislev, 5711): Chanukah
1950(25th of Kislev, 5711):
Eighty-one-year-old Edward Aaron, the Illinois born sone of Bennett and Minnie
Lewin, the husband of Annie Boas Aaron with whom he had two children, Bernice
and Rheta and the President and Chairman of the Board for Edward Aaron Corporation
which operated a poultry plant in Lamar, MO passed away today in Kansas City,
MO after which he was buried in the Rose Hill Cemetery
1950: In Passaic, New Jersey, Morris Goldberger
and Edna Kronman gave birth to architect and Vanity Fair editor Paul Goldberger the Pulitzer Prize winner who is
the husband of Rutgers University trained attorney “Susan L. Solomon, the
co-founder of the New York Stem Cell Foundation.”
1951: Having survived the ghetto in Kielce,
Auschwitz and Sachsenhausen, seventeen year old Thomas Buergenthal “emigrated
from Germany to the United States” today where he pursued a legal education
which led to him serving as a Judge of the International Court of Justice from
2000 to 2010.
1951: Aaron Copland’s “Pied Piper," premieres in New York City.
1952: “Two’s Company” a musical revue with
lyrics by Sammy Cahn, directed by Jules Dassin and choreographed by Jerome
Robbins did not open on Broadway as scheduled due to the illness of one of the
leading stars.
1952: “Million Dollar Mermaid” a biopic
directed by Mervyn LeRoy was released in the United States today by MGM.
1952: The
Jerusalem Post reported that the cabinet approved the resignation of
Lt.-Gen Yigael Yadin, the second chief of General Staff, and appointed
Maj.-Gen. Mordechai Makleff as his successor. Yigael Yadin was one of those
amazing figures who helped to form Israel in the early days of the Jewish
state. A sabra, born in 1917, Yadin was the son of the famed Eliezer
Sukenik of Dead Scrolls fame. Just prior to, and during the War for
Independence, Yadin was the acting chief of staff of the Jewish military forces.
After the war he was the first chief of staff of the IDF and created the mold
for the military that is followed to this day. After leaving the
military, Yadin pursued a career in archaeology which was so successful that
almost overshadowed his military successes. He passed away in 1984.
1953: Eighty year old Russian born NYU Law
School graduate Alice Petluck, “the first woman lawyer to practice in the
Federal District Court in the Southern District of New York and the first of
her sex to argue a case in the Appellate Division, First Department who
co-founded the Bronx Women’s Bar Association after the Bronx Bar Associated
rejected her “because she was a woman and who was the husband of Dr. Joseph
Petluck with whom she had three children – Charles, Ann and Robert – all of
whom became lawyers passed away today.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1953/12/11/92769131.pdf
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/petluck-alice-s
1955(19th of Kislev, 5716):
Seventy-one-year-old banker Benedict Joseph Lazar passed away today.
1955: Announcement of the engagement of Ruth
Frances Ephriam, the daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Alfred J. Ephriam to Peter
Charles Freudenthal, the son of Mr. and Mrs. David Freudenthal
1956(30th of Kislev, 5717) Rosh
Chodesh Tevet; Sixth Day of Chanukah
1956(30th of Kislev, 5717):
Eighty-four-year-old Charles Garfunkel, the husband of Lina Adler Garfunkel and
the father of Sylvan and Benjamin Garfunkel passed away today.
1956: A month after opening on Broadway at the
Majestic Theatre, “Fanny” a musical with lyrics and music by Harold Rome and a
book co-authored by S.N. Behrman transferred to the Belasco Theatre.
1958(22nd of Kislev, 5719): Fifty-nine-year-old
Charles “Charley” Horne, the Spitalfields born son of Etta-Tsivya Levin and
Avram Gorn, the husband of Eva Levy whom he married at the Dukes Place Synagogue
in Lond and the father of Patricia and Sandra Horne who during WW I serving
with D Company, 38th Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers passed away
today at the Central Middlesex Hospital in London.
1959: Today, CBS broadcast “Judgment Night,’ the
tenth episode of Rod Serling’s “Twilight Zone,” featuring a guest appearance by
Nehemiah Persoff
1959: “The Stranglers of Bombay” a horror movie
written by David Zelag Goodman was released today in the United Kingdom.
1960(15th of Kislev, 5721):
Seventy-four-year-old Austrian born City College alum and WW I Army veteran
Jacob Field “a tax consultant, former I.R.S. revenue officer” and “regional
director of the American Joint Distribution Committee in Minsk” who was the
husband of “Mrs. Minna Field, the author of Patients Are People: A
Medical-Social Approach to Prolonged Illness passed away today.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1960/12/05/99827816.pdf
1960(15th of Kislev, 5721): Fifty-seven-year-old
composer and conductor Walter Goehr who was forced to leave Germany, like so
many of his contemporaries because he was Jewish passed away today “in City
Hall, Sheffield, United Kingdom, today immediately after conducting a
performance of Handel's Messiah.”
http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Bio/Goehr-Walter.htm
1961(26th of Kislev, 5722): Second
Day of Chanukah
1965(10th of Kislev, 5726) Parashat
Vayetzei
1965(10th of Kislev, 5726):Sixty-nine-year-old
Rose Pesotta (was an anarchist, feminist labor organizer and vice president
within the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union succumbed to cancer
today.
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/pesotta-rose
1967(2nd of Kislev, 5728) Ninety-year-old
Columbia graduate and American diplomat Lewis Einstein, the New York born son
of the former Caroline Fatman and “wool magnate David Lewis” who counted Judah
P. Benjamin among his relatives passed away today.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1967/12/05/82164138.pdf
1967(2nd of Kislev, 5728): Seventy-two-year-old
Bert Lahr, the New York City born son of German Jewish immigrants Augusta and
Jacob Lahrheim and actor best known for his role the Cowardly Lion from “The
Wizard of Oz” passed away today while filming “The Night They Raided Minsky’s.”
1968: “Where Eagles Dare” the film version of
the novel produced by Elliot Kastner and Jerry Gershwin was released today in
the United Kingdom.
1969(24th of Kislev, 5730): First
Channukah light is kindled for the first time during the Presidency of Richard Nixon.
1970: “The Garden of the Finzi-Continis” a film
version of the novel by the same name produced by Arthur Cohn and Artur Brauner
was released today in Italy.
1971: Birthdate of American screenwriter and
producer Adam Horwoitz, creator of the “ABC fantasy series “Once Upon a Time.”
1971: Today, in honor of Sol Hurok’s “influence
on American music…he was awarded the University of Pennsylvania Glee Club Award
of Merit.
1972(28th of Kislev, 5733): Fourth
Day of Chanukah
1972(28th of Kislev, 5733):
Seventy-seven-year-old Israeli political leader Kadish Luz passed away at
Degania Bet.
1973: Funeral services are scheduled to be held
today at Temple Emanu-El for seventy-year-old “apparel manufacturer” Irving
Geist whose philanthropic activities were of such a magnitude he was awarded
the Medal of Merit by President Truman.
1974: Birthdate of Irish cricketer Jason Molins
the Dublin native who is a right-handed batsman
1975(29th of Kislev,
5736): Hannah Arendt passed away.
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07/07/misreading-hannah-arendts-eichmann-in-jerusalem/
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/arendt.html
1976(12th
of Kislev, 5737): Parashat Vayetzei
1976(12 of Kislev,
5737): Sixty-four-year-old Brooklyn born, New York Medical College graduate Dr.
Irving Innerfield, “research professor of medicine at New York Medical College
and a pioneer in the medical field of inflammation” and husband of “the former
Jean Pozefsky” with whom he raised four children passed away today.
1976: In Israel,
“three young Palestinian killed themselves while building a bomb.”
1976: In New York
City, novelist Fred Waitzkin, the author of Searching for Bobby Fischer: The
Father of a Prodigy Observes the World of Chess and his wife gave birth to
chess prodigy Joshua Waitzkin.
1977(24th
of Kislev, 5738): Light the first Channukah candle
1977: Neil Simon's "Chapter Two" premiered
in New York City.
1977: The Jerusalem Post reported that
President Anwar Sadat and the Egyptian government were disappointed by what
they regarded as an insufficiently forthcoming Israeli response to Sadat's
historic visit to Jerusalem. Sadat was reported to be still expecting a
'dramatic' Israeli concession at the planned Cairo meeting which he hoped would
advance the success of the reconvened Geneva peace conference. Prime Minister
Menachem Begin arrived in Britain for a five-day official visit 'to renew the
covenant signed by the British people and the Jewish people 60 years earlier on
that unforgettable Lord Balfour Day, of November 2, 1917.'
1977: After 22 performances the curtain came
down on Uncommon Women and Others the first play by Wendy Wasserstein.
1978: Dianne Feinstein is named the 1st female mayor
of San Francisco.
1978(4th of Kislev, 5739): Samuel Abraham Goldsmith passed
away. Born in 1902, Goldsmith was a Dutch-born
U.S. physicist who, with George E. Uhlenbeck, a fellow graduate student at the
University of Leiden, Netherlands, formulated (1925) the concept of electron
spin. It led to recognition that spin was a property of protons, neutrons, and
most elementary particles and to a fundamental change in the mathematical
structure of quantum mechanics. Goldsmith also made the first measurement of
nuclear spin and its Zeeman Effect with Ernst Back (1926-27), developed a
theory of hyperfine structure of spectral lines, made the first spectroscopic
determination of nuclear magnetic moments (1931-33), contributed to the theory
of complex atoms and the theory of multiple scattering of electrons, and
invented the magnetic time-of-flight mass spectrometer (1948).
1981: “Reds” with a historical film that
included a portrayal of Julius Gerber, the Russian born American Socialist, and
with music by Stephen Sondheim was released today in the United States
1982(18th of Kislev, 5743): Parshat
Vayishlach
1982(18th of Kislev, 5743): Eighty-one-year-old
Harry Mordecai Freedman, the Russian born son of Barnett Freedman and Beila
Henah and husband of Rebecca Ginsberg who served as a rabbi in the United
Kingdom, Australia and the United States while establishing a reputation as a
great Hebrew scholar passed away today in Melbourne.
http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/freedman-harry-mordecai-12510
1983(28th of Kislev, 5744): Fourth
Day of Channukah
1983: “Baby” the David Shire musical opened on
Broadway today at the Ethel Barrymore Family.
1983:
The Anatomy Lesson by Philip
Roth, The Price of Power by Seymour M. Hersh and The Rosenberg File by Ronald Radosh are among the twelve
books chosen by the New York Times Book
Review as the best books published in the country during the preceding year.
1985: “Les Misérables” a musical version of the
French novel with lyrics and book by Alain Boublil “transferred to the West
End’s Palace Theatre” today where it became “the longest-running musical in
West End history.
1986: Neil Simon's "Broadway Bound"
premiered in New York.
1988(25th of Kislev, 5749): The First Day of
Chanukah; in the evening, kindle the second light
1988: The five Soviet citizens involved in the
hijacking of an Aeroflot plane to Israel on Friday were sent back to the Soviet
Union today in two Soviet planes.
1988: Israel's stock market in Tel Aviv was hit
by a 24-hour strike by employees today, and share trading was halted. Israeli
news reports said the market was expected to reopen today. The strike was
called after contract negotiations stalled over who would arbitrate a dispute
about seniority benefits, the Haaretz daily said.
1989: Today, The Baltimore Evening Sun
published excerpts from the “previously secret diary” of H.L. Mencken in which
he “discloses virulent anti-Semitism, racism and pro-Nazi leanings…”
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1989-12-05-mn-198-story.html
1990(17th of Kislev, 5751):
Sixty-eight-year-old Hungarian born and survivor of Auschwitz and Buchenwald
Eugen “John” Heimler who after the communists took over his native land escaped
to England “where he trained as a psychiatric social work,” eventually became Professor
of Human Social Functioning in Calgary while writing several tomes including Night
of the Mist that describe his survival of the Holocaust.
1990: An Israeli military court sentenced 12
Palestinian guerrillas today to 30 years in prison for a foiled seaborne raid
in May that prompted Washington to sever its contacts with the Palestine
Liberation Organization. Israeli forces killed 4 Palestinians and captured 12
in the attempted speedboat raid on beaches near Tel Aviv. The captured men were
convicted last month of membership in a terrorist group, illegal possession of
arms and attempted murder. The Palestine Liberation Front, a P.L.O. faction led
by Abul Abbas, was behind the assault.
1992: One day after winning a special election
Diane Feinstein began serving as California’s first female U.S. Senator.
1993: Daniel Schorr delivered the eulogy for
the late composer Frank Zappa today on NPR.
1993: Talal al-Bakri's living came from selling vegetables in
Hebron. His death came from traveling past this neighboring Jewish settlement.
Someone in a group of Israelis waving submachine guns here today put a bullet
in his head. Five Israelis have been arrested in connection with the case.
1994: Tony Kushner’s "Angels in
America-Millennium Approaches" closes after 367 performances.
1994(1st of Tevet, 5766): Seventh
Day of Chanukah; Rosh Chodesh Tevet
1994(1st of Tevet, 5766):
Seventy-three-year-old British political and constitutional historian and
Regius Professor of Modern History Sir Geoffrey Elton, the son of “son of
Jewish scholars Eva Dorthea Sommer and Victor Ehrenberg, the husband of Sheila
Lambert and brother physicist Lewis Elton who was best known for his studies of
the Tudor period passed away today.
1995(11th of Kislev, 5756):
Seventy-seven-year-old Jack Rotman, who played at Boston University from
1938-1940 where he was a two-time All-New England selection passed away today.
1995: The confessed assassin of Yitzhak Rabin suggested today
that one of the slain Prime Minister's bodyguards had been an accomplice in the
shooting. The killer, Yigal Amir, asserted that if he told everything he knew,
it "would turn the country upside down." Mr. Amir spoke to reporters
before the start of a hearing at the Tel Aviv Magistrate Court, where he was
ordered held in custody for four more days. Police officers and the presiding
judge, Dan Arbel, cut Mr. Amir off, as they have several times in the past, to
prevent him from using the courtroom as a platform for his opinions. Israel
Radio did not even carry Mr. Amir's voice in its news roundups today, referring
to his statements only as "abusive language."
1996: “Oui” a French comedy costarring Dany
Boon as “Wilfried” was released today in France.
1997: "Diary of Anne Frank" opens at Music
Box Theater New York City.
1997(5th of Kislev, 5758): Joseph Wolpe passed
away. Born in 1915, Wolpe was a South African-born American psychotherapist who helped
usher in cognitive behavioral therapy during the 1960s; he devised a treatment
to help desensitize patients with phobias by exposing them to their fears
incrementally. He worked on systematic desensitization with a methodology
designed to treat people with extreme anxiety about specific events,
situations, things, or people. His approach involved developing a hierarchy of
anxiety-provoking situations, learning relaxation techniques, then associating
these situations with relaxation, beginning at the bottom, or least
anxiety-provoking, part of the hierarchy. He founded the Association for
Advancement of Behavior Therapy and the Journal of Behavior Therapy.
1998: The Yogi Berra Museum, which would be the
site of the 1999 reconciliation meeting between the former Yankee All Star
Catcher and Manager and Yankee owner George Steinbrenner, opened today in
Little Falls, NJ
1999(25th of Kislev, 5760): Chanukah
1999: Shanghai Jews were permitted to use Ohel
Rache Synagogue for Chanukah services.
2000: It was reported today that Vice
Presidential candidate Senator Joseph Lieberman is the most enthusiastic
supporter for Al Gore to pursue the case in Florida courts that could decide
the election most remembered for “hanging chads.”
2001: The United States froze the financial
assets of organizations allegedly linked to Hamas, the group that claimed
responsibility recent deadly suicide attacks in Israel.
2001: Today’s search of the Home Land
Foundation’s offices by the government led to a lawsuit with prosecutors
claiming that the Judith Miller had queried the Islamic charity in such a way
that it made the members aware of the planned searches.
2002(29th of Kislev, 5763): Fifth
day of Chnaukah
2002: President Bush met with Jewish
leaders in the Roosevelt Room including Jay Lefkowitz, an observant Jew who was
chief of the president's Domestic Policy Council
2003: “In
an unusual alliance, 32 prominent Christian, Jewish and Muslim leaders have
started lobbying the Bush administration and Congress to intervene more
actively in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by pressing the peace plan known
as the ''road map.''
2003:
“Israeli officials have concluded that the Islamic movement Hamas has suspended
its suicide bombing campaign in recent months, a senior Israeli military
officer said today, citing that as one reason Israel has not suffered any
deadly bombings in the past two months.”
2004: After
only a week on the Job, Victor Bailovsky lost his job as Science and Technology
Minister when his party left the governing coalition.
2004:
Avraham Poraz completed his term as Minister of Internal Affairs.
2004:
“Christmas at Water’s Edge” co-starring Tom Bosley was released today in the
United States.
2004:
Eliezer Sandberg completed his term as Minister of Energy and Water Resources.
2004: Prime
Minister Ariel Sharon ousted Avraham Poraz from his position as Interior
Minister. Poraz was a member of the Shinui party. When Shinui voted against Sharon’s budget, he
removed all members of the party from his government.
2005:
During his talk SPORT show today Charles Wolf described Rachel Corrie, an
American peace activist who had been killed by an Israeli military bulldozer,
as "scum." Ofcom would later rule this comment to be in breach of the
"Generally Accepted Standards" section of the Broadcasting Code and
stated it was "seriously ill-judged".
2005(4th of
Kislev, 5766): Eighty-eight-year-old “German born Israeli woodcut artist and
art collector” Jacob Otto Pins passed away today.
2005:
Opening session of the Conservative movement’s biennial convention in Boston,
MA where leaders will be unveiling a more liberal and aggressive outreach program.
2005: In an interview with Time Magazine, movie director Steven Spielberg said his new film
"Munich," the story of Israel's revenge for the killing of its
athletes by Palestinian guerrillas at the 1972 Olympics, is "a prayer for
peace." The man who brought the
world “Schindler’s List” and the “Shoah Project” is very proud of the fact that
"Munich" doesn't demonize either the Israeli or Palestinian
side. Spielberg says that “the biggest
enemy is not the Palestinians or the Israelis. The biggest enemy in the region
is intransigence." Such an
evenhanded treatment does not seem to jibe with the facts. Palestinian terrorists invaded the Olympic
Village, seized the Israeli Olympic team and later murdered them.
2006(13th of Kislev, 5767): Arthur Shimkin,
Grammy Award winning producer of children’s records passed away at the age of
84. In one of those cultural ironies
that are part of Jewish History, Shimkin produced the Rudolph The Red-Nosed
Reindeer album sung by Jimmy Durante.
2006: While appearing on his late-night
television show, comedian Stephen Colbert jokingly took credit for the recent
nuptials of two Jewish Democratic congressmen – Brad Sherman of California and
Steven Rothman of New Jersey. Sherman married Lisa Kaplan, a State Department
anti-Semitism expert. Rothman found his
new wife, Jennifer Beckenstein on JDate.com.
Jewish love- isn’t it grand?
2006: The Hebrew Free Burial Association (HFBA)
“launched a Russian edition of their website to further reach out to members of
that community. The HFBA was established
in 1888 as a free burial society for Jews living on the Lower East Side. As Jews moved into other communities, the
association widened its service area and today it is the largest burial society
outside of the state of Israel.
2006: Dennis Prager continued to defend his
contention that Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress should be
allowed to take the oath of office using a Koran because “the act undermines
American Civilization”
2007: Michael Korda who has written the first
major single-volume biography of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, exploring a
great general and an important president—a man who won the war and kept the
peace. Korda’s previous books include Charmed
Lives: A Family Romance, Queenie,
Ulysses S. Grant: The Unlikely Hero
and Journey to a Revolution: A
Personal Memoir and History of the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 appeared
at the 92nd Street Y in New York City.
2007: The Center for Jewish History presents a
special screening of “The Year My
Parents Went on Vacation”, Brazil's Official Selection for the 2008 Academy
Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
2007: The Jewish
Aggies, a student group at Texas A&M, lit the largest menorah in the state
of Texas.
2008: Final night of the
2008 Oud Festival sponsored by Confederation House.
2008: At the Chabad
House in Iowa City a genuine Simchah – the Brit Milah of the son of Avremel & Chaya Blesofsky
2008: The Labor Party
is scheduled to hold its primary which was postponed after computerized voting
systems malfunctioned in several locales around the country on December 2.
2008: A Kassam rocket
landed near Sderot, causing no casualties or damage.
2009: “1943, A pause
during the Holocaust” a film based on Angelo Donati’s rescue of 2,500 Jews
trapped in Nice was “shown for the first
http://www.filmsdocumentaires.com/films/949-1943-a-pause-in-the-holocaust
2009: The 20th
Washington Jewish Film Festival features a matinee presentation of A Matter of
Size (Sipur Gadol).
2009: At Temple Judah
in Cedar Rapids, IA, Friday Night Services mark the start of the Third Season
of Musical Shabbat.
2009:
Police arrested a man from Baka al-Gharbiya for orchestrating an extortion
attempt aimed at McDonald's of Israel.
2010: Shalshelet’s
4th International Festival at Congregation Ansche Chesed, New York City.
2010: “Gruber’s
Journey,” “The Debt,” “Mary Lou” and “Phovidilia” are scheduled to be shown
tonight at the 21st Washington Jewish Film Festival.
2010: Gabe Finn was
called to the Torah as a Bar Mitzvah at Temple Judah in Cedar Rapids, IA.
2010: The
12th Jerusalem Film Festival opened at the Jerusalem Cinematheque
2010: Jerry Herman was among the five
2010 Kennedy Center Honorees who were feted at tonight's gala in Washington,
D.C.
2010: In
“'Candlelight': 2010's Hanukkah anthem” Monica Hesse traces the rise of the
Maccebeats The
field of Chanukah music was wide “open
for the harmonizing Maccabeats, whose YouTube video of "Candlelight"
(jauntily sung to the tune of Taio Cruz's "Dynamite") reached nearly
1 million views in less than eight days.
How a 14-Man A Cappella Group from
Yeshiva University Created the Hanukkah Anthem of 2010:
Step
1: Flip your latkes in the air (sometimes)
"The whole message of Yeshiva
University is that you can be an Orthodox Jew and participate in secular
society," says Immanuel Shalev, who wrote the song's lyrics. The group had
already covered Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah," replacing the lyrics
with Hebrew scripture. When Shalev found himself listening to Cruz singing
"I throw my hands up in the air sometimes" and mentally replacing
them with "I flip my latkes in the air sometimes, singing ay-oh, spin the
dreidel," he knew he was onto something.
Step
2: Be resourceful
Uri Westrich, a medical student and
Yeshiva grad, had made a video for the Maccabeats before - a rendition of
"One Day" that reached a modestly successful 100,000 hits. The group
asked him if he could direct their new idea. "I said, 'Let's add a
reenactment! And let's add a Hanukkah party!' " He recruited three beefy
friends to play the Greeks who battled the ancient Maccabees and rustled up
some greenery for the Greeks' laurel wreaths.
"We basically wanted to hit our
target audience of the Orthodox Jewish community in New York," Westrich
says - the people who normally hired the Maccabeats for live performances.
(From the Maccabeats Web site: "Having the Maccabeats is the perfect way
to energize and enhance your Bar/Bat Mitzvah, Sheva Brachot, or simcha of any
kind.")
Step
3: Achieve local, then national, fame
After the song was uploaded, Shalev
was in the library when he noticed that everyone around him seemed to be
whistling the song. He went to grab a slice of pizza, and the cashier
congratulated him.
The video was widely blogged online,
hitting influential ones like BoingBoing.net. The Maccabeats were invited on
CBS's "Early Show," and the video appeared on "Today." The
chief rabbi of London phoned to see about a possible video collaboration. They
heard from Jay Leno's people, but that's still up in the air.
Meanwhile, "Every four minutes,
I'm getting another request," says Maccabeat director and singer Julian
Horowitz. "They keep asking, 'When are you going to be in Israel on tour,'
or 'When are you going to be in London?" says Horowitz, pointing out that
the group won't be going anywhere but to final exams. "It's like they
think we're the Rolling Stones."
Step
4: Win your elders' respect
"Last night, we opened up for
Matisyahu, you know, the first celebrity Orthodox reggae artist," Shalev
says. The Maccabeats are all fans, so this was a huge honor.
And although the Maccabeats were
supposed to be just the opening act, "It was obvious," Shalev says
modestly, "that the crowd was very, very excited about us."
2011: “The
Kissinger Saga: Walter and Henry Kissinger, Two Brothers From Feurth,” is among
the films scheduled to shown on the second day of the Washington Jewish Film
Festival.
2011: The Temple Sinai
Sisterhood Chanukah Bazaar is scheduled to take place a New Orleans’ largest
Reform congregation.
2011: Soccer player Camille
Levin, a graduate of the Tarbut V’Torah Community Day School in Irvine, CA set
up the winning goal scored by her teammate which finally led to Stanford
University winning the NCAA College Cup.
http://jwa.org/thisweek/dec/04/2011/camille-levin
2011: “A commemorative plaque
to Władysław Szpilman in Polish and
English was unveiled at 223 Niepodległości Avenue in Warsaw in the presence of
his wife, Halina (Grzecznarowski) Szpilman, son Andrzej and Wilm Hosenfeld's
daughter Jorinde Krejci-Hosenfeld
2011: As a sign of the
vibrancy of the Cedar Rapids Jewish community Diane Handler and Robert Becker
are scheduled to host Temple Judah’s first annual adult congregational cocktail
party.
2011: The New York Times
featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to
Jewish readers including “Howard Cosell: The Man, the Myth and the
Transformation of American Sports” by Mark Ribowsky, “Balzac’s Omeltte” by Anka
Mulstein (the great-great-granddaughter of James de Rothschild) and “MetaMaus”
by Art Spiegelman as well as three children’s books about Chanukah: “The
Golem’s Latkes” by Eric A. Kimmel, “Chanukah Lights” by Michael J. Rosen and
“The Story of Hanukkah” by David Adler.
2011: The epicenter of an earthquake felt across
northern Israel today was in the Hula and Sea of Galilee (Kinneret) area, the
Geophysical Institute of Israel stated.
2011: Israel’s decision to
release frozen public funds to the Palestinians last week came after Germany
insisted it did so as a condition for the completion of the sale of a
submarine, a German newspaper reported today.
2011: A commemorative plaque
to pianist and Holocaust survivor
Władysław Szpilman in Polish and English was unveiled at 223
Niepodległości Avenue in Warsaw in the presence of his wife, Halina
(Grzecznarowski) Szpilman, son Andrzej and Wilm Hosenfeld's daughter Jorinde
2012: The YIVO Institute for
Jewish Research is scheduled to honor Baron David de Rothschild at its 87th
Annual Benefit Dinner.
2012: Professor Jonathan Sarna
is scheduled to discuss “When General Grant Expelled the Jews with Jonathan
Karp, Executive Director, American Jewish Historical Society at the Museum of
Jewish Heritage. (A book and an evening not to be missed)
2012: Rabbi Bruce Aft of
Congregation Adat Reyim is scheduled to lead a discussion of “A Century
Catholic-Jewish Relations” under the auspices of the JCCNV.
2012(20th of
Kislev): For Chabad Chasidim “the 20th of Kislev is like the second day of Rosh
Hashanah. Just as the two days of Rosh Hashanah are considered a single “long
day” (יומא אריכתא ) so the 19th and 20th of Kislev are considered a single long
day marking the redemption of the Alter Rebbe and a turning point in the
history of Chassidut. The 19th of Kislev was the day on which the Alter Rebbe
was released from prison and acquitted of the charges against him. But, what
happened on the 20th of Kislev? Historically, after the Alter Rebbe was
released, he was taken to S. Peterburg to the house of a wealthy local Jew. It
seemed all good and well, but that house was the house of one of the greatest
mitnagdim, those who opposed the Chassidic movement and were responsible for
the Alter Rebbe’s incarceration in the first place. And so, the Alter Rebbe had
to stay with this Jew and his family for a few hours until he left his house on
the 20th of Kislev. (From the teachings of Harav Yitzchak Ginsburgh)
2012: “Insular and Torn,
Straight From Hasidic Brooklyn” published today provides a review of ‘My Name
Is Asher Lev’ playing at the Westside Theatre.
2012: French police today
announced that they had arrested a man and a woman in connection with the
Toulouse shootings in March, in which Mohammed Merah, a French-Algerian
Islamist, killed a rabbi and three children at a Jewish school, several days
after gunning down four French paratroopers in two separate attacks.
2012: Tzipi Livni, the head of
the Hatnua (The Movement) party, today lambasted the government for its
handling of the fallout from the Palestinians’ successful UN status-upgrade
gambit, saying that its apparently punitive decision to construct thousands of
housing units in East Jerusalem and the West Bank, including in the
controversial E1 corridor between the capital and the settlement of Ma’aleh
Adumim, was detrimental to Israel’s security interests.
2013: In Coralville,
Iowa, Agudas Achim is scheduled to host its annual Chanukah Party.
2013(30th of
Kislev, 5774): Ninety-two-year-old Lila Perl, “the award-winning children’s
book Four Perfect Pebbles: A Holocaust Story” passed away today.
http://www.slj.com/2013/12/industry-news/lila-perl-childrens-book-author-dies-at-92/#_
2013: The Jewish
Community Center of Northern Virginia is scheduled to sponsor Light Up the
Night: Community Menorah Lighting at Mosaic District
2013: “The Art of Spiegelman”
and “Through the Eye of a Needle,” a film about Holocuast survivor and artist
Nisenthal Krinitz is scheduled to be shown at the Jerusalem Jewish Film
Festival.
2013: Hezbollah accused
Israel of assassinating Hasan al-Laqis “a top operative” and “one of the main
commanders of its rocket division
2013: A group of more
than 20 Christian leaders from Norway will be coming to the Knesset today to
ask for forgiveness for the diplomatic process between Israel and the
Palestinians that began in their capital.
2013: NGO Monitor will
be awarded the prestigious Begin Prize, "For the organization's efforts
exposing the political agenda and ideological bias of humanitarian
organizations that use the discourse of human rights to discredit Israel and to
undermine its position among the nations of the world."
2013: Today Warner
Bros. revealed that Israeli actress Gal Gadot was cast in the role of Wonder
Woman in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.”
2013: In “Degenerate
Hart and the Jewish Grandmother” published today Walter Laqueur described the
events that led up to the discovery of an art collection that belonged to
Cornelius Gurlitt, the son of Hildebrand Gurlitt, “one of four dealers
commissioned by the Nazis to sell their looted art abroad…”
https://mosaicmagazine.com/observation/2013/12/degenerate-art-and-the-jewish-grandmother/?print
2014: “Three FREE
masterclass conversations for everyone interested in comedy: The Joys of
Podcasting with Helen Zaltzman (Answer Me This) and Stuart Goldsmith (The
Comedian’s Comedian) Understanding the Industry with Steve Bennett (Chortle)
and a top comedy agent Comedy Formats: TV, Theatre and Social Media with Dan
Patterson (Mock The Week) are scheduled to take place at the UK Jewish Comedy
Festival
2014: Today marks the
70th anniversary of 1,361 Jews of the Kasztner transport release
from Bergen Belsen.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAb71ZqswDA&feature=youtu.be
http://www.killingkasztner.com/
2014: The Discovery
Channel is scheduled to broadcast “Biblical Mysteries Explained” which will
examine “new scientific theories that support the extraordinary tale of
Exodus.”
2014: “After only a
two-month hiatus from politics, former interior minister Gideon Sa’ar is
reportedly considering running against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for
the Likud party leadership next month, party sources said today.”
2014: “Over 80 people
were treated for respiratory problems on both sides of the Israel-Jordan border
this morning, amid warnings of an ecological disaster following a major oil
spill overnight that flooded the highway leading into Eilat.” (As reported by
Avi Lewis)
2015(22nd of
Kislev, 5776): Seventy-five-year-old “long-term MK Yossi Sarid” passed away
today.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/journalist-and-former-meretz-minister-yossi-sarid-dies-at-75/
2015: In Olney, MD,
Shaare Tefila is scheduled it annual “Taste of Chanukah.”
2015: In Cedar Rapids, Shir Yehuda will lead Temple Judah in a
“Musical Shabbat.”
2016(2nd of
Kislev, 5777): Ninety-two-year-old Jacob “Jack” Rudin, the New York City born
son of the former May Cohen and Samuel Rudin, who was a Bronze Star winning WW
II veteran, real estate developer and member of Congregation Sheartih Israel
passed away today.
2016: Israeli-born
composer and musician Eyal Vilner is scheduled to return “to Eldridge Street
with his swinging sixteen-piece band which will perform Vilner’s new
compositions, original versions of jazz classics and music from the Big Band’s
new project “Sacred Swinging Sounds!”
2016: The New York Times features books by
Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Last
Girl Before Freeway: The Life, Loves, Losses and Liberation of Joan Rivers by
Leslie Bennetts, The Daily Show (The Book): An Oral History by Chris
Smith, Let There Be Laughter: A Treasury of Great Jewish Humor and What It
All Means by Michael Krasny, The Menorah: From the Bible to Modern Israel
by Steven Fine, Moses: A Human Life by Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg and Jerusalem:
1000-1400 Every People Under Heaven edited by Barbara Drake Boehm and
Melanie Holocomb
2016: “Holy Zoo” and
“Forever Pure” are scheduled to be shown at the 10th Annual Other
Israel Film Festival.
2017: “LA folk singer
Cindy Paley will perform with Issac Sadigursky on accordion, Miamon Miller on
violin, Zinovy Goro on clarinet, and guest artist from Poland Menachem Mirski
are scheduled to perform this evening at Valley Beth Shalom.
2017: The Leo Baeck
Institute is scheduled to present a lecture by historian Jeremy Adelman on
“Pariahs and Prophets: How Outsiders Help Insiders Think About the Wordl.”
2017: Global Jewish singer, superstar Yaakov Shwekey is
playing live for one night only in London tonight as Mizrachi UK launch their
“Israel 70 programme”
2017:
Rabbi David Wolpe is scheduled to present the first session of “Lessons on Lust
and Love From the Bible: Torah As A Dating and Relationship Manuel” at the
Streicker Center.
2017: Jewish Book
Month, an annual event that provides us with a chance to contemplate Jewish
books and the lives of authors such as Deborah Pessin whose works included History
of the Jews In America, one of the first Jewish history books I ever read,
continues today.
2018(26th of
Kislev, 5779): Second Day of Chanukah
2018(26th of
Kislev, 5779): Ninety-six-year-old Selma Wynberg one of the last two survivors
of the Sobibor uprising passed away today. (As reported by Katharine Q. Seelye)
2018: The Temple
Emanuel Streicker Center is scheduled to host “Jewish Lives, Jewish Legacies”
during eight biographers discuss the lives of several prominent Jews including
Rabbi Akiva – Sage of The Talmud; Barry W. Holtz, Professor of Jewish Education
at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America; Barbra Streisand who redefined
Beauty, Femininity and Power;Neal Gabler, award-winning journalist and
historian; David Ben-Gurion – Father of Modern Israel; Anita Shapira, winner of
the Israel Prize for History; Louis D. Brandeis – American Prophet; Jeffrey
Rosen, President & CEO of the National Constitution Center; Emma Goldman
for whom Revolution was a Way of Life; Vivian Gornick, celebrated critic and
essayist; Hank Greenberg, America’s leading Jewish athlete; Mark Kurlansky,
award-winning author of 32 works of fiction and nonfiction; Peggy
Guggenheim;Francine Prose, award-winning author of 20 novels; Yitzhak Rabin –
Soldier, Leader, Statesman and Itamar Rabinovich, Rabin’s ambassador in
Washington and president of the Israel Institute
2018: Thousands of
women are expected to take to the streets today to protest government inaction
in addressing violence against women; cities including Tel Aviv, Haifa, Be'er
Sheva and Jerusalem and many companies and organizations pledge support to campaign.
(YNET)
2018: The Yiddish Book
Center is scheduled to host Gerri Chanel in an “author talk” in which she talks
about “Saving Mona Lisa.”
http://support.yiddishbookcenter.org/site/Calendar?id=7777&view=Detail
2019: In New Orleans,
The Hillel at Tulane University, of which the author of this blog was once
President, is scheduled to hold its board meeting. (“History is what the people writing the
history say it is.” Anonymous):
2019: In San Francisco,
at Green Apple Books, Jewish author Michael Franks is scheduled to discuss his
new novel What is Missing.
2019: In Oakland, CA,
Temple Sinai is scheduled to present “Teaching Israel on Campus: the Cal
Experience” during which “UC Berkeley professor Ron Hassner discusses Israel,
Zionism and anti-Semitism at U.S. colleges, with a focus on his campus.”
2019: The American
Sephardi Association, the World Jewish Congress and JIMENA are scheduled to
co-host “Jewish Refugee Commemoration at the United Nations,” “Israel’s
official day to commemorate Jewish refugees from North Africa and the Middle
East.”
2019: The Oxford
University Jewish Society is scheduled to host a “Toast the Term” celebration.
2019: The Streicker
Center is scheduled to present “Rebecca Traister on the Power of Women’s
Anger.”
2020: In Manhattan, the
Marlene Myerson JCC is scheduled to host a second day of the Other Israel Film
Festival which will featuring a “Shabbat Night Dinner program with a screening
of My Dearest Enemy followed by a Q and A.
2020: Based on
information made public yesterday, as of today “Israel is now due to receive two shipments of two million
doses each, which are expected to arrive either by the end of December or the
start of January.”
2020: the Jessie Ball
duPont Fund and the Jaxson Magazine are scheduled to co-host a celebration
of the contributions of Jacksonville’s
Jewish community and its connections to renowned businessman and national philanthropist
Julius Rosenwald through a screening of Aviv Kempner’s documentary film
“Rosenwald.”
2020: Temple Israel of
Boston is scheduled to present online the start of its Burstein
Scholar-in-Residence weekend with Robert Putnam.
2020: The Contemporary
Jewish Museum is scheduled to host a talk about Levi Strauss’ journey to the
West, his role in founding a new Jewish community and his philanthropy, by Lynn
Downey, author of a 2016 book about Strauss.
2020: In Palm Beach
Gardens, FL, Temple Judea is scheduled to host a Chanukah Drive By Event For
Adults with Rabbi Yaron, Rabbi Feivel, and Cantorial Soloist Abbie Strauss.
2020: In Columbus, OH,
the Tifereth Israel Congregation is scheduled to complete its study of How
to Read the Jewish Bible.
2021: 2021: In
partnership with Menemsha Films, The Jewish Heritage Museum of Monmouth County
is scheduled to host a screening of “A Starry Sky Above the Roman Ghetto” as
part of the Hanukah Film Festival.
2021: The Eden Tamir
Center is scheduled to host “The Glorious Sound of the Piano” featuring
“Shubertiade in 4 Hands.”
2021: In Iowa, YAD is
scheduled to host a community Channukah party.
2021: The French
Cultural Center of Boston is scheduled to present online a conversation with
journalist and author Anne Sinclair as she discusses her latest book, In the
Shadow of Paris which is both a memoir and an historical document in which the
author “takes us on a journey to find answers in this age of rising
antisemitism worldwide, answers about the life of her grandfather Léonce
Schwartz.”
2021: In Columbus, OH,
Tifereth Israel is scheduled to host Chanukah Under The Stars in its parking
lot complete with a musical Havdalah and concert, s’mores, sufganiyot and a
whole lot more.
2021(30th of Kislev,
5782): TRIPLE HEADER SHABBAT – Parshat Miketz; Shabbat Shel Chanukah; Rosh
Chodesh Tevet.
2022: The Stone at The
New School is scheduled to host a special free concert during which the
acclaimed Saxophonist and Composer, Uri Gurvich, and his Quartet invite the
Bergamot String Quartet for a unique collaboration, presenting global jazz at
its best.”
2022: In New Orleans, Rabbi
Daniel Kripper, author of Living Fully is scheduled to give a one-day
workshop based on his work and his book.
2022: The Mandel Jewish Community Center is scheduled
to host its "Meet the Latkes" family event in Beachwood, OH.
2022: Bob
Silber and Jonathan Lachman are scheduled to co-host a Zoom meeting “If My
Parents Were Alive: Lessons Learned From Two Holocaust Survivors.”
2022: Itzhak
Perlman, reigning virtuoso of the violin, is scheduled to present his
collection of traditional klezmer music, In the Fiddler’s House with the
Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
2022: The
New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of
special interest to Jewish readers including Finale: Late Conversations With Stephen Sondheim by D.T. Max and The Extraordinary Life of
an Ordinary Man, a memoir about Pau Newman by David Rosenthal
2022: The
ASF Institute of the Jewish Experience and the Center for Jewish History is
scheduled to present “From Middle Eastern North African Jewish Refugees to
Israeli Cultural Renaissance,” an “an international conference featuring
speakers from Canada, Israel, the Netherland, Sweden, the U.K. and the U.S.
2022: The National
Library of Israel is scheduled to host a “conversation between Arun Schaechter
Viswanath - ‘Harry Potter' Yiddish translator, and Gili Bar-Hillel Semo, 'Harry
Potter' series Hebrew translator.”
2022: President Isaac
Herzog is scheduled to take off today for an official visit to Bahrain at the
invitation of King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa.
2022: In Metairie, LA, Chabad
Jewish Center, Metairie, PJ Library and Whole Foods Market are scheduled to
host “Latke Cooking at Whole Foods Market!”
2023: My Jewish
Learning is scheduled to present the second lecture by Rudy Namdar on Talmudic
storytelling.
2023: In Petaluma, CA,
Chabad of Petaluma is scheduled to host a pre-Chanukah floral resin menorah
making workshop and women’s social.
2023: Temple of Israel
of Boston is scheduled to host its third annual concert featuring Cantor Alicia
Stillman and Cantor Emeritus Roy Einhorn.
2023: The Jewish
Education Project is scheduled to present “Meeting the Moment: Israel + Jewish
Peoplehood Education in a Time of War.”
2023: Politics/foreign
policy consultant John F. Rothmann is scheduled to discuss current events in
Israel and the Middle East in an event co-sponsored by Congregation Beth Emek
and CCJCC.
2023: The JWI Women to
Watch Luncheon is scheduled to take place today in Washington.
2023: The United States
Supreme Court is scheduled to hear “arguments on the legality of the Purdue
Pharmacy Bankruptcy Plan” in which “in exchange for giving up ownership of drug
manufacturer Purdue Pharma and for contributing up to $6 billion to fight the
crisis, members of the wealthy Sackler family would be exempt from any civil
lawsuits” and “at the same time, they
could potentially keep billions of dollars from their profits on OxyContin
sales.”
2023: The Streicker
Cultural Center is scheduled to host “50 YEARS of MS. More Than A Magazine: A Movement.”
2023: As December 4 begins
in Israel, the menace to Israel is increasing based on yesterday’s attacks by
the Houthis on shipping in the Red Sea and Hezbollah’s continued shelling in
the north which has forced the evacuation of the civilian population while in
response to international pressured the IDF has “updated” and “amended” is
operational plans to do even more to minimize civilian casualties even as the
rest of the Hamas held hostages begin day 59 in
captivity. (Editor’s note: this situation is too fluid for this blog
to cover so we are just providing a snapshot as of the posting at midnight
Israeli time)
2024: The Tel Aviv
District Court gave the state until 1 p.m. today to decide whether it
intends to appeal the release Eli Feldstein, who has been charged with knowingly
breaching military censorship when he leaked a stolen, classified IDF document,
to house arrest.
2024: The exhibition Celebrating
Chanukah: Light, Tradition, and Inclusivity is scheduled to open today at the
Bradford Reform Temple in London.
2024: The Temple
Emanu-El Streicker Center is scheduled to host “All About Challan,” a
celebration of this bread “with creative bakers who are redefining the tender
loaves at the heart of culinary Judaism.”
2024: The Weitzman
Museum in partnership with the Museum of Jewish Heritage, is scheduled to host
“historian Scott D. Seligman for an online talk on The Chief Rabbi’s Funeral,
exploring a dramatic 1902 Lower East Side event that shaped American Jewish
history
2024: “Kafka:
Metamorphosis of an Author,” “a new exhibition at
the National Library presenting items from the archive of Franz Kafka” is
scheduled to open today.
2024: Lockdown
University is scheduled to host a lecture by Professor Samuel Kassow and David
Herman on “The Rudashevski Diary: A Voice from the Vilna Ghetto.”
2024: Chabad is
scheduled to host the next session of “Nurturing Relationships, a six week
course on Torah insights to deepening our relationships across the board.”
2024: Lockdown
University is scheduled to host a lecture by Jeremy Rosen on “Middle Books
of the Bible: Judges 6:25, Gideon.”
2024: The American
Jewish Historical Society with the Glucksman Ireland House and the Kansas City
Irish Center are scheduled to present, “Opening Doors: The Unlikely
Alliance Between the Irish and the Jews in America with author Hasia R.
Diner in conversation with Terry Golway.”
2024: As December 4th
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, demonstrations at a high school production of “The Diary
of Anne Frank” and the beating of a college student in Chicago sweeps the
United States and the Hamas held hostages begin day 425 in captivity while
Israelis brace for more rocket attacks by Hezbollah, Iran and terrorists based
in Iraq (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)
