This Day, February 9, In Jewish History by Mitchell A and Deb Levin Z"L
February 9
474: Zeno was
crowned as co-emperor of the Byzantine Empire. “The feeling of Emperor Zeno
towards the Jews is illustrated by a remark made at the races of Antioch. After
a mob murdered many Jews, threw their corpses into the fire, and burned their
synagogue Zeno commented, ‘They should have burned the living ones also.’”
1119: Calixtus
II was named Pope. During his twenty-five years on the papal throne,
Calixtus II “provided a considerable amount of protection for Roman Jews.”
1267: The
Synod of Breslau ordered Jews of Silesia to wear special caps.
1288(4th
of Adar): Pola, a female copiest who belonged the Avanim family from Rome
completed working on a book of the Bible as can be seen from the colophon which
revealed “the name of her father, her forefathers, her first husband and the
date of completion.” (As reported by Renee Levine Melammed)
1404: In
Constantinople, Manuel II Palaiologos and Helena Dragaš gave birth to
Constantine XI Palaiologos, the last Byzantine Emperor who would lose his
capital to the Ottomans led by Mehmed II in 1453. This would mark the end of
Christian domination in parts of eastern Europe and Asia Minor, a change which
would have incalculable effect on Jews living in the region as far west as
Spain.
1517: Isabel
Lopez, the daughter of Maria Lopez offered an expanded rebuttal of the charges
made against her by the Inquisition. “She never observed Shabbat or wore
special clothes except in honor of a Church holy day, a baptism or wedding
ceremony. She recited the Ave Maria, the Pater Noster, the Creed and the Salve
Regina. She had no idea what the sciatic nerve was, but was a clean woman who
ate all types of fish and animals. She asked the tribunal to restore her honor
and reputation. In August, she stated that the evidence was false and invalid.
She was a good Christian; nothing she did was heretical. If she cleaned her
meat, it was because she was meticulous; she never dressed up on Friday or
Saturday and had no special lamps in her home.” (As reported by Renee Levine
Melammed)
1621: Gregory
XV was elected Pope. Gregory’s support of the censorship of Jewish books can be
seen in the fact that during his brief papacy (1621-1623) at “least three
expurgators of Hebrew books were appointed by the Roman Inquisition: Vincentius
Matelica, 1622, "auctoritate apostolica"; Isaia di Roma, 1623,
"per ordine di Roma"; and Petrus de Trevio, 1623,
"deputatus" (officially appointed to revise books).”
1737: “In
Thetford, Norfolk, England,” “Joseph Pain, a tenant farmer and stay-maker and
Frances Cocke” gave birth to Thomas Paine, the author
of “Common Sense” and political pamphlets who relied on the experience of the
ancient Israelites when arguing against monarchy. “The quiet and rural lives of
the first patriarchs hath a happy something in them, which vanishes away when
we come to the history of Jewish royalty. Government by kings was first
introduced into the world by the Heathens, from whom the children of Israel
copied the custom. It was the most prosperous invention the Devil ever set on
foot for the promotion of idolatry.”
1670: Sixty
year old Frederick III, who said of the Jews, they “have stolen into Denmark
contrary to long-standing custom, [since the days of the Reformation, the
Lutheran creed had, according to the laws of Denmark, been compulsory
throughout the kingdom], and have dared to traffic with jewels and the like”
which led him “to order that no Jew should enter Denmark without a special
passport ("Geleitsbrief"), and that those who were already in the
country should be heavily fined if they did not leave within fourteen days”
passed away today. [Editors’ note: A few years later, however, the tables were
turned. Frederick III., being in need of funds for his wars, borrowed money
from the Jew Abraham (or Diego) Teixeira de Mattos of Hamburg (known through
his relations with the Swedish queen Christina), and gave as security
crownlands in Jutland. Teixeira thereupon made such good use of his influence
with the Danish king that, as early as Jan. 19, 1657, "the Portuguese
professing the Hebrew religion" were permitted to travel everywhere within
the kingdom, and to trade and traffic within the limit of the law. Teixeira
himself gained little by his transaction with the Danish monarch. As his loan
was not returned, he took instead the estates he held as security, selling them
later at a great loss. The king acted similarly in his dealings with the De
Lima family, who were in possession of the Hald estate from 1660 to 1703.”
1749: Benedict
XIV issued a papal bull, “Singulari Nobis consoldtioni” that prohibited
marriages between Jews and Christians.
1757: In
London, Moses Vita-Haim Montefiore Medina, the Livorno, Italy born of Sarah and
Judah Moses Raphael Montefiore gave birth to Samuel Hayyim Montefiore, the
husband of Grace Montefiore.
1760: In New
York, of Naphtali Hart-Myers and Hester Thackrah/ Tharkrah (Moses) gave birth
to Faybes Myers.
1773: In
Virginia, Elisabeth and Benjamin Harrison gave birth to William Henry Harrison
whose service as the 9th President of the United States lasted only
32 days and whose connection to the Jewish people came through his grandson
Benjamin Harrison, the President who in 1892 appealed to the Czar to stop
mistreating his Jewish subjects. (As reported by Denis Brian)
1799(4th
of Adar I, 5559) Parashat Terumah
1800: In
Germany, Marget Isaac and Aron Abraham Arnold gave birth to Abraham Arnold, the
husband of Maria Abrahams whom he married in Philadelphia and with whom he had
16 children.
1803: Michael
Benjamin married Sarah Goodman today at the Great Synagogue.
1807: Napoleon
convened the French Sanhedrin. The first meeting in Paris of the Napoleonic
Sanhedrin was under the leadership of The Assembly of Jewish Notables. It
opened amid great pomp and celebration under the direction of Abraham Furtado.
The Sanhedrin was modeled on the ancient Tribunal in Jerusalem and consisted of
71 members - 46 Rabbis and 25 laymen. Rabbi David Sinzheim of Strasburg was its
President. They were presented with 12 questions regarding the positions of
Jewry regarding polygamy, divorce, usury, other faiths, and most important
whether they considered France to be their Fatherland. Needless to say, they
received "guidance" from the emperor as to the general formulation of
the answers.
1808: In
Westphalia, a large delegation of Jews visited King Jerome, the brother of
Napoleon to express their thanks for his granting them full emancipation.
During the audience he told them: Tell your brothers to enjoy the rights that
were granted to them. They can depend upon my protection on a par with
the rest of my children."
1811(15th
of Shevat, 5571): Parashat Beshalach; Shabbat Shirah; Tu B’Shevat
1811:
Birthdate of Eutin, Holstein, Germany native James
Nathan Gotendorf the German-American merchant and litterateur who went to the
United States in 1830 where for the next twenty years was engaged in the
commission business and who became friendly with journalist Horace Greely in
1843 after which he met and became involved with Margaret Fller.
1812:
Birthdate of Israel “Izzy” Lazarus, the London born bare-knuckle boxer who
moved to the United States in 1853 with his wife and two sons (both of whom
were boxers) where he was “saloon keeper” and fight promoter.
1813:
Birthdate of Maria Godfrey Solomons, the wife of Gabriel Myers and the mother
of Henrietta and Matilda Myers.
1815:
Birthdate of Austrian Talmudist and historian Isaac Hirsch Weiss best known for
his 5 volume work Each Generation and Its Scholars, “a history of the
Halakha, or oral law, from Biblical times until the expulsion of the Jews from
Spain at the end of the 15th century.”
1823: Kitty
Etting and Benjamin Cohen, who were married in 1819 gave birth to John Jacob
Cohen.
1825:
Birthdate of Abraham Pereira Mendes, the native of Kingston Jamaica whose
lengthy career as a rabbi took him London and Montego Bay before spending the
last ten years as the leader of Touro Synagogue in Newport, R.I.
1825: For the
first, and so far only time, the House of Representatives chose the President
of the United States when it elected John Quincy Adams to the Presidency during
which he responded to a letter from Major Mordecai Manuel Noah by saying “I
believe in the rebuilding of Judea as an independent nation.”
1826(1st
of Shevat, 5586) Rosh Chodesh Shevat
1826(1st
of Shevat, 5586): Sixty-eight-year-old Abraham Benjamin Nones, the Bordeaux
born son of Rachel and Abraham Benjamin Nones, Sr. and husband Miriam Marks do
Nones, who had earned the rank of Major while serving as an aide to General
Washington who settled in Philadelphia where he raised a son Joseph who “was
wounded while serving as a midshipman in 1815.”
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/nones-benjamin
1828(24th
of Shevat, 5588): Parashat Yitro; Shabbat Mevarchim Chodesh Adar
1828: In
Germany, Gela Weil and Isaac Jacob Bamberger gave birth to Moses Bamberger, the
resident of Baltimore and husband of Elizabeth Pels with who me had five
children – Julius, Seymour, Louis, Rena and Arnold. (Do not confuse him with
German rabbi Moses Lob Bamberger.)
1830: In
Sparrow Court, London, Hannah and Abraham Harris gave birth to Nathan Harris.
1842: In
Charleston, SC, Frank Segar wed Elizabeth De Haan, the daughter of Samuel De
Hann.
1842: Samuel
H. Myers was admitted to the Bar of United States District Court today.
1844(19th
of Shevat, 5604): Karl Stix, the son of Deborah Cohen and Solomon Stix who had
been born in Germany in 1816, passed away today in Cincinnati.
1844(19th
of Shevat, 5604): Eleven-year-old Sarah Stix, the German born daughter of
Deborah Cohen and Solomon Stix passed away today on the same day as her older
brother Karl also called Charles.
1849: Sigmund
Max Einhorn, the son of “Maier Mendel Einhorn and Karoline Einhorn” and the
former Karoline Schloss gave birth to Fanni Einhorn who became Fannie Goetz
when she married Gottlieb Goetz.
1849(17th
of Shevat, 5609): Eighty-five-year-old Michael Josephs (aka Myer Königsberg)
the native of Konigsberg who met Moses Mendelssohn which studying Talmud in
Berlin after which he moved to London where he pursued a business career while
writing articles for "Hebrew Review," the "Voice of Jacob,"
and the "Jewish Chronicle” passed away today.
1852: Today’s
“News by the Mail” column reported that “Rabbi Raphall is lecturing at Albany
on the Poetry of the Hebrews.”
1854: In
Sappemeer, Netherlands, Abraham Jacobs and Anna de Jongh gave birth to Aletta
[Henriëtte] Jacobs, activist for the rights of women and the first Dutch female
physician.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/google-doodle-salutes-jewish-dutch-womens-rights-pioneer/
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jacobs-aletta-henri-x00eb-tte
1855: Today
issue of the Israelite, published today bh Charles F. Schmidt, with Isaac M.
Wise serving as Editor reported that Joseph Wise is the papers “authorized
agent for the six New England States.”
1857(15th
of Shevat, 5617): Tu B’Shevat observed for the last time during the Presidency
of Franklin Pierce, “the first U.S. President to appoint a Jew, August Belmont,
as both U.S. Charge d ’Affairs and Ambassador to the Hague.”
1860: “The
Temple of the Reformed Jews” on Twelfth street, between Third and Fourth
avenues, was among the buildings damaged by a gale described as a "winter
tornado" that swept across New York City this evening.
1860: The
Philadelphia North American reported that it is unlikely that “Captain
Moses” will end up in jail. The man who had been previously described as
“a Hebrew” had been charged with swindling those wishing to make donations to
aid the destitute Jewish and Christian refugees from Morocco who had taken
shelter at Gibraltar. There will be no trial because there is no real
evidence to substantiate the charge.
1861(29th
of Shevat, 5621): Parashat Mishpatim; Shabbat Shekalim
1862: Toechter
Lodge No.2, the second women’s lodge of the Free Sons of Israel was organized
today.
1864: In a
report published today, the Richmond Examiner highlighted the presence
of Jews among those seeking to escape from the Confederacy and find refuge in
the North. The Examiner reported that “it is reliably estimated that during the
past week over 100 Jews, principals of substitutes and others, have come...to
Richmond from the South, put up at the hotels, and disappeared by the various
underground routes to the North. How they go is known only to themselves and
their agents, but it is true they have gone and are still going. Ten Jews left
one of the principal hotels on Sunday morning. They are mostly of the wealthy
class, and $10,000 is frequently tendered for a safe passage to the Potomac.”
Farmers who have brought goods to the Confederate capital reportedly smuggle
the refugees North in their empty wagons. Those caught trying to leave have
been imprison in the Castle Thunder Prison. Jews have been able to escape
from the prison by pretending to be dead and having their embalmed bodies taken
“through the lines, en route to bereaved relatives in the North.”
1864: N.S.
Isaacs of New York wrote to Union General Benjamin Butler concerning his use of
the term “Jew” in a disparaging manner in his recent dispatches about a group
caught trying to smuggle contraband to Confederate forces.
1865:
Professor John W. Draper gave the first in a series of lectures on "The
Historical Influence of Natural Causes." In his address tonight on “The
Influence of Climate” he said that that “climate does change men” as can be
“seen in the Jews, who come of a common stock. In northern Europe they are fair,
with blue eyes, while in Palestine they are tawny, and in Malaga, almost
black.”
1865:
Birthdate of actress Mrs. Patrick Campbell whom Jewish Artist Solomon J.
Solomon painted ‘Paula Tanqueray’ in 1894.
1866(24th
of Shevat, 5626): Sixty-eight-year-old Dutch mathematician Rehuel Lobatto, the
Amsterdam born son of “a Portuguese Jewish family” after whom “The
Gauss-Lobatto quadrature method is named as are his variants on the Runge–Kutta
methods for solving ODEs, and the Lobatto polynomials” passed away today.
1867: Hermann
Rosenwald, the German born son of Vogel and Bendix Rosenwald and his wife
Jeanette David gave birth to Ida Rosenwald who became Ida Bach when she married
David Bach with whom she had one child, Alfred Bach.
1870:
Twenty-seven-year-old Simon Wolfe Rosendale, the Albany, NY native and Union
University trained attorney who was the Vice President of the American Jewish
Historical Society married Helen Cone today.
1873:
Birthdate of Lower East Side native Joseph A. Levenson, the Republican party
activist who never strayed from his Chrystie Street roots and whose career
included serving “as city marshal during the administration of Mayor William J.
Gaynor” and “one of the Presidential electors for Theodore Roosevelt in 1904”
while also serving as Director of the Young Men’s Hebrew Association and
writing “several books” including A History of the Lower East Side of
Manhattan.
1873(12th
of Shevat, 5633): Sixty-seven-year-old Jewish German orientalist Julius Furst
passed away in Leipzig.
1875: In New
York, the hat store on Third Avenue that belonged to a Polish Jew named Abraham
H. Keinski burned tonight.
1876: Today’s
session of P.N. Rubenstein’s trial for the murder of Sara Alexander in Kings
County lasted from 10:30 in the morning until 3:30 in the afternoon.
1877: Siegmund
Nathan Levy, the Lubeck, Germany born son of Hannchen and Moses Nathan Levy and
his wife Bertha Levy gave birth to Jenny Levy
1878 Giulia
Warwick (born Julia Ehrenberg) created the part of Lady Viola in “The Spectre
Knight,” which replaced Dora's Dream as the curtain raiser at the Opera
Comique.
1879(16th of
Shevat): “Markus Edinger, the first Jew in Mayence to serve as a juror, passed
away today
1879: Both
sides rested during the trial Abraham D. Freeman and Charles Bernstein who were
accused of complicity along with Abraham Perlstein in setting to the house on
Ludlow Street. Perslstein has already been convicted and sentenced.
In his charge to the jury, Judge Barrett spoke strongly on the matter of
prejudice, telling all concerned that it had no place in the decision-making
process. As of midnight, the jury had not reached a verdict.
1879: It was
reported today that modern day London and its suburbs cover an area of 700
square miles with a population that includes more Jews than are found in all of
Palestine.
1880: In
Winnsboro, LA, Henriette and Arron Landauer gave birth to Horace Haas Landauer,
the husband of Gertrude Landauer and the father of Sarah Jane Landauer.
1880: It was
reported today that Hebraica, which has been published as a monthly
supplement to the Jewish Messenger will now be published as a weekly
featuring articles on Hebrew literature and the science of the Bible.
1880: In
Lewiston, ME, George and Rachel Ehrenfried gave birth to Harvard trained
physician and WW I veteran Albert Ehrenfried, the husband of Grace Waterman
with whom he had three children – George, Fredrika and Constance.
http://collections.americanjewisharchives.org/ms/ms0028/ms0028.html#top
1881: Russian
novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky passed away. To the world he is the author of Crime
and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov. For Jews, he was a
skilled author who was also a vocal anti-Semite. He freely disparaged
them as “Yids” who “have everything to gain from every cataclysm and coup
d’état…and only profit from anything that serves to undermine gentile society.”
1884: In
Winnsboro, LA, Aaron Landauer, the German born son of Sarah and Salomon Levi
Landauer and his wife Henriette gave birth to Horace Haas Landauer.
1885: In
Vienna, Johanna and Conrad Berg gave birth to Austrian composer, Alban Berg, a
protégé of Arnold Schoenberg.
1887(15th
of Shevat, 5647): Tu B’Shevat
1889: The
United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) is established as a
Cabinet-level agency. Former Kansas Congressman Dan Glickman who served as USDA
Secretary from 1995 to 2001 is the only Jew to head this department of the U.S.
Government.
1889: In
Liverpool, Mordecai Neiman and Golda Dalavitch gave birth to WW I Royal
Engineer sapper Jacob Nieman, the husband of Esther Hughes
1890: Grand
Master J.E. Lowenstein presided over the opening session of the Grand Lodge,
No.1 of the Independent Order of Free Sons of Israel at Webster Hall in New
York City.
1890: A
memorial service in honor of the late Seligman Solomon was held today at the
Hebrew Orphan Asylum in New York City.
1890: It was
reported today Princeton University Professor Arthur Frothingham presented each
of the students in his Hebrew Class with a new Hebrew Lexicon and a volume
containing the text of Genesis. The course was an elective. Frothingham
was one of the first professors of art history and an archeologist who got in
trouble with President of Princeton over his choice of courses. I have
not been able to find out why he was teaching a course in Hebrew, except for
the face that his academic training had been foreign languages.
1891: The
Baron de Hirsch Fund whose purpose was “to Americanize and assimilate the
immigrants with the masses and teach them to become good and self-supporting
citizens and to prevent by all proper means their congregating in large cities”
was organized today.
1891: A deed
of trust signed by Baron Hirsch and those who have been named to oversee the
$2,400,000 grant designed to improve the lot of Russian and Romanian immigrants
to the United States was filed in the Register’s office in New York
1895: The
mid-year examinations in Hebrew are scheduled to be given at Columbia College
today.
1895: William
G. Morgan invents volleyball at YMCA in Holyoke, MA. Jewish
volleyball players include the Brazilian women’s star Adriana Brandão Behar,
Aryeh ("Arie") Selinger the Polish born Israeli who coached the Dutch
Men's Team to the silver medal at the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona, Spain
and Avital Haim Selinger, a 48 year old Sabra, who, before his retirement,
played for two different Dutch teams in the Summer Olympics.
1895(15th
of Shevat, 5655): Tu B’Shevat
1895(15th
of Shevat, 5655): Elim D’Avigdor “the eldest son of Count Salamon Henri
d'Avigdor and of Rachel, second daughter of Sir Isaac Lyon Goldsmid” who
followed his engineering career with a publishing career while serving as a
leader of the Jewish community as “a warden of the Spanish and Portuguese
Synagogue” and “chief of the Chovevi Zion Association” passed away today.
1897: The
funeral of 58 year old Morris Goodhart, the President of the Hebrew Sheltering
Guardian Society Orphan Asylum is scheduled to take place this morning at
Temple Beth El followed by interment at the family plot at the Washington
Cemetery.
1898(17th
of Shevat, 5658): Seventy-six-year-old “Elizabeth Cashmore (Solomon), Free
"Enchantress" 1833, the London born daughter of Samuel Moss
(Shemayah) Solomon, Free "Enchantress" 1833 and Esther Solomon, Free
"Enchantress" 1833 and wife of Michael Cashmore passed away today in
Melbourne, Australia.
1898: “Hebrew
Charities Building to be incorporated” published today described New York State
Senator Cantor’s introduction of a bill in the state legislature that would
allow for the incorporation of the Hebrew Charities Building in New York
City. “The object of the corporation is to establish and maintain a
building in which Hebrew benevolent institutions can have their headquarters,
and at which all applicants for aid may apply.” The building will also
include a public library “with a special department of Judaica.”
1899: It was
reported today that Ida Silverman was among those chosen to serve on the
Executive Committee of the People’s Club in New York City.
1900(10th
of Adar I, 5660): Seventy-six-year-old Adolph Carl Rothschild, the Italian born
son of Carl Mayer von Rothschild and Adelheid von Rothschild and husband of
Caroline Julie Anselme von Rothschild, a scion of the Naples branch of the
Rothschild banking family, passed away today.
1900:
Davis Cup competition is established. The most prominent American Jewish
player in Davis Cup competitor was Aaron Krickstein. He was a member of the
U.S. Davis Cup team from 1985-1987 and also was a member of the 1990 squad. He
compiled a 6-4 record in singles play during Davis Cup ties. The highlight of
Krickstein's Davis Cup career came in 1990 when he scored two hard fought
victories in a World Group Quarterfinal tie against Czechoslovakia leading his
team to a 4-1 win. Israel first competed in Davis Cup play in 1949. Shlomo
Glickstein and Eleazar Davidman are two of the most prominent members of the
Israeli teams over the last half century.
1900:
Birthdate of Friedrich Mandl, the Austrian fascist armaments manufacturer whose
wives included Jewish actress Hedy Lamar and Monika Brücklmeier, the daughter
of one of the men executed for his role in the plot to kill Hitler in July of
1944.
1901(18th
of Adar, 5661): Parshat Ki Tisa; Shabbat Parah
1901:
“Antiquity of the House That Jack Built” published discusses the Jewish origins
that folk-lore tale based on a book “published in 1835 at the New Juvenile Book
Store in New York” that “bears upon its title page the inscription ‘A Kid, A
Kid, or the Jewish Origin of he Celebrated Legend, The House That Jack Built.’”
1902: Moses
Shindeling, the Lithuanian born son of Rachel and Isiah Schoneling and his wife
Dora Shindeling gave birth to Helen Ray Genis, the wife of Bernard David Genis.
1902(2nd
of Adar I, 5662): Seventy-three-year-old Somerville, OH native and Jefferson
Medical College trained physician Levi Cooper Lane, the U.S Navy Surgeon, the
founder of Cooper Medical College and one of the pioneers of medical education
on the Pacific Coast of the United States.
1903: The
fifty-one sweatshop proprietors who were each fined five dollars today for
“running their plants on Sunday, “were indignant” because they claimed, “that
Jews who keep their own Sabbath ought to have the right to do business on
Sunday.”
1903: It was
reported today that Herman Grossman, a delegate of the Women’s Garment Maker’s
International Garment Makes International Union complained about the police
going through the east side of New York on Sunday and stopping all work because
“he said that this was a hardship to thousands of Orthodox Jews who kept the
Sabbath on Saturdays” and that “it has always been understood” that until
Police Commissioner Greene took this action “the Orthodox Jews who keep
Saturday as the Sabbath must not be molested on Sundays.”
1904: Sir
Matthew Nathan completed his term as the 20th Governor of the Gold
Coast, the British colony that became the independent nation of Ghana.
1904: Twenty-five-year-old Joseph Adler, the Russian born
son of Solomon and Goldie Adler and the Yeshiva trained rabbi who worked “in
the wood product industry” before, in 1909 coming to the United States where he
served as the “Rosh Yishva Torah Vo’dath in Brooklyn and Rabbi of the New
People’s Synagogue while helping to organize the Jewish Sabbath Alliance,
married Jennie Resnick today.
1904: As some
Zionist leaders consider temporary alternatives for a Jewish homeland, Leopold
Greenberg cables to accept the offer of the territory in Nandi without delay
because a governmental change was impending. Under this pressure Herzl writes
back the demanded consent. On the next day he cables Greenberg again to
undertake nothing until he received Herzl's written instructions.
1905: In
Newark, NJ, Martha Levy and Maurice Steinfeld gave birth to Harold L.
Steinfeld.
1906:
“According to Dr. Mosesohn, a prominent Jew” living in Portland, Oregon, “whose
are assertions are corroborated by the local Post Office Officials, a large
amount of the money sent from the United States to aid Jewish sufferers in
Russia has never been received by those for whom it was intended” due to “a
general failure on the part of the Post Offices throughout Russia to cash
postal money orders which have been sent to Jews” in Russia.
1906:
Birthdate of California native Erwin Charles Ginsburg, who earned All-Far
Western Conference honors while playing for Fresno State from 1925 to 1929.
1907(25th
of Shevat, 5667): Parashat Mishpatim; Shabbat Shekalim
1907: In New
York, at Columbia University, “the meeting of the Jewish students, held this
afternoon, was for the purposed of forming a society, the object of which shal
me the fostering of a Jewish spirit among the Jewish students” and not to
protest against discrimination to which these students are subjected.
1908:
Birthdate of Jacob Finkelstein, the Chicago native who boxed as welterweight
under the name of Jackie Fields.
1908:
Birthdate of Florence, Italy native Giulio (Yoel) Racah, the Israeli physicist
and mathematician who was “acting President of the Hebrew University of
Jersualem.’
1909: “Friends
of the Hebrew Technical Institute met at the Hotel Astor tonight to hold what
Prof. Morris Loeb, the Chairman, called its silver wedding feast” during which
Dr. Edgar T. Barney reported that only eight per cent of the students leave
without graduating as compared to forty per cent at ordinary high schools and
that the “annual earnings of the graduates is $800,000.”
1910: In
Hartford, CT, Russian Jewish immigrants Sarah and Samuel Sokolow gave birth to Anna
Sokolow, the influential modern dance choreographer.
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/sokolow-anna
1911: It was
reported today that Elbridge T. Gerry, President of the Children’s Welfare
Society told a gathering at the Seventy-first Regiment Armory that “few Hebrew
children came within” the Society’s “sphere, partly because there were few Jews
in” New York City “bu in the main because of the instinctive cre their parents
to them and their morals.
1912(21st
of Shevat, 5672): Eighty-one-year-old Marx Moses who had been the Rabbi at
Ahavath Chesed in Jacksonville, FL until 1885, passed away today in New
Orleans.
1912:
Birthdate of Marianne Baum, the husband of Herbert Baum who were both Jewish
leaders of the anti-Nazi resistance.
1912(21st
of Shevat 5672): Fifty-eight-year-old Louisiana native Theodore David “Ted”
Marks, the grandson of Isador Newman, one of New Orleans’ wealthiest
businessmen who after dabbling in several occupations became a leading agent
for vaudeville acts in the United States and the United Kingdom passed away
today in New York.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1912/02/10/104890825.pdf
1913: Miss
Prudence Neff is scheduled to perform a piano solo this evening at the
Seventeenth Sinai Orchestral Concert at the Sinai Temple.
1913: In
Detroit, Michigan, Elias and Freida (Mendelson) Safran gave birth Hyman Safran
the WW II US Navy Lieutenant and President of Safran Printing Company who was
the husband of Leah Yoffee and the father of “Sharon Elaine, Frederick David,
Kenneth Jay, James Allan” Safran.
https://myjewishdetroit.org/2018/02/lchaim/
1913: In his
final offering of the weekend, Boris Thomashefsky is scheduled to present
“Strange Children” this afternoon at the Haymarket.
1913: The
Judaeans are scheduled to hold a meeting this evening at the Hotel Astor where
they will “honor of the board of editors of the new Bible translation now being
prepared under the joint auspices of the Jewish Publication Society of American
and the Central Conference of American Rabbis.
1914: It was
reported today that “proof of the early settlement of Jews in New York and of
subsequent colonial activities of the followers of that religion” which has
“been obtained by the Jewish Historical Society” headquartered in Philadelphia
will be submitted at the upcoming annual meeting of the society along “with the
results of other research work.”
1915: In a
letter written today, Charles S. Hartwell who has offered 100 bushels of corn
to the Serbian Agricultural Relief Commission shared the text of a postcard
from “A Hebrew” who noted that by doing this he was “trying to please the Czar,
the protector of my Jewish brethren.”
1915: During
today’s session of the Duma, Foreign Minister Segei Sazonov denied allegations
that the Russians had organized pogroms against the Jews and that any suffering
came from “the Jewish population being in the theatre of war” where
“suffering…is an inevitable evil.”
1915: At
Worcester, MA, “the 63rd annual convention of District 1, I.O.B.B.,
the oldest fraternal Jewish order in American came to a close today after
donating $1,000 to the American Zionist toward the relief ship which is to go
to Palestine” and appointing “a special committee…to assist in the relief work
of the indigent and unemployed of New York.”
1915:
“Celebration for Army and Navy Jews” published today described the plans of the
Army and Navy Young’ Men’s Hebrew Association to arrange “a Passover
celebration…for Jews serving the United States Army and Navy stationed in the
vicinity of NewYork” which be held at the Vienna Hall at 58th and
Lexington in Manhattan.
1915: It
was reported today that “there are more than 8,000 Jews” currently serving in
the U.S. military.
1916: It was
reported today that the matzoth that will be shipped aboard the U.S. Navy
collier Sterling “is intended for distribution among Jews who, owing to the war
conditions will be unable to get a supply from any other source” and that “the
matzoth is being prepared in accordance with all the requirements of the Jewish
religion.”
1917: The
600-year-old synagogue of Congregation Shaari Zedek in Tunis was destroyed by
fire.
1917: Dr.
Isaac Straus, the editor of the American Jewish Chronicle, who has just applied
for his naturalization papers denied that he had ever been a member of The
Committee for the East, a pro-German propaganda organization or that he had
come to the United States with Bernhard Dernburg, the German-Jewish leader who
had come to the United States to present the German point of view before
America entered the war on the side of the allies.
1917: The
Joint Distribution Committee, chaired by Felix M. Warburg, today authorized the
transfer to Europe of all of the funds in its possession - $955,000 – for the
purpose providing relief to Jews of Europe, Turkey and Palestine.
1917: This
week’s issues of The American Hebrew
and The American Jewish Chronicle
published today, “both pledged to President Wilson the unwavering support of
the Jews in America” if the United States goes to war with Germany.
1918(27th
of Shevat, 5678): Parashat Mishpatim; Shabbat Shekalim
1918: “Operating
expenses of the Jewish Hospital of Brooklyn for the last year increased
$53,000, from $218,720 to $271,954, according to the report of Edward C. Blum,
President of the Jewish Hospital.”
1919: Rabbi
Jacob S. Minkin delivered the prayer at the ceremony today marking the opening
the Nursery of the Daughters of Israel in New York which can accommodate as
many as 150 youngsters.
1919: Fannie
Newberger is scheduled to present a paper on “Civilization of Ancient India and
the Vedie religion” at today’s meeting of the Jewish Literary Society at Zion
Temple in Chicago.
1919(9th
of Adar I, 5679): Seventy-year-old Ludwig Geirger, the son of Abraham Geiger,
who was chair of the history department at the University of Berlin passed away
today.
1919: The
pupils of the Hebrew School are scheduled to perform a playlet and sing songs
in Hebrew at today’s annual of the Jewish Education Centre in New York.
1920(20th
of Shevat, 5680): Eighty-two-year-old Emily Frederika Meyer, the Charleston, SC
born daughter of Catherine and Hertz Wolf Oppenheim and the wife of Emily
Joseph Meyer passed away today in Montgomery, AL>
1920:
“Moroccan Jews Ask to be Spanish” published today reported that “a delegation
of Jews from the Spanish zone in Morocco has arrived” in Madrid “with a largely
signed petition from their co-religionists asked that Spanish citizenship be
granted to them.”
1921: In an
interview given today, “Nahum Sokolov, the President of the Executive Zionist
Committee” suggested “that the Jews of America and Europe organize a plan to
transport the oppressed Jews in the Ukraine to Palestine as soon as feasible.”
1921: “Actors
Want Rest Day” published today reported that “actors and actress” have joined
together in “opposition to the bill which would permit Jews who observe
Saturday as Sabbath to keep their places of business open on Sunday.”
1922: “Lord
Northcliffe, who is visiting Jerusalem,” was “reported in a Jerusalem dispatch
to The London Times” to have expressed “regret at finding the country in a less
satisfied state than when he was there years ago.”
1923: “Vienna,
City of Song” a “silent film directed by Alfred Deutsch-German” who thought he
was safe when he took refuge in France but ended up being murdered at
Auschwitz.
1923: Premiere
of “The Land of Smiles,” “a romantic operetta with a libretto co-authored by
Fritz Löhner-Beda would be murdered by the Nazis two decades later at Monowitz
concentration camp.
1924:
Twenty-one-year-old Rose Dinn married 27 year old Sam Ash, the founder of Sam
Ash Music Corp. which was, at one time, “the largest family owned chain of
musical instrument stores in the United States.
1925(15th
of Shevat, 5685) Tu B’Shevat
1925: The
Technion opened in Haifa. “As Israel's oldest and premier institute of science
and technology, the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology has been an
active and leading participant in Israel's establishment and development. With
supreme effort and unyielding dedication, deserts have bloomed, swamps have
been transformed into fertile agricultural valleys, and sand has given way to
silicon. Israel is now recognized as one of the world's most prominent
high-tech innovators, and has been called the second Silicon Valley.”
After some years of intense pioneering activities, with which Prof. Albert
Einstein's deep involvement, the Technion opened its doors in the 1920’s
becoming Israel’s first modern university. The first undergraduate class consisted
of 16 students in two areas of instruction; Civil Engineering and Architecture.
After serious debate, the language of instruction was chosen to be Hebrew, as
opposed to German. The impact of the first Jewish university in an embryonic
Jewish state brought about a vital link between the two. The faculty has had an
impact in a variety of fields and has one numerous international honors. In
2004, “Professors Avram Hershko and Aaron Ciechanover of the Faculty of
Medicine received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their discovery of the
crucial role of ubiquitin in the process of protein breakdown in cells.”
The accomplishments are all the more amazing when one considers the political,
economic and cultural milieu in which the Technion was developed – limited funding,
terrorism, and the constant threat of national annihilation.
1925: The
children of Jerusalem planted trees on Tu B’Shevat
1926:
“Municipal Court Justice Jacob S. Strahl of a Brooklyn and other officers and
directors of the American Palestine Line were sued in the Supreme Court” today
“for $150,000 in damages for false arrest and malicious prosecution by Hyman
Epstein, the former general manager of the line.”
1927: Mrs.
Louis L. Rapport gave an address of greeting at “the first joint Senior and
Junior meeting of the National Council of Jewish Women of Bergen County Section
was held at the Y.M.H.A. building in Hackensack, NJ this evening
1927: “Wrapped
in elegant gray furs, Helen Menken was handcuffed and charged with
‘contributing to a common nuisance’ and ‘obscene exhibition’ when police
arrested her and the rest of the cast of “The Captive.”
1928: The
Hamburg-American liner New York whose passenger list includes the members of
Max Reinhardt’s theatrical company is scheduled to depart for the Channel ports
today.
1929(29th
of Shevat, 5689): Parashat Mishpatim
1929:
“Zeppelin Trip Postponed” published today described the decision to delay the
Graf Zeppelin’s trip to Egypt and Palestine until the latter half of March.
1930: In
Massachusetts, Samuel and Bessie Bassok Warshawsky gave birth to Irving
Warshawsky, the “husband of Anita (Kornfeld) Warshawsky.”
1930: “The
first union service of Christian and Jewish students ever held in New England”
is scheduled “to take place” this evening at 8 p.m. “at the Temple Israel”
where “Rabbi Levy will preach and leaders of many denominations will take part
in the services.” (JTA)
1931:
Birthdate of William “Willie: Harmatz, the native of Wilkes-Barre, PA, who grew
up in California where he learned the skills to make him a leading jockey who
won the Preakness, the third jewel in the triple crown, in 1959.
1932: James W.
Gerard, the treasurer of the Democratic National Committee “spoke at the Jewish
Centre of Brooklyn” this evening “during which he made no reference to American
politics” as later alleged by the New York Times.
1933: It was
reported today that the proceeds of a Hadassah luncheon held at the Hotel Astor
which attended by more than 600 members will go to help “to support the
Hadassah medical organization which maintains hospitals and clinics in
Palestine.
1934: The
funeral for Abraham Shiplacoff, a veteran labor leader and the first member of
the Socialist Party to be elected to the New York State Assembly is scheduled
to be held today the Daily Forward Building in New York City.
1934: In
Chicago, Jules Stein the ophthalmologist who founded MCA, and “the former Doris
Jones” gave birth to Jean Babette Stein “whose restless curiosity led her to
produce oral histories about Robert F. Kennedy, the tragic Warhol star Edie
Sedgwick and a group of people and families who transformed Los Angeles.” (As
reported by Richard Sandomir)
1934: Three
days after he had passed away, Lazarus Isaacs, the husband of Rebecca Isaacs
was buried today at the “Brompton (Fulham Road) Jewish Cemetery.
1934: In the
UK, premiere of the “The Rise of Catherine The Great” directed by Paul Czinner,
produced by Alexander Korda, with music by Irving Berlin.
1935(6th
of Adar I, 5695): Parashat Terumah
1935(6th
of Adar I, 5695): Thirty-four-year-old Maurice Elfenbein, the son of Samuel and
Celia Elfenbein and husband of Mildred Elfenbein with whom he had two children
– Lucille and Richard – passed away today.
1935: In
Wheeling, West Virginia, the third and final day of the celebration marking the
85th anniversary of the E off Street Temple.
1936: “Mrs.
William Dick Sporborg accepted the chairmanship of the women’s division of the
United Palestine Appeal” which plans on “raising $3,500,000 during 1936 to
finance the settlement in Palestine of large numbers of Jews from Germany and
other Eastern European countries.
1936: In a
statement issued today “through Dr. Stephen S. Wise” Dr. Chaim Weizmann said
“American Jewry constitutes the premier Jewish community in the world” and such
it “must recognize that the rebuilding of Palestine as Jewry’s ‘one means of
self-preservation’ rather than a mere philanthropic enterprise. (Editor’s
note: Compare this inclusionary
statement with the exclusionary policies followed increasingly by the current
of government of Israel)
1936: In a
sermon this morning, Dr. J. Stanley Durkee, the pastor of the Plymouth Church
of the Pilgrims in Brooklyn criticized “Jews for declining to become ‘an
integral part of the civilization around them’” while describing their
persecutors as those “who have driven them away and so over-pressed them that
their only hope lies in money to purchase their freedom.”
1936: In
Buffalo, at a meeting of the executive board of the Union Hebrew Congregations,
Chairman Jacob W. Mack of Cincinnati made a plea for the 286 reformed
congregations in the United States “to become a counterpart of the liberal
movement in world Jewry.”
1936: An
article published today in the New Orleans Times-Picayune “discussed Felix J.
Dreyfous and the concept of a small claims court” which Dreyfous thought would
be able “to protect the rights of dependent children and to render services to
families in difficult straits.”
1936: “Modern
Jewish Thought” published today provided a lengthy review of Rebirth: A Book
of Modern Jewish Thought by Ludwig Lewisohn.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive/pdf?res=9501E2DD123BE33BBC4153DFB466838D629EDE
1937(28th
of Shevat, 5697): Georges Calmann-Levy, “the famous French publisher” the
grandson of the founder of the firm of Calmann-Levy, which published the works
of Antaolo France, Pierro Loti and Ernest Renan passed away today. (As reported
by JTA)
1937: Albert
Ganzert’s “Borderline” a play set in Berlin that “describes the havoc wrought
in a substantial, happy family when certain persons discover that the
grandfather of the head of the family (an eminent physician) was a Jew” “was
presented by Maurice Schwartz and the Yiddish Art Theatre Company at the
Forty-ninth Street Theatre” tonight.
1937:
Following violent demonstrations last night during which 22 Jewish students
were injured, nationalist students at the university in Vilna proclaimed today
as “A day without Jews” and barred Jewish students from entering the classroom
1938: The
Jerusalem Post reported that a British sergeant was killed while pursuing
an Arab gang near Tulkarm.
1938: The
Jerusalem Post reported that Arab terrorists cut telephone wires, shot at
and stopped an Arab bus near Hebron, killed one passenger and took away the
uniform of an Arab constable, warning him to leave the force.
1938: The
Jerusalem Post reported that in elections to the Jerusalem Communal Council
(Va’ad Kehila) out of 9,404 votes cast, Labor won 1,417, Revisionists 877,
General Zionists 416, Mizrahi 413, and the rest was divided among 13 small
political parties.
1938: Today
“The Rumanian National Bank committee forbade the sending of currency to
Rumanian Jews studying abroad.”
1938: Today,
“Colonial Secretary William Ormsby-Gore told the House of Commons that the
British Government would consider the problem of the Jews in Rumania when it
set the new immigration for Palestine.”
1939: Per a
request by the executive council that had met at the Jewish Theological
Seminary, prayers are scheduled to be offer this evening…in the 300 synagogues
that belong to the Rabbinical Assembly that the deliberations at the Palestine
parley in London will be conducted in the spirit of truth, mutual understanding
and brotherhood.”
1939: Today in
London, Arab leaders said, “The helpless condition of Jewish refugees from
Germany is a problem for the world in general and must be kept separate from
the question of Palestine.”
1939: In Johannesburg, “Betty (née Sonnenberg) and
Saul Suzman, a wealthy tobacco importer” gave birth to South African actress
Janet Suzman, the granddaughter of South African MP Max Sonnenberg and the
“niece of Helen Suzman, South African politician and anti-apartheid
campaigner.”
1940: William
E. Dodd, the American historian who served as Ambassador to Germany from 1933
to 1937 passed away. Dodd was the first American ambassador who served
under the Hitler régime. He tried to warn the State Department and the American
people about the danger, but his warnings fell on deaf ears. (For more see In
the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson, a history book that reads like a
novel.)
1940(30th of
Sh'vat, 5700): Rosh Chodesh Adar I
1940: U.S.
premiere of “Broadway Melody of 1940,” a musical directed by Norman Taurog,
filmed by cinematographer Joseph Ruttenberg with a story co-authored by Dore
Schary.
1941:
Dutch Nazis sparked the first anti-Jewish riots in Amsterdam. Among other
damage, the Nazi collaborators destroyed the pro-Jewish café Alcazar Amsterdam.
Alcazar refused to hang "No Entry for Jews" signs in front of café.
1941(14th
of Shevat, 5701): Sixty-eight-year-old Russian born award winning painter
Benedict Anton Osnis who at 14 came to the United States where he “studied
painting at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts” before going on to create
portraits of many problem people including President Coolidge and General John
J. Pershing passed away today in Philadelphia.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1941/02/11/85447955.html?pageNumber=23
1942: In
Manhattan, Eugenia Crammer, a schoolteacher, and Sidney N Klein, a firefighter
Carol Joan Klein who gained fame as singer-songwriter Carole King.
1943: In Gary
Indiana, (née Fishman) and Nathaniel D. Stiglitz gave birth to Joseph E.
Stiglitz, American economist, winner of the Nobel Prize for Economics.
1943, G R
Barnes, the director of talks at the BBC “complained about an interview which
strayed into forbidden territory by discussing anti- Semitism: 'Personally I
don't want to touch the subject, except by implication in talks on other
subjects,' he wrote.” His complaint was emblematic of an anti-Semitic mentality
at the BBC that “led to a policy which suppressed news about Germany's attempt
to exterminate European Jews.”
1944(15th
of Shevat, 5704): Tu B’Shevat
1944: Tarnow,
Poland ‘was declared ‘Judenrein’ – Jew free – today.
1944: The Lodz
Ghetto received machinery and a factory was set up that helped to secure
survival for a while longer for many Jews. Unknown to them, the machinery came
from Poniataw, where the Jewish population had been obliterated in November of
1943.
1945:
Churchill sends Ibn Saud, the Saudi Monarch, urging him to meet with FDR who is
on his way back to the United States after the Yalta meetings. Churchill
mistakenly believes that FDR will provide leverage for the settlement of Jews
in Palestine after the war.
1946(8th
of Adar I, 5706): Parashat Terumah
1946: “Evan
Wilson, the research assistant of the Anglo-American Commission on Palestine
arrived in the Middle East to assist in making arrangements for the
commission’s visit.”
1947: “Dr.
Frank Aydelotte, a member of the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry on
Palestine appealed” today “for the United States to take its share of
responsibility in solving the Arab-Zionist problem in the Holy Land.”
1948: The
Stern Gang blew up two Arab owned building in Jerusalem from which Arab snipers
had been shooting at Jews.
1948: During
the fight for Jerusalem, the Haganah attacked the Arab village of Sur Bahir
from which snipers had been shooting at the residents of Talipot.
1948: The
Supreme Court, including Justice Felix Frankfurter began hearing oral arguments
in the landmark anti-trust cast – United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc.
(Paramount was the creation of a cadre of Jews including Zukor, Frohman, Lasky,
Goldywyn, et al)
1949: On the
Island of Rhodes, “Egyptian-Israeli armistice talks appeared today to be
marking time for the second day in succession but a well-informed source said
that positive developments were expected within a few days.”
1950: “Young
Man with a Horn” the movie version of the novel with the same name directed by
Michael Curitz, produced by Jerry Wald, with a screenplay co-authored by Carl
Foreman and starring Kirk Douglas and Lauren Bacall was released in the United
States today.
1951: In New
York City Michael Allen Pomeranz and the former Bonnie G. Bernstein gave birth
to singer/songwriter David Pomeranz.
1951(3rd of
Adar I, 5711): Pianist and society band leader, Eddy Duchin passed away. Born
in 1910, in Cambridge, MA, this son of Jewish immigrant parents trained as a
Pharmacist before pursing his musical dream. He was a musical genius who began
leading his own orchestra in 1931 when he was only 22. He was 41 years old when
he died of acute myelogenous leukemia. He was the father the even more famous
Peter Duchin. The Eddy Duchin Story, a film with Tryone Power playing the
title role and Kim Novak playing his High Society first wife, made no mention
of Duchin being Jewish or the challenges that must have presented as he pursued
his career among those who if not anti-Semitic certainly were not partial to
having Jews around.
https://geezermusicclub.wordpress.com/2010/10/31/the-real-eddy-duchin-story/
1952: John
Demjanjuk , a guard at Sobibor who Michael Hanusiak, editor of the Ukrainian
News would list as a Ukrainian suspected of collaborating with the Nazis, his
wife and child arrived in New York aboard the USS General W.W. Haan
1953: The
Jerusalem Post reported that by six votes of Mapai and Ha’oved Hatzioni
against two of Mapam, and one member of Mapam abstaining, the Histadrut decided
to ban Communists from the organization.
1953(24th
of Shevat, 5713): Fifty-eight-year-old London born American cinematographer
Richard Fryer passed away today.
1953: The
Jerusalem Post reported that three marauders were killed and eight captured
along the Jordanian border.
1953: The
Jerusalem Post reported that the cabinet had decided on the establishment
of the State Bank, agreed to hold the Conquest of the Desert Exhibition and
allocated land for the Hebrew University Givat Ram development.
1954(6th
of Adar I, 5714): Julius Isaacs, the Lithuanian born “son of Isaac and Sarah
Postawelsky” and husband of “Matilda (Tillie) Isaacs” passed away today after
which he was buried in Sheffield, England.
1954:
Birthdate of Salah Tarif, a Druze Israeli politician who served in the Knesset
for fourteen years. His service in the cabinet of Ariel Sharon made him
the first non-Jew to serve as a government minister in Israel.
1956(27th
of Shevat, 5716): Fifty-three-year-old Sailing P. Baruch, Jr. the Elberon, NJ
born son of Sailing Baruch and the former Leonora Prince, the brother of Donald
Edward Baruch and nephew famed financier Bernard Baruch who served as an Ensign
in the Coast Guard during WW II and who was “president of the investment hose
of Baruch Brothers and Company passed away tonight in Miami Beach, “after a
series of abdominal operations.”
1958: “Thirty
sticks of dynamite discovered by police in suitcase at Temple Emanuel in
Gastonia, North Carolina.”
1958(17th
of Tevet, 5718): Fifty-six-year-old Philadelphia native Emanuel “Manny” Sacks,
the executive at Columbia Records and RCA Victor, who played an integral role
in the careers of such stars as Harry James and who played a major role in
promoting the acceptance of the LP record passed away today.
https://pennsylvaniamilitarycollege.org/maine-sacks-pied-piper-stars/
http://www.totaltheater.com/?q=node/487
1958:
Birthdate of New Yorker Jonathan Joseph “Jon” Ledecky the founder of U.S.
Office Products and uncle of gold medal winning swimmer Katie Ledecky who along
with his Harvard roommate Scott D. Makin, the brother-in-law of Senator Richard
Blumenthal, purchased the New York Islanders of the NHL.
1959(1st
of Adar I, 5719): Rosh Chodesh Adar I
1959(1st
of Adar 1, 5719): Seventy-five-year-old David Jacob Cohen, the “honorary
secretary of the Beth-El Synagogue, vice president of the Calcutta Jewish
Association and member of the Bengal Legislative Council who “was appointed an
Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1941” passed away today.
http://www.jewishcalcutta.in/items/show/104
http://www.jewishcalcutta.in/items/show/128
1960(11th
of Shevat, 5720): Sixty-four-year-old Yiddish theatre star Jennie Goldstein,
the New York born daughter of Samuel Goldstein, a butcher, and the former
Beckie Scheffie who made her stage debut at the age of six, passed away today.
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/goldstein-jennie
https://www.nypl.org/blog/2019/02/08/yiddish-drama-actor-writer-jennie-goldstein
1960: In
Washington, D.C. Dorothy Simon (née Ligeti), a homemaker, and Bernard Simon, a
former journalist and then public relations director for B'nai B'rith for 20
years gave birth to University of Maryland trained screenwriter David Judah
Simon creator of the gritty police drama “The Wire.”
1964: Thanks
to the work of their manager Brian Epstein, the Beatles made their first
appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show, three days before they were to appear at
Carnegie Hall as a result of a deal work out between Epstein and impresario Sid
Bernstein.
1964(26th
of Shevat, 5724): Seventy-five-year-old Lviv native Marek Weber, the successful
“German violinist and bandleader” who fled Nazi Germany where his work was
labeled “degenerate” and came to the United States where he was featured as the
“Waltz King” on NBC radio passed away today.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62vpXVUS-Jw
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/gay-south-florida/article3538787.html
1965: A
funeral is scheduled to take place at Riverside Memorial Chapel for eighty-three-year-old Riga born, New York
College of Dentist graduate Dr. Isadore Hirschfeld who in 1890 came to the
United States where he became “an authority in treating gum diseases” as served
as “chairman of committees of Jewish dentists who collected dental equipment
for the Israeli Army and raised funds for dental schools in Israel” while
raising two children with his wife the former Pauline Steinberg.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1965/02/06/95530323.html?pageNumber=25
1966 (19th of
Shevat, 5726): Seventy-nine-year-old Sophie Tucker, the last of the Red
Hot Mommas, passed away.
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/gay-south-florida/article3538787.html
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/tucker-sophie
1967(29th
of Shevat, 5727): Eighty-one-year-old Minsk native Brooklyn Law School trained
“lawyer and arbitrator Isaac Seigmeister” who in 1892 came to the United Sates
where he studied engineering at Cooper Union, married Bertha Seigmeister with
whom he had one daughter and for 23 years “arbitrated millinery disputes
between the Joint Board of Millinery
Workers Union and the Eastern Women’s Headdress Association passed away today.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1967/02/11/82579649.html?pageNumber=28
1968 (10th of
Shevat, 5728): Sydney Silverman, Labour MP, foe of the death penalty and a
supporter of Jewish causes passed away today.
1969: Today,
over a year after the INS Dakar sank with all hands-on board, a Palestinian
fisherman found her stern emergency buoy marker washed up on the coast of Khan
Yunis, a Palestinian town southwest of Gaza.
1970: “A
four-day mid-winter meeting of Hadassah focusing on the ‘problem of disaffected
Jewish youth’ is scheduled to open today” in New York.
1971: “Little
Murders,” an off-beat comedy directed by Alan Arkin, written by Jules Feiffer,
starring Elliot Gould and featuring Lou Jacobi was released in the United
States today.
1972(24th of
Shevat, 5732): Bella Fromm passed away. Born in Bavaria in 1890, she
became a successful journalist who sought refuge in the United States in 1938.
In 1942, she published an account of her time spent covering the Nazis in a
bestseller entitled “Blood and Banquets: A Berlin Social Diary.”
1972(24th
of Shevat, 5732): Fifty-six year old Newark native Dr. Irving K. Perlmutter,
the graduate of the University of
Pennsylvania and Jefferson Medical College and the “former director of
obstetrics and gynecology at Beth Israel Medical Center” who was the husband of
Helen Perlmutter with whom he had had three children – Armin, Eric and Penny –
passed away today.
https://www.nytimes.com/1972/02/11/archives/dr-irving-perlmutter.html
1973: Brazil’s
Foreign Minister, Mario Gibson Barboza is scheduled to complete “his official
visit to Israel” today.
1973(7th of
Adar I, 5733): Max B. Yasgur, an American farmer, best known as the owner of
the dairy farm in Bethel, New York at which the Woodstock Music and Art Fair
was held passed away.
1974: “The
editors at Billboard “singled out
Barbra Streisand’s ‘The Way Were’ in its ‘Spotlight’ section.
1975: The
Second National Conference in Solidarity with Chile co-sponsored by Herbert
Aptheker, came to an end.
1975:
Birthdate of rabbi and author Danya Ruttenberg who in 2010 was named as “one of
the 36 most influential leaders under the age of 36.”
https://jps.org/bookauthors/rabbi-danya-ruttenberg/
1975(28th
of Shevat, 5735): Eighty-six-year-old Romanian native, Leon Rene Yankwich, the
holder of law degrees from Williamette University College of Law and Loyola Law
School who began serving as Federal judge after being nominated to the bench in
1935 by President Roosevelt passed away today.
https://www.fjc.gov/node/1390201
1975(28th
of Shevat, 5735): Sixty-four-year-old art dealer and “art sleuth” Frank Richard
Perls passed away today.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive/pdf?res=9E07E0D81438E63BBC4852DFB466838E669EDE
1975: “A Brief
Vacation” an Italian film produced by Arthur Cohn was released today in the
United States.
1976(8th
of Adar I, 5736): Fifty-six year old Israeli archaeologist Yohanan Aharoni who
took part in numerous digs including Tel Hazor and Lachish as well as the
“discovery of the Bar Kokhba Caves” passed away today.
1978: “The
Betsy,” the movie version of the novel by Harold Robbins who co-wrote the
script with Walter Bernstein was released in the United States today.
1978: A day
after he passed away, Dr. Arnulf M. Pins, “the director for the Middle East
Region of the Joint Distribution Committee and associate director of JDC-Israel
was buried in Jerusalem today.
1978: The
Jerusalem Post reported that Egyptian President Anwar Sadat succeeded in
persuading US President Jimmy Carter to adopt a more active role in peace
negotiations. In New York, Foreign Minister Moshe Dayan denied that Israel had
violated pledge given to the US on the settlement issue and sharply attacked
Sadat¹s negotiating stance. In Geneva, meeting Jewish leaders, Prime Minister
Menachem Begin warned that the sale of US arms to Egypt and other Arab
countries endangered peace.
1978(2nd
of Adar I, 5738): Sixty-two-year-old Woodrow “Woody” Gelman whose varied career
as a cartoonist and publisher included the creation of the “Triple Nickel”
books and the designing of the Topp’s Baseball Card sets passed away today.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive/pdf?res=9C03E0DC1430E632A25752C1A9649C946990D6CF
1981(5th
of Adar I, 5741): Seventy-one-year-old professor of medical psychology at
Columbia University and author Helen Cohn Schucman passed away today.
http://acim-archives.org/Scribes/autobiography_preface-Helen.html
1982:
“Twenty-eight veteran refuseniks sent an open letter to participants of the
Madrid Conference of the CSCE meeting listing Soviet violations of the Helsinki
Final Act.”
1982(16th
of Shevat, 5742): Forty seven year old Polish native Israel Giladi, the son of
Haim Yehuda Giladi and Nechama Laska and
brother of Michael and Bilha Laska passed away today in Antwerp.
1985: Reagan
appointee Alex Kozinski ended his service as Chief Judge of the United States
Claims Court today.
1986(30th
of Shevat, 5746): Rosh Chodesh Adar I: Ukrainian born Broadway columnist Louis
Sobol passed away today.
https://www.nytimes.com/1986/02/10/obituaries/louis-sobol-90-dies-broadway-columnist.html
https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-xpm-1986-02-11-8601090630-story.html
1987:
Kidnappers holding four Western hostages reiterated that they would kill their
captives at midnight tonight unless 400 Arab prisoners were freed by Israel,
then, as the deadline passed, announced that it had been extended ''until
further notice.'' Between the kidnappers' statements, a car-bomb explosion
killed 17 people and wounded 80 in a densely populated Shiite Moslem suburb of
Beirut. A hand-written letter signed by three American hostages had said the
kidnappers, Islamic Holy War for the Liberation of Palestine, ''will execute us
at midnight because Israel is refusing to release 400 Palestinians from its
cells.'' The statement, delivered to a Western news agency in Moslem-controlled
West Beirut, was accompanied by a photograph of one hostage, Alann Steen. Three
other teachers - Robert Polhill and Jesse Turner, both Americans, and
Mithileshwar Singh, an Indian national - were also abducted by gunmen from
Beirut University College last month. The Israelis indicated that they might
consider the demand for the release of the 400 Palestinians, but they have not
taken up an offer by the leader of the Lebanese Shiite militia Amal, Nabih
Berri, to exchange an Israeli Air Force navigator being held by Amal for the
400 prisoners in Israel.
1987:
Israel's Defense Minister, Yitzhak Rabin, said tonight that Israel would
consider any American appeal to swap 400 Arab prisoners for hostages held by
kidnappers in Beirut. But he, Prime Minister Shamir and Foreign Minister Peres
emphasized that the United States had not asked Israel to get involved. ''If
and when the U.S. will turn to us, we'll consider what to do,'' Mr. Rabin said.
Mr. Peres said Israel did not know which 400 prisoners the kidnappers wanted
released.
1989: Sally
Oppenheim-Barnes who served in the House of Commons with her for four years,
“was created a life peer today as Baroness Oppenheim-Barnes of Gloucester in
the County of Gloucester.
1990:
Unrepentant, the Israeli peace campaigner Abie Nathan was released from prison
today. He vowed to continue the activities for which he was jailed four months
ago.
1991(25th
of Shevat, 5751): Parashat Mishpatim; Shabbat Shekailm
1991: A new
Scud missile attack on Israel left 20 people slightly wounded in Tel Aviv, the
military said. Iraq fired a single Scud missile armed with a conventional
warhead at Israel early this morning, and the authorities said it was hit by a
Patriot missile over Tel Aviv. But burning debris struck buildings in a
residential area, badly damaging some of them and wounding between 15 and 20
people, the army said.
1992: The
"Schwarzkopf March," which was composed by Abraham Sternklar in honor
of General Norman Schwarzkopf, is scheduled to have its premiere at the North
Shore Jewish Center in Port Jefferson Station. As a 12-year-old living in Tel
Aviv in 1943, Sternklar had composed a march in honor of British General
Bernard Montgomery entitled “Montgomery’s March.”
1993: Launch
of the INS Eilat (501) a Sa’ar 5 – class corvette.
1994: Israeli
minister Shimon Perez signed a peace accord with PLO's Arafat.
1994: Poet
Kenneth Koch, professor of English and comparative literature at Columbia, was
named winner of the Bollingen Prize in Poetry by Yale University.
1994: In
Israel, two portfolio managers, Vladimir Saar and Arye Shafir, have been
detained on suspicion of a multimillion-dollar stock market manipulation scheme
on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, the police said today. Press reports said they
were suspected of violations involving more than $26 million. Reports of the
arrests led to a slide in the exchange's blue-chip index, which closed 3.5
percent lower. Dealers reported particularly sharp drops in shares of eight
companies whose prices the two men were said to have manipulated. Last year,
the prices of some of those companies rose as much as 700 percent. Police
officials said the arrests were the result of an investigation by the
Government's Securities Authority, an oversight group. Stock exchange and Securities
Authority officials declined to comment on the case while it was still under
investigation.
1994 (28th of
Shevat, 5754): Taxi driver, Ilan Sudri was kidnapped and killed while returning
home from work. The Islamic Jihad Shekaki group sent a message to the news agencies
claiming responsibility for the murder.
1994(28th
of Shevat, 5754): Eighty-year-old Romanian born “French-speaking Surrealist
theorist and poet” passed away today.
1996(19th of
Shevat, 5756): One hundred six-year-old Rabbi Albert J. Amateau, founder of the
Brotherhood of Rhodes, and the Sephardic Brotherhood, an offshoot of the
Salonican Brotherhood, passed away.
http://www.nytimes.com/1996/02/29/nyregion/rabbi-albert-j-amateau-106-sephardic-leader.html
1997: The
New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of
special interest to Jewish readers including The Reichmanns Family, Faith,
Fortune, and the Empire of Olympia & York by Anthony Bianco and French
Children of the Holocaust: A Memorial by Serge Klarsfeld
1999: The
New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of
special interest to Jewish readers including A Journey to the End of the
Millenium by A.B. Yehoshua and Preempting the Holocaust by Lawrence
L. Langer.
1999:
Journalist Claudia Dreifus highlighted her expertise in a talk on the art of
the political interview given at the National Archives in Washington, D.C.
1999(23rd
of Shevat, 5759): Just ten days before his 78th birthday NCAA
heavyweight wrestling champion and college and professional football standout
Leonard Bernard “Butch” Levy passed away in his hometown – Minneapolis, MN.
2000(3rd of
Adar I, 5760): Stephen Robert Furness a member of the Pittsburgh Steelers'
famed Steel Curtain defense who earned four Super Bowl rings, passed away.
2001: Arthur
Levitt, Jr. the twenty-fifth and longest-serving Chairman of the United States
Securities and Exchange Commission stepped down from his position today.
2001: STS-98
Atlantis blasted off today with Mark Lewis “Roman” Polansky serving as pilot.
2001(16th of
Shevat, 5761): Eighty-four-year-old Nobel Prize winning economist Herbert
Simon passed away.
https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/economic-sciences/1978/simon/biographical/
2002: In
today's broadcast of Verbatim, Rabbi Raymond Apple described his early life in
Melbourne (including his early experience of a Catholic kindergarten) from
short pants to long 'Bar Mitzvah' trousers and the steady development of his
religious vocation
2003: The
Times of London featured a review of Charlotte and Lionel by Stanley
Weintraub
2003: The
New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of
special interest to Jewish readers including Lost In America: A Journey With
My Father by Sherwin B. Nuland and Genuine Authentic: The Real Life of
Ralph Lauren by Michael Gross.
2004: It was
reported today that “Israel is working to reroute parts of its West Bank
separation barrier to make it less burdensome on the Palestinians and more
acceptable to the United States…”
2005(30th
of Shevat, 5765): Sixty-seven-year-old former Mossad agent Sylvia Rafael passed
away today.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/Rafael.html
2006(11th
of Shevat, 5766): The Indian film star known as Nadira passed away today in
Mumbai after a long illness. There is some confusion as to her age – she
was either 73 or 75. That is not the only confusion. According to
one source her name was a native of Palestine named Florence Ezekiel who moved
to India in the late 1940’s to begin a career in films. Another source
said her name was Farhat Ezekiel Nadira and she was the daughter of Baghdadi
Jews.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/10/arts/10nadira.html?scp=1&sq=Nadira&st=nyt
2006: The
United States confirmed the appointment of Eric S. Edelman as Under Secretary
of Defense for Policy.
2006: In Germany,
after several delays, Holocaust denier Ernst Zundel’s trial in which he was
facing charge of “14 counts of inciting racial hatred” was resumed.
2007:
Haaretz reported on a study conducted by the Steinhardt Social Research
Institute at Brandeis University that found between 6 million and 6.4 million
Jews live in the United States, about 1 million more than was previously
thought.
2007: Ernst
Leitz II, “the German owner of the company that manufactures Leica cameras was
honored” posthumously “by the ADL for saving
200 to 300 employees and their families from the Nazis.”
http://archive.adl.org/presrele/holna_52/4975_52.html#.VrlRyv8UV9C
2008: The 12th
Sephardic NY Film Festival continues with “A Tribute to Israel at 60” featuring
the North America premiere of “Exodus, Ada’s Dream” which is “based on the true
story of Ada Sereni who became a leader of Aliyah Bet helping the underground
Jewish Brigade bring survivors to Palestine in 1945” followed by the New York
Premier of “Family Heroes” or “Le Heros de Famille.”
2008: It was
reported today that Conservative Rabbis plan to vote on a resolution (see
below) criticizing the Pope’s revision of prayer recited on Good Friday.
“The revision of a
contentious Good Friday prayer approved this week by Pope Benedict XVI could
set back Jewish-Catholic relations, Conservative Judaism’s international
assembly of rabbis says in a resolution to be voted on next week.
The
prayer calls for God to enlighten the hearts of Jews “so that they may
acknowledge Jesus Christ, the savior of all men.”
The
draft resolution states the prayer would “cast a harsh shadow over the spirit
of mutual respect and collaboration that has marked these past four decades,
making it more difficult for Jews to engage constructively in dialogue with
Catholics.”
On
Tuesday, the pope released new wording for the prayer, part of the traditional
Latin, or Tridentine, Mass.
Before the
Second Vatican Council, also known as Vatican II, the Good Friday Mass in Latin
prayed for the conversion of Jews, referring to their “blindness” and calling
upon God to “lift a veil from their hearts.”
An
unofficial translation of the new prayer reads: “Let us pray for the Jews. May
the Lord Our God enlighten their hearts so that they may acknowledge Jesus
Christ, the savior of all men.”
Lay
Jewish groups this week called the change insufficient.
Rabbi Joel
H. Meyers, executive vice president of the Rabbinical Assembly, the
Conservative rabbis’ group, said leaders from the Reform and Reconstructionist
movements had also been in touch with him about issuing a joint statement on
the papal revision.
“We
have been very much involved in interfaith activities and dialogue for years,
and relationships with the Catholic Church are really quite good,” the rabbi
said. “I think it really turns back the clock a bit and reverts to some sense
that the church is pulling back from the positions it took in Vatican II.”
Most
Catholics worship in the vernacular, and their prayers will
not be affected. But last year, the pope made it easier for traditionalists to
celebrate the Latin Mass that was the norm before Vatican II.
At a
meeting in Washington from Sunday to Thursday, the Rabbinical Assembly will
vote on a draft resolution, which, while subject to revision, says the group is
“dismayed and deeply disturbed to learn that Pope Benedict XVI has revised the
1962 text of the Latin Mass, retaining the rubric, ‘For the Conversion of The
Jews.’ ”
The
Rev. James Massa, executive director of the secretariat of ecumenical and
interreligious affairs of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops,
said Friday that the prayer would be heard by “a tiny minority of Catholics and
they will hear it in Latin.”
“The
publication of the prayer and its interpretation by some of our partners in the
Jewish community does lower the temperature a bit,” Father Massa said, “but we
have persevered other controversies in the past and at the end of the day we
are all at the table of dialogue.”
2008: It was
reported today that the selection of Israel as guest of honor at this spring’s
International Book Fair in Turin has set off a furious debate among Italian,
Israeli and Arab authors and intellectuals, including calls to boycott the
event, Italy’s largest annual gathering of the publishing world provides
portrait of the double standard to which Israel and Israelis are subjected.
2009(15th
of Shevat, 5769): Tu B’Shevat
2009: At NYU, the Taub Center for Israel Studies
cosponsored a briefing and Q&A session with Ambassador Asaf Shariv,
Consul General of Israel.
2010: The 14th
New York Sephardic Jewish Film Festival is scheduled to present a screening of
“Pillar of Salt,” a film “based on the autobiographical novel by sociologist
Albert Memmi” which “captures the cultural richness and social complexity of a
Jewish boy's life in Tunisia.”
2010: The 92nd
Street Y in New York is scheduled to present “Those Who Trespass Against Us: A
Dialogue on Murderous Neighbors” a program featuring Philip Gourevitch author
of We Wish To Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families,
and Jan Gross the author of Neighbors, an extraordinary account of the
day in 1941 when the Jews of Jedwabne, Poland, were brutally killed by their
fellow townspeople, discuss this question and its dreadful consequences.
2010: In
Washington, D.C., Maina Chawla Singh is scheduled to present "Being
Indian, Being Israeli: Migration, Ethnicity and Gender in the Jewish
Homeland."
2010: Joel
Chasnoff’s memoir The 188th Crybaby Brigade: A skinny Jewish Kid
From Chicago Fights Hezbollah is scheduled for release today by its
publisher Free Press.
2010:
Well-known Holocaust survivor Eli Wiesel relayed his efforts to speak out
against both the Iranian regime and the Goldstone Commission's report today.
The prolific author has put together a petition denouncing Iranian President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, signed by some 50 other Nobel Prize winners, which will
run as a full-page advertisement in newspapers such as the New York Times.
2010(25th
of Shevat,5770): Ninety-three-year-old Dr. Albert M. Kligman, a dermatologist
who invented the widely used acne medication Retin-A but whose experiments
involving prisoners raised ethical questions that dogged his career, died today
in Philadelphia (As reported by Denise Gellene)
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/23/us/23kligman.html?pagewanted=all
2010: A memorial
service for 86 year Samuel Hirsch, “a life-long labor and civil rights activist
who served in the U.S. Army will be held today NYU’s Tamiment Library.
2011: “The
Socalled Move,” a film that “charts the personal quest of an obsessive
personality as he excavates, then deconstructs his Jewish musical heritage to
create an illuminating union of cultures” is scheduled to be screened at the
Atlanta Jewish Film Festival.
2011: The
Eleventh Annual Herzliya Conference is scheduled to come to an end.
2011: Tony
Kushner. The Professor of Jewish/non-Jewish relations in the Parkes Institute
and History Department, University of Southampton whose research interests
includes British Jewish history, immigration issues and responses to the Jews,
is scheduled to be one of those delivering a lecture entitled Refugees in the
Media: Then and Now at the Wiener Library in London.
2011: NewCAJE
is scheduled to present a webinar by Rabbi Anne Brener entitled
"Reflections on Life, Death and Debbie Friedman."
http://newcajelehrhausonline.org/page.aspx?id=237452
2011: Kadima
launched a new campaign today highlighting the faults of Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu's government and calling for early elections.
2011(5th
of Adar I, 5771): Eva Lassman, a Holocaust survivor who became prominent in the
Spokane, Wash., area for her frequent appearances at schools and events where
she spoke against hatred and bigotry, passed away today at the age of 91.
Lassman and her family arrived in Spokane in 1949, but she began speaking
publicly only after attending the inaugural gathering of Holocaust survivors in
Washington, D.C., in 1983. In the following years she appeared repeatedly at
Spokane-area community events, met frequently with schoolchildren, helped
organize a major exhibit about Anne Frank at Gonzaga University, and appeared
at a human rights rally to counter a hate march by white supremacists in nearby
Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. Her awards included a presidential commendation from
Whitworth University, an honorary law doctorate from Gonzaga and the Carl Maxey
Racial Justice Award from the area’s YWCA. In 2009 she became the first
recipient of an award named for her, the Eva Lassman Award, from Gonzaga’s
Institute for Hate Studies, to recognize individual achievement in combating
hatred. George Critchlow, an associate law professor at Gonzaga and a founder
of that institute, said Lassman “was so committed to educating about the
Holocaust.”Lassman was born in Lodz, Poland, and fled to Warsaw following the
Nazi invasion. After the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, she was sent to Majdanek death
camp, where she did forced labor. “They took everything from us. I could not
take my ring off of my swollen finger. They cut it off with pliers," she
told students in 2001. "The air smelled of burning flesh. It was a scene
that no human being should ever have to witness.” She met her husband,
Walter “Wolf” Lassman, at a refugee camp after the war. They had two children
in Europe and went to Spokane in 1949 under the sponsorship of the Spokane
Jewish community. Her husband, a tailor, ran a clothing shop there until he
died in 1976. The Spokane newspaper editorialized about Lassman after her
death: “She labored to make sure this and future generations never
underestimate the consequences of hate. She made hundreds of presentations,
mostly to children, and her powerful message made the Holocaust chillingly real
for thousands." The editorial added that "the Inland Northwest,
tainted as it has been by Hitler worshipers, is a better, more ethical region
as a result of her efforts.” (As reported by the Eulogizer)
2011: “Poles
'plundered mass graves and turned Jews over to the Nazis'”, published in
today’s Daily Mail described material
in Golden Harvest by Jan Gross and Irena Grudzinska in which the authors
“claim some Poles actively profited from the persecution of the Jews – and
would turn them in to the occupying forces for a reward.”
2012:
Marc Caplan is scheduled to deliver the Podbrodz Memorial Lecture sponsored by
the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research entitled Belarus in Berlin/Berlin in
Belarus: Moyshe Kulbak’s Raysn and Meshiekh ben-Efrayim
2012:
At the JCC of Northern Virginia, The ReelAbilities Film Festival part of a
week-long festival dedicated to promoting awareness and appreciation of the
lives, stories, and artistic expressions of people with various disabilities is
scheduled to come to a close.
2012:
Significant steps forward were taken today in talks between the Finance
Ministry and the Histadrut Labor Federation to end Israel’s general strike
2012: The State Comptroller’s report on the December 2010 Carmel fire
will place “special” responsibility with Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz and
Interior Minister Eli Yishai for failures that led to the disaster, and
“general” responsibility with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Public
Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovich, observers said today.
2012: It was announced today that Josh Lewin would be joining
the New York Mets Radio Network sharing the play-by-play with Howe Rose thus
giving the New York an all Jewish duo in the booth.
2013: The Ensemble Millennium is scheduled to perform “The
Russians” a concert featuring the works of Shostakovich and Tchaikovsky at the
Eden-Tamir Music Center in Jerusalem.
2013(29th of Shevat, 5773): Parashat Mishpatim;
Shabbat Shekalim
2013(29th of Shevat, 5773): Eighty-nine “painter and
sculptor” Richard Artschwager, the son of Eugenia (nee Brodsky) Artschwager a
“Jewish Ukrainian” “amateur artist and designer” passed away today.
2013: In Frederick, MD, Beth Sholom Congregation is scheduled to
host its Second Annual Casino Night.
2013: As a near record blizzard batters the Northeastern United
States, “at least two synagogues in Providence, RI, called off Shabbat
services. “Due to the impending blizzard all worship services have been
canceled Friday, Saturday and Sunday,” said a recorded message at Providence’s
Temple Beth-El yesterday afternoon. Newport, RI’s Touro Synagogue, the oldest
synagogue in the country, will reportedly not hold services this Shabbat for
the first time in years. Nearly 99% of Aquidneck Island, where Newport is
located, lost power, according to the Providence Journal. (As reported
by JTA and AP)
2014:
“The Mexican Suitcase,” an exhibition of the photographs of CHIM (David
Seymour) is scheduled to come to a close at Museo San Ildefonson in Mexico
City.
2014:
The Jewish Museum is scheduled to host David Weinstone and The Music for
Aardvarks Band
2014:
Rabbi Cahim Seidler is scheduled to present “Exile: The Secret of Jewish
Survival” at Temple Emanu-El’s Skirball Center for Adult Jewish Learning.
2014:
“The Dybbuk” made in Poland in 1937 with a “screenplay by Yiddish novelist
Alter Kacyzne, and cantorials by Gershon Sirota is scheduled to be shown at the
Westside Neighborhood School in L.A.
2014:
This morning the Israeli Air Force targeted a terrorist in the Gaza Strip who
was involved in multiple attacks against Israel, critically wounding him. The
targeted terrorist was identified as Abdallah Kharti, a Popular Resistance
Committee operative affiliated with global jihad. (As reported by Yoav Limor,
Shlomi Diaz, Daniel Siryoti and Israel Hayom Staff)
2014:
“The Decent One” an Israeli documentary about Heinrich Himmler premiered today
at the Berlin International Film Festival.
2014:
The Federation of Hungarian Jewish Communities said today it will boycott all
government events commemorating the 70th anniversary of the Holocaust in
Hungary unless the government cancels some of the planned memorials.
2014:
The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of
special interest to Jewish readers including Sex After: Women Share How
Intimacy Changes as Life Changes by Iris Krasnow, Last Train to Paris
by Michele Zackheim and Alena by Rachel Pastan as well as an interview
with Rachel Kushner
2015:
Ronnie Perelis is delivered a lecture “The New World Adventures of Luis de
Carvajal- Mexican Crypto- Jew and and Mystical Searcher” at the Jewish Museum
of Florida.
2015:
“GETT: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem” is scheduled to be shown at the JCC
Manhattan.
2015:
Banking giant HSBC faced damaging claims today that its Swiss division helped
wealthy customers, including “6,200 Israelis with holdings totaling some $10
billion, dodge millions of dollars in taxes after a “SwissLeaks” cache of
secret files emerged online.
2015(20th
of Shevat, 5775): Ninety-eight-year-old Milton “Ed” Sabol who changed the face
of football when he found NFL Films passed away today.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2015/02/09/6b8c8c16-b0ab-11e4-854b-a38d13486ba1_story.html
2015(20th
of Shevat, 5775): Eighty-two-year David Levy “composer of Mourning Becomes
Electra” passed away today.
2015:
Jon Stewart announced that he was leaving “The Daily Show.”
2015:
According to today’s Army Radio poll “nearly one in two Israelis believe Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should cancel his March 3 address to the United
States Congress amid heightened tensions between the White House and
Jerusalem.”
2015:
“French police arrested a man today as he tried to burn an Israeli flag,
outside the kosher supermarket in Parish where four Jewish men were killed and
dozens held hostage, by a jihadist last month.”
2016:
Arthur M. Blank “co-founder of the Home Depot” and owner of the Atlanta Falcons
announced today that he had a very treatable form of prostate cancer. (Spoiler
Alert – Feel Good Moment; Blank is still alive and kicking. Baruch Hashem)
2016:
The Carnegie Deli re-opened today.
2016:
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan met with a delegation of the Conference
of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, led by Stephen M.
Greenberg and Malcolm Hoenlein in
Ankara, today.
2016:
Today, seventy-four-year-old Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders “became the first
Jewish candidate to win a presidential primary election.” (As reported by Nicholas Confessore)
2016:
As part of the “The Real Housewives of the Bible” Rabbi Sharon Kleinbaum is
scheduled to deliver a lecture on “Hagar.”
2016:
In London, the Pears Institute for the Study of Anti-Semitism is scheduled a
lecture by Professor Dan Stone on “Race Theory, Anthropology and the Jewish
Connection.”
2016:
As the U.S. Presidential primary season begins, the approximately 10,000 Jews
join their fellow one million plus fellow Granite Staters in the first primary
election of 2016.
2016(30th
of Shevat, 5776): Calendar Coincidence – Mardi Gras and Rosh Chodesh Adar I
2017(13th
of Shevat, 5777): Ninety-one-year-old author and journalist Barbara Gelb who
collaborated with her husband New York Times managing editor Arthur Gelb on
“the first full-scale biography of Eugene O’Neil” passed away today in New
York.
2017:
Today, “an Islamic State—affiliated terror group…claimed” responsibility for
yesterday’s “attack tht saw four rockets fired at…Eilat…from the Sinai
Peninsula.
2017: Dr. Steve
Feller is scheduled to lead a Thursday Forum on “The Conflicted Jewish World of
Chaim Potok” featuring a discussion of My Name is Asher Lev and The
Gift of Asher Lev.
2017: The Oxford University Jewish Society is scheduled to
host an after-dinner talk by Teaching Fellow Maureen Kendler on “Satan: Friend
or foe?”
2017: The American Jewish Historical Society is scheduled
to host a Valentine’s Day Program – “Bubby: Kosher Love Advice in Unkosher
Times” - a fashion photo series that features real bubbies imparting love and
life advice.
2018: After premiering at the Los Film Festival, “The
Female Brain” co-starring Beanie Feldstein was released today in the United
States.
2018: “First We Tale Brooklyn” a crime whose protagonist is
an Israeli ex-con who moves to Brooklyn directed and produced by Sabra Danny A.
Abeckaser who also co-authored the screenplay is scheduled to be released in
selected theatres throughout the United States.
2018: The 2018 Winter Olympics in which figure skater Aimee
Buchanan competed with the Israeli team began today in Korea.
2018: In partnership with the Jewish Federation of Greater
Des Moines, The Des Moines Young Artists' Theatre production of 'I Never Saw
Another Butterfly' is scheduled to open at the Stoner Theatre.
2018: “The House of Z” is scheduled to be shown at the San
Diego Jewish Film Festival.
2018: The Oxford University Jewish Society is scheduled to host
a meeting of the Book Club where extracts from G-d, Science and the Search for
Meaning by Rabbi Lord Sacks will be read while attendees will explore the
question “Can and should religion and science both have a place in the modern
world, and if so…how and why?”
2018: Annual observance of National Bagel Day (formerly
known as Bagel and Lox Day)
https://nationaldaycalendar.com/national-bagel-and-lox-day-february-9/
https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/nationalbagelday?source=feed_text&story_id=10154689119412107
https://forward.com/food/362649/celebrate-national-bagel-day-with-free-bagels/
http://www.nationalbagelday.com/
For more on the subject see The Bagel by Maria
Balinska
2019(4th Adar I, 5779): Parashat Terumah;
2019: On a Shabbat where the weekly portions is called
“Gifts” the family of Nili Bayla Rosenbloom are scheduled to celebrate the gift
of her first birthday.
2019: “De-Centralizing the Global Middle Ages” a two-day
conference co-sponsored by the Jean and Samuel Frankel Center of Judaic Studies
at the University of Michigan is scheduled to come to an end today.
2019: Limmud Baltics is scheduled to continue for a second
day.
2019: National Bagel Day; for more about special offers see
https://www.bustle.com/p/7-national-bagel-day-2019-deals-freebies-to-take-advantage-of-this-year-15932665
2020: The New York
Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special
interest to Jewish readers including To the Edge of Sorrow by Aharon
Appelfeld, The Teacher by Michal Ben-Naftali, House on Endless Waters
by Emuna Elon, Mengele: Unmasking the “Angel of Death” by David G.
Marwell and by Why We’re Polarized by Ezra Klein.
2020: In Brookline, MA, the Chai Center is scheduled to
host “Girl’s Night Out: The Seeds of Happieness” a “special Tu B’Shvat workshop
led by Raizel Schusterman.”
2020: In Sonoma, CA, Congregation Shir Shalom is scheduled
to host Oakland author Michael David Lukas talks about his novel, The Last
Watchman of Old Cairo, the “winner of the 2019 Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish
Literature.”
2020: In Lafayette, CA, Temple Isaiah is scheduled to host
the “East Bay Jewish Choral Festival” during which “singers from different East
Bay Synagogues perform with Cantor Leigh Korn” who began his musical career
with Temple Judah in Cedar Rapids, IA.
2020: The Illinois Holocaust Memorial and Education Center
is scheduled to host a screening of “Notorious RBG: The Life and Times of Ruth
Bader Ginsburg.”
2020: “JAMI, the mental health service for the Jewish
Community” is scheduled to host “Finding Your Creative Voice Workshop.”
2020: The Jewish Heritage Museum of Monmouth County, NJ, is
scheduled to host “Green Fields” as part of the Yiddish Film Festival.
2020: Among those awaiting the outcome of the Oscar
ceremonies scheduled to be held tonight are nominees for best director (Sam
Mendes for “1917”) and best actor (Joaquin Phoenix for “Joker”) and Scarlett
Johansson who got two nominations: best actress (for “Marriage Story”) and best
supporting actress (for “Jojo Rabbit”).
2020: Friends and family are scheduled to celebrate the
second birthday of Nili Bayla Rosenbloom
2020: “The Weinberg Center for Holocaust Education at The
Breman Museum and Eternal Life-Hemshech” are scheduled to present
“Unforgettable Stories From the Holocaust.”
2020: All of those who love great combinations are
scheduled to observe National Bagel
and Lox Day.
https://nationaldaycalendar.com/national-bagel-and-lox-day-february-9/
2021: National Bagel and Lox Day; Pandemics may come and
pandemics may go but this great comfort food combination is here again. https://foodimentary.com/2018/02/09/february-9th-is-national-bagel-and-lox-day-2/
2021: Sanoma State University is scheduled to host the
first session in it “Virtual Holocaust and Genocide Lecture Series.”
2021: The Temple Emanu-El Streicker Center is proud to
present actor Bryan Cranston and the creators of Your Honor, to discuss
adapting Your Honor, a version of the Israeli show Kvodo, for American
television and the question of how a tiny country of 8.8 million people with
only one TV channel until 1993 became a global storytelling powerhouse.
2021: In London, the Highgate United Synagogue is scheduled
to “Highgate 15 Minutes of Fame,” during which three members of the community
“speak on topics passionate to them in 15 minutes of less.”
2021: The Breman Museum is scheduled to a virtual tour of
the “Notorious RBG Exhibition” first seen at the Illinois Holocaust Museum.
2021: The Vilna Shul, “Boston’s Center for Jewish Culture”
is scheduled to present, “Watch and Learn: Exploring ‘Jewish’ Through Film,”
the first in a four-part series that will explore Jewish themes through
television and movies.”
2021: The Aquarian Minyan is scheduled to present “Radio DJ
Amy Wachtel as he talks about the spiritual and cultural similarities between
Judaism and Rastafarianism, including Zion, the 12 Tribes, the Sabbath and the
six-pointed star.”
2021: The Berkeley Center Jewish Studies is scheduled to
present Professor Dina Danon of SUNY-Binghamton in conversation about her 2020
book, The Jews of Ottoman Izmir, which describes the Mediterranean port
city Izmir emerging as a major center for Sephardic Jewish life some 125 years
ago.
2021: The decision made by Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu in consultation with Defense Minister Benny Gantz, Education
Minister Yoav Galant and Health Minister Yuli Edelstein to keep schools closed
until February 11 is scheduled to be presented to the cabinet today.
2022: JW3 is scheduled to host the final
screening of “Shalom Taiwan.”
2022: The Temple Emanu-El Streicker Center is
scheduled to host a virtual book talk during which Ambassador David Friedman
discusses his new book Sledgehammer which tells the story of a small
team of neophyte diplomats who threw away the State Department playbook,
recruited the support of both the Oval Office and the highest echelons of power
in the Middle East and wound up in the intense negotiations that led to a
series of historic breakthroughs including: the first Israeli embassy opening
in Abu Dhabi — and the first embassy of the United Arab Emirates in Tel Aviv;
Israel and Bahrain exchanging ambassadors, Israel’s foreign minister visiting
Morocco, the Sudanese agreeing to establish ties with Tel Aviv and Israelis
excitedly beginning flying direct to Dubai.
2022: The London School of Jewish Studies is
scheduled to present Rabbi Yonatan Rosensweig lecture on “Depression and
Anxiety: Can I Listen to Music on Shabbat?”
2022: The Museum at Eldridge Street is
scheduled to host a “cinema chat” during which Jane Gaines, a Professor of Film
at Columbia University discusses “The Jazz Singer” and its impact on film and
America today.”
2022: The Schusterman Center for Israel Studies
at Brandeis University and the Belzberg Program I Israel Studies at the
University of Calgary are scheduled to sponsor Lital Levy lecturing on “Esther
Moyal, Emile Zola, and Alfred Dreyfus: An Arab-Jewish Feminist on the Affair
that Rocked the World” which is part
of the 2nd edition of the Sephardi Thought and Modernity Series.
2022: Based on previously published
information, in Israel, the “never-ending infection party” has not been “joined
by Omicron’s newest family member – the BA.2 variant .”
2022: The YIVO Institute for Jewish Research is
scheduled to present “Awful, Offal Dinner”
which will feature six cooking videos which detail the preparation of
six organ-meat dishes, discuss their historic cultural contexts, and feature
friends trying and discussing the surprisingly delicious results.”
2022: The Sir Martin Gilbert Learning Center is
scheduled to host “The Future of Holocaust Education” during which Joe Hayman,
the Former Managing Director of the Holocaust Educational Trust (HET), Joe
shares his reflections on the contemporary relevance of the Holocaust and the
future of Holocaust education.
2023: Cathy and Morris Bart are scheduled to
sponsor a screening of “The Jews and The Blues” at the Jewish Community Center
in New Orleans.
2023: The Palm Beach Jewish Film Festival is
scheduled to host a screening of “Miss and Back In Berlin.”
2023: LBI is scheduled to present a lecture by
Jason Maurice Yonover in which he “argues that Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel’s
predecessors, Baruch Spinoza and even Salomon Maimon, help to shed light on the
realist view Hegel takes here.
2023: The JWA Film Club is scheduled to host a
screening of “Dirty Dancing.”
2023: As Israeli teams continue to assist the
victims of the earthquake in Turkey and Syria, Israelis brace for the
possibility of another tremor following the three that have already been felt.
2023: Based on previously published
information, today experts are trying to figure out if there are eight million
jews in the United States as reported by the Jewish Population Project at
Brandeis University or sic million as reported by the Israel Central Bureau of
Statistics.
https://www.ynetnews.com/article/bj7gav11po
2023: By today, winter storm Barbara is
scheduled to be largely gone from Israel, but low temperatures will continue,
and some rainfall is expected is some parts of the country.
2023: The Sir Martin Gilbert Learning is
scheduled to host a lecture by Candice Millard, author of Hero of The Empire,
which tells about Churchill and the Boer War.
2024: Kan Kol Hamusika is scheduled to
broadcast a Young Artists in Concert live from the Eden Tamir Music Center.
2024: At Temple Emanu-El for the first time –
and for one night only – Friday Night Hub is scheduled to be open to the entire
community, regardless of age.
2024: YWIN Philly is scheduled to host “Shabbat
Across Philly” at a location in the city and in the suburbs that will include
“a free, home cooked” Shabbat meal.
2024(30th of Shevat, 5784): Rosh
Chodesh Adar I
2024: As February
9th, begins in Israel, the Hamas held hostages begin
day 126 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.)
