This Day, May 1, In Jewish History by Mitchell A and Deb Levin Z’L
May 1
305: Due to age and ill health and a desire to
provide stability for the Roman Empire Diocletian resigned as Emperor of
Rome. Relatively speaking, Diocletian’s
reign was a positive period for the Jews.
Diocletian was not overly concerned with his Jewish subjects since he
was much concerned about controlling the Christians whom he regarded as a
source of major instability in the Empire. From his point of view their
contempt for Roman state religion and zealous proselytizing made them enemies of
the empire. The Jews posed no such threat.
Therefore, he exempted them from the requirement to include national
sacrifices in their services. The decrees of Diocletian are actually recorded
in the Talmud. According to some
Diocletian lived in Palestine as a youth and was a swineherd. As Emperor he visited Palestine at which time
enemies of the Jews told him that he was mocked by the Jews for working with
pigs. When confronted with this, the
Jewish leaders allegedly told him that while they may have made jokes about
swineherds (something they regretted) they never made jokes about an
Emperor. This must have assuaged
Diocletian’s anger because no reprisals were taken against the Jews. It should be noted that Palestine suffered
economically during this time, but that was as a result of the general
impoverishment of the region and not as a result of anti-Jewish policies. Diocletian looks especially good when you
remember that the reign of Constantine is just over the horizon.
408:
Theodosius II or Theodosius the Younger under whom Jews were from barred the
civil service, the military and the holding of public office, began his reign
as Emperor of the Byzantine Empire.
680:
Muawiyah the founder of the Umayyad Dynasty,who “was crowned as caliph at a
ceremony in Jerusalem in 661” was reported to treated Jews and other minorities
“well” “passed away today.
1160:
Bishop William of Beziers, France, who was appalled by the custom of beating of
Jews during Palm Sunday, issued an order excommunicating Priests who did so.
Beziers was the home to many Albigensians and was one of the more liberal, open
cities in France. The Albigensians would be labeled heretics by the Roman
Catholic Church. Sometimes during the Middle Ages, areas that were
hospitable to those quarreling with Rome provided some sort of comfort for Jews
who might have otherwise been subject to persecution.
1218:
Birthdate of King Rudolf I whose subjects included Meir of Rothenburg who was
born three years before the monarch and who bring additional persecution to the
Jews of his realm.
1218:
In Luxembourg, Bouchard d'Avesnes and Marguerite
II de Hainault gave birth to Jean Ier d'Avesnes comte de Hainaut who was
treated by Elias of London, an English Jew who was given special permission to
go abroad to treat him. Jews of England
78
1338:
Louis the Bavarian “informed the council of Worms that the Jews of that city
were bound by agreement to pay the sum of 2,000 gulden toward the king's
contemplated expedition against France, and that, if necessary, force might be
employed in collecting this sum.”
1339:
A party that included John of Marignola, who would report on his conversations
with Jews in China, stopped in Constantinople before going on to The Middle
Kingdom.”
1576:
Coronation of Stephen Bathory, “who proved to be both a tolerant rule and
friend of the Jews” as King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania.
1572:
Pius V, the Pope who expelled Talmudist Gedaliah ibn Yahya ben Joseph and the
rest of the Jews from Imola, Italy passed away.
The expulsion cost him 10,000 gold pieces but he overcame the hardship
to write the Sefer Shalshelet ha-Ḳabbalah before dying in Alexandria in 1587.
1591:
Thomas Lorkin, the father-in-law of Edward Lively, the Regius Professor of
Hebrew at Cambridge and considered “the greatest of Hebraist passed away today.
1663:
Phillipe Mendes Da Costa is scheduled “to take a house in Rouen” today and then
go on “to fetch the people from Bayonne.”
1642:
Today the Jews of Mauritsstad wrote a petition “offering an annual present of
3,000 florins to Count Maurice if he would be induced to remain as their
Governor in Brazil.
1647:
William Prynne, the English jurist and political leader who opposed allowing
the Jews to return to England was appointed one of the commissioners for the
Visitation of the University of Oxford.
1672:
Pius V, the Pope who expelled Talmudist Gedaliah ibn Yahya ben Joseph and the
rest of the Jews from Imola, Italy passed away was beatified today.
1707:
The Act of Union joins the Kingdom of England and Kingdom of Scotland to form
the Kingdom of Great Britain. While Jews had been expelled from England in 1290
and readmitted under Cromwell in the middle of the 17th century,
Jews had been living in Scotland without interruption, possibly since Roman
Times, but certainly since the 12th century. According
Jewish-Scottish scholar David Daiches ,“there are grounds for saying that
Scotland is the only European country which has no history of state persecution
of Jews.” By the time that the Act of
Union became law, Jews were attending and teaching at Edinburg University. Within a decade and a half after the Act of
Union, there were 20,000 Jews living in Glassgow.
http://www.scojec.org/resources/files/scotlands_jews.pdf
1718(11th of Iyar, 5478): Birthdate of
Hirsh Ashkenazi
1720(6th of Iyar, 5780): Hewle Meise, the
wife of Salomon Nathan Maas and mother of Nathan Salomon Maas and Meir Salomon
Maas passed away today.
1769: Birthdate of Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of
Wellington. Wellington’s claim to fame
is his victory over the French. It was in this role that he found the Jews most
helpful since Nathan Rothschild had provided the financial backing for the Iron
Duke’s campaign against the French in Spain at a time when nobody else would
risk the funds. Few people remember that the Duke, like other war heroes
entered politics, serving as Prime Minister in the 1820’s and 1830’s. It was here that betrayed those Jews who had
supported him by defeating the attempts at Jewish emancipation first when he
served in the House of Commons and then, even more viciously when he served in
the House of Lords. The Duke had been able to support a bill emancipating seven
million English Roman Catholics, but he could not bring himself to do the same
for thirty thousand English Jews.
1732: George
Frideric Handel’s “Esther” which was based on the Biblical heroine and was the
first English oratorio premiered at King’s Theatre in London. Handel drew on Biblical tales for many of his
oratorios.
1768(14th of Iyar, 5528): Pesach Sheni
1775(1st of Iyar, 5535): Rosh Chodesh
Iyar
1775(1st of Iyar, 5535): Thirty-six-year-old
mathematician and botanist Israel Lyons the Younger, the Cambridge born son of
Israel Lyons, the elder and husband of Phoebe Person passed away from measles
today “while preparing a complete edition of Edmond Halley's works sponsored by
the Royal Society.”
1790: The citizens of Pesth had set today as the day
to expel all of the Jews from the town – a decision which was overturned by the
Diet but did not prevent the citizens from making life as unpleasant for the
Jews as possible.
1799: In Prussia, Alexander Wolff and his wife gave
birth to their second son, Michael, who would become Michael Solomon Alexander,
the convert who became the first Anglican Bishop in Jerusalem.
1805: Birthdate of Kindenheim, Germany native and
Philadelphia resident Rosina Seligmann Kahnweiler, the wife of Benedict Kahnweiler,
mother of Fridoline Kahanweiler Gimbel and the mother-in-law of Adam Gimble
founder of Gimbel’s Department Store.
1805:
Königsberg merchant, Gerson Jacoby, and his wife, Lea Jonas gave birth to
Prussian socialist leader Johann Jacoby.
http://www.ohio.edu/chastain/ip/jacoby.htm
1807:
Birthdate of Sir Henry Francis Goldsmid, who "after receiving careful
instruction, was called to the Bar in Hilary term, 1833 making him the first
Jew who ever obtained that distinction in Great Britain.”
1808(4th
of Iyar, 5568): Two-year-old Joshua Hendricks, the son of Frances Isaacs, the
Lancaster, PA born daughter of Joshua Isaacs and Harmon Hendricks the
“prominent manufacturer of copper and grandson of Uriah Hendricks one of the
founders of Congregation Shearith Israel, passed away today.
1810(27th
of Nisan, 5570): Buchau born Jacob
Raphael Kaulla, the “German court banker” upon whom King Frederick of
Wurttemberg confirmed full citizenship, a grant of rights which extended to “a
number of his immediate relatives,” including his sister Madame Kaulla, passed
away today.
1812:
Birthdate of Ignaz Kuranda, the Prague born son and grandson of “second-hand
book dealers” who became an author, newspaper published and member of the
Reichsrate.
1814:
In Strasbourg, Alsace, “Auguste Ratisbonne and his wife, Adelaide Cerfbeer,[
members of the famed family of Jewish bankers” gave birth to Marie-Alphonse
Raisbone a convert to Catholicism who became a Jesuit priest and “a co-founder
of the Congregation of Our Lady of Sion, a religious congregation dedicated to
the conversion of Jews to the Catholic faith.”
1817:
Birthdate of Karl Isidor Beck the native of Baja, Hungary, the son of Jewish
parents raised as Protestant who became a noted Austrian poet.
1812:
Birthdate of Ignaz Kuranda, the native of Prague who ended his career in
journalism to concentrate on a political career that included serving in the
Reichsrate for 20 years.
1822:
Friedrich von Gentz, the German diplomat, wrote in his diary, “Rothschild and
Baruch excite me with an account of the deplorable Frankfort Jewish matter.”
1823:
Birthdate of German native Julius Freiberg who lived in Cincinnati, Ohio where
he established a distillery and was the husband of Duffie Freiberg.
1825:
In London, Adeline (Adelaide) Helbert the daughter of Levi Barent Cohen and Lydia Barent-Cohen
(Diamantschleifer) and her husband John Israel Helbert gave birth to Adeline
Matilda Weisweiller, the wife of Wife of Daniel Bernhard, baron de Weisweiller
and mother of Adela Ettling - Capron; Mathilde Betty Porgès and Isabella
Weisweiller
Sister
of Lionel Helbert; Lydia Helbert
1833:
In Mathews, VA, Henry Benjamin Nones, the Philadelphia born son “of Abraham
Benjamin Nones and Miriam Marks de Nones” and his wife Anna M. Nones gave birth
Anna Virginia Nones who tragically passed away two weeks after her birth.
1834(22nd
of Nisan, 5594): Eighth Day of Pesach
1835:
In Bavaria, Kela Bamberger and Seligman Baer (Dov) Bamberger gave birth to
Salomon Shlomo Zalman Bamberger
1838:
In Prague, Simon and Rachel Ausch gave birth to Pauline Ausch who became
Pauline Hirschfeld when she married Dr. Jacob Jacques Heinrich Hirschfeld.
1841:
Birthdate of German native and Chicago Heights resident These Schoenemann
Eisendrath, the wife of Benjamin Eisendrath with whom she had four children – Bertha,
Samson, Frieda and Oscar.
1848:
Birthdate of Ohio native and Missouri resident Rose Harsch Fraley, the wife of
Moses Fraley with whom she had three children – Sadie, Jessie and Edward – before
passing away in 1949 and being buried in the New Mount Sinai Cemetery.
1849(9th
of Iyar, 5609): Isaac Bernays, Chief Rabbi in Hamburg, passed away. Born in
1792 at Mayence he completed his studies at the University of Würzburg, where
he had been also a disciple of the well-known Talmudist R. Abraham Bing. Then
he went to Munich as private tutor in the house of Herr von Hirsch, and afterward
lived at Mayence as a private scholar. In 1821 he was elected chief rabbi of
the German-Jewish community in Hamburg, to fill a position where a man of
strictly Orthodox views but of modern education was wanted as head of the
congregation. After personal negotiations with Lazarus Riesser (father of
Gabriel Riesser), who went to see him in Mayence, Bernays accepted the office
on characteristic terms; namely, that all the religious and educational
institutions of the community were to be placed under his personal direction;
he wanted to be responsible to the government only. Besides this he required a
fixed salary, independent of incidental revenues, and wished to be called
"clerical functionary" or "ḥakam," as the usual titles, "moreh
ẓedeḳ" or "rabbi" did not seem to him highly esteemed at that
time. (Based on an article in the Jewish Encyclopedia)
1851:
During the reign of Queen Victoria, whose friendship with members of the Jewish
community began when “Sir Moses Montefiore, lent the Queen a key to his estates
in Ramsgate Kent, The Great Exhibition opened in Crystal Palace which was
conceived by Prince Albert in London
today.
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/5cec/f6ebfdc496ed8396862368dba19c028f836a.pdf
1852:
In Great Britain, the Court Exchequer fined Mr. Salomons, the elected Member of
Parliament from Greenwich, was fined for voting against the law that excluded
the Jews from sitting in the House of Commons.
Apparently, he was found guilty of three separate violations since the
court imposed three separate fines, of 500 pounds each.
1853:
Birthdate of Jacob Michailovitch Gordin “a Russian-born American playwright
active in the early years of Yiddish theater” who was “known for introducing
realism and naturalism into Yiddish theater.”
1854(3rd
of Iyar, 5614): Seventy-year-old Frances Isaacs Hendricks, the Lancaster, PA
born daughter of Joshua and Brandy Isaacs and the wife of Harmon Hendricks the
“prominent manufacturer of copper whose father was one of the founders of
Congregation Shearith Israel, whom she had married in 1800, passed away today
in New York.
1855:
The New York Times reported that the American Hebrew Christian
Association had issued a public invitation to all converted Jews to attend a
meeting at the Asbury Methodist Episcopal Church in Manhattan on the evening of
May 10th.
1855:
Students at the Union Theological Seminary began taking their final exams
today. One of the subjects in which they
will be tested during the next week is the Hebrew Language.
1858:
According to reports published today the Jews of Philadelphia have established
a Permanent Hebrew Relief Association.
1860:
Today’s “City Intelligence” column reported that Giacomo Meyerbeer is a
favorite of New York opera goers. His
principal works have been received with enthusiasm, and although inordinately
expensive to produce -- when compared with others of the Italian repertoire
equally celebrated -- have never failed to pay a handsome dividend to the
enterprising manager who produced them.” Meyerbeer was German-Jewish opera
composer.
1860:
Today’s “City Intelligence” column described the performance of Fromental
Halévy’s “La Juive” (The Jewess) at the Winter Garden Theatre. After providing
a detailed description of each act the reviewer concluded “It is seldom that a
work of such pretension receives fair treatment on a first night, and we do not
assert unqualifiedly that even in this instance it did so, but there cannot be
a doubt that in all the essentials of good management and liberal desire to
praise, there was successful effort, and a most cordial response. If incessant
applause means anything, it surely guarantees a long run for the
"Jewess." A triumph more complete, in all that makes a triumph
pleasing, has never been put on record.”
1861:
Caesar Hartog Gerson married Julia Jonassohn at the Synagogue on Margaret
Street.
1863:
The Battle of Chancellorsville, during which Henry Heller earned the Medal of
honor began today.
1863(12th
of Iyar, 5623): Ninety-year-old Rachel Judah, the New York born daughter of
Hillel Judah who married Zalma Rehine, the Prussian born merchant who settled
in Richmond before moving on to Baltimore where he helped to lead what may have
been the city’s first high holiday services , passed away today.
https://www.encyclopedia.com/religion/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/rehine-zalma
1863:
In common with the rest of their fellow-citizens, the Israelites assembled in
their respective places of worship and carried out the precepts of the
President's Proclamation. Most of the Synagogues were opened and he Psalms
appointed to be read on penitential days, read on the occasion.
A
very eloquent address was delivered by Rabbi Morris J. Raphal, at the
Greene-street Synagogue. He remarked that it was a curious coincidence that on
this, a fast day appointed by their own religious observances, they met in
compliance with the Proclamation of the President of the United States, to fast
and pray. He had been in this country fourteen years. During the first ten
years no public proclamation had ever directed their thoughts and feelings to
humiliation and fasting. Once in every year the highest functionary in every
State proclaimed a day of general thanksgiving, and with that the debt of
national gratitude was supposed to be paid. But now the rulers of the nation
come year after year and call upon the people to weary Heaven with fruitless professions
of a penitence they did not feel, and of a humility they did not practice.
These proclamations fast days, on which no one fasts, are but the repetition of
those so strongly reproved by the prophet Isaiah; and, though the people dare
not put his questions, "Wherefore do we fast and Thou seest it not?
Afflict our souls and Thou will not notice it!" -- since in reality the
people do neither -- still the answer would stand good. "Because while you
profess humiliation, you persist in your arrogance and your extortions do not
cease." If ever a people needed to humble itself before God -- if ever
fasting and prayer, sack cloth and ashes were to be worn -- it was by the
people of these United States. Like our fathers, the Israelites of old, for
whom pious Nekeiniah made such fervent supplication, the people of this country
are justly amenable to his confession made for Israel: "In their
dominions, in all the great prosperity Thou didst bestow upon them, and
throughout the large and rich land which Thou gavest unto them, they did not
serve Thee, neither turned they from their evil deeds." The preacher then
drew a parallel between the sins of the Israelites, which called forth the
reproof of the preacher, and the past conduct of this nation, which was equally
amenable to the words of the inspired prophet.
What
were they to say for the citizens of the United States who already and so long
possess the two greatest earthly blessings, Education and Freedom, and yet make
so bad a use of both. Education should be the guardian of freedom and of
virtue, it was the birthright of every American, bestowed on all and withheld
from none. But what principles did it actually inculcate -what virtues did it
really teach? Did it inculcate respect for free institutions? Answer, ye
place-hunters, ye ballot-box stuffers, ye shoulder-hitters, who reduce
self-government to a disgusting farce. Did it teach patriotism? Answer, ye
spoils-men, ye office-teekers and holders, who cement party lines with the
cohesive force of public plunder. Did it teach common honesty? Answer, ye peculators
and speculators, who fatten on the blood of the hard-worked masses, and who
dignify roguery by the name of smartness. His heart ached as he spoke to them
of the effects of perverted education; it would ache still more were he to
direct attention to the bitter fruits of abused freedom. He need not remind
them that while the best men North and South had long been driven aloof from
the affairs of the country, demagogues, fanatics and a party Press had so
managed matters that they found themselves in the third year of a destructive
but needless sectional war, which has armed brother against brother, consigned
hundreds of thousands to an untimely grave, and to ruin and devastation tens of
thousands of square miles of flourishing and happy land; and what was worse
than all this, while humanity weeps we must suppress our sympathy. However, our
hearts may yearn for peace and brotherly love, our reason convinces us that the
present is not the time to expect, or even to hope for the cessation of blood.
On the contrary, though we may detest the cause and course of events, it is our
duty loyally to stand by our section of the country, to maintain her quarrel
and defend her rights, while we have the consolation to know that our side did
not begin the fray, and that the cause of Union was the worthiest in the field.
"The
preacher concluded his address with a fervent prayer.
1864:
Joseph Seligman and his brothers founded J & W Seligman & Co.
1864:
In, “The City Cars and General Goods Delivery,” published today the author complains
about the crowded, smelly conditions on the city’s public include the statement
that “immediate contact with a huge pile of superannuated Hebrew clothing stock
is not desirable at any time: it is most undesirable in overheated and
overcrowded cars.” The author then goes
on to compare the aroma with that found in packages of partially dried codfish
and, strangely enough, joints of half cured pork.
1866:
“The Galveston Hebrew Benevolent Society was established” today.
https://www.songhall.org/profile/Charles_K_Harris
1868:
In Santa Fe, N.M., Jacob and Minna (Loewenbein) Amberg gave birth to German
trained physician and “otologist”, Emil Amberg, the husband of Cecile Siegel
with whom he raised two children – Robert and Adele - while practicing in
Detroit where he was a member of Temple Beth-El.
1868:
In Minsk, Isaiah and Deborah (Leibowich Sissman, gave birth to Lake Forest
University College of Law trained attorney Peter Sissman who in 1886 came to
the United States where he married the former Rose I. Goldberg, served as
Secretary of the Chicago Clockmaker’s” Union and was a law partner of the
famous Clarence Darrow while being a member of B’nai B’rith in Chicago, Il.
1869:
Today’s issue of the French Jewish review “Archives
Israélites,” published by Isidore Cahen, announced the marriage of Alphonse
Hirsch, the painter of chief rabbi Lazar Isidor, to Henriette Perugia. The
notice adds that Perugia’s sister was married to Arthur Sassoon of the wealthy
Sassoon family. (Based on reports from the Forward)
1869:
In Kalvaria, Poland, “Fischel and Feiga (Edelstein) Eron gave birth to Joseph
E. Eron who in 1882 came to the United States where he earned a BA and MA from
Columbia, married Frances Haas, worked with Abraham Cahan and spent more than
25 in various projects aimed at educating and “Americanizing” immigrants
including the founding of the Workmen’s School and the Educational League with
Jacob Gordin.
1869:
In a classic American success story, J & W Seligman & Co was admitted
to the New York Stock Exchange. Joseph Seligman, the founder of the firm had
arrived from Bavaria in 1837 “with $100 dollars in the lining of his trousers.
By 1860, he and his brothers, who started as itinerant peddlers” had entered
the investment banking business. During
the Civil War, they played a leading role in selling United States Government
securities to Europeans which helped to finance the Union victory. By the end of the decade, the Seligman’s had
branches in London, Paris, Frankfort, New Orleans and San Francisco. The brothers would take a leading role in
financing the boom in railroads and in supporting Jewish charitable endeavors.
1870: It was reported today that the late Dr. George
Frick, a resident of Baltimore, bequeathed $1,000.00 to the Hebrew Society of
Baltimore.
1870: According to a report published today, Michael
Isaacs and Isaac Goldstein, two Jewish pack peddlers who had been indicted on
charges of rape were found guilty and sentenced to ten years in prison by the
Suffolk County court in New York.
Marguerite II de Hainault, Marguerite II
de Hainault,
1872: Adolph Marx Oppenheimer, the son of Sarah and Marx
Oppenheimer and his wife Julie Oppenheimer gave birth to Laura Oppenheimer
1873: Birthdate of Vienna native Zelman Morris, who gained
famed talent agent Willliam Morris, the founder of the William Morris Agency and
the husband of Emma Berlinghoff with whom he had two children—William, Jr and
Ruth.
https://localwiki.org/hsl/William_Morris
1873: In Vienna, opening of the World’s Fair where the
Illés Relief is a 1:500 scale model of Jerusalem by Stephen Illés “two wooden
models of the Temple Mount” built by Conrad Schick were displayed.
1874(14th of Iyar,5634): Pesach Sheni
1874: Ludwig Chronegk began his 26-year career as
stage-manager with the Meininger troupe “when they first appeared at the
Friedrich-Wilhelm Theatre in Berlin.
1874:
In Ukraine, Isaac Cutler, who “was murdered during the 1882 pogrom in
Elizabethgad” and Mrs. Ethel “Etta” Yaroshev Cutler gave birth to Colonel Harry
Cutler, the resident of Providence, Rhodes Island who was the chairman of the
Jewish Welfare Board of the United States.
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/cutler-harry
1874:
Birthdate of Samuel Aaron Tannenbaum the native of Hungary who came to the U.S.
in 1886 where in 1898 “he began practicing psychotherapy in New York City” and
became a “widely recognized scholar of Shakespeare and his times.
http://finding-aids.lib.unc.edu/01920/#
1876:
Establishment of Children of Israel Synagogue in the eastern part of Des Moines,
Iowa.
1876:
During the fiscal year that ended today the United Hebrew Charities “gave away
754 tons of coal, 716 pairs of shoes and 1,625 women’s and children’s garments”
1877(18th
of Iyar, 5637): Lag B’Omer
1877(18th
of Iyar, 5637): Just weeks before her 81st birthday, eighty-year-old
Miriam Marks, the Osining, NY born daughter of Jochabed Isaacks and Michael
Marks who were married in 1786 and the wife of Andrew Abner Jones whom she
married in 1821 after the death of her first husband Jonas Barnett passed away
today in Philadelphia, PA.
1879:
Julius and Sarah Rothenberg Bressler, gave birth to David M. Bressler, who
attended City College, JTS and the New York Law School, was widely known for
his activities in Jewish, State and municipal relief and in charity
organizations and for his work with the Removal Office which was aimed at
diverting the flow of Jewish immigrants from eastern cities to areas in the
South and the Mid-West and providing them funds and training to acclimate them
to their new homes
1879:
In Bartfa, Hungary, Benjamin and Esther (Schoenfeld) Waldman gave birth to
Morris David Waldman the graduate of NYU, JTS and Columbia University who went
from the rabbinate to “the field of social and welfare work.”
http://collections.americanjewisharchives.org/ms/ms0023/ms0023.html
1880(20th
of Iyar, 5640): Sixty-three-year-old French composer Samuel Naumbourg who was
the chazzan and reader at Besançon and directed the choir at the synagogue
Strasburg before moving to Paris in 1845 where he officiated at the synagogue
of the Rue Notre-Dame de Nazareth at Paris and became professor of liturgical
music at the Séminaire Israélite passed away today.
1880:
During the fiscal year ending today, the United Hebrew Charities had raised
over $58, 00 of which almost $47,000 was spent in meeting the needs of 27,915
applicants for service.
1880:
While visiting Freiburg, Germany, Texas banker Morris Lasker and Nettie Davis
Lasker gave birth to Albert Davis Lasker who would leave his mark on the world
of advertising as a partner of Lord & Thomas.
http://www.laskerfoundation.org/
http://www.britannica.com/biography/Albert-Davis-Lasker
1880:
According to a report from a Berlin correspondent, “all the Jews of foreign
birth” have been given six hours to leave St. Petersburg, the Russian capital.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9407E2D81F31EE3ABC4953DFB366838B699FDE
1881:
It was reported today that the “Alliance Israelite Universelle” is extending
its work among the Jews of the Orient.
In the past six months, Alliance has opened 9 schools in the Ottoman
Empire. All told the Alliance is
supporting 33 schools serving a total of 6,300 pupils. Sixty-eight thousand francs have been raised
towards the establishment of primary and professional schools in Palestine.
1881:
In Odessa, Michael Pofcher and Rose Nizel Pofcher gave proof to Dr. Elias
Harrry Pofcher, the husband of Fanny G. Pofcher.
1881:
In New York city, Levi and Amelia (Garfunkel) Bilder gave birth to Chicago-Kent
College of Law trained attorney Nathaniel Bilder, a member of the New Jersey
law firm of Bilder and Bilder who was a member of the board of directors of Y.M. & Y.W.H.A. and the husband of
Zerlina Hirsh with whom he belong to Congregation B’nai Jeshrurun in Newark,
NJ.
1881:
The funeral of Isaac Hendricks, a member of the prominent Hendricks family, is
scheduled to take place today at the New York home of his brother-in-law, H.S.
Henry.
1882:
“Beaconsfield’s Birthday” published today described British reaction to the
anniversary of the birth of Lord Beaconsfield who passed away last year. Admirers wore the primrose, the favorite
flower of the late Benjamin Disraeli.
1882:
It was reported today that General Nicholai Ignatief has issued a denial of
claims that the anti-Jewish violence is the result of a lack of action by the
government. Furthermore, the violence
has been limited to Balta and was started by the Jews who were seeking “revenge
for an insult to a Jew by a Christian child.”
1882:
Amid reports that Jews are living Vilna en mass, two hundred families are to
leave for America today.
1882(12th
of Iyar, 5642): Seventy-six-year-old retired architect David Alfred Mocatta,
the son Abigail Lindo and Moses Mocatta, members of large, distinguished
Anglo-Jewish Sephardi family, the husband of Ann Goldsmid passed away today.
1883:
Israel Lewy who had succeeded David Joël as "Seminarrabbiner" began
serving as chair of Talmudic Literature at Jewish Theological Seminary of Breslau
1883:
In Lask, Poland, Henrietta LaFrantz and Herman Weiner gave birth to Hunter College graduate, NYU trained
attorney and Democratic Party activist, Anna Weiner Hochfelder, the wife of
patent attorney Julius Hochfelder with
whom she practiced while they lived in New York, the mother of Julian with whom
she practiced law and Lt. Colonel Richard Hochfelder and who among other things founded the
American Alliance of Civil Service Women, Hochfelder, was a member of the
American Jewish Congress and Hadassah and began a whole new career when she
moved to California in 1940 where she was admitted to the bar and practiced law
with Nadia Williams.
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/hochfelder-anna-weiner
1884:
The Hebrew Technical Institute moved from 206 East Broadway to 129 Crosby
Street. The Institute had occupied the
Broadway facility since January of 1884 when it opened with 24 pupils.
1885:
It was reported today that the late Isaac Vogel had made bequests of $1,000
each to the Young Men’s Hebrew Association, the United Hebrew Charities, the
Montefiore Home for Chronic Invalids, Mount Sinai Hospital, the Hebrew Orphan
Asylum and the Hebrew Free School Association.
1885:
Birthdate of Israel George “Izzy” Levene “the All-American end at the
University of Pennsylvania who went on to coach at the University of Tennessee
and Wake Forest.
1885:
Birthdate of Jacob Paley, the native of Kiev who came to the United States and
with his brother Samuel Paley Congress Cigar Company which would provide the
funds for his nephew William to buy the radio station that because the Columbia
Broadcasting System.
1886: The Moses Montefiore Congregation bought
property at 160 East One Hundred and Sixteenth Street which was the site of a
Baptist Church. Plans to use the
structure for a synagogue came to naught when it was determined that the
building was unsuitable for that purpose and that it would be too small for the
number of congregants who would be using the synagogue.
1886:
“In Lozdzieje, Russian Empire (now Lazdijai, Lithuania),” Bertha and Julian
Achron, “an amateur violinist gave birth violinist and composer “Joseph
Yulyevich Achron” who emigrated to the United States in 1925 where he spent the
rest of her life and who was the brother of Isidor Achron, “Jascha Heifetz’s
accompanist.”
https://www.classicalarchives.com/composer/10638.html
1886:
The American Federation of Labor, led by it’s newly elected President, Samuel
Gompers, strikes on a nationwide basis in an attempt to secure an eight hour
day.
1886:
Birthdate of Leipzig native businessman Walter Cramer who “took part in the
civilian resistance against the Nazis” and was hanged for his part in the
attempt to kill Hitler on July 20, 1944.
1887:
Birthdate of Felix Rosenblüth, who as Pinchas Rosen was Israel’s first Minister
of Justice.
1887:
Birthdate of NYU Law School graduate Isaac Allen who in 1891 came to the United
States where he “was a founder of the American Jewish Committee and the
American Jewish Congress” and wrote regularly for the Yiddish Tageblatt.”
1887:
In New York City, William B. and Annie (Goldberg) Roth gave birth Bellevue
Hospital Medical College trained surgeon and author Aaron Roth, the attending
ear, nose and throat surgeon at the Jewish Hospital in Brooklyn who served as
Lieutenant in the Medical Corps during WW I before being promoted to the rank
of Captain in the Medical Reserve Corps of the United States Army and who was a
member of the Jewish Center in Brooklyn.
1888:
In Germany, Samuel Fleischer, the Mulbach born son of Aron and Pauline
Fleischer and his wife Emilie Fleischer gave birth to Arthur Fleischer.
1889(30th
of Nisan, 5649): Rosh Chodesh Iyar
1889:
In Galveston, TX, at 5:00 pm “more than fifty children assembled” at the home
of Morris and Nettie Lasker to celebrate the 9th birthday of future
advertising great Albert Lasker starting with an hour of “supervised games”
followed by a May Pole dance.
1890:
The United Hebrew Trades Union is one of several organizations taking part in
today’s march sponsored by the American Federation of Labor in support of an 8
hour work day.
1890:
Following a fortnight of attacks on Jewish shops in outlying provinces,
Austrian authorities fear that there will be a May Day attacks on Jews
throughout the empire including Vienna.
1890:
An unnamed anarchist has called for May Day attacks in Paris including the assassination
of the Rothschilds.
1890:
The old Hebrew Orphan Asylum building on 77th street is going to
converted into a public school that should accommodate 1,200 children.
1890:
Members of the American Federation of Labor, the union organization headed by
Samuel Gompers will be taking part in a large demonstration this evening in
support of the eight workday.
1891:
As of today, 142 people were residing at the Home for Aged and Infirm Hebrews.
1891:
The International Cloak Makers Union of America was founded today. Among the delegates attending the meeting was
Benjamin Schlesinger, a delegate from Chicago who would become the business
manager of Local 5 in Chicago.
1891:
Oscar Hammerstein held a reception for newspaper men in which he discussed his
plans to build a new opera house in New York.
1891:
Approximately 4,000 Jewish who work in the clothing trades held a pro-union
parade on the east side of New York.
1891:
Alexander Becce, a Russian Jew “a native of the town of Byzlik received a notice from the government that he
must either leave the country within thirty days or be exiled together with his
family to Siberia for life on his account of his religion.”
1892(4th
of Iyar, 5652): Rabbi Joseph Dov Soloveichik passed away
1892(4th
of Iyar, 5652): Abraham L. Grabfelder who was born in Bavaria 53 years ago and
was the General Southern Agent of the Manhattan Life Insurance Company for
twenty wand who was a Director of the Sanitarium for Hebrew Children passed
away today.
1892:
“Young Hebrew Gymnasts” published today described a demonstration of physical
skills by members of the Young Men’s Hebrew Association and the Young Woman’s
Hebrew Association, the latter of whom showed their skills with dumbbells. The youngsters were coached by Professor
Herman Weber.
1892
:When the fiscal year of the Home for Aged and Infirm Homes ended today the
charity had receipts of $66,113.01 while having made expenditures of $37,
783.80 leaving a balance of $28,329.21.
1892:
“Art and Literature Abroad” published today included the note that “the result
of Mr. Joseph Pennell’s visit to Russia will be published under the title The
Jew At Home: Impression of a Summer and Winter Spent With Him.
1892:
“For A New Clubhouse” published today described the plans of the Columbia Club,
the lead Jewish social organization in Harlem to build a new facility on 127th
Street and 5th Avenue. The club paid $50,000 for this new location.
1893:
“As A German Knows Bismarck” published today verified “Prince Bismarck’s
statement that he was never a friend of the Jews” and that as Junker, he was
“an enemy of everything that was liberal” which meant that he “disliked
Catholics and workmen.”
1893:
Among the books that will be published Putnam and Sons is The Jews of
Angevin England by Joseph Jacobs
1893:
According to “Literary Notes” published today A Study of the Jews in
Medieval England compiles by Joseph Jacobs is “among the book on the
announcement list of the Putnams.
1893:
“A New Rabbi for Baith Israel” published today described the changes at the
synagogue at Street and Boerum Place where Rabbi Marcus Friedlander who moved
to Oakland to take the pulpit at Temple Sinai has been replaced by Rabbi Joseph
Taubenhaus who is the brother of chess champion of Jacob Taubenhaus and the
brother of the rabbi at Congregation Beth Elhoim
1894:
Council No. 3 of the Council of Jewish Women was formed in Baltimore, MD with a
membership of 115 led by Mrs. Bertha Rayner Frank as President and Miss Rose
Summerfield as Secretary.
1894:
It was announced today that Baron Arthur de Rothschild is one of the six member
of the Sailing Committee which will oversee the Nice Regatta to be held in
April of 1895 and that Rothschild has also donated a cup valued at 200 English
pounds for the second place finisher in the competition for sailing yachts
weighing over twenty tons.
1894:
The funeral of Jesse Seligman who passed away in San Diego, CA, on April 23 is
scheduled to take place at Temple Emanu-El starting at 10 o’clock.
1894:
At today’s May Day Parade the contingent of United Hebrew Trades that included
“400 young women” led by Dora Levine” were greeted by cheers
1895: A lease was signed for a building at Mott
Avenue and 149th Street which was to the home for the Hebrew Infant
Asylum.
1895:
In Watertown, NY founding of the Congregation of the Standard Of Israel.
1895:
A letter was dropped in the mailbox of Samuel Zuckerman today in which their
son twenty-year-old Bernard Zuckerman acknowledged “that he had robbed their
flat” and in which he enclosed a pawn ticket representing the candlesticks
which he had pledged with a pawnbroker for $15
1895:
The contingent from the United Hebrew Trades marching in today’s Labor Day
Parade were life “by fifty members of the Mineral and Soda Water Makers’ Union
on horseback wearing white jackets and red sashes.” (For “2 cents-plain made by Jewish union
workers?)
1895:
This evening Isidor Bader of 208 Madison Street in New York City received “a
letter written Hebrew” saying that the mother of the little mute boy whom an
unknown couple had left with Bader earlier in the day, was dead and that his
father was unable to provide for him.
1895:
“Nathaniel S. Rosnau, Superintendent of the United Hebrew Charities gave a talk
on practical philanthropy to the Council of Jewish Women at Temple Emanu-El.”
1896(18th
of Iyar,5656): Lag Baomer
1896:
Sixty-four-year-old Nasser al-Din Shah Qajar during whose reign Dr. Jacob
Eduard Polak was brought to Persia to teach medicine and surgery to a whole
generation of Persian physicians as part of an attempt to modernize the
kingdom, was assassinated today.
1896:
In Bellaire, Ohio, founding of the Congregation Sons of Israel whose members
included Julius Weill, Joseph Sonneborn, Max L. Herzberg and Simon Behr which
held Friday night and Saturday morning services and was supported by a Ladies’
Auxiliary Society.
1897:
“Turks Still Advancing” published today described the Ottoman capture of
Larissa from the Greeks. The Jews had
remained at Larissa since they expected to be protected by the Turks.
1897:
“Home For Working Girls” published today described the establishment of the
Clara de Hirsch Home for Working Girls.
The home is the first manifestation of aid for Russian Jews in America
by possible by the $2,000,000 bequest from the Hirsch family.
1898:
“Rabbi Grossman Approves the War” published described the views on the
Spanish-American War of the leader of Temple Rudolph Sholom who “said that if a
war was waged for a holy cause, it was this one.”
1898:
Birthdate of Dave “Pep” Tobey, “the first Jew to be elected into the Naismith
Basketball Hall of Fame.
http://www.hoophall.com/hall-of-famers/dave-tobey/
1898:
Joseph Baroness, the socialist leader and the Grand Marshall of last night’s
proposed parade surprised authorities by agreeing to call of the parade to
avoid the threat of violence. He also
said that he never intended to criticize the United States for the war with
Spain. He said that it was “a just war
and if there is anyone who sympathizes with Spain we don’t want him in our
parade.
1898:
“Russian Jews Will Enlist” published today described the Jewish response to the
Spanish-American War including seventy Jewish Russian from the east side of New
York who have signed enlistment, the papers, the carpentry class from the
Jewish trade school that has volunteered and the Jewish farmers from the Hirsch
Colony of Woodbine, NJ, many of whom served in the Russian Army, who have
enlisted.
1898:
The first battle of the Spanish American War took placed at Manila Bay where
Commodore George Dewey, commanding the U.S. Navy's Asiatic Squadron aboard USS
Olympia, in a matter of hours defeated a Spanish squadron, an event later
described by Dr. Joseph M. Heller who arrived in the Philippines in 1899.
1899:
Myer S. Isaacs, President of the Hirsch Fund has read about the bequest of the
late Baroness Hirsch in the newspapers but has received no official
communication on this matter.
1899:
Dr. Lee K. Frankel of Philadelphia, PA, is scheduled to officially assume his
duties as the manager of the United Hebrew Charities in New York. A native of
Philadelphia who holds both a B.S. and a Ph. D. from the University of
Pennsylvania, Frankel is secretary of Rodef Shalom, Vice President of the Baron
de Hirsch Committee and Director of the Jewish Chautauqua Society.
1899:
After twenty-three years of service, Dr. Herman Baar will be stepping down as
superintendent of the Hebrew Orphan Asylum effective June, 1.
1899:
“Hirsch Memorial Services” published today described plans the several New York
Jewish charitable institutions are making to honor the memory of the late
Baroness Hirsch.
1899(21st
of Iyar, 5659): Joel Deutsch who had been principal of school for deaf-mutes
established in Nikolsburg and moved to Vienna in 1852 passed away today.
1900:
In Konitz, a county in the province of Prussia, Germany, a blood
accusation occurred after the death of a local student. Wolf Israelski was
accused and arrested, while Count Plucker promoted riots against the Jews.
After Israelski was proven innocent, two others, Adolf Levy and Rosenthal, were
arrested on the same charge. Rosenthal was acquitted and Lewy sentenced on a
perjury charge to four years.
1900:
Dutch Zionist leader Jacobus Kann resigned as director of the Bank designed to
finance the purchase of land in Eretz Israel and help settlers make Aliyah.
1900:
In what was then a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, “Avrum Kletter, a
carpenter and cabinet maker and his wife gave birth to Max Keletter, musician,
composer of operettas, and actor on the Yiddish stage in the United States who
was the husband of Sylvia Feder.
(Editor’s note: According to one source he was born in 1901 but we are
using the dob on his tombstone.)
http://www.museumoffamilyhistory.com/yt/lex/K/kletter-max.htm
1901:
Birthdate of Endre Bohem, the native of Arad who became a successful American
screenwriter and producer.
http://articles.latimes.com/1990-05-08/news/mn-96_1_endre-bohem
1901:
In Mayesville, SC, Emanuel and Bertha Strauss Sternberger gave birth to Blanche
Sternberger who became Blanche Sternberger Benjamin when she married New
Orleans native and Harvard graudate Edward Bernard Benjamin, the father of
Edward Bernard Benjamin, Jr.
1902:
It was reported today that House of Representatives has adopted “the Goldfogle
Resultion which calls on the Secretary for information as o whether the Russian
Government had barred or excluded American citizens of the Jewish faith who
desired to visit Russia.”
1903:
In his poem "Tale of the Slaughter," the famous Jewish poet Chiam
Nachman Bialik chastised the Jews for not defending themselves in the Pogrom at
Kishinev that had taken place in April, 1903. Herzl was also affected by the
massacre and he decided to visit Russia and give consideration to the Uganda
Plan. The Uganda plan would be rejected but it would cause a painful split in
the infant Zionist movement. The massacre also provided the impetus in America
to lay the groundwork for the American Jewish Committee, casting American Jewry
into international prominence. There would be another pogrom in Kishinev in
1905 with more loss of life.
1904:
It was reported today that a car belonging to Jefferson Seligman had taken
place in recent parade “held under the
auspices of the American Automobile Club of America” whose clubhouse is located
at 5th Avenue and 58th Street.
1905:
Bernard “Zuckerman was elected a delegate to the founding convention of Poale
Zionof America that took place” today.
1905:
Birthdate of Hermann Kosterlitz, the native of Berlin who gained fame as movie
director Henry Koster, a refugee from Nazi Germany, who is best remembered as
the man who discovered Abbott & Costello.
He saw their comedy act and convinced Universal Studios to sign them to
a contract. He directed their first film
in which all of America heard the “Who’s On First” routine for the first time.
1906:
“For the Hebrew Children’s Sanitarium” published today described the progress
made in raising funds for the Jewish institution to which Jacob H. Schiff has contributed
$10,000 and Mortimer L. Schiff and Adolph Lewisohn have each contributed
$2,500.
1907: Today,
twenty –three year old Saul Dushman, the Rostov born son of Samuel and Olga
Dushman, holder of Ph.D. from the University of Toronto and one of the “most
valuable researchers” at the General Electric Labs in Schenectady, NY., married
his first wife Amelia Gurofksy who pre-deceased him leading to his marriage to
Anna Leff in 1914.
1908: Yiddishe
Tegliche Presse, the forerunner of “Die YIDDISHE VELT (Jewish World) was
Cleveland's principal Yiddish-language newspaper for over 40 years’ was founded
today by Samuel Rocker, Adolph Hass and Jonas Gross.”
1908:
In Warsaw Poland, Count Jerzy Skarbek, a Catholic, and Stefania née Goldfeder,
the daughter of a wealthy assimilated Jewish family gave birth to their second
child and first daughter Krystna who served with bravery and distinction as an
agent who operated in occupied Europe for the British Special Operations
Executive (SOE)
1908:
Heinrich Conried “retired from the Metropolitan Opera House due to his poor
health.”
1909:
“During a worker’s demonstration in Buenos Aires, a Jewish anarchist murdered a
local police chief. Rioters responded by
attacking and sacking the city’s predominately Jewish small retail business
quarter.”
1909:
Birthdate of Philadelphia, PA, native David “Cy” Kaselman the outstanding
player for the Philadelphia Sphas from 1928 to 1940.
1909: The Jewish anarchist, Simon Radowitzki, attempted
to assassinate Ramon Falcon, the Argentinean chief of police.
1909 A
Workers’ Day rally in Buenos Aires, led in part by Simon Radowitzky, turns
violent .Ukrainian-Jewish anarchist Simon Radowitzky emigrated to Argentina
when he was 17 years old. In 1909, he… [More] participated in the Labor
Day demonstration in Plaza Lorea that was suppressed by the police — between
eight and 12 individuals 8 died and dozens were wounded. Out of revenge,
Radowitzky allegedly threw a bomb at chief of police Ramon Falcon. In the following
week, Falcon pursued the workers. The police began to fan an anti-Semitic
campaign against Russian Jewish instigators. Radowitzky was sentenced to death,
but it was commuted to life imprisonment because he was barely 18, and he was
ultimately released in 1930. He then took part in the Spanish Civil War and
ultimately managed to escape from a French internment camp to Mexico. [Less]
1910(22nd of Nisan, 5670): Eighth Day of Pesach
1910: Birthdate of Henryk Ross “who was employed as a photographer by the
Department of Statistics for the Jewish Council within the Łódź Ghetto,”
survived the Holocaust and testified at the Eichmann trial before passing away
1991.
http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/this_month/march/12.asp
1910:
The Sunday New York Times published
“‘Icy Italy As Seen: by Israel Zangwill’ the fourth in a series of ‘Italian Fantasies’
written by this well-known author.”
1910:
As part of the “Annual Jewish-Christian Union Services in Pittsburg,” “Rabbi J.
Leonard Levy of the Rodeph Shalom Congregation” is scheduled to “again preach
in St. Mark’s Reformed Church” today where “his topic will be ‘A New Gospel.’”
1911:
“Here in Behalf of Abyssinian Jews” published today described the arrival of
Dr. Jacques Faitlovich in New York where he plans on establishing a branch of a
society designed to unite the black Jews of Abyssinia with the rest of the
Jews’ of the world.
1911:
In Pennsylvania, Louis Lazarus, the Romanian born son of Morris and Rebecca
Lazarus and his wife Rose Lazarus gave birth Anna Lazarus who became Anna
Weiner when she married Myer Weiner.
1912(14th
of Iyar, 5672): Pesach Sheni combines with celebration of May Day
1912:
Five days after he had passed away, 38 year old Henry Baumann, the Glasgow born
son of German immigrants William and Rosalie Baumann was buried today at the
“Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery.”
1913:
In Hartford, CT, Joseph Neistat and Jennie Sherman gave birth to Louis Neistat
who gained fame Louis Nye one of a stable of comedians who first gained
national notice on the “Steve Allen Show.”
1913:
Birthdate of Czech born British conductor Jay Walter Susskind.
1913:
As the investigation into the death of Mary Phagan continues, E.F. Holloway,
the pencil factory’s day watchman saw Jim Conley, the pencil factory’s janitor
washing a dirty shirt which led to Conley’s arrest that day. At first Conley tried to hide the shirt and
then claimed the stains were rust from the overhead pipe on which he had hung
the shirt. Detectives examined it for blood, found none and returned it.
[Conley would later testify against Leo Frank. Decades later, Conley would be
exposed as the person who had murder Mary Phagan.]
1914:
Nissim Mazliach is appointed to the Turkish Chamber for Smyrna.
1914:
In Cincinnati, Ohio, founding of the Mizrachi Organization of America
1915:
Four days after the Zion Mule Corps had landed at Helelles the 29th
Indian Infantry landed at Sari Bair securing the area beyond the landing
beaches.
1915:
Schiff Has Fears For British Jews” published today contains the expression of
the concerns by Jacob H. Schiff “that
England has become ‘contaminated’ by her alliance with Russia in so far as the
Jewish question is concerned and that conditions will be harder for Jews in
England after the war, while they will be better in Germany.”’
1915:
Abraham Shiplikeff of the United Hebrew Trades is scheduled to preside over an
assemblage those delivering speeches demanding equal rights for Jews the world
over…in a dozen different languages.”
1915:
“A May Day demonstration in favor of peace in Europe, equal rights for Jews
after the war, socialism and women suffragists brought 25,000 labor unionists
and Socialist to Union Square” in New York today.
1915:
The Federation of Rumanian Jews of America’s home “at Grand View-on-the Hudson”
which has accommodations for 180 patients is scheduled to open today thanks in
no small measure to the work of Dr. Julius Weiss and Morris D. Reiss.
1915:
Abraham Cahan, edtor of The Jewish Dail Forward, was the speaker at a meeting a
Carnegie Hall” tonight “given in his honor by the United Hebrew Trades and the
East Side branches of the Socialist party in order to get the story of his
investigation in the war zone from which he had returned last week.”
1915:
In the U.K. poet Jon Rodker and dancer Sonia Cohen gave birth to “political
activist and television producer” Joan Rodker.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/culture-obituaries/8277253/Joan-Rodker.html
1916:
Labor activist Bessie Abramowitz and Amalgamated president Sidney Hillman
announced their engagement while marching at the head of the clothing workers'
contingent of the Chicago May Day Parade.
1916:
An anti-war demonstration which had a formative effect on 12-year-old Hans
Achim Litten took place in Berlin today.
1916:
The Ninth Semi-Annual Assembly of the Eastern Council of Reform Rabbis which
had been meeting at Temple Emanuel during which Rabbi Stephen S. Wise said
“Louis D. Brandeis, whom power and privilege seek to prevent from ascending the
Supreme Court bench of the United States, is the single Jew in America who is
standing our as the prophet of social justice and Jewish righteousness” came to
an end.
1916:
It was announced today that Jacob Schiff will deliver a major address at the
meeting of the Jewish Publication Society of America later this month in
Philadelphia, PA.
1916:
It was reported today that the first volume of Simon Dubnow’s History of the
Jews of Russia and Poland will be sent to JPS members later this month.
1917:
Preacher Billie Sunday said today that “many prophecies are coming true” as can
be seen by the fact that “the Jews are going back to Palestine and are to have
nation of their own for the first times since the days of the sweet singer of
Israel.”
1917:
It was announced at the headquarters of the Young Judea Club in Manhattan,
“that 5,000 young Jews have enlisted to work on garden farm in” New York state”
and are “ready to serve under the Mayor’s committee.
1917:
U.S. Secretary of State Lansing “received a cablegram from the Joodsch
Correspondentie Bureau at the Hague asserting that it has been established by
Jewish intellectuals for the purpose of keeping the press of the world informed
regarding the Jewish situation and asking the attitude of the United States
Government toward the national renaissance of the Jewish people.”
1917:
Jacob Schiff and Louis Marshall held “an informal consultation today” and
decided that as soon as they had had received a text of a telegram from the
State Department that had been sent from leaders of the Jews of Russia saying
that they were supporting “a new public loan for freedom issued by the
Provisional Government” they would begin soliciting public support for the
measure.
1917:
The first national meeting of the American Jewish Congress did not take place
today as scheduled due to differences among several Jewish organizations as to
the power of the Executive Committee and the allocation of delegates.
1917:
Abraham Elkus, the U.S. Ambassador to Turkey who had contracted spotted typhus
in April which made it impossible for him to leave Constantinople after the U.S
declared war on Germany “was pronounced out of danger today” but still was not
well enough to travel.
1918:
Today, a special nurse was added “to the regular staff of nurse maintained by”
The Irene Kaufmann Settlement in Pittsburgh who will deal with “prenatal and
post-natal nursing” which marked the inauguration of “this kind of district
nursing service in Pittsburgh.
1918:
Sixteen-year-old Yitzak Jacov Liss, the father of Victoria Shalvah Liss
Herzberg, an art teacher in Vermont, and Houston physician, Dr. Shelly E. Liss,
began serving as enlisted man today “in the British Jewish Legion 38th
Battalion Royal Fusiliers.”
1918:
Nineteen-year-old Toronto, Canada, native Alexander Solomon enlisted in the
Jewish Legion which led to his serving in Palestine during World War after
which he returned home to practice law for 27 yers and serve as the National
Director of the Canadian March of Dimes from 1950 to 1963.
1918:
It was reported today “Palestine has lost a large proportion of its Jewish
people since the war began, with some in Egypt, some in Turkish prisons and
some in exile” while “Jerusalem has lost two-third of its Jewish population
because of exile, typhus and starvation.”
1919:
Today’s May issue of Jewish Charities will be the last since it will start
appearing under the masthead of “Jewish Social Service” in June.
1919:
The rabbis of Palestine hold a first conference. Rabbi Avraham Yitzhak HaCohen
Kook is asked to serve as chief rabbi.
1919:
In Chicago, Professor George L. Scherger is scheduled to lead a discussion of
Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace at the Literary Study Circle.
1919:
Two days after she had passed away, 28-year-old Rachel Manning, the daughter of
Ada and Lewis Freedman and the wife of Richard Manning was buried today at the
“East Ham Jewish Cemetery.”
1920:
Young anarchist Mollie Steimer began a 15-year prison term for distributing
leaflets opposing American intervention in the Russian Revolution. She was
later deported.
1920:
Final Broadway performance of “Martinique,” produced by Walter Hast at the
Eltinge 42nd Street Theatre.
1921:
University of Pennsylvania trained surgeon Frank Benton Block, the Philadelphia
born son of Reada A. Mayer and Louis B. Block and instructor in gynecology at
the University of Pennsylvania who served as a first lieutenant with the U.S.
Army Medical Corps in WW I married Etta N. Stauffer today in Leighton, PA.
1921:
Not for the first or last time, Arabs resort to violence to try and stop
the growth of the Jewish community. In this case riots began
in Jaffe resulting in the death of forty Jews and the wounding two
hundred others. The riots soon spread to Tel Aviv, Petah Tikva, Kfar Saba,
Hadera and Rehovot. Though casualties were relatively light, the British
decided to appease the Arabs and "redefined" the borders of the
Balfour Declaration. This was neither the first time nor the last
time that the British would violation the terms of the Mandate. It was
also one of the many examples in which the British sought to curry favor with
the Arabs, even if it meant betraying the Jews.
1922:
Today “the Free Trades Unions of Munich commissioned a monument dedicated to
‘the Dead of the Revolution’” after which the urn containing Kurt Eisner’s
ashes was walled into its pedestal.
1923:
On Coney Island in Brooklyn, Russian immigrants Lena and Isaac Donald Heller
gave birth to author Joseph Heller who created Catch-22, the literary
masterpiece that gained additional fame as a film.
http://www.notablebiographies.com/He-Ho/Heller-Joseph.html
1923:
“British Chief Rabbi Defends Schechita In The Times” published today by the
Jewish Correspondence Bureau described the strongly expressed opposition of
Joseph Hertz, the Chief Rabbi of the United Kingdom proposed legislation that
would end “the Jewish method of slaughtering animals for food” which he says
“according to the testimony of competent experts including Lord Lister, Sir
Michael Foster, Dr. Leonard Hill and Dr. T.H. Openshaw” is “the most human
method” for doing this.
1924:
In Baltimore, MD, Abraham Benjamin Cohn, native of Pottsville, PA and his wife
Hattie Rose Cohn gave birth to Malcolm Randolph Cone
1925:
In the UK, Marie Bader and Louis Balmuth gave birth to Helen Balmuth who gained
fame as Helen Rae Bamber who among other things “worked with Holocaust
survivors after the liberation of the concentration camps
1926:
In Bochum Germany, Hans Ehrenberg “a German Jewish philosopher and theologian”
who was “one of the co-founders of the Confessing Church” and was forced to
emigrate to England because of his Jewish ancestry and his opposition to Nazism”
and his wife Else Zimmerman gave birth to statistician and marketing scientist Andrew Ehrenberg. http://www.marketingscience.info/name-and-founders
1926:
“The all-Jewish football (soccer) club, SC Hakoah Wien, led by Béla Guttmann
played before a crowd of 46,000 people at the Polo Grounds in New York City.
1927:
It was reported today that “what was said to be the first open-air concert in Eretz-Israel
since the time of the Roman occupation took place on April 13 in the stadium of
the Hebrew University on Mount Scopus.”
1927:
“The election of Adolph S. Ochs as President of the recently organized
Association of Reform Congregations, was announced today by Ludwig Vogelstein,
Chairman of the Executive Board of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations.”
1928:
A large number of workers in Palestine heeded the call of the Worker’s Councils
for a general strike. In other May Day
activities, Arab and Jewish workers held mass meetings in several towns
including Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, where police dispersed the gatherings after
arresting several demonstrators some of whom would later be labeled as
“communists.”
1928:
Mrs. Richard Gottheil, president of the Women’s League for Palestine is
scheduled to preside over todays luncheon which is being held to raise funds to
build communal centers for pioneer working girls in Palestine.
1928(11th
of Iyar, 5688): Fifty-eight year old Joseph Solomon Wallenstein, the son of
Solomon and Esther Wallenstein, passed away today.
1928:
In London, variety store proprietors Victor and Leah Cohen gave birth to art
pioneer Harold Cohen.
http://www.aaronshome.com/aaron/aaron/index.html\
1929:
Mr. and Mrs. Stuart J. Lebach of Park Central announced the engagement of their
daughter Lenore Block Lebach, the Columbia University student and granddaughter
of Leo Bloch to Edmond Nathaniel Cahn the graduate of Tulane University, member
of ZBT and Phi Beta Kappa and son of Mr. and Mrs. Edgar M. Cahn of New Orleans,
LA.
1929(21st
of Nisan, 5689): Seventh Day of Pesach
1929:
For the first time since their inception in 1889, the annul May Day rally in
Berlin turned violent and when “the workers were charged with severe breach of
the peace and sedition” Hans Litten stepped in to defend them.
1930:
In Siófok, Hungary, József and Ilona Hirsch, both of whom perished in The
Holocaust, gave birth to theatre director John Hirsch was brought to Canada “in
1947 through the War Orphans Project of the Canadian Jewish Congress.
1931(14th
of Iyar, 5691): Pesach Shein
https://history.yale.edu/people/donald-kagan
https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/authorpage/donald-kagan.html
1932:
According to reports by John Martin published today, famed ballerina Belle
Didjah has set sail from New York to begin her European Tour which will include
performances in Tel Aviv and other communities in Palestine. The performances are being sponsored by the
Cultural Committee of Histadruth.
1933:
With the fortunes of Adidas on the rise and Hitler having just assumed power in
Germany, the Dassler brothers formally joined the Nazi party, according to
journalist Barbara Smit’s book “Sneaker Wars,” a history of Adidas.
1933:
“Crowd Assaults Fascist Who Insult London Jews” published today described how
“an after theatre crowd of about 7,000 persons surrounded and assaulted a band
of young Fascists who had hurled insults at groups of Jews in Piccadilly
Circus.”
1934: Julius
Streicher's Nazi periodical, Der Stürmer--one
of Germany's most popular periodicals and a favorite of Hitler--reminded its
readers that during the Middle Ages, the Jews were accused of committing ritual
murder of Christian children and of using their blood for religious ritual
purposes
1934(16th
of Iyar, 5694): Seventy year old Polish born manufacturer and Jewish
philanthropist Israel Unterberg who came to the United States in 1873 at
approximately ten years of age passed away today.
https://www.jta.org/1934/05/02/archive/unterberg-dies-philanthropist-and-educator
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1934/05/02/94520698.pdf
1934: The
Rassenpolitisches Amt der NSDAP
(Racial Policy Office of the National Socialist German Workers Party) was
established by Hitler's friend and secretary, Rudolph Hess.
1935:
It was reported today that a riot at a lecture in Munich celebrating the 10th
anniversary of the founding of Hebrew University in Jerusalem was averted by
Jewish restraint in the face of threats from Nazi students some of whom were
dress in the Brown Shirt uniform.
1935:
In Manhattan, German born tent manufacturer Walter Stern and bookkeeper Jean
(Friedlander) Stern gave birth CCNY and Harvard Law School graduate Henry
Jordan Stern, the long-time and forceful commissioner of parks and recreation
in New York City who was the husband of Dr. Margaret Ewing, father of Jaren and
Kenan Stern and the brother of Susanne Kenneth and Jerome Stern. (As reported
Robert D. McFadden)
1936:
Despite have arrested 106 Communists, British authorities braced for more
violence today which is both the Muslim Sabbat and May Day.
1936:
During his May Day speech today, when Hitler asked who was spreading the lies
that “Germany will invade Austria or Czechoslovakia” the crowd respond with
“cries of the Jews” which was the same response he got when he asked “who are
the elements which want no peace?”
1936:
“Several Jewish-owned shops were destroyed by a bomb explosion at Ovwock,
Poland.”
1936:
In explaining the University of Michigan’s decision to send representatives to
an anniversary at the Heidelberg University despite Nazi involvement, President
Alexander G. Ruthven was quoted today as saying “he believed that Germany’s
persecuting of the Jews and Catholics had been no worse than Italy’s treatment
of the Ethiopians.”
1937(20th
of Iyar, 5697): Parashat Emor
1937:
A five-year-old Jewish boy was killed today while his mother and six Jews men
wounded today in Warsaw when “fascists threw bombs and fired shots at the
tail-end of a May Parade sponsored by the Jewish Socialist party.”
1937(20th
of Iyar, 5697): Sixty-nine-year-old Broadway and silent screen star Snitz
Edwards, born into Jewish home in Budapest as Edwad Neuman, the husband of
Eleanor Taylor with whom he had three daughters - Cricket, Evelyn and Marian – who “often
appeared in the first decade of the 20th century on Broadway in productions for
such prominent stage directors as Arthur Hammerstein and Charles Frohman” and
performed with such silent screen stars as Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks and
Ramon Navarro passed away today in Los Angeles.
1938:
Big band singer Beatrice Ruth Wain married French born American radio
personality Andre Baruch.
1938: Following
the Anschluss, Austrians forced
Jewish men and women to scrub the streets with small brushes and with the
women's fur coats.
1939:
“An Associated Press photograph shows some of over 132,000 members of the
Hitler youth assumed at the Olympic Stadium in Berlin” today
http://cdn.timesofisrael.com/uploads/2016/03/AP_3905010249.jpg
1939:
Alexander “Burnstein informed Cyrus Adler that he had successfully relocated 33
rabbis to the United States including Rabbi Emil Schorsch of Hanover, the
father Rabbi Ismar Schorsch, the former chancellor of JTS.
1939: In
Hungary, discriminatory laws were passed against Jews engaged in law and
medicine. Jewish participation in the economy was restricted to six percent.
1939:
Following a decision “made in the secretariat of Hashomer Hatzair, Kibbutz
BaMa'ale and Kibbutz BaMifne “were settled in Menashe Heights” and eventually
be called Kibbutz Dalia.
1940:
In France, premiere of “Sarajevo,” directed by Max Ophüls and filmed by
cinematographer Otto Heller.
1940:
Birthdate of Colette Avital, the Bucharest native who made Aliyah in 1950 and
developed a career as a diplomat and political leader.
1940: Polish
and Baltic-area Jews began to escape across the Soviet Union to Japan, the
Dutch East Indies, Australia, Canada, the United States and, in a few instances
to Eretz Israel. In all, only a few thousand Jews from the region manage to
escape.
1940:
The Lodz Ghetto is closed. At the outbreak of the war, Lodz was the
second largest Jewish community in Europe, Warsaw being the largest. When
the Ghetto was sealed, it imprisoned over 230,000. Those who did not die
of starvation, pestilence, etc. ended up being transported to the Chelmno death
camp. There were less than 900 Jews left alive when the Soviets
liberated the ghetto in January, 1945.
1940(23rd
of Nisan, 5700): One hundred forty Palestinian Jews died as German planes bombed
their ship
1940: Rudolf
Höss, adjutant at the Sachsenhausen, Germany, concentration camp, was ordered
to turn the former Polish army barracks at Auschwitz, Poland, into an
extermination camp.
1940:
From today through December 1940 thousands of Polish Jews are sent
eastward as forced laborers to construct fortifications along the new Soviet
frontier.
1941:
New York City premiere of “Citizen Kane” with a screenplay co-authored by
Herman J. Mankiewicz and a score by Bernard Hermann.
1941: Thousands
of Jews who had fought in the French Foreign Legion against Germany in 1940 were
deported to slave-labor camps in the Sahara to build railroads.
1941(4th
of Iyar, 5701): In Bucharest, Romania 120 Jews are slain in the streets
during anti-Semitic violence
1941: Jewish
cemeteries, synagogues, and businesses in Zagreb, Yugoslavia, are destroyed
1941: A
concentration camp is established at Natzweiler, Alsace, Germany.
1941: Gross-Rosen,
formerly a satellite camp of Sachsenhausen, Germany, becomes an independent
camp.
1942(14th
of Iyar, 5702): Pesach Sheni
1942:
From today through the 31st of the month, more than 3600 Jews in the
Warsaw Ghetto die of starvation. Nazis force their way into Jewish apartments
in Warsaw, shoot and club the residents, and throw the bodies from windows.
1942:
During May a slave-labor camp opens near Minsk, Belorussia.
1942: During May small groups of Jewish youths
manage to escape into the woods outside Lida and Stolpce, towns in Belorussia.
1942: During May, in the Eastern Galicia region
of Poland, Jews aged 14 to 60 are driven to isolated spots and killed by hand
grenades and machine guns after being forced to dig their own graves. Other
victims of this Aktion include
orphans, residents of old-age homes, and women in the streets.
1942:
During May, inmates at Auschwitz-Birkenau are put to work as slave laborers at
the camp itself and at a synthetic-oil and rubber plant at nearby Monowitz.
1942:
During May, Jewish women at Auschwitz-Birkenau are selected for medical
experiments. A Jewish inmate at a labor camp at Schwenningen, Germany, is
buried in earth up to his shoulders as punishment for having an attack of
diarrhea outside a barracks; after more than ten hours in the ground, the man
dies.
1942:
During May, a slave-labor camp opens at Maly Trostinets, Byelorussia
1942:
During May in Holland, a collaborationist auxiliary police unit, Vrijwillige Hulp-Politie (Volunteer
Auxiliary Police), is established. It is charged with the roundup of Dutch Jews
for deportation to the East.
1942:
During May, Communist Jews in Paris initiate organized armed resistance to
the Nazi occupiers.
1942:
During May, The Bund (Jewish Labor Organization of Poland) appeals to the
Polish government-in-exile in London to persuade the Allied governments to warn
the German government about the consequences of the murder of the Polish Jews.
The Bund's appeal contains detailed information concerning the systematic mass
murder of Jews. It reports that 700,000 Polish Jews have already been executed.
1942: In early May, 260 Luxembourg Jews,
some of whom who had converted to Christianity, are sent to Chelmno.
1942: In early May, Jewish Council members
at Bilgoraj, Poland, are executed after refusing to compile a list of
candidates for deportation.
1942: More than 1750 Jews are deported
from Tripoli, Libya, to forced-labor sites at the Libyan cities of Benghazi,
Homs, and Derna. Hundreds perish from heat and hunger, and others die during
Allied bombings after being forbidden to use air-raid shelters
1942:
In that part of North Africa occupied by the Axis Powers (Germany and
Italy), 2600 Libyan Jews are deported to a forced-labor camp at Giado,
Libya, to build roads for the military.
1942(14th
of Iyar, 5702): Approximately 1000 Jews are murdered at Dvinsk, Latvia.
Only about 450 Jews are left in Dvinsk, down from 16,000 from the previous
year.
1942:
In its daily broadcast, Radio Orange issued a call to defy the order to
wear the "Jewish star." During World War II, Radio Orange was
the name given to the broadcasts by the Dutch government-in- exile which were
carried by the B.B.C.
1942:
Trucks began transporting the Jews out of the Dvinsk ghetto. Dvinsk was a town
in the Baltic state of Latvia. Before the war, there were
16,000 Jews living in Dvinks. At the end of the war, only 500
had survived.
1943:
“Lady of Burlesque” featuring J. Edward Bromberg and Pinky Lee was released
today in the United States.
1943:
SS-Gruppenführer Jürgen Stroop
completes his official written chronicle of the liquidation of the Warsaw
Ghetto which is entitled “The Stroop
Report.”
1943:
The first of four trains carrying nearly 11,000 Jews arrive at Auschwitz from
Salonika, Greece. This would mark the next step in the end of this ancient
Jewish community that lives on in their unique music including that which is
used in chanting Psalm 118.
1943: The Axis send the first of what would
total 5000 Sephardic Jews from Occupied Tunisia to labor camps near North
African battle zones.
1943: The Warsaw Ghetto uprising had
lasted eleven days. By now, the Jews knew that the Polish Underground
would not come to their aid. The Jews fought on even as they awaited the
inevitable. Among the those who died at this time were Abrasha Blum, an
organizer of armed resistance in the Warsaw Ghetto and a member of the
Coordinating Committee of Jewish Organizations> He was shot by Germans after enduring confinement
and torture
1943:
German Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels, reacting to the Jewish
Warsaw Ghetto revolt, notes in his diary: "Heavy engagements are being
fought there which led even to the Jewish Supreme Command's issuing daily
communiqués. Of course, this fun won't last very long. But it shows what is to
be expected of the Jews when they are in possession of arms."
1943: Jewish
writers and artists, inspired by the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, gather in the
Vilna (Lithuania) Ghetto for an evening of poetry, with the hopeful theme "Spring
in Yiddish Literature."
1943(26th
of Nisan, 5703): Many members of the Jewish community in Brody, Ukraine,
are killed at the Majdanek death camp.
1944:
An internal memo from the United States Government War Refugee Board states
that as of late March: "All registered Jews in Athens are said
to have been placed in a concentration camp; registered Jews from the provinces
were subsequently added."
1944:
An internal memo of this week from the United States Government War Refugee
Board states that a small group of Jews in Greece claimed to be Portuguese
nationals.
1944: Christian
Wirth, SS-Sturmbannführer and
commandant of the Belzec, Poland, death camp, is assassinated by partisans in
Fiume, Yugoslavia.
1944:
Starting today the Nazis begin the liquidation of the Lodz (Poland)
Ghetto.
1944(8th
of Iyar, 5704): Itzhak Katzenelson and his son Zvi were murdered at Auschwitz.
Born in 1886, he was a teacher, poet and dramatist. His wife and two of his other sons had
already been murdered at Treblinka.
Katznelson participated in the Warsaw Ghetto uprising and was one of the
few survivors. While being held at a
detention in Vittel, France, he wrote the Yiddish epic poem “Song of the
Murdered Jewish People” which he buried in bottles before being shipped to the
death camp. The Ghetto Fighters' House
Holocaust and Jewish Resistance Heritage Museum in Israel, is named in his
memory. For more about his epic work see http://motlc.wiesenthal.com/site/pp.asp?c=ivKVLcMVIsG&b=476157
1944(8th
of Iyar, 5704): As mass deportations of Jews from Hungary to death camps
begin, hundreds of Hungarian Jews at Sátoraljaújhely and Miskolc are shot after
refusing to board trains destined for Auschwitz.
1944:
Birthdate of Bronx native Robert “Bob” Mankoff the cartoon editor of The New Yorker magazine.
http://www.newyorker.com/cartoons/bob-mankoff/cartoon-of-atonement
1944:
Between today and the 31st of May, 33,000 Jews from Munkács,
Hungary, are killed at Auschwitz.
1945:
After 68 months of war, just one of every ten of Poland's prewar Jewish
population of 3.3 million is alive
1945(18th
of Iyar, 5705): Lag B’Omer
1945(18th
of Iyar, 5705): When a Jew in a group of laborers from the camp at
Sonneberg, Germany, chanted and danced with joy upon word of Hitler's death, a
“German guard calmly shot the man dead.”
1945: The
concentration camp at Stutthof, Poland, is liberated by the Red Army. Just 120
inmates remain alive.
1945:
Henry Krasucki, a survivor of Auschwitz and Buchenwald “celebrates” his May Day
in Paris.
1945:
The Death Marches to Mauthausen continued even as the U.S. Army approached, and
even though Hitler committed suicide the prior day. The Jews were being marched
to Mauthasan in Austria from the various death camps and concentration camps
that had fallen in the wake of Allied and Soviet advances.
Hundred more Jews would die during the marches from
exhaustion. Approximately 200,000 people were imprisoned at
Mauthausen. Not until May 3, would the Nazi guards give up and slip away
trying to hide among the general mass of refugees.
1946(30th
of Nisan, 5706: Rosh Chodesh Iyyar
1946(30th
of Nisan, 5706): Former Jewish partisan leader and Red Army officer
Eliyahu Lipszowicz is murdered by an anti-Semitic Pole at Legnica, Poland.
1946:
In a draft of a letter to British Prime Minster Clement Atlee, Winston
Churchill reiterated his belief in Partition as the only realistic was for
settling the conflict in Palestine.
1946:
The English-American Commission on the Jewish Refugee Problem in Europe
recommended the immediate entry of 100,000 Jews into Eretz Israel. The British
continued to maintain the blockade keeping the Jews out of Palestine. It
was at this time that Golda "proposed a hunger strike by fifteen Zionist
leaders" as means of forcing the British to change their policy.
When the Mrs. Meir asked the head of the British government in Palestine if the
hunger strike would make a difference he ask asked her,"...do you think
for a moment that His Majesty's government will change its policy because you
are not going to. She replied, "No, I have no such illusions.
If the death of six million didn't change government policy, I don't expect
that my not eating will do so. But it at least it will be a mark of
solidarity" with those Jews being turned away by the British
military.
1947:
Last day of Bercovici v. Chaplain in which Louis Nizer represented the
plaintiff in case charging plagiarism by Chaplain and which was settled with
Chaplain paying the plaintiff $95,000.
https://www.encyclopedia.com/law/law-magazines/bercovici-v-chaplin-1947
1947:
In Mexico City, Joseph Bekenstein, a carpenter, and the former Esther
Vladaslavotsky, a homemaker, two Jewish immigrants from Poland who had met in
Mexico during World War II gave birth to Jacob David Beckstein, the Michael
Polak professor emeritus of theoretical physics at Hebrew University who
“revolutionized the theory of Black Holes.”
1947:
Leonard Bernstein introduces his "Jeremiah" symphony in the Edison
Cinema in Jerusalem.
1948(22nd
of Nisan, 5708): Eighth Day of Pesach and Shabbat
1948:
“The Arabs opened a large-scale attack on Ramot Naphtali in the northern hills
near Lebanon.” The settlement was the
key to a Jewish victory in the Galilee.
If the Arabs could take the settlement, they would be able to keep the
Palmach from sending reinforcements Safed.
In the end, the settlers held and Jewish forces were able to take
control of Safed after an extremely difficult battle later in the month.
1948:
Abba Eban makes his maiden speech in the U.N. General Assembly.
1948
(22 Nissan 5708): Israeli forces liberate the Qatamon neighborhood of
Jerusalem.
1949: An article published in “Harefuah”, a
medical journal published by the Israel Medical Association, described how
Aaron Valero first observed the outbreak of Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever in
Palestine.
1950(14th
of Iyar, 5710): Pesach Sheni
1950:
In Tel Aviv, Israel Eldad and his wife gave birth to Professor Aryeh Eldad who
combined medicine with a career in politics.
1950:
Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion’s attempts to form a new government suffered a
setback tonight when the executive committee of the General Zionist Party
decided not to join the coalition. The
party, which is more conservative than those represented by the labor movement,
had been offered the Commerce and Industry ministries as an enticement to join
the new government but the leadership felt that Ben Gurion had not made a
strong enough commitment to adopt some of their economic and educational reform
policies.
1950:
“South Pacific,” the famous musical by Rogers and Hammerstein won the Pulitzer
Prize as the best original American Play.
1950:
“Double Confession” a crime film co-starring Peter Lorre and with music by
Benjamin Frankel was released today in the United Kingdom.
1951:
The bond drive of United Jewish Appeal is scheduled to begin today.
1951:
In “Hungary’s and Rumania’s Nazis-in-Red” Hitler’s Graduates Staff Stalin’s New
Order” published today Bela Fabian described the emergence in Eastern Europe of
former Nazis now enforcing the teachings of Karl Marx.
1952:
Funeral services are scheduled to be held for 79-year-old “lawyer banker and
civic worker whose “philanthropes, particularly to Jewish charities ran up into
the millions of dollars” and who married Mrs. Elizabeth Rebstein in 1943 after
his first wife Selda passed away in 1938” is scheduled to buried today.
https://www.newspapers.com/clip/48123150/obituary-for-ralph-jonas-aged-73/
1953:
Today, “£650 of the "Hungarian crown jewels collection" was stolen
from” the antique shop belong to Esta or Esther Henry, who had been born at
Newcastle-upon-Tyne in 1883 and passed away at Edinburgh in 1963
1954:
U.S. premiere of “Flame and Flesh” directed by Richard Brooks, produced by Jose
Pasternak with a screenplay by Helen Deutsch and with music by Nicholas
Brodszky.
1954:
“A practical application of the ideals of brotherhood will be put into operation”
in Newburgh, NY starting today when local Methodist congregation whose church
is being torn down to construct a new house of worship is scheduled to begin
worshipping at Temple Beth Jacob in an arrangement worked out with Rabbi
Maurice J. Bloom during Brotherhood Week. (JTA)
1954:
J & W Seligman & Company celebrated two anniversaries today – the 90th
anniversary of its founding and the 85th anniversary of its being
listed on the New York Stock Exchange.
1955:
Birthdate of Julien Mark Wiener “a former Australian cricketer who played in
six Tests and seven one-day internationals from 1979 to 1980. A right-handed
opening batsman and a very occasional off spin bowler, he is the only known
Jewish Australian to represent his country at cricket…Wiener's mother and
father, Vella and Sasha, were Polish and Austrian Jews respectively, and both
escaped the concentration camps of Nazi Germany during the Holocaust. The
surname Wiener came from Vienna, the home of Sasha. His parents married in 1947
in Paris, before coming to Australia as refugees on the famous Dunera ship in
1947. Wiener's father ran a successful textile business, which allowed him to
send Wiener to the private Brighton Grammar School. Wiener's father had early
sporting success in table tennis, which Wiener applied to his cricket, playing
for Prahran in Melbourne grade cricket. He subsequently completed his
university education at Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in business
management, before moving to England to pursue his cricket career.”
1955:
A revival of “Guys and Dolls” starring Walter Matthau as “Nathan Detroit” came
to an end at the New York City Center.
1956:
The polio vaccine developed by Jonas Salk is made available to the public. For all those who like to talk about greedy
Jews, considering the following. Salk
refused to take out a patent on his vaccine.
Some things, he said, were more important than making money.
1956:
“Bhowani Junction” a film version of the novel by the same name directed by
George Cukor, produced by Pandro S. Berman, with a script co-authored by Sonya
Levien and featuring Abraham Sofaer was released in the United States.
1956:
Moshe Dayan, the Chief of Staff of the Israeli Defense Forces, made a speech at
the funeral of a young settler, Ro'i Roitberg, killed in a clash with
Palestinian infiltrators from the Gaza Strip
1957:
“Desk Set” a comedic look at the installation of a computer in a major
corporation produced by Henry Ephron who co-authored the script with Phoebe
Ephron was released in the United States.
1957:
Lawrence Harvey Zeiger, who gained fame as Larry King, began his broadcast
career today at WAHR in Miami Beach by working as the disc jockey from nine to
noon.
1958:
“Fort Massacre” an “oater” produced by Walter Mirisch was released in the
United States today.
1958:
Birthdate of Ronen Shilo, the native of Nes Ziona, IDF veteran and Technion
graduated who became the CEO of Conduit which in 2013 was Israel’s largest
Internet company.
http://www.bloomberg.com/research/stocks/private/person.asp?personId=417740&privcapId=36571034
1959:
Birthdate of Lawrence Seeff the Johannesburg native who was a South African
First-class cricketer. “He played with Western Province and Transvaal and was
one of the South African Cricket Annual's Cricketers of the Year in 1981. He
opened the batting for Western Province with his brother Jonathan Seeff.”
1959:
“The Young Land” with music by Dimitri Tiomkin who earned a nomination for
Academy Award for Best Original Song for "Strange Are the Ways of
Love" – the picture’s theme song – was released today.
1960(4th
of Iyar, 5720): Yom HaZikaron
1961:
In the U.K., premiere of “The Curse of the Werewolf” with music by Benjamin
Frankel
1962: Birthdate of actress Maia Morgenstern. A
native of Bucharest, Morgenstern played the Virgin Mary in Mel Gibson’s The Passion of Christ.
1963(7th
of Iyar, 5723): Seventy-four-year-old Elkan Cohn Voorsagner the Reform Rabbi
who during WW I served in France with the American Expeditionary Force as the
Senior Chaplain for the 77th Division earning a Purple Heart and the
Distinguished Service Cross during the Battles of the Agonne, the Marne and
Chateau Thierry passed away today
1964:
The Center for Jewish History marked today as the beginning of the public
movement for freeing Soviet Jewry.
1964(19th
of Iyar, 5724): Seventy-one-year-old Anna Kampner David, the widow of Abe J.
David, the former Union County, NJ prosecutor with whom she had three children
– Jane, Betty and Anne – passed away today.
1964(19th
of Iyar, 5724): Sixty-six year old Aaron Nissenson, who came to United States
from his native Russia in 1911, earned “a degree in pharmacy from Fordham”
which he did not use turning instead to a life as “a poet, essayist, novelist
and journalist working for The Jewish Morning Journal while being married “the
former Kate Heller” with whom he had “a son, Herschel” passed away today.
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/nissenson-aaron
1965(29th
of Nisan, 5725): Shabbat Mevarchim and Parashat Achrei Mot
1965:
“The New York Board of Rabbis representing some 850 members of the Orthodox,
Conservative and Reform branches of American Judaism asked its member to
dedicated their services today to the founding of the State of Israel.”
1965:
Sharp criticism of what he said was the failure of American rabbis to impart
"meaningful interpretations of Judaism to American Jews," was voiced
here today by Rabbi Elmer Berger, the executive head of the American Council
for Judaism.
1966(11th
of Iyar, 5726): Eighty-eight-year-old Hyman Pearlston, the Buffalo, TX born son
of Barney and Lena Catosk Pearlston, and the husband of Claire and Mable
Roxanne Pearlstone who was a businessman in Waco, Palestine, and Dallas passed
away today In Dallas, TX where he was buried.
1967: Birthdate of Yael
Arad Israel, an Israeli judoka who won a silver medal at the Barcelona Olympics
in 1992.
1967:”
Welcome to Hard Times,” a film based on a novel by E. L. Doctorow” produced by
Max E. Youngstein was released today in the United States.
1967(21st
of Nisan, 5727): Seventh Day of Pesach
1967:
The Pulitzer Prize was awarded to Bernard Malamud for his novel, The Fixer.
Born in 1914, Malamud wanted to be thought of as great writer, not just a great
Jewish writer. In other words, even though he often used Jewish themes
and motifs, he was writing about the human condition. The success
of The Natural, a book about a baseball player was an example of
that desire. "Malamud explicated the tragic role of the Jew in many
of his stories, including The Fixer (1966), which won the National Book Award
and the Pulitzer Prize, and later was adapted into a motion picture. That novel
was based on the true story of Mendel Beilis, victim of the Kiev Blood Libel of
1913." He passed away in 1986.
1968(3rd
of Iyar, 5728): Yom HaZikaron
1968:
“Indians,” a play written by Arthur Kopit had its US premiere today at the
Arena Stage in Washington, D.C.
1968:
“The Vengeance of She” filmed by cinematographer Wolf Suschitzky was released
in the United States today.
1969:
Nasser repudiated the cease fire agreement with Israel
1969:
“A number of France’s outstanding intellectuals, writer and artist will attend
a conference” scheduled to open today “on the plight of Jews in Russia.”
1969:
Fifty-seven-year-old theatrical lighting Jean Rosenthal who was responsible for
“lighting up” such hits as Cabaret and Fiddler on the Roof passed away today.
http://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/rosenthal-jean
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive/pdf?res=9907E3DB123AEE34BC4A53DFB3668382679EDE
1970(25th
of Nisan, 5730): Seventy-nine year old Maurice Sanditen,
the founder and board chairman of OTASCO passed away today in Tulsa, OK.
http://cdm16063.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p16063coll1/id/1910
1971(6th
of Iyar, 5731): Parashat Metzora
1971(6th
of Iyar, 5731): Sixty-eight-year-old Dr. Maurice Levine, the Chairman of the
Department of Psychiatry at his undergraduate alma mater the University of
Cincinnati passed away today.
http://ead.ohiolink.edu/xtf-ead/view?docId=ead/OhCiUWC0003.xml;query=;brand=default
https://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/abs/10.1176/ajp.128.5.652?journalCode=ajp
1972:
Julie and Adolph Marx Oppenheimer gave birth Laura Oppenheimer
1973(29th
of Nisan, 5733): Ninety-four-year-old Goodman Lipkind, the London rabbi who
served several American congregations in Milwaukee, St. Louis and Schenectady,
NY passed away today at Long Beach, NY.
1974(9th
of Iyar, 5734): George Backer, the former editor of the New York Post and
Democrat Party leader passed away today.
1975(20th of
Iyar, 5735): Sixty-nine-year-old Philadelphia born attorney turned bridge who
with his wife Margery Golder formed “The Top Married Bridge Team” passed away
today.
1978(24th of
Nisan, 5738): Seventy-five-year-old New York City
born and St. Lawrence College trained labor lawyer Robert Abelow, a partner in
the firm of Weil, Gosthael and Magnes and the editor of “The Employee Relations
Law Journal” who was the husband of “the former Miriam Steinbrink” and a
son-in-law of New York State Supreme Court Justice Meyer Steinbrink” passed
away today.
1979(4th
of Iyar, 5739): Yom HaZikaron
1979:
Elton John became the first pop star to perform in Israel.
1981(27th
of Nisan, 5741): Yom HaShoah
1981:
President Ronald Reagan issued a proclamation today declaring the week starting
on May 3, 1981 as Jewish Heritage Week. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=43771#axzz1Kxu92zHU
1983:
“Past That Stay Present” includes a review of Points of Departure by Israeli
Poet and Holocaust Survivor Dan Pagis.
http://www.nytimes.com/1983/05/01/books/pasts-that-stay-present.html?pagewanted=all
1983:
George and Ira Gershwin’s “My One and Only” opened on Broadway at the St. James
Theatre” today.
1983(18th
of Iyar, 5743): Lag B’Omer
1983(18th
of Iyar, 5743): Eighty-two-year-old Manhattan native and NYU trained historian,
Dr. Minna R. Falk, the first woman to become a full professor of history at New
York University, passed away today at Mount Sinai Hospital.
https://jwa.org/people/falk-minna
1984(29th
of Nisan, 5744)
1985:
Today, the American Jewish World Service (AJWS) was established in Boston when
Larry Phillips and Larry Simon, together with a group of rabbis, Jewish
communal leaders, activists, businesspeople, scholars and others came together
to create the first American Jewish organization dedicated to alleviating
poverty, hunger and disease among people across the globe.
1985:
Showtune which was originally titled Tune the Grand Up, and premiered today as
a cabaret production at The 1177 Club in the Gramercy Towers on Nob Hill in San
Francisco. “Showtune is an internationally popular Off Broadway musical revue
celebrating the words and music of Broadway composer Jerry Herman. Its title
was inspired by Herman's autobiography of the same name.”
1987:
Birthdate of Shahar Pe'er, Israeli female professional tennis player.
1987:
“Rosa Luxemburg, “ a biopic about the famous Jewish revolutionary, known as “Red
Rosa” who was murdered at the age of 49 opened today at the Lincoln Plaza 3 in
NYC.
https://www.nytimes.com/1987/05/01/movies/film-rosa-luxemburg-new-light-on-early-leftist.html
1987:
Pope John Paul II beatified Sister Teresa Benedicta of the Cross. Born
Edith Stein, she became a Carmelite nun. She was arrested by the Nazis in
Holland when the Germans were rounding up Jews who converted to
Catholicism. She was gassed at Auschwitz. For those who question
the role of the Pope during the Holocaust, the fate of Edith Stein, and others
who had converted to Catholicism before World War II, raises an interesting
dilemma. There are those who can understand why the Pope did not move to
save the Jews but wonder why he did not move to save Jews who had become
Catholics. In the end, did he not consider them real Catholics?
This is something for use to ponder at this season of the year which often
coincides with Yom Hashoah.
1987:
It was reported today that Israel’s governing coalition “was under strain” as
deal with proposals for an international peace conference and “the Israeli
investigation in the Jonathan Jay Pollard spy case.”
1988(14th
of Iyar, 5748): Pesach Sheni
1988:
Final broadcast of season six Family Ties the sitcom created by Gary David
Goldberg.
1989(26th
of Nisan, 5749): Eight-nine year old New York native and CCNY graduate Max
Gewirtz, the holder of a Masters from Teachers College at Columbia and
Doctorate from NYU who retired as an assistant superintended “of a district in
Queens in 1961 and became “head of a religious school at Temple Israel in
Lawrence, L.I. passed away today.
https://www.nytimes.com/1989/05/02/obituaries/max-gewirtz-98-a-retired-school-official.html
1990:
At an Arab summit meeting held in Baghdad, President Saddam Hussein of Iraq
threatens to use "weapons of total destruction" in response to an
Israeli attack against Arabs. The main item on the summit agenda is immigration
of Soviet Jews to Israel, which is denounced as a grave threat to Arab
security. Syria and four other Arab states do not attend the meeting.
1990:
Greece establishes full diplomatic relations with Israel.
1990:
Opening night of the Israel Film Festival attended by two of the most famous
mayors in Jewish history - Teddy Kollek and Ed Koch
1991:
A production of “King Lear” directed by Nicholas Hytner opened at the Barbican
Theatre.
1994:
Israeli and PLO delegates opened a final round of talks in Cairo leading to an
agreement on PLO self-rule. The
resulting entity, the Palestine Authority would sink under the weight of
Arafat’s corruption and unwillingness to do the things necessary to create a
viable, responsible government.
1996(12th of Iyar, 5756): Asher Wallfish journalist for the Jerusalem Post passed away at the
age of 67
1996: In “Moises Ville Journal: Sun Has Set on Jewish Gauchos, but
Legacy Lives,” Calvin Sims describes the fate of Argentina’s rural Jews.
1996: During today’s playoff game, The New York Knicks “observed a
moment of silence” in memory of Dora
Sudarsky, broadcaster Bill Mazer’s wife
of 50 years who had passed away on April 28.
1997: The
Jerusalem Post reported that the sentenced American spy, Jonathan Pollard,
petitioned the Israeli High Court of Justice to order the Prime Minister to
declare that he had been an agent of Israel. Pollard also requested a temporary
injunction ordering the Government of Israel to reveal who had been in charge
of his case and what steps had been taken to secure his release from the
American prison. The petition queried the official Israeli position, according
to which Pollard had been part of a rogue operation. It called for a temporary
injunction outlining what he was paid for his services. The High Court issued a
temporary injunction, apparently at the request of the security services,
forbidding the publication of Pollard's petition. This ban was lifted following
an appeal by the "Yediot Aharonot" newspaper.
1997: The
Jerusalem Post reported that Mr. Norman Spector assumed the post of the
President and Publisher of The Jerusalem Post.
1997:
The transfer of the ownership of The
Chattanooga Times from the four grandchildren of Adolph S. Ochs, who bought
the paper in 1878 and remained its publisher until 1935, to his 13
great-grandchildren is scheduled to be completed today.
1997:
“The Return of Tobias” oil on canvas by Benjamin Ulmann was sold today. A
French Alsatian Jew born in 1829 he was a pupil of Michel Martin Drolling and
of François-Édouard Picot. He passed
away in 1884.
1997:
Laborite Greville Wan Janner completed his service as a Member of Parliament
for Leicester West.
1998:
In the U.K., premiere of “Sliding Doors” produced by Sydney Pollack and
starring Gwyneth Paltrow.
1999:
Three Ring, a filly owned by Barry K. Schwartz, finished ran out of the money
in today’s Kentucky Derby.
2000:
Palestinian prisoners being held in Israeli jails begin a hunger strike to draw
attention to their poor conditions.
2000:
In Los Angeles, premiere of “Gladiator” a film about the decline of the Roman
Empire with music by Hans Zimmer
2000:
Funeral services are scheduled to be held today for ninety-five year old
Abraham “Goldie” Goldberg, the husband Rose Goldberg, the father of Muriel
Ginsberg and the founder of the “Fraser-Gold Carpet Corporation in Manhattan.”
2000: After almost seventeen months in prison, the
trial of the 13 Jews opened in the Revolutionary Court in Shiraz. Hearings were
held every Monday and Wednesday until May 29. The thirteen defendants were
brought to the courtroom in shifts over the five-week trial.
2001(8th
of Iyar, 5671): Eighty-six-year-old Theodore Wilentz, the co-founder with his
brother of iconic Eighth Street Bookshop passed away today.
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/05/06/nyregion/theodore-wilentz-86-dies-a-bookman-extraordinaire.html
2001:
The annual meeting of the International Catholic-Jewish Liaison Committee
opened today in New York.
2001:
Former government intern Chandra Levy disappears.
2002:
Doubleday published Man Walks Into a Room, “the first novel by American
author Nicole Krauss.”
2002:
Yasser Arafat's five-month imprisonment in his Ramallah headquarters draws to
an end as the Palestinians hand over six high-profile prisoners to
Anglo-American custody.
2003:
“Schools closed, airports shut down, and practically all public services ground
to a halt today as 700,000 workers began an open-ended strike to protest
spending cuts and mass firings proposed by Israel's finance minister, Benjamin
Netanyahu.” (As reported by Greg Myre)
2004:
Noa (Achinoam Nini) and Gil Dor, together with the noted Israeli rhythm and
dance troupe Mayumana, gave a joint performance between the two final games of
the Euroleague basketball championship, broadcast to thousands of television
viewers around the world.
2004:
Maccabi Tel Aviv crushes Italy's Skipper Bologna 118-74 to become European
champions for the fourth time in the club’s history.
2004:
Rabbi Sir Jonathan Henry Sacks begins serving as Rabbi and Spiritual Leader,
Western Marble Arch Synagogue London.
2005
22nd of Nisan, 5765): 8th day of Pesach
2005:
Stanley Fisher began serving as Governor of the Bank of Israel.
2005:
A Broadway revival of David Mamet’s Pulitzer Prize winning drama “Glengarry
Glen Ross” opened today at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre with Liev Schreiber in
the role of “Roma.”
2005
22nd of Nisan, 5765): Rene Rivkin an Australian entrepreneur, investor,
investment adviser, and stockbroker passed away. He was a well-known
stockbroker in Australia for many years until his conviction for insider
trading.
2005:
The New York Observer features a
review of “The Treehouse: Eccentric Wisdom From My Father on How to Live, Love,
and See” by Naomi Wolfe
2005:
The New York Times featured reviews
of books by Jewish authors and/or special interest to Jewish readers including Soldiers
and Slaves: American POWs Trapped by the Nazis' Final Gamble by Roger
Cohen, Given Up For Dead: American GI's in the Nazi Concentration Camp at
Berga by Flint Whitlock and the recently released paperback editions of Conspirator
by Michael Andre Bernstein and Madame Secretary by Madeline Albright
with Bill Woodward, an “insightful memoir that focuses as much on Albright’s
voyage of personal discovery (she belatedly learned of her Jewish heritage) as
on her years as President Clinton's secretary of state.”
2006:
First episode of “The Perfect Home” a television series based on The
Architecture of Happiness by Alain de Botton, the scion of a prominent
Egyptian Jewish family that was forced to flee to Switzerland.
2007:
Hilary Koprowski was awarded the Albert Sabin Gold Medal by the Sabin Vaccine
Institute in Baltimore. Koprowski was
one of three Jews (the others being Salk and Sabin) who played a key role in
developing a vaccine against polio.)
2007(13th
of Iyar, 5767): Eighty-eight year old Dr. Clemens E. Prokesch passed away
today.
http://www.neilanfuneralhome.com/obituary/Clemens-E.-Prokesch/New-London-CT/416809
2007:
“Secretary-General of Labor Party, Minister Eitan Cabel announced today that he
was resigning from the government, following the conclusions of the Winograd
Commissions.”
2007: May is celebrated as Jewish
Heritage Month by proclamation of the President of the United States.
2008:
Judge Robert D. Sack “was awarded the Federal Bar Council's Learned Hand Medal
for excellence in federal jurisprudence” oday.
2008: “Brothers: Rahm Emanuel and His Family”
published today looks at the lives and accomplishments of Rahm, Zeke and Ari.
http://www.washingtonian.com/articles/people/brothers-rahm-emanuel-and-his-family/
2008: In New York City, PEN World Voices, a
festival of international literature presents “Conversations Between A. B.
Yehoshua and Leon Wieseltier” an event during which “Yehoshua discusses a lifetime in
literature, fact in fiction, writing politics and atonement with Leon
Wieseltier, Literary Editor of The New Republic and author
of Kaddish.”
2008: Local elections are held in Great Britain.
Community organizations have come together to encourage the British Jewish
community to vote in these local elections being held across the country
because of a fear of gains that could be made by for the ultra-nationalist
British National Party (
2008
(26th of Nisan): Yom Hashoah – Eastern Iowa observes Holocaust
Remembrance Day. In Cedar Rapids The Holocaust Memorial Fund (created and
endowed by Dr. David and Joan Thaler) and the Jewish-Christian Dialogue are
sponsoring Yom Hashoah Service at Westminster Presbyterian Church at
2009: In
Alexandria, Va., Pulitzer Prize-winning illustrator Jules Feiffer reads and discusses “Which Puppy” a children’s
picture book he recently co-authored with his daughter Kate.
2009: The
American Society for Jewish Music and the American Jewish Historical Society
present a lecture by Rabbi Jeffrey A. Summit of Tufts University entitled “The
Participating Observer: Fieldwork in Jewish Settings.”
2009: After
having first been released in Sydney, “X-Men Origins: Wolverine” with a
screenplay co-authored y David Benioff and co-starring Liev Schreiber was
released today in the United States.
2009: Mike
Brown, one of the few Jews in the NHL “was ejected from Game 1 of the Western
Conference Semi-finals after a questionable hit on then-Detroit Red Wings
forward Jiří Hudler, who was left dazed and bloodied on the ice.”
2009: In
“Roosevelt and the Jews: A Debate Rekindled,” published today, Patricia Cohen
reviewed Refugees and Rescue: The Diaries’ and papers of James G. McDonald,
1935-1945.
2009(12th
of Iyar, 5769): Sam Cohn, whose nearly endless client roster of top actors,
writers and directors and imaginative engineering of deals for them made him
the most powerful talent broker in theater and film during the 1970s and 1980s
and a progenitor of the Hollywood superagent passed away today at the age of
79. (As reported by Bruce Weber)
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/07/arts/07cohn.html?_r=0&pagewanted=print
2010: Jewish
American Heritage began today as proclaimed by President Barak Obama. The
proclamation read as follows:
In 1883, the
Jewish American poet Emma Lazarus composed a sonnet, entitled “The New
Colossus,” to help raise funds for erecting the Statue of Liberty. Twenty years later, a plaque was affixed to
the completed statue, inscribed with her words:
“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe
free….” These poignant words still speak
to us today, reminding us of our Nation’s promise as a beacon to all who are
denied freedom and opportunity in their native lands. Our Nation has always been
both a haven and a home for Jewish Americans.
Countless Jewish immigrants have come to our shores seeking better lives
and opportunities, from those who arrived in New Amsterdam long before
America’s birth, to those of the past century who sought refuge from the
horrors of pogroms and the Holocaust. As
they have immeasurably enriched our national culture, Jewish Americans have
also maintained their own unique identity.
During Jewish American Heritage Month we celebrate this proud history
and honor the invaluable contributions Jewish Americans have made to our
Nation. The Jewish American story is an essential chapter of the American
narrative. It is one of refuge from
persecution; of commitment to service, faith, democracy, and peace; and of
tireless work to achieve success. As
leaders in every facet of American life—from athletics, entertainment, and the
arts to academia, business, government, and our Armed Forces—Jewish Americans
have shaped our Nation and helped steer the course of our history. We are a stronger and more hopeful country
because so many Jews from around the world have made America their home. Today,
Jewish Americans carry on their culture’s tradition of “tikkun olam”—or “to
repair the world”—through good deeds and service. As they honor and maintain their ancient
heritage, they set a positive example for all Americans and continue to
strengthen our Nation. NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United
States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution
and the laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim May 2010 as Jewish
American Heritage Month. I call upon all
Americans to observe this month with appropriate programs, activities, and
ceremonies to celebrate the heritage and contributions of Jewish Americans. IN
WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this thirtieth day of April, in
the year two thousand ten, and of the Independence of the United States of
America the two hundred and thirty-fourth.
[Editor’s
Note: … President Obama has made a subtle, symbolic gesture that some would say
demonstrates uncommon sensitivity to the Jewish community. Thanks to the New
Jersey Jewish News for this story, which reports that President Obama removed
the standard phrase “in the year of our Lord” from a proclamation welcoming May
as Jewish Heritage Month. As the newspaper reports, previous similar
proclamations — by Obama, George Bush, and Bill Clinton — all included the
standard line affixed at the end, pegging the missive’s date to the birth of
Jesus Christ … Obama, in praising Jews for their unique contributions to
American culture, took the extra step of taking it out this time. This may not
sit well with “the our-country-is-a-Christian-nation crowd” and it may seem
like a small thing, but it shows a certain level of sensitivity if not outright
political courage. There are those who think that Jewish community should be
more outspoken in acknowledging this, and in voicing appreciation.”]
2010: At The
Library of Congress an exhibition entitled “Herblock!" highlighting the
life and works of the great political cartoonist is scheduled to come to a
close.
2010 A Secret,
a film adapted from the award-winning autobiographical novel by Philippe
Grimbert, is scheduled to be shown tonight at the Northern Virginia
International Jewish Film Festival.
2010: In
“Death on the Baltic” published today, Jeremy Elias described an eyewitness
account of the sinking of the Cape Arcona.
http://www.jpost.com/Magazine/Features/Death-on-the-Baltic
2010: Achinoam
Nini, the world famous Israeli performer known as Noa, is scheduled to appear
in concert tonight at East Brunswick (NJ) Performing Arts Center.
2011:
The Cedar Rapids community is scheduled to mark Yom Hashoah with “”Lest We
Forget,” A Service in Memory of the Victims of the Shoah sponsored by The Jewish Christian Dialogue Group and The
Thaler Holocaust Memorial Foundation. (See The Story of History
which provides background information on the Thaler Holocaust Memorial Fund
which was co-founded by David and Joan Tahler)
2011:
Yeshiva University Museum is scheduled to present “Growing Up Jewish in
Montreal” a panel discussion during which “four distinguished scholars reflect
on their formative years in one of North America's most vibrant Jewish
communities.”
2011:
“Recipes Remembered: A Celebration of Survival” by June Feiss Hersh is scheduled to go on sale today at the
Museum of Jewish Heritage.
2011:
A memorial service for Maj. Gen. Orde Wingate, who trained members of the
Haganah, is scheduled to take place today at the Arlington National
Cemetery. The ceremony is being held
under the auspices of the Jewish War Veterans Association of the United States
of America.
2011:
Reform Judaism’s flagship social justice conference, the Religious Action
Center’s Consultation on Conscience is scheduled to open in Washington, DC.
2011:
Start of Jewish American Heritage Month
2011:
The New York Times featured reviews of book by Jewish authors and/or of
special interest to Jewish readers including “Money and Power: How Goldman
Sachs Came to Rule the World” by William
D. Cohan, “Iphigenia in Forest Hills: Anatomy of a Murder Trial” by Janet
Malcolm that is set against a backdrop of the “Bukharin Jewish immigrant
community in Queens” and the recently
released paperback edition of “Crossing
Mandelbaum Gate Coming of Age Between the Arabs and Israelis, 1956-1978” by Kai
Bird
2011:
The March of the Living participants are scheduled to visit Auschwitz on Yom
Hashoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day, on May 1, to commemorate the Nazi murder of
6 million Jews and to pledge to fight intolerance and prejudice in the future.
2011(27th
of Nisan): Yom Hashoah – observance of the holiday will take place in many
places tomorrow “to avoid adjacency with Shabbat).
2011(27th
of Nisan, 5771): Moshe Landau, the fifth president of the Supreme Court and an
Israel Prize laureate, died on today, only two days after his 99th birthday,
and 50 years after presiding at the trial of Adolf Eichmann.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/03/world/middleeast/03landau.html
http://www.jpost.com/NationalNews/Article.aspx?id=218680
2011:
The 6 million Jews murdered by the Nazis during the Holocaust will be honored
at ceremonies held across Israel this evening, the start of Holocaust and
Heroism Remembrance Day. President Shimon Peres, Prime Minister Binyamin
Netanyahu, IDF Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Benny Gantz and other
dignitaries will attend the official state ceremony at Yad Vashem. This year,
the central theme of the ceremony will be Fragments of Memory: The Faces Behind
the Documents, Artifacts and Photographs, a campaign launched by the Holocaust
museum aimed at collecting and preserving documents so that future generations
may learn about the genocide of the Jewish people by the Nazis from first-hand
sources. During the ceremony, six Holocaust survivors will light torches in
memory of those who suffered under Nazi persecution before and during World War
II. Yona Fuchs, whose nickname is Janek, will be among the honorees at the
event. In 1942 he escaped from a concentration camp and found work as a
translator for a German company in Kiev. In that capacity he managed to save
over a dozen Jews by recruiting them as workers for his employers. Later, he
evaded arrest by posing as a German soldier. He arrived in British-controlled
Palestine in 1944, fought in the War of Independence and settled in Haifa. He
has 14 grandchildren.
2011:
After 443 performances a revival of
Jerry Herman’s “La Cage aux Folles” came to a close.
2011:
Israel's new Police Commissioner Yohanan Danino was sworn in today, replacing
David Cohen, who served in the post for four years. Danino was formerly the head of the Israel
Police investigations and intelligence branch, and comes to the commissioner's
chair from his last posting as the commander of the Southern District Police.
2011:
Distinguished composer Gilbert Levine, whose grandparents emigrated from Poland
and whose mother-in-law was a survivor of Auschwitz, will be among the hundreds
of thousands of people converging on the Vatican for the beatification of Pope
John Paul II. (As reported by Ruth Ellen Gerber)
2011:
Osama Bin Laden was killed by U.S. Navy Seals a compound in the Pakistani city
of Abbottabad.
2011:
As part of its Yom HaShoah observance,
in Hollywood, Temple Israel’s newly established arts council invited
community members to join the jury at a mock trial of Rudolph Kastner (As
reported by Johan Lowenfeld.
2012:
Israeli photographer Gil Cohen-Magen is scheduled to deliver a lecture entitled
“Hassidic Courtyards: A Photographic Study of the Ultra-Orthodox Community in
Israel” at the JCC of Northern Virginia.
2012:
Robert Caro’s The Passage of Power, the award winning fourth volume in his
multi-volume biography about Lyndon Johnson was released today.
2012:
“Kafka’s Last Story” is scheduled to be shown at the Westchester Jewish Film
Festival.
2012: Rabbi Ed Cohn and Canto Joel Colman
officiated at the graveside services for Inge Elsas, holocaust survivor, Temple
Sinai Sunday School teacher and pillar of the New Orleans Jewish community.
2012:
Start of Jewish American Heritage Month
2012:
Thirty-one-year-old Daniel Timerman, the son of Jacobo Timerman “was sentenced
today to 35 days in jail for refusing to serve with the Israeli Army in
Lebanon.”
2013:
The 36th International Convention of the World Union for Progressive
Judaism is scheduled to open in Jerusalem.
2013:
The Center for Jewish History is scheduled to presents “The Quest for Justice
in the Postwar Jewish Community - Function and Role of Honor Courts in the
Displaced Persons Camps.”
2013:
The Center for Jewish History is scheduled to co-host “Guernica – Bravery and
Gender in Confessional Writing.
2013:
Today “Scholastic published Gorgeous, Paul Rudnick's first
young adult novel” which “Publishers Weekly, in a starred review, said
that the book included "writing that's hilarious, profane and profound
(often within a single sentence.)"
2013:
In a case of “the East” meets the Jews, Iron Man 3, based on a creation of Stan
Lee, Don Heck, Larry Lieber and Jack Kirby and co-starring Gwyneth Paltrow
opened in China today.
2013:
Gravestones and bones from an ancient Turkish Jewish cemetery were unearthed
during construction work.The remains in the Turkish city of Izmir were found
more than 20 feet below the ground, during construction work on an underground
tunnel, the Hurriyet Daily News reported today.
2013:
Israel needs to reach peace with the Palestinians to prevent becoming a
bi-national state, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said today, stressing –
however – that the core of Israel's conflict with the Palestinians is not
territory, but a Palestinian unwillingness to recognize Israel's legitimacy
within any boundaries.
2013:
Start of Jewish American Heritage Month
http://www.jewishamericanheritagemonth.us/index.aspx
2014(1st
of Iyar, 5774): Rosh Chodesh Iyar
2014:
“The White Rose Exhibit” which commemorates the work of one of the few genuine
resistance movements in Nazi Germany is scheduled to open at the College of
Public of Health of the University of Iowa.
2014:
Washington Hebrew Congregation is scheduled to host Adam Mendelsohn of the
College of Charleston, whose book Jews
and the Civil War: A Reader (co-edited with Jonathan D. Sarna) was
published in 2010 speaking on “Beyond the Battlefield: The Legacy of the Civil
War for America’s Jews.”
2014:
“The Prime Minister: The Pioneers” is scheduled to be shown at the Lenore
Marwil Jewish Film Festival in West Bloomfield, Michigan.
2014:
American Jewish Heritage Month opens with a special tribute to the American
Joint Distribution Committee that is celebrating its centennial anniversary.
2014: “According to figures released today by the
Central Bureau of Statistics” the population of Israel now “stands at 8.18
million people.”
2014:
“The news website actualitte.com reported today a
15th century printed book of the Torah fetched a record 3.87 million
dollars at an auction in Paris.”
http://www.timesofisrael.com/torah-fetches-record-3-87-million-at-paris-auction/
2014(1st
of Iyar, 5774): Assi Dayan passed away today.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/the-brash-matinee-idol-who-treated-life-as-a-metaphor/
2015:
Fred Spiegel author of Once the Acacias Bloomed: Memories of a Childhood
Lost is scheduled to speak at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum.
2015:
Following riots in Maryland’s largest city, “fourteen rabbis in the Baltimore
region joined a rally and march for ‘police reform and justice for Freddie
Gray.’”
2015:
The second performance of the Israel Story is scheduled to place UnionDocs in
Brooklyn.
2015:
Lewis Black is scheduled to perform in Atlanta, GA.
2015:
“Amy Winehouse: A Family Portrait,” is scheduled to come to a close at Beit
Hatfutsot.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/the-jewish-life-of-amy-winehouse/]
2015:
In an attempt to placate its Arab allies, it was reported today that the United
States was considering selling F-35 to the United Arab Emirates which would
threaten Israel’s qualitative edge in any future war with Arab states.
2015:
Opening of Jewish American Heritage Month
http://www.jewishamericanheritagemonth.us/index.aspx
2016(23rd of Nisan, 5776): Eighty-three year
old Johns Hopkins and Harvard mathematician Solomon W. Golomb whose wide
ranging intellect led to create new games while helping to usher in “the
digital age” passed away today in Los Angeles. (I will not even pretend to
understand what he accomplished so I offer the following.)
https://news.usc.edu/100264/in-memoriam-solomon-golomb-communications-technology-pioneer-83/
http://coding.yonsei.ac.kr/kart-berlekamp.pdf
2016: The New York Times features books by Jewish
authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Continental Divide: A History of American Mountaineering by Maurice Isserman
and A Rage for Order: The
Middle East In Turmoil From Tahrir Square to ISIS by Robert F. Worth.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/trump-proclaims-may-annual-jewish-american-heritage-month/
http://www.jewishheritagemonth.gov/
2017(5th
of Iyar, 5777): Yom HaZikaron – Remembering the “23,544 members of Israel’s
security forces who died while in active service”
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/yom-hazikaron-israeli-memorial-day
2017(5th of Iyar, 5777):
Eighty-four Stan Weston “the Godfather of G.I. Joe” passed away today (As
reported by Richard Sandomir)
2017:
Ninety year old defense lawyer Gustave Newman passed away today. (As reported
by Sam Roberts)
2017:
At Touro College in Brooklyn Henry Abramson is scheduled to lecture on
“Nahmanides: The Ramban.”
2017:
As part of its celebration of Israeli Independence Day, Rabbi Shalom Hammer,
who served in the Chaplaincy of the IDF is scheduled to lecture on “What are we
Fighting For” at the Greenpoint Shul.
2017:
FFI-LEHI is scheduled to hold its annual Memorial Day ceremonies today.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/in-tel-aviv-a-glimpse-into-the-turbulent-years-when-the-british-ruled/
2018:
The Oxford University Jewish Society is scheduled to host “a discussion based
Jewish Women’s Aid’s new ‘Safer Dating’ initiative.”
2018;
The Temple Emanu-El Steicker Center is scheduled to host “Making Peace in the
Kitchen.”
2018:
In the United States, May is officially Jewish Heritage Month
2018:
“Previously unseen Dead Sea Scroll fragments, which had been stored in cigar
boxes since archaeologists unearthed them in the 1950s, were identified and
unveiled at an international conference today in honor of the 70th anniversary
of the scrolls’ discovery in Jerusalem. (As reported by Amanda Borschel-Dan
2019:
Following yesterday’s swearing in ceremony that marked the start of the new
session of the Knesset, MK’s will get down to business and see how much power
smaller parties have “to impose their will, even if it means going against the
popular opinion on certain issues.”
2019:
Just two days after the funeral of Lori Gilbert Kaye, Jewish American Heritage
Month is scheduled to begin today.
2019:
In Iowa, this evening Rabbis Barton, Jacobson and Kaufman are scheduled to
officiate at the Community Yom Hashoah event sponsored by the Jewish Federation
of Greater Des Moines,
2019:
In the evening, start of observance of Yom Hashoah
https://reformjudaism.org/jewish-holidays/yom-hashoah
2019:
Rabbi Deborah Silver is scheduled to officiate at the funeral of 84 year old
Rosalyn Nina Allison, the New Yorker who made New Orleans her adopted home
where she was a member of Shir Chadash Conservative Congregation.
2020:
Temple Emanu-El and Temple Israel of the City of New York are scheduled to host
“A special virtual Shabbat service celebrating Israel’s 72nd Independence Day”
including greetings by Ambassador Dani Dayan, “renowned singer Shulamit “Shuli”
Natan performing Jerusalem of Gold, Aibi Levi, a paratrooper who helped
liberate the Western Wall in 1967 and Fanny Kirsch, the first Jew born in the
Old City after its liberation from Jordan.”
2020:
The Vilna Shul, “Boston’s Center for Jewish Culture” is scheduled to host “The
Sarajevo Haggadah and People of the Book” an interactive discussion of
Geraldine Brooks’ 2008 historical novel led by “author and historian Carol
Cohen.”
2020:
Jewish American Heritage Month is scheduled to begin today.
https://www.jewishheritagemonth.gov/
2020:
Low-cost European carrier Wizz Air is scheduled to resume some flights from
Luton Airport today including those to Tel Aviv, Israel.
2020:
The Streicker Center is scheduled to host “You Don’t Look Your Age and Other
Fairy Tales” a virtual presentation by Sheila Nevins.
2021:
The Eden Tamar Music Center in Jerusalem is scheduled to host the Israel String
Quarter with Tali Kravitz.
2021:
“In the face of the worst civilian tragedy in Israeli history, citizens from
all sectors – Jews and Arabs, religious and secular – continue to rally to
support the victims of the stampede that claimed 45 lives at a Lag BaOmer
celebration on Mount Meron attended mainly by the ultra-Orthodox community.”
2021:
Michael Kransy, The recently retired host of KQED radio’s “Forum,” and Sherith
Israel congregant, is scheduled to be interviewed by Sherith Israel Rabbi
Emeritus Martin Weiner.
2021(19th
of Iyar, 5781): Parashat Emor; Pirkei Avot- Chapter Four;
2021:
Jewish American Heritage is scheduled to begin today in the United States.
2022:
In commemoration of Jewish American Heritage Month, the 16th annual
of celebration of which is scheduled to begin today, the “NMAJH is launching a new exhibit that
will focus on the rise of anti-Semitic violence by highlighting the January
2022 hostage situation at the Congregation Beth Israel synagogue in
Colleyville, Texas.”
https://www.insightintodiversity.com/jewish-american-heritage-month/
https://www.jewishexponent.com/2021/05/05/nmajh-leads-jewish-american-heritage-month/
2022:
The Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History is scheduled to
celebrate its opening with a gala honoring Wolf Blitzer.
2022:
Michael Ian Grade, Baron Grade of Yarmouth assumed the chairmanship of Ofcom
(the office of communication in the UK)
2022:
The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of
special interest to Jewish readers including Atomic Anna, a novel b
Rachel Barnbaum and the recently released paperback edition of The Code
Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing and the Future of the Human Race by
walter Isaacson.
2022:
The Streicker Center is scheduled to present Billy Crystal in a new musical
comedy “Mr. Saturday Night.”
2022:
The Jewish Heritage Museum of Monmouth County is scheduled to host an even as
part of “Weekend in Old Monmouth.”
2022:
The National Library of Israel is scheduled to host Dr. Yechiel Weizman
lecturing “Living Next to Poland’s Material Jewish Traces After the Holocaust
in which he “explores what happened to the thousands of abandoned Jewish
cemeteries and places of worship that remained in Poland after the Holocaust,
asking how postwar society in small, provincial towns perceived, experienced,
and interacted with the physical traces of former Jewish neighbors.”
2022:
In London, the Jewish Museum is scheduled to host a lecture by Mike Levy the
author of Get The Children Out: Unsung Heroes of the Indertransport.
2022:
In Cleveland the Maltz Performing Arts Center is scheduled to present “An
Evening with Mandy Patinkin and Kathryn Grody.
https://www.clevelandjewishnews.com/patinkin/
2023:
The Sir Martin Gilbert Learning Center is scheduled to host a lecture by Professor
Geneviève Zubrzycki on Resurrecting the Jew:
Nationalism,
Philosemitism, and Poland's Jewish Revival.
2023:
Speaker of the House of Representatives Kevin McCarthy is scheduled to address
the Knesset today.
2023:
The first episode of the min-series “A Small Light” which will focus on the
life of Miep Gies, the girl who hid Anne Frank and her family is scheduled to
be broadcast today.
2023:
Tikvah's 2023 Leadership Mission trip to Israel is scheduled to begin today.
2023:
Jewish American Heritage Month is scheduled to begin today.
2024:
In Cedar Rapids, the Haddasah Book Club under the leadership of Nancy Margulis
is scheduled to discuss The Hired Girl by Laura Amy Schiltz
2024:
The Streicker Center is scheduled to host “Frank Bruni in Conversation with
Katie Couric.”
2024:
The Eden Tamir Center is scheduled to host a Special Holocaust Memorial Day
Concert: Musical Testimony - Holocaust Trauma and Memory in the Music of
Mieczysław Weinberg
https://edentamir.org/en/events/special-concert-musical-testimony/
2024:
Lockdown University is scheduled to host lectures by Trudy Gold on “Expulsion
from Spain and Bayezid II” and Jeremy Rosen on “Making Sense of the Bible: Can
its Ancient Text Be Relevant Today? Numbers 22, Balaam the Sorcerer.”
2024:
Today opening of the “Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center’s new
groundbreaking Spagat Family Voices of Genocide Exhibition that explores how
and why genocide continues to occur across geography and time. Learn from
survivors and descendants of genocides in Armenia, Guatemala,
Bosnia-Herzegovina, Rwanda, and Burma about the common conditions that can lead
to genocide and how recognizing these factors helps determine efforts toward
intervention and prevention.”
2024:
The ADL is scheduled to host a webinar on “Campus Antisemitism Crisis.”
2024:
In one of those ironic moments in history as a wave of anti-Semitism sweeps the
country, “"By Congressional resolution and
Presidential proclamation, MAY is Jewish American Heritage Month (JAHM)."
https://www.jewishheritagemonth.gov/
2024:
The Lillian and Albert Small Capital Jewish Museum is scheduled to host “Sarah
Birnbach in conversation with Meghan Riordan Jarvis, grief therapist and
author, as they discuss Birnbach's book, A Daughter's Kaddish: My Year of
Grief, Devotion, and Healing.”
2024:
Since Pesach ended on April 30, Jews can plan on eating toast, or pancakes, or
waffles or whatever.
2024:
As May 1st begins in Israel, an unprecedented wave of anti-Semitism sweeps the
United States and the Hamas held hostages begin day
208 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.)
