This Day, November 28, In Jewish History by Mitchell A and Deb Levin Z"L
1058: Casmir I the Restorer who was “the de jure monarch of Poland
starting in 1034” during whose reign there were Jews living in the capital city
of Gniezno passed away today.
1095: On the last day of the Council of Clermont, Pope Urban II appointed
bishop Adhemar of Le Puy and Count Raymond IV of Toulouse to lead the First
Crusade to the Holy Land. The call for
the Crusade is based, in part, on false reports of atrocities committed by
Muslims against Christian pilgrims. The
Crusades, which will begin in the following year, mark a dark chapter in Jewish
history as those marching under the Sign of the Cross sack Jewish settlements
in Europe and later slaughter Jews living in Eretz Israel.
1598: “In the archives of the city of Amsterdam, probably the
oldest date dealing with Portuguese Jews is today, when there was entered in
the "Puyboek," v. 22b, the announcement of the intended
marriage of Manuel Lopez Homé and the above-mentioned Maria Nuñez.”
1654(28th of Kislev,
5415): Meir ben Jacob HaKoen Schiff, known as the Maharam Schiff, the German
rabbi and talmudist who was the Frankfort-on-the Main born son of Yeshiva
Director passed away today.
1660: At Gresham College, 12 men,
including Christopher Wren, Robert Boyle, John Wilkins, and Sir Robert Moray
decide to found what is later known as the Royal Society. A British physician
named Isaac de Sequeira Samuda
or Isaac de Sequeyra Samuda was
elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1727, making him the first Jew to be
so honored.
1680: Seventy-eight-year-old “Jesuit
polymath Athanasius Kircher” who “found the best evidence of the Hebrew-first
theory in the simplicity of the language’s triconsonantal roots” passed away
today.
1706(4th of Tevet, 5476):
Meshullam Zalman ben David Mirles, the Vienna born German Rabbi and father of
Zeeb Wolf who was elected as the chief rabbi for Altona, Hamburg and Wansbeck
passed away today.
https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/10871-mirels-meshullam-zalman-ben-david-neumark
1744: Frederick the Great took Prague in the Wars of Succession and the populace ransacked the
ghetto. He soon left and the Croats returned. They accused the Jews of treason
and again their quarters were sacked. A few weeks later (December 18 and
January 7) Empress Maria Theresa banished all the Jews of Bohemia and Moravia.
Due to the protests of the Jews and the governments of England and Holland, the
decree was dropped everywhere but in Prague.
1752: Lisbon native Isaac Mendes
Seixas and London born Rachel Franks Levy, gave birth to Grace Mendes Seixas,
the wife of Simon Nathan and the mother of “Isaac Mendes Seixas Nathan.”
1755(24h of Kislev, 5516): In the evening, Kindle the first Chanukah
Light, at a time when Jews in New York are embroiled in clash between Solomon
Hays and Congregation Shearith Israel.
1757: Birthdate of William Blake, English poet, painter and printmaker.
Controversy surrounds Blake’s grasp of
Jewish mysticism. It seems pretty clear that Blake’s art and writing invoke
Kabbalah, but scholars debate how Blake accessed the Jewish mystical concepts
he quoted. Some argue that the dozen or so Hebrew inscriptions in Blake’s
etchings and watercolors show that Blake was fluent in Hebrew. But close
analysis of the works, some of which are on exhibit at The Morgan Library &
Museum, reveals that Blake had not even mastered the letter alef. Reading
Kabbalah in Hebrew without knowing the first letter of the alef-bet would be as
implausible as tackling “Finnegans Wake” with barely a grasp of the English
alphabet. Arguments that Blake knew Hebrew date back to Frederick Tatham, who
cared for Catherine after Blake’s death in 1827. In a letter to bookseller
Frances Harvey, Tatham said that Blake’s library included “well thumbed” books
in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, French and Italian, as well as works by Swedenborg and
Christian mystic Jacob Boehme. “His knowledge was immense, his industry beyond
parallel,” Tatham wrote. Modern scholars echo Tatham’s claim. Writing in the
journal Modern Philology in 1951, David V. Erdman ascribed “some Hebrew” to
Blake, particularly the knowledge that beth-lehem means “house of bread.” “We
know that Blake knew a little Hebrew,” Anthony Blunt agreed, writing in the
Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes in 1943, “for he wrote to his
brother in 1803 that he was learning the Hebrew alphabet, and his etching of
the Laocoön [a copy of the sculpture “Laocoön and His Sons”] bears a few words
in Hebrew script.” In his book “The New Apocalypse: The Radical Christian
Vision of William Blake (The Davies Group, Publishers, 2000), Thomas J. J.
Altizer suggests not only that Blake knew Hebrew, but also that he was
self-taught. But the work that Blunt cites as proof of Blake’s proficiency in
Hebrew, “Laocoön” — a circa 1820 print depicting snakes strangling the famous
Trojan priest and his two sons — is one of the best pieces of evidence that
Blake did not know Hebrew. Writing “malakh Jehovah,” which he translated as
“The Angel of the Divine Presence,” Blake inadvertently rotated the alef 90
degrees on its y-axis. He spelled “Lilit” (Lilith) correctly, but he miswrote
“Jeshua” (Jesus) with another rotated letter, this time an ayin (the 16th
letter). “Laocoön” does not appear in the Morgan show, but an etching from
Blake’s Job series does. In an etching from Blake’s Job series, the artist again
wrote “The Angel of the Divine Presence,” but this time he wrote the Hebrew
“melekh Jehovah,” which means King Jehovah, rather than malakh (with an alef),
the Angel of Jehovah. In “William Blake’s Illustrations of the Book of Job,” S.
Foster Damon says that Blake intentionally removed the alef to show that Job
was worshipping a false God — mistaking an angel for the king. But could Blake
really have known enough Hebrew to distinguish between “melekh” and “malakh,”
when he revealed in “Laocoön” that he didn’t even know how to form the letter
properly? “Job’s Evil Dreams,” features
a bearded figure with hooves encircled by a snake. The figure hovers above a
reclining man and points with its right index finger to the Ten Commandments.
Though Blake wrote out only two of the commandments in full, the inscriptions
contain more than a dozen mistakes. One line contains a properly and an
improperly formed alef, a further inconsistency suggesting that Blake was
copying a language he did not understand. “Blake did study Hebrew with his
one-time patron, William Hayley, but scholars are not agreed about his
proficiency in the language,” explained Leslie Tannenbaum, associate professor
of English at Ohio State University and author of “Biblical Tradition in
William Blake’s Early Prophecies: The Great Code of Art” (Princeton University
Press, 1982). According to Tannenbaum, the late Gerald Bentley, a Blake scholar
who taught at Princeton University, implied in a biography that Blake was
“fairly fluent” in Hebrew. But Tannenbaum also notes that Sheila A. Spector,
whom he describes as “an extremely meticulous scholar and expert on Blake and
the Kabbalah,” writes that Blake did not know the biblical language.In Blake’s
preface to the chapter “To the Jews,” from the poem “Jerusalem,” Tannenbaum
sees references to the kabbalistic concept of Adam Kadmon (the primordial man).
Blake learned Kabbalah from Swedenborg’s writings on Boehme, who seems to have
been influenced by Balthasar Walther, Tannenbaum adds, and Blake also identified
with the Avignon Society, which sought science and reason “in such unlikely
places as alchemical lore, cabbalistic numerology, mesmerist séances,
Swedenborgian spiritualism, and (perhaps most surprising of all) the
Scriptures.” In “Wonders Divine: The Development of Blake’s Kabbalistic Myth”
(Bucknell University Press, 2001) Spector, an adjunct associate professor at
New York University, agrees that Blake’s kabbalistic sources were Christian
rather than Jewish, and English rather than Hebrew. Further, Blake was
“unfortunately” influenced by his contemporary Anglo-Israelites, who thought
that English derived from Hebrew “and that the language of the Jews was a
spurious version in which the rabbis obscured the ‘true Christian’ message to
be found in the Bible,” Spector said.“Under the circumstances, the question of
whether or not Blake was fluent in Hebrew misses the point,” she added. “He
rejected normative Hebrew in favor of the linguistic gymnastics that
re-interpreted words to conform with some eccentric – to be charitable –
interpretations that coordinated Hebrew and English, as well as Greek,
etymologies to proffer a new interpretation of Scripture.” (As reported by
Menachem Wecker)
1763: Ester Alvares and Bordeau native Daniel Nones gave birth to Isaac
Nones.
1774(25th of Kislev, 5535): Channukah
1788(28th of Kislev, 5549): Sampson Lazarus, the English born
son of Eleazar Lazarus and husband of Frumet Cohen who came to New York City in
1748 after which he settled in Lancaster, PA where he was a shopkeeper passed
away today.
1791: One day after he had passed away, Levi Levy, the son of Barnet Levi
and Esther Elias was buried today at the “Falmouth Jewish Cemetery.
1793(24th of Kislev, 5554): Kindle the first Channukah light
1799(30th of Cheshvan, 5560): Rosh Chodesh Kislev
1804(25th of Kislev, 5565): First Day of Channukah
1805: In Savannah, GA, Divinah Cohen and Isaac Minis who had been married
at Georgetown, SC in 1803 gave birth to Philip Minis, the husband of Sara
Livingston.
1809: Solomon Emanuel, Reuben Cantor and Anhalt Cothn became citizens of
the United States today.
1810: Noah Davis married Catherine Levy at the Great Synagogue today.
1816(8th of Kislev, 5577): Eighty-six-year-old Benjamin
D’Israeli, the Italian born Anglo-Jewish merchant who was the grandfather of
the British Prime Minister of the same name passed away today.
1821:Birthdate of Polish native and Mexican American War veteran Bernard
Kowalski, the future resident of Texas who was the husband of Sophia Bernstein
Kowalski and the father of Louis, Isaac, Benjamin and Zachary Kowalski.
1822: Ezekiel Moss married Elizabeth Moses at the Great Synagogue today.
1823(25th of Kislev, 5584): First Day of Channukah
1825: In Münster (Westphalia), Elias Marks and Alexander Grove Village
founded The Marks Grove Village Foundation which funded programs to help train
Jewish children and integrate them into German society.
1827: Philadelphia native Mordecai Manuel married Rebecca Esther Jackson
today in New York City.
1827 (9th of Kislev, 5588): On the secular calendar Dov Baer Schneersohn
passed away. Dov Ber succeeded his
father Shneur Zalman of Lyady as the second Lubavitcher Rebbe. Shneur Zalman was the found of Chabad, Dov
Baer was known as the “Middle Rabbi” because he came between Shneur Zalman and
the third Rebbe Menachem Mendel known as the Zemen Zedek. Among other things, Dov Baer was responsible
for starting a Chabad settlement in Hebron in 1823. In 1826, Dov Baer was
imprisoned by the Czar on trumped up charges of sending money to support the
Sultan of Turkey. He was released on the
tenth of Kislev which has been a day of celebration among Lubavitchers ever
since. “The only way of converting
darkness into light is by giving to the poor.”
“Every act of kindness that God performs for man should make him feel
not proud, but more humble and unworthy.”
1827: Aaron Harris married Martha
Benjamin at the Great Synagogue today.
1829: Birthdate of Frankfurt born
Helene Lewandowski, the wife of Louis Lewandowski and mother of Martha Cohen
and Alfred Lewandowskil
1829: Birthdate of composer Anton Rubinstein, who was converted from
Judaism to Christianity at the age of on orders from his grandfather. A
widely performed composer in his lifetime, but following his death, according
to some Rubinstein’s works were largely ignored because of the anti-Semitism
prevalent at that time in Germany, the musical hub of Europe.
https://web.archive.org/web/20051230061239/http://www.smerus.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/rubinstein.htm
1831: Birthdate of John William
Mackay, the Irish born American industrialist and one of the four Silver Kings
of the Comstock Lode who was greatly upset when in 1890 he was erroneously
accused of “despising Jews.”
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=F40F16FF3B5F10738DDDAA0A94D0405B8085F0D3
1835(7th of Kislev,
5596): Parshat Vayetzei
1835(7th of Kislev,
5596): Salomon Lanudauer, the two-week old son of Seligman Ben Schemmel
Landauer and Zirle (Cilli) Landauer passed away today in Bavaria.
1839: According to a report issued
today by the Ministry of the Interior, Joseph Friedlander was the only Jew
living in Saxon outside of Dresden or Leipzig.
1839: Birthdate of Jacob Moser, the
scion of the only Jewish family in Kappeln, Schlewsig who was educated in
Hamburg before moving to “Bradford in 1862 where he became a wealthy woolen
manufacture and exporter as well as leading member of the Anglo-Jewish
community and active Zionist who among other things supported the Jewish
hospitals in Leeds and Manchester as well as contributing the funds to build
the Herzlia Gymnasium in Jaffa while being married to “his beloved wife,” the
former Florence Julia Cohen.
1839:In Baltimore, MD, Eleazar and
Abigail De Pass Block gave birth to Josephine Block, the wife of Benjamin
Franklin Jonas whom she married in 1859 and the mother of Edwin a Jonas.
1842(25th of Kislev,
5603): First Day of Channukah
1842(25th of Kislev,
5603): Eighty-seven-year-old Abraham Salomon Cohen Kloot, the Dutch born son of
Judith and Samuel Cohen Kloot passed away today in the Hague.
1855(18th of Kislev,
5616): On his 50th birthday, Philip Minis, the Savanah born son of
Divinah Cohen, and Isaac Minis and the husband of Sara Livingston passed away
today.1856: Two days he had passed away, Moses Jacobs, the son of Henry Jacobs
and Kitty Moses and the husband of Sarah Levy who with he had had five
children, was buried at the “Brompton (Fulham Road) Jewish Cemetery” today.
1855: Margarine manufacturer Sigmund
Feuchtwanger and Johanna Bodenheim gave birth to “lawyer, lecturer, author and
Dachau inmate Ludwig Feuchtwanger, the husband of Rosina Rehinstrom, the father
of historian Edgar Feuchtwanger, and brother of novelist Lion Feuchtwanger who
escaped to England after the rise of the Nazis.
1856(1st of Kislev,
5617): Rosh Chodesh Kislev
1856: At Creglingen, Wurtembeg,
Ludwig Ster and his wife gave birth to German trained rabbi Jacob Ludwig Stern,
the teacher at “Jewish schools in Brighton, UK, New York and St. Louis who led
a congregation in Salt Lake City, Utah before becoming the rabbi at Be’er
Chayim Congregation in Cumberland, MD in 1891.
1857: In Philadelphia, Elvira S.
Solis, the New York born daughter of Isaac Mendes Seixas Nathan and Sarah
Mendes Nathan and her husband David Hays Solis, the Mount Pleasant, New York,
born merchant who was a supporter of the Jewish Publication Society, gave birth
to Jacob Solomon Solis
1860: Two days after she had passes
away “Joseph, Rebecca (nee Hyams),” the wife of Samuel Joseph with whom she had
had eight children was buried at “Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery.”
1861(25th of Kislev,
5622): First Day of Channukah
1861(25th of Kislev,
5622): Seventy-year Myer Jacobs, the husband of Rebecca Jacobs and father of
Adeline (Jacobs) Emanuel who “was Surveyor of Customs and a Colonel in the 12th
South Carolina Regiment” passed away today after which he was buried at the
Corning Street Cemetery in Charleston, SC.
1862: In Texas, Bavarian born Lazar
and Fredericka Cahn gave birth to grocer Solomon Cahn, the husband of Nettie
Kahn with whom he six children and a member of Temple Beth El in Pensacola, FL.
1862: During the Civil War, after
volunteering for duty, Theodore Minis Etting “received the appointment of
acting Midshipman” today in the United States Navy.
1863: Thanksgiving was first observed as a regular American
holiday. Proclaimed by President Lincoln the previous month, it was declared
that the event would be observed annually, on the fourth Thursday in
November. While Thanksgiving is a
secular holiday, it has it origins in the Bible. The Pilgrims were students of what they
called The Old Testament. When they had
enjoyed their first successful harvest at Plymouth, they looked to scripture
for a way to express their joy. They
found the answer in the holiday of Sukkoth – a celebration of in-gathering; a
celebration of thanks that took place after the harvest was completed. There are reports that the first Thanksgiving
was a week-long affair but I would avoid making any claim that this was
intended to mirror the seven days of Sukkoth.
1864: During the Civil War, Major
Alfred Mordechai, Jr. was named Chief of Ordinance for the Union Army’s
Department of the Cumberland.
1864: Jacob B. Eckerman, who had
been wounded at Salem Height and during the Wilderness Campaign completed his
more than two years of service with Company E. of the 139th
Regiment.
1865: In Troy, NY “Bennett and
Pauline (Spero) Marks gave birth to music publisher and “member of President
Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Council for the Coordination of Industry, Edward Bennet
Marks, the husband of Miriam Chuck with whom he had three children
1866: In Germany Heinrich and Regina
Sedel Schafnner gave birth to Morris Schaffner who settled in Erie, PA where he
was a member of the Fire Commission, a member of the Jewish Welfare Board and a
supporter of B’nai B’rith’s Home for Friendless Children.
1866: In San Francisco, Louise and
Sigmund Wohlfeld gave birth to David Wohlfeld who gained fame as actor David
Warfiled whose first appearance was at the Wigwam Theatre in San Francisco in
1899 and went to a career in New York that made him one of the richest
performers of his times who the husband of May Gabrielle Bradt whom he married
in October of 1899.
1872: In Manhattan, Leonard and
Rosalie Jacobs Lewisohn gave birth to Julia Lewisohn, the wife of Sir Charles
Solomon Henry.
1873: In Kovno, Isaac and Cecilia
(Jaffe) Ginzberg gave birth to Louis Ginzberg, husband of Adele Katzenstein who
became a noted Talmudist, as a professor at the Jewish Theological Seminary, a
leader of the Conservative Movement in the United States for half a century.
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Louis-Ginzberg
1873: Birthdate of Lehmann
(Leo) Katzenberger, the owner of several shoe shops in Nuremberg who
guillotined by the Nazis for allegedly having an affair with an Aryan woman.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007908
1873 “The Laundry Business”
published today traced the history of laundering clothes from ancient to modern
times reported that “the ancient Jews had great regard for cleanliness. They never sat down to a meal or said a
prayer without first washing their hands, and it is only fair to presume that a
people who would be so particular in keeping their goodies clean would not be
behind in keeping their garments equally spotless and free from taint, the more
particularly as among these ancients white garments were the emblems of purity
and holiness.
1874: The Young Men’s Hebrew
Association hosted a musical and literary entertainment this evening at Number 112, West 21st
Street in Manhattan.
1874: Rabbi Schneerson, an American
citizen in Palestine, was attacked by a group of Jews at Tiberias. After
robbing him, he was imprisoned, stoned, stripped naked and ridden through the
streets, barely escaping with his life.
1878: A theatrical review published
today shows the changing view of the Jew, at least in the theatrical
community. Unlike his famous
predecessors, the great tragedian Edwin Booth portrays Shylock as man “of well
and keen perception.” “A certain class
of critics” now seek Shylock “as a species of hero and martyr who is more
worthy of our sympathy and pit than our contempt.”
1879: In Rochester, NY, Levi Adler
and his wife gave birth to Harvard graduate Mortimer Adler, a vice president
and co-founder of Levy brother, a leading clothing manufacturer and a present
of Congregation B’rith Kodesh who was the husband of “the former Ida
Lichtenstein” and the father of Robert, Ruth and Frances Adler.
1880(25th of Kislev,
5641): First Day of Chanukah
1880: It was reported today that
meetings instigated by the anti-Semitic party are being held in Leipzig.
1880: It was reported today that the
police have torn down placards in south-eastern Berlin “directly inciting the
inhabitants to persecute the Jews.”
1881: New York Congressman Samuel S.
Cox returned from his visit to Palestine today on board of the SS Republic.
(Four years later Cox resigned his seat in Congress to serve as U.S. Ambassador
to the Ottoman Empire, replace Lew Wallace, the author of Ben Hur, the
novel with the Jewish prince as its protagonist.)
1881: In Russia, William and Hodel
Fink gave birth to Cornell and University of Pennsylvania (Ph.D.) entomologist
David Ely Fink, the husband of Nellie Snyder and author of such works as “The
Asparagus Mine the Twelve-Spotted Asparagus Bettle” and “Injury to Truck Crops
by Spring-Tails” while working in the Entomology Department of the University
of Pennsylvania.
https://www.amazon.com/Eggplant-Lace-Bug-Classic-Reprint/dp/0364109874
1881: The articles of incorporation
for the Hebrew Society for the Improvement of the Sanitary Condition of the
Poor were filed in the County Clerk’s office today.
1881: “Aid For Hebrew Immigrants”
published today described efforts to meet the rising and growing tide of Jewish
immigrants Russia. Leading Jewish
citizens in New York have agreed to organize the Hebrew Emigrant Aid Society
which will be incorporated under the laws of New York State. Jacob Schiff publicly expressed his
opposition to the formation of the group, but most of his co-religionists
including Charles L. Bernheim, Jacob Seligman and Frederick Nathan overcame his
objections. Baron Maurice de Hirsch has pledged a million pounds to support the
efforts of the society to assist in the establishment of agricultural
“colonies” which will provide homes and a livelihood for the immigrants.
1881: In Vienna Ida Brettauer, “a daughter of
Jewish banking family” and textile manufacturer Mortiz Zweig gave birth to “novelist, playwright, journalist, and biographer” Stefan
Zweig. Although barely known today, in
his time he was a noted poet, essayist and dramatist. Although he was an assimilated Jew, he could
see that Austria was no place for Jews and he fled the country in 1934. Sadly, he and his wife committed suicide in
Brazil in 1942. They had come to the
conclusion that life was no longer worth living in a world that was spinning a
downward spiral.
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Stefan-Zweig
1883(28th of Cheshvan,
5644): “Russian Hebraist and author Mordecai Plugian” who was “a descendant of
Mordecai Jaffe” passed away today.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/judaica/ejud_0002_0016_0_15875.html
1883: It was reported today that
“Sir Moses Montefiore is the first Jews that was ever elected to be Sherriff of
London. He was chosen a few days after
the succession of Queen Victoria and received the honor of Knighthood at the
hands of her Majesty when she visited the city on the following Lord Mayors’
Day.”
1884: “Hittite Inscriptions”
published today provided a detailed review of The Empire of the Hittites
by William Wright who contends that these ancient people were contemporaries of
the ancient Israelites and were involved in the story of their enslavement in
Egypt.
1884: Birthdate of Olean, NY native
Benjamin M. Marcus the Columbia University trained “oil company executive.”
1884: It was reported today that
Reverend Charles H. Eaton has told his congregation that “the sentiment of the
Hebrew song sung at the Feasts of Tabernacles” has now come “naturally to our
lips upon our Thanksgiving Day.” (Editor’s note – Nice to see that a 19th
century Christian source acknowledge the Jewish origins of our most popular
secular holiday)
1885: It was reported today that
much to the surprise of her family, Mamie Curran, a Catholic girl, has secretly
married a Jewish suitor, John Cohen. Her
father, Edward Curran, is so distraught over the news that he has gone to his
room which is over a local saloon and has refused to leave it.
1885: In Munich, “orthodox Jewish
margarine manufacturer Sigmund Feuchtwanger and his wife Johanna née Bodenheim”
gave birth to “lawyer, lecturer and author” Ludwig Feuchtwanger, younger
brother of Lion Feuchtwanger, the well-known German-Jewish novelist and
playwright and father of historian Edgard Feuchtwanger who was incarcerated in
Dachau after Kristallnacht and then escaped to England where he died in 1947.
1886(1st of Kislev,
5647): Rosh Chodesh Kislev
1887: It was reported today that
German-Jewish author and historian Jacob Auerbach has passed away.
1887: It was reported today that
Daniel Greenleaf Thompson has dedicated his latest book, The Religious
Sentiments of the Mind, to “my friend and partner, Oscar S. Straus…” Straus was a leading figure in the American
Jewish community who served as U.S Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire.
1888(24th of Kislev,
5649): In the evening, kindle the first light of Chanukah on the Wednesday
before Thanksgiving. This will not
happen again until 2013.
1888: Baron Hirsch has made a
donation of $5,000,000 for schools for Jews in Galicia and Bukovina
1888: In New York, police began
looking for Yetta Reiner, an 18-year-old girl who has been in this country for
two weeks and has been reported as missing.
1888: Mrs. Julia Lind challenged the
will of her late mother Jettie Lissauer, a Jewess who passed away in December
of 1887.
1888: Today the cornerstone was laid
for the new home of the Progress Club was had been designed the Jewish
architect Alfred Zucker who was a native of Silesia.
1889: Two hundred and fifty-eight
children who attend the Industrial and Sunday Schools sponsored by the United
Hebrew Charities will be eating Thanksgiving dinner today at St. Mark’s Place
in New York City.
1889: The Conference of the Civic,
Commercial, Industrial and Educational Bodies will present a silk banner to the
Hebrew Benevolent and Orphan Asylum Society as its annual Thanksgiving festival
today at 3 p.m.
1889: Samuel D. Levy celebrated his
birthday today by sending a box of candy to each of the children who attend the
schools sponsored by the United Hebrew Charities.
1889: The Washington Centennial
Committee presented a banner to the youngsters at the Hebrew Orphan Asylum in
recognition of their “excellent marching in the civic parade” that had been
held last Spring. Charles Freund accepted the banner on behalf of his
schoolmates. General William T. Sherman
spoke to the boys complimenting them on their drilling.
1889: The cornerstone of the new
Temple that will be used by Congregation Zichron Ephraim was laid this
afternoon on 67th Street between Lexington and Third avenues.
1890: Herman Kertscher is under
arrest following the accident at yesterday’s annual parade of the boys at the
Hebrew Orphan Asylum. While driving his
wagon, his horse crashed into the parade seriously injuring two boys. Kertscher “made no effort to stop his horse
either before or after the accident.
1890: A Day following the national
holiday, Temple Israel of Harlem will host a Thanksgiving Service where the
topic of the sermon will be “The Ethics of Gratitude.”
1890: Twenty-eight-year-old Eugene
Simeon Benjamin, the Leavenworth, KS born son of Alfred and Sophie Woolf
Benjamin who was “made president” of Alfred Benjamin Company, wholesale
clothiers last year and who would eventually become managing director of the
Baron de Hirsch Fund married Miriam Gutman today with whom he had one child,
Alfred Benjamin.
1891: Today’s review of “Pauline
Blanchard” which opened at the Standard Theatre in New York described the theme
of the play as “well-worn” and “familiar” but praises the performance of Sarah
Bernhardt in the title role saying that her “genius elevates this role” and
that “her acting was incomparably fine and eloquent…played with all of her
energy.”
1891: Birthdate of Berlin born
physician Max Pinner who in 1928 became a naturalized citizen of the United
States where he served on the staff of the Municipal Tuberculosis Sanatorium in
Chicago and the faculty of the University of Illinois
http://www.jameslindlibrary.org/articles/max-pinner-1891-1948/
1892: Engineer George Franjieh
presented his plans for a tramway in Jaffa.
The plan, like his one for a new water supply system to Jerusalem, we
rejected.
1892: Baron Hirsch was
wounded in the hands and forearm by the explosion of his gun while hunting at
Acheres in France.
1892: The French
government was confronted by a demand that the coffin of Baron Reinach be
exhumed amid rumors that his death was a sham and that the coffin does not
contain his body.
1893: The Berlin Verein
Zur Abwehr Des Anti-Semitismus, a Society to Combat Anti-Semitism, held its
first general meeting today under the leadership of Rudolf Geniest, Heinrich
Rickert and Theodor Barth at which it was reported that it had 13,331 members
in 963 localities
1893: “New Bill At The
Theatres” published a review of the “Merchant of Venice” which found Henry
Irving’s portrayal of Shylock to be “fine, subtle, thoughtful” but not his
greatest work since “he reached the zenith of his powers some time ago.” (Irving was one of those who had made a
career playing the Jewish banker, providing at one time, a powerful
interpretation.) As in so many earlier
productions, Ellen Terry played Portia to Irving’s Shylock.
1893: Twenty-five-year
Philadelphia Dental College graduate Max Greenbaum the Austrian born son of
Phillip and Marie (Goldfinger) Greenbaum who had been practicing dentistry in
Philadelphia since 1891 and who was a member of Keneseth Israel married Blanche
Goldsmith today in Philadelphia.
1894: “Russian Jews
Forgive Russia” published today described a strange ceremony where 400 Jews
having attended a memorial service for the late Czar in Paris swore allegiance
to his successor, Nicholas II “in the presence of the Russian Consul and the secretary
of the Russian Embassy.”
1894: General Mercier,
the French Minister of War “declared in an interview with Le Figaro that
Dreyfus’ guilt was ‘absolutely certain.’”
1895: Three hundred and
fifty young ladies attended the Thanksgiving Day Dinner hosted by the Girl’s
Industrial School of the United Hebrew Charities at St. Marks Place.
1895: Registrar
Ferdinand Levy delivered a speech at the Thanksgiving Service held at the
synagogue at 115 East 86th Street entitled “The Jews as a Citizen
and Patriot.”
1895: Rabbi Silverman
delivered a sermon at the Temple Emanu-El Thanksgiving Service entitled “The
Ethics of American Patriotism.”
1895: Rabbis Mendes and
Harris will speak at the West End Synagogue Thanksgiving Service to which The
Young Men’s Hebrew Association and members of Temple Israel of Harlem have been
invited.
1895: Half a dozen Jews
including Rabbi Isaac Blankfort “rushed into the Madison Street (Police) State”
tonight “and said that two loafers had assaulted them and pulled their beards
on East Broadway.” The police went out
and arrested the two after they saw them “striking at every Jew they passed.”
1896: According to
reports published, the Tenth Ward of New York, in spite of its being the most
densely crowded area of its size in the world” has “a remarkably low rate”
because “its population consisted largely of Hebrews, who were the first race
in the world that learned the secret of the ‘length of days’ and have known
what not to eat ever since the adoption of the Levitical codes, three or four
thousand years ago.
1896: In New York City,
Solomon Edman, “a shirt manufacturer” and Ricka Sklower Edman, gave birth to
Irwin Edman, the Columbia University Phi Beta Kappa undergraduate who earned
his PhD from Columbia where he spent his academic career rising to chair of the
philosophy department in 1945.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1954/09/06/84133208.pdf
1897: In Paris, “Le
Figaro published a letter informing the public about the belief that Esterhazay
was the doorway to France and its army.”
(By doorway, they meant that Esterhazy and not Drefyfus was the spy
selling French military secrets to the Germans)
1897: Three days after
she had passed away, Leah Coleman, the daughter of “Julia and Israel Coleman”
was buried today at the “Plashet Jewish Cemetery in London.”
1898: In Chicago,
opening of a charity fair bazaar sponsored by the Young Men’s Hebrew Charity
Association the proceeds of which will split evening between Michael Reese
Hospital and United Hebrew Charities.
1898: “Jewish Agrarian
Colony In Bessarabia Russia” published today descried a law that “has just been
promulgated in St. Petersburg for the establishment of a Hebrew agrarian colony
on the estate of Baron Horace Guenzburg…which covers about 1,350 acres.”
1899: Birthdate of
Louise Cohn, the wife of Arthur Benjamin Cohn and the mother of Arthur B. Cohn.
1899: Birthdate of
Louise Cohn, the wife of Arthur Benjamin Cohn whom she outlived by a quarter of
century and the mother of Arthur B. Coh
1899: At Petach Tikva,
Taub (Yona) Margalit, the Bialystok born daughter of Elijah and Sara Golda
Bloch, and her husband Moshe Dov Bear Margalit gave birth to Sara Margalit who
became Sarah Mirkin when she married Moshe Arie Mirkin.
1900: “The Wedding” by
Anton Chekov whose Jewish stereotypes in his “writing owe their origin not so much
to the anti-Jewish typology found in the Russian literary tradition or in the
political rhetoric disseminated in the right wing press, but rather to the
views of Jewish people as express in the medical and scientific discourses of
his time,” “was given its first
performance, making its debut at the Moscow Hunt Club.”
1900: Birthdate of
Erich Klibansky, the native of Frankfurt am Main, husband of Meta David with
whom he had three sons: “Hans-Raphael, Alexander and Michael” and “headmaster
and teacher of Jawne, the first Jewish Gymnasium of Rhineland in Cologne” who
was murdered by the Nazis in the woods in Minks
1901: This evening the
New Era Club whose “membership is made up for the most part of Jewish young men
of the east side between the ages of 18 and 25 led by its President, Dr. A.L.
Wolborst celebrated Thanksgiving with festivities that were attended by most of
the three hundred members and their sweethearts or sisters.
1902: In Berlin,
Gertrude Sternberg, who was Jewish, and Dr. Oscar Jolles gave birth to
Heinz-Frederic Jolles who gained fame as pianist and composer Henry Jolles.
1903(9th of
Kislev, 5664): Sixty-five-year-old Jules Levy, “the most celebrated cornetist
of the 19th century, passed away today.
http://abel.hive.no/trumpet/levy/
1903: Today’s dispatch
from Kieff to The Times of London reported that “little progress has been made
in the trial at Kishineff which began on November 19” and that several more
days will be taken up with preliminaries” before evidence will be presented against
those charged with attacking the Jews.
1903: Birthdate of
Portland, OR, native Maurice Edward Dorfman, the hold of an “A.B. from Reed
College” who went on to graduate school at the University of California and
then worked as a “research chemist with Midway Gas Company.
1904: The Russian
correspondent of The Times of London said, “that Russian reservists continue to
escape in large numbers into Austrian Poland” and that “most of them,
especially the Jews, are provided with money and their escape is facilitated by
the Russian frontier guards who freely take bribes for passing them across the
border.”
1905: Sinn Fein founded
today based on the vision of Arthur Griffith whose disciples included Michael
Noyk the Lithuanian born Irish-Jewish lawyer who joined shortly after the
“Easter Rising.”
1905: In a letter from U.S.
Ambassador White of Morocco to the Algeciras Conference, he stated,
"Concurrent testimony positively affirms the intolerance of the Mohammedan
rule in that country toward non-Musselmans….Jews, especially, appear to suffer
from painful and injurious restrictions."
1905: Four thousand Jews attended a
meeting tonight in Berlin “to protest against the massacres in Russia.”
1905: It was reported today that
$895, 225 has been raised by the national committee collecting funds for the
relief of the Jews in Russia $103 from the “Jews of Decatur, Alabama, $50 from
Congregation Emanuel, Talladega, Alabama, $395 from Congregation B’nai Israel,
Monroe, Louisiana and $106 from Congregation B’nai Jacob, Charleston, West
Virginia.”
1905: It was reported that “uprising
against the Jews” have taken place in Bahmut, Luhgantz, Marianople Ghenitchesk
and Ekaterinoslav.”
1905: Isidor Straus, the President
of the Educational Alliance, presided over a meeting of fifty business and
professional men at his home to discuss the future of the organization.
1905: Seventeen year old Boris Gorb,
a Russian Jew “who recently arrived in New York after escaping from the Uligani
in Ekaterinoslave received a letter” today “from one of his brothers…informing
him that that their father, Simon Gorb had been mortally wounding in defending
their 15 year old sister Dora” and after reading it fainted while in the
presence of Isador Bader, the agent of the United Hebrew Charities at the
Immigrants’ Home on Montgomery Street where he has been staying.
1906: It was reported today that
“the Jewish Relief Society has come into possession of a secret report which
Capt. Pjetnchoff, Chief of the Siedlce police sent to an assistant of the
Governor General of Warsaw’ which is “a highly sensational statement of 4,000
words that shows that the Military Commander, Gen. Tichanowsky, not only was
responsible for the pogrom at Siedlce last Summer, but also ordered the killing
of innocent persons in a peculiarly atrocious manner. “
1907: In Haverhill, Massachusetts, scrap-metal
dealer Louis B. Mayer opened his first movie theater. From these humble beginnings would come the
famed studio MGM.
1907: At Birmingham, The Tennessee
Volunteers coached by Izzy Levene lost the final game of the season to the
University of Alabama leaving them with an over-all record of 7-2-1.
1908: Birthdate of Claude
Levi-Strauss. Born in Belgium,
Claude Levi-Strauss was the son of an artist, and a member of an intellectual
French Jewish family. He was a popular
French anthropologist most well-known for his development of structural
anthropology.
1908: Birthdate of Jeanette Felsen Fishman, the wife of Bernard Fishman,
both of whom are buried in Commerce City, CO.
1909(15th of Kislev, 5670): Jossel Schafir passed away today.
1910: It was reported today that Joseph Claster presided over the
memorial services that had been held for Dr. Abraham H. Ershller that were held
at Chizik Amunah Synagogue and Dr. Nahcman Heller, a personal friend of the
deceased rabbi delivered the eulogy.
https://www.newspapers.com/article/harrisburg-daily-independent-mystery-ers/38724912/
1910:Today in Vienna, “Austrian composer of operettas, popular songs and
film scores” Leo Ascher the Vienna born son of umbrella manufacturer Moritz
Ascher and his wife Luise Fankl gave birth to their only daughter, the writer
Franzi Ascher-Nash,
1910: In Brooklyn, Alter Abelson, a rabbi and poet, and of
Anna Schwartz Abelson, a writer of short stories gave birth to Lionel Abel who
won an Obie for his tragedy “Absalom.”
1911: It was
reported today that “the success of the Jewish farmer in America was hailed as
an indication that the Jews were coming into their own after forced and
unnatural pursuits in commerce and finance, by both Mayor Gaynor and Jacob H.
Schiff, during the third annual convention of the Federation of Jewish Farmers
of America.”
1912: In Chicago, The Lenora Sewing Club which meets and sews every
Thursday at Temple Sholem will not meet today because it is Thanksgiving.
1912: The Haymarket is scheduled to host another evening of Yiddish
Theatre which may include “Every Woman,” “Madame X” or “The Jewish Crown.”
1912: “The annual ball of the B’nai Abraham Auxiliary whose officers are
Charles D. Kaufman, President, Rose F. Ehrman, Financial Secretary and Clara C.
Weil, Recording Secretary, is scheduled to be held “in the Louis XVI Room of
the Hotel Sherman
1912: Birthdate of Morris Louis Bernstein who gained fame as Morris Louis,
one of America’s leading abstract expressionist painters before his untimely
death at the age of 49.
1913(28th of Cheshvan, 5674): Philanthropist Bertha
Rayner Frank, the Baltimore born daughter of Amalie and William Solomon Rayner
and the wife of Dr. Samuel Leon Frank whom she married in 1869 and who “became
the epicenter of a national debate on anti-Semitism when she forced an Atlantic
City hotel to publicly apologize for refusing to serve Jews” passed away today.
(Some sources show her death date as November 22)
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/frank-bertha
1913: Birthdate of Marvin M. Revich, the Michigan Jew who was the husband
of Chilly Grossberg Revich and who lived to the ripe old age of 92.
1913(28th of Cheshvan, 5674): Eighty-six-year-old Isaac
Greensfelder, “the grand old man” of the Jewish people of Chicago and the
founder “of the Associated Charities” passed away today in Chicago.
1914: It was reported today that Lemberg, a major city in Galicia which
the Russian have captured from the Austrians has a population of 30,000 Jews,
50,000 Roman Catholics and 15,000 Greek Orthodox.
1914: “Palestine for the Jews” published today includes Israel Zangwill’s
response to the following inquiry addressed to him by H.G. Wells: “And now what
is to prevent the Jews having Palestine and restoring a real Judea?”
1914: William Jessup Hand, an attorney, writes from Scranton, PA that “it
is plan that Leo Frank was denied…the highest and most vitally essential right
of every person: a fair and impartial trial.
1914: “It was learned today that when counsel for Leo M. Frank asks leave
of the Supreme Court of the United States on November 30 to file a petition for
a writ of error a brief will be presented at the same time” due to the rules of
procedure governing appeals of this sort.
1915: It was reported today that “$30,000,000 will be needed to
rehabilitate the Jewish communities of Eastern Europe and to save the families,
many of whom are dying of starvation.”
1915: Rabbi Herbert Goldstein and Commissioner of Education Joseph
Barondess were among the speakers at today’s dedication of the new facility
belong to the Jewish Day Nursery.
1915: “Seventy-five fatherless children…romped in a sunny playground at
the new nursery” operated by the Harlem branch of the Jewish Day Nursery which
opened today 61 East 107th Street.
1915: The Bronx Relief Committee of the People’s Relief Committee for the
Jewish Sufferers has divided the borough into 500 districts in which 1,500
volunteers are scheduled to sell tags during today’s fund raiser.
1915: It was reported today that the Dr. Julius Weiss will be presiding
over the upcoming service sponsored by the Federation of Rumanian Jews of
America to honor the memory of the late Professor Solomon Schechter.
1915: “A History of the Jews of Russia and Poland” published today
provides a review of The Jews of Russia and Poland by Israel Friedlander in
which the reviewer says the author “sketches a sympathetic yet faithful and
carefully objective history of Jews of Russia and Poland lands which not harbor
in their inhospitable and storm-tossed midst half the Jews of the world and
upon whose mercies, in the future even as in the long pain-racked past, the
fate of the Jews in the Diaspora must ever chiefly depend.”
1916: “Word that the Turkish Government has rescinded its previous
agreement to allow several hundred Americans to leave the Turkish Empire via
Jaffa reached the State Department” in Washington “today from Ambassador Elkus
at Constantinople.”
1916: In Memphis, TN, Josef Kalusner, the Hungarian born son of Chaim and
Chana Klausner and Tillie Klausner, the Polish born daughter of Arron and
Miriam Bienenstock, gave birth to David Klausner
1916: “Prominent Jews from all over the country attended a dinner at the
Hotel Savoy honoring philanthropist and statesman Simon Wolfe who “for more
than fifty has been the representative in Washington of American Jewry” on his
80th birthday.
1916: Screenwriter Samuel Ornitz and his wife gave birth to
cinematographer Arthur J. Ornitz who directed “Wanted – A Master” which was
nominated for an Academy Award in 1936 for Best Short Subject (One-Reel).
1916: It was reported today that George Gothein, a Jewish member of the
Reichstag, expressed the view that “it might not be advisable to grant the High
Council” which is the highest Jewish authority in Poland “unlimited
self-government at once” since the German government has only recently taken
full control of the area from the Russians.
1917(13th of Kislev, 5678): Sixty-two-year-old German
lexicographer Emil Levy whose son Frederich would die in a concentration camp,
passed away today.
1917: Former President William H. Taft was among those who attended the
production of “On the Road to Victory” which was under the direction of Mrs.
Jacob H. Schiff was part of Jewish Relief Day, a fundraiser for the Joint
Distribution Committee of American Funds for Jewish War Relief.
1917: Sigmund
Romberg’s revue "Over the Top," premiered in New York City.
1917: Andrei Ivanovich
Shingarev, a physician and leader of the Kadets (Constitutional Democrat Party)
who in March of 1916 took the unusual position of defending the Jews against
charges of destroying the war effort, was arrested today by the Bolsheviks and
“imprisoned in the Peter and Paul Fortress” today.
1917: In London, General F.B. Maurice, Chief Director of Military
Operations at the War Office said “Our troops are now in sight of Jerusalem,
but the Turks have had time to get up reserves and make a stand and it is
problem that Jerusalem will not fall without another definite battle.
1917: The Ottoman forces continued to re-take the village of Nebi Samwil
(Tomb of Samuel) which the British had conquered after a week of hard fighting
as they continued their campaign to take Jerusalem.
1918(24th of Kislev, 5679): Thanksgiving feast is followed in
the evening by the kindling the first light of Chanukah.
1918: On Thanksgiving, Rabbi Hyman Gerson Enelow is scheduled “to take
part in services at a large Synagogue” in Paris.
1918: With Lou Mervis playing tackle, the U. of Pittsburgh Panthers
defeated Penn St. at Forbes Field.
1918: The Jewish Guardian reported
that on the first anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, T.E. Lawrence (aka
Lawrence of Arabia) declared, “Speaking entirely as a non-Jew, I look on the
Jews as the natural importers of western leaven so necessary for countries of
the Near East.”
1918: Eighteen days after crossing the border into Holland, Kaiser
Wilhelm II who blamed the Jews for his defeat and who would send telegrams of
praise to Hitler following his victories “issued a belated statement of
abdication from both the Prussian and imperial thrones, thus formally ending
the Hohenzollerns' 400-year rule over Prussia.”
1919: Birthdate of Faye Schulman, the Lenin born photographer who was one
of only 26 people spared by the Nazis when they slaughtered the Jews of town
including her parents, sisters and younger brother. They did not kill her
because they wanted her to develop their pictures of the massacre
http://www.jewishpartisans.org/t_switch.php?pageName=mini+bio+short+bio+2&fromSomeone=&parnum=56
1920: Pianist and composer Mana-Zuca is scheduled to perform an original
composition which will be heard in New York in the Hippodrome.
1920(17th of Kislev, 5681): Fifty-year old Alsace, France
native and Texas resident Hippolyte Uhry, the husband of Dora Kahn Urhy and the
father of Ralph, Marjorie and Julian Uhry passed away today after which he was
buried at the Hebrew Rest Cemetery in Beaumont, TX.
1921: “Colonel J.H. Patterson, who
commanded the Jewish Mule Corps in Gallipoli in 1915 and later commanded Jewish
troops in Palestine” who arrived today in New York aboard the Cunard line
Carmania “said he came to help the Zionist cause in Palestine.”
1922: “The Russian delegation arrived in Lausanne” where negotiations had
already begun on settling the outstanding questions regarding the replacement
of the Ottoman Empire, which had included Palestine, with what would become the
modern nation of Turkey.
1922: In the Bronx, Sadie "Sonia" Birkenfeld and
Harry Eidus, a Latvian born Jewish violinist gave birth to Arnold Eidus, “the
first American violinist to win the Jacques Thidbaud Award
1923: “Samuel Untermyer, President of the Keren Hayesod also known as the
Palestine Foundation Fund, received a radiogram from Jerusalem” today “from
Reverend Joseph Silverman, the rabbi emeritus of Temple Emanu-El” which said,
“Jewish achievements in Palestine are beyond expectations” and “the future of
Palestine is assured.”
1924: “The Blonde Hannele” filmed by cinematographer Mutz Greenbaum was
released in Germany today.
1924: French premiere of “Le Miracle des Loups” (The Miracle of the
Wolves) the historical melodrama directed by Raymond Bernard.
1925: Today Chaim “Zhitlowsky's 60th birthday was celebrated at the
Manhattan Opera House in New York” and “a Zhitlowsky memorial volume was
published in Berlin containing articles and reminiscences of his intimate
friends and disciples” with the proceeds from the sale of the work going to
YIVO in Vilno.
1926: Hillel Rogoff is scheduled to preside over the huge mass meeting in
the Central Opera House that was called for by the Writers Club “to express
sympathy with the Jewish colonization work in Soviet Russia.”
1926: Dr. Henry S. Pritchett, a trustee of the
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, in a report to the Endowment on his
observations in Egypt, Palestine and Greece, made public today, declares that
the movement to colonize Palestine with Jews is "unfortunate and
visionary," and will in the long run "bring more bitterness and more
unhappiness both for the Jew and for the Arab." According to Dr. Pritchett, “Zionist plans
for a national Jewish home in Palestine…have nothing to commend them and are
bound to fail.” He also wrote
despairingly of any attempt to improve the economic conditions in Palestine;
attempts which he said were doomed to failure. Nicholas Murray Butler, who is
President of the Carnegie Endowment, was responsible for the report being
published today. As President of
Columbia, Butler has advocated limiting the enrollment of Jews at Columbia
where he has supported a strong quota system.
1926: Rabbi Morris Lichtenstein preached a sermon at the Jewish Science
Services held at the Hotel Astor on the subject of “the home is the heart of
the nation.:
1926: British flyweight Moe Mizler fought and won his seventh bout today
at Premierland, Whitechapel.
1926: In Jerusalem, Rabbi Yitzhak Nissim and his wife gave birth to Meir
Benayahu, the researcher who devoted his life to the of Kabbalah, Sabbaticalism
and the Sephardi Diaspora who was also the brother of MK Moshe Nissim.
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/404349
1927: “The Hungarian Government declined today to give guarantees for the
protection of Jewish students in the University of Budapest against
anti-Semitic attacks by Nationalist undergraduates.”
1927: Bert Lahr, the born son of upholster Jacob Lahrheim and Agusta
Bessen who named him Irving Lahheim “debuted on Broadway in Harry Delmar's
Revels.”
1928: “London Blames Jews in Wailing Wall Issue” published today
“concludes by explain that while the Palestine government is ready and anxious
to act as an intermediary in obtaining a Moslem-Jewish agreement over the
Wailing Wall, it cannot use compulsion to ring this about especially as the
disputes have now ceased to be purely religious and have become political and
racial also.” (Editor’s note – the irony is that nine decades later, the issue
has now become one of Jew versus Jew as the Orthodox seek to exercise a
hegemony over this holy site that denies access other Jews.)
1928: “Woman in Flames,” a silent move directed by Max Reichman was
released today in Germany.
1928: Birthdate of Shulamit Aloni. Born in Kfar Shmaryahu, Israel,
Aloni served in the Palmach in the War of Independence and gained fame as an
attorney, teacher, journalist and the winner of numerous awards including
Honorary PhD in Humanities from Hebrew Union College (1994), Honorary PhD of
Law from Kon-Kuk University in Seoul (1994),Honorary PhD of Philosophy,
Weitzman Institute of Science (1999), Decoration of Honor from the
International Academy for Humanism (1996), Honorary PhD from the Free University
in Brussels (1997) and Israel Prize Honoree for special lifetime contribution
to Israeli society (2000).
1929: In Chicago, Samuel “Sam” Rabinovitz, the Lithuanian born son of
“Sholem Moshe Rabinovitz and Chaya-Leah Levy” and his wife Esther Hannah
Callner gave birth to Myrtle Rabinovitz
1929: “Show of Shows” a Warner Brothers film that was unique because it
was “a talkie” and in Technicolor featuring Carmel Myers was released today in
the United States.
1929: “The Girl with the Whip” a comedy with a script by Walter Wasserman
and filmed by cinematographer Otto Heller was released in Germany today.
1929(25th of Cheshvan, 5690): Sixty-seven-year-old Hannah
Bachman Einstein a Jewish social worker who “was one of the founders of the
Federation of Jewish women’s Organizations” passed away today.
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/einstein-hannah-bachman
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/heinstein.html
1930: “Father and Son” a German-Swedish film co-starring Martin Herzberg
was released today.
1931: In their final game of the season, with Sid Gillman playing End,
Ohio State lost to the University of Minnesota today.
1932: NBC’s Blue Network broadcast the first episode of “Flywheel,
Shyster, and Flywheel” a situation comedy radio show starring Groucho and Chico
Marx and written primarily by Nat Perrin and Arthur Sheekman.
1932: Groucho Marx performed on
radio for the first time.
1933: “East of Fifth Avenue,” with a
script by Jo Swerling which was based on Brownstone Front by Lew
Levenson.
1933(10 of Kislev 5694):
Sixty-seven-year-old Rabbi Moshe Mordechai Epstein died in Jerusalem
http://matzav.com/rav-moshe-mordechai-epstein-ztl-on-his-yahrtzeit-today-4/
1934: The Gold Eagle Guy, written by
Melvin Levy with a cast that included Luther Adler, Stella Adler, J. Edward
Bromberg, Clifford Odets, Sanford Meisner and Jules Garfield opened on Broadway
at the Morosco Theatre.
1935(2nd of Kislev,
5696): Frederick Falk, MD, passed away today in Seattle, Washington
1936: “Alpha and Omega” a play
written by two Jewish authors “was hooted off the stage” in Poznan, Poland by a
group of anti-Semitic Students.
1936: In New York, at the Manhattan
Opera House, Mayor La Guardia told the 20,000 delegates attending the
convention of the National Labor Committee for the Jewish Workers in Palestine
that “rulers of modern countries that seem to thrive on the persecution of
minorities face the fate of the Romanoffs and the Hapsburgs.
1936: Louis Edwin Freudenthal, the
Las Cruces, New Mexico born son of Amalia and Phoebus Freudenthal and his was
Carmen Sylvia Freudenthal gave birth to Max Arthur Freudenthal.
1936: “The elimination of race
prejudice and religious intolerance was advocated” today “by the Rev. Dr. Ralph
W. Sockman, pastor of Christ Methodist Episcopal Church speaking as guest
preacher at the Sabbath service of Central Synagogue which opened the ninetieth
anniversary celebration of the congregation.”
1937(24th of Kislev, 5698): This
evening Jews kindled the first Chanukah Candle.
1937: “Non-Stop New
York” a sci-fi film with a script co-authored by Curt Siodmak and filmed by
cinematographer Mutz Greenbaum opened in the United States today.
1938: Dr. Arthur H.
Compton is scheduled to be installed as co-chairman to night during the dinner
meeting of the New York Round Table of the National Conference of Jews and
Christians at the Hotel Astor.
1938(5th of
Kislev, 5699)
1938: The Henry Street
Settlement and East Side Branch of the Progressive Women’s Council is scheduled
to host a panel including Cecilia Razofsky, Reverend William B. Sperry, Louis
Bart, Lena Finkelstein, Max Schenk and Helen Hall that will discuss “”What Can
We Do to Help the Jews in Germany?”
1938: Dr. David de Sola
Pool is scheduled to lecture on “Jewish Wanderings, Whither Today?” at the
Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue.
1939: The Nazi governor-general of
Poland established the Judenrat. The Jews were ordered to set up Jewish
Councils in every Jewish community in the General Government of Germany.
Heydrich ordered that the deportation of 80,000 Jews and Poles should be carried
out by December 17.
1939: In what was tantamount to a
death sentence, “The authorities of Kaunas, Lithuania arrested” Polish refugee
“ Maurycy Orzech, a correspondent for the Jewish Daily Forward and ordered him
to return to the German-occupied territory of Poland.”
1939: During today’s meeting of the
Good Neighbor Committee on the Émigré and the Community “Edward M.M. Warburg,
chairman of the administration committee of the Joint Distribution Committee
told of the tremendous burned placed on the Jewish community in this country
and abroad by the refugee problem and warned that anti-Semitism was spreading
in Europe.
1939: In Bucharest, Premiere George
Tatarescu delivered a speech today in which he announced a new plan that “would
facilitate the emigration of Jews who are not Rumanian.”
1939: It was reported today that
“70,000 Jews from Germany have been absorbed in Palestine since 1936” and that
there are plans for “the immediate settlement of 25,000 Jewish refugees in
Palestine.”
1939: As the case against Fritz
Kuhn, the leader of the German American Bund who is charged with grand larceny
came to a climax, Assistant District Attorney Herman J. McCarthy presented his
summation to the jury challenging Kuhn’s contention that he was the victim of
plot carried out by Daniel Kirchman, the young Jewish lawyer whom Kuhn says was
a thief and the young Jewish accountant Irving Hest who is on the staff of
District Attorney Thomas E. Dewey.
1940: The anti-Jewish film Der
Ewige Jude, “The Eternal Jew,” was released.
1940: “The legal successor of the
DIG, the Jewish Religious Association (Jüdischer Religionsverband in Hamburg),
was forced to sell the building for the ridiculous sum of ℛℳ 120,000 to the Colonial Office
(Kolonialamt; a legally dependent subunit of Hamburg).”
1941: “The Corsican Brother” a
swashbuckler directed by Gregory Ratoff, produced by Edward Small with music by
Dimitri Tiomkin was released in the United States today.
1941: In Riga the Jews responded in
horror when the Nazis issued orders that separated the able-bodied men from the
rest of the population because they knew that in Latvia a separation of
population had preceded the murder of the Jewish population.
1941: “Walter Bruns, a Major General
of Engineers, learned today that planned mass executions would soon take place
in Riga
1941: The
first transport of Laupheim (Germany) Jews left for Stuttgart, before being
shipped to Riga.
1941: Hitler entertained Hajj Amin al-Husseini during which
the grand mufti of Jerusalem pledges to cooperate in the extermination of the
Jews and offers to enlist Arabs to fight for Germany.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/full-official-record-what-the-mufti-said-to-hitler/
1942: “Winter Soldiers,” a play
“about saboteurs in Nazi-occupied countries” directed by Shephard Traube is
scheduled to “open tonight at the Studio Theatre of the New School for Social
Research.”
1942: “George Washington Slept Here”
the film version of the stage play by Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman, produced
by Jerry Wald and starring Jacky Benny was released in the United States today
by Warner Bros.
1943: The U.S. Army Medical Corps
established a 500-bed hospital at Tlemcen, the Algerian city whose “most
important place pilgrimage of all religions was the Jewish cemetery on the
outskirts of town.”
1943: Birthdate of singer Randy
Newman known for a variety of off-beat ditties including Short People, I Love LA, and Raindrops.
1943: A testimonial is scheduled to be held tonight to celebrate the 70th
birthday of Dr. Louis Ginzberg, the Polish born Talmudist and Professor at the
Jewish Theological Seminary (JTS) who has been living in the United States for
the last 44 years. Dr. Louis
Finnkelstein, President of the JTS is chairing the committee hosting the event;
a committee that includes several notables such Dr. Butler, President of
Columbia, Dr. Woodburn, Chancellor of New York University and Dr. Hertz, the
Chief Rabbi of the British Empire.
1944: As he tried to negotiate the rescue of Hungarian Jews Rudolf
Kasztner followed the instructions of the Germans and left for the Swiss
border.
1944: In Budapest, Hungarian Fascist gangs attacked a hospital of Jews,
killing 28.
1945 During a luncheon hosted by Metropolitan region of the Women’s
American ORT, Dr. Charles Bruggmann said “an estimated 250,000 European
civilian and military refugees have entered Switzerland since the beginning of
the Nazi regime
1945: Playwright Lillian Hellman told those attending todays ORT luncheon
that “Jews must stop thinking of themselves as the only people who have
suffered” and “work for groups afflicted through war and persecution.”
1946: Today, Kindertransport survivor and HUC trained rabbi, Jakob Josef
Petuchowski, the Berlin born son of Samuel Meir Sigmund Petuchowski, and
eventually a research professor of Jewish Theology and Liturgy and the Sol and
Arlene Bronstein Professor of Judeo-Christian Studies at the Hebrew Union
College-Jewish Institute of Religion, Cincinnati, Ohio married Elizabeth Mayer,
a former resident of Bochum, Germany with whom “he had three sons: Samuel,
Aaron and Jonathan.
1946: Three Jewish refugee
ships were reported off Haifa tonight, trying to run the Navy-Air Force
blockade in a new challenge to British immigration policy.
1947: In Haifa, the
British admit 1,450 Jews from Cyprus, ahead of immigration quota.
1947: The United Nations General Assembly “postponed a vote on the
Palestine questions” today when it approved a resolution to delay the vote for
24 hours “to give the Arab representatives an opportunity to present a
compromise plan as a substitute for partition.”
1947: In Stirling, 87-year-old Scottish architect James Miller who
designed the building that housed the Edinburgh Synagogue, an Orthodox
congregation that opened on September 11, 1932 with a seating capacity for one
thousand people and contained a mikveh, passed away today.
1948 (26th of Cheshvan): Moses Kleinman editor of Ha-Olam, passed away
1948: Lt. Col. Moshe Dayan and his
Arab counterpart met at Government House in Jerusalem. Under UN supervision,
the two military commanders worked out the terms of cease fire for the divided
holy city. Once the cease fire was
announced soldiers of the Arab Legion danced with joy and Arab refugees
returned to the Old City. All attempts
by Jews to pray at the Wall were rebuffed.
As the cease fire took effect Chaim Weitzman returned to the city for
the first time in a year. The first
President of Israel comforted the people over the fact that Jerusalem was
divided. “All will come to pass in
peace.”
1948: Birthdate of self-promoting
political lobbyist Dick Morris.
1948: Birthdate of author Bruce
Vilanch.
1948: The Polaroid Land Camera first
went on sale, at a Boston department store. The 40 series, model 95 roll film
camera went on sale for $89.75. This first model was sold through 1953 and was
the first commercially successful self-redeveloping camera system. A
sepia-colored photograph took about one minute to produce. Jewish inventor
Edwin H. Land had previously demonstrated his invention of instant photography
at a meeting of the Optical Society of America on 2 Feb 1947. His first
commercial success came in 1939 with his invention of Polaroid filters for
lenses in products such as ski goggles, sunglasses and slip-on sunglasses for
optical glasses.
1949: “A citation bearing the
inscription ‘in recognition of a woman’s achievements in the first half
century’ is scheduled to be presented to Julia Felsenthal” the daughter of
Henrieta Felsenthal and Dr. Bernhard Felsenthal , the founder of the Chicago Sinai
congregation in 1861 which he served as its first rabbi, “by the Conference of
Jewish Women’s Organizations at luncheon” today
1949: Birthdate of Canadian born
Mossad agent and author Victor John Ostrosky, the grandson Esther and Haim
Margolin, the Auditor General of the Jewish National Fund and the husband of
artist Bella Ostrovsky.
1949: U.S. premiere of “Port of New
York” directed by László Benedek, produced by Aubrey Schenk with music by Sol
Kaplan.
1949: Birthdate of bandleader and
David Letterman straight man Paul Shaffer.
1950: The New York Council of the
Pioneer Women is scheduled to have its Chanukah meeting at the home of Mrs.
David H. Panitz.
1950: Oscar Karlweis and Mrs. Irving
M. Engel are scheduled to address today’s meeting of the Brooklyn Section of
the National Council of Jewish Women being held at Temple Beth Elohim.
1950: Dr. Henry shoskes is scheduled
to address todays meeting of the Abraham Herman Chapter of HIAS.
1950: The Passaic, NJ Section of
Hadassah is scheduled to meet this evening at the Y.M.H.A.
1951: In France, re-release of “Le
Miracle des Loups” the classic film directed by Raymond Bernard first shown in
1924.
1951: Arthur Wilson and the former
Harriet C. Friedeberg gave birth Mary Jean Alexandra Wilson, who gained fame as
British historian Mary Fulbrook, the winner of the “Wolfson Prize 2019 for
Revelatory Holocaust Study Reckonings.”
https://www.midaspr.co.uk/news-stories/mary-fulbrook-wins-wolfson-history-prize-2019/
1953(21st of Kislev,
5714): Parshat Vayeshev
1953(21st of Kislev,
5714) Adeline Moses, the Montgomery, AL born daughter of Jeanette Nathan and
Alfred Huger Moses and the wife of Carl Morris Loeb whom she married at St.
Louis in 1896 and with whom she had four children – John, Margert, Carl and
Henry – passed away today in New York City.
1953: In Elizabeth, NJ, Rabbi
Gershon Baruch Chertoff (1915–96), a Talmud scholar and the former leader of
the Congregation B'nai Israel in Elizabeth” and “Livia Chertoff (née Eisen), an
Israeli citizen and the first flight attendant for El Al gave birth Harvard
trained attorney Michael Chertoff, the grandson of Rabbi Paul Chertoff and
Esther Barish Chertoff who served as the 2nd United States Secretary
of Homeland Security from 2005 to 2009.
1954: For the first time ABC aired
“What’s Going On?” a game show produced by Mark Goodson and Bill Todman.
1954: Enrico Fermi, Italian
physicist and Nobel Prize laureate passed away.
Fermi was not Jewish, but his wife was.
He left Europe in 1938 because he was afraid of the fate that awaited
her and her family.
1955:
Edmund Leopold de Rothschild and Elizabeth Edith Rothschild née Lentner gave
birth to British Soprano Charlotte Henriette de Rothschild the twin sister of
David Lionel de Rothschild and wife of Nigel S. Brown who is the namesake for
the “Charlotte de Rothschild” rhododendron which was cultivated at the Exbury
Gardens which had been built by her grandfather.
1957(5th
of Kislev): Dr. Pinchas Churgin, the first president of Bar-Ilan University
passed away.
1958(16th
of Kislev, 5719): Avrom Zeev (Abraham) Dorfman the Russian born son of Shmerl
(Shmerka) Simonovich Dorfman and Rochlia-Frieda Abram-Vulfovna , the husband of
Chasha Rachel Lappir and the father of
Charles Dorfman; Annie (Ena) Dorfman and Raphael Dorfman passed away today in
Liverpool, England.
1959(27th
of Cheshvan, 5720): Parashat Chayei Sara
1959(27th
of Cheshvan, 5720): Seventy-one-year-old Rabbi Nathan Emanuel Barasch, the
Romanian born son of Samuel and Rachel Barash passed away today in Bayonne, NJ.
1961:
One hundred five Moroccan Jews sailed from Casablanca for Nice on board the
French steamship Lyautey. This marked the beginning of a major exodus of
Morocco’s ancient Jewish community.
1960: Today, Francis Henry Russell, who had served as “a special
assistant for Israeli-Arab relations under Secretary John Foster Dulles and who
served as charge d’affaires at the United States Embassy in Tel Aviv in 1953
and 1954 completed his served as the United States Ambassador to New Zealand.
1962(1st
of Kislev, 5723): Rosh Chodesh Kislev
1962: Birthdate of Jonathan Stuart Leibowitz who gained fame as
Jon Stewart host of the fake news program The
Daily Show. Born Jonathan
Stuart Leibowitz, the popularity of this late-night show has earned
Stewart notoriety as “the most trusted name in fake news,” a sardonic
reflection of his stature as the Walter Cronkite for a younger generation. He
has also gained attention as an outspoken critic of established news media
sources.
1963(12th of Kislev, 5724): Actress Karyn "Cookie" Kupcinet,
daughter of columnist Irv Kupcinet was murdered today. The crime remains unsolved.
1963: Rabbi Stanley Rabinowitz delivered a sermon at the interfaith
Thanksgiving Day service attended by President Lyndon Johnson who was making
one of his first such appearances since the assassination of President John
Kennedy.
1963: This evening, in a nationally televised address, President Johnson
paraphrased the words Rabbi Rabinowitz had used early in the day, “speaking of
how blessings can come from evil situations.”
1963(12th of Kislev, 5724): Seventy-year-old Abba Hillel Silver, who
served as Rabbi of The Temple in Cleveland, Ohio and was an ardent Zionist
passed away today.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive/pdf?res=9E02EEDB103AE637A2575AC2A9679D946291D6CF
1964(23rd of Kislev,
5725): Fifty-six-year-old Hans von Halban, the French physicist who worked on
the Heavy Water project related to the development of the Atomic Bomb passed
away today.
1965: Two days after he had passed
way, funeral services are scheduled to be held in Brooklyn for 80-year-old Sam
Shapiro, the husband of Esther Shapiro and the father of David and Gustave
Shapiro.
1966: Birthdate of actor, writer and
media commentator Sam Seder
1967: Morris Lasker was nominated to
serve as a federal judge on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District
of New York Today.
1968: In today’s Village Voice,
Alfred Leslie, revealed that “Pull My Daisy” directed by Robert Frank was not
“an improvisational masterpiece” but “actually carefully planned, rehearsed,”
before being shot “on a professionally lit studio set.’ (Frank was Jewish,
Leslie was not)
1970(29th of Cheshvan, 5731): Parashat Tolodot
1970: Birthdate of Ran Ben Shimon,
the Israeli football (soccer) player who became the manager for Hapoel Tel
Aviv.
1971: Elizabeth Janeway reviewed Out
of My Time by Marie Mannes, the New York born Jewish author and social
critic who was the daughter of Clara Damrosch and David Mannes, the founder of
the Mannes College of Music.
1973: Donna Karen participated in
today’s The Battle of Versailles Fashion today as an assistant to her mentor
Anne Klein.
http://www.harpersbazaar.com/fashion/designers/a11385/versailles-french-american-fashion-show/
1974(14th of Kislev,
5735): Seven days after his 60th birthday, Detroit lawyer, Archie
Katcher, the North Dakota born son of Louis and Rebecca Katz Katcher who was an
active member of the Anti-Defamation League passed away today.
1975(24th of Kislev,
5736): Seventy-three Jack S. Popick, a native of Kishinev who came to the U.S.
in 1906 where he became a “business executive and Jewish communal and Zionist
leader passed away today in Miami.
1980(20th of Kislev, 5741):
Eighty-two-year-old, Russian born, Israeli painter, sculptor and author Nachum
Gutman passed away today
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nachum_Gutman#/media/File:HHGM_20121230_153928.jpg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nachum_Gutman#/media/File:Gutmanstudio.jpg
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Society_&_Culture/Gutman.html
1981: “Merrily We Roll Along,” based
on a play be George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart, with music and lyrics by Stephen
Sondheim, orchestrated by Jonathan Tunick and directed by Harold Prince
completed its Broadway run at the Alvin Theatre today.
1981: “Venom” a horror film produced
by Martin Bregman with music by Michael Kamen was released in Japan today.
1982: The film version of Norman
Mailers, The Executioner’s Song, co-starring Eli Wallach was released today in
the United States
1982: Today, at a “Delegates
Conference in NYC, 65 elected representatives of New Jewish Agenda (NJA)
chapters and at-large members from across US, consented on a National Platform”
that included a general Statement of Purpose and specific statements on 18
issue areas.
1983(22nd of Kislev,
5744): Eighty-one-year-old Columbia graduate James Waterman Wise, the Portland
born son of Rabbi Stephen Wise, the father of Stephen, Halle and Deborah Wise
and “an author, art dealer and lecturer who warned against Nazism before Hitler
came to power” as can be seen in two of his books, ''Swastika, the Nazi
Terror'' written in 1933, and ''Nazism, the Assault on Civilization'' written in
1934 passed away today “at his home in France where he had lived since 1950.
1984: Seventy-eight-year-old
Hubertus, Prince of Löwenstein-Wertheim-Freudenberg the anti-Nazi German
historian who came to the United States to warn against the danger of Hitler
and the evil of anti-Semitism passed away today. (As reported by Eric Pace)
http://www.nytimes.com/1984/12/01/obituaries/prince-loewenstien-hitler-foe-dies-in-bonn-at-78.html
1985(15th of Kislev,
5746): Eighty-year-old Washingtonian and GWU graduate Joseph Henry Abel who had
been a member of the American Institute of Architects since 1941 and married
Marjorie B. Abel after the death of his first wife Dorothy passed away today in
Washington, D.C.
1985: “Dispute Flares Over Book On
Claims to Palestine” published today, described the controversy over From
Time Immemorial: The Origins of the Arab-Jewish Conflict over Palestine by
Joan Peters.
1986: Birthdate of New York native
and Wesleyan University graduate Max N. Rose, the decorated U.S. Army combat
veteran who celebrated his bar mitzvah at Union Temple of Brooklyn in Prospect
Heights and who served in the United States Congress before becoming a member
of the Biden Administration
1989(30th of Cheshvan,
5750): Rosh Chodesh Kislev
1989(30th of Cheshvan,
5750): Eighty-eight-year-old NYU trained attorney Meyer Pessin, “a former
corporation counsel for Jersey City, NJ and former president of the Jewish
National Fund of America passed away today in Caracas, Venezuela” where he had
been living for the last four years.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1989/11/30/927489.html?pageNumber=114
1989: After having been convicted of
involuntary manslaughter in the death of his mother, actress Susan Cabot, her
son Timothy Scott Roman “was sentenced to three years’ probation” today.
1990: Sir Malcolm Leslie Rifkind
completed his service as Secretary of State for Scotland.
1990: Sir Malcolm Leslie Rifkind,
began serving as Secretary of State for Transport
1993(14th of Kislev,
5754): Marvin H. Bernstein, a businessman and philanthropist in New York for
many years, died today at the Miami Heart Institute. He was 66 and lived in
Miami. Mr. Bernstein was the founder and for 34 years the president of the
Variety Knit Corporation of Manhattan, which makes women's clothing and
T-shirts. He also founded the Marvin Bernstein Oil Company, a petroleum
exploration company with headquarters in Miami.n Mr. Bernstein was a
fund-raiser for and a contributor to the Federation of Jewish Philanthropies,
the Simon Weisenthal Center, Israel Bonds, the Weitzman Institute of Science,
Tel Aviv University and other medical and religious groups.
1993(14th of Kislev, 5754): Monroe
Abbey passed away. Born in 1904, he was a Canadian lawyer specializing in
mining law and a Jewish civic leader in Montreal. He was president of Canadian
Jewish Congress from 1968 to 1971.He was married to Minnie Cummings. His
daughter, Sheila Finestone, was a Member of Parliament and Senator. In 1978, he
was made a Member of the Order of Canada in recognition for being "devoted
community worker who has held office in every important Jewish organization in
Montreal".
1994(25th of Kislev, 5755): First Day of Chanukah; in the evening kindle
the second light
1994(25th of Kislev, 5755): Jerry Rubin, the 1960s war protester,
died in Los Angeles at 56, two weeks after he was hit by a car.
1999: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors
and/or about topics of Jewish interest including A
Life on the Stage: A Memoir by Jacob Adler, translated and
edited by Lulla Rosenfeld, Carl Sagan: A Life by Keay Davidson and Carl Sagan: A Life in the Cosmos by
William Poundstone.
2000(1st of Kislev,
5761): Rosh Chodesh Kislev)
2000: Workers cut away at the ice
that has encased David Blaine since he began the Frozen in Time stunt 63
hours, 42 minutes and 15 seconds ago which was a world’s record.
2001(13th of Kislev, 5762): Kal Mann
passed away. Born Kalman Cohen, the
Philadelphia native gained fame for writing lyrics to such rock and roll hits
as Elvis Presley's "Teddy Bear," Bobby Rydell's "Wild One",
and Chubby Checker's "Let's Twist Again."
2002(23rd of Kislev, 5763): Three
suicide bombers detonated an SUV in the lobby of the Israeli-owned Paradise
Hotel in Mombasa, Kenya, killing 13 people and injuring 80. Among the dead were
three Israeli tourists who presumably were the targets of the attack, and 10
Kenyans, mostly members of a dance troupe. About 20 minutes earlier, two
surface-to-air missiles were fired at an Arkia Boeing 757 airliner carrying 271
people, narrowly missing the aircraft, which was taking off from nearby Moi
International Airport. The plane was able to land safely in Tel Aviv.
2002(23rd of Kislevn
5763):Noy and Dvir Anter, aged 12 and 14, of Ariel, and Albert (Avraham) de
Havila, 60, of Ra'anana were killed along with 10 Kenyans when a car bomb
exploded in the lobby of the Israeli-owned beachfront Paradise Hotel,
frequented almost exclusively by Israeli tourists, near Mombasa in Kenya; 21
Israelis were among the 80 wounded. Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaeda claimed
responsibility for the attack, as well as for the simultaneous attempt to down
an Arkia plane.
2002(23rd of Kislev,
5763): Haim Amar, 56; Ehud (Yehuda) Avitan, 54; Mordechai Avraham, 44; Ya'acov
Lary, 35; and David Peretz, 48 - all of Beit She'an; and Shaul Zilberstein, 36,
of Upper Nazareth, were killed and about 40 wounded when two terrorists opened
fire and threw grenades at the Likud polling station in Beit She'an, near the
central bus station, where party members were casting their votes in the Likud
primary. The Fatah al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades claimed responsibility for the
attack.
2003: “The barrier that Israel is
building in the West Bank is causing "serious socio-economic harm" to
the Palestinian people and is undermining the Middle East peace process,
Secretary General Kofi Annan declared in a report today.”
2004: Juilliard instructor Samuel
Zyman praised Jay “Bluejay” Greenberg's talent during a CBS News 60 Minutes
broadcast this evening.
2004: NBC broadcast “A Christmas
Carol: The Musical” a television version of the stage musical co-starring Jason
Alexander as the Ghost of Jacob Marley and with a score by Alan Menkin
2004: The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors
and/or on topics of special interest to Jewish readers including including High
Noon In the Cold War: Kennedy, Khrushchev, and the Cuban Missile Crisis by
Max Frankel and Leo Strauss and the Politics of American Empire by Ann
Norton.
2005: The Jerusalem Post
reported from Budapest that the Israeli ambassador to Hungary, David Admon had
recognized the efforts of 13 Hungarians and their families to assist Jews
during the Holocaust by presenting them with the title of "the Righteous
among the Nations." Ten of the 13 honored were awarded the distinction
posthumously. The ceremony in the Hungarian Academy of Sciences was attended by
the president of the National Assembly, Katalin Szili, and the primate of the
Catholic Church in Hungary, Cardinal Peter Erdo. Yad Vashem has so far awarded
the "Righteous among the Nations title to over 20,000 people worldwide,
including 650 in Hungary. Nearly 600,000 Hungarian Jews were murdered during
World War II.
2005(26th of
Cheshvan, 5766): Ninety-five-year-old character actor Marc Lawrence (born Max
Goldsmith) passed away today.
2006: Fred Goldsmith
was hired today to coach football at Lenoir-Rhyne University.
2006: Groundbreaking Ceremony for the New Schechter Institute Campus in
Jerusalem.
2006: Today, in his maiden speech as National Party
leader John Key talked of an "underclass" that had been "allowed
to develop" in New Zealand, a theme which received a large amount of media
coverage,
2006(7th of Kislev,5767): Seventy-nine-year-old “Elliot Welles, a Holocaust survivor who spent
the years after World War II as a tireless hunter of Nazis, starting with the
man who murdered his mother passed away today at the age of 79. [Information
supplied by Margalit Fox, one of the great obituary writers for the New York
Times.]
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/03/nyregion/03welles.html
2006: In a move that would earn him the appellation of “Bigot” from New
York Mayor Ed Koch, Dennis Prager “wrote that Keith Ellison, the first Muslim
elected to Congress, should not be allowed to take his Congressional oath using
a Koran because ‘the act undermines American civilization.’” (Apparently Mr.
Prager’s Jewish education did not include a study of the problems that Jews in
England had in taking their seats in Parliament after being elected.)
2006(7th of Kislev, 5767): Ninety-year-old Rose Mattus who
with husband Reuben created Häagen-Dazs Ice Cream passed away today. (As reported by Dennis Hevesi)
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/01/obituaries/01mattus.html
2007: “The Rothschild Egg,” a Fabergé egg Béatrice Ephrussi de Rothschild
presented to Germaine Halphen upon her engagement to Béatrice's younger
brother, Édouard Alphonse James de Rothschild “was sold by Christie's auction
house today for £8.9 million (including commission) which “set three auction
records: it is the most expensive timepiece, Russian object, and Fabergé object
ever sold at auction, surpassing the $9.6 million sale of the 1913 Winter egg
in 2002.”
2007:
“Yiddish Theatre: A Love Story” is shown for the last time at the Two Boots
Pioneer theater in Manhattan. This
new documentary film is about Zypora Spaisman the amazing woman who has kept
the oldest running Yiddish Theater in America alive. Zypora Spaisman is a
Holocaust survivor who conquers all hearts in her passion for art, life and
Yiddish.
https://jwa.org/thisweek/nov/28/2007/zypora-spaisman
2007: “The Land Was Theirs” is shown at the
Highstown Memorial Library in Highstown, NJ. “An absorbing documentary
about Farmingdale, New Jersey, one of many Jewish farming communities in the
United States established with the help of the Jewish Agricultural Society.
Spanning more than fifty years, the history of Farmingdale provides a perspective
on the pressures, problems, and satisfactions of rural Jewish life as
experienced in one community.”
2007: Social scientist Riane
Eisler, Czech born Jewish American author of the influential The Chalice and the Blade,
discusses her new book, The Real
Wealth of Nations: Creating a Caring Economics at the National Press
Club in Washington, D.C
2008(1st of Kislev, 5769): Rosh
Chodesh Kislev
2008: Daniel “Barenboim made his
conducting debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York for the House's 450th
performance of Wagner's Tristan und Isolde.”
2008: Former government minister and
civil rights activist Shulamit Aloni celebrates her 80th birthday.
2008: The centenary of the legendary
French anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss is celebrated in Paris. As a
centenary celebration of a legend, however, it is rather unusual, as the
birthday boy is very much alive and well at this time. (He passed away on
October 30, 2009.)
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-me-claude-levi-strauss4-2009nov04,0,890035.story
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2009/nov/03/claude-levi-strauss-obituary
2008: Indian commandos were dropped
by helicopter on the roof of the besieged Chabad headquarters in Mumbai as
Indian snipers at the site opened fire early Friday morning. Sharpshooters in
buildings opposite the headquarters of Chabad began shooting early Friday as a
helicopter circled overhead. Meanwhile, there were at least three blasts in the
building Friday, as militants were believed to be holed up inside - possibly
with hostages - but the situation still remained murky. Approximately 5.000
Jews live in Mumbai. This does not include the large number of Jewish visitors
to the city, including a large number of Israelis on their way to visit other
tourist sites on the subcontinent. Where there are Jews, there is Chabad. In this case the Chabad House is run by Rabbi
Gavriel Holtzberg, from Brooklyn and his Israeli born wife. In response to requests from Chabad, Jews
around the world recite Psalm 20 as they wait for further word on the fate of
their co-religionists facing this nightmare.
2009: In Cedar Rapids, IA, Noah
Thalblum is called to the Torah as Bar Mitzvah at Shabbat Morning Services.
2010: Today Germany's main Jewish
group elected its first leader born after the Holocaust, a 60-year-old
businessman who promised to focus the organization more on contemporary Jewish
life. Dieter Graumann was born in Israel in 1950, the son of Jewish refugees
who moved to Germany two years later
2010: The New York
Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special
interest to Jewish readers including Dealings: A
Political and Financial Life by Felix
Rohatyn and I Remember Nothing by Nora Ephron.
2010: The Los Angeles Times featured
reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers
including Finishing the Hat: Collected Lyrics (1954-1981) With Attendant
Comments, Principles, Heresies, Grudges, Whines and Anecdotes by Stephen
Sondheim
2010: Party Like A Jew is scheduled
to come to an end in Brussels, Belgium.
2010: Terrorists in Hamas-controlled
Gaza resumed rocket fire on the Western Negev this morning, striking near
Sderot. As usual when no one is injured and there is no serious damage, Israel
media did not report the Kassam attack. The short-range rocket exploded in
mid-air as thousands of children and college students returned to schools and
the local Sapir College.
2010(21st of Kislev,
5771): Eighty-nine-year-old “Samuel T. Cohen, the physicist who invented the
small tactical nuclear weapon known as the neutron bomb, a controversial device
designed to kill enemy troops with subatomic particles but leave battlefields
and cities relatively intact, died today at his home in Los Angeles” (As reported by Robert D. McFadden)
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/02/us/02cohen.html?pagewanted=all
2011: The 92nd St Y is
scheduled to host “Finding A Lost Tribe of Israel: The Bnei Menashe of India,”
a program in which “the Bnei Menashe community, along with Shavei Israel
founder Michael Freund, tell the remarkable story of how this lost tribe is
finally coming home.”
2011: President Shimon Peres, under
the instructions of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, left for Amman today to
meet with Jordan's King Abdullah II, to discuss stalled Israeli-Palestinian
peace talks.
2011: The IDF returned fire on the
source of at least three rockets fired into northern Israel from Lebanon
tonight,
2011(2nd of Kislev,
5772): Ninety-nine-year-old Brooklyn born, Cornell University graduate Charles
Baker Schleifer, a World War II codebreaker who was the husband of Florence
Schleifer and the father of Doctors Lawrence and Leonard Schleifter, passed
away today.
2012: The Jewish Community Relations
Council of Greater Washington is scheduled to present its legislative agency at
tonight’s “Northern Virginia Legislators’ Reception at the JCCNVa
2012(14th of Kislev,
5773): Ninety-six-year-old New York real estate and newspaper tycoon Jerry
Finkelstein passed away today. (As reported by Robert D. McFadden)
2012: The French Institute American
Alliance Française is scheduled to host a reception prior to the opening of
“Haim Shelley Part One & Two” which “presents works by Brigitte NaHoN from
1999 to the present, a period when the artist lived in New York and immigrated
to Tel Aviv.”
2012: The convulsions of the Arab
Spring may be driving the American public’s support for Israel to new highs,
according to a poll released today by the Washington-based group The Israel
Project.
2012: Today Germany announced its
opposition to the Palestinian bid to upgrade its status at the United Nations
to a nonmember state, but did not indicate whether it would vote against or
merely abstain.
2013(25th of
Kislev, 5774): First Day of Chanukah
2013(25th of
Kislev, 5774): Ninety-three-year-old “Yiddish poet and songwriter “Beyle
Schaechter-Gottesman, the daughter of Lifshe Sschaecter and wife of Dr. Johan
(Yoyne) Gottesman with whom she survived the Holocaust passed away today in the
Bronx.
https://www.arts.gov/honors/heritage/fellows/beyle-schaechter-gottesman
2013(25th of Kislev,
5774): Eighty-eighty-year-old Joseph Bihari one of three brothers who “the
founders of Modern Records in Los Angeles and its subsidiaries such as Meteor
Records based in Memphis” passed away in Los Angeles. (As reported by William
Yardley)
2013: Thanksgiving –
for the first time since 1888, the first day of Chanukah and Thanksgiving
coincide. In 1888 it happened on
November 29.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/thanksgivukkah-watch-eat-groan/
2013: A Jordan-based scientific
research center that counts as its members Iran and other Middle Eastern
countries has named an Israeli physicist from Jerusalem’s Hebrew University,
Eliezer Rabinovici, as vice president, AFP reported.
2013: A two-year-old baby was
seriously injured today when Muslim terrorists hurled rocks at the car she was
in, at the entrance to the Armon Hanatziv neighborhood in southern
Jerusalem.2014: In Melbourne, “Orange People” is scheduled to be shown this afternoon
at the Jewish International Film Festival.
2014: “Maj. Gen. Gadi Eizenkot,
named tonight as the next IDF chief of the General Staff, firmly opposes
Israeli military intervention to thwart Iran’s nuclear program unless Iran
poses an immediate existential threat to Israel, an Israeli television report
said.”
2014: “The highly anticipated
trailer for the seventh installment of the Star Wars blockbuster directed by
J.J. Abrams was screened today to film audiences throughout the United States.
2014: In Atlanta, GA, the Berman
Museum’s store is scheduled to hold a “Black Friday Sale” offering “BIG
SAVINGS.”
2015: The Eden-Tamir Music Center is
scheduled to host Schumann-Brahms concert featuring Yevgenia Pikovsky, Elyakum
Salzman – Violin; Dmitry Ratush, Vladislav Krasnov –Viola; Felix Nemirovsky –
Cello and Marianna Sorkin – Piano.
2015: The Historic Sixth & I
Synagogue is scheduled to host an evening with “Hot Tuna.”
2015(16th of Kislev,
5776): Shabbat Va-yishlach
2015: Today, the curtain came down
on the final performance of West Revival
of Stephen Sondheim’s “Gypsy” which had opened at the Savoy Theatre in April.
2016(27th of Cheshvan,
5777): Yahrzeit Deborah Dorfman Levin, the wife of Joseph B. Levin
2016: “Rabin In His Own Words” and
“The Pickle Recipe” are scheduled to be shown at Melbourne as part of the
Jewish International Film Festival.
2016: “The Shas party said” today
“it would propose a bill that would make it illegal to hold pluralistic prayer
services at the Western Wall plaza” which should it pass “would effectively end
the negotiated agreement by the cabinet almost a year ago that decided on an
egalitarian prayer plaza alongside the Orthodox-controlled one at the holy
site”
2016: The Center for Jewish History
is scheduled to present “Israel in Three Anthems” in which Michael A. Figueroa
(University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill) addresses three anthems that
have helped shape Israeli society—“Ha-Tikva,” “L’Internationale,” and
“Yerushalayim shel Zahav,” analyzing these songs as performances of
collectivity representing the multifaceted nature of Zionism and the
shifting political landscape in Israel.
2017: Rich Recht is scheduled to
appear at tonight’s JRR Donor Appreciation Concert.
2017: The Center for Jewish History
is scheduled to offer the second part of Yitzhak Lewis’ “Introduction to
Gershom Scholem”
2017: The Oxford University Jewish
Society is scheduled to host Shabbat Candlestick Making Workshop preceded by a
free dinner.
2017: The Temple Emanu-El Streicker
Center is scheduled to host the last session of Dr. Naomi Weinberger’s “American Priorities in the Middle East.”
2017: Jewish Book Month, an annual
event that provides us with a chance to contemplate Jewish books and the lives
of authors such as Heinrich whose works included the classic and
ground-breaking, multi-volume “History of the Jews” continues today.
2018: At the University of
Michigan’s Jean and Samuel Frankel Center for Judaic Studies, the “Author’s
Forum” is scheduled to host “A Rich Brew: How Cafes Created Modern Jewish
Culture,” a conversation with “Samer Ali, an association professor of Arabic language
and literature” and Shachar Pinsker, professor of Judaic studies and Middle
East Studies and author of A Rich Brew: How Cafes Created Modern Jewish
Culture.
2018: Today The American Sephardi
Federation is scheduled to “a screening of Duki Dror’s ‘Shadow in Baghdad’ in
honor of the date date chosen by the Knesset to commemorate the Middle Eastern
Jewish experience, including the exodus of Iraqi Jews after denationalization
in 1950.”
2018: In London, the UK Jewish Film
Festival is scheduled to host a screening of “Diobedience.”
2018: The Streicker Center is
scheduled to host the “State of Moral Emergency,” in which Daniel Altschuler,
Stosh Cotler, Rabbi Jill Jacobs and Melanie Nezer, along with Rabbi Joshua M.
Davidson discuss “the Jewish Response to the Immigration Crisis.”
2018: Beit Ave Chai is scheduled to
host a lecture by Professor Zeli Gurevich on “The Language of Love in Shir
HaShirim.”
2019: The Oxford University Jewish
Society is scheduled to host a Thanksgiving Dinner with the Chaplains.
2019: As Americans look at their
tables for their Thanksgiving turkey, Israelis look to the skies to see if
yesterday’s IDF action will mean there will be a day without more rockets being
fired from Gaza.
2019(30th of Cheshvan,
5780): Rosh Chodesh Kislev
2020(12th of Kislev,
5781): Parashat Va-yaytzay
2020: Tiftereth Israel is scheduled to host a
“Shabbat Warmup” which is a “Torah Talk with Sharon Barr Skolnik.
2020: The Cape Cod Synagogue is
scheduled to host online “an evening of Jewish humor with Joel Chasnoff direct
from Israel.”
2020: Israel braces for attacks by
Iran or her proxies following the assassination yesterday of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, a nuclear scientist dubbed
the "father of the Iranian bomb.”
2020: B’nai Jeshurun is scheduled to
host, online, “Starbucks, Bread and Torah.”
2021: In move to halt the spread of
the Omicron COVID variant, travel will not be taking place between Israel and
fifty African countries which have been added to the “red list.”
2021: The Chanukah Run-a-Latke 5K
and Klezmer Concert hosted by Chabad of the North Shores is scheduled to begin
at 11:00 this morning.
2021: In Coralville, IA, Agudas
Achim Congregation is scheduled to host it annual Channukah Party complete with
Latkes and Doughnuts in a socially distanced, masked environment.
2021: Temple Emanuel of Newton, MA
is scheduled to present online its “Annual Thanksgiving Concert Featuring
Safam,” “the American Jewish rock band from Boston formed by Dan Funk, Joel
Sussman, Robbie Solomon and Alan Nelson in 1974.”
2021: In partnership with Menemsha
Films, the Jewish Heritage Museum of Monmouth County is scheduled to present
the first night the Channukah Film Festival.
2021(24th of Kislev,
5782): Kindle the first Channukah Candle
2022: Martin Kaufman is scheduled to
deliver another lecture on Maimonides’ Psychoanalytic Interpretation of the
Scripture at the Streicker Center.
2022: The Center for Jewish History
is scheduled to present Vivian J. Prins Artistic Resident Zuzanna Hertzberg as
she discusses her practice of recovering memory, mainly herstories of Jewish
women, as a tool for combating cultural and political oppression and increasing
fascism. In the artivist (art + activism) practice, she brings archives out
into the streets and other public spaces. The aim of her actions is
construction of a new archive accessible to all.
2023: In London, the Wiener
Holocaust Library is scheduled to launch it “2023 Big Give Christmas Challenger
campaign” today.
2023: The World Jewish Congress -
North America and American Sephardi Federation are scheduled to present
“Remembering The Forgotten Jewish Refugees” which is “a commemoration of the
mass exodus and expulsion of Jews from the Middle East & North Africa in
the 20th century and its impact on present-day antisemitism.”
2023: In New Orleans, Touro
Synagogue is scheduled to hold its monthly board meeting.
2023: LBI is scheduled to present a
“special event hosted in partnership with The Wiener Holocaust Library, London,
which will see British journalist and politician, Daniel Finkelstein OBE, in
conversation with Prof Debórah Dwork in celebration of Two Roads Home:
Hitler, Stalin and the Miraculous Survival of My Family, Daniel
Finkelstein’s remarkable new book.
2023: As November 28
begins in Israel there are reports that the truce maybe extended for another
two days as Hamas continues to trade their victims for time to regroup to
inflict more damage while the rest of the Hamas held
hostages begin day 53 in captivity.
2024: The Illinois
Holocaust Museum is scheduled to be closed because of Thanksgiving.
(Editor’s note: this
situation is too fluid for this blog to cover so we are just providing a
snapshot as of the posting at midnight Israeli time)
2024: Quad Cinema is
scheduled to host the last screening of “Nathan-ism.”
2024: In the United
States celebration of Thanksgiving which during the 19th century
many congregations celebrated with special and in some cases with participation
in ecumenical services which stood in sharp contrast with the European
experience.
https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/is-thanksgiving-kosher/
https://aish.com/6-ways-jews-shaped-thanksgiving/
2024: Sixteenth
anniversary of the third day of the terrorist attack in Mumbai when the Indian
commandos attempted to enter the Chabad house where the rabbi and his wife were
being held hostage.
2024: The National
Library of Israel is scheduled to host “Gallery talk with Dr. Samuel Thrope” on
"The Best of Arabic Literature and the Finest Works of Islam": The
Islamic Manuscript Collection at the NLI.”
2024: As November 28th begins in Israel, an unprecedented
wave of anti-Semitism that has included Hamas supporters calling for Zionist
passengers on a New York subway to raise their hands, demonstrations at a high
school production of “The Diary of Anne Frank” and the beating of a college
student in Chicago sweeps the United States and the Hamas held hostages begin
day 419 in captivity while Israelis brace for more rocket attacks by Hezbollah,
Iran and terrorists based in Iraq (Editor’s note: this situation is
too fluid for this blog to cover so we are just providing a snapshot as of the
posting at midnight Israeli time)
