December 17
520 BCE (24th of Kislev): “The
foundation-stone of the Temple was laid” (As reported by Jewish Encyclopedia)
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/4902-darius-i
630: Modestus of Jerusalem who replaced Zacharias as
Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem when the latter was killed following
destruction of Jerusalem by Chosroes II passed away today. (Editor’s note – the conquerors come and go
but Jerusalem remains the City of Daivd)
1141 (Tevet, 4902): After leaving Cairo, Jehuda
Halevi arrived at the port of Damietta where he was warmly received by his old
friend Abu Said Chalfon.
1261: Pope Clement IV, who in 1264 “renewed the
prohibition of the Talmud promulgated by Gregory IX, who had it publicly burnt
in France and in Italy” and who “ordered that the Jews of Aragon submit their
books to Dominican censors for expurgation” was “created” as a Cardinal by
Urban IV
1187: Gregory VIII, the Pope who called for the
disastrous Third Crusade, passed away. Each of the crusades was a disaster for
the Jewish people in way or another. On
top of everything else, the Third Crusade removed the protective hand of King
Richard from England and left the Jews to suffer under the anti-Semitic Prince
John.
1398: Tamerlane, also known as Timur, defeated the
armies of Sultan Nasir-u Din Mehmud's in Delhi. This battle was part of the war between the Persians
and the Mongols. According to one
source, Timur brought Persian Jews to his kingdom so that they could help
develop the textile industry. For more
on this subject see Tamerlane and the Jews by Michael Shterenshis
https://www.amazon.com/Tamerlane-Jews-Michael-Shterenshis/dp/1138010693
1489: Today Italian rabbi, Obadiah ben Abraham
Bartenura wrote that “he had moved to Hebron where he found the atmosphere much
more conducive, and a small Jewish community numbering some twenty households
who were of a better temperament than those in Jerusalem, and where they lived
along one alleyway.”
1490: Yucef Franco went on trial today charged with
“trying to attract conversos to Judaism as well as having participated in the
ritual crucifixion of a Christian child on Good Friday.”
1531: A Bull was issued by Pope Clement
1538: Pope Paul III excommunicates Henry VIII of
England. Henry had reportedly sought support from Italian rabbis in making the
Biblical case for his annulment. The
Italian Jews were fearful of the Pope among whom they lived than they were of a
distant monarch who did not let Jews live in his kingdom. The excommunication led to a weakening of the
Church and the strengthening of the Protestant Reformation which helped to
contribute to the Jews return to England in the 17th century.
1595: In Lima, Peru, ten people were accused of
violating the law by practicing the Jewish religion including Francisco
Rodriguez who was later burned at the stake.
1600: King Henry IV of France married Marie de'
Medici. She is most famous as the mother of Louis XIII in whose name she
reigned for seven years as Queen Mother and regent. During that time she defied the ban on Jews
living in France by retaining Elijah Montalto as court physician. To gain his
services Marie agreed to let him practice his religion and not to have to work
on Shabbat. When Louis came of age he
reverted to the practice of his predecessors and reaffirmed the ban on Jews
living in his kingdom.
1651: “A forced of more than 1,000 Barbadian
militia” under the command Francis Willoughby, under whose leadership a group
of Sephardic Jews migrated to Suriname” were defeated in clash with
pro-Parliament forces.
1651: When a seven ship fleet arrived off the coast
of Barbados today and demanded it surrender, the island’s governor, Francis
Willoughby, 5th Baron Willoughby of Parham, under whose leadership a group of
Sephardic Jews migrated to Suriname in 1652 and “settled in the Jodensavanne
area” refused saying “he knew of no supreme authority over Englishman except
the King” and announced his plans to resist.
1660: Today “Mr. Hollis presented to this House, an
Order made by the Lords of His Majesty’s Privy Council, and specially recommend
to this House for their advice therein touch protection for the Jews was read.”
1728: Congregation Shearith Israel
purchased a lot on Mill Street in lower Manhattan, to build New York's first
synagogue.
1762(1st of Tevet, 5523): Rosh Chodesh
Tevet; Seventh Day of Chanukah observed on the birthdate of American inventor
Pliny Earle
1767(26th of Kislev, 5528): Second Day of
Chanukah
1771(10th of Tevet, 5532): Asara B’Tevet
1773(3rd
of Tevet, 5534): Eighth Day of Chanukah
1775(24th
of Kislev, 5536): In the evening, kindle the first Chanukah light for the first
time during the American Revolution.
1775:
Moses Dobruška a cousin of Jacob Frank, the founder of the Frankist sect,
“converted from Judaism to the Catholic faith and took the name of Franz Thomas
Schönfeld.”
1778(28th
of Kislev, 5539): Fourth Day of Chanukah observed on the birthdate of famous
English chemist Sir Humphry Davy.
1784(4th
of Tevet, 5545): Liefmann Calmer, the Aurich, Hanover native whose “full
synagogal name was Moses Eliezer Lipmann ben Kalonymus” and who “obtained
French letters of naturalization” after having become the “official purveyor to
King Louis XV” passed away today in Paris.
1787:
Birthdate of Amsterdam native Roseanna Linderman, the wife of Levi Abrahams and
the mother of their Philadelphia born children, Hester and Maria Abrahams.
1789:
Birthdate of Bavaria native Isaac Nordlinger, the husband of Eugenie Schweizer
and the father of Wolf, Rosali, Fredricka, Bernhard and Marie Nordlinger, all
of whom were born in Alsace.
1790(10th
of Tevet, 5551): Asara B’Teveet
1791(21st
of Kislev, 5552): Chief
Rabbi David Tevele Schiff passed away. He was the chief rabbi of the United
Kingdom and the rabbi of the Great Synagogue of London from 1765 until his
death. He was the son of Solomon Schiff, member of a famous and learned family
from Frankfurt am Main. Tevele Schiff was educated in the schools of Rabbis
Jacob Poper and Jacob Joshua Falk. He served as maggid in Vienna. He also was
head of the Beth Midrash in Worms, and later Dayan in Frankfurt.
1792(2nd
of Tevet, 5553): Eighth day of Chanukah
1792:
Lilie Marx and Samuel Strauss gave birth to their daughter Sprinz Strauss.
1792(2nd
of Tevet, 5553): According to Gotthard Deutsch, this was the day on which
“Teble Schiff, the rabbi of London” passed away. (Editor’s note – any help will be greatly
appreciated in resolving the discrepancy)
1794(25th
of Kislev, 5555): First day of Chanukah
1794: William Moultrie who n 1794, during his
final year in office, Moultrie attended the consecration of Congregation Beth
Elohim in Charleston, SC, completed his second term in office as Governor of
South Carolina.
1796:
Birthdate of Charleston, SC native Judith Hyams, the wife of London native
Henry Hyams with whom she had eight children and who, like her husband, was
buried in New Orleans.
1797:
Birthdate of Prussian native and London resident Helena Horn, the wife of
Lehman Meyer Gluckstein, with whom she had nine children
1800(1st
of Tevet, 5561): Sixth Day of Chanukah; Rosh Chodesh Tevet is observed for the
first time in the 19th century.
1803(2nd
of Tevet, 5564): Shabbat shel Chanukah; Parashat Miketz
1806:
Birthdate of German historian Theodor Hirsch who like a certain segment of
Jewish society at this time converted to Christianity in order to further his
career and/or gain greater social acceptance.
1807:
In Charleston, SC, Caroline Lazarus and Aaron Phillips gave birth to Philip
Phillips a lawyer who served as Representative from Alabama’s First
Congressional District before the American Civil War.
1808(28th
of Kislev, 5569): Shabbat shel Pesach; Parashat Miketzzzzz
1808:
Today,
“a central consistory for the Jews in Holland was authorized by royal decree.”
1809(10th
of Tevet, 5570): Asara B’Tevet
1809:
In Columbia, SC, Rebecca Phillips and Isaiah Moses gave birth to Hannah Moeses.
1816(27th
of Kislev, 5577): Third Day of Chanukah observed on the same day that former
President John Adams wrote a letter of reference to President James Madison.
https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/99-02-02-6674
1819:
Simón Bolívar declared the independence of the Republic of Gran Colombia in
Angostura (now Ciudad Bolívar in Venezuela). Jews served in Bolivar’s army and
provided him with the financial backing that was necessary for his ultimate
success.
1821:
Birthdate of Dutch Journalist Isaac Jacob Lion, the editor of the “Handelsbad,”
and owner/publisher of the "Dagblad van 'sGravenhage en
Zuid-Holland."
1821(23rd
of Kislev 5582): Thirty-six year old Grace Mendes Seixas, the daughter or
Richea Hart and Abraham Seixas who were married in Charleston in 1777, passed
away today.
1822(3rd
of Tevet, 5583): Joseph Aguilar the husband of his first cousin Grace Aguilar
and the grandfather of author Grace Aguilar passed away today.
1823:
Solomon Levitt married Ann Isaacs at the Great Synagogue today.
1824(26th
of Kislev, 5585): Second Day of Chanukah
1824:
Birthdate of Parisian native Adolphe Hatzfeld, the son of a goldsmith who
obtained a Doctorate in Letters after which he was professor of foreign
literature in Grenoble and a professor of rhetoric at the Lycée Louis-le-Grand
in Paris.
1827(28th
of Kislev, 5588) Fourth Day of Chanukah observed on what would have been
Beethoven’s 57th birthday had he not passed away in March.
1830:
Simon Bolivar, the liberator of Venezuela and Columbia known as the “George
Washington of South America” passed away. “Simon Bolivar found refuge and
material support for his army in the homes of Jews from Curaçao. Jews such as
Mordejai Ricardo and the brothers Ricardo and Abraham Meza offered hospitality
to Bolivar as he fought against the Spanish, thus establishing brotherly
relations between Jews and the newly independent Venezuelan republic. Several
Jews even fought in the ranks of Bolivar's army during the war.” “The Jews of
Curacao became involved with Simon Bolivar and his fight for the independence
of Venezuela and Colombia from their Spanish colonizers. Two Jewish men from
1832(25th
of Kislev, 5593): Chanukah
1833:
In Philadelphia, PA, Benjamin and Harriet Marx Etting gave birth to Frank Marx
Etting who became Paymaster of the United States Army during the Civil War.
1833:Henry
Etting and his wife gave birth to Frank Marx Etting who gave up his law
practice in Philadelphia to join the U.S. Army serving as paymaster with the
rank of major in 1861 and eventually serving as chief paymaster under General
Irwin McDowell in 1868.
1834:
Birthdate of “English philanthropist, social reformer, architect, and Jewish
communal leader Nathan Solomon Joseph who “collaborated on the design of a
number of important synagogues, including the Garnethill Synagogue, New West
End Synagogue, and Hampstead Synagogue” and who was he author of Religion
Natural and Revealed: A Series of Progressive Lessons for Jewish Youth
(1879) and The Persecution of the Jews in Russia (1890).
1835(26th
of Kislev, 5596): Second Day of Channukah
1836:
In Bavaria, Seligman Ben Schemmel Landauer, the Bavarian born son of Samuel Joseph Arjeh Landauer and Rebecca
Breindl Landauer, and his wife of Zirle (Cilli) Landauer gave birth to Isaac
Landauer.
1836:
In Dover, UK, the Dover Telegraph reported that "Mr. Danofsky, of King
Street, St James, Westminster, has married Mrs. Hughes, widow of the late Mr.
Moses Hughes formerly of Albion Hotel, Dover.”
1837:
Three days after he had passed away, Jacob Abrahams, the father of Abraham,
Joel, Henry and Naphtali Abrahams, was buried today at the “Canterbury Jewish
Cemetery.”
1839(10th of Tevet, 5600): Asarah B’Tevet
1839(10th
of Tevet, 5600): Joseph Flesch, the son of Abraham Flesch, whose
accomplishments included translating the works of Philo into Hebrew, passed
away today in his native Moravia.
https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/6187
1839:
In Paris, Baron Anselm von Rothschild and Charlotte von Rothschild gave birth
to their second son, Ferdinand James
Anselm von Rothschild an English politician and art collector, and a
member of the prominent Rothschild family of bankers who would pass away
exactly 59 years later on his birthday.
1843(24th
of Kislev, 5604): The first Chanukah candle was kindled in the evening of the
day when, according to some sources A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
was published.
1844:
In Poland, Abraham Jacob Morris and his wife gave birth to Benjamin Morris who
began his cantorial career in London before taking the position with
Congregation Beth Miriam in Long Branch, NJ.
1846:
In Vienna, Moritz Pollak and Julia Benjamin gave birth to Emile Pollak, the
husband of Carrie Benjamin who “came to Cincinnati in 1865” where he became
President of the Block-Pollak Iron Company and a leader of the Jewish community
as can be seen by his membership on the board of directors of Hebrew Union
College and the United Jewish Charities.
1846:
Jeaneta Mallan and Kent, England native Joseph Davis gave birth to Rosetta
Davis.
1847(10th
of Tevet, 5608): Asara B’Tevet
1849:
In Washington, D.C. Sarah Ann Hays and Major Alfred Mordecai, the West Point
graduate who had commanded the arsenal at Washington, D.C. during the
Mexican-American War gave birth to Mordecai Gratz the husband of Frances
Kingsland Gifford and author whose works included “Notice of Jacob Mordecai,
Found and Proprietor From 1809 to 1818 of the Warrenton, NC Female Seminary”
and A Report on the Terminal Facilities for Handling Freight of the
Railroads Entering the Port of New York: Especially of Those Railroads Having
Direct Western Connections
1851:
In Baltimore, MD, Members of the Kaschurn Lodge, No. 3, a Jewish fraternal
organization, met with Lajos Kossuth, the exiled Hungarian leader. They gave him seventy-five dollars. They also gave him three banners. The largest one had three full length
pictures of Moses, Washington and Kossuth.
Moses represented Asia; Washington represented America and Kossuth
represented Europe. The two smaller
banners contained the statement, in both Hebrew and English, “Thy enemies shall
come against thee one way, and flee before thee seven ways. In thee shall all the nations of the earth be
blessed.”
1852:
Benjamin Disraeli finished serving as Chancellor of the Exchequer. He will be replaced by Gladstone. This is the first of three times that
Disraeli will hold this office in the English government.
1852(6th
of Tevet, 5613): Jacob Prince was buried in the “Lauriston Road Jewish
Cemetery” after he has passed away today.
1854(26th
of Kislev, 5615): Second Day of Chanukah observed for the first time since the
Republican Paty was formed in Ripon, WI
1857(30th
of Kislev, 5618): Rosh Chodesh Tevet; Sixth day of Chanukah
1857:
Iranistan, a Moorish Revival mansion in Bridgeport, Connecticut designed by the
Austrian-American architect Leopold Eidlitz caught on fire tonight.
1859(21st
of Kislev, 5620): Parashat Vayeshev
1859:
British political leader Henry Fitzroy, the husband of Hannah Rothschild and
the son-in-law of Nathan Mayer Rothschild passed away.
1859:
During his sermon at the Greene Street Synagogue, Rabbi Raphall delivered “a
fervent appeal on behalf” of the Jews who had been forced to seek refuge at
Gibraltar because of the war between Spain and Morocco. The Jews fled because of their justified fear
of attacks by the enraged native population.
Several thousand had been forced to leave all of their possessions
behind and were now living in tents provided by the British colonial government
and eating food provided by funds from the Jews of England. The congregation responded by immediately
raising several hundred dollars to aid their suffering co-religionists.
1859:
It was reported today that “From Austria, amid the echoes of Hungarian
dissatisfaction, and Tyrolese boldness, come the reports of promised reform. It
is stated as a certain fact that in a few days the Emperor will issue a decree,
relieving the Jews from many disabilities under which they now lie. The law
which forbade a Jew to have a Christian servant is already repealed; and the
emancipated Israelite can now rejoice in the possession of a cook who hasn't a
conscientious objection to getting up and making a fire, of a Saturday morning.
The expected decree will abolish the old law, by which no one of the three
witnesses required for a Christian's will could be a Jew -- a blind provision,
which has been the source of more trouble to Christians than Jews. Then the
rule, still on the statute-books in Austria, that a Jew's evidence in a civil
case against a Christian should be considered as "doubtful," will be
done away; as also the present prohibition, which prevents any but a Christian
from filling the office of Notary. This last provision is no older than 1855.
Before that year Jews were allowed to be Notaries, and it is said that there is
a Jewish Notary in Prague, who was appointed under the old law, and holds his
office still. It is proper that the Government should concede these rights to
an oppressed class; but one cannot but notice how, through these reforms, it
hopes to escape more pressing and important demands from its subjects. Hungary
demands her constitutional rights, and the Emperor grants a couple of reforms
to Venice. Tyrol desires her ancient and guaranteed privileges, and he
emancipates the Jews at Prague! No matter -- the day is coming
1860(4th
of Tevet, 5654): Seventy-year-old Hanna Bodenheimer, the widow of Emanuel
Bodenheimer passed away today after which she was at the Durbach Jewish
Cemetery in Baden-Württemberg, Germany.
1860(4th
of Tevet, 5654): Seventy-nine-year-old Bella Seixas, the Newport, RI born
daughter o Johabed Levy and Moses Mendes Seixas passed away today.
1860:
In Charleston, SC, Rabbi Henry S. Jacob officiated at the weeding of Daniel S.
Hart and Priscilla Lopez, “the only daughter of David Lopez.”
1860:
“Affairs in France” published today described the conflict between the French
Empress and Achille Fould, the Jewish financier and political leader whom she
used to value as an advisor. The Empress
has changed her view of Fould due to the influence of the Catholic clergy. Fould is not bothered by the possible loss of
the Pope’s temporal power while the clergy and the Empress are greatly
distressed by such a possibility. It is rumored that the Empress has said she
will not return from England until Fould has been dismissed from office.
1861:
In Iowa, Jacob Lehman who would be wounded at the Battle of Shiloh in 1862,
enlisted today in Company D of the 16th Infantry Regiment.
1862(25th
of Kislev, 5623): Chanukah
1862:
Birthdate of Bagdad native Madelien Ellis, the wife of Ellis Ezekiel Isaac
Ellis, who, like her husband would be buried in China.
1862:
Birthdate of Moriz Reosenthal, the native of Lemberg who became a world
renowned pianist and composer.
https://www.amazon.com/Moriz-Rosenthal-Word-Music-Nineteenth/dp/0253346606
1862: General Grant, in issuing his infamous
Order 11, ordered all "Jews as a class" expelled from his lines. In
1863:
Eleven-year-old Frederic Hymen Cowen gave “his first genuine public recital at
the Bijou Theatre of the old Her Majesty’s Opera House.
1864(18th
of Kislev, 5625): Parashat Vayishlach
1864: La
belle Hélène (The Beautiful Helen), an operetta by Jacques Offenbach to
an original French libretto co-authored Ludovic Halévy “was first performed at
Paris's Théâtre des Variétés” today.
1865(29th
of Kislev, 5626): Fifth day of Chanukah
1868:
Three days after he has passed away, Joshua Israel Brandon, the son of Abraham
Israel Brandon and Emily Ascoli and the husband of Jesse De Symons, was buried
today as the “Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery.”
1870:
This evening will mark the close of the Hebrew Fair which has been held for
several days at the 22nd Regiment Armory in New York City.
1871:
Birthdate of Lazarus Goldschmidt, the Lithuanian trained Rabbi who “in 1888
went to Germy and in 1890 entered the /Berlin University…where he devoted
himself to the sudsy of Oriental languages” with an emphasis on “Ethiopic.”
1871:
Today, Charles Frederick Tyrwhitt-Drake
an explorer, naturalist, archaeologist, and linguist joined the initial survey
group of the PEF was led by Captain Richard Warren Stewart.
1872:
In Lebro, Sweden, “architect Emil Victor Langlet and his wife author Clara
Mathilda Ulrika Clementine Söderén” gave birth to Swedish publish Valdemar
Langlet, who along with his Nina Borovko-Langlet “is credit with saving many
Jews” living in Budapest “from the Holocaust by providing Swedish documents
saying that these people were waiting for Swedish nationality.”
1873(27th
of Kislev, 5634): Third Day of Chanukah
1873:
Birthdate of Vilnius native Hyman Elias Goldstein who gained fame as British
magician Horace Goldin.
https://www.lybrary.com/horace-goldin-m-579495.html
1874:
At today’s meeting of the Board of Alderman in New York, the resolution
submitted a t a previous meeting in favor of permitting the Hebrew Benevolent
Orphan Society to sublet their premises” which is property own by the city “was
called up and laid over.”
1875:
The three men convicted of killing a Jewish peddler named Abraham Weissburg are
scheduled to be executed today in New York.
1875:
It was reported today that in the Hebrew Charity Fair’s contest for most
popular minister Dr. Einhorn is in first place with 43 votes followed by Dr.
Isaacs with 37 votes. This is just part
of the many activities connected with this pre-Chanukah fundraising fair.
1875:
P. Nathan Rubenstein was identified as the man who had bought the knife that
was used in the murder of Sarah Alexander. The same witness said she had not
sold this unique item to Lewis Rubenstein, Nathan’s brother. Both of the young men are Jewish.
1876(1st
of Tevet, 5637): Seventh Day of Chanukah; Rosh Chodesh Tevet
1876:
Today’s edition of The Sunday School Helper focuses on Acts xii. 1-11 which
described how King Herod killed James “and because he saw it pleased the Jews,
he proceeded further to take Peter also.” (Editor’s Note – these depictions of
the evil Jews persecuting Christians provided the soil from which ant-Semitism
has grown.)
1877:
In Germany, Joseph and Rosalie Kahn gave birth to Mollie Kahn who in 1906
became Mollie Kahn Fuchs when she married University of Michigan trained civil engineer
Walter Mortiz Fuchs, the mother Miriam, Elizabeth and Walter Paul Fuchs.
1878(21st
of Kislev, 5639): Fifty-six-year-old Solomon Eting Cohen, the son of Kitty
Etting and Benjamin I. Cohen who married anna Maria Denny in 1842 and who was
the father of Solomon, Jr., Benjamin, George, Anna Maria and Herbert Cohen
passed away today.
1878:
Garnier and Schaefer were schooled to play tonight at the Hebrew Fair in
Tammany Hill.[ Garnier and Schaefer were locally famous billiard players and
this match must have been part of the fair’s fundraising activities.]
1880:
Ernst Henrici delivered a speech propagating his anti-Semitic ideas at the
Imperial Hall.
1881(25th
of Kislev, 5642): Chanukah
1881:
In Russia Bessie and Elias Werlinsky gave birth to Philadelphian Morris
Werlinsky, the husband of Rebecca Navaisky Werlinsky
1882:
It was reported today that Herr Belchman has come to the conclusion that there
are both blond- and dark-haired people among the Jews living in Western
Russia. Furthermore, they have “narrower
chests” and “shorter heads” than their non-Jewish counterparts.
1882:
It was reported today that Rabbi Gustav Gottheil had testified before Senators
Boy and Browning who are investigating “corner and futures and the effect… they
have on commerce and public morals.” The Rabbi said he could not speak about
the business aspect of the topic. But as
to the moral implication he cited the Jewish prohibitions against allowing a
man who engaged in gambling to serve as a Judge as a witness. Furthermore, the lure of gambling misled
young man and was comparable to putting a stumbling block before the blind.
1882:
In London, Julia Matilda Waley and stock broker gave birth to British palaeographer,
historian of science, medical historian and philanthropist Dorothea Waley
Singer, the wife of physician Charles Singer with whom she adopted two children
“ Andrew Waley Singer and Nancy Waley Singer” and the sister of Sir Robert
Waley Cohen, the industrialist and “leader of the Anglo-Jewish Community” and Charles
Waley Cohen, “a soldier, barrister and Liberal Party politician.”
1883:
Madame Fanny Janauschek will appear in tonight’s production of “Zillah, the
Hebrew Mother” at the Third Avenue Theatre in New York
1883:
A Jewish peddler named Simon Holzman was assaulted and nearly killed near
Eatontown, NJ.
1884(29th
of Kislev, 5645): Fifth Day of Chanukah
1885:
Julius C. Koosher, a Russian Jew who came to this country after his business
was destroyed in his native land because of his religion and who worked in the
United States worked as a land agent but was cheated out the money owed to him
by the railroad tycoon Henry Villard, was being held by authorities after
having been arrested yesterday for trying to murder 20 prominent Californians
and blow up Chinatown
1886:
20th of Kislev, 5647): According to the Jewish Encyclopedia, seventy-one-year-old
fighter for Italian independence and member of the Italian Parliament Giuseppe
Finzi, the Mantua born son of Rosa and Abraham Finizi passed away today.
https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/6126-finzi-giuseppe
1887(2nd
of Tevet, 5648): Shabbat shel Chanukah; Parashat Miketz
1887:
In Chicago, Charles and Mary Haas gave birth to Rose Alice Alschuler, the child
educator and Zionist who was the wife of Alfred Samuel Alschuler, Sr.
https://jwa.org/people/alschuler-rose
1887:
Simplicius, a story of the Thirty Years' War, with a libretto by Victor Léon
was produced at the Theater an der Wien today.
1888:
In Philadelphia, PA, Mat Goldberger went on trail today for the murder last
April of Mrs. Annie Schuleberg
1888:
The Republican Club of 450 5th Avenue blackballed Benjamin F.
Peixotto and James W. Moses this evening
1889(24th
of Kislev, 5650): Kindle the first Chanukah Candle
1889:
Mrs. Martin M. Lewis took a leading part in the activities at today’s Hebrew
Fair.
1889:
A fire broke in a tenement on Eldridge Street that housed several Jewish owned
businesses as well as a synagogue and school used by Jewish immigrants from
Russia.
1889:
Anton Solki, an itinerant Jewish dentist will be arraigned today in Yorkville
for having attacked Dr. C.H. de Lamater, after the latter had treated him for a
dental problem. The accused does not
remember the attack and can give no reason for having done what he is accused
of doing.
1890(6th
of Tevet, 5651): English writer Philip Abraham, the husband of Harriet Boss and
the father of opera singer Leonora Braham who was Headmaster at the National
Hebrew School in Birmingham whose works included The Autobiography of a Jewish
Gentleman and Autumn Gatherings passed away today in London after which he was
buried at the Balls Pond Road Cemetery.
https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/550-abraham-philip
1890:
The Auxiliary Society of the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society is scheduled to
host a reception at Terrace Garden this evening.
1891:
“Under Cover Of Her Child’s Right” published today described the case of Hannah
Bocks a Russian Jewess who will be allowed to stay in the United States because
her child was born here and “the law will not permit her to be separated from
her child” who is an American by birth.
1891:
Alexander Becce, a Russian Jew living in San Antonio, TX filed suit today in
Federal court against the Hamburg-American Packet Company for $5,000 in damages
after the company refused to honor the tickets it had sold him or to refund his
money.
1891(16th
of Kislev, 5652): Benedict Zuckermann, an observant German-Jewish mathematician
and astronomer passed away today. He was
a colleague of Henrich Graetz and a supporter of Zacharis Frankel.
1892(28th
of Kislev, 5663): Parashat Miketz; Fourth Day of Chanukah
1892:
Birthdate of American biochemist Edwin Cohn.
In
1940 the hard-driving Harvard biochemist Edwin Cohn broke plasma down into its
different proteins — and saved millions of soldiers' lives Most
fatalities in World War I occurred not from the direct physical damage of
bullet wounds but from loss of blood. In the spring of 1940, as another war
seemed inevitable, finding a way to replace lost blood became a medical
priority. Edwin Cohn, a Harvard biochemist, took on the problem of breaking
down blood plasma to isolate a protein called albumin that could be stored for
long periods without spoiling, shipped efficiently and used easily on a
battlefield to save lives. Patriotic blood drives yielded whole blood from
which a small inventory of albumin had been accumulated by
1892:
Rabbi David Cahn conducted services this morning as Rodeph Shalom continued the
celebration of its fiftieth anniversary which included a sermon, delivered in
German, by Rabbi Wise entitled “Retrospective Glances” that traced the history
of the congregation
1892:
In an attempt to exercise better control over the Jews, “the Russian Senate has
promulgated a law requiring that Jewish artisans shall only reside in places
where official boards of trade exist.”
1892:
Samuel Muhr a leading Philadelphia Jewish merchant and Mayer Sulzberger a
prominent Jewish Philadelphia lawyer were among the dignitaries who attended a
dinner at the Art Club in Philadelphia honoring the Secretary of the
Commonwealth of Pennsylvania who was also the Chairman of the National
Democratic Committee.
1892:
The celebration of the 50th anniversary of the founding of Rodeph
Sholom continues today with services starting at 9:30 a.m.
1893:
Birthdate of German native Erwin
Piscator who has been described as one of the most renowned figures
of modern theater famous for his avant-garde productions at the Epic Theater in
Weimar Berlin and his innovative contributions to the American stage.
1893:
Rabbi Joseph Silverman delivered a sermon on “Shall We Give State Aid to
Denominational Schools?” this morning at Temple Emanu-El
1893:
In “France and Autocracy” published today Gabriel Monod of The Contemporary
Reviews writes “we cannot go on feigning ignorance” of the persecution of the
Jews by the “Russian autocratic government.”
1894:
Birthdate of Arthur Fiedler.
Fiedler gained fame as the conductor of the Boston Pops which he turned
into an American institution. He passed
away in 1979.
1895:
“The Sweat-Shop Problem” published today described the growth of the clothing
industry which “has been built up…largely on the cheap labor of poor Jews who
have sought refuge here from oppression in other countries.
1895:
The New York Life Insurance Company made a donation of $500 to the Hebrew
Educational Fair which was conveyed to Oscar Straus in the form of a check from
its president, John A. McCall.
1895:
Max Schindler was injured today when he tried to stop a fight between Italian
and Jewish pushcart peddlers on Essex Street which was being repaved.
1895:
In Cincinnati, Louis H. and Ada Landman gave birth to Solomon
Landman, the husband of “the former Rita Boehm,” father of Doris, Joan, Louis
and Nathan Landman and graduate of the University Cincinnati and Hebrew College
who began his rabbinic career B’rith Sholom Temple in Springfield, Il, founded
the Hillel Chapter at the University of Wisconsin and was leading Temple Isaiah
in Kew Gardens, Queens at the time of his death.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1951/05/21/87260846.pdf
1896:
Twenty-four year old Louis A. Strauss, the Chicago born son of Abraham and
Ernstina (Leopold) Strauss and holder of Ph.D.
from the University of Michigan where he rose to be the Chairman of the
English Department married Elsa Riegelman today in New York City.
1897:
New Yorkers were contributing to American Kollel “incorporated today as ‘The
American Congregation, Pride of Jerusalem.’”
1898(4th
of Tevet, 5659): On his 59th birthday, Liberal MP Ferdinand James
Anselm, Freiherr von Rothschild who had become a British citizen, endowed the
Evelina Hospital for Sick Children in Southwark, south London in memory of his
wife who had died in childbirth and held leadership position in the
Anglo-Jewish community including Warden of the Central Synagogue and Treasurer
of the Jewish Board of Guardians passed away today.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Baron_Ferdinand_de_Rothschild.png
1900(25th
of Kislev, 5661): First Chanukah of the 20th century
1900:
Birthdate of Henry Calechman, who would be buried at B’nai Jacob Memorial Park seventy-seven
years later.
1900:
British soldier and diplomat Sir Matthew Nathan began serving as the Governor
of the Gold Coast.
1900:
New buildings were opened on Ellis Island as it returned to operation following
fire which had meant that immigrants, including tens of thousands of Jewish
immigrants, had been processed at the Barge Office.
1901:
Clara and Emil Worms gave birth to Bella Worms who became Bella Adler when she
married Leo Adler with whom she had three children – Milton, Gunther and Greta.
1902(17th
of Kislev, 5663): On the Jewish calendar, Yahrzeit of Louis de Carabajal and
his mother Francisca Nuenez “who were burned at the stake in an auto-de-fe in
Mexico City in 1596.
1902:
Joseph and Clara Bloch Kern gave birth to Monroe, LA resident Nathan Solomon Kern,
the husband of Novie Cobb Kern and older bother of Joseph Kern, Jr.
1903
(28th Kislev, 5664): On the fourth day of Chanukah The Wright
Brothers made their first powered and heavier-than-air flight in the Wright
Flyer at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. According to some, the success of the
Dayton bicycle men was based on early work by Otto Lielenthal who died during a
flight test seven years before. Arthur L. Welsh, a young Jew from Dayton,
was one of the early pilots who were taught to fly by the Wright brothers. When
Welsh died in 1912 during a test flight, he was the only pilot employed by
Wrights who were close friends as well as his mentors. Finally, Hart O. Berg
played a critical role in helping the Wright Brothers promote their aircraft on
their first European tour and his wife was one of their first, if not the first
woman to fly with the Wrights
1904:
T.C. Evans reviewed “he Life of Lord Beaconsfield” by Walter Sichel, a
“biographical study of the remarkable man, wit, statesman, novelist, the
celebration of whose centenary is now at hand.”
1905:
“After weeks of anxious waiting the national committee which is raising the
relief fund for the victims of the Russian massacres” today received from “Sir
Samuel Montague and Lord Rothschild the first reports concerning the
distribution of the $1,000,000 already sent” from the United States and Jews in
western Europe.
1905:
It was reported today the relief fund for the Jews suffering from the massacres
in Russia totaled $1,172,639 including $424 from the “Orthodox Hebrews of
Jacksonville, Fla.”
1905:
A map published today “shows at a glance where…massacres of the Jews have
occurred “ in Russia.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=980DE4DB153AE733A25754C1A9649D946497D6CF
1906(30th
of Kislev, 5667): Rosh Chodesh Tevet; Sixth Day of Chanukah
1906:
Oscar Straus became the third U.S. Secretary of Commerce and Labor.
1906:
It was reported today that as part of the Czar’s crackdown on revolutionaries,
in Ceznestochowa, a Polish town with “a population of about 50,000, including
many Jews” “seven so-called terrorists have been by tried by drumhead
courts-martial and executed during the last two weeks.”
1907:
Thirty-one-year-old Armour Institute of Technology trained architect, Alfred
Samuel Alschuler, the Chicago born son of Samuel and Fannie Alschuler “who was
the first architect to used reinforced concrete in the City of Chicago” and who
was a member of North Shore Temple Israel married Rose Haas today.
1907:
Over one hundred people who had received invitations from Mrs. Samuel
Guggenheim, Mrs. Solomon Schecther, Rabbi J.L. Magnes, Jacob Feschwar, Louis
Loeb and Bernard G. Richard attended a meeting tonight at Temple Beth-El where
it was decided to form a Society of Jewish Art the purposed of “will be the
promotion of all forms of Jewish art.
1908:
it was reported today that Oscar S. Straus, the Secretary of Commerce and Labor
was among those seated at “the President’s Table” at the Twenty-third Annual
Banquet of the Society of New York which was also attended by Otto Kahn and
Daniel Guggenheim.
1909:
Muslims in Tunis protested when Jews were going to be put under French
jurisdiction. Muslims stated that this was discriminatory and a violation of
treaties, even though it was the Muslims the French were going to protect the
Jews from.
1910(16th
of Kislev, 5671): Parashat Vayislach
1910:
Dr. H. Pereira Mendes, the rabbi of the Synagogue of Spanish and Portuguese
Jews is seriously ill at him having developed blood clots in his legs.
1910:
According to a report today from St. Petersburg, “forty Jewish families will be
expelled from Moscow on January 14” because “they do not come with the
provisions of the new law recently passed by the Czar permitting Jewish
merchants of the first guild and their families to reside in the city and
province of Moscow.”
1911(26th
of Kislev, 5672): Second Day of Chanukah
1911:
Rabbi Joseph Silverman delivered an address at Temple Eman-El today in the wake
of the abrogation by the United States of the Treaty of 1832 with Russia which
subjected Jewish Americans visiting Russia to the same discriminatory laws to
which Russian Jews were subjected.
1911:
“A bronze memorial tablet to the late Abraham Abraham, the Brooklyn merchant
and philanthropist, was unveiled today at the Brooklyn Hebrew Orphan Asylum at
the close of the annual meeting.
1912:
In Chicago, Sinai Temple is scheduled to host the Chicago Woman’s Aid for Opera
Day this afternoon..
1912:
The funeral for Ernest J.D. Rappaport, the eighteen-year-old son of Rabbi and
Mrs. Julius Rappaport is scheduled to take place this afternoon.
1913:
Birthdate of American businessman Sol Linowitz who served as Chairman of the
Board of Xerox Corp and negotiated the return of the Panama Canal.
1913:
It was reported today that Judge Leonard S. Roan who had presided over the
original Leo Frank trial and refused to grant a new trial “said that he
personally was not absolutely convinced of the accused’s guilt or innocence.”
1914(29th
of Kislev, 5675): Fifth day of Chanukah
1914:
Tulane Medical School graduate Dr. Sidney K. Simon, the New Orleans born son of
Charles and Dora (Kohn) Simon and Professor of Gastroenterology married Emma
Roos Dreyfous today in New Orleans.
1914:
At Clark University, the school’s president gave the after-dinner address at
the first banquet of the Menorah Society.
1914:
“Albert Lucas, Secretary of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of
America announced today that he had received a letter from the Secretary of the
Jews’ Temporary Shelter in London saying ‘If you can see your way of further
assisting us in our extremely heavy outlay by making a grant to our funds you
can be sure that the money will be put to the best possible purpose, especially
for food and lodging for the Yiddish-speaking and refugees from Belgium.’”
1914:
It was reported today that Senator Ellison Smith the South Carolina bigot and
racist who was Chairman of the Committee on Immigration expressed his
opposition to any change to the immigration laws that might be of benefit of
Jews Russia.
1914:
In New York, Herbert L. Satterlee “announced that he had completed arrangements
with Felix Warburg who was at the head of the committee for the relief of the
Jews in Poland, whereby the Polish American Relief Committee and the Polish
American Relief Committee and Mr. Warburg’s committee would work in unison in
relieving the distress of the Poles.”
1914: The Turks expelled the Jews of Tel Aviv,
sending them to Egypt Russia Turkey
1914:
This “afternoon Bedouin police raided the Ghetto at Jaffa, arrested 1,600
persons and drove them at the point of the bayonet” While being forced aboard
the already overcrowded Florio, “sever of the men resenting the brutalities to
their wives were thrown overboard by boatmen and drowned before the eyes of the
women.” (Editor’s note – these Jews were transported to Alexandria where they
found temporary refuge at the Hotel Metropole)
1915(10th
of Tevet, 5676): Asara B’Tevet
1915(10th
of Tevet, 5676): Seventy-one-year-old Imperial Councilor Adolf Schrmack passed
away today in Vienna.
1915:
Today “The National Workmen’s Committee on Jewish Rights, a body representing
500,000 Jewish workers organized ‘to assist in obtaining rights for Jews in
countries of the present war zone where they are deprived of their rights,’
received a letter …from Samuel Gompers which included a set of resolutions
adopted by the American Federation of Labor at its recent convention in San
Francisco in which the federation took steps to co-operate with the committee.”
1916:
“The Joint Distribution Committee which is led by Chairman Felix M. Warburg and
Treasurer Herbert H. Lehman continued to receive “large contributions from all
parts of the country” including $5,500 from the Baltimore Committee and $2,000
from the Omaha Committee.
1916:
It was reported today that the Central Committee for the Relief of Jews
Suffering Through the War of which Harry Fischel is the Treasurer received $225
from the committee in Sioux City, Iowa, $124 from Rokeach and Sons and $35 from
the committee in Marshalltown, Iowa.
1916:
At tonight’s annual meet of the Brooklyn Federated Jewish Charities, Edward
Lazansky the former Secretary of the State for New York was President of the
organization succeeding Benjamin H. Namm who had held the job for the past four
years.
1916:
Tonight, “a recommendation that the Eastern Council of Reform Rabbis
representing more than 1,000,000 Jewish in the Eastern and New England States,
officially indorse the German peace proposals and a pleas that a federation of
synagogues be formed at once to check the spread of Jewish religious
indifference were made…by Rabbi Joseph Silverman at Temple Emanu-El in his
Presidential message to eighty rabbis assembled for the Autumn conference of
the council” which was chaired by Justice Irving Lehman.
1916:
Today, 750 people heard a sermon delivered by Rabbi Jesse Bienfeld at the
dedication of “Judah Halevi Temple, a $30,000 white brick structure at 106th
Street and Morris Avenue” which was atteneded by Judge Otto Rosalsky and
Charles Eno.
1916:
Felix M. Warburg, the President of the Manhattan Federated Jewish Charities and
Rabbi Stephen S. Wise expressed their support for the “amalgamation” of the
Brooklyn and Manhattan federations.
1917(2nd
of Tevet, 5678): Eighth Day of Chanukah
1917(2nd
of Tevet, 5678): Sixty-four-year-old Julia Matilda Cohen, the daughter of Jacob
and Matilda Waley and the wife of Nathaniel Cohen who was the longtime
president of the Union of Jewish Women and author whose works included The
Children’s Prayer Book…with a Prayer Book for Home Use in Jewish Families,
Infants’ Bible Reader and Addresses to Children, passed away today.
1917(2nd
of Tevet, 5678): Thirty-six-year-old Dov Ber
Borochov, one of the founding fathers of the Labor Zionist movement, passed
away.
http://www.yivoencyclopedia.org/article.aspx/Borokhov_Ber
http://streetsofisrael.wordpress.com/2013/04/10/10-things-you-need-to-know-about-dovberborochov/
http://www.haaretz.com/misc/article-print-page/this-day-in-jewish-history-a-great-zionist-mind-dies-young.premium-1.485342?trailingPath=2.169%2C2.216%2C2.221%2C2.489%2C
1917:
Birthdate of Jacob Landau, the native of Philadelphia who gained fame as an
artist “known for his evocative works on the human condition and whose works
can be found in in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art,
the Library of Congress, the Museum of Modern Art, and the National Gallery.
https://www.davidsongalleries.com/collections/jacob-landau
1917:
A newly independent Finland moved to make Jews full-fledged today when
“Parliament approved an act concerning ‘Mosaic Confessors’” that made Jews
“Finnish nationals.”
1917:
“According to the Messaggero, the Pope has addressed a circular to all Bishops
in the belligerent countries declaring that if any Christian State aids the
Turks in an attempt to retake Jerusalem it will be condemned by the Hoy See.”
1918(14th
of Tevet, 5679): Vilna born “Rabbi Isaac Zev Vendrovksky, the author of many
works on Jewish law and literature” who in 1895 “went to South America where he
was placed in charge of a division of the Baron de Hirsch colonies” before
moving to New York in 1900 where became “consulting editor for religious work
on the Jewish Daily News” passed away today.
1918:
Sanger Brothers, the department store chain founded by Sam Sanger in Waco, TX
and which was “often described as the pioneer retail stores of Texas” was incorporated
today.
https://wacohistory.org/items/show/85
1918:
Release date for “Carmen” a 1918 German silent drama film directed by Ernst
Lubitsch
1919(25th
of Kislev, 5680): Chanukah
1919:
In Berlin, “the government is taking measures to prevent any violent outbreak
of anti-Semitism” which are opposed by “the Pan German press.”
1920:
It was reported today ant one-eighth of the 2,000 students attending the
University of Chicago are Jewish.
1920:
Mary Werne, the wife of Rabbi Isaac Werne who would go on to become the Chief
Orthodox Rabbi of the United Orthodox Rabbinate of Los Angeles, passed away today
in Dallas after which she as buried in the Shearith Israel Memorial Park.
1920(6th
of Tevet, 5681): Seventy-five-year-old Louise Herschman Mannheimer, the Prague
born daughter Joseph Hershman and Katherine Urbach and wife of Professor Sigmund Mannheimer who gained fame as the author, contralto and “founder of
the Cincinnati Jewish Industrial School for Boys while raising Eugene, Leo,
Jennie and Edna Mannheimer
1921(16th
of Kislev, 5682): Parashat Miketz
1921:
In Chicago, Morton David Cahn, the son of Joseph and Miriam Cahn, and Julia
Elizabeth Cahn gave birth to Alan Hofeller Cahn.
1921:
Nathan Weiner, the Russian born son of Rebecca Selzer and Samuel Weiner, the Columbia
School of Pharmacy graduate who in 1907 came to the United States where he was
member of the ZOA and Chevra Anshe Mir and who in 1921 went into the dress
manufacturing business married Rebeca Polovnick today.
1922(27th
of Kislev, 5683: Third Day of Chanukah
1922:
In “Blindness Waning in Palestine” published today Rabbi Stephen S. Wise
described how the British, with the help of the Hadassah society have
successful waged war against trachoma.
1923:
Early in his career, Sid Terris fought a future Lightweight Boxing Champion “to
a ten round draw at Madison Square Garden” in New York City.
1924:
Birthdate of Yohai Ben-Nun, the sixth commander of the Israeli Navy.
1924:
In Krefeld, Germany, women’s department store owner Eugene Frank and classical
singer Luise (Wallerstein) Franks gave birth Sosanna Frank who gained fame as
Susan Feingold whose “Bloomingdale Family Program provided preschoolers with a
haven” and which became a model for the Head Start Program. (As reported by
Alex Vadukul)
1925:
Having been appointed by President Coolidge “to a seat on the United States
District Court for the Eastern District of New York” Grover M. Moscowitz, the
Hot Springs, AR born son of Bertha Less and Morris Moscowitz and the husband of
Miriam Greenbaum awaited confirmation by the U.S. Senate.
1925:
“An important discovery was made near Jaffa” when “archaeologist unearthed a
mausoleum containing a hall, two chambers and a small niche
1926:
“Dig Up Jerusalem Walls” published today described the ongoing excavation of
“the course of the third wall of the City of Jerusalem” “undertaken by the
Hebrew University and the Jewish Archaeological Society under the supervision
of Dr. Sukenik.”
1926(12th of Tevet, 5687):
Sixty-eight-year-old innovative Memphis cotton merchant and active member of Children of Israel
Congregation Joseph Newburger, the Coffeeville, Mississippi born son of Esther
Lichtenstadter and Leopold Newburger and graduate of Spring Hill College who “conceived
the idea of selling cotton directly to the mill” which led The Newburger Cotto
company having “agencies in England, France and Holland and offices in Germany,
Italy, Switzerland, Sweden and Greece” passed away “suddenly” today at the Ritz
Carlto Hotel in New York City.
http://www.jhsmem.org/bio/JosephNewburger.pdf
1927(23rd
of Kislev, 5658): Parashat Vayeshev
1927:
“Two Flaming Youths,” a silent comedy with a script co-authored by Herman J.
Mankiewicz and edited by Rose Loewinger, the Manhattan born daughter of Julie
Gutman and Jacob Loewinger.
1927:
“The Spider,” for which Alex Yokel served as General Press Representative was
performed for the last time on Broadway at the Music Box Theatre.
1927:
It was reported today that Rabbi Edward Lissman of the Riverside Synagogue has
said that “Christianity and Judaism traditionally run parallel in the latitudes
of human experience and if the ethics of civilization are to be save, let the
ideals of the two beliefs predominate in the interests of perpetual
righteousness.”
1927:
“Abraham Krotoshinsky, the savior of the "Lost Battalion," who won
many war medals, has become a postal clerk in the New York postoffice through
an Executive order issued today by President Coolidge waiving civil service
status.”19
1927:
Final performance of “The Spider” at the Music Box Theatre which was owned and operated by Sam Harris and Irving
Berlin and was leased by Schubert Organization and for which Alex Yokel served
as “General Press Representative.
1928:
Aaron Copland was part of a group participating in a musical event at the New
School for Social Work today.
1928:
New York Municipal Court Justice Panken presided over a meeting of the American
Ort tonight at the Pennsylvania Hotel where he said today “anti-Semitism runs
rampant” in Russia and Nathan Chanin of the Jewish Socialist Federation said
“Jewish children were discriminated against in Russian vocational schools”
while “Jews were prohibited from buying food in the Soviet cooperatives” which
meant they “were obliged to deal directly with farmers who exacted exorbitant
prices.”
1929: In New
York City, Oliver C. and Ida Panish Safir gave birth to William Safire. Unique among the Jews of his generation,
Safire was a conservative Republican who was a speech writer for President
Nixon. He spent almost three decades as
a political columnist for The New York
Times.
1929: In Pensacola, FL, the two-story brick building
on East Chase Street which was the home to Temple Beth El whose original
building had burned down in 1895 was struck by a devastating fire that “almost
completely destroyed the structure.”
1930: “The recent charge by the Hitlerite organ in
Berlin, the Voelkische Boebachter that 80 percent of the judges in
Chicago were Jews was refuted by figures obtain today in Chicago which showed
that only 13 of the 100 jurists in all courts are Jews.
1930: According to reports published today, Arabs
have failed to stop Jewish settlers from plowing their land at Hedera after
they lost a lawsuit designed to keep the land from the Jews. After the police intervened, the Arabs agreed
to await the outcome of the appeal before taking any further action. The Arabs said that they understood the
recently issued White Paper to mean that all land in Palestine belonged to
them.
1931: “Tonight or Never,” a comedy directed by
Mervyn LeRoy, produced by Samuel Goldwyn, with music by Alfred Newman and
co-starring Melvyn Douglas was released in the United States today.
1931: In Manhattan, Blanche and Milton Frankfurt
gave birth to Stephen Owen Frankfurt “an advertising executive who helped lead
the transformation of television commercials from straightforward sales pitches
in the 1950s to sophisticated, art-designed productions” (As reported by Leslie Kaufman)
1931: The meeting of the World Islamic conference
came to an end in
1932:
In response “to an inquiry by Paul Felix Warburg and Ira M. Younker, chairmen
of the campaign of the Federation of the Support of Jewish Philanthropic
Societies,” Dr. Shirley W. Wynne “warned today that epidemics and ill health
surely would result from prolonged malnutrition.”
1932:
In Warsaw, the Bund continues its three-day celebration of the jubilee
celebrating its 35 years of existence.
1933: In today’s Advent sermon Michael von
Faulhaber, the Cardinal Archbishop of Munich “spoke to the "People of
Israel" about the "Old Testament" and declared "This
treasure did not grow in your own garden... this condemnation of usurious
land-grabbing; this war against the oppression of the farmer by debt, this
prohibition of usury, is certainly not the product of your spirit!".
(Editor’s Note: Guenter Lewy concludes: "It, therefore, is little short of
falsification of history when Faulhaber's sermons in 1933 are hailed by one
recent Catholic writer [Yves Congar] as a 'condemnation of the persecution of
Jews)
1934:
In Chicago Samuel Petlin, who went from being a cantor to Poland to working in
a cleaning plant in the United States and “Rose (Cohen) Petlin” gave birth to
painter Irving Petlin who lost at least 49 members of his family in the
Holocaust. (As reported by Richard Sanomir)
1935:
Based on votes counted so far, Meier Dizengoff trails Laborite Joseph Aronowitz
in the Tel Aviv mayoral election held on Sunday.
1936:
Governor Herbert H. Lehman is scheduled to deliver the opening address at the
Jewish Theological Seminary in what will be the first in a series of programs
designed to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the institution.
1936:
The death of Aaron Solomon Bakestein, a New York City rabbi was “announced” today.
1937:
Temple
Shaaray Tefila began a weekend of services dedicating their reconstructed
sanctuary. The Temple had been the victim of an arsonist’s fire in March
necessitating this rebuilding project.
1937:
The Palestine Post reported that
three Arabs were killed when British troops and police fought a large Arab gang
near Tulkarm.
1937:
The Palestine Post reported that a
Jewish boy of 16 was killed when a Polish hooligan shot him and threw a bomb at
a shop in the village of Czarna, near Warsaw, completely demolishing it. Polish
officials were reported to be planning to deport, with French approval, some 30,000
Jewish families, 120,000 persons to
1938:
After almost two weeks of terrorist activities in Haifa during which three
Arabs and four Jews have been killed, Haifa enjoyed a third day “of
tranquility.”
1939:
The 18th annual convention of the Agudath Israel Youth Council which
had been organized in 1922 with purposed to uniting “Jewish youth in the spirit
o the Torah and in that spirit to solve the problems that confront Jewry in
Palestine and in the Diaspora and whose members included Daniel Baron, Israel
Feigenbaum, Morris Davidowitz and Albert Hook, came to an end today in NYC.
1939(5th
of Tevet, 5700): Fifty-seven-year-old Congressman William Irving Sirovich
passed away today.
http://history.house.gov/People/Detail/21701
1940:
Thanks to the efforts of Marge Iverson, the wife of Phillip Iverson, The St,
Johnsbury Jewish Woman’s Club held its first meeting in St. Johnsbury, Vermont.
1940: Drunken SS guards at the
Sachsenhausen labor camp awaken Jews during a frigid night and order them to
roll in the snow.
1941(27th
of Kislev, 5702): Third Day of Chanukah
1941:
Fifty-six year old Oskar Blumentahl was transported today from Prague to
Terezin, the first step on a journey that would lead to his murder in the first
month of the New Year.
1941:
Presidential Executive Order 8982 created the Board of Economic Warfare among
whose employees was Raphael Lemkin the Polish lawyer who created the term
“genocide” in 1944.
1941:
The slaughter of the Jews of Skede, which began on December 15, came to an end.
German security police and Latvian police marched almost three thousand Jews to
a ditch, forced them to strip and then shot them in groups of ten. For those who doubt the truth, Yad Vashem has
a photograph that was taken by one of the German or Latvian killers.
http://www1.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/this_month/december/06.asp
1941:
German Christian church leaders of Saxony, Nassau-Hesse, Mecklenburg,
Schleswig-Holstei, Anhalt, Thuringia and Lubeck announced that the “severest
measures” should be taken against the Jews, who should be expelled from German
territories.
1941(27th of Kislev, 5702): Dr. David
Dubslo and two of his colleagues died of spotted typhus while treating Gypsies
who had been sent to the
1942:
Celebration of the 80th birthday of Moriz Rosenthal.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive/pdf?res=9C0CE2D6173FE33BBC4B52DFB4678389659EDE
1942:
“Random Harvest,” the film version of the novel with the same name directed by
Mervyn LeRoy, with a screenplay co-authored by George Foreschel and filmed by
Joseph Ruttenberg was released today United States.
1942:
Dr. Samuel Goldenson is scheduled to officiate at the funeral services for
David M. Bressler at Temple Emanu-El
1942:
The Yishuv announces a 30-day period of mourning to commemorate the tragedy of
the Jews in
1942: Pressure from members of
Parliament, from Jewish groups in
1942: Accepting the United States
government’s position that the Jews being massacred by the Germans can be
helped only by a total and unconditional Allied victory over Germany, the
American press continues to treat the Holocaust as just another war story and
is unwilling to discuss the systematic annihilation of the Jews. Given the
Allied governments' knowledge of the Holocaust at this time, waiting until the
Allied Armed Forces have achieved a total victory over the Germans indicates
that the Allied governments have accepted the probability that the majority of
European Jews will be killed before the Germans can be stopped.
1942: Jewish inmates at the labor
camp at
1942: The Allies
issued a statement saying Jews were being taken to tBirkenau, the part of
Auschwitz devoted to extermination and killed.
1943
Sixty-year-old German actress who was forced to divorce her Jewish husband
actor Fritz Spira by the Nazis and was the mother of Camilla Spira whom she
saved from the Weterbork transit camp (a first stop on the trip to death in the
East) and actress Steffie Spira passed away soon after hearing that Fritz had
died in a concentration camp in Yugoslaia.
1943: Transport 63 departed with a cargo
of French Jews being sent to Nazi-Germany
1943: Jews are executed at
1943:
Birthdate of Barbara Berman who as Barbara Berman Dobkin, the wife of Eric
Dobkin became “the pre-eminent Jewish feminist philanthropist of the end of the
twentieth and beginning of the twenty-first century.”
http://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/dobkin-barbara
1944(1st
of Tevet, 5705): Rosh Chodesh Tevet coincides with the 2nd day of
the Battle of the Bulge.
1944:
On the second day of the Battle of the Bulge Sergeant Roddie Edmonds who
refused to tell the Germans which of his troops were Jewish saying definitely
that “We are all Jews here” ate his last meal.
1945(13th
of Tevet, 5706): Eighty-year old music publisher, Edward Bennet Marks, the son
of Bennet and Pauline (Spero) Marks, the husband of Miriam Chuck with whom he
had three children who was a “member of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s
Council for Coordination Industry” and the President of the highly successful
Edward B Marks Music Corporation whose works included “Kaddish of My Ancestry”
passed away today.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1945/12/18/88322520.pdf
1945:
U.S. Senate votes for Wagner-Taft resolution calling for free entry of Jews
into Palestine and establishment of Jewish commonwealth. Wagner is Senator
Robert Wagner, a New York liberal Democrat. Taft is Senator Robert Taft a
conservative Republican from Ohio. This
shows the bipartisan support the measure had.
1945:
Birthdate of Novisibrsk native Ariye (Arik) Paz (Feingold) who parents Zelda
and Simcha immigrated to Israel in 1948 where he served on the Submarine Dakar
which was lost on January 25, 1968 at the age of 22.
1946:
With the assistance of Rabbi Louis Gerstein, Rabbi David de Sola Pool of the
Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue conducted the funeral service for 84-year-old
“American social worker, labor activist and suffragist” Maud Nathan whose
prominent relations included Emma Lazarus and Justice Benjamin Cardozo”
followed by a burial at the Cypress Hills Cemetery in Queens.
1946:
Sylvia Fine and Danny Kaye gave birth to their daughter Dena,
1946:
Land purchases and budgetary matters were discussed at a meeting of the World
Zionist Congress.
1946: Birthdate of Hamilton, Canada native Eugene
Levy the writer and comedic actor is best known to Americans for his role
in “American Pie.”
1947:
Birthdate of Russian violinist Zakhar Bron.
1947:
Dorothy Fuldheim became television’s first female news anchor.
https://jwa.org/thisweek/dec/17/1947/dorothy-fuldheim-becomes-televisions-first-female-news-anchor
1947:
Birthdate of Eddie Antar who was the cofounder of the electronics retail chain
Crazy Eddie, Inc. He fled to
1947:
Birthdate of New York City native and holder of Ph.D. in linguistics from
Harvard, Alan Jeffrey “Jerry” Nussbaum, the professor of Indo-European
linguistics, and the Greek and Latin languages at Cornell University and
husband of philosopher Professor Martha Nussbaum.
1947:
In the face of mounting violence and fearing that worse was to come, the Jewish
leaders of Jerusalem opened a blood bank with goal of producing 1000 doses of
plasma.
1947:
The U.S. State Department expressed its fears that the Soviet Union is
supplying arms to both sides of the Palestine conflict.
1947:
The Arab League Council announced it will stop the proposed partition of
Palestine by force and begins raids on the Jewish communities in Palestine.
1947:
The State Department reported that the Arab League Council had begun buying
weapons to implement its policy of thwarting the partition of Palestine.
1947:
Moshe Shertok, Jewish Agency political head, charges that British are obstructing
partition and that British administration does not protect Jews from Arab
attacks, yet they prevent Jews from defending themselves. Dr. Nahum Goldmann,
1947:
The Jewish Agency executive, reports Jewish plans for Swiss-like neutrality.
1947:
Pinchas Ben-Porat, a pilot with Sherut Avir, the air arm of Haganah, boarded
his single engine RWD-13 and flew a medical doctor to the small town of Beit
Eshel.
1947:
After completing his flight to Beit Eshel, “Ben-Porat was assigned a support
role to Nevatim, a Jewish settlement in the Negev desert. When Nevatim came
under attack by Arab irregulars, Ben-Porat flew an RWD 13 or Auster to Nevatim.
Upon arriving, he removed the right door of the plane and set up a Bren gun and
gunner with several hand grenades. Ben-Porat and his gunner flew a half-hour of
close air support. The tactic was emulated by many Jewish pilots and crew in
the Israeli War of Independence.” Once he completed that leg of the mission
Ben-Porat was supposed to fly to Nevatim, but learning that 200 Arabs were
assaulting it, he removed the doors of his aircraft to install a Bren Gun, and
with a volunteer gunner and some hand grenades, took off for the village
1948:
Four thousand, one hundred Jews set sail from Yugoslavia for Israel.
1949:
Today marked the final performance of the original Broadway production of
“Regina” a Mrc Blitzstein opera based Lillian Hellman’s “The Little Foxes”
conducted by Maurice Abravanel, choreographed by Anna Sokolow and starring
Brenda Lewis “Birdie.”
1950:
Actress Ruth Roman, the daughter of Lithuanian-Jewish parents, married Mortimer
Hall.
1951:
In Chicago, Bernard Meltzer, “a former prosecutor at the Nuremberg war crimes
trials” and his wife gave birth to Daniel Julius Meltzer, the Harvard Law
School Professor who was an adviser to President Obama.
1952: According
to a report issued today by Moshe Kol, co-treasurer of the Jewish Agency for
Palestine, and chairman of the Youth Aliyah management committee in Israel
twenty million dollars has been expended by Hadassah, the Women's Zionist
Organization of America, on its Youth Aliyah (youth immigration) activities in
Israel in the last eighteen and a half years.
1952:
The Jerusalem Post reported that the
new Mapai-General Zionists coalition won 73 seats in the Knesset.
1952:
The Jerusalem Post reported that in
1952:
The Jerusalem Post reported that
officers and men of the Jerusalem Area Police Force contributed IL 136 to the
Post's Hanukkah Toy Fund, the largest amount given by any organized group of workers
and assisted the newspaper's volunteers in the distribution of toys and sweets
in the Jerusalem Corridor's outlying ma'abarot.
1953(11th
of Tevet, 5714): Seventy-four-year-old Carrie Davidson, “a founder of the
National Women’s League of the United Synagogue of America,” “the editor for 24
years of The Women’s League Outlook” and the widow of “Dr. Israel Davidson, the
Professor of Medieval Hebrew Literature at JTS” with whom she raised two
daughters passed away today after a week long illness.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1953/12/19/83742253.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/davidson-carrie-dreyfuss
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1953/12/19/83742253.pdf
1954(22nd
of Kislev, 5715): Thirty-eight-year-old Ruth Wilma Jaffa Lowenstein, the New
Mexico born daughter of Benjamin Oppenheimer Jaffa and the mother of Ellen
Patricia “Patti” Lowenstein Kight passed away today in Hollywood after which
she was buried at the Home of Peace Memorial Park.
1955(2nd
of Tevet, 5716): Eighth Day of Chanukah; Parashat Miketz
1955:
This morning, Rabbi Leo Y. Goldman is scheduled to deliver a sermon on “When
Dreams Come True” at Northwest Israel Synagogue in Detroit.
1956:
In London, Conservative politician Nigel Lawson, and his first wife socialite
Vanessa Salmon gave birth to journalist Dominic Lawson
1956:
Time magazine “panned" Jewish playwright’s “Night of the Auk”
saying “that a good case of actors…were unhappily squandered on a pudding of a
script…that sounded like cosmic advertising copy.”
1958:
In Cedar Rapids, IA, George and Joyce Skinner gave birth to Kevin Skinner, a
loyal member of Temple Judah.
1959:
“The fourth Knesset started with David Ben-Gurion's Mapai party forming the
ninth government” today.
1959:
Haim-Moshe
Shapira replaced Israel Bar-Yehuda as Internal Affairs Minister.
1959:
Yisrael
Barzilai completed his term in office as Communications Minister.
1959:
Rabbi Ya'akov Moshe Toledano returned to his position as Minister of Religions.
1959:
Violinist Isaac Stern and his wife gave birth to symphony conductor Michael
Stern.
1960(28th
of Kislev, 5721): Parashat Miketz; Fourth Day of Chanukah
1960(28th
of Kislev, 5721): Fifty-nine-year-old Bella Weretnikow Rosenbaum, the first
Jewish female attorney in the state of Washington, passed away today.
http://jwa.org/thisweek/jun/06/1901/bella-weretnikow
1960:
After 488 performances the curtain came down on “Take Me Long” a musical whose
book was co-authored by Joseph Stein and with lighting by Jean Rosenthal.
1961(10th
of Tevet, 5722) Asara B’Tevet observed for the first time during the Presidency
of John Kennedy.
1962(20th
of Kislev, 5723): Latvian born “Hebrew and Yiddish author,” Simon Gerson Bernstein,
the holder of Ph.D. from the University of Berne who came to the United States
in the early 1920’s where he was an active Zionist, and a member of the
National Executive Committee of the American Jewish Congress passed away today
in NYC.
1963(1st
of Tevet, 5724): Seventh Day of Chanukah; Rosh Chodesh Tevet observed for the
first time during the Presidency of Lyndon B. Johnson
1964:
At the Terrace Room of the Plaza, “Rabbi Moshay Mann” officiated at the
marriage Miss Elissa Pamela Landau, daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Gustave J. Laudau”
and “Barry Steven Glassman, son of Mr. and Mrs. Edward Glassman.”
1964:
Nobel Prize winner Victor Francis Hess passed away. A native of
1964:
Dr.
Luther L. Terry, Surgeon General of the Public Health Service, announced today
the Dr. Stanley F. Yolles, the husband of Dr. Tamarath K. Yoles, has been named
director of the National Institute of Mental Health and Assistant Surgeon
General of the Public Health Service.
https://www.nytimes.com/1964/12/18/archives/yolles-named-director-of-mental-health-unit.html
1965:
Funeral services are scheduled to be held at the Riverside Memorial Chapel on
Amsterdam Avenue for 60 year old Columbia University trained attorney Thomas
Charnas, “a leader in efforts to ease the problems of the aged” and husband of
Juliette Schoenbrun Charnas with whom he raised two sons – Stephen and Jonathan
– who president of the Hebrew Convalescent Home in the Bronx and “an active
director of Beth Abraham Hospital” which was also located in the Bronx.
1965(23rd
of Kislev, 5726): Seventy-three-year-old Louis Cohen, the acting Postmaster of
the Bronx who made a career as functionary in the Democratic party starting
with Mayoral election of 1913 and the husband of “the former Belle Lazarus and
father of Robert and Joseph Lazarus, passed away today.
1965: Astronomer David H.
Levy began his search for comets.
1966:
“El Dorado” a western co-starring James Caan was released today in Japan.
1966:
Birthdate of Aryeh Judah Schoen Nusbacher, the New York native who “became a
Senior Lecturer at Sandhurst, a captain in the Territorial Guard and Baal Koreh
at the Guilford Synagogue” and who has been Lynette Nusbacher “since her gender
change in 2007.”
1967(15th
of Kislev, 5728): Seventy-nine year old University of Berlin trained economist and
health educator Savel Simand the Rumanian born son of Morris and Marie Kauffman
who in 1913 came to the United States where he wrote for the New York Times,
lectured at Yale, Harvard and Columbia while serving as the “administrative
director of the Bellevue-Yorkville Health Demonstration and director of public
education for the New York City Health Department passed away today,
1968(26th
of Kislev, 5729): Second day of Chanukah
1968:
After premiering in London yesterday, “Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang” with songs by
Richard and Robert Sherman and a background score by Irwin Kostal was released
today in the United Kingdom.
1968:
It was reported today that the announcement of the rescinding of the order of expulsion
of the Jews by Ferdinand and Isabella took on an additional significance
because it also marked “the opening of the first synagogue built in Spain in
600 years.
1969:
A planned attack by two British national on an El Al plane in London was
“forestalled” today.
1970:
“Alex in Wonderland” a comedy directed and written by Paul Mazursky and
featuring future Oscar winner Michael Lerner was released today in the United
States.
1970:
“Rio Lobo” featuring Sherry Lansing whose other Margaret Heimann “fled from Nazi Germany in 1917 at the age of 17”
was released today in the United States.
1970(19th
of Kislev, 5731): Seventy-two-year-old Aiken, SC native and University of South
Carolina trained attorney Benet Polikoff, Sr, “a partner in the New York law
firm of Polikoff and Clareman” passed away today.
https://www.nytimes.com/1970/12/18/archives/benet-polikoff-sr-counsel-to-actors.html
1972:
Release date for “Avanti!” a comedy produced and directed by Billy Wilder with
a screenplay by Billy Wilder and I.A. L. Diamond.
1972:
“The chairman of the Jewish Agency, Louis A. Pincus, said today that this year
56,000 new settlers arrived in Israel, 30,000 of whom came from the Soviet
Union.”
1972:
“The Heartbreak Kid” a comedy directed by Elaine May, written by Neil Simon and
Bruce Jay Friedman and co-starring Charles Grodin and Jeannie Berlin was
released in the United States today.
1973:
Arab terrorist killed 32 passengers when they tried to attack a Pan American
jet at the Rome airport.
1973(22nd
of Kislev, 5734): Ninety-two-year-old Belle May Loewenstein, the Cleveland born
daughter Ameilia and Nahum Hexter and the wife of Moses Lowenstein and Solomon
Emanuel Ullman (not at the same time) passed away today in Richmond, VA.
1973:
At the Rome airport Arab terrorist hijacked a Lufthansa jet and flew to Kuwait where 13 hostages -12 alive and one dead -
were released and the Kuwaitis released the terrorist to the PLO after refusing
to extradite them to Italy.
1974(3rd
of Tevet, 5735): Seventy-three-year-old Estonian born award winning of
University of Pennsylvania trained architect Louis Isadore Kahn, passed away
today.
https://www.philadelphiabuildings.org/pab/app/ar_display.cfm/21829
1974:
Birthdate of super chef Duff Goldman.
1974:
Release date for “Front Page,” the cinematic adaptation of Ben Hecht’s play
made possible by the writing team of I.A.L. Diamond and Billy Wilder who also
served as the director, starring Walter Matthau and featuring Harold Gould as
“The Mayor” and Allen Garfield as “Kruger.”
1975:
Irene Shubik produced “Rumpole of the Bailey” broadcast today on “Play for
Today.”
1975:
It was reported today that E. Manning Rubin, a senior vice president of Grey
Advertising has “received the Samuel Dalsimer Human Relations award for his
work in behalf of the A.D.L.”
1976(25th
of Kislev, 5737): First Day Chanukah celebrated
for the last time during the Presidency of Gerald Ford
1977:
“Capricorn One” a Mars based mystery directed by Peter Hyams, with music by
Jerry Goldsmith and starring Elliot Gould was released in Japan today.
1978:
Channel 2 (WCBS) broadcasts “Lamp Unto My Feet – Chanukah in Romania” at ten
o’clock this morning.
1978(17th
of Kislev, 5739): Ninety-two-year-old University of Pittsburgh trained lawyer
Louis Kaplan. the “11th national President of the American Jewish
Committee” passed away today.
1978(17th
of Kislev, 5739: Eighty-year-old Irving Jacobson, a star of the Yiddish theatre
who made the successfully transition to the world of American film and
legitimate theatre passed away today.
1979:
CBS broadcast the first episode of “House Calls,” a sit com that included
Richard Lewis playing Dr. Leon Promethesu.
1980(10th
of Tevet, 5741): Asar B’Tevet
1982:
“Tootsie,” starring Dustin Hoffman, with a script by Larry Gelbart, Murray
Schisgal, Barry Levinson and Elaine May was released today in the United
States.
1982:
In the U.K. and U.S. opening of Frank Oz’s “The Dark Crystal.”
1982:
“Best Friends” with a script by Barry Levinson and co-starring Goldie Hawn and
Ron Silver was released in the United States today by Warner Brothers.
1982:
Israeli born cellist Ofra Harnoy, a winner of the 1982 Concert Artists Guild
Award, made her debut this evening at the Carnegie Recital Hall at the age of
17.
1983(11th
of Tevet, 5744): Parashat Vayechi
1983(11th
of Tevet, 5744): Sixty-seven-year-old Murray Siegel, the husband of Simone Siegel,
the father of Robert Siegel and executive director of the West Side Chamber of
Commerce as well as the founder in 1977 of the annual Columbus Avenue
festival, who was cited in 1981 by Mayor Koch for his ''noteworthy
commitment to the economic vitality of New York'' passed away today at Montefiore
Hospital in the Bronx.
1984:
Three people were injured when terrorists hurled grenades at a Tel Aviv bus
stop.
1985:
Yale Laws School graduate Stanley Sporkin, the Philadelphia born son of the
former Ethel Weiner and Judge Maurice Sporkin, began serving as a Judge of the
United States District Court for the District of Columbia.
1986:
“The Name of the Rose” a medieval murder mystery featuring Ron Perlman as
“Salvatore” and Elya Baskin as “Severinus” was released in France today.
1987:
“Synagogue Looks Back on 125 Years” published today provides a history of the
Wilshire Boulevard Temple Israel “the oldest synagogue in Los Angelese.”
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1987-12-17-vw-29522-story.html
1988:
Abdeen Jabara, the 45-year-old president of the Arab-American
Anti-Discrimination Committee, an American citizen, was barred from entering
Israel today. According to a spokesman
for the Foreign Ministry the decision was based on Jabara’s record which
includes “activities as a lawyer defending terrorists, attempts to prevent the
collection of money for Israel, trying to legally prevent the entry of Prime
Minister Shamir into the U.S., and an F.B.I. investigation against him.''
1989:
The New York Times reviewed “Birth Power: The Case for Surrogacy” by
Israeli lawyer Carmel Shalev.
1989:
The first episode of “The Simpsons” whose developers included James L. Brooks
and Sam Simon was broadcast today.
1990(30th
of Kislev, 5751): Sixth Day of Chanukah; Rosh Chodesh Tevet
1990(30th
of Kislev, 5751): Rabbi Boruch Milikowsky of the Talmudical Academy of
Baltimore passed away today.
199110th
of Tevet, 5752): Asara B’Tevet
1992:
After
more than 18 months of racial and ethnic unrest, Jews and blacks joined hands tonight
in an emotional session at Harlem's historic Apollo Theater to recall their
past alliances and pray for future healing. The reason for the gathering was
the showing of a documentary on the black soldiers who liberated Jews from Nazi
concentration camps at the end of World War II. But the real drama occurred on
the great stage of the Apollo after the house lights came up and Jews and
blacks hugged, wept, held hands and vowed to put their differences behind them.
It was an emotional catharsis that included the singing of "We Shall
Overcome," personal reminiscences from the Rev. Jesse Jackson and Mayor
David N. Dinkins's quoting the great Talmudic sage Hillel. Those at the Apollo
last night seemed weary of the fighting and eager to come together, nodding and
applauding as the Mayor quoted the first-century Jewish scholar by asking,
"If not now, when?"Mr. Jackson, who first suggested that the film, "Liberators:
Fighting on Two Fronts in World War II," be used as a vehicle for
reconciliation , said, "The walls that came down in Dachau and Buchenwald
must not be resurrected in Crown Heights or any place."As he spoke, he
reached out for the hands with those around him. At one point he held tight to
Rabbi Leib Glanz, an official of the Satmar Hasidic group, which is based in
Williamsburg, Brooklyn. At another he clasped the hand of Abe Chapnick, a
concentration camp survivor. Mr. Jackson, who angered Jews in 1984 when he
called New York City "Hymietown," spoke softly and haltingly as he
implored the group to remember it was bound by historic links. His appearance
was one of several recently in which he has reached out to the Jewish
community. As the film was shown at the Apollo last night before an invited
audience of 1,200, it was also viewed by gatherings of blacks and Jews at more
than 100 other locations around the city, including synagogues, churches and
private living rooms. At the Apollo, the audience members included the Rev. Al
Sharpton; Betty Shabazz, the widow of Malcolm X; Felix Rohatyn, the financier;
Peggy Tishman of the Jewish Community Relations Council, Representative Charles
B. Rangel of Harlem and Robert M. Morgenthau, the Manhattan District
Attorney."We intend to go on the moral offensive," Mr. Jackson told
the crowd, "and take this message to the nation. We will defeat hatred and
fear and violence." "The pain and violence surrounding Crown Heights
is a challenge to come together, not to fall apart."After Mr. Jackson
spoke, Rabbi Glanz prayed for healing, saying, "Let us have peace and show
the world that we all have backgrounds where we suffered. Let us say to
suffering, enough is enough."Rabbi Glanz's Satmar group was among those
who met with Mayor Dinkins at a tense private meeting in Crown Heights on
Wednesday. The primary group in Brooklyn neighborhood, the Lubavitch, had no
major officials at the Apollo, although several Lubavitch followers attended. A
Jewish communal official who spoke on the condition of anonymity said that
tickets had been set aside for Lubavitch officials but that they declined to
attend, saying that they did not feel that enough progress had been made at the
Wednesday meeting to warrant their attendance. Several of the speakers at the
Apollo last night recalled the great alliance between blacks and Jews. Symbols
of that alliance, they said, included the tragic -- like the murder of three
civil rights workers, two Jews and one black, in Philadelphia, Miss., in 1964
-- and the triumphant, the march through Selma, Ala., in which the Rev. Dr.
Martin Luther King Jr. was joined by a host of rabbis. The focus of the evening
was the encounter between two black Army units, the 761st Tank Batallion and
the 183d Combat Engineers, and the emaciated, hollow-eyed survivors of
Buchenwald. As one survivor, Rabbi Yisrael M. Lau, now the chief rabbi of Tel
Aviv, said in the film, "To us, they looked like angels."Ms. Tishman
called on the audience to "symbolically re-enact that moment of
reconciliation and brotherhood. “and "Not simply to rekindle, but to
refuel the lamp of brotherhood in this city," she said. Mayor Dinkins
received a standing ovation when he took the podium to introduce the movie. He
said that "images and words have been used to great harm" in the
city, and that "it is our task to use them to heal.” The work of
reconciliation, he said, "will take more than one film and one
evening." And he called the night at the Apollo "the first volley in
a long campaign."
1992:
As violence from Palestinian terrorist escalated 415 terrorist leaders of Hamas
and Islamic Jihad were flown to Israel’s northern border and deported to
Lebanon.
1992:
At the Apollo Theater in Harlem, another screening of “Liberators,” directed by
Williams Miles and Nina Rosenblum, was held before an audience of 1,200
prominent Jews and blacks, hosted by three influential politicians: Congressman
Charles Rangel, Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau and Jesse
Jackson. Elie Wiesel, who didn’t appear in the film, sent a videotaped message
of support, and the event was broadcast on WNET. (As reported by Mark Schulte)
http://www.timesofisrael.com/ceremony-marks-20-years-since-oscar-nominated-sham/
1993:
Today Judith Rodin became the first graduate of the University of Pennsylvania
to serve as the president of that school and she became the first woman to
serve as president of an Ivy League university.
1993(3rd
of Tevet, 5754): Fifty-year-old actress Janet Margolin lost her battle with
ovarian cancer and passed away today.
http://www.nytimes.com/1993/12/18/obituaries/janet-margolin-film-and-tv-actress-50.html?_r=0
1993:
“Robin Hood: Men in Tights” a comedy directed, produced and written by Mel
Brooks and co-starring Richard Lewis was released in France today.
1994:
In Los Angeles, “jazz pianist Michael Wolff and actress Poll Draper” gave birth
to actor and music Nathaniel Marvin Wolff, the older brother of
singer/songwriter Alex Wolff.
1995(24th
of Kislev, 5756): Kindle the First Chanukah Candle
1995:”Vatican
Reaffirms Its Policy on Jerusalem” published today takes issued with Leah
Rabin’s description of the Pope’s comments about the Israeli capital city.
http://www.nytimes.com/1995/12/17/world/vatican-reaffirms-its-policy-on-jerusalem.html?ref=leahrabin
1995:
The New York Times featured a review of the recently published paperback
edition of Yehoshua Kenaz’s The Way To The Cats, an “Israeli novel that
presents old age with all its ravages” as seen through the life of its
protagonist “Yolanda Moscowitz, 76, who is recuperating from a broken leg in a
rehabilitation center in Tel Aviv, where she hopes that her dignity won't go
the way of her beauty.
1996(7th
of Tevet, 5757): Song writer Irving Caesar passed away. Born in 1895, he was originally known as
Isidor Caesar. He wrote lyrics for
"Swanee," "Sometimes I'm Happy," "Crazy Rhythm,"
and "Tea for Two," one of the most frequently recorded tunes ever
written.
1996:
“Unlike Agnel” a Christmas made-for-television movie featuring Eli Marienthal
as “Matthew” was broadcast for the first time by CBS.
1997:
“Wag the Dog,” a dark, political satire directed and co-produced by Barry
Levinson, with a screenplay co-authored by David Mamet and starring Dustin
Hoffman premiered today at Century City.
1998(28th
of Kislev, 5759): Fourth Day of Chanukah
1998:
“Parade,”
“a musical with a book by Alfred Uhry and music and lyrics by Jason Robert
Brown” “premiered on Broadway at the Vivian Beaumont Theater.”
1999:
“Sunshine” a marvelous film that traces a Hungarian Jewish family for five
generations from the days of the Austro-Hungarian Empire to the 1956 Hungarian
Revolution began a limited opening in three Canadian cities.
1999:
“Stuart Little” a film version of the novel by the same name directed by Rob
Minkoff was released today in the United States.
2000:
Three days after his death funeral services are scheduled to be held this
morning at the Riverside of seventy-seven year old Justine Sable Oppenheim, a
member of Congregation Shearith Israel, the Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue
and the husband Joyce Oppenheim with whom he had three children – Janet, Judith
and Jeffrey.
2000:
The New York Times featured reviews
of books by Jewish authors and/or about subjects of Jewish interest including Maestro: Greenspan's Fed and the American Boom
by Bob Woodward, Freud: Darkness
in the Midst of Vision by Louis Breger, Schmidt Delivered by
Holocaust survivor Louis Begley and Sex and Power by Susan Estrich.
2000:
In entitled “A Haunting Legacy in Provence” published today Michael Frank
provides a brief informative view of the history of a French Jewry.
http://www.nytimes.com/2000/12/17/travel/a-haunting-legacy-in-provence.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm
“The
story of Diasporic Jews is a long and poignant one. Here is a people whom
history has sent packing from their place of origin. They touch down on
unfamiliar soil and quickly arrange their lives with a mixture of the
chameleonlike and the steadfast. They speak their host's language, wear his
clothes, adapt his cuisine and use his architectural vocabulary to build their
houses and their synagogues, yet all the while they nurture and are nurtured by
their faith and their identity and their history, and they pass along this
heritage to their children, often in the face of considerable persecution and
pain. It is a story of endurance and longevity, an old story, but every time I
happen upon it, as I did last summer in France, I am compelled by it anew. ''Happen
upon'' was key, in this case, for me. I was living in Rome when one drizzly
Saturday in May I received a call from friends who had rented a house in
Provence for a week, rather off the beaten track near a village called Le
Barroux, and they were summoning me there for a visit. I soon booked a flight
and a car and three weeks later found myself cruising through Provence in a
rented Ford. My concept of the region was molded by the movies of Marcel
Pagnol, the travel reminiscences and essays of M. F. K. Fisher, the canvases of
Cezanne and Derain and Van Gogh. Living in Rome had made me conscious of the
long, tentacular reach of those dogged ancient empire builders, so I knew that
they had left their mark on the Provencal landscape. I knew the houses were beautiful,
the furniture elegant, the food first-rate. But I knew nothing of the region's
connection to the Jews. On my first approach to Le Barroux, I circled around
Carpentras, the nearest town of any size. I had been driving and exploring by
then for many hours. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a sign: Cimetiere
Israelite, it said, with an arrow pointing to the right. In my fatigue I
thought I had imagined it. A Jewish cemetery, tucked away in this corner of
Provence? Impossible. But the next day I
saw it again, and I decided to investigate. For me investigation, like travel,
begins in reading and proceeds with looking. I soon learned that the Jews had
lived in the South of France from the time that it was known as Roman Gaul. In
the period after the fall of Masada in 73, Jews fled into the region and lived
there for some time, at relative peace until the 14th century, when the South
of France was united with the French Kingdom, and the Jews were expelled from
the Languedoc and Provence. They found unusual -- if conditional -- refuge
under the Pontifical states of Avignon. The Popes for the most part welcomed
and protected these banished French Jews and allowed them to live in the region
known as the Comtat Venaissin, which is today part of the Vaucluse. At first
these Juifs du Pape, as they were known, had freedom of residence and worship.
They were allowed to work in trades and as craftsmen; they were doctors,
bookbinders, scientists, masons. They resided among Christians but prayed by
themselves. Then things changed. Before Jews came under the protection of the
Popes, they had been required to wear a distinctive sign, the rouelle, or
wheel. Now, as ethnic tensions grew, Jews were forced to live in ghettos, or
carrieres (carreira means street in Provencal). They were banished from all
professions except for friperie (secondhand clothes dealing), brocante
(secondhand furniture selling) and usure (money lending). The Church prohibited
them from owning property, charged them inflated taxes, and in 1524 required
them to replace the rouelle with more visible signs: a yellow hat for men, a
scrap of yellow cloth for women. By the middle of the 15th century, the Jews of
Provence were confined to four towns: Avignon, Carpentras, Cavaillon and
L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue. Despite the myriad hardships imposed on them, Jews were
palpably present in local life: at their height in the 18th century, these four
communities totaled about 4,000 people, in Carpentras alone numbering 1,000, or
one-tenth the size of the town's Catholic population. Although by this period
restrictions were relaxed, French Jews had no civil rights until the Edict of
Tolerance in 1789 recognized the rights of all men. The edict definitively
freed Jews from ghetto life and dispersed them again throughout France. What
remains of the long Jewish sojourn in Provence today? In L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue:
nothing. In Avignon: a substantial 19th-century synagogue built in the
neo-Classical style, a replacement for an 18th-century building that burned. In
Carpentras and Cavaillon: treasures, among them two sparkling, hidden, subtle,
storied jewel-like 18th-century synagogues. (In Carpentras, the synagogue,
which is still in use, is open year round; though services are no longer held
at the synagogue in Cavaillon, it can be visited at set times between April and
October, and by appointment the rest of the year.) The synagogue in Carpentras
is the oldest in France. It was first built in 1367 and extensively rebuilt in
1741-43 by the architect Antoine d'Allemand and remodeled again soon
thereafter. You enter at street level and climb a grand if plainly made
staircase to reach the sanctuary. Neither the spare facade (decreed by the
Catholic Church, which forbade elaborate exterior decoration) nor the stairs
prepares you for the explosion of color and craftsmanship that distinguish this
spacious room, which is arranged on two levels and decorated in characteristic
Louis XV style. On the first level, against the wall facing East (and thus
Jerusalem) is the Ark, the focus of the sanctuary. It is surrounded by carved
paneling painted with a faux marbre finish and flanked by a row of unusual
arched, screened openings that separate the men from the women during services.
The rest of this level is similarly paneled but painted a strong blue-green
picked out in gold. The ceiling is sky blue. A pair of small curved staircases
leads up to a gallery above. Windows with fanlights, some fitted with colored
panes of glass, suffuse the whole interior with gentle bright light. Hanging
from the ceiling is a veritable inverted orchard of chandeliers and ritual
lamps, some brass, some crystal, others tin. An intriguing rarity, seen in
Provencal synagogues, is a tiny chair made for the prophet Elijah. A perfect
Louis XVI fauteuil in miniature, gilded and upholstered in threadbare red
velvet, it stands in its own niche to the right of the reading desk, a place
for Elijah to monitor circumcision ceremonies. Forbidden to own property
individually and prevented from being artisans, the Jews of Carpentras, it
seems clear, were asserting themselves almost defiantly with this beautiful,
burnished interior. It partakes of the local architectural vocabulary of its
time -- boiserie, gilding, faux marbre and the rest -- yet is resolutely
adapted to the customs of Judaism: the Torah scrolls stand behind a curtain in
the Ark; men and women worship separately; the whole decorative scheme is
devoid of graven images. Today in Carpentras and the nearby countryside there
are about 80 families, my tour guide told me, many of them aged. They have no
resident rabbi; an itinerant rabbi visits from Avignon to officiate during
holidays and as needed. On the bulletin board outside the sanctuary a note
announced that there would be no weddings or bar mitzvahs that summer. ''And during
the war?'' I asked the guide. ''During the war,'' she answered, ''the region
was occupied by the Germans. When they were approaching Carpentras in 1942, the
director of the town museum collected and hid anything of value.'' ''What about
the people?'' ''Some people were hidden too. Others were not.'' It was clear
from her tone the conversation would not proceed any further. Beneath the
synagogue but awaiting restoration and thus, alas, not accessible to visitors
is a complex that includes a bakery with ovens for regular bread and matzo and
a mikvah (ritual bath) with six flights of stairs. Both are still much as they
were during the Middle Ages, when the synagogue, rather than standing in shy
retreat as it does today in one of the town's many sweet squares, would have
been enveloped by the teeming carriere. Here as many as 128 houses, which often
rose to eight levels to accommodate the large population, turned inward, since
Jews were not permitted to have windows facing out of the ghetto. People lived
in crowded, squalid conditions and were locked in at night. As for the cemetery
that first caught my attention, it too was closed to visitors and ''tres
arbore,'' or overgrown with trees, the guide told me in a tone of voice that
quickly closed this subject, too. Only later did I learn that the cemetery had
been the site of an act of brutal anti-Semitism in May 1990, when the body of
an elderly Jewish rug merchant named Felix Germon was exhumed and mutilated.
The crime was not solved until six years later, when one of its five
perpetrators, a gang of Hitler-worshipping skinheads from Avignon, confessed to
the police. The guide was right about one thing: when I parked in front of the
cemetery's tall, sober gates, I saw little beyond a furred thickness of trees
and shrubs growing out of the only land that the Juifs du Pape were permitted
to own. Here, amid the weeds and the ubiquitous cricket song, was probably the
most potent display of the long Jewish association to Carpentras: the cemetery,
while locked and tree-shrouded, was divided by a long path that led far into
the horizon, a vast property, vastly populated. From the beginning, the Jewish
community in Cavaillon was smaller than its counterpart in Carpentras,
numbering between 150 and 200 people in the 18th century. The synagogue is
commensurately more modest but no less refined in concept or execution. As at
Carpentras, the synagogue incorporated an older (in this case, 15th-century)
structure. Built between 1772 and 1774 by an unknown architect, its boiserie is
white picked out in blue and gold, its columns are fluted and gilded, its walls
pink. In its heyday the synagogue had seven Torah scrolls, a large number for
so small a congregation and yet another possible sign of defiance, since the
synagogue was one of the few places Jews were allowed to spend their money.
Among the collection of chandeliers are six oil lamps from the original
synagogue, and there is another miniature chair, gilded and covered in velvet,
for Elijah. The synagogue was last used in 1920. Only 10 Jewish families remain
in the area, and the seven impressive Torah scrolls have been transferred to
Avignon. This exquisite building is only part of Cavaillon's Jewish story,
however, because the ghetto of Cavaillon is at least vestigially intact. Its
one cobbled street, which establishes the boundaries of the actual carriere, is
clearly demarcated by arches at each end. All along this road, open and airy
today, would have been tall, crowded, unsafe tenementlike buildings until the
Revolution. Among those that remain are the rabbi's house and the mikvah (both
under restoration and closed) and the bakery, which is underneath the synagogue
and has been converted to a small but lovely museum (open April through
October, or by appointment). It is assumed that women listened to the prayers
from the bakery, through grates cut into the synagogue floor long since covered
over. Here you can see the oven in which the bread known in Provencal as
coudoles and in French as pains azymes -- matzo -- was baked. Here, too, is an
array of touching objects: tombstones from the Jewish cemetery, which was paved
over and turned into a square; Bibles and prayer books; cabalistic amulets and
ketubahs, or marriage contracts, with delicately painted flowered borders. There
are the doors of the original 15th-century Ark, much smaller and more primitive
than the one fabricated in the 18th century and capable of holding only a
single Torah. There are fragments of a Torah from L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue, burnt,
it is assumed, during the Revolution and discovered hidden in the roof of
Cavaillon's synagogue, when it was restored early in this century. Another
object found hidden in the roof was a prayer book inscribed, ''This book
belongs to Citizen Cadet Cohen fils; whoever finds it will return it to me,
otherwise he will be guillotined!'' Also on display is a photograph of an old,
fragile Jewish woman in the ghetto. The picture was taken in 1913, which makes
her one of the last surviving Jews of Cavaillon. She wears Provencal dress, a skirt,
a heavy apron and a hat, and in appearance she seems so deeply of this town,
this place, that it is easy to forget how apart the Jews were made to feel
during their long and checkered sojourn in Provence. The people are nearly gone
now, the Torahs packed off to more populous places and the ghettos erased, but
these two synagogues and this touching museum remain to tell their powerful
story.
2001(2nd
of Tevet, 5762): Ninety-four-year-old Jeanne Mandello the Jewish photographer
who fled from Germany and France to escape the Nazis and who finally found
refuge in Uruguay passed away today.
http://jeannemandello.com/about-part-10-her-work/
2002:
The money that South African businessman Cyril Kern had lent to the campaign of
Ariel Sharon was returned to him today.
2003:
It was reported today that “Jewish Big Brothers Big Sisters” will honor “Mark
Canton with the Sydney J. Rosenberg Lifetime Achievement Award at the 12th
Annual Dinner & Auction Gala” being held at the Century Plaza Hotel next
month.
2004:
“Prime Minister Ariel Sharon struck a deal today with the opposition Labor
Party to join his Likud government, which is likely to ensure that Mr. Sharon
can carry out his plan to dismantle all Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip
and four small ones in the West Bank.”
2005:
On SNL, Andy Samberg co-starred in the Digital Short "Lazy Sunday", a
nerdcore hip hop song performed by two Manhattanites on a quest to see the film
The Chronicles of Narnia.
2006:
Sir Arnold Wesker, the Jewish dramatist was the castaway on Desert Island
Discs, BBC Radio 4
2006:
The Times of London names Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky (translated by Sandra
Smith) as number one on its list of “The Best Books of 2006.” This recently
discovered volume written by a French Jewish author describes life in
2006: The Jewish people should develop a long-term
strategic planning mechanism to address the threats that endanger all Jews,
according to recommendations submitted at today’s cabinet meeting. According to
former US envoy to the Middle East Dennis Ross "The nature of the threats
to the Jewish people put a premium on better planning," Ross is chairman
of the board of the Jewish People Policy Planning Institute, a Jewish Agency
think tank presenting the recommendations to the cabinet in the framework of
its third annual assessment of the state of the Jewish people. The presentation
focuses on several "emerging trends.” These include the rise of Islamic
terrorism and its widespread use of anti-Semitic themes; the danger to
2006: In
2006: The Association for Jewish Studies (AJS)
opened its 38th Annual Conference,
2006(26th of Kislev, 5767): Dodger Pitcher Larry
Sherry, who with his brother Norm formed the only all brother, all Jewish
battery in baseball history that led a team (the 1959 Dodgers) to a World
Series Championship, passed away.
2007: After only 3 months with the team, punter Josh
Miller was released by the Tennessee Titans of the National Football League.
2007: In
2007: The
Jerusalem Post reported that for the first time since the 1917
Bolshevik Revolution, a chief rabbinical chaplain is servicing the spiritual and
religious needs of Jewish soldiers in
2007: The owners of the
2008: “The Wrestler,” a sports movie directed and co-produced by
Darren Aronofsky and with a screenplay by Robert Siegel “was released in a
limited capacity” today in the United States.
2008:
In New York, Chamber Music at the Y features acclaimed Jerusalem born pianist,
Benjamin Hochman
2008: The rocket that shattered
the front windshield of Pinchas Cohen's bright yellow hatchback this evening
narrowly missed his wife and son. So as he stood with his arms folded in front
of him in the dark parking lot outside the Victory supermarket in Sderot on this
evening, Cohen thanked God for saving his family. He turned his eyes in the
direction of the sky. "Who else but God could have saved them?" he
asked. This was the second time his family had been spared. Only last year, he
said, a rocket fell meters from his Sderot home while he, his wife and their
three children were vacationing in
2008:
Hadassah, the Women's Zionist Organization of America, announced today that it
had invested $90 million with Bernard Madoff, who has been charged with
securities fraud. This means that “The Madoff Scam” may cost Hadassah the
entire ninety million dollars.
2009:
The Northern Virginia Hebrew Congregation and the Potomac Chapter offer a
program entitled “Harry Truman and the Founding of Israel” featuring Allis and
Ronald Radosh, authors of A Safe Haven: Harry S. Truman and the Founding of
Israel.
2009(30
Kislev, 5770): Rosh Chodesh Kislev.
2009:
The third annual Global Forum for Combating Anti-Semitism comes to a close
today in Jerusalem.
2009:
Shamai Kedem Leibowitz, an American lawyer and blogger also known as Samuel
Shamai Leibowitz, who is the grandson of Yeshayahu Leibowitz also known as
Samuel Shamai Leibowitz, “pleaded guilty to knowingly and willfully disclosing
five Secret level FBI documents in April 2009, to a blogger, who then published
information derived from those documents on the blog.”
2009:
Germany announced today that it was donating 87 million dollars to a new
endowment for Auschwitz-Birkenau to preserve barracks, gas chambers and other
evidence of Nazi crimes at the former death camp.
2010(10th
of Tevet, 5771): Yarhtzeit of Judy
Rosenstein (nee Levin)
2010(10th of Tevet,
5771): Fast of the Tenth of Tevet
2010: "A Day in the Warsaw Ghetto: A Birthday Trip in Hell" is
scheduled to open at Holocaust Memorial Center in Farmington Hills, Michigan
2010: A traditional Friday Night Shabbat services with MesorahDC
complete “with soulful melodies, contemporary insights, and stories followed by
a three-course dinner is scheduled to take place at the Historic 6th
& I Synagogue in Washington, D.C.
2010: The Los Angeles Times published David Ulin’s list of
the ten top books of 2010 which included three works by Jewish authors – Almost
Dead by by Assaf Gavron, Freedom by by Jonathan Franzen and The
Collected Stories of Deborah Eisenberg by Deborah Eisenberg.
2010(10th of Tevet, 5771: Mary Jane “M.J.” Bear, a
journalist and Internet pioneer who built websites around the world, died today
at the age of 48. Bear, a native of Des Moines, Iowa, worked for TV and radio
stations. At National Public Radio she became a vice president. She also worked
for Online, Radio Free Europe in Prague and Microsoft, in Vienna, Austria. She
launched websites for Microsoft in Greece, Poland, Israel and Turkey, as well
as TV programming in Kyrgyzstan and Georgia. During her illness from leukemia,
Bear created a website on Caring Bridge, which provides free and private
websites “that connect people experiencing a significant health challenge to
family and friends.” The site is now filled with touching tributes from friends
and family. Bear took an active role in Jewish communities in every city in
which she lived, and was a founding board member of the Online News
Association, which is establishing an endowment fund in her name for young
journalists.
http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/desmoinesregister/obituary.aspx?n=mary-jane-bear-mj&pid=147307984
2010: In “Beneath the Dead Sea, Scientists Are Drilling for
Natural History,” published today Isabel Kershner, describes how “an
international team of scientists has been drilling beneath the seabed to
extract a record of climate change and earthquake history stretching back half
a million years.”
2011: “Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg” is scheduled to be shown at
Congregation Beth Am in Los Altos, CA.
2011: The third weekend of Hamshoushalayim is scheduled to come to
an end.
2011: Havdalah, Board Installation and Centennial are scheduled to
take place this evening at the Union Of Reform Judaism Biennial.
2011: Opening night of the 13th annual Jerusalem Jewish
Film Festival
2012: The Conservative Synagogue of Fifth Avenue is scheduled to
host “Living A Serious Jewish Life” which will examine what it mean to be an
“observant Jew’ using The Observant Life as the basis for the
presentation.
2012: Director Mariano Wainsztein is scheduled to discuss his film
“The Mitzvah makers which premieres tonight at the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue.
2012: “Jud Süss” is scheduled to be shown at the Jerusalem Jewish
Film Festival.
2012: Dorit Beinisch, the first female President of the Supreme
Court of Israel became an Officer at The French "National Order of the
Legion of Honour
2012: A memorial service was held today for director, writer,
actor and impresario Isaiah Sheffer
http://forward.com/articles/167976/isaiah-sheffer-remembered-for-lullaby-voice-and-en/?p=all
2012: Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis, the spiritual leader of one of the
largest congregations in London and a former chief rabbi of Ireland, was named
Britain's chief rabbi-designate today.
2012: The state informed the High Court of Justice today that it will evacuate
the two Jewish families living in four rooms in Hebron’s Beit Ezra building.
http://www.jpost.com/DiplomacyAndPolitics/Article.aspx?id=296255
2012: Funeral Services were held today for six-year-old Noah
Pozner, the youngest victim of the slaughter at Sandy Hook Elementary School
and the only Jew who was killed
2013:
The UK Jewish Film Festival is scheduled to sponsor a screening of “David”
directed by Joel Fendelman and “Don’t Tell Santa You’re Jewish.”
2013:
Weather permitting, the Jerusalem Jewish Film Festival is scheduled to show
“Jews for Sale” which tells the story of “the sale of Jews of Romania to the
State Israel starting with WW II and climaxing during the rule of Nicolai
Ceausescu.
2013:
After having been indicted on charges of “obstruction of justice, child
endangerment, failure to report child abuse and conspiracy” the Dauphin County
Judge ruled that Graham Spanier’s attorneys “would not be allowed to call to
the stand Cynthia Baldwin” the attorney for Penn State who had testified
against him before the Grand Jury as part of a guarantee for immunity. (Spanier
was the child of Holocuast survivors who served as the head of Penn State who
was charged with not fulfilling his duties during the Jerry Sandusky child
molestation investigation.)
2013:
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi is due to arrive in Israel tonight for a
high-profile visit, which is expected, for the first time, to focus on
political issues such as Iran and the peace process in addition to efforts to
foster economic cooperation. (As reported by Raphael Ahren)
2013:
Today Shia , LaBeouf released his short film Howard Cantour.com to the Internet”
following which “bloggers noted its close similarity to Justin M. Damiano, a
2007 comic by Ghost World creator Dan Clowes” which led to charges of
plagiarism.
2013(3rd
of Tevet. 5583): Eighty-year-old Dr. Robert Neuwirth, “a pioneering
gynecologist” passed away today. (As reported by William Yardley)
2014:
“Tito’s Glasses” and “Closer to the Moon” are scheduled to be shown at the
Jerusalem Jewish Film Festival.
2014(25th
of Kislev, 5775): Chanukah – one hundred years ago Jews in Vienna provided
provisions for Jewish refugees who fled the battlefields held by the Russians
to help them celebrate the holiday.
2014:
“Canada and Australia announced that they would not attend a Geneva Convention
conference hosted by Switzerland on the situation in Gaza, the West Bank, and
East Jerusalem today.’
2014:
“O live
oil was used in the Land of Israel as early as 8,000 years ago, archaeologists
working at an antiquities site in the Lower Galilee said today, heralding the
earliest evidence for use of the staple in the country and possibly the entire
Middle East.”
2014:
“American Alan Gross has been released from a Cuban prison after five years, as
part of an agreement that also includes the release of three Cubans jailed in
the United States.”
2015:
The Skirball Center is scheduled to host Jeffery Gorsky, author of Exiles in
Sepharad: The Jewish Millennium in Spain as he talks about “the incredible
arc of the dramatic 1,000-year history of Spanish Jewry.
2015:
Andy Sandberg served as host at the Emmy Awards
2016(17th
of Kislev, 5777): Parashat Vayishlach
2016: The Brotherhood Synagogue is scheduled to
host is “Annual Eyal Vilner Big Band Concert followed by continuous vodka and
latkes.”
2016:
The 14th Street Y is scheduled to host the penultimate performances
of “Hannah and the Moonlit Dress.”
2016:
In Memphis, TN, Temple Israel is scheduled to host “Pankcakes and Prayer.”
2017:
The Jewish Federation of Greater Des Moines, Iowa, is scheduled to host a
screening of “I’m Dreaming of a Jewish Christmas” a comedy “set entirely in a
Chinese restaurant.”
2017:
The New York Times features reviews
of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers
including Promise at Dawn: A Memoir by Romain Gary, The Kites by
Romain Gary, Girls Trip by Tiffany Haddish, a former “energy producer at
Bar Mitzvahs” and the recently released paperback edition of Judas by
Amos Oz.
2017:
The Center for Jewish History is scheduled to host a special Chanukah party
that includes events for history buffs, artists and music lovers of all ages.
2017:
Matisyahu, Neshama Carlebach and Eli Schwebel are among the artists scheduled
to perform at today’s concert at Congregation Rodeph Sholom in New York which
is “a benefit concert to support JQY or Jewish Queer Youth.”
2017:
In London, JWE3 is scheduled to host a screening of “Menashe,” the first
Yiddish-language feature film that has been made in several years.
2017:
Kosher Cajun restaurant is scheduled to “be frying up tons of fried chicken and
latkes” for this afternoon’s annual community Chanukah celebration at the
Jewish Community Center on St Charles Avenue in New Orleans.
2017(28th
of Kislev, 5778): Fifth Day of Chanukah
2018:
In London, JW3 is scheduled to host a screening of “Three Identical Strangers.”
2018:
In Columbus, OH, the Tifereth Israel Men’s Club is scheduled to host “Hockey
with Tifereth” at Nationwide Arena as the Blue Jackets play the N.Y. Rangers.
2018:
In Chevy Chase, MD, Ohr Kodesh is scheduled to host a lecture on “Russian Jewry
in 2018: What’s New?” in which Harvey Leifer provides an update on the life of
the “million refusniks” who made Aliyah after the Soviet Union changed its
immigration policy.
2018:
The International Academy for Russian Music, Arts, and Culture (IARMAC) and
Agudas Achim Congregation are scheduled to present pianist Polina Shepherd
performing “Songs of the Steppes.”
2018:
In response to the recent wave of violence, Israelis now use hitchhiking and
bus stops that are more like fortifications completed with a compliment of
armed soldiers.
2019:
Following earlier reports that “Israel’s famed Mossad intelligence agency
recently helped bust a major terrorist cell in Denmark as part of an ongoing
policy of collaboration with Western intelligence agencies, it was reported
today that Austrian authorities have
thwarted what appear to be ISIS inspired Christmas season attacks.
2019:
In Walnut Creek, CA, the National Council of Jewish Women is scheduled to host
its “Hanukah Party,” the annual fundraiser that includes “a silent auction,
raffles, bake sale, lunch and entertainment.”
2019:
In Palo Alto, CA, the Oshman Family JCC is scheduled to host “Yiddishe Khanike”
a “trio including vocalist-accordionist Jeanette Lewicki performs Yiddish songs
and klezmer music.”
2019:
The Streicker Center is scheduled to host Drs. Jay Berkovitz, Lisa Leff and
Maurice Samuels as they discus “Jews and Judaism After the French Revolution.”
2019(19th
of Kislev): On the Jewish calendar, The “New Year” of Chassidism.
2019(19th
of Kislev): On the Jewish calendar, 75th birthday of Avraham
Elimelech ben Yosef Dov
2019(19th
of Kislev): On the Jewish calendar Yahrtzeit of the “Maggid of Mezrech
(1710-1772), the successor of the Baal Shem Tov.”
https://www.aish.com/dijh/Kislev_19.html
2020(2nd of Tevet, 7801): Seventh Day of
Chanukah
2020: Temple Emanuel of Newton is scheduled to present
online “Doughnut-Baking With Stephanie Weitzman
2020: The Temple Emanu-El Streicker Center is scheduled to
provide a chance to “spend the last night of Chanukah with The Shitisel
Mishpacha!”
2020: San Francisco based JIMINA is scheduled to host
online “Chag Habanot: A North African Chanukah Celebration of Women” during
which attendees will celebrate and learn about the Mizrachi holiday that honors
women and the heroine Judith” and hear the music by Israeli singer Lala Tamar
and local musician Hind Ennaira, plus dance instruction.
2020: ADL Cleveland is scheduled to host “an event
featuring Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley and Pittsburgh Mayor William Peduto, who have
led their communities through mass tragedies and incidents of hate.”
2020:
Despite the surge in coronavirus case and a talk about another nationwide
lockdown, Israelis can look forward to go the library following yesterday’s
approval of “the immediate reopening of all public libraries” (As reported by
Yuval Plotkin)
2021:
Temple Sinai of Brookline is scheduled to host a Bluegrass Shabbat complete “with
banjo, mandolin, guitars, bass, fiddle and more!”
2021:
Lloyd Schwartz, “an American poet, professor laureate at the University of
Massachusetts-Boston and Pulitzer Prize winner for his work as classical music
editor of the old Boston Phoenix and Somerville poet laureate” is scheduled to join JLive for the final segment of the Fall
2021 season.
2021:
Israel's National theater awarded Zev Nesher its prestigious "Cultural
Icon" Award
2021:
“Israel's Green Pass mandate for
shopping malls — which was set to go into effect today— has been delayed until
further notice after the government failed to reach an agreement on the outline.
(As reported by Tamar Eichner and Adir Yanko)
2022: The Eden-Tamir Center is scheduled to
present “Ensemble Millennium/Toscanini Quartet, Ensemble in Residence and
Friends
With Noam Buchman and Dror Semmel The Father, the
Son and the Concerto Spirit.”
2022: In New York, The City Winery is scheduled
to present a matinee show with Aviv Geffen, one of the biggest Israeli
musicians and creators in the rock music industry
2022: In Waterloo, IA, Rabbi Kushner is scheduled
to lead services at Congregation Sons of Jacob.
2022: In Lexington, MA, Temple Emunah is
scheduled to host an where attendees try to build the world’s tallest
hanukkiyah out of Lego bricks.
2022:
In Berkley, CA, Peet’s Theatre is scheduled to host a second performance of
“Remember This: The Lesson of Jan Karski,” “a play in which actor David
Strathairn portrays a Polish World War II hero and Holocaust witness who risked
his life to report about the Warsaw Ghetto, only to be met with inaction and
disbelief.”
2022: Schechter Boston is scheduled to present
its “Hanukkah Kickoff Event “ that includes Havdalah and sports and games by
Knucklebones Entertainment.
2022(23rd of Kislev, 5783) :
Va-yayshev (“And he dwelt” or “settled”)
2023: As part of the Atlanta Jewish Music
Festival, Joe Alterman is scheduled to “team up with Dara Starr Tucker for an
exploration of the synthesis of the African American and the Jewish experiences
in popular music.”
2023: In the last lecture in the series of online
lectures "On the Anchored State of the Soul", participants are
scheduled read together with the writer and psychologist Esther Peledin the
story "Twice as much" and examine the deep layers of the soul from
which Agnon writes.
2023: In Washington, DC, as part of the URJ 150
weekend, Israeli musician David Broza is scheduled to perform in concert in an
evening of solidarity.
2023: The New York Times features reviews
of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers
including Collected Poems: Including Late and Uncollected Work by
Anthony Hecht, the son of German Jewish parents and Late Romance: Anthony
Hecht – A Poet’s Life by David Yezzi.
2023:
Hadassah New Orleans is scheduled to host a virtual event with Israeli Tova
Korczyn live from Israel.
2023:
Jewish Federation of Greater Des Moines is scheduled to its “2023 All-in-One
Fundraiser Event Featuring YidLife Crisis.”
2023:
As December 17 begins in Israel, more information becomes public Yotam Haim,
Samar Fouad Talalka and Alon Shamriz who were mistakenly killed by IDF forces in a part of Gaza that
has seen heavy fighting in the last couple of days, the threat from Hezbollah
increases as can be seen by death yesterday of 53 year-old IDF solider Yehezkel
Azaria during drone attack and the threat from the Houthis continues to
expand as can be seen from the barrage of drones they fired toward Eilat
yesterday, while the Hamas held hostages begin day 72
in captivity. (Editor’s note:
this situation is too fluid for this blog to cover so we are just providing a
snapshot as of the posting at midnight Israeli time)
2024:
Rabbi Mike Uram, Chief Jewish Learning Officer at the Jewish Federations of
North America is scheduled to facilitate
the third in a three-part series that
unpacks Israel’s history through a lens of complexity and gain a better
understanding of the key features of Israel and Zionism wit the aim of helping attendees
to feel more grounded and confident when it comes to understanding Israel today
and the politics as they show up in North American Jewish life.
2024:
As part of the Yiddish New York pre-festival program today’s opening event for
the “Emes Truth Visual Arts Exhibition
will feature a performance by Yiddish singer Sarah Myerson with Ilya
Shneyveys.
2024:
In Metairie, LA, Shir Chadash is scheduled to host a lunch learn in which Rabbi
David will explore “Judaism’s 10 Best Ideas.”
2024:
Shelter a play based on an anthology of
short stories published by the Israeli Institute for Literature and includes
texts by, among others, Joshua Cohen, Tzipi Shmilovich, Max Beller, Maayan
Eitan, Odeh Bashaarat, Maya Arad Yasur, Oded Carmeli, and many others directed
by Yonatan Esterkin is scheduled to open at New York City’s New Jewish Theatre.
2024(16th
Kislev): On the Jewish calendar, yahrzeit for Holocaust survivor Ann Gilbert
(Chana Zylberstajn), the wife of Fred Gilbert, and the mother of Jack Gilbert,
Doris Gilbert-Steiger and Lena Gilbert.
2024:
As December 17th 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 438 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)
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