March 8
1126: Alfonso VII is proclaimed king of Castile and Leon, after the death of his mother Urraca. Under the reign of Alfonso Christian Spain “became a refuge for the persecuted Andalusian Jews. The capital city of Toledo became a new center for Jewish learning. The major reason for this positive turn of fortune for the Jews was the king’s positive relationship with Yehuda Ibn-Ezra. After taking the fortress of Calatrava, the king appointed Ibn-Ezra as its commander as a reward for his bravery. Ibn-Ezra used his influence to create a refuge for the Jews who were fleeing Almohades, a religiously fervent Berber Moslem dynasty that had crossed into Spain after successful conquests in parts of North Africa. Those who equate the Golden Age of Spain with Moslem rule would do well to remember that life for the Jews was much more varied than that.
1255: King Przemysl Ottocar II of Austria renewed the charter granting favorable rights to his Jewish subjects.
1607: A complaint was filed today by the Inquisition “against Jorge de Almeida, a Portuguese domiciled in the City of Mexico, husband of Dona Lenor de Andrada” who had been convicted of observing Mosaic law” which makes her a Jewess.
1688: On this night a large group of secret Jews planned to escape from the island of Majorca by booking passage on an English ship. They were looking for religious freedom. A storm delayed their departure, and their plan was betrayed. All those planning to leave were put in prison. In the spring of 1691 these prisoners were sentenced at an auto-de-fe, where 37 were burned at the stake.
1702: King William II of England passed away today. Antonio Lopez Suasso, later Baron Avernes de Gras had provided financing for William who had been Prince of Orange to take the English throne. In 1700 William knighted Solomon de Medina who had served as an army contractor making him the first Jew to be so honored.
1712: At Carr End in Yorkshire, England John Foterhgill and “his first wife Margaret Hough” gave birth to Dr. John Fothergill who sought solace in the suffering of the Friends or Quakers by comparing them to the Jews as can be seen when he wrote “John Pemberton during the American Revolution that he often reflects “on the history of the Jewish people with humbling admiration” and that their sufferings affords “instructive lessons.”
1731: In Mladá Boleslav, David Brandeis a Jewish shopkeeper who had been accused of poising a local Christian printer with plum jam was released today after the accusation was proven to be untrue.
http://www.yivoencyclopedia.org/article.aspx/Mlada_Boleslav
1754(14th of Adar, 5514): Purim
1757: Jacob Pinto and Thankful Pinto gave birth to Abraham Pinto today.
1762: In Buchau, Franziska Levi and David Einstein gave birth to Jacob David Einstein.
1766: In the Netherlands, on the day when Prince William V reached his majority, Jews held services of Thanksgiving as sign of their on-going support for the monarch who was not universally popular.
1768: In the Netherlands, synagogues held services of thanks-giving on the day that “King William V entered the legislature on the day of his majority.” “Under the government of William V the country was troubled by internal dissensions; the Jews, however, remained loyal to him” and William did not forget the loyalty of his Jewish subjects.
1773(13th of Adar, 5533): Ta’anit Esther
1773: In the evening, Rabbi Raphael Hayyim Isaac Caregal attended Purim services at the synagogue in Newport, RI, with Ezra Stiles, the future President of Yale who described him as being "dressed in a red garment with the usual Phylacteries and habiliments, the white silk Surplice; he wore a high fur cap, had a long beard. He has the appearance of an ingenious and sensible man"
1777(29th of Adar I, 5537): Parashat Vahakhel; Shabbat Shekalim
1777: As the Jewish people observed their day of rest, “American troops under the command of Brigadier General William Maxwell defeated the British at Amboy, New Jersey.”
1792(14th of Adar, 5551): Purim
1792: Birthdate of Brumath,bas-rhin,France native Jacques Goudchaux who married Barbe Levi, with whom he had 9 children, in 1813 and then married Rosette Kahn with whom he had 11 children, in 1834 before finally marrying Marie Metger in 1852 with whom he had one child, Marie Goudchaux.
1794: Madel and Jakob Loew Feuchtwanger gave birth to Esther Feuchtwanger, the wife of Isaac Fraenkel with whom she had five children.
1799(1st of Adar II, 5559): Rosh Chodesh Adar II
1799: In Maytown, PA, Charles Cameron and his wife gave birth to Simon Cameron who as Secretary of War at the outset of the Civil War complied with law by not allowing Michael Allen, a Jew, to serve as the chaplain for the unit known as Cameron’s Dragoons which had been named for Cameron and which had a large contingent of Jews from Philadelphia in its ranks and leadership.
https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/jewish-chaplains-in-the-civil-war/
1800(11th of Adar, 5560): Parashat Tetzaveh; Shabbat Zachor observed for the first time in the 19thcentury.
1804: Birthdate of Bishopgate, London, native Sara Eliza Henriques, the wife of Kingston, Jamaica native Joseph Gutteres Henriques and the mother of Frederick and Alfred Henriques.
1807: In France, the Great Sanhedrin presented its conclusions at its final session.
1816: In Whitechapel, London, Hanna and Abraham Harris gave birth to Henry Harris
1817: In New York, the Stockbrokers Guild formerly incorporates itself and becomes the New York Stock Exchange. Among the founders were several prominent Jewish financiers including Benjamin Seixas, Isaac Gomez, Alexander Zuntz and Ephraim Hart. Ephraim Hart’s son’ Bernhard, became Secretary of the NYSE. Bernhard was also the grandfather of writer Bret Harte.
1817: Joseph Jonas the first Jew to settle in Cincinnati, Ohio arrived in the Queen City today. He was an English-born peddler who had come from Philadelphia, PA. “He became a successful watchmaker and silversmith and lived on Broadway between Fifth Street and Harrison. Jonas, like most early Jews, settled in downtown Cincinnati. Jonas wrote letters describing the opportunities that existed in the Ohio River valley. This convinced other Jews to join him including two younger brothers. In 1821, when Benjamin Lieb was dying, he begged to be buried as a Jew. He was the first Jew to die in Cincinnati. In response to his request, Joseph Jonas and Morris Moses, two of Cincinnati's six Jews, purchased the lot for Cincinnati's first Jewish cemetery from Nicholas Longworth for $75.00, and then buried Lieb there. This cemetery known as the Old Jewish Community or the Chestnut Street Cemetery is the oldest Jewish cemetery west of the Alleghenies. By 1824 there were enough Jewish residents to fulfill the requirement of ten adult males so that regular religious services could be held, and the first Jewish congregation beyond the Allegheny Mountains was established. This congregation became the Rockdale Temple. Most of the early Jews were British.”
1825: Birthdate of Salomon Kohn, the son of Prague merchant who traded in his business career in 1873 for the world of literature.
1826: This evening, in Charleston, SC, Isaac Soria of New York married Hetty Cohen, “the daughter of Moses Cohen.
1830: Birthdate of German Jewish jurist Hermann Makower who was also a leader of the Berlin Jewish community.
1831: Birthdate of French photographer Félix Bonfils who created one of the first modern photographic records of the Middle East including Palestine including the Wall of the Second Temple.
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.architechgallery.com/arch_images/architech_images/bonfils_photos/bonfils_temple_1.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.architechgallery.com/arch_info/artists_pages/felix_bonfils.html&h=445&w=600&sz=103&tbnid=IewwNBMIE1UQhM:&tbnh=94&tbnw=127&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dfelix%2Bbonfils%26tbm%3Disch%26tbo%3Du&zoom=1&q=felix+bonfils&docid=DQ0or5Gfn3EqTM&hl=en&sa=X&ei=RbtWT9fvBMbMtgeGsaSyBA&sqi=2&ved=0CEMQ9QEwAw&dur=2929
1832: Nathan Solomons married Deborah Abrahams today in the UK.
1841:”A general thanksgiving service” was held today “in the Synagogue of Spanish Portuguese Jews (Bevis Marks) “to commemorate the success which attended Sir Moses Montefiore in his mission to the East.”
1842: One day after she had passed away, Ann (Levy) Simmons the wife of Joshua Simmons and mother of Simeon, Julia and Barnett Joshua Simmons was buried today “Brompton (Fulham Road) Jewish Cemetery.”
1852: Caroline Davis and Levy Jacobs gave birth to Walter Jacobs.
1857: Today one of the first real organized actions of women's solidarity took place in New York City when hundreds of women staged a strike against the garment and textile factories in New York City, protesting low wages, long working hours and inhumane working conditions. This strike, which undoubtedly included Jewish workers took place 54 years before the Triangle Shirt Factory Fire.
1857: Reverend Charles Harris, "a Christian Jew" is scheduled to preach twice today at the John Street First M.E. Church in New York City. [The Jews for Jesus concept obviously was not a 20th century phenomenon.]
1860(14th of Adar): As war clouds loom in the United States, celebration of Purim
1860: Sir Saul Samuel completed his term as 6thTreasurer of New South Wales
1863: In London “Julius L. Sterner, a German-born American citizen” pursuing business opportunities in the UK and Sarah Steiner gave birth to Albert Edward Sterner, a student at Julien’s Academy and Ecole des Beuaz Arts who came to the United States in 1881 where he pursued a career as an “artist, scene painter and lithographer.”
1864: Birthdate of Hyman M. Lasker, the rabbi of Beth Israel in Troy, NY and the grandfather of Harold I Saperstein, the Rabbi at Temple Emanu-El in Lynbrook, NY.
https://kevarim.com/rabbi-chaim-mordechai-lasker/
1866: Two days after he had passed away, 40 year old Solomon Emanuel, the son of Uzziel Emanuel and Jane Solomonson, the husband of Phoebe Benjamin and the father of Jeanette, Elizabeth, Esther and Mark Emanuel was buried today at the “Brompton (Fulham Road) Jewish Cemetery.”
1871(15th of Adar, 5631): Shushan Purim
1871: A review of The Recovery of Jerusalem: A Narrative of Exploration in the City and the Holy Land” by two legendary British officers, Captains Wilson and Warren, who, among other accomplishments, conducted the first modern mapping of the ancient Jewish capital was published today.
1871: “The Purim Festival” published today described the history of the holiday as well as local observances including the celebrations at the Asylum for the Aged and Infirm, the Orphans’ Home and the Industrial Home on West 17th Street.
1872: Four years after Abraham Oppenheim had been ennobled, German-Jewish banker Gerson von Bleichröder and his family were made Prussian nobles; making them the second Jewish family to have been so honored.
1874: In Münstereifel, Germany, Rabbi Joseph Kahn and his wife Rosalie who would raise their family in Detroit, gave birth to Julius Kahn, the University of Michigan trained engineer who invented “the Kahn System, a reinforced concrete engineering technique for building construction.
1874: “The Prince of Printers” published today traces the history of printing in Italy including the rise of the printers of Soncino who were the first to print texts using Hebrew letters. Although they would set up presses at other locations, they always used the name of their home town which they adopted as their family name.
1875(1st of Adar II, 5635): Rosh Chodesh Adar II
1875: It was reported that next week’s Hebrew Charity Ball will include music supplied by two bands and a supper catered by Delmonico’s served at the Academy of Music.
1877: The Hebrew Lodge, Number 5 of the International order of B’nai Brit is sponsoring a fundraiser at the Steinway Hall tonight to aid those who suffered loss in the recent fire in Brooklyn. Entertainment will included vocalists and violinists.
1877: In Eichstetten, Leopold Bloch, the son of Samuel and Jeanette Bloch and Babette Bloch gave birth to Jakob Bloch
1879: Birthdate of Otto Hahn. In 1944, he won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for discovering the fission of heavy nuclei, which made the atomic bomb possible.
1879: It was reported today that the Young Men’s Hebrew Association of Harlem are sponsoring a Purim Calico Ball which will be held on the day that coincides with Shushan Purim.
1879: The Young Men’s Hebrew Association of Manhattan will host its fourth annual Purim celebration at the Lexington Avenue Opera House.
1881: The town of Seligman, MO, which was named for Joseph Seligman, was incorporated today.
1882: Abraham Aarons married Miriam Solomons today in London.
1883: Nissim and Mozelle Ezra gave birth Dinah Ezra who was buried in the Happy Valley Jewish Cemetery in Hong Kong when she passed away two months after her sixth birthday.
1887: “In the history of the religious life of the Israelites of” the United States “there was never expressed in the midst of the Jewish people such deep-felt grief and sorrow over the death of a public man as over the death of Henry Ward Beecher” the 73 year old social reformer and abolitionist clergyman who passed away today and was eulogized by Rabbi David Phillipson of Cincinnati.
1890: “The charity ball of the Hebrew Benevolent Society of Long Island City took place tonight at Ahler’s Astoria Assembly Rooms.
1891: “Palestine for the Jews” published today described the plan “advocated by prominent men of the leading cities” including such philo-Semites as Yale Professor Charles Toten “to obtain in a peaceable way” the “old homes in Palestine for Jews through… an international conference.”
1891: “Electric Light In The Holy Land” published today relied on information that first appeared in the Pall Mall Gazette to described the introduction of electric light at a new flour mill located near the Damascus Gate in Jerusalem.
1891(28th of Adar I, 5651: Seventy year old Benjamin Feuerstein, a clothing cutter, passed away while riding the elevated on his way to a meeting of a Jewish charitable society.
1891: Birthdate of American film and television actor Sam Jaffee. His film career included the role of Gunga Din in the movie of the same name and “Doc”, the criminal mastermind in the film noire classic “The Asphalt Jungle.” His film career came to a halt as a result of the infamous blacklist. He returned to acting as the wise old Dr.Zorba in the television medical melodrama “Ben Casey.”
1892: As public health workers in New York cope with the latest outbreak of typhus, 20 year old Sarah Koslofsky who was living in a tenement occupied by 18 Jewish families was taken to the hospital after she was found to suffering with the fever. Thirteen year old Baruch Stelson who was also found to be suffering from the disease was taken the facility at North Brother Island.
1892: Birthdate of New York native and Oregon resident Benjamin Cohen, the husband of Anna Klein Cohen and the father of Gerald Robert Cohen.
1894: “Benny” Weiss” saw Wardman Jeremiah Levy and Charles Krumm shake hands but do not exchange any money.
1894: “Brooklyn Bridge Trustees” published today described Senator Cantor’s objection “to removing men from office upon charges of dishonesty unless the charges were shown to be true.”
1894: “Mr. Ainsworth Makes an Apology to the Hebrews” published today described New York Assemblyman Ainsworth’s public recantation of his use of the term “Jew pawnbrokers’ claiming that he spoke hastily during the debate on reforming pawn-brokering “and did not think of my Hebrew brethren on the floor of the house.”
1895: “Unparalleled” published today, relying on information first appearing in the Cincinnati Tribune described the United as “perfect in a religious way” because it is the only country on earth where “a Hebrew Mayor” could “call for the troops to keep the Catholics and Protestants from getting into a riot.”
1896: “Rabbi Morais’s Anniversary” published today described plans for the upcoming celebration of Dr. Sabato Morais’s 45th anniversary as the Rabbi of Philadelphia’s Congregation Mikve Israel.
1896: Birthdate of Otto Heller, the Prague born English cinematographer Otto Heller.
1896: Birthdate of Joseph Bernbaum, the native of Stopnica, Poland native who came to Canada in 1918, joined the Jewish Legion in 1918 and who “left Toronto with first group of volunteers and served in Palestine with the 39thRoyal Fusiliers.
1897(4thof Adar II, 5657): Frederick C. Salomon passed away. A native of Prussia where he trained as a surveyor, Salomon moved to Wisconsin where he worked as a surveyor, registrar of deed and chief engineer on a local railroad. At the outbreak of the Civil War, he joined the Union Army where he served with such distinction that he rose to the rank of Major General (Brevet) by the time he mustered out in 1865. After the war he served as the Surveyor General of Utah Territory and settled in Salt Lake City where he passed away.
1897: Maurico Jacobs, a native of Peru who has been living in Cuba for the last 12 years has applied to the United Hebrew Charities for assistance for himself and his family.
1897: “Welcomes the Controversy” published today described Temple Emanu-El’s Rabbi Gottheil response to Reverend Lyman Abbot’s claims about the Bible including the charge that the Book of Psalms was not theological because it was written in poetry.
1898(14thof Adar, 5658): Purim
1898(14thof Adar, 5658): Sixty-eight year old Moses Bruckheimer, a pawnbroker living in Brooklyn passed away today. He was active in the Jewish community serving as trustee of Temple Beth Elohim and the Hebrew Orphan Asylum.
1899: At the annual diplomatic dinner given by the Emperor of Germany Today, the Kaiser looked “robust,” having “fully recovered from the effects of his Palestine” trip where he sought to strengthen the German role in the Ottoman Empire.
1899: In Albany, State Senator Elsberg introduced a bill “authorizing the consolidation of the Education Alliance and the Hebrew Free School Association of New York City.
1899: At the Bloomingdale Church in Manhattan Dr. Madison C. Peters will deliver a lecture on “Justice to the Jew,” “which is intended to refute popular fallacies and prove that the movements of civilization have hung upon the Jew.” “Dr. Peters claims that he will show that the Jew is in the front rank as patriot, lawyer, statesman, scientist, philosopher, artist, dramatist, poet, physician, musician, mathematician, astronomer, actor, discoverer, philologist, physiologist – in every department of human activity.”
1900: Ray Emanuel, the daughter of David and Amelia Emanuel married Joseph Jewell at the Central Synagogue.
1901: In Jackson, TN, Memphis merchant and philanthropist Jacob C. Felsenthal, the Kentucky born son of Bina and Marcus Felsenthal and his wife Cecilia Felsenthal gave birth to Marcus Stanley Felsenthal
1902: Birthdate of Bernard Irvin “B.I,” Greenhut who served as Mayor of Pensacola, FL from 1965 through 1967.
1903: At Temple Beth-El in New York, Rabbi Schulman delivered the opening prayer and Leo N. Levi delivered the main address at the celebration marking the fiftieth anniversary of the founding of District Grand Lodge No. 1, Independent Order of B'nai B'rith.
1905: In New York, Rebecca (née Green) and Dr. Isidore L. Marrow gave birth to psychologist Dr. Alfred J. Marrow, the husband of Monette Marrow and father of Paul Bennett Marrow and Marjorie Samberg.
http://psycnet.apa.org/index.cfm?fa=buy.optionToBuy&id=2005-09571-002
1906: In New York City, Rebecca (née Green) and Dr. Isidore L. Marrow gave birth to Alfred J. Marrow “American industrial psychologist, executive, civil rights leader, and philanthropist.”
1906: Po’alei Zion was organized underground in Poltava, Russia
1907: The independent Order of B’nai B’rith has joined the Jews of Cleveland in their campaign “to force the distasteful figure of Shakespeare’s Shylock out of the public schools.”
1908: The Federation of Rumanian Jews in America was founded
1908(5th of Adar II, 5668): Adolph Meyer, a native of Natchez, Mississippi, who served as a member of the House of Representatives from Louisiana, passed away today.
1908: Miss Dora Brachman married Louis Ginsberg in Marietta, Ohio where they will make their home.
1909(15thof Adar, 5669): Shushan Purim
1910: Two days after he passed away, 63 year old Zygmnunt Wartski, the native of Kalisch, Russia, was buried today in Vienna.
1910: Birthdate of Louis “Lulu” Bender, “an all-American basketball player at Columbia whose stellar play during the Depression helped popularize the game and make Madison Square Garden a magnet for college basketball…” (As reported by Vincent M. Mallozzi)
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/13/sports/basketball/13bender.html
1911: International Women's Day is launched in Copenhagen, Denmark, by Clara Zetkin, leader of the Women's Office for the Social Democratic Party. Born Clara Eissner, she married a Russian Jewish socialist leader named Ossip Zetkin.
1912(19thof Adar, 5672): Seventy-six year old Colonel Isaac Hirsch, he former Mayor of Chillicothe, MO, passed away today.
1912: Birthdate of Seymour Louis Stark, the Brooklyn native who played college football at Syracuse before turning pro and playing for the Boston Redskins in 1935.
1912: The Greek town of Zante was devastated by an earthquake. The Jewish quarter was destroyed, and more than 100 Jewish families are homeless
1912: Marco Besso of Trieste and Errea Cavalieri of Ferrara were both elected as Senators in Italy.
1913(29thof Adar I, 5673): Parashat Pekudi and Shabbat Shekalim
1913: Seventy-three year old Leon Israel, “the manager of the first Italian grand opera company to appear in Chicago passed away today at his home on Calumet Avenue.
1914: Birthdate of Yakov Borisovich Zel'dovich who played a key role in the development of nuclear weapons for the Soviet Union
1914: Mrs. Simon Baruch hosted a party at her home today for twenty-one Italian children from the Bronx as part of an attempt to combat anarchist propaganda and to the immigrant a children a sense of American history and patriotism. Mrs. Baruch is the wife of Dr. Simon Baruch. They are the parents of Bernard Baruch.
1915: In Washington, DC, “Count von Bernstorff, the German Ambassador, issued a statement today declaring that tolerance toward all religious beliefs had been displayed by the Turkish Government and that the disturbances of which he Jews in Palestine were victims were caused by the overzealousness of local Turkish authorities.
1916: It was reported today that of the 325 seniors at Yale, twelve of them are Jewish.
1917: “The trial of a $50,000 libel suit brought by Maschulem F. Seidman, war correspondent for the Warheit and other Jewish news against The Day, another Jewish publication” which centered around whether or not was in fact part of “German propaganda effort to win the sympathies of Jews in America for the Teuton cause” continued for a second day in New York.
1918: The first issue of Di varhayt (The Truth), the first Yiddish communist paper in the world, was published today. Di varhayt was published in Petrograd, Russia by the People's Commissariat for Jewish Affairs. It was closed down after a brief existence, as the People's Commissariat was shifted to the new capital Moscow and the lack of Yiddish journalists in Petrograd. The paper was later re-started as Der Emes.
1918: A meeting of the Fatherland Union, the Elberfeld German People’s Party resolved “to request that in the future all professors and teachers of German, theatre managers and contributors to the press in all German states be of pure German lineage.” (Editor’s note: For all of the Holocaust apologists, please note that the war is still going on, there is no Versailles treaty and Hitler was a corporal in the Kaiser’s Army)
1918: Birthdate of Dresden native Irene H. Aronson, the English and American trained artist.
https://americanart.si.edu/artist/irene-aronson-147
1918: Ukrainian mobs massacred the Jews of Seredino Buda
1918: In Salonica, the government decided to exempt Jewish Ottoman subjects living in Greece from the regulation prohibiting commercial transactions with subjects of enemy states.”
1918: Jews of Gloucher were massacred by Ukrainians. At this point in Russian history, the empire was in chaos. The Czar had been deposed. Kerensky and his Social Democrats were trying to rule the country. The Bolsheviks under Lenin and Trotsky were plotting to replace the Provisional Government. In the meantime, the Ukrainians continued their tradition of anti-Semitism and killing Jews whenever they had the chance.
1918: The Government of Greece decides to exempt Jewish Ottoman subjects living in Greece from regulations prohibiting commercial transactions with subjects of enemy states.
1918: “As a result of steps taken by pro-Jewish labor leaders, the ban against using Jewish employees in the factories” was lifted in Bobruisk.
1919: Representative Julius Kahn, Republican congressman from California expressed his opposition to Zionism. He said “that the Zionist Congress which was recently held in Philadelphia had asserted that it represented 150,000 out of approximately 3,000,000 American Jews. These figures would seem to indicate that the so-called Zionist number only a small minority” of American Jewry. “The reason I am opposed to a Jewish state is that experience has shown that the Jew becomes a good patriotic citizen of any country giving him full citizenship and civil and religious liberty….I am afraid that many avowed Zionists are also internationalists. I am not. I believe that we in America should stand for this country and its institutions against all the world. In fact, I believe that as nationalist we make of our religion a secondary matter. Our country comes first. Our Judaism is simply our religious faith.”
1920: Faisal I bin Hussein bin Ali al-Hashimi who fought with Lawrence of Arabia and who signed an agreement with Chaim Weizmann that was blueprint for cooperation between Arabs and Jews began his short lived reign as Faisal I, King of Syria.
1920: During a series of Arab protest demonstrations “led to several Arab attacks on Jewish passers-by and shop owners. The British authorities were alarmed at the violent tone of the Arab protests, in which calls to kill the Jews were heard alongside the popular slogan ‘Palestine is our land and the Jews are our dogs.’”
1921: In Paris, Marguerite and Paul Rosenberg, “a key figure in the Parisian art world in the first half of the century” gave birth to “Alexandre P. Rosenberg, founding president of the Art Dealers Association of America and for many years a prominent art dealer in New York.” (As reported by John Russell)
1921: Rufus Daniel Isaacs, 1st Marquees of Reading, completed his service as Lord Chief Justice of England.
1922: Birthdate of New York native and NYU and MIT trains physicist Melvin Lax, winner in 1999 of “the Willis Lamb Medal for Science and Quantum Optics.
https://www.aip.org/history-programs/niels-bohr-library/oral-histories/5037
1923: “Excludes Alien Jewish Students” published today described the announcement of “a decision of he Board of Professors” at the Vienna Polytechnic” that henceforth numerous clauses will be applied against foreign Jewish students.”
1924: Ninety-two year old Hannah Mathilde von Rothschild, the daughter and wife of members of the famous members of this banking dynasty who was unique in her musical activities which included studying with Chopin, writing songs for popular vocalist of the day and publishing “a volume of 30 melodies” passed away today.
https://family.rothschildarchive.org/people/53-hannah-mathilde-mathilde-von-rothschild-1832-1924
1925: Louis Marshall, the President of Temple Emanu-El addressed the members of the Emanu-El League, the congregations newest organization which is designed to attract younger congregants, calling on them “to study and spread Judaism and learn the History of the Jews and their contributions to civilization” while participating in the philanthropic and communal pursuits that will prepare to lead the Temple in the future.
1926: “Denies Break in Jews’ Life” published today included a denial by Rabbi Nathan Krass of Temple Emanu-El “that the blank page in the” Christian “Bible separating the Old and New Testaments was meant to mark a barren period in the history of Israel.”
1926: In Philadelphia, PA, “prominent basketball referee and baseball umpire Harry Rudolph” and his wife gave birth to Marvin “Mendy” Rudolph who was an NBA referee for 22 years from 1953 to 1957
https://web.archive.org/web/20070714142048/http://www.hoophall.com/halloffamers/bhof-marvin-rudolph.html
http://web.archive.org/web/20070930181653/http:/www.hoophall.com/ot/rudolph-induction-article.html
1927: In New York City, Joseph C. Hyman and Lee Roven, the sister of concert pianist Anton Rovinsky gave birth to composer and conductor Richard “Dick” Hyman
http://www.dickhyman.com/
1927: Birthdate of Joel Kaufman who played forward and center for New York University before choosing to play professional with the American Basketball League after having been drafted by the Warriors of the NBA.
1928: Bantamweight Herman “Kid” Silvers (born Herman Silverberg) was defeated in his 32nd bout.
1929: “Fräulein Else” the movie version of a novella by Arthur Schnitzler and directed by Paul Czinnner was released in Germany today.
1929: Financier Paul Warburg warned that the wild speculation gripping the stock market could lead to disaster. [Bernard Baruch was another Jewish financier who expressed the same concern.]
1930(8th of Adar, 5690):Parashat Teruman and Shabbat Zachor
1930: Der shtern, “a Yiddish language newspaper published in Kharkov” which “was an organization of the Central Committee of the Communist party” demanded today that OZET, “the public Society for Settling Toiling Jews on the Land” in the Soviet Union, “liquidate all religious habits in the Jewish colonies” noting that many of “the Jews still observed the Sabbath” and Kashrut.
1932: Judge Pound, “another ‘liberal’” is scheduled to succeed “Benjamin N. Cardozo as chief judge of New York’s State Court of Appeals.”
1935: U.S. premiere of “Roberta” produced by Pandro S. Bermon with music by Jerome Kern and conducted by Max Steiner.
1936(14th of Adar, 5696): Purim
1936: “A festival of Purim play was given” this “afternoon at Temple Emanu-El on 5th Avenue.
1936: At Temple Ansche Chesed, “Rabbi Joseph Zeitlin said Purim offered consolation to all oppressed people” because “it teaches us that force will inevitable fail” and that “the more a people is persecuted for devotion to ideals the more attached and loyal they become.”
1936: “At Temple B’nai Jershurun, Rabbi Israel Goldstein reviewed historical instances of persecution” saying that “the problem that confronted the Jews of Persia and Rome now confront the Jews of the twentieth century” who must “yield to the forces and lose their identity” or “resist those forces” and risk isolation.
1936: In the Bronx, “Dr. Jacob Katz rabbi of the Montefiore Congregation said the celebration of PUrimes was not to commemorate the defeat of the Persians, but to revive the spirit of endurance, patience and fortitude of the Jews ‘until the time comes when neither nations nor creeds shall ask conquest but shall rely for their survival and progress on the true human value and divine inspiration.’”
1936: “Rabbi Herbert S. Goldstein, preaching at the Institutional Synagogue, said anti-Semitism arose not only from the desire to abolish Judaism but also from political and economic jealousies.”
1936: “Three hundred chapters throughout the” United States are scheduled to “merge the celebration…with founders’ day programs” today on a “date that marks the 24th anniversary of the organization which was established by Miss Henriette Szold in 1912.”
1936: Dr. Chaim Weizmann is scheduled to arrive today in London where he will engage in “a series of consultations on the increasingly serious position of Jewish communities’ including Germany, Poland – where “anti-Semitism on the Nazi model” is growing and Rumania as well as actions being taken by the British government in Palestine which are inimical to Jewish interests and violate the Balfour Declaration.
1936: “Rabbi Joseph Rosen, an authority on Talmudic law…known to Jews as the Rogachever Gaon (sage of Rogachev, Russia)…was eulogized at services” in Vienna today where were attended by “a great number of his co-religionists.”
1936: The three winners of the Einstein Medals which are presented by the Jewish Forum “for distinguished services in the fields of peace, literature and philanthropy” tonight were awarded to “Mrs. Estelle M. Sternberger, executive director of World Peace ‘for outstanding service to the cause of world peace and goodwill; author Franz Werfel for distinction as a novelist and playwright and James G. McDonald, former high commissioner for German refugees for his services to the humanitarian cause.”
1937: Helmut Hirsch, a Jewish architectural student originally from Stuttgart was sentenced to death today for his role in the attempted murder of Julius Streicher.
1937: The New York Times reported on acts of human kindness and brotherhood during the ongoing wave of terrorism in Palestine. “During recent disturbances a Jewish chauffeur took the son of an Arab who was killed to a hospital and an Arab driver rescued on the Jews hurt by stone-throwing.”
1938: The Jewish Theological Seminary of America observed the twenty-fifth anniversary of Dr. Joseph H. Hertz as Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the British Empire in a broadcast from Radio Station WHN. Dr. Hertz was the first graduate of the seminary.
1938: “The Girl of the Golden West” a musical based on a play by David Belasco and directed and produced by Robert Z. Leonard was released in the United States today.
1939: “The British Government decided today to suspend all formal and informal meetings with the Jewish and Arab delegates to the Palestine Conference and to proceed with the formulation of its own plan, which will be submitted to both sides early next week. (As reported by Robert P. Post)
1939: Sixty-three year old Isaïe Schwartz, the Grand Rabbi of Strasbourg who during the World War had served as a stretcher bearer and as a chaplain at the American Army based at Bordeaux, was elected Grand Rabbi France, “replacing Israel Levy who had retired on account of his health.”
1940: A curfew which had gone into effect yesterday following protests over the “new restrictions on land transfers” which has been “led by the chief rabbis and members of the Vaad Leumi” was scheduled to fe lifted today.
1941: In a prelude to her famous diary, Esther "Etty" Hillesum wrote a letter addressed to Julius Spier in an exercise book. These would provide a picture of life in Amsterdam under Nazi occupation.
1942: “Chaim Weizmann, president of the Jewish Agency for Palestine, laid upon the British Government today responsibility for the death of 760 Jewish refugees from Rumania who perished when the steamer Struma sank in the Black Sea recently”
1942: The 2,500 delegates attending the annual conventions of H.I.A.S.at the Hotel Astor were told today that “n the eighteen months since the fall of France, "rescue through emigration" of 25,000 men, women and children from Europe has been aided by the Hebrew Sheltering and Immigrant Aid Society and its European affiliate.”
1943(1stof Adar, 5703): Rosh Chodesh Adar II
1943: Greek Jews of Salonika were transported to Nazi extermination camps.
1943: The Sokolovo Czech battalion battled the Germans for three days. Of the 1,000 Czech soldiers, 600 are Jews.
1944: In the Warsaw Ghetto 37 Jews are given away in their hiding places. Emanuel Ringelblum, noted historian and author of a detailed chronicle of the plight of the Warsaw Jews is one of the group that is captured. Ringelblum was tortured for three days during which he revealed nothing about his fellow Jews in hiding. A few days later Ringelblum aged 43, his wife, and 13 year old son Uri were executed. (Some sites show this as having happened on March 7. The fog of war and change of time zones can play havoc with precision dating sometimes)
1944: In France, "in the morning there is a knock on the door at the apartment of Hélène Berr's family." Her parents Raymond and Antoinette will die later that year in Auschwitz. Helene will survive until 1945 when she will die at Bergen Belsen where she was beaten to death five days before the camp was liberated by the British.
1945(23rdof Adar, 5705): Katherine Garfield the only daughter of actor John Garfield and Roberta Seiman who had been born in 1938 passed away today after contracting a case of strep throat while on a USO tour with her father.
1945: The Big Red One, whose members included Samuel Fuller captured Bonn today.
1946: “World Zionism officially proposed to the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry on Palestine today that 1,000,000 more Jews be brought to Palestine within the next decade.”
1947: The Committee organizing the second International Music Festival to be held in Prague has invited Leonard Bernstein to conduct the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra when it performs in May of this year.
1947: After having been sighted by RAF plane the refugee-filled SS Ben Hecht also called the Abril was intercepted by British ships- HMS Chieftain, HMS Chevron and HMS Chivalrous and HMS St. Bride’s Bay off the coast of Palestine and were boarded by two waves of British soldiers wearing red berets which earned them the sobriquet “red devils”
1947: Dr. Ludwig Fischer was executed for his role in the liquidation of the Warsaw Ghetto
1947: Jewish terrorists defy British Martial law by launching a series of attacks in Tel Aviv tonight that injure 17 people, including 15 Jews, one British constable and one Arab constable.
1948: Birthdate of Yaakov Zvi, the London native we know as Jonathan Henry Sacks, the Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth and one of the most influential Jewish leaders of his time.
http://rabbisacks.org/
https://www.aish.com/authors/48865787.html
1948: “It was learned tonight after the first meeting of the Great Powers” that “the Soviet Union is pressing for a prompt decision on steps to carry out the partition of Palestine while the United States still hopes that a settlement satisfactory to both Jews and Arabs can be worked out.” (As reported by Thomas J. Hamilton)
1948: Milton Sperling and Betty Warner gave birth to their third child, Cass Warner.
1948:The U.S.Supreme Court ruled that religious instruction in public schools was unconstitutional.
1949: During Operation Uvda, as the defending Jordanian forces withdrew, the Golani forces took Ein Ghamr.
1949: During the day the IDF moved towards Umm Rashrash through the Valley of the Fingers which in the evening the Alexandroni Brigade set sail from Sodom on the Dead Sea with the intent of seizing Ein Gedi.
1949: Following elections, David Ben-Gurion formed the first government of Israel. In what would prove to be the curse of the Israeli political system, it was a coalition government led by Mapai but including two other smaller parties. Ben-Gurion served both as Prime Minister and Defense Minister. Future Prime Minister Golda Meir served as the Minister of Labor and Social Security.
1949: "In a Knesset session in Tel Aviv...Eliahu Eliashar, a parliamentary representative of the Sephardi Jews, spoke on behalf of the Jews from Muslim lands."
1950(19thof Adar, 5710): Sixty-seven year old Hans Müller-Einigen, the son of Dr. Josef Müller and Johanna Müller, who is best “known for his screenplay for ‘The White Horse’” passed away today in Germany.
1950(19thof Adar, 5710): Fifty-eight year old “Oscar A.H. Danenberg, a former state representative and legal aid for the municipal department of public welfare passed away today in Stratford, Ct.
1950: An overflow crowd of one thousand mourners filled New York’s Park West Memorial Chapel and spilled out into the street at the funeral services for Daniel Frisch, the president of the Zionist Organization of America. Rabbi Bernard Bergman officiated at the service and he was assisted by Cantor Robert Segal. Numerous tributes were paid to Frisch for his support of Jewish causes and Zionism by several famous dignitaries include Eliahu Elath, Israel’s Ambassador to the United States, Louis Lips, chairman of the American Zionist council and Dr. Nahum Goldmann, chairman of the American section of the Jewish Agency for Palestine. Following the service, Mr. Frisch’s body will be taken to Indianapolis for burial.
1950: Judge Morris Rothenberg, National Chairman of the United Palestine Appeal, issued a report today that funds raised by American Jews “had made possible” the establishment” of 3,000 small businesses for the rehabilitation and resettlement of invalid immigrants in Israel at a cost of five million dollars.”
1951: The International Table Tennis Federation banned Egypt for refusing to play Israel. You have to give some points to the ping pong players. They were one of the few international organizations that has not knuckled under to the Arabs and their supporters.
1951: In London, the original West End production of “Kiss Me, Kate” a musical with the book by Samuel and Bella Spewack opened today.
1951: “Royal Wedding” the Alan Jay Lerner musical comedy directed by Stanley Donen premiered today in New York City
1951: Release date for “Lemon Drop Kid,” a comedy directed by Sidney Lanfield, featuring Sid Melton as “Little Louie” and Ben Welden as “Singing Solly.”
1952: Birthdate of former U.S. Senator George Allen. According to Jewish law, Allen is Jewish since his mother was Jewish. This information surfaced during Allen’s campaign for re-election in 2006. He did not find out that his mother was Jewish until sometime after he became an adult. His mother had lived in Tunisia during World War II and seen her father hauled off by the authorities. She did not want her children to know about their Jewish heritage because she saw being Jewish as threat to their physical well-being. If it could happen in Tunisia, she reasoned, it could happen again, even in the United States,
1955(14thof Adar, 5715): Purim
1957: Egypt reopened the Suez Canal to minor shipping after the withdrawal of Israeli troops from the Sinai Peninsula. This was the last chapter in the Suez Crisis of 1956. Unfortunately the United Nations did not honor its guarantees to Israel and the result was the Six Days War of 1967
1957(5thof Adar II, 5717): A shepherd from kibbutz Beit Guvrin was killed by terrorists in a field near the kibbutz.
1959: “Too Many Crooks” a comedy co-starring Bernard Bresslaw and music by Stanley Black (Solomon Schwartz) was released in the United Kingdom today.
1959: George Lincoln Rockwell founded the American Nazi Party
1961(20thof Adar, 5721): Seventy-three year old Artur Carlos de Barros Basto (Abraham Israel Ben-Rosh) the Portuguese army office the crypto-Jew who affirmed his Judaism through conversion, helped hundreds escape the Shoah and worked to rebuild the Jewish community on the Iberian peninsula passed away today
http://www.the-jewish-story.org/basto.html
http://forward.com/news/breaking-news/324119/portuguese-dreyfus-cause-taken-up-by-leading-candidate/?utm_content=daily_Newsletter_BreakingNews_Position-3&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=New%20Daily%202015-11-05&utm_term=The%20Forward%20Today%20%28Monday-Friday%29
1961: Birthdate of actress Camryn Manheim. She has appeared in such movies as “Bonfire of the Vanities” and television programs as “The Practice.” In 1999 she published her autobiography entitled Wake Up, I'm Fat!
1963: A five-man syndicate led by Sonny Werblin bought the New York Titans which they would rebrand as the New York Jets, the first AFL team to win the Superbowl. (As reported by Bob Wechsler)
1964(24th of Adar, 5724): Seventy three year old Budapest born American psychoanalyst Dr. Franz Gabriel Alexander, the husband of “artist Anita Venier with whom he had two daughters, Sylvia and Francesca, passed away today.
https://www.nytimes.com/1964/03/09/archives/dr-franz-alexander-73-dies-was-pioneer-in-psychosomatics-analyst.html
https://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1176/appi.ajp.159.8.1305
1965:The Knesset passed the “Broadcasting Authority Law” which is the basis for the Israeli Broadcasting Authority’s operations. The Israeli Broadcasting Authority (IBA) was formed as an independent corporation responsible for all broadcasts in Israel and to the Diaspora. Until 1965, Kol Israel operated under the Office of the Prime Minister.
1969: During “The War of Attrition” a massive artillery barrage marked the start of the Egyptian campaign to destroy the Bar Lev Line. The plan was under the direct supervision of General Abdul Munim Riad, the chief of Staff of the Egyptian Armed Forces.
1970: “Thirty-nine Soviet Jews from different cities protested against the” U.S.S.R’s’ “continuing anti-Israel and anti-Zionist Campaign.”
1970: Attorney Robert Shapiro, part of the O.J. Simpson “dream team” and a co-founder of LegalZoom married Linell Thomas today.
1971: Birthdate of David Aaron Greenberg, the native of New Haven, CT whose poetry was inspired by a meeting with Allen Ginsberg.
1971: William Davidon, a Jewish physics professor at Haverford College led “a group of anti-war activists” who “broke into a small FBI satellite office in the town of Media,” Pennsylvania.
http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/158354/fbi-burglars-revealed?utm_source=tabletmagazinelist&utm_campaign=8ce0925f8d-1_7_2014&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c308bf8edb-8ce0925f8d-206644398
1971: Dorothy Fields was inducted into the Songwriters' Hall of Fame. She was the only woman in the first class of inductees. Two of her songs that are still played today are"I Can't Give You Anything But Love, Baby" and "On the Sunny Side of the Street." The song "The Way You Look Tonight" an Academy Award for "Best Song" in 1936.
1973: CBS broadcast the “Marcus-Nelson Murders” with a script by Abby Mann in what would prove to be the pilot for the police drama “Kojak” created by Mann.
1973(4th of Adar II, 5733): Seventy-two year old accountant Frank Abrams, “a close association of the late Rabbi Stephen S. Wise “ and an “honorary vice president of the American Jewish Congress” who raised three sons – Sheldon, Douglas and Barry – with his wife Sylvia passed away today.
https://www.nytimes.com/1973/03/09/archives/frank-abrams-dies-a-leader-in-aic.html
1974: “Henry Kissinger warned Congress of a presidential veto if the trade bill” was linked to the issue of Jewish immigration from the Soviet Union.
1976(6th of Adar II, 5736): Eighty-six year old Edith Altschul Lehman, the widow of former New York Governor Herbert H. Lehman passed away today. (JWA shows her death date as 1974 while the Times uses 1976)
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/archival/collections/ldpd_4078517/index.html
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/Lehman-Edith-Altschul
https://www.nytimes.com/1976/03/09/archives/edith-lehman-philanthropist-is-dead.html
1977: “Cross of Iron” a WW II move set on the Eastern Front with music by Ernest Gold was released in the UK today.
1977: First International Women’s Day as proclaimed by the United Nations.
1981: Foreign Minister Yithak Shamir “warned that the arms race already underway in the Middle East would be accelerated by the U.S. decision to sell additional sophisticated weaponry to Arab countries…”
1985(15th of Adar, 5745): Shushan Purim
1985:“Two hundred and fifty Congressmen addressed a letter to President Reagan requesting the administration to set up talks with the Soviet Union, aimed solely at allowing freer emigration of Soviet Jews, in accordance with the Helsinki Accords.”
1988: Refuseniks meet today with U.S. Senators Sam Nunn, Alan Cranston and Carl Levin all of whom were Democrats.
1989: “Will You Marry Me?” a one act opera by composer Hugo David Weisgall was performed for the first time today by the Opera Ensemble of New York.
1993(15th of Adar, 5753): Uri Magidish was stabbed to death by two Palestinians while working in a hothouse at Gan Or.
1998: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or special interest to Jewish readers including The Picasso Papers by Rosalind Krauss, Mahler by Jonathan Carr and Conversations With Joseph Brodsky: A Poet's Journey Through the Twentieth Century
by Solomon Volkov.
1998(10th of Adar, 5758): Forty-four year old Broadway musical star Laurie Hope Beechman passed away today.
http://www.nytimes.com/1998/03/10/arts/laurie-beechman-dies-at-44-played-grizabella-in-cats.html
2001(13th of Adar, 5761): Ta’anit Esther; Erev Purim
2001(13th of Adar, 5761): Sixty-seven year old Plymouth, PA native Abraham ‘Abe Cohen who played college football at the University of Tennessee, Chattagnooga before turning pro with the CFL Hamilton Tiger-Cats and the NFL Boston Patriots (the forerunner of the New England Patriots) passed away today.
2003(4th of Adar II, 5763): Parashat Pekudi
2003(4th of Adar II, 5763): Ninety-one year old Dr. Benjamin W. Pushkin, the husband of Ann Pushkin with whom he raised two children – Robert and Judy -- who practiced podiatry for sixty years in Chicago and Los Anglese and who had been President of the Howard Paul Wilson B’nai B’rith Lodge passed away today..
2004(15th of Adar, 5764): Shushan Purim
2004(15th of Adar, 5674): Ninety-two year old painter Elise Asher, the wife of poet Stanley Kunitz, passed away today.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/13/arts/elise-asher-92-painter-poet-who-blended-images-and-words.html?_r=0
2005: “A report on the Israeli government's support for illegal settlement outposts in the West Bank” which “describes widespread state complicity, fraud and cynicism, illegal diversion of government funds and illegal seizure of private Palestinian land” “was formally delivered to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon” today.
2006: The Hebrew Cemetery in Richmond, VA “aka Hebrew Burying Ground” founded in 1816 was added to the Virginia Landmarks Register.
2006: French born, American-Jewish businessman Roland Arnall begins serving as United States Ambassador to the Netherlands.
2006: Zubin Mehta, conductor of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, is honored as a Dan David Laureate the annual awards ceremony at the Opera Garnier in Paris. The Dan David Prize annually awards 3 prizes of US$ 1 million each for achievements having an outstanding scientific, technological, cultural or social impact on our world.
2006(8thof Adar, 5766): Sixty-nine year old George Sassoon, the multi-talented son of poet Siegfried Sassoon passed away today.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1513183/George-Sassoon.html
2007: Haaretz reports the 2006 war in Lebanon triggered a baby boom. According to health maintenance organization statistics show that the number of women now in their fifth, sixth or seventh month of pregnancy was 35 percent higher than the figure a year ago.
2008: A scaled down London revival Jerry Herman’s and Harvey Fierstein’s “La Cage aux Folles” came to a close at the Menier Chocolate Factory
2008: Rosh Chodesh Adar II, 5768, First Day of Adar II
2008: Shabbat Shekalim, 5768
2008: (1 Adar II 5763) Yahrzeit for the passengers killed on Egged Bus #53 five years ago in Tel Aviv:
Kmer Abu Khamed, 12, from Daliyat al Karmel
Yuval Mendelevitch, 13, from Haifa
Smadar Firstatter, 17, from Haifa
Avigail Lietel, 14, from Haifa
Asaf Tzur, 16, from Haifa
Daniel Harush, 16 , from Safed
Tom Hershko, 16, from Haifa, and his father-
Motti Hershko, 41, from Haifa
Tal Kehrmann, 17, from Haifa
Elizabeth (Liz) Katzman, 17, from Haifa
Meital Katav, 20, from Haifa
Moran Shushan, 20, from Haifa
Anatoly Biryakov, 20, from Haifa
Be'eri Ovad, 21 , from Rosh Pina
Eliyahu Laham, 22, from Haifa
Miriam Atar, 27, from Haifa
Mark Takash, 54, from Haifa
2009: In Chicago final performances of two plays by Lillian Hellman – “The Little Foxes” and “Scoundrel Time.”
2009: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Pictures at an Exhibition by Sara Houghteling, The Kindly Ones by Jonathan Littell, The Believers by Zoe Heller and the recently published paperback edition of The Forger by Cioma Schönhaus.
2009: In its on-line edition The Washington Postfeatured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including The Believers by Zoe Heller and Hunting Eichmann:How a Band of Survivors And a Young Spy Agency Chased Down The World's Most Notorious Nazi by Neal Bascomb.
2009:Military Intelligence chief Amos Yadlin said today at the weekly cabinet meeting that "Iran has crossed the technological threshold" in its quest for nuclear arms.
2009: In “They Lived in our midst: Area was haven for Nazi-era figures,” published today, Ron Grossman reports on Nazis who moved to Chicago after World War II. http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-chicago-nazis-08-mar08,0,758025,print.story
2009: Israel advanced to the Davis Cup quarterfinals for the first time since 1987 after rallying to beat seven-time champion Sweden 3-2 today in a close series overshadowed by political protests. Harel Levy beat Andreas Vinciguerra 6-4, 4-6, 6-4, 3-6, 8-6 to decide the World Group first-round series in a near-empty arena in Malmo.Only about 300 special invitees were allowed to watch the match because city officials said they couldn't guarantee security at the venue. Critics, including the Israeli team, said Malmo was caving in to threats of violence from anti-Israel groups.
2009: In “Even Among Venerable Texts, a Torah Like No Other,” published today Sophia Hollander describes the discovery of an 800 year-old Torah and the unique career of Yitzchok Reisman who is both a rabbi and a sofer.
The weathered brown parchment with its frayed edges and inked Hebrew letters seemed beautiful but unremarkable. Itzhak Winer, a 34-year-old Torah scribe turned Judaica seller, considered the item a nice find, but just one of the 30 or more Torahs he buys and sells in a year. From his Jerusalem dealer, he learned that the Torah had been owned by a family in Morocco and was in excellent condition. “He knew that it’s old, but he didn’t really know — and neither did I — how special it was,” said Mr. Winer, who works out of his home in Willowbrook, Staten Island. Curious about the item’s origins, Mr. Winer took it to a Lower East Side rabbi named Yitzchok Reisman, an expert in identifying antique Torahs, the scrolls containing the first five books of the Hebrew Scriptures. Rabbi Reisman, born in 1938 in Flatbush, Brooklyn, found himself drawn as a teenager to the scribes who congregated on the Lower East Side. They shared their craft with him, passing down stories and lore of ancient scrolls. Rabbi Reisman also became attracted to the buying and selling of Torahs. “There were 400 congregations that were declining, closing up and selling off the Torahs and the assets,” he said. As Torahs from the Lower East Side migrated to the suburbs and across the continent, the sellers, he saw, “helped transfer the Torah scrolls on to the rest of America.” Today, Rabbi Reisman restores Torahs using handmade ink and carved turkey feathers at his workshop on Grand Street. Heaps of wooden rollers and antique furniture obscure treasures like the gleaming copper case of a 300-year-old Yemenite Torah and an elaborately woven Torah cover from Iraq. Rabbi Reisman quickly realized that Mr. Winer’s Torah was unique. The materials and calligraphic style identified it as Spanish, which meant that it was written before 1492, when the Jews were expelled from Spain. In addition, the strong swirls on the top of certain letters matched the style favored in Kabbalah, the Jewish mystical movement. “There are very, very few manuscripts and pieces of manuscripts that are older than the 1400s,” Rabbi Reisman said on a recent day in his ramshackle office as Mr. Winer looked on. And the kabbalistic flourishes, the rabbi added, make it “the only Spanish Torah known done in that way.”
These special markings are “like thorns that appear in certain letters that only show up in a small window of time,” Rabbi Reisman said. “No!” Mr. Winer interrupted. “A few hundred years.” “That’s a small window,” Rabbi Reisman retorted. As they bickered gently over nearly every detail, the two men also said that their research suggested that the Torah was created between 1272 and 1302, and that it could be connected to a famous Spanish scribe, Shem-Tob ben Abraham ibn Gaon. But they did seem to agree on who should get the Torah. “We’re hoping to get somebody or some community or some organization that wants to preserve the Spanish kabalistic tradition,” Mr. Winer said, “and it’s important to them to give it the
2010: CJH, LBI and YIVO are scheduled to present “Czernowitz in Jewish Memory” during which a panel of historians and writers, including Marianne Hirsch and Leo Spitzer, the authors of a new volume entitled Ghosts of Home: The Afterlife of Czernowitz in Jewish Memory, will discuss and debate the reconciliation of the two different memories Czernowtiz within the broader history of Jewish emancipation, assimilation and resistance in Eastern Europe. Czernowitz-"Vienna of the East"-is the site of two different powerful memories. To some, it was home to an assimilationist Austro-German Jewish culture; to others, it was a hub for the creation of modern Yiddish language and culture.
2010(22nd of Adar, 5770): Ninety-two year old microbiologist Benjamin Rubin, “the investor of the bifurcated vaccination needle” passed away today.
2010(22nd of Adar, 5770: David Kimche, reputed Israeli spymaster and diplomat passed away. A native of London who made Aliyah in 1936 he fought in the War of Independence before attending the Sorbonne and Hebrew University.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/10/world/middleeast/10kimche.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=David+Kimche%2C&st=nyt
2010: “The Addams Family” a musical comedy with a book co-authored by Marshall Brickman and lyrics by Andrew Lippa with Bebe Neuwirth as Morticia began previews on Broadway at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre
2010: Ronald Florence is scheduled to discuss Emissary Of The Doomed: Bargaining For Lives In The Holocaust his new book on the fate of Hungary’s Jews during World War II at noon today in the James Madison Building of the Library of Congress.
2010: Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. began a five-day visit to the Middle East today, part of a concerted American effort to restart Israeli-Palestinian peace talks and keep Israel focused on relying on sanctions against Iran’s nuclear program rather than on unilateral military action.
2010: George J. Mitchell, the administration’s Middle East envoy, announced today in Jerusalem that Israel and the Palestinians had agreed to start indirect negotiations and that he would be back next week to continue structuring those talks.
2010: The Women’s International Zionist Organization (WIZO) hosted a ceremony at the Tel Aviv Opera House where it presented mock awards for what the nonprofit organization has termed the “most sexist advertisements” of the year. The five “winners,” including a mix of television commercials and billboard ads from some of the country’s most well-known local and international manufacturers, show women in either an inappropriate sexual capacity or in a degrading conjugal role, said those judging the contest. Listed as the top five Most Sexist Advertisements for 2009 are ads from Fairy dish liquid, AXE deodorant, Goldstar Beer, the morning-after contraceptive pill by Postinor, and DO IT Kitchen’s print campaign. This is the second year WIZO has run such a campaign. The Fairy ad had been awarded first prize in the competition because it depicted a family situation in which the woman or mother was left to wash up all the dishes alone while her husband and the male relatives watched her.
2010: Today “it was announced that Rob Morrow has signed on to star in Jerry Bruckheimer's new series, The Whole Truth, on ABC
2011: At the Crowden Music Center, in Berkley, CA, violinist Noah Bendix-Balgley is scheduled to perform the “rarely heard works from the St. Petersburg Society for Jewish Folk Music, a turn-of-the-century movement that brought Jewish folk music into European classical form” during the Jewish Music Festival.
2011: The Center for Jewish History is scheduled to host a panel discussion entitled “The Rebbe, Charismatic Leadership and the American Spiritual Landscape.”
2011: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Moonwalking With Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything by Joshua Foer
2011: A recent blast of cold air from Scandinavia coupled with warm Mediterranean Sea influence created torrential rain and thunderstorms today. Snow fell in the Hermon and other areas in the north. The morning hours saw between 10-30 mm of rainfall in the country's center, and between 5-15 mm in the North, with the Israeli Meteorological Service reporting up to 32 mm in the Tel Aviv area. Showers are expected to dissipate in the afternoon hours. Authorities closed the Hermon to visitors as snow began to fall. The stormy weather wreaked havoc on motorways as well, causing heavy traffic in the Center and even worse traffic jams in the North. In the Kirya junction in Tel Aviv, a traffic disturbance developed when traffic lights malfunctioned and jammed the roads until a police officer arrived to help direct traffic.
2011: A film festival on women and religion is launching today at the Jerusalem Cinematheque.
2011: The Hurva Synagogue, which was officially rededicated a year ago, celebrated a milestone today. For the first time since its destruction by the Jordanian Arab Legion in May 1948, the Ashkenazi synagogue in the Old City of Jerusalem’s Jewish Quarter hosted a wedding ceremony as an operational house of worship. Avraham Pashnov and Rachel-Orli Journo were married in the Hurva’s courtyard. During the ceremony, Pashnov said he and his wife are “only a tiny chain link that brings together the past and the future.”
2011: In an interviewed published today by the Wall Street Journal, Defense Minister Ehud Barak said that Israel was considering asking the United States for an additional $20 billion in aid due to the increased volatility in the Middle East.
http://www.jpost.com/Defense/Article.aspx?id=211231
2012(14thof Adar, 5772): Purim
2012: Under the leadership of Rabbi Pinchas Ciment, Chabad Lubavitch of Arkansas is scheduled to sponsor the Royal Purim Feast With The Stars in Little Rock, AR.
2012: “Grace Paley: Collected Shorts” is scheduled to be shown at the Farthest North Jewish Film Festival in Fairbanks, Alaska.
2012: Professors Jerome Copulsky and Alison Peterman are scheduled to lead “Scripture and Spinoza,” a backstage discussion following tonight’s performance of “New Jerusalem: The Interrogation of Baruch De Spinoza.
2012:A Palestinian stabbed an IDF soldier in the village of Yata in the southern Hebron Hills today. The soldier returned fire, injuring the attacker and killing another Palestinian with him. The two Palestinians that were shot were both teenagers. The soldier was moderately wounded and evacuated to Hadassah Ein Karem Hospital in Jerusalem.
http://www.jpost.com/Defense/Article.aspx?id=261037
2012: Maj.-Gen. Nitzan Alon was appointed head of the Central Command in place of Maj.-Gen. Avi Mizrahi. Alon, who in the past served as commander of the Judea and Samaria Division will officially take up his post on the first day of next week at a ceremony at Central Command headquarters in Jerusalem. During the ceremony today, Mizrahi said that the position was the most "complicated and difficult" that he had performed throughout his career.
2012: As Israel struggles with how to keep Iran from going nuclear “Six world powers called on Iran today to let international inspectors visit a military site where the UN nuclear watchdog says development work relevant to nuclear weapons may have taken place.”
2013: Soloists and Ensembles of the Jerusalem Conservatory of Music and Dance are scheduled to perform at the Eden-Tamir Music Center.
2013:Eva Erben who as a young girl “ was forced by the Nazis to leave her home in Prague and join one of the transports to the Theresienstadt Ghetto” is scheduled to speak at the Wiener Library on “Escape Story: Surviving the Holocaust as a Young Girl.”
2013: The Maccabeats are scheduled to perform at Beth Jacob Congregation in Beverly Hills, CA.
2014: Nir Areli’s, “Inframan” in which he created a series of portraits using an infrared technique is scheduled to have its final showing at the Daniel Cooney Gallery.
2014: In London the Girls in Trouble duo (poet and multi-instrumentalist Alicia Jo Rabins, accompanied by bassist Aaron Hartman) are scheduled to perform songs from their two albums; Girls in Trouble and Half You Half Me.
2014: “Natan” and “When Jews Were Funny” are scheduled to be shown at the Washington Jewish Film Festival.
2014: “The Jewish Cardinal” is scheduled to be shown at the Northern Virginia Jewish Film Festival.
2014: “The Klos-C, which was captured with what the IDF says is a cargo of Iranian arms in its hold” and “its Israeli Navy escort entered the port of Eilat this afternoon after a voyage of three-and-a-half days following Israel’s interception of the ship off the coast of Sudan earlier this week.” (As reported by Ilan Ben Zion)
2014: “A Little String Music” featuring performances of Israeli and klezmer music by Ruth Navarre is scheduled to take place this evening at “LIMMUD” New Orleans.\
2014(6th of Adar II, 5774): Ninety-three year old Holocaust survivor Leo Bretholz passed away today.(As reported by Paul Vitello)
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/30/world/europe/leo-bretholz-93-dies-escaped-train-to-auschwitz.html?hpw&rref=obituaries
2015(17th of Adar, 5775): Fifty-nine year old Sam Simon, the creative of “The Simpsons” passed away today.
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/10/arts/television/sam-simon-who-helped-shape-the-simpsons-dies-at-59.html?_r=0
2015: The New York Times features reviews of books by and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including To Explain the World: The Discovery of Modern Science by Steven Weinberg.
2015: The Jewish Museum of Florida is scheduled to mark the 30thanniversary of the screening of Shoah by showing Part 3 of the famed documentary.
2015: The Jewish Community Center of Northern Virginia is scheduled to host “Have We Overcome?” which will include a screening of a film depicting the famous 1960 Woolworth’s sit-in.
2015: In Iowa City, Rabbi Avremel and Chaya Blesofsky are scheduled to host the Upsherin of their son Berel.
2015: IPTV presents “The Jewish Journey: America.”
2015: “Residents of the Bat Ayin settlement in the Etzion bloc south of Jerusalem accused the IDF and police of “provoking” a violent altercation with local youth today that ended with a soldier firing in the air to ward off the demonstrators” after police entered the settlement “to arrest two residents suspected of ‘nationalist crimes.’”
2015: “A composition from Estonian-born composer Jonas Tarm entitled ‘March to Oblivion’ which was set be performed today at Carnegie Hall was pulled at the last minute because it “contained a 45-second musical quotation from ‘Horst-Wessel-Lied’ – the Nazi anthem. (As reported by Lazar Berman)
2016: The Jewish Genealogical Society of Broward County is scheduled to host a “presentation from Jewish Records Indexing-Poland” that “will deal with Jewish records and research for two major areas of Poland.”
2016: The Pew Research published “Israel’s Religiously Divided Society” today.
http://www.pewforum.org/2016/03/08/israels-religiously-divided-society/
2016: In “Deep Rifts Among Israeli Jews Are Found in Religion Survey” published today Isabel Kershner described a House of Israel that has many rooms.
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/09/world/middleeast/study-israel-jews-pew-research.html?hpw&rref=world&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=well-region®ion=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well&_r=0
2016: “A Nazi Legacy” is scheduled to be shown at the Houston Jewish Film Festival in Houston, TX.
2016: Dr. Donneil Hartman, President of the Shalom Hartman Institute is scheduled to lead the final lecture of six session series at the Skirball Center that “focuses on the personal and social mores behind the passionate opinions surrounding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
2016: In London, the Pears Institute for the Study of Antisemitism is scheduled to host a lecture by Professor Sander Gilman of University on “Circumcision: An Index of Difference and/or the Health Exception?”
2017: Rabbi Yigal Levinstein “who works together with Rabbi Eli Sadan at the Bnei David pre-army program told several hundred graduates of another pre-army that IDF service had ‘driven our girls crazy’” because they are recruited into “the army where they enter as Jews but” are not “Jews by the time they leave.”
2017: In “Lunch with Lisa Jackson Pulver: Aboriginal health 80 years behind rest of Australia” published today, Mark Dapin described his interview with “Western Sydney University pro-vice-chancellor Lisa Jackson Pulver AM, a typical Aboriginal Jew who escaped a horrifically violent home life to achieve a PhD in medicine and go on to become a Group Captain in the Royal Australian Air Force and the first female president of an Orthodox synagogue in Australia.”
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/lunch-with-lisa-jackson-pulver-aboriginal-health-80-years-behind-rest-of-australia-20170308-gutaat.html
2017: In Chicago, Dr. Richard A. Chaifetz and E. Scott Santi are scheduled to be honored at tonight’s 2017 Humanitarian Awards Dinner sponsored by the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center.
2017: The Oxford University Jewish Society is scheduled to host “Pizza and Movie Night”
2017: The Temple Emanu-El Streicker Center is scheduled to host “Streit’s Matzo Mania” - an evening with Streit scion, cookbook author Michele Heilbrun and chef/cookbook author David Kirschner who will provide a crash course on matzo history, complete with clips from a fascinating Streit’s documentary.
2018: “Nora’s Will” is scheduled to be shown at the 21st NY Sephardic Jewish Film Festival today.
2018: In honor of International Women’s Day, the National Library of Israel is scheduled to host special “Women’s Day tours” today.
2018: Today, on International Women’s Day, Yad Vashem launched to on-line female focused exhibits. (As reported by Tracy Frydberg)
https://www.timesofisrael.com/on-international-womens-day-yad-vashem-launches-two-female-focused-exhibits/?utm_source=The+Times+of+Israel+Daily+Edition&utm_campaign=d7b33715ef-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_03_08&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_adb46cec92-d7b33715ef-53921877
2018: “Israeli air defense commander Brigadier General Tzivka Haimovitch” and Lieutenant General Richard Clark said today that “thousands of America and Israeli soldiers are preparing for the real possibility that they will have to fight ‘shoulder to shoulder’ against a massive ballistic attack on the State of Israel.” (As reported Judah Ari Gross)
2018: Oxford University Jewish Society is scheduled to host the “Jewniversity Challenge.”
2018: “Itzhak” by Alison Chernick is scheduled to open in New York.
2019(1stof Adar II, 5779): Rosh Chodesh Adar II meaning that Purim is on its way and Pesach is getting just a little closer.
2019: Today, Women of the Wall celebrated its 30th anniversary with a special anniversary prayer service which several prominent ultra-Orthodox rabbis sought to disrupt by calling for their student to demonstrate at the Kotel.
2019: In Arlington, VA, Congregation Etz Hayim is scheduled to host its “2ndFriday Night Musical Shabbat.”
2019: In San Leandro, CA, Temple Beth Sholom is scheduled to host “Shanghai Angel” during which “Soprano Heather Klein sings the story of her grandmother fleeing Nazi-occupied Austria for China and then U.S. With pianist Joshua Horovitz.”
2019: The Fattal Rock Festival is scheduled to continue for a second day in Eilat.
2020: San Jose State University is scheduled to host “A Day to Honor and Study Jewish Military Service” which includes the opening of the exhibit “Uncommon Valor: Jewish-American Medal of Honor Heroes,” the “2020 Jewish Studies Levinson Memorial Lecture: “American Jews and Military Service” by Judge Quentin Kopp, the 2020 Burdick Military History Symposium: Jewish Military History, moderated by Dr. Jonathan Roth, Professor of History, San Jose State University, "Zionists in the Red Army during the Russian Civil War" by Ignat Ayzenberg, Coordinator of Jewish Studies, San Jose State University, “The Boys of Camp Ritchie: From refugees to instruments of justice” by Lieutenant-Colonel Erik Brun, California State Guard Military Museum Command" and Jewish Military Chaplains: An American Tale"
Dr. Ronit Stahl, Assistant Professor, Department of History, U.C. Berkeley
2020: The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Strung Out:One Last Hit and Other Lies That Nearly Killed Me
A Memoirby Erin Khar of New York City, who is developing a spiritual practice, and for whom “ultimately converting to Judaism, has been pivotal to her recovery from heroin addiction.”
2020: In response to a coronavirus outbreak that has impacted the family of Lawrence Garbuz and Rabbi Reuven Fink Young members Israel of New Rochelle “who attended a bar mitzvah and funeral in late February have been asked to self-quarantine until at least” through today.
2020: The JCC Chicago Film Festival is scheduled to host the mid-west premiere of “Chichinette: How I Accidentally Became a Spy” which tells “the untold story of Marthe Cohn, a 98-year-old French-Jewish woman who was a spy in Nazi Germany in WWII.”
2020: The East Bay International Jewish Film Festival is scheduled to host screenings of “The Best of Enemies” and “Unsettled: Seeking Refuge in America.”
2020: Two days after having cancelled flights to “San Francisco and a number of European cities amid a global drop in travel over fears about the new coronavirus,” today, El Al “was also expected to cancel flights to Munich, Budapest, Amsterdam, Brussels, Bucharest, Vienna and Marseille.”
2020: “Due to the current coronavirus outbreak and restrictions on travel, Isaac Herzog will not be traveling to Boston for today’s Birnbaum Lecture”
2020: “The Jewish Heritage Museum of Monmouth County, NJ is scheduled to host a screening of “The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg.”
2020: The Israeli Film Festival of Philadelphia is scheduled to host a screening of “The Art of Waiting.”
2020: This evening, in New Orleans, Tulane University is scheduled to host a lecture organized under the leadership of Brian Horowitz, the Sizeler Family of the Jewish Studies Department on “The Frankist Movement in 18th Century Poland: What Happened to This Jewish Messianic Group?” by Professor Pawel Maciejko, of Johns Hopkins University.