March 17
796 BCE (1stof Nisan, 2956): Based on computations using the Bible and archaeology, possible date for the death of Jehoash, King of Judah.
45 BCE : Julius Caesar defeated the forces of Pompey at the Battle of Munda. Caesar’s victory put an end to the Pompeian attempt to rule Rome. Considering the way Pompey treated the Jews, Caesar’s victory was the preferable outcome.
180: Antonius Marcus Aurelius Emperor of Rome passed away at the age of 58. The author of Meditations was known as a wise philosopher-king. However, he had little use for the Jews. While traveling in Judea, he described the Jews as "Stinking and tumultuous." He reportedly expressed a preference for the Teutonic barbarians whom he was fighting on the border between Gaul and Germania.
455: Petronius Maximus becomes emperor of the Western Roman Empire after murdering Valentinian III and forcing the Empress Eudoxia to marry him. The Empress wrote to Genseric the Vandal asking him to come to Rome to avenge her. According to Theophanes he came and sacked the city and reportedly carried off the treasures from the Second Temple that had been seized by Titus in 70.
763: Birthdate of Harun al-Rashid, the Abbasid caliph who sent Jewish teachers to France at the request of Charlemagne.
1190: The Crusaders completed the massacre of Jews of York England slaughtering 500 Jews on this particular day.
1398: Today “The city council of Worms enacted an ordinance that every Jew or Jewess over twelve should pay one old tournois in Leibzoll, but not one farthing more.”
1406: Seventy-three year old Tunisian born Muslim historian Ibn Khaldun whose writing about the history of the Berbers described the conversion of Kahina, the 7th century “warrior queen” to Judaism.
1526: After making “major concessions to Charles V” Francis I who had no Jewish subjects but had a strange interest in the Hebrew language as can be seen by his unsuccessful attempt get the Hebrew grammarian Elias Levita to move to his realm, was freed today.
1616: In Holland, under the rule of Prince Maurice of Orange, it is decided that each city could decide for itself whether or not to admit Jews. In those towns where they were admitted they would not be required to wear a badge of any sort identifying them as Jews.
1636: Urban VIII issued “Cum allias piae” a Papal Bull that ordered the “Synagogues of the Duchies of Ferarri and Urban, to pay a tax of 10 ecus.”
1654: Alexis Mikhailovich, the second Romanov Czar, issued an edict today instructing “a party of Lithuanian Jews to proceed from Kaluga to Nijni-Novgorod” under the protection of an “escort of twenty sharpshooters.”
1733: “Deborah,” an oratorio by Handel based on Chapters 4 and 5 of the Book of Judges premiered at the King’s Theatre in London.
1749: “Solomon,” an oratorio by Handel based on the Biblical account of the Israelite King had its first performance at the Theatre Royal in London.
1762: The first St. Patrick’s Day Parade is held in New York City. The parade was organized by Irish soldiers serving in the British Navy. “Corned beef and cabbage is the traditional meal enjoyed by many on St. Patrick's Day, but only half of it is truly Irish. Cabbage has long been a staple of the Irish diet, but it was traditionally served with Irish bacon, not corned beef. The corned beef was substituted for bacon by Irish immigrants who came to America and who could not afford the real thing i.e. bacon. According to one version of this tale, the Irish immigrants learned about the cheaper alternative, corned beef, from their Jewish neighbors.” Are we to believe that traif bacon gave way to kosher Corned Beef? Only in America!
1757: Following a dispute with other members of the Bet Din in London, Isaac Nieto wrote a letter today resigning as ab bet din. Nieto was the son David Nieto and he had served as the Haham of Bevis Marks and as the first Rabbi of the Great Synagogue in Gibraltar. He had been serving as the ab bet din since 1751.
1798: Birthdate of Jacob Ettlinger, the native of Baden who became a leader of Orthodox Judaism and served as Chief Rabbi in Altona from 1836 until his death in 1871
1789: Birthdate of Edmund Kean, the great 19thcentury Shakespearian actor who first gained fame for his portrayal of Shylock. The portrayal of the Jew from Venice was a difficult role and a career-maker for those few who did it successfully.
1801: In Galicia, Rabbi Shebah ha-Levi and his wife gave birth to Orientalist Simchah Pinksker, the father of Leon Pinsker.
1805: The Italian Republic, a creation of Napoleon, was transformed in the Kingdom of Italy with the French emperor serving as King. The Jews of Italy benefited from the appearance of the French revolutionary armies. Between 1796 and 1798, they had liberated several ghettos, most notably the Rome Ghetto in 1798. The Jews will be forced to return to their ghettos with the return of Italian reactionaries but Napoleon would have one last success when he freed the Jews of Florence from their Ghetto in 1808.
1807: Birthdate of Mendel Hess the Chief Rabbi of the Grand Duchy of Weimar (Germany).
1808: Today an imperial edict was issued that “divided the Jews living in French countries into consistories. Brussels (Belgium) was included in the consistory of Crefeld. Since 1794, the French had controlled Belgium. By the time of the issuance of that edit, this meant Napoleon was the one issuing the orders. On the overthrow of Napoleon, Belgium was united with Holland; and the Jewish community of Brussels became the head of the fourteenth religious district of Holland. After the revolution of 1830 Brussels became the head of the Belgian consistories, and a chief rabbi was nominated.”
1808: The Infamous Decree (decret infame) of Napoleon canceled all debts owed to Jews by those serving in the military or by women if it was signed without the approval of their husbands or parents. It also abolished freedom of trade of the Jews by forcing them to acquire permits (which were almost never given) from the local prefects, and it prevented Jews from settling in the area of the Upper and Lower Rhine.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infamous_Decree
1808: Establishment of the Central Consistory of French Jews.
1811: Birthdate of Karl Gutzkow, the author “Uriel Acosta” which was first performed in Yiddish in 1882 at the Mariinsky Theatre in Odessa starring Abba Schoengold whom Jacob Adler described as "the god of the Yiddish public, the god, indeed, of all who saw him on stage... the handsomest man in the world. Tall. Blue eyes. Golden hair. An Apollo."
1811: The Austrian Emperor denied Simon Edler von Lämel permission to purchase a house in Vienna but “in the same year elevated him to the hereditary nobility” as a reward for his assistance in supplying the Army during the Napoleonic Wars.
1815: In Darmstadt, Reina (Rachel) Oppenheimer and Abraham Oppenheimer gave birth to Myer Oppenheimer.
1818: “A restrict measure, which Napoleon had enacted in 1808, -- to continue in force for ten years only, on his assumption that such a ten years’ term was necessary to enable the Jews to conform to the conclusions of his Sanhedrin to become good citizens of the country of their domicile and to be an alien nation expired” today “by its own limitation.”
1819: Abraham Solomon married Ellen Levy at the New Synagogue today.
1832: Birthdate of Moncure Daniel Conway the Unitarian clergyman and author whose works include The Wandering Jew and Solomon and Solomonic Literature
1836: In Charleston, South Carolina, Isaac and Babetta Dittenhoefer, gave birth to Abram Jess Dittenhoefer. His parents were immigrants from Germany who lived in Baltimore and Charleston before settling in New York where his father became a successful merchant. A graduate of Columbia Law, young Dittenhoefer would become a practicing attorney and successful judge. Oddly enough, this Jew who was born in the Cradle of the Confederacy would be one of the electors from New York who would cast a vote for Abraham Lincoln in the Electoral College.
1840: Henry Benjamin married Marian Alexander at the Great Synagogue today.
1840: Birthdate of Henri Didon Louis Remy, the Dominican friar who spoke “approvingly of Renan’s closing work, History of the Jews which depicts “Christianity as the flower, masterpiece and glory of Judaism.”
1841: Harris Barnett married Leah Levy at the Great Synagogue today
1848: Eight years before the death of his father Jacob Steinschenider, Moritz Steinschneider “after many difficulties succeeded in becoming a Prussian citizen” in “the same year” that “he was charged with preparation of the catalogue of Hebrew books in the Bodleian Library at Oxford.”
1848: By the time the time that Carl Heinrich Spitzer, a 17 year old Moravian Jew studying at the Vienna Polytechnic who had been the first one shot down by imperial troops two days ago was laid to rest today, Emperor Ferdinand had “had acceded to the students’ demands for a national guard, a freed press and the promise of a constitution.”
1851: Rabbi Sabato Morais arrives in Philadelphia with the expectation of becoming the spiritual leader of Congregation Mikveh Israel.
1852: In Germany, Lazarus Siegel and Zerlin Koch gave birth to Henry Siegel, who married Marie Vaugh Wilde after his first wife Julia Rosenbaum passed away and came to the United States in 1867 and opened a series of progressively more successful department stores starting in Parkersburg, West Virginia and climaxing with purchases of emporiums in Chicago and New York.
1852: In Eubigheim, Lazarus Siegel and Zerlina Koch gave birth to Henry Seigel, the German immigrant who came to United States in 1852 where he established and/or acquired a series of increasingly successful department store including Siegel, Hartsfield & Co., the Siegel Cooper Company, Simpson Crawford Company in New York, and the Schlesinger and Mayer Company in Chicago.
1854: Mr. and Mrs. Moses Ley Maduro Peixotta gave birth to Daniel Levy Maduro Peixotto, a leader in the New York State Militia who died as a result of fever contracted during the Spanish-American War.
1857: Paul Reuter, a Jew by birth who would become one of the first of the modern Press Lords as the founder of Reuters legally became a British subject. Reuter had already shed the Jewish part of his origins when he converted in November of 1845, a month after he had moved to London.
1859: In Frankfurt, Selig and Clementine Goldschmidt gave birth to their second child Flora.
1861: The Kingdom of Italy is proclaimed. The ghetto walls came tumbling down and the Jews were fully emancipated. Jews played an active part in the creation of the modern Italian state and they enjoyed a level of social and legal acceptance that was second only to that enjoyed by the Jews of Great Britain.
1862(15th of Adar II, 5622):Shushan Purim
1862: A group of wealthy young men who formed what would be known as the Purim Association held the first Purim Ball in New York City.
1862(15th of Adar II, 5622): Composer Jacques François Fromental Élie Halévy passed away. Born in 1799, Halévy composed the tragic opera La Juive and the comic opera L'Éclair. These works are his major claim to artistic fame.
1864(9th of Adar II, 5624): Abraham David Meijer, the brother of Jonas Daniel Meijer (the first Jewish lawyer in the Netherlands) passed away today.
1865(19th of Adar, 5625): Seventy-one year old Rabbi Isaac Noah Mannheimer, the native of Copenhagen passed away today in Vienna.
Born in Copenhagen in 1793, he was “the son of a chazzan who began the study of the Talmud at an early age, though not to the neglect of secular studies. On completing the course of the cathedral school at Copenhagen, he took up philosophy, Oriental languages, and theology at the university there, at the same time continuing his studies in Talmud and Jewish science. When the Jews of Denmark were emancipated in 1814, confirmation was made obligatory, and the office of catechist was instituted by the state, Mannheimer being the first incumbent (1816). The first confirmation took place May 1817. In 1821 Mannheimer went to Vienna, where there was then no congregation, the community being divided into two opposing parties. Mannheimer, who was welcomed by both factions, soon succeeded in organizing a congregation, drafting a program and ritual on the traditional basis and harmonizing the views of the two parties. He returned to Copenhagen in December of the same year. Failing in his attempt to secure a new synagogue for Reform services, he accepted a call to the pulpit left vacant by Zunz in Berlin. German services, however, were interdicted in that city; the temple formerly under the ministry of B. Beer was closed, and the royal cabinet order of 26 December 1823, obtained by the Orthodox party, frustrated the attempt to adapt the old ritual to new forms by delivering German sermons in the chief synagogue. Mannheimer therefore left Berlin and took temporary charge of the pulpit of Hamburg, preaching also at Leipzig during the fairs. In 1824 he married Liseke Damier, and in November of the same year he was called to the new synagogue of Vienna. As he could not receive the title of preacher or rabbi, he was inducted, in June, 1825, as "Direktor der Wiener K. K. Genehmigten Oeffentlichen Israelitischen Religionsschule"; he dedicated the new temple in April, 1826, and officiated there until 1829. Mannheimer's success was due in great measure to his oratorical gifts. His sermons were, for their time, models (Geiger, Einleitung in das Studium der Jüdischen Theologie, in Nachgelassene Schriften, ii. 31). His German translation of the prayerbook and of the fast-day prayers, and his arrangement of the fast-day liturgy, are of permanent importance for the ritual, the conservative spirit in which this work was undertaken leading to its adoption by many communities.In 1848 Mannheimer was returned by Brody to the Austrian Reichstag, where he delivered two memorable speeches, one on the Jewish tax (5 October 1848) and the other on the abolition of capital punishment (29 January 1849). On his seventieth birthday the city of Vienna conferred honorary citizenship upon him. He devoted the gifts bestowed by the community upon him on that occasion to a foundation for the aid of rabbis, preachers, and teachers, which still bears his name. Mannheimer published the following works: Prædikener Holdte ved det Mosaiske Troes-Samfund's Andagts-Övelser i Modersmaalet i Sommerhalvaaret 1819 (Copenhagen, 1819); Gottesdienstliche Vorträge Gehalten im Israelitischen Bethause zu Wien im Monate Tischri 5594 (Vienna, 1834); Gottesdienstliche Vorträge für die Wochenabschnitte des Jahres, vol. i, Genesis and Exodus (ib. 1835; partly translated into Hebrew by E Kuttner, ib. 1865); a translation of the prayer-book and of the fast-day prayers according to the ritual of the Vienna Temple (1840; frequently reprinted). His polemics and responsa include: Gutachten für das Gebetbuch des Hamburger Tempels (1841); Gutachten Gegen die Reformpartei in Frankfurt-am-Main in Angelegenheit der Beschneidungsfrage (1843); Einige Worte über Juden und Judenthum (supplement to the Oesterreichische Medicinische Wochenschrift, 1842, No. 34), directed against Professor Rosa's statements in reference to the Jewish Question (1848). Two numbers of his Gottesdienstliche Vorträge appeared posthumously, edited by
1869: In Baghdad, Heskel Shalma Ezra Shlomo-David, Hakham and Messouda/Massoda/Massouda Shlomo-David gave birth to Sir Sassoon Eskel, who following WW I became Iraq’s finiance minister and who was the father of Rahel Cohen and Meir Eskel
1869: Louis and Bluma Joseph were married today at Cavendish Square.
1870(14th of Adar II, 5630): Purim
1870(14th of Adar): Rabbi Dov Ber ben Isaac Meisels of Cracow, author of Hiddushei Mahardam passed away
1870: Since the Purim balls in New York appear to have lost their popularity, tonight’s Purim celebrations will not consist of any “grand demonstration” but will be limited to some unpretentious entertainments.
1873(18th of Adar, 5633): Seventy-seven year old Joseph Salvador a member of a distinguished French Sephardi family whose mother was Roman Catholic, the author of Paris, Rome, Jerusalem ou la Question religieuse au XIX siècle who was angered by the anti-Jewish riots in German and was considered a ‘proto-Zionist” passed away today,
1873: Three days after she had passed away66 year old Catherine “Kate” Collins (nee Isaacs) the wife of Solomon Collins and the mother of Adelaide and William Collins was buried today at the “Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery.”
1874: In Budapest, Dr. Aaron Wise, the future rabbi of Congregation Baith Israel Anshei Emes in Brooklyn, New York and his wife gave birth to Rabbi Stephen Samuel Wise, the grandson of Rabbi Joseph Hirsch Weiss and Móric Fischer de Farkasházy, the founder of the Herend Porcelain Company.
Rabbi Stephen Samuel Wise declined to accept the pulpit of New York's largest Reform Congregation if it meant he could not speak out in favor of Zionism and he became the President of the Zionist Organization of America. Wise was one of several Jews who attended the Paris Peace Conference at the end of World War I. In 1922, Wise founded the Jewish Institute of Religion "in an attempt at sectarian non-partisanship, so that its graduates might serve any one of the [Jewish] religious groupings" in the United States.
1876: Birthdate of New York City native Samuel Levy, the lawyer, the New York Board of Education and Manhattan Borough President who married Sadie Vesell with whom he had one son Lawrence, the husband of Betha Rothafel, “the daughter of theatrical impresario and entrepreneur Samuel Roxy Rothafel.
1879: In Paris, Noémie and Adolphe Bloch gave birth to Jules André Albert Bloch
1877: According to a report published today in The Times of London the “Jews’ Deaf and Dumb Home” “was founded in 1863 by Baroness Mayer de Rothschild as a school where resident Jewish children could learn to speak.”
1878: “Ethical Culture” which was published today describes the growth of The Society for Ethical Culture which was founded only two years before by Felix Adler. The author gives due consideration to Adler’s Jewish origins and the effect that has had in creating the increasingly popular movement.
1878: The Jewish owner of the coffee and cake saloon at number 7 Fulton Street failed in his effort to get Justice Murray to find that his employee was not guilty of violating the city’s ordinance against throwing oyster shells, after shucking them, into the street.
1878: The annual Purim reception at the Home for Aged and Infirm Hebrews began this morning at 11 o’clock. Due to the inclement weather, the turnout was smaller than normal. The reception ended at 6 in the evening.
1878: Cohen Davis, an elderly glazier, was tried for perjury today in the General Sessions Court. The prosecutor charged that he had lied under oath during the trial of Abraham Freeman and Charles Freeman who have been convicted of arson in the first degree.
1880 In New York City, “Isaac Jacobs and Rachel Strauss gave birth to boxing Promoter Michael “Uncle Mike” Jacobs whose career spanned an era the ran from Jack Dempsey’s reign to the retirement of Joe Louis, two of the greatest heavyweight champions of the world during boxing’s so-called golden age.
1880: It was reported today that the annual ball sponsored by the Purim Association had raised $18,585.80 for the New York’s Mt. Sinai Hospital.
1880: It was reported today that George Kessler is among those selling tickets the Concord Society’s first grand annual charity ball which is a benefit for the Young Ladies’ Charitable which is an adjunct of the United Hebrew Charities.
1882: In Chicago, “Abraham and Anna (Hinde) Shemerinsky” gave birth to Gertrude Shemerinsky who married Jacob Kaplan and as Gertrude Kaplan gave birth to five children.
1882: “Justice Steckler Expelled” published today described the decision to expel Alfred Steckler and some of his associates from the Tenth Assembly District Republican Association. Steckler and his associates were not expelled because they were Jewish but because they had failed to support the Republican candidate.
1882: Birthdate of Polish native Max Cline, who in 1885 came to the United States where graduated from MIT and became “the chief chemist of the International Paper Company’s research division.
1884: Birthdate of Dr. Nahum Nir, the native of Warsaw who made Aliyah in 1925 and was one of the signatories of the Israeli Declaration of Independence.
1884(20th of Adar, 5644): Benjamin Gratz passed away in Lexington, KY. Part of the famous Gratz family, he was born in Philadelphia in 1792. After serving in the Army during the War of 1812 he moved to Kentucky where he practiced law and served as trustee of Transylvania University.
1885: Three days after she had passed away, 24 year old Constance Baumann, the daughter of “David and Sarah Baumann” was buried today at the Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery.
1884: After moving to Kansas City, MO and working “at the law firm of Lathrop, Smith and Marrow in 1884, today William J. Berkowitz “and his brother founded Berkowitz and Company Printers the forerunner if what is now called the Tension Corporation.
1886(10th of Adar II, 5646): Ninety-one year old Leopold Zunz also known—"Yom Tov Lipmann Tzuntz" passed away. Born in 1794, “he was a German Reform rabbi and writer, the founder of what has been termed the "Science of Judaism" (Wissenschaft des Judentums), the critical investigation of Jewish literature, hymnology and ritual.”
1888: In Bloomfield, NJ, Mr. and Mrs. Eli Harris gave birth to WW I veteran and President of the Young Men’s Building and Loan Association Harvey E. Harris, the Postmaster of Bloomfield who was the brother of Jerome, Irving and Hazel Harris.
1888: In Yemen, Bohemian born linguist Eduard Glaser began his third journey from Sanaa to Ma’rib
1889(14th of Adar II, 5649): Purim
1891: Birthdate of New York native and CCNY graduate Max Gewirtz, the hold of a Masters from Teachers College at Columbia and Doctorate from NYU who retired as an assistant superintended “of a district in Queens in 1961 and became “head of a religious school at Temple Israel in Lawrence, L.I.
1892(18th of Adar, 5652): Fifty-seven year old Moravian native Max Srakosch, “an impresario and agent” who was the brother of Maurice Strakosch passed away today in New York.
1892: It was reported today that Rabbi Stephen S. Wise will be addressing the congregants at Temple Israel in Harlem.
1892: In Seattle, WA, founding of the Ladies’ Hebrew Benevolent Society which met on the first Wednesday of each month and whose members included Ida Davis who served as the society’s secretary.
1893: “Russia’s Securities May Suffer” published today described an appeal made by the London Russo-Jewish Committee that has been “sent to every Jewish banker, bank director, bank manager, stock broker, and “agent de change” in Europe calling on them” to boycott Russian loans and Russian financial transactions in general. “The appeal is in retaliation” for the continued severe treatment of the Russian Jews by the Czar
1894: Moritz Kepes, a Jewish saloon owner, was beaten up today by John Fuchs and his son who owned a nearby saloon.
1894: A fire broke out today in a tenement house on Jefferson Street this morning that is owned by Abraham Doworsky and is occupied by Russian Jews. Some of the tenants told Doworsky that they would be starting a newspaper in the building’s basement, but the fire exposed the fact that they were operating an illegal still.
1894: “The Germans and their Fatherland” published today provides a detailed review Germany and the Germans by William Harbutt in which the author devotes one chapter to the anti-Semitic party and another chapter the criminal activities in which Jews engage. The author does raise and does not answer the question “What do the anti-Semites propose to do with the Jews and what would do without them
1894: The United Hebrew Charities reported today that between October 1, 1893 to March 1, 1894 that they had over 18,000 applicants for assistance. During those five months, the charity had spent over $103,000 for clothing, medicine burials, coal and operating the industrial schools. For the same period a year ago, they had spent a little more than $46,000 which is indicative of the losses caused by the depression that began in 1893.
1895: Three days after she had passed away, 58 year old Esther Nyman, the wife of Abraham Nyman was buried today at the “West Ham Jewish Cemetery.”
1895: Contrary to what is listed in Wikipedia, today, in Brooklyn Solomon and Jennie Horwitz gave birth to Samuel Horwitz who gained fame as Shemp Howard of The Three Stooges.
1895: Contrary to what is listed in Wikipedia, today, in Brooklyn Solomon and Jennie Horwitz gave birth to Samuel Horwitz who gained fame as Shemp Howard of The Three Stooges.
1897(13thof Adar II, 5657): Ta’anit Esther; erev Purim
1897: Birthdate of Charles Levine, the son of Massachusetts scrap metal dealer, who was a pioneer in the field of aviation. A contemporary of Lindbergh, he was on the second plane that flew from America across the Atlantic. Unlike Lindbergh who was heading for Paris, Levine was trying to make Berlin. Although he had to land one hundred miles short of his distance, he had actually out-distanced the Lone Eagle.
1897: Samuel Simon Leibowitz arrived in America with his parents from Romania. Born in 1893, he would become a famous defense attorney and New York Judge. He is best known as attorney who took the lead in defending the Scottsboro Boys.
1898:”The Baron De Hirsch Fund” published today described the efforts to build “model tenements” and erect “suburban homes” to relieve the overcrowding on the Lower East Side. Some of the money had already been used to purchase 12 lots across the Harlem River where “model tenements” will be constructed. These efforts are not to be confused with other efforts financed by the late Baron Hirsch and his widow to develop “agricultural colonies” including the one at Woodbine, NJ.
1899: “Jewish Philanthropy” published today described Simon Wolf’s view of Jewish generosity. According to him, “We take care of our people and we help others.” “In the largest cities in the United States” Jews have collected $64,000,000 for philanthropic purposes, thanks in no small measure to the efforts of such mean as Oscar Nathan, Isidor Straus and Adolphus S. Solomon.
1899: On Chicago’s South Side, Rabbi Isaac M. Wise dedicated the sanctuary of The Reform Congregation of Isaiah Temple which had been designed by Dankmar Adler.
1900: Birthdate of American film composer Alfred Newman, a major Jewish-American composer of music for films. He received 45 Academy Award nominations (a record in the music categories, now shared with John Williams), winning 9 times; in 1940 he was nominated for 4 different films. He also composed the familiar fanfare which accompanies the studio logo for 20th Century Fox, where he headed the music department. He was active until the end of his life, scoring Airport shortly before his death. Between 1930 and 1970, he wrote music for over 200 films of every imaginable type, including a score for the newsreel made from the World War II footage of the Battle of Midway
1901: In Philadelphia, PA, a federation of Jewish charities including the Jewish Hospital Association, Jewish Foster Home, Society of United Hebrew Charities, Hebrew Education Society, Orphans' Guardians, Jewish Maternity Association, Jewish Immigration Society, Young Women's Union, and Hebrew Sunday-School Society was formed today with Jacob Gimbel as President
1902: Two days after she had passed away, 76 year old Louisa Levy, the husband of Charles Levy with whom she had had eight children was buried today at the Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery.
1902: Herzl is authorized to obtain three letters of credit, each for a million francs, from banks in Paris, Berlin and London. The funds are to be deposited in Turkish banks. Several members of the Actions Committee including Avraham Menachem Mendel Ussishkin are opposed to the plan. Ussishkin and Herzl were both fervent Zionists but they had different views as to the goal of establishing a Jewish home in Eretz Israel could be accomplished. Born in 1863 in Russia, Ussishkin would become an early Zionist leader and first President of the Jewish Nation Fund or JNF.In his youth,he became an enthusiastic reader of the works of contemporary Hebrew writers in his teens, and from then on the revival of the Hebrew language was one of the main goals of his life work. Like many other early Hibbat Zion members, he was shocked by the Russian pogroms of 1881, which emphasized to him the necessity for Jewish emigration. Ussishkin then began working actively for several Zionist groups. After graduating as a technical engineer from the Technological Institute in Moscow, he became active in Hebrew educational work as well as in Zionist propaganda and fund-raising in Russia. Ussishkin was a "practical" Zionist who viewed agricultural settlement in Eretz Israel as the first and most important step toward attaining a Jewish state. He was thus active in recruiting youth for pioneer work and for agricultural settlement of the land. He was a delegate to the First Zionist Congress held in Basle in 1893, and was appointed Hebrew secretary of the Congress. At the Seventh Zionist Congress (1905), he was among the leaders of those who forced the abandonment of the Uganda Scheme, and he then proposed a program of Zionism which was later adopted by the Zionist movement. Under his influence the Zionist movement actively supported the establishment of agricultural settlements, educational and cultural institutions, and a Hebrew university. In 1919 Ussishkin himself settled in Eretz Israel, and in 1923 he was chosen to head the Jewish National Fund, a position he held for nearly twenty years.
1904: Birthdate of Alfred Henry “Truck” Miller the native of Boston who played who played for Harvard before spending one year as a profession with the Boston Bulldogs.
1904: Birthdate of Chaim Gross an Austrian born American sculptor. Gross began exhibiting both his sculpture and graphic art in 1935, and was one of 250 sculptors who exhibited in the 3rd Sculpture International held at the Philadelphia Museum of Art in the summer of 1949. Gross was a practitioner of the direct carving method, with the majority of his work being carved from wood. Gross was a professor of printmaking and sculpture at both the Educational Alliance and the New School for Social Research in New York City, as well as a member of Artists Equity, the Federation of Modern Painters and Sculptors, and the National Institute of Arts and Letters. He served as President of the Sculptors Guild of America. He passed away in 1991 at the age of 84. (As reported by John T. McQuiston)
1905: In Chelsea, MA, Joseph A Strauss and Ida (Chayah) Kasriels of Russia gave birth to Harry Strauss who married Cecile G Pofcher in 1931.
1906: Adolf Kraus of Chicago, the President of the Executive Committee of B’nai B’rith received a cablegram from the Russian Premier, Count Witte in response to his letter inquiring what measures had been put in place to protect the lives and property of Jews during a planned Easter massacre in which Witte said his government does not approve of violence and that all measures will be taken to protect “peaceable inhabitants without regard to nationality.”
1906: It was reported today that “two high officials of the Ministry of the Interior, one of whom has been arrested” were “the authors of the pamphlet inciting the people to murder the Jews”
1907(2nd of Nisan, 5667): Gotlieb Schmelkes the husband of Henriette Schmelkes and the father of Markus and Rachel Schmelkes passed away today
1908(14thof Adar II, 5668): Purim
1909: Welterweight Joe Hirst fought “his first big fight today in Philadelphia which was a six round bout that was a draw.
1909: Sixty-four year old Marim Myers was buried today at the Belfast Jewish Cemetery in Northern Ireland.
1910: Alma Gluck is scheduled to appear in a matinee performance of the opera “Werther” at The New Theatre in New York.
1910: Birthdate of David Abraham "Sonny" Werblin the Flatbush native who gained national fame for his purchase of the New York Jets and the signing of Joe Namath – an act which helped to force the NFL to merge with the AFL.
1911: In Vienna “artisan Jakob Goldsand and his wife Helene” gave birth to American classical pianist Robert Goldsand.
1911: Birthdate of Moshe Baram the native of Zdolbuniv who made Aliyah in 1931 and after Independence served as an MK and cabinet minister.
1913(8thof Adar II, 5673): Forty-four year old glass manufacturer Jacob H. Werbelowsky passed away today in in Brooklyn, NY.
1915: Birthdate of Wolfgang Doblin the son of German author Bruno Alfred Döblin
1915: The Russian official press bureau tonight issued a statement tonight denying claims by the Austrians that Russian soldiers have “committed outrages on the Jewish populations in Galicia, Bukowina and Russian Poland.”
1915: “The American Jewish Relief Committee announced” today “that letters to person in Russia should be written in either Russian, English or French” since owing to the strict censorship in force in Russia…letters written in Yiddish or any other language than those named had little or no chance of being delivered.”
1915: As of today, the American Jewish Relief Committee has collected $573,267.00.
1915: Today, Professor A.T. Fowler of the Biblical Department of” Brown “University and a member of the Advisory Board of the” Menorah “Society spoke on ‘The Bible as a Literary Document.’”
1915: As of today it was reported that there are an estimated 50,000 Falsahas (Black Jews) living in Abyssinia (Ethiopia) and that Dr. Jacques Faitlovitch, a French Jew is working on developing an educational program for them.
1915: Tonight, in Washington, DC, “the Austro-Hungarian Embassy…made public a dispatch from the Foreign Office in Vienna” that the “Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Army under the pretext that populating sympathizing with Austrians and Germans…has ordered that Jews are forbidden to remain in districts occupied by the army and are forbidden to enter the country east of Jaroslau.” (Editor’s Note – Jaroslau is a town in southeast Poland on the border with Russia where Jews had lived since the 15th century and whose pre-WW I population was 25% Jewish. On the Eastern Front all warring parties accused the Jews of being spies or worse and used this as an excuse for indiscriminate killing and expulsion.)
1916(12thof Adar II, 5676): Julia Frankau, the Dublin born Jewish daughter of photographer Hyman Davis and wife of Arthur Frankau who used the penname Frank Danby during her writing career which began with the publication of a novel that was a “social satire” of Anglo-Jewry passed away today.
1916: Birthdate of Dr. Albert M. Kligman, a dermatologist who invented the widely used acne medication Retin-A but whose experiments involving prisoners raised ethical questions that dogged his career.
1916: During the expedition to capture Pancho Villa, a military action that involved so many Jewish soldiers that Jewish chaplains were dispatched to the theatre of operation and High Holiday services were held at several locations, General Pershing established his main base at Colonia Dublan.
1917: One hundred and ninety Jews from Palestine migrate to Cyprus on an Ottoman mail steamer.
1917: Birthdate of Karel Švenk, the native of Prague and multi-talented entertainer – “cabaret artist, comedian, songwriter and writer” – who was shipped to Terezin and then to Auschwitz before weeks before the war ended on a transport to Mauthausen.
1917: Dorothy Cohen Schwartzman, Ida Bienstock Landau, Minna Goldsmith Mahler, Eva Effron Robin, and Sylvia Steierman founded Delta Phi Epsilon (ΔΦΕ or DPhiE) is an international sorority at New York University Law School.
1918: It was reported today that “as a result of their on Washington’s Birthday the 62,000 members of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union have contributed $140,000 to the American Jewish Relief Committee.
1918: The British Army including the Jewish battalion captured Amman.
1918: It was reported today that the American Jewish Relief Committee chaired by Louis Marshall continues to receive contributions from committees across the country including $1,000 from Nashville, TN and $174 from Richmond, Indiana.
1919: In Paris “President Wilson conferred today with Bernard Baruch and others who are serving as economic experts with the American mission and approved their proposals of no trade discrimination against enemy countries after the war.”
1919: Today, “leaders of the Isaac M. Wise Centenary Fund Campaign expressed themselves as highly pleased with the result of the first day’s work in the campaign…which will endeavor to raise $100,000 among the Jews of New York for the furtherance of the work of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations and the Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati, Ohio.”
1920: St. Louis Rabbi, Goodman “George” Lipkind wrote a one act comedy, “Wanted a Housekeeper.”
1921: Birthdate of Meir Slutzki who as Meir Amit gained fame as an Israeli politician, general, and Director of the Mossad.
1921: The Constituent Assembly ratified the constitution of the Polish Republic which granted equal rights to the Jews.
1921: Thirty year old Barney Sedran led the Trenton Bengals to victory over the Wilkes-Barre Barons.
1921: At the Cairo Conference attended by Winston Churchill and T.E. Lawrence (better known as “Lawrence of Arabia”) it was agreed that Transjordan (an Arab State) should be separated from Palestine “thus enabling Britain to fulfill its wartime pledges to both the Arabs and the Jews.” The decision reinforced the right for Jews to “be able to settle the land from the Mediterranean to the Jordan, from the Galilee to the Negev.” (“This comprised the area of both Israel and the West Bank today.”)
1925: Three days after he had passed away, funeral services were scheduled to be held this morning at the Ethical Culture Meeting House in Manhattan for sixty-three year old Harvard and Columbia Law School trained corporate attorney Alfred Jaretzki, the New York born son of Gustave and Henrietta Jaretzki and the father of Maud, Alice, Alfred Jaretzki, Jr. who was a member of Sullivan and Cromwell, “trustee of the Mount Sinai Hospital, a director of the Baron de Hirsch Fund and a director of the Jewish Agricultural and Industrial Aid Society” followed by burial at Mt. Pleasant, NY.
1926: Rodgers and Hart's musical "Girl Friend" premiered in New York. This is but one example of a Jewish team providing a hit musical comedy for Broadway.
1926: Seventy two year old Alexsei Brusilov, the Chief of Staff who approved the appointment of Jewish Chaplains to serve in the Russian Army in 1917 passed away today.
1926: As of today members the Women’s Division of the Harmonie Club which is helping to raise six million dollars for the United Jewish Campaign include Mrs. Felix M. Warburg, Mrs. Rebekah Kohut, Mrs. Ira Hill Bamberger and Mrs. Charles J. Liebman.
1927(13thof Adar II, 5687): Fast of Esther
1927: A man identified as “Prince Michel Obolensky, scion of a noble but impoverished Russian family celebrated by St. Patrick’s Day by” delivering “an oration” attacking the Jews on the corner of 14th Street and Avenue which touched off neighborhood brawl.
1928: In Manhattan “Benjamin Kaufman, the chairman of Kaufman Management, and the former Stella Cohen, a fashion designer known as Brownie” gave birth to George Stewart Kaufman, “the real estate magnate” who helped to make the Queens a place for movie and television production. (As reported by Sam Roberts)
1929: The Flonzaley Quartet which had played the String Quartet No. 1 by Erin Schulhoff performed for the last time in a public concert at The Town Hall in New York City.
1929: On St. Patrick’s Day, flyweight Moe Mizler fought his 29th bought in London.
1930: The four day dedication exercises “of the new Temple Rodeph” in Manhattan were scheduled to come to an end today.
1930: It was reported today that “King Alexander has accepted patronage over the Jewish National Fund bazaar which the Jews of Zagreb are organizing” and that “he is also making a personal donation to the King Peter Forest which the Jewish National Fund is to plant in Palestine.”
1933: Victor Klemperer writes in his diary, “on Friday, unfortunately, Thiemes was here. It was frightful . . . such enthusiastic conviction and support. The phraseology of unity. Progress piously repeated. Grete (his wife) said, "Everything else failed, now we have to blow this horn." He corrected her vehemently. "We didn't have to." In really free elections he has voted for the right cause. This I can't forgive him. The poor dog may be frightened for his job. He must howl with the wolves. But why in front of me? . . . Naked violence, breach of law, terrible hypocrisy, unmitigated barbarism poses as law.
1933: The Chevrolet Program starring Jack Benny is broadcast for the first time on NBC Radio
1935(12thof Adar II 5695): Mary Goldsmith Prag, the mother of “Florence Prag Khan, the first Jewish congresswoman” passed away today.
1935: The Palestine Maccabee Association announced that it would not participate in the 1936 Olympics to be held in Germany because of that country’s treatment of its Jewish citizens.
1936: “Louis Lipsky, vice president of the American Jewish Congress and honorary president of the Zionist Organization of America returned” today “on the Cunard White Star line Berengaria from Paris and London where he attended several conferences with Jewish leaders and foreign statesmen on the situation of the Jews in many countries including Germany and Poland.”
1936:”Resolutions condemning war as a means of settling international disputes and calling upon the United States Government to ‘reiterate its renouncement of war’ made in the Kellogg-Briand pact were adopted at the closing session today of the biennial convention of the United Synagogue of America.”
1936: “Wolf’s Clothing,” a British comeday co-starring Lilli Palmer, the daughter “Dr. Alfred Peiser, a German Jewish surgeon” and his wife Rose, “an Austrian Jewish stage actress” was released today the United Kingdom.
1936: In response to the receipt of a copy of Victor Gallancz’s The Yellow Spot: The Extermination of the Jews in Germany from Harold Laski, Churchill wrote Laksi urging the Laborite to find a way to gain support from the Labor Party for the re-armament program designed to thwart the threat of the Nazis.
1936: Following a series of Pogrom-like attack on Jews in central Poland, a mass demonstration of Polish Jews, left-wingers, and liberals was held to protest anti-Semitism in Poland.
1937: Three days after his 18th birthday, Brooklynite Bernard Abramofsky arrived in Spain today and served with Abraham Lincoln Brigade until “he was executed behind the lines in May, 1938.
1937: “One Jewish policeman was seriously injured and sixteen other Jews were slightly hurt tonight when a bomb was thrown in to a bus on Jaffa Road, Jerusalem’s main thoroughfare.”
1937: The Palestine Post reported that in addition to five young Jews who were murdered by Arabs during the past few days, there were two more victims: Samuel Gottfried, 26, of Rosh Pina and an Arab villager who defended his flock from robbers.
1937: “At about 10:30 P.M.,” Meyer Levin discovered two large swastikas painted in black enamel on the door of Ahavath Chesed in Brooklyn and four smaller ones in chalk on the side doors of the synagogue and then notified Abraham Beier, the president of the synagogue “who then asked the police to place a guard on the building.”
1937: The Palestine Post reported that The Jewish Agency Executive in London submitted a memorandum to the British government which claimed that the Arab disturbances which began on April 19, 19 36, did not end on October 12, 19 36, as claimed by the government and the Arab Higher Committee, but continued uninterruptedly, claiming many Jewish lives.
1938(14thof Adar II, 5698); Purim
1938: “In a message read during the Purim Festival program sponsored by the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee” the national radio audience heard the words of President Roosevelt who said “enteral vigilance is the price of liberty” and “the defeat of Haman’s plot to destroy the Jews…is one of the milestones in mankind’s long and bloody struggle to achieve freedom.”
1938: Among the “Books Published Today” were An Open Letter to Jews and Christians: A discussion of Jesus in relation to Jews today by John Cournos and the Selected Works of Israel Zangwill including “Children of the Ghetto,” “Ghetto Comedies” and “Ghetto Tragedies.
1939: At a meeting in Tel Aviv today, “the National Council of Palestine Jews…decided to a call a 24 hour strike” to start on Monday, March 20th “ “as the first step in its program of ‘drastic political action’ against Great Britain’s plan” for Palestine. “The Council condemned the plan as ‘the liquidation of the Jewish national home and strangulation of the Jewish settlement.’”
1939: Erich Otto Sonnheim arrived in the United States from Germany.
1940: Fritz Todt, who escaped being tried at Nuremberg because he died during WW II was named Riech Minister for Armaments and Ammunition today.
1941: According to a death certificate issued by the Soviet government and made public in 1954 this is date of the death of Isaac Babel. It would not be until the 1990’s that this would be exposed as a lie. Babel had actually been executed by the Soviets on January 27, 1940.
1941: Hans Frank, General Governor of Occupied Poland, had a meeting with Adolf Hitler about the fate of Jews in Europe. Afterwards, Frank informs the General Government's undersecretaries of state, police and SS chiefs, district governors, and department directors that the Jews are to be eliminated.
1942: The 60,000 Jews in Tunisia are restricted to publishing only one newspaper.
1942: It was reported today that “despite the fact that Jews constitute about three percent of the population in the United States, they total eight percent of the 75 recipients of the Distinguished Flying Cross so far in this war, among American forces.” (JTA)
1942: In eastern Poland, the Belzec Concentration Camp opened as 1,500 Jews arrive from the Lviv Ghetto in the western Ukraine. At that time 30,000 Lublin Polish Jews were transported to this death camp.
1942: In eastern Poland, the Belzec Concentration Camp opened as 1,500 Jews arrive from the Lviv Ghetto in the western Ukraine. At that time 30,000 Lublin Polish Jews were transported to this death camp.
1942: The deportations which began in Lublin would not until 30,000 had been shipped to Belzec by April where most of them were murdered.
1942: Birthdate of South African born educator Meyer Feldberg the Dean of the A.B. Freeman School of Business at Tulane University and the Dean of the Columbia School of Business
1942(28th of Adar, 5702): In Pochep, Russia, 1,816 Jewish villagers were massacred in an anti-tank ditch.
1943(10th of Adar II, 5703): More than 1200 Jews from Lvov, Ukraine, were killed at Piaski, Poland, as retribution for the March 16 murder of an SS trooper by a Jewish man. Eleven Jewish policemen were hanged in the ghetto, 1000 Jewish slave laborers were executed, and an additional 200 Jews were murdered.
1943:Today,”the National Gallery of Art marked its second anniversary with the announcement of an extraordinary gift from print collector and former Sears, Roebuck and Company chairman Lessing J. Rosenwald: Rosenwald's print and drawing collection, which ultimately numbered more than 22,000 works at the time of his death.
1943: Dimitur Peshev and 40 other members of the Sobranje, the Bulgarian parliament, sign a petition demanding that deportations of Jews from Bulgaria to Occupied Poland end. Archbishop Kiril of Plovdiv sends a telegram to Tsar Boris III informing him of his intention to lie down on the tracks in front of any trains transporting Bulgarian Jews.
1944: Al Bummy Davis (Abraham Davidoff) lost a bout to the former lightweight chamption today.
1945(3rdof Nisan, 5705): After enduring six months of imprisonment at Buchenwald sixty-one year old Henri Paul Gaston Maspero, the French sinologist died today just weeks before the camp was liberated by Patton’s Third Army.
1945: Birthdate of mathematician Valery Senderov, the native of Moscow who risked his life and career “in the struggle against state sponsored anti-Semitism.”
1946(14thof Adar II, 5706): Purim
1946: Some of the members of “Kibbutz Buchenwald” set sail for Palestine from France today on the Maapilim boat the “Tel-Chai”.
1947: The Palestine police issued a “broadsheet” today “offering an unspecified reward for information leading to the arrest of 18 wanted men” described as “terrorist chiefs.” The list which includes photos and physical descriptions is in alphabetical order beginning with Menachem Begin of the Irgun. The penultimate spot on the list goes to Nathan Friedman Yellin, Abrahm Stern’s successor as head of the Stern Gang. The last name on the list is Itshak Yexernitsky who has been captured by the British but has escaped their custody.
1947: Leaders of the Arab League are scheduled to meet in Cairo today where they will map out their propaganda program to oppose the creation of a Jewish state and how best to present their case at the upcoming meeting of the United Nations.
1947: “Just before noon today an Army officer blew his whistle” in Jerusalem marking the end of martial law in several areas including Mea Shearim.
1948: In Jerusalem, the British abandoned their compound on the grounds of Schneller Orphanage which the Etzioni Brigade would “use at its base of operations during the Israeli War of Independence.
1948: While speaking at a news conference of the American Fund for Palestinian Institutions, Moshe Pomorok of the Palestine Maritime League said that “90 per cnet of Palestine’s export and import trade went to foreign shipping companies” which led him to call for the “establishment of Palestine’s sea power.”
1948: Dr. Alexander Rosenfeld of the Hebrew World Union described “an underground movement to teach Hebrew in Syria and Iraq where the language has been banned.”
1948: The Naval Service, which became the Israeli Sea Corps, was formed today and the members for the Plugat HaYam (the naval arm of the Palmach) were ordered to join.
1950: The Jewish Agency for Palestine announced tonight that it was prepared to receive 20,000 refugees from Iraq. This issue has taken on a great deal of urgency for Iraq’s 150,000 Jews, since the Baghdad government has given them a year to leave the country for Israel. As part of the price of departure, the Jews must basically leave behind most of their possessions and wealth for use by the Iraqi’s.
1950(28th of Adar, 5710): Eighty-four year old Ellis Gimbel, Sr. the last surviving of the Gimbel brothers who has served as Chairman of the Board of Gimbel Brothers, Inc since 1936 passed away today
1953(1stof Nisan, 5713): Rosh Chodesh Nisan
1953: The “Life Saver’s” luncheon of the Combined Jewish Appeal chaired by Mrs. Saul Herman is scheduled to be held at the Saxony Hotel with Mme. Helene Benator, a “heroine of the French underground, a lawyer and an authority on the Jews of the Moslem world” delivering the featured talk.
1953: With the help of Anna Sokolow, “Camino Real” starring Eli Wallach opened on Broadway today.
1954(12thof Adar II, 5714): Sixty-six year old Dr. Hyman I. Goldstein, the Baltimore born son of Solomon and Rose Zuckerman Goldstein and University of Pennsylvania and Vienna trained physician who discovered “Goldstein’s Toe Sign,” served in the Medical Corps, USA, during WW II and was part of a family of doctors – Dr. Leopold Z. Goldstein, Dr. Henry Z. Goldstein and David E. Cooper, the husband of his sister who earned his DD.S from the University of Pennsylvania and who was pre-deceased by his wife Joan and children – Joan, Alice and Louis – passed away today in Philadelphia after which he was buried at the New Camden Cemetery in Camden, NJ.
1954: Following last night attack in the Negev, where an Israeli bus was ambushed by “a group of Palestinian Arabs who had infiltrated into Israel from Jordan in which the driver and ten passengers were killed “Israeli trackers assisted by police dogs and accompanied by UN observers followed the attackers' tracks to a point 6 miles west of the Jordanian border, where the tracks were lost”
1957(14thof Adar II, 5717): Purim
1957: “Great Philosophy in Small Packets” included a review of The Age of Enlightenment: The Eighteenth Century Philosophers, Selected with introduction and commentary by Isaiah Berlin.
1962(11thof Adar II, 5722): Shabbat Zachor
1962(11thof Adar II, 5722): Ninety-four year old “Rabbi Clifton H. Levy, the oldest past president of the New York Board of Rabbis and a leader of the Reform rabbinate” passed away today. “Together with the late Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, Rabbi Levy was a founder in 1922 of the Association of Reform Rabbis of New York City and Vicinity. Born in New Orleans, LA, Rabbi Levy received his ordination from the Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati. He was the author of a book, Judaism Applied to Life, and of pamphlets and articles on Biblical archaeology and art.” (As reported by JTA)
1967: “Mourning Becomes Electra” a three act opera composed by Marvin David Levy premiered at the Met in New York City.
1968: Israel defeated Ceylon today in the Olympic Games soccer qualifier thanks to the play of Mordechai Spiegler.
1969: Golda Meir became Prime Minister of Israel. A dedicated Zionist and Socialist, Mrs. Meir devoted her entire life to creating a national homeland for the Jewish people where we could flourish in peace and safety. Her life reads more like a novel with all of its twists and turns ranging from the gritty determination of the 1920's when she was a pioneer in primitive Palestine, to the clandestine trips she made to meet the King of Jordan in an attempt to avert war in 1948, to her fund raising in the United States so the unborn state would have some weapons with which to face the invading Arab Armies, to...well I think you get the idea. She certainly is worthy successor to the memory of Miriam and Deborah and Moses and David as well.
1972: “The Time of Your Life” a revival of which in 1969 was directed by John Hirsch was revived again today in Los Angeles co-starring Richard Dreyfus, Lewis J. Stadlin
1973(13thof Adar II, 5733): Parashat Vayikra; Shabbat Zachor; erev Purim
1973: “Lost Horizon” a musical version of the pre-war movie and novel of the same name produced by Ross Hunter, with a script by Larry Kramer and music by Burt Bacharach and Hal David was released in the United States today.
1974(23rd of Adar, 5734): Seventy-three year old architect Louis Kahn passed away.
1974: “The Ford Foundation allocated $250,000 to help resettle Soviet émigré scholars and writers in America.”
1974: Funeral services are scheduled to be held today for Albert H. Godwin, the husband of Gertrude Godwin at the Riverside Chapel in the Bronx.
1977:The Jerusalem Postreported that Leah Rabin, wife of the prime minister, admitted that she had closed her dollar account in Washington and transferred the money totaling $2,000, as a donation to a charity for autistic children which she headed. Events surrounding this bank account would lead to Prime Minster Rabin’s political downfall, end the Labor Party’s domination of Israeli politics and bring Menachem Begin and Likud to power for the first time since the founding of the state in 1948.
1977: “The Cadaver in the Clutter” the second episode of “Lanigan’s Rabbi” starring Bruce Solomon as Rabbi David Small was broadcast tonight.
1978: Reuven Schmeltzer, who had been orphaned at the age of 13 and was “one of the 1684 Jews who escaped Nazi-controlled Hungary on the Kastner train and spent time in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp before being released in Switzerland” and his wife gave back to their 11th child Lipa Schmeltzer, the “singer, entertainer, and composer” who is popular among Hasdic and “modern Jewish communities.”
1978: Jack Klugman was roasted on The Dean Martin Celebrity Roast on NBC
1983: In Jerusalem, the Third World Conference on Soviet Jewry came to an end.
1983: Actor Dustin Hoffman and Lisa Hoffman give birth to their daughter Rebecca Lillian Hoffman
1983: The Third World Conference on Soviet Jewry which had been attended by over 1,000 delegates from 30 countries came to an end today in Jerusalem.
1984: Billy Crystal hosted SNL for the first time tonight.
1984: “Entertaining God” published today provided a complete review The Life and Times of Cotton Mather by Pulitzer prize-winning historian Kenneth Silverman
1985: Abraham Sutzkever, who “wrote poems as underground fighter crawling through the sewers un the Vilna ghetto to elude the Nazis,” “while fighting the partisans in the forest of Lithuania outside Vilna” and even “while hiding inside a coffin” is scheduled to “read some of his poems at a YIVO gathering at the Society for the Society for the Advancement of Judaism” this afternoon in Manhattan.
1989: The Broadway production of “Chu Chem,” a musical inspired by “a trip to Kaifeng Fu (prefecture), China, the site of a major Jewish migration in the 10th century” with music by Mitch Leigh opened at the Ritz Theatre.
1989: “The Adventures of Baron Munchausen” a fantasy comedy with music by Michael Kamen was released in the United States today.
1991: “The Substance of Fire” written by Jon Robin Baitz opened Off-Broadway at Playwrights Horizons with a cast that included Ron Rifkin and Sarah Jessica Parker
1992 (12th of Adar II, 5752): The Islamic Jihad used a truck bomb to attack the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires Argentina killing 29.
1994(5th of Nisan, 5754): Ninety-four year old German born English zoologist and geneticist Charlotte Auerbach, the daughter of Friedrich Auerbach and the granddaughter of Leopold Auerbach passed away today.
1995: Premiere of “Candyman: Farewell to the Flesh” a horror film with music composed by Philip Glass.
1995: “Bye Bye, Love” directed by Brandeis grad Sam Weisman, co-authored and co-produced by Gary David Goldberg and co-starring Paul Reiser and Rob Reiner was released in the United States today.
1997: Janet Rosenberg Jagan, the Chicago born Jewess, began serving as Prime Minster of Guyana.
1997: Eighty-one year old Joe J. Heydecker who as a German soldier created a secret photographic record of the Warsaw Ghetto, which, after being published in 1981 provided “evidence of Nazi atrocities and inhumane living conditions in the Ghetto passed away today.
1999: HBO released the final episode of “Tracey Takes On…” starring Tracey Ullman
1999(29th of Adar, 5759): Seventy-seven year old Ernest Gold the Austrian-born Jewish-American Academy Award winning composer of the theme from the movie Exodus, the creator of 100 film/television scores between 1945 and 1992, including the Hawaii Five-O theme and the composer of a 1968 Broadway musical "I'm Solomon" passed away today.
2000: Barbra Streisand continued her Timeless tour with a concert at Melbourne’s Colonial Stadium.
2002: At the Jewish Museum in New York an exhibition entitled ''The Emergence of Jewish Artists in 19th-Century Europe'' comes to a close.
2002: Twenty-five people were injured in a terrorist bombing of Egged Bus 22 in Jerusalem.
2003(13thof Adar II, 5763): Ta’anit Esther; Erev Purim
2003(13thof Adar II, 5763): Eight-seven year old historian Herbert Aptheker passed away. (As reported by Christopher Lehman-Haupt)
2005(6th of Adar II, 5765): Seventy-eight year old college and professional basketball player Norman Clifford "Norm" Mager who was involved in a point shaving scandal passed away today.
2005: “The Southern Command of the Israel Defense Forces issued a military order prohibiting Israeli citizens not living in the Gaza Strip settlements from taking up residence there.”
2006: The Forwards reported that the Aleph Institute, an organization linked to the Chabad-Lubavitch movement was approved by the Department of Defense to endorse chaplains.
2006: Premiere of “Tall: The American Skyscraper and Louis Sullivan” a documentary directed and produced by Manfred Kirchheimer.
2006(17thof Adar, 5766): Eighty-year old Henry Thalsheimer, a relative of Nicaragua native Maria T. Thalsheimer and Achille Thalsheimer passed away today after which he was buried at Hebrew Rest Cemetery in New Orleans.
2007: Shabbat Ha-Chodesh
2007: At the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, an exhibition styled “Adi Nes: Bible Stories” opens to the general public. The series contains fourteen works of staged photography created by Adi Nes between 2003 and 2006. The large-scale photographs are all anchored in the Bible stories: Cain and Abel, Noah, Abraham and Isaac, Jacob and Esau, Joseph, David and Jonathan, Saul and Samuel, Job, Elijah, Ruth and Naomi. Chosen as “actors” and background for each shot were individuals and landscapes from here and now; the emphasis is placed on godforsaken places and on figures on the fringe of Israeli society: a woman beggar on a street corner, an old and barefoot homeless person. The photographs are charged with enriching references to the history of art and masterpieces, including Caravaggio’s “Abraham,” “Ivan the Terrible Murdering His Son” by Ilya Repin, or the famous and impressive portrait taken by Dorothea Lange – “Migrant Mother.”
2008: In “How Hamas Is Playing the Spoiler,” published todayU.S. News & World Reportdescribes how the latest Hamas rocket attacks on Ashkelon pose a new strategic threat to Israel and the limited options available to the Israelis in responding to this latest downward spiral in the Middle East.
2008: Today, David Gregory began hosting “a show on MSNBC weekday evenings.”
2008(10 Adar II, 5768): Ronald E. Arnall, French born American businessman who served as U.S. Ambassador to the Netherlands and was a “friend” of Chabad-Lubavitch passed away.
2008: Sports Illustrated describes the pending confrontation over allegations that Patriots coach Bill Bilichick illegally videotaped his opponents. This could turn into a Jew versus Jew situation since the probe into the matter is being spearheaded by Arlen Specter, the Jewish Republican Senator from Pennsylvania and the Patriots are owned by Jewish businessman and philanthropist Robert Kraft.
2008: Israel and Germany upgraded their ties approving a host of joint projects and agreeing to hold annual government consultations, in one of the highlights of German Chancellor Angela Merkel's three-day visit.
2008: Chief Rabbi Shlomo Amar announced that Ethiopian immigrants should be able to convert to Judaism in their native land and make Aliyah under the Law of Return.
2008: Haaretz reported that Elie Wiesel has told the Prime Minister’s office that he will not take part in the torch-lighting ceremony marking the 60thanniversary of Israel’s Independence due to prior commitments.
2008: Governor of New York Eliot Spitzer resigns after a scandal involving a high-end prostitute.
2009: “For the Love of Movies: The Story of American Film Criticism” a 2009 documentary co-starring Stanley Kaufman and featuring appearances by Manny Farber, Harland Jacobson, Leonard Matlin, Pauline Kael and Gene Siskel.
2009: At The YIVO Institute for Jewish Research Dr. Ellen Kellman of Brandeis University delivers a lecture entitled “Educating ‘Moyshe’ or Corrupting Him? Polemics around the Novel Saninin the American Yiddish Press ca. 1908” in which she discusses the role of serialized fiction in the American Yiddish press which was the subject of rancorous debate from its beginnings. Critics lambasted socialist-oriented papers for printing romance novels instead of serious fiction in translation. Yet some works, such as the Russian novel Sanin, proved to be even more controversial than those originally written in Yiddish.
2009: Services are held at Congregation Shaarey Zedek in Southfield for Detroit Pistons owner Bill Davidson, a noted philanthropist who was inducted into the basketball Hall of Fame last year and passed away on March 13, 2009 at the age of 86.Among the causes he funded were Hadassah University Medical Center, the Israel Antiquities Authority,the Jerusalem Archaeological Park,the Wexner Foundation and the William Davidson Graduate School of Jewish Education at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York.
2009: Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said today that her surgery for pancreatic cancer was successful and that she is scheduled to undergo a precautionary round of chemotherapy starting later this month.
2010(2nd of Nisan, 5770): Ninety-one year old Albert J. Rosenthal who had served as Dean of the Columbia Law School passed away.
2010(2nd of Nisan, 5770): One the day after his 90th birthday, award winning author Albert Sidney “Sid” Fleischman passed away today in Santa Monica. (As reported by Margalit Fox)
2010: In Jerusalem, Hama'abada is scheduled to present "Janana," by Yiftach Klein.
2010: Cookbook author Judy Zeidler is scheduled to offer tips on prepping for your Seder and mastering your grocery list, along with recipes for new and traditional Seder dishes in a program entitled “Passover: Cooking with Judy” sponsored by the American Jewish University.
2010:Some 3,000 officers were put on high alert on today after Hamas called for anti-Israel protests.
2010: “Sin,” a play by Mark Altman opened at the .Baruch Performing Arts Center.
2010:Veteran IPO subscribers enjoy a memorable evening as Itzhak Perlman performs with Israel Philharmonic Orchestra.
2011:Tamar Hirschl is scheduled to show a suite of paintings and recent resin works “in the inaugural Artist Project in New York City, a fair for independent artists.”
2011: The Hadassah Mahj Tournament, sponsored by Hadassah of Greater Detroit, is scheduled to take place at Hadassah House in West Bloomfield, Michigan.
2011(11th of Adar II): Ninety-year old Betty Sarah Wouk, “the wife and literary agent of bestselling writer Herman Wouk” passed away.
2011(11th of Adar II): Ta’anit Esther
2011(11th of Adar II): Eighty-one year old Gabrial Laderman, a painter of figurative art, passed away today. (As reported by William Grimes)
2011: President Shimon Peres said today that the Navy's seizure of the cargo ship Victoria earlier this week proves that Syria is providing weapons to Hamas in Gaza and to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
2011: Sacramento Kings and Israel National Basketball Team forward Omri Casspi may temporarily sign to play with Maccabi Tel Aviv in the event of an NBA work stoppage, he said in an interview with Army Radio today. The second-year NBA player, who formerly played with Maccabi Tel Aviv, said that there had already been some discussions about him possibly rejoining the team in the event of a lockout.
2011: Alaska Airlines apologizes today for the misunderstanding that occurred earlier this week on board one of their flights, in which flight attendants issued a security alert when three Mexican Jews began praying with Tefillin.
2011: “Suzie’s Grill keeps Houston Jews Kosher, Connected” published today described and the culinary and business skills of Susan Goldstein who operates “one of the only kosher-drive throughs in the country.”
2012: Twentieth Anniversary of the Iranian bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Argentina.
2012(23rd of Adar, 5772): Yahrzeit of Yitzchak Meir Alter the first Rebbe of the Ger Chasidic Dynasty who was born in 1799 and passed away on March 10, 1866.
2012: “Grace Paley: Collected Shorts” is scheduled to be shown at the Schenectady JCC Jewish Film Festival at Niskayuna, NY
2012(23rd of Adar, 5772): Anniversary of the first assembling of the Mishkan on Adar 23 (1321 BCE)
2012: The Eilat Chamber Music Festival is scheduled to come to an end.
2013: The Skirball Center for Adult Jewish Learning at Temple Emanu-El is scheduled to present “Deconstructing Woody Allen: Humor, Identity, Judaism” with Dr. Daniel Fainstein
2013: The Theatre at the 14thStreet Y is scheduled to present a puppet show “Lost & Found In Israel” written and performed by Zvi Sahar and Leat Klingman.
2013: The Center for Jewish History is scheduled to present “Yellow Sneaker and "The Matzah Time Crunch"
2013:“Samson and Delilah,” sung in French (with English supertitles) will be presented today at the Mahalia Jackson Theater for the Performing Arts in New Orleans featuring Cantor Joel Coleman “as the Old Hebrew.”
2013: The Minneapolis Jewish Film Festival is scheduled to come to an end.
2013: Today, “Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras vowed to crack down on neo-Nazi groups in a landmark speech marking the 70th anniversary of the first deportations of Thessaloniki’s Jews to the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp.” (As reported by JTA)
2013: Minutes released today by the Israel State Archive revealed details of tense and nearly failed meetings between then-prime minister Menachem Begin and former US president Jimmy Carter during the latter’s visit to the country in 1979, as the two leaders tried to hammer out the last details of the Israel-Egypt peace treaty.
2013: Likud MKs met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at his office in Jerusalem -today receive their marching orders for the next Cabinet and other government roles.
2014: Film critic Shlomo Schwartberg is scheduled to present the final lecture in the series “Defining Greatness – Director Steven Speilberg at the Miles Nadal JCC.
2004: Professor Yair Reisner of the Weizmann Institute of Science is scheduled to be recognized for his work in bone marrow transplant therapy when he receives his Rapport Prize today. (As reported by David Shamah)
2014: Dr. Yaakov Nahmias of Hebrew University is scheduled to receive the Rapport Prize today for identifying a grapefruit molecule that can block viruses. (As reported by David Shamah)
2014: “Brave Miss World” is scheduled to be shown at the Houston Jewish Film Festival.
2014: “Once Upon a Time at 55th and Hoover,” a documentary about the 300 Sephardic families from Rhodes who emigrated to Los Angeles (USA) and established a Judeo-Spanish (Ladino) language neighborhood in the area around 55th St and Hoover, in South Central Los Angeles” is scheduled to be shown at the New York Sephardic Jewish Film Festival.
2014: Grammy-award winning performer Ron Levine is scheduled to share stories from his fantastic career, including touring with nationally renowned recording artists and his award-winning work on the motion picture Urban Cowboy, at Coe College in Cedar Rapids, Iowa this evening.
2014: During his visit to the White House today “US President Barack Obama urged Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to make tough decisions and take risks for peace with Israel, saying he hoped to see progress in US-brokered negotiations in coming weeks.”
2014: Today New York State Senator Lee “Zeldin voted against the New York Dream Act.
2014: Today, Jordan condmenned what is call Israeli ‘escalation’ in the flashpoint Temple Mount in Jerusalem after Housing Minster Uri Ariel “deputy leader of the hardline national-rligious Bayit Yehudi party visited the Al-Aqsa compound in Jerusalem’s Old City yesterday.
2015: The Jewish Community Relations Council and The Jewish Federation of Greater Washington are scheduled to host “a real time analysis of the results of the Israeli elections as they unfold” in North Bethesda, MD.
2015: “The Iranian Americans” and “Before the Revolution” are scheduled to be shown at the 18th Annual New York Sephardic Jewish Film Festival.
2015: In San Diego, Jack Goldberg is scheduled to deliver a lecture on American Dilemmas in the "New" Middle East: The Elusive search for Coherent Strategies;”
2015: A Vanderbilt University official said that the spray painting of three swastiskis on fraternity house belong to the Tau Chapter of Alpha Epsilon Pi is being investigated as a hate crime.
2015: For those looking for a Jewish connection to St. Patrick’s Day consider “St. Patrick’s Day, Kosher Style.”
2016: “How to Win Enemies” and “Sabena Hijacking” are scheduled to be shown at the Houston Jewish Film Festival.
2016(7thof Adar II, 5776): Seventy-one year old Meir Dagan, the Director of Mossad from 2002 to 2011 passed away today, (As reported by Isabel Kershner)
2016: The Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center is scheduled to host its 2016 Humanitarian Awards Dinner.
2016: Judge Merrick Garland, President Obama’s nominee to the Supreme Court visited Capitol Hill today where he was warmly greeted by Democrats while facing the opposition of Republicans who said they would not hold any hearings in a move which was unprecedented in American history, calling into question the claims of the GOP being the party of Conservatives i.e. those who protect the values of the past.
2016: New York premiere of “Iraqi Night” at the New York Sephardic Jewish Film Festival.
2016: Thirteen month after disclosed “that he had treatable prostate cancer” today Arthur M. Blank, the co-founder of The Home Depot and the owner of the NFL Atlanta Falcons “announced that he was cancer-free following treatment.”
2017: Thousands of runners took part in the 2017 Jerusalem Marathon today.
2017: The “Ma’agan Michael II”, “a replica of a 2,500 year old trading ship found off the coast of Israel was christened this morning ahead of its first voyage…”
2017: Charlemagne Palestine’s Bear Mitzvah in Meshugahland is scheduled to open at the Jewish Museum in New York City.
2017: The Oxford University Jewish Society is scheduled to Kabbalat Shabbat followed an hour later with a Shabbat Friday night dinner and hour later.
2017(19thof Adar, 5777): Eighty-two year old Gershon Kekst, the founder of Kekst and Company passed away.
2017: “Rima Khalaf, a Jordanian who served as executive secretary of the Beirut-based Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia” resigned today “after the body she led was ordered by the UN secretary-general to remove from its website a controversial report that charged Israel has established an “apartheid regime” guilty of “racial domination” over the Palestinians.
2017: In honor of St. Patrick's Day, one national bagel chain has advertised "green bagels" while supplies last.
2018(1stof Nisan, 5778): Triple header Shabbat – Shabbat HaChodesh, Rosh Chodesh Nisan, start reading the book of Vayikra.
2018: As many Irish people and people who wish they were Irish celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, Jews can contemplate their Irish connection including Yitzhak HaLevi Herzog, the Chief Rabbi of Ireland and the second Ashekanzi Chief Rabbi of Palestine and his sons Chaim Herzog, the sixth President of Israel and Yaakov Herzog, the Haganah member and Israeli diplomat as well as the father and son team of Robert and Ben Briscoe, both of whom were Lord Mayor Dublin, author Julia Frankau who died on St. Patrick’s Day, 1916 and of course “Leopold Bloom,” the protagonist in Ulysses by James Joyce.
2018: “Humor Me” and “Love is Thicker Than Water” are scheduled to be shown at the Houston Jewish Film Festival.
2018: Temple Rodef Shalom's Rabbi Amy Schwartzman is scheduled to ashare her experiences as a woman rabbi as part of “To the Bimah: Women's Activism Enters the Synagogue.”
2018: The “Cake Maker” is scheduled to be shown at the New Jersey Jewish Film Festival.
2018: Distant Cousins is scheduled to perform as part of LimmudFest Saturday Night in New Orleans.
2019: The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish readers and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including I.M.: A Memoir by Isaac Mizrahi, Madame Fourcade’s Secret War: The Daring Young Woman Who Led France’s Largest Spy Network Against Hitler by Lynne Olson and the recently released paperback edition of To End A Presidency: The Power of Impeachment by Laurence Tribe and Joshua Matz.
2019: The New York Sephardic Jewish Film Festival is scheduled to host the New York premiere of “Pepe’s Last Battle” and the international premiere of “Labor, Rebellion, Upheaval from the Ancestral Sin Series.”
2019: “From salt beef sandwiches and Rachel Riley, to making one’s own Jewish News front page” there are plenty of reasons to visit The Big Family scheduled to open this morning in Hendon.
2019: In New Orleans, the JCC is scheduled to host the annual Community Purim Carnival.
2019: As the Irish and all those people who want to be Irish (which is just about everybody) prepare to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, examine the connection between Jewish and Irish cuisine. https://www.myjewishlearning.com/the-nosher/the-secret-jewish-history-of-corned-beef-and-cabbage/