OCTOBER 8
314: In his quest to consolidate his power, Constantine I, the man who will become the first Christian Roman Emperor defeats his rival Licinius at the Battle of Cibalae. Constantine will officially transform the Roman Empire into an anti-Semitic entity.
705: “The reign of the Umayyad Caliph Abd al-Malik” during Abi Isa “a self-proclaimed Jewish prophet” preached his message in Persia, came to an end today.
1075: Dmitar Zvonimir is crowned King of Croatia. At this point Roman Catholicism was the dominant religion of Croatia. But the King did have Jewish subjects. Some of them might have been able to trace their ancestry to the 3rdcentury when Jews first arrived in the Balkan principality. Others may have part of the legendary Khazars who lived in the region in the 10th century.
1408: The city of Jassy (Hungarian) or Yas (Yiddish) is mentioned in business correspondence between Prince Alexander the Good (Alexandru cel Bun) and merchants from Lviv then a part of Poland. The Romanian city of Yas would become a center of Jewish settlement as well as the site of the largest massacre of Jews in Romania in World War II.
1573: In what would prove to a turning point in the Eighty Years War, the Dutch score their first victory when the Spanish siege of the Dutch city of Alkmaar comes to an end. The war would last until 1648. When it was over, the independence of the Netherlands would be a reality. The Dutch Republic would provide a haven for European Jews, especially those fleeing Spain and its inquisition.
1576: The Sultan ordered 1,000 wealthy Jews to move from Safed to Cyprus. The Jews would be requested to take with them their possessions and riches. The firman ordering the moved utilized wording which warned the Turks that they would be severely punished if they accepted bribes from the Jews to have their names removed from the list. A year later another 500 Jewish families would be forced to move from Safed to Cyprus. Population movements like this were not unusual in the Ottoman Empire. It was the Sultan’s way of encouraging economic development throughout the empire.
1600: San Marino, a small patch of land on the Italian peninsula that “claims to be the oldest surviving sovereign state and constitutional republic in the world” adopted a written constitution. According to surviving documents, Jews have lived there since 14th century and Jews were living there when the constitution was adopted since “measures and resolutions regarding the Jews and their trades were repeatedly passed by the government in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.”
1713: Birthdate of Yechezkel ben Yehuda Landau who would gain fame as an expert on Halachah, Jewish ritual law and who was the father of Samuel Landau, the “chief dayyan of Prague.”
1753(10th of Tishrei, 5514): Yom Kippur
1762: Mordecai Sheftal married Frances Hart in Charleston, SC today.
1763: Birthdate of Michael Josephs (Myer Königsberg) the native of Konigsberg who met Moses Mendelssohn which studying Talmud in Berlin after which he moved to London where he pursued a business career while writing articles for "Hebrew Review," the "Voice of Jacob," and the "Jewish Chronicle."
1780(9th of Tishrei, 5541): A week after Major John Andre is hung as a spy marking the end to Benedict Arnold’s treason, an event that unfairly implicated his Jewish aide-de-camp, Colonel Franks, Jews heard Kol Nidre.
1781: Birthdate of Abraham David, the brother of Jonas Daniel Meijer, the first Jewish lawyer in the Netherlands.
1784(23rd of Tishrei, 5545): Simchat Torah
1791(10th of Tishrei, 5552): For the first time in history, Jews in France observe Yom Kippur as equal citizens having been “emancipated” on September 28 of this year.
1799(9th of Tishrei, 5560): Erev Yom Kippur; Kol Nidre is chanted for the last time in the 18th century.
1803(22nd of Tishrei, 5564): Shabbat and Shmini Atzeret
1805(15th of Tishrei, 5566): Sukkoth
1810(10th of Tishrei, 5571): Yom Kippur
1821: In Rawicz, Germany, Jewish cloth merchant Heimann Strassman and Judith Guhrauer gave birth to Dr. Wolfgang Strassman
1821: Abraham Isaacs married Elizabeth Benjamin at the Great Synagogue today.
1826: At “Klingen, near Landua, Rhenish Palatine, Samuel Weis and Agatha Levy gave birth to Julius Weis the husband of Carrie Mayer who moved to New Orleans where he was “director of the Jewish Widows’ and Orphans’ Home” and “president of the Hebrew Educational Society, Touro Infirmary and Benevolent Association and Temple Sinai.
1828: George Solomons married Rosetta Solomon at the Hambro Synagogue today.
1835(15th of Tishrei, 5596): As Mexican forces move to put down the rebellion in Texas, Jews celebrate Sukkoth
1836: Birthdate of John Phillips, the native of Birmingham, England, the husband of Leah Mosely and son-in-law of Lewin Mosley, who represented Ladywood Ward in the City Council and served as President of the Birmingham Hebrew Congregation.
1837(9th of Tishrei, 5598): For the first time during the Presidency of Martin Van Buren, Kol Nidre is chanted.
1838: Birthdate of Alsace, France native Charles Weill, the husband of Emilie Kahn Weill with whom he had ten children.
1838: In Great Britain, Frederick Goldsmid and his wife Caroline Samuel gave birth to barrister Sir Julian Goldsmid, MP, Vice-Chancellor of London University and husband of Virginia Philipson with whom he had five children – Violet, Edith, Margherita, Beatrice and Mau.
1841(23rd of Tishrei, 5602): Simchat Torah
1845: The Sephardic Synagogue of Kingston, Jamaica celebrated taking possession of a new Sefer Torah." The service was conducted by the Isaac Lopes, who served as rabbi for the congregation.
1848: On the day after Yom Kippur Joseph Wile, Samuel Marks, Joseph Katz, Gabriel Wile, Meyer Rothschild, Henry Levi, Jacob Altman, Joseph Altman, A. Adler, Elias Wolff, Abram Weinberg, and Jacob Gans met in Rochester, NY and formed Congregation Berith Kodesh.
1851: “Europe” published today told the story of Jewish con artist working in the British Isles. “An old Jew” had advertised in an English country town,” that among other wondrous things he would get into a quart bottle. At the appointed time his room was filled with eager spectators. He came on the stage, and after a deal of preparation, did nothing he had promised. ‘A swindle! A swindle !’ cried one of the cheated company, who had paid his shilling to the door-keeper” who by then had disappeared. “Amid the noise, the Jew came forward, and with imperturbable gravity said, ‘Ladies and Gentlemen; it is a svindle and vat then?’”
1856(9th of Tishrei, 5617): Erev Yom Kippur
1857: In the Recorders Office, Nathan Levins testifies against Israel Steinhardt in a case brought by Levins claiming that Steinhard robbed him of 940 pounds in English Sterling notes. Steinhard then has a chance to rebut Levins’ claims. The story is a tale that takes the court across Europe and involves a variety of convoluted transactions. The story is even harder to understand because neither party speaks English nor testimony has to be translated. Apparently the 20 Jews attending the hearing were not affected by the language barrier since, like the plaintiff and defendant they came from Germany or Hungary. The case was continued until tomorrow.
1861: Louis Bach completed his service with Company D of the 27th Regiment.
1862(14th of Tishrei, 5623): Erev Sukkoth
1862: During the Civil War, in Kentucky, Union forces defeat the Confederates at the Battle of Perryville which means the family of future Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis who supported Abraham Lincoln’s candidacy will continue to live under the Stars and Stripes.
1862: Brooklyn Backs the President" published today described the support being given Mr. Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation. The speech by James S. Wadsworth demonstrates how deeply the story of the Exodus from Egypt inspired the Abolitionist Movement showing once again the important role that Jewish ideals and idioms have played in man’s march towards freedom. General Wadsworth told the crowd that “In ancient times, when the Hebrews, escaping out of the house of bondage, stood upon the shores of the Red Sea, with the hosts of Pharaoh hovering on their rear, conservatism shrunk back and feared to wet its sandals in the angry waves. But the Book of Books tells us that the Lord said unto Moses, "Speak unto the children of Israel that they go forward!" They obeyed, and Pharaoh and his hosts sank like lead in the waters. The age of miracles is past. In our country, vox populi, vox Dei. Our great cause confronts a sea of difficulties, before which timid souls stand appalled. But, the Proclamation reveals to us the land of promise, the Canaan beyond the floods. Let the people, the vox Dei, say unto the President, ‘Abraham, speak unto the armies of the Union that they go forward!’”
1865(18th of Tishrei, 5626): Chol Ha Moed Sukkoth
1865(18th of Tishrei, 5626): Fifty-three year old Moravian born violinist and composer Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst passed away in Nice.
1867(9th of Tishrei, 5628): Erev Yom Kippur
1868: Oswald Hönigsmann who “represented the city of Brody in the Galician Diet delivered a speech today in behalf of the emancipation of the Jews” which helped bring a victory for Franz Smolka’s effort to gain full civil rights for the Jews.
1869: President Franklin Pierce passed away. Pierce was one of those forgettable mediocrities who served in the White House in the decade before the Civil War. His record of dealing with Jews is limited and mixed. Franklin Pierce was the first and maybe the only President whose name appears on the charter of a synagogue. Pierce signed the Act of Congress in 1857 that amended the laws of the District of Columbia to enable the incorporation of the city's first synagogue, the Washington Hebrew Congregation. Washington Hebrew Congregation is one of the oldest and largest Reform Congregations in the Washington Metropolitan Area. But two years before, in November of 1855, Pierce signed a treaty with Switzerland that had been ratified by the Senate. The treaty allowed the Swiss government to discriminated again American citizens who were Jews so that the treatment of American Jews would be consistent with the treatment of Swiss Jews by their government.
1871(23rd of Tishrei, 5632): Simchat Torah
1871: The Great Chicago Fire made its impact felt the area settled by Jews of German origins. It was referred to by some as The Golden Ghetto. This was in contrast to the area where eastern European and Russian Jews settled which was known as just The Ghetto. This area suffered a fair amount of damage in the less famous Fire of 1874.
1873: It was reported today that the Jews of Cleveland, Ohio have raised $800 which they have sent to Shreveport, LA and Memphis, TN to help those suffering from the current Yellow Fever Epidemic.
1875(9th of Tishrei 5636): Erev Yom Kippur
1876: In Philadelphia, Ida Marie Fleisher and Benjamin W. Fleisher, Jr gave birth to Arthur Adler Fleisher.
1877: It was reported today that Dr. De Sola Mendez is scheduled to give a lecture on “Young America” at an upcoming meeting of the Young Men’s Hebrew Association.
1878: In Philadelphia, Morris Moses Pflazer, the German born son of “Karoline and Marx Mordechai Pfaelzer and his wife “Sophie Pfalzer” gave birth to “Henrietta (Hettie) Pfaelzer” who became Henrietta Stern when she married Horace Stern, the University of Pennsylvania Law School graduate and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.
1879(21st of Tishrei, 5640): Hoshana Raba
1879: Sir George Grey, who hired Samuel Joseph, an Anglo-Jew from London as his interpreter” completed a two year term as Prime Minister of New Zealand.
1881(15th of Tishrei, 5642): Sukkoth
1882: It was reported today that sometime in the first two weeks of November, Edward Harrigan’s new play, “Mordecai Lyons” will premiere at the Theatre Comique. The play tells the story of a Jewish father who forces her to marry a man not of her choosing. The play is “both humorous and dramatic” and portrays a father who loves a daughter who has been touched by misfortune.
1882: “Romance of the Jews” published today provides a detailed review of The Jews of Barnow, a collection of stories by Karl Emil Franzos.
1882: “Songs of a Semite” published today provides a detailed review of Songs of a Semite: The Dance to Death and Other Poems by Emma Lazarus.
1883: Birthdate of Nobel Prize winner, Otto Heinrich Warburg, the son of Emil Warburg who was related to the famous family of Jewish financier. However, Warburg’s father had converted to Christianity as a result of an undisclosed family dispute.
1886: It was reported today that Kaiser Wilhelm has sent the Sultan of Morocco a gift – 12 volumes of the Talmud in Hebrew. (I have no idea why the German Emperor would send the Muslim monarch such a gift.)
1886(9th of Tishrei, 5647): Erev Yom Kippur
1886: “Yom Kippur” published today opens with the following “From sunset this evening until tomorrow at sunset there will be observed by some seven or eight million Israelites scatter all over the globe the…solemn festival of Yom Kippur or Day of Atonement.” In describing the history and customs of the day, J.S. Moore contends that “there is no other religion…that has a similar festival. The great object is…that one a year one day out of the 365 shall be set apart for no other purposed than to commune with God, confess the errors of life and perchance resolve to amend them.”
1886: “Veteran Rosenberg’s Death” published today described the life and death of Joseph Rosenberg, the 102 year old Jewish citizen of New Orleans who was buried yesterday. A native of Baden, Germany, he served with Napoleon’s French Army when he captured Moscow. He came to the Crescent City in 1852 where he raised a family that included 3 daughters.
1886: “A Suicide in the Tombs” published today described how Solomon Goldberg, a Polish Jew, being held in the jail was able to hide a knife from authorities which he then used to kill himself.
1886: It was reported today that Emperor of Germany has sent the Sultan of Morocco 12 volumes of the Talmud, in Hebrew, as a gift. (I cannot find a reason for this)
1886: Theatre receipts were considerably less tonight than normal because the Jewish patrons were observing “the Jewish fast of Yom Kippur.”
1887: In New York City Josephine Morgenthau and Henry Morgenthau, Sr. gave birth to Alma Morgenthau.
1888: “Eating The Old Mare” published today described a dinner hosted by Dr. Rush S. Huidekeper, Chief of the Veterinary School of the University of Pennsylvania during which he told his guests that “the only beef that is properly inspected is that eaten by the” Jews, “which is killed according to their rules.”
1889: Members of Ahavath Chesed met tonight “and voted to all they could” to help raise money for the establishment of a “Jewish Cooper Union.” At the same meeting, “a delegation from the Young Men Hebrew’s Association” pledged their support for this endeavor.
1889: In Cortland, NY, Abraham H. Jachles of Binghamton, NY marred Emily J. Klein of Walterboro, SC.
1890: “An Impossible Shekel” published today described the discovery of coin which the owner claims to be a shekel from the time of Simon the Macabee which is impossible because it has markings including a Star of Bethlehem, that were never used on the genuine coins which made of silver and copper while this one is make of gold, bronze and platinum.
1890: Birthdate of Lithuanian native Samuel Goodman “Sam” Hoffenstein, an American newspaperman and husband of Edith Morgan who moved to Los Angeles where pursued a successful career as a screenwriter.
http://www.filmreference.com/Writers-and-Production-Artists-Ha-Ja/Hoffenstein-Samuel.html
1890: At today’s annual meeting of the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society Orphan Asylum Mrs. Philip J. Joachimsen was elected President.
1891: August Belmont received a telegram today in Louisville, KY telling him that the home he and his family were renting in New York had burned down to which he replied “that he would come to New York at once.”
1891: “A dispatch from the St. Petersburg to the New York Daily News says that the United States Immigration Commissioners who have been visiting Russia” were impressed the conditions of suffering under which the Jews of Russia were living.
1891: At Rochester (NY) University, President Hill addressed the Query Club, “a literary club composed largely of young people from Temple Bortih Kodesh” on the subject of “Higher Education.”
1891(6thof Tishrei, 5652): Seventy-two year old Dr. Jacob Eduard Polak “the pioneer of modern medicine in Iran” who served as personal physician to the Shah passed away today.
http://www.ams.ac.ir/AIM/0582/0020.pdf
1892: A fire that started in the rooms of Moritz Feinman, spread to the rest of the tenement at 100 Suffolk Street which drove the nearly 100 residents all of whom were Jewish out into the street.
1892: In New York, Jewish Americans begin the observance of Columbus Day which marks the 400th anniversary of the discovery of the New World.
1892: At Park East Synagogue Rabbi Bernard Drachman delivered a sermon entitled “Israel’s Debt of Gratitude to Columbus and America.
1893: In the elections for the Reichstag, “the Anti-Semites” are running against the Conservatives and National Liberals in seven districts of which they “may capture four.”
1893: Birthdate of Ada Fishman who made aliyah in 1912, played an active role in the development of pre-State Palestine and as Ada Maimon was a member of the first Knesset.
1894: “The east side Hebrew Anarchists have completed preparations to burlesque the fast of Yom Kippur” which begins tomorrow evening, with an evening that will include dancing, singing and a speech by anarchist Emma Goldman at the Clarendon Hall.
1894: “Dental surgeon and businessman Dr. Hugo Ascher and Minna Luise Ascher gave birth to Charlotte Hedwig the younger sister of painter Fritz Ascher a protégé of Max Liebermann
1895: German born American-Jewish inventor/businessman, Emil Berliner founded the Berliner Gramophone Company which was to produce “flat gramophone records” or what would be called phonograph records. He designed the disc model which replaced Edison’s cylinders.
1895: Birthdate of future Laborite MP and death penalty foe, Sydney Silverman.
1895: The Executive Committee of the Central Conference of American Rabbis is scheduled to meet this morning in Cincinnati, Ohio.
1896: In Oregon, Joseph Simon was elected to the U.S. Senate, making him the first Jew to represent the Beaver State in the Upper Chamber of Congress.
1896: It is reported today that the Sultan is demanding a payment of $220,000 from the Grand Rabbi following rioting in Hasskeuy.
1897: Birthdate of Kovno native Oscar Straus Caplan, a “Judge in Chicago’s Municipal Courts for more than a quarter of century and after retirement “a part-time instructor at the University of Miami Law School who was the husband of Sarah Caplan and the father of Mitchell Caplan.
1897: “Care of Russian Jews” published today includes a denial by prominent Jewish leaders including Oscar S. Strauss and Jacob Schiff that “the Baroness de Hirsch has given directions” to end the financing of schemes to send Russian Jews to Argentina and “has ordered that the balance of the funds…be devoted to the establishment of technical and industrial schools in Russia.”
1898(22nd of Tishrei, 5669): Shemini Atzeret
1898: Forty-seven year old German born, Portland, Oregon attorney Joseph Simon began serving as the United States Senator from Oregon today.
1898: In response to the announcement by Ismail Bey, the Civil Governor of Crete that Turkish troops are being withdrawn from the island as demanded by Great Britain, Russia, France and Italy, Jews, Christians and Moslems are crowding aboard steamers leaving Crete.
1898: “Gladstone” published today provided a review of The Story of Gladstone’s Life by Justin McCarthy includes chapters on “the long with duel with Disraeli in the House of Common” and his “advocacy of the admissions of Jews to Parliament.”
1900(15th of Tishrei, 5661): Sukkoth
1900: Birthdate of Serge Ivan Chermayeff, “a Russian born, British architect, industrial designer, writer, and co-founder of several architectural societies, including the American Society of Planners and Architects.”
1900:Herzl met with the Austro-Hungarian Prime Minister, Ernest von Koerber.
1902: Two days after he had passed away, eighty-three year old Austrian Rabbi Jacob Jacques Heinrich Hirschfeld, the son “Marie and Emanuel Isak Hirschfeld” and the husband of Pauline Hirschfeld was buried today in Vienna.
1902: Birthdate of Arthur Harold Babitsky, the native of Omaha, Nebraska who gained fame as award winning Disney animator Art Babbit who worked on such classics as “Snow White and the Seven Dwarts” and “Fantasia.
1903(17th of Tishrei, 5664): Chol Hamoed Sukkoth
1903: In Cincinnati, OH, Theodore Mack and Pauline Mack, the Cincinnati born daughter of Joseph and Hannah Sachs, gave birth to Henry Mack.
1903: In San Francisco, having gained approval for the building of a new sanctuary the rabbi and officers of Congregation Sherith Israel gathered this morning for a groundbreaking ceremony.
1904: Birthdate of Minsk native Sol Joseph Taishoff, the Washington, DC raised “editor and cofounder of Broadcasting magazine.
1904: Edmonton, Alberta was incorporated as a city today. Jews had been living there for more than a decade. The first Jews, Abraham and Rebecca Cristall - came to what was then an unincorporated community in 1893. George and Rose Cristall were the first Jews born in the town. By the time of incorporation there were 17 Jews living in what would become Alberta’s capital city.
1904: Prince Albert, Saskatchewan was incorporated as a city. By this time two colonies had been established by Baron Hirsch’s Jewish Colonization Society – the second of which was called Hirsch, Saskatchewan founded in 1892. Among the Jews who had come to Saskatchewan and left before the incorporation of Prince Albert were Ekiel and Mindel Bronfman of Seagram’s Whiskey fame. Two years after the incorporation, Jewish immigrants from Lithuania would establish The Edinbridge Hebrew Colony, another of the settlements created by the Jewish Colonization Society
1905: Founding of the Society for domestic art and industry in Palestine.
1905(9th of Tishrei, 5666): Erev Yom Kippur
1905: In London, “The Fast of the Day of Atonement commences at 5:20 p.m. with synagogue services commencing at 5:45 p.m”.
1907: The Tennessee Volunteers coached by Izzy Levene defeated the football team from the Tennessee Military Institute in the school’s first game of the season
1907: Today King Edward VII’s private secretary wrote to Nathaniel Mayer, known as “Natty” the first Lord Rothschild who was an Executor of Benjamin Disraeli’s estate concerning “letters of a very confidential and family nature that may been written by the late Queen Victoria to Lord Beaconsfield between 1874 and 1880.”
1908: Mr. and Mr. William E. Dodd gave birth to Martha Dodd. Martha accompanied her father to his posting as FDR’s first ambassador to Hitler’s Germany. A romantic figure, she finally became aware of the danger presented by the Nazi regime
1909(23rd of Tishrei, 5670): Simchat Torah
1909: After having been taken to the hospital two weeks, fifty-two year Galicia born poet, author and Zionist Naphtali Herz Imber who had first visited Palestine at the age of 16 and is best known “as the author ‘Hatikvah,’ the Zionist National hymn” passed away today in New York.
1911: Birthdate of Czech jazz musician Karel Vlach who had “a day job as a traveling salesman for Jewish notions firm until the German occupation made it untenable” and who played with several Jewish musicians including Fritz Weiss before the war when Weiss was ultimately shipped to his death at Auschwitz.
1912(27th of Tishrei, 5673): Dr. Morris Loeb, Professor of Chemistry and Columbia, a noted scientist and philanthropist and the husband of Eda K. Loeb passed away today in New York City.
1912: In Elmira, NY, founding of the Hebrew Institute.
1912: The First Balkan War began today which when it ended find the 60,000 Jews living in Salonika going from Ottoman rule to Greek rule – a reality that caused concern among the Jews which would lead to the Greek government, in 1917 becoming one of the first supporters of the Balfour Declaration.
1913(7th of Tishrei, 5674): Seventeen year old Schore Feitelsohn passed away today.
1915: It was announced today that “Catholics, Protestants and Jews have joined at Columbia University’s Teacher College in a co-operative union to be known as the Students’ Religious Organization.”
1915: It was reported today that “Djemal Pasha is especially annoyed because of the Zion Mule Corps which consists of volunteers from among the Jewish refugees from Palestine who are engaged in transport work at Gallipoli.
1915: It was reported today that “Djemal Pasha has announced he will extirpate Zionism root and branch and that not a single Jew will be allowed to re-enter Palestine.”
1915: It was reported today “about five hundred Jewish women are confined at the Bella Vista Hotel at Jaffa” where they are suffering “much privation.”
1916(11th of Tishrei, 5677): In New York, retired realtor Samuel Hirsch, the husband of Eugenia Hirsch, whose estate was appraised at $774, 928 passed away today.
1916: It was reported today that an exhaustive report “purports to show that the (Russian) military censor was in definite alliance with the anti-Semitic press and took every” opportunity “to fan the flames of racial antagonism and hatred by having the Jew proclaimed as an enemy of Russia, more to be feared even than the German invader…so that every attempt to reveal the truth about the Jewish solider, his bravery, his fortitude, his unselfishness, the suffering of his helpless wife and children was systematically suppressed.”
1917(22nd of Tishrei, 5678): Shemini Atzeret
1917: In Frankfurt an der Oder, Siegfried and Frieda Nuemann gave birth to Gerhard Neumann, who served with the fabled “Flying Tigers” during WW II, became a leading aviation designer and General Electric executive and earned the Daniel Guggenheim Medal in 1979
1917: It was reported today that there are more than 50,000 Jewish soldiers serving in the U.S. Army, “a percentage far in excess of the ratio of Jews to the general population.
1918: Birthdate of Arthur Mendelowitz, the native of Sighetu Marmației who survived Auschwitz, joined Mosad and gained fame as Amos Manor the Director of Shin Bet.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3433999,00.html
http://www.shabak.gov.il/English/History/heads/Pages/AmosManor.aspx
1918: During World War I, in France, on the Western Front U.S. Army Corporal Samuel Sampler charged an enemy bunker that was inflicting severe causalities and using hand-grenades neutralized the enemy position allowing the unit to continue his advance. He was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for his action.
1919: In New York, Hyman and Sophie Shemin Davis gave birth to Sadie Davis who married Morris (Murray) Altman and as Sadie Altman was the mother of Robert and Nathaniel Altman.
1920: Today’s Issue of the American Hebrew is scheduled to be devoted to the “various phases of” the late Jacob “Schiff’s life and activities.”
1920: Harry H. Schlact was “appointed special assistant commissioner of immigration” today.
1920: Rabbi Wise and Judge Elkus are scheduled to speak at the exercises marking the installation of Hebrew Union College graduate Maxwell Silver as the Rabbi of the Flushing Division of the Free Synagogue.
1921(6th of Tishrei, 5682): Shabbat Shuva
1921(6th of Tishrei, 5682): Rabbi Joseph Wasserman, who came to New York City in 1890 and was “active in the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society” passed away today.
1923: In Notting Hill, London, “merchant banker Ellis Arthur Franklin” and the former Muriel Francis Waley, gave birth to Oxford educated, decorated WW II veteran Collin Ellis Franklin the bibliographer and collector of rare books who was the brother of biophysicist Rosalind Franklin and the grand-nephew of Viscount, Sir Herbert Sameul.
1923: Following a summer marked by economic setbacks in the Soviet Union, the uncovering of secret groups within the Communist Party and failure of a Communist revolution in German, Leon Trotsky “sent a letter to the Central Committee and Control Commission which “attributed these” setbacks “to a lack of Intra-Party Democracy. (Editor’s note – This was part of what would become a fight between Trotsky and Stalin for control of the Party and the Soviet Union; a fight that would end with Stalin having Trotsky murdered in 1940.)
1924(10th of Tishrei, 5685): Yom Kippur
1924: While speaking in the lower house of the Hungarian Parliament, Dr. Bela Fabian, a Jewish deputy described the power of the anti-Semitic Association of Awakening Magyars, some of whose members had just been acquitted in case where they had been charged “in the bombing a charity of a charity ball organized by the Jewish Women of Csongrad in which several people were killed.”
1925: At Forbes Field, The Washington Senators, with Buddy Myer at 2nd base lost the second game of the World Series to the Pirates.
1925: Birthdate of NYU basketball star Sidney Tanenbaum who “won the 1947 Bar Kochba Award, which honored him as the best Jewish American athlete.”
http://www.nytimes.com/1986/09/06/obituaries/sid-tanenbaum-60-is-slain-nyu-basketball-star-in-40-s.html
1926: The New York Times reported that Jews in Palestine have called upon the British government not to let Arabs be the ones to repair Rachel’s Tomb.
1927:With Jewish editor Herman Bermstein acting as interpreterMordachai Golinkin, conductor of the Palestine Opera and former director of the Petrograd Opera, told reporters at the Ansonia Hotel how he, his wife, Lea, lyric soprano, and G. Giorini, dramatic tenor, had been detained on Ellis Island for three days. Golinkin had nothing but praise for the way in which he was treated during the internment and expressed a desire to return to the Island to give a concert. Golinkin is in this country to raise $200,000 to build an opera house in Palestine. Nathan Struas and Herman Bernstein “were greatly impressed by the artistic merits” of Golinikin’s productions in Israel which have included performances of Fause and Aida in Hebrew.
1927(12thof Tishrei, 5688): Judith Solis-Cohen passed away.
http://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/solis-cohen-judith
1927: In Bahía Blanca, Argentina, were Máxima (Vapniarsky) and Lázaro Milstein, a Jewish Ukrainian immigrant gave birth to biochemist César Milstein who “shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1984”
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1984/milstein-bio.html
1927: In Omaha, Nebraska, Jacob Lipsey, a Jewish immigrant from Russia who “own a wholesaled poultry and meat market” and “the former Molly Brick” gave birth to Stanford Lipsey, thePulitzer Prize winning publisher and friend of Warren Buffet.
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/03/business/media/stanford-lipsey-died-buffalo-news.html?hpw&rref=obituaries&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=well-region®ion=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well&_r=0
1927: “Shootin’ Irons,” an “oater” produced by B.P. Schulberg with a script co-authored by Sam Mintz was released today in the United States.
1928: Joseph Szigeti, the Jewish Hungarian violinist, gives the first performance of Alfredo Casella's Violin Concerto.
1928(24th of Tishrei, 5689): Silent screen comedian Larry Semon reportedly passed away. Semon directed, wrote and starred in the silent screen version the Wizard of Oz. There are those who contend that this is not the date of Semon’s death. According to them, Semon was in financial trouble and he faked his death to get away from his creditors. However, they have not been able to come up with alternative date for his death.
1928: Hungarian born Joseph Szigeti performed in the début of Alfredo Casella's Violin Concerto. Szigeti is one more in a long line of Jewish virtuoso violinists.
1928: Several people were injured today and three were arrested in “a clash between Hebraist and partisans of the Yiddish language” at Tel Aviv. “The occasion for the clash was a celebration by the Poale Zion Club commemorating the 20th anniversary of the Czernowitz Conference, where Yiddish was proclaimed as ‘a national language’ of the Jewish people.” G’dud Magginei Ha’saf-fah “a youth organization ‘for the protection of the Hebrew language’ was responsible for the attack. Among the injured was M. Wescher, a Poale Zion leader and member of the Tel Aviv Municipal Council.
1930: In Pittsfield, MA, Harry and Ruth Klein Kaufman gave birth to Donald Kaufman, the Vice President of KB Toys who was responsible for creating “one of the largest and most valuable collections of antique toy cars and trucks in the world.”
1929 Birthdate of Bronx High School of Science, Arthur Bernard Bisguier who became an International Grandmaster in 1957, the same year in which he played Bobby Fischer at the U.S. Open in Cleveland
.1931:Berlin Alexanderplatz: die Geschichte Franz Biberkopfs (Berlin Alexanderplatz: the story of Franz Biberkopfs) with a script co-authored by Bruno Alfred Döblin premiered today.
1931: The Habima Theater opened in Tel Aviv. Founded by Nahum Zemach in 1917 in Moscow, Habima (Hebrew word meaning “the stage”) was one of the first Hebrew language theatre groups. The group left the Soviet Union in 1926 and went on tour before finally settling in Tel Aviv. Habima was designated as the national theatre in 1958.
1931(27th of Tishrei, 5692):General Sir John Monash, who was the highest ranking Jewish officer to serve in the Australian Army during the World War I and who served with distinction at Gallipoli and on the Western Front passed away.
1932(8th of Tishrei, 5693): Shabbat Shuva
1932: In Brooklyn, electrical engineer Irwin Appel and the former Lillian Sender gave birth to Kenneth Ira Appel, a “mathematician who harnessed computer” (As reported by Dennis Overbye)
1933(18th of Tishrei, 5694): Fourth Day of Sukkoth
1935(22nd of Tishrei, 5697): Shemini Atzeret
1936: Birthdate of Rona Burstein, who gained fame as Hollywood gossip columnist Rona Barrett
1936: Abraham Kaiser, a Jew living in Duisburg, Germany was sentenced by a National Socialist tribunal to one and a half years imprisonment “for writing to a friend in America a letter that contained uncomplimentary remarks about Chancellor Hitler and the National Socialist party.”
1936: It was reported today that “a nationwide unofficial army was being formed by a WPA group to ‘fight reds’ and quoted” “Wilbert Eldred, a middle-aged employee in the Procurement Division of the Unite States Treasury Department” “as saying that the ‘growing influence of Reds and Jews was menacing the country.’”
1937: Broadcast of the first episode of “Grand Central Station,” a dramatic radio anthology produced by Himan Brown.
1937:The Palestine Post reported that the Franco-Luxembourg-German borders were closed to Jews. All trains arriving at the border were searched and Jews were turned back. Jews seeking to return to Germany were also turned back. In Germany Jews were called to police stations and asked point-blank when they were going to emigrate, or they would face serious consequences.
1937: “Lance Spy” directed by Gregory Ratoff, co-starring Peter Lorre and featuring Luther Adler, Fritz Feld, Joseph Schildkraut and Maurice Moscovith was released in the United States today.
1938: The Slovak Peoples' Party establishes Hlinkova Garda (Hlinka Guard), an anti-Semitic militia that will collaborate with the Germans.
1938:Jewish composer David Rose marries Martha Raye
1939: A new Nazi–Soviet agreement was reached by an exchange of letters between Vyacheslav Molotov and the German Ambassador
1939: Birthdate of Harvey Pekar, the son of Jewish immigrants from Poland, whose autobiographical comic book “American Splendor” would “a cult following for its unvarnished stories of a depressed, aggrieved Everyman negotiating daily life in Cleveland” and would become “ the basis for a critically acclaimed 2003 film.”
1939:The Nazis ordered to the establishment of a Ghetto in Piotrkow, Poland. This was the first of a series of ghettos and camps planned by Heydrich.
1939: “The reported plan of Chancellor Hitler to establish a Jewish State in Polish territory was condemned” today “by the annual conference of the Order of the Sons of Zion.”
1939: The Nazis orchestrated a pogrom against the Jews of Lodz.
1939: “Writer Sees Nazis Leaving No Choice” provided a summary of the views of Anne O’Hare McCormick of the editorial staff of The New York Times on Hitler’s peace proposals most of which she dismissed except for his proposal of “setting up some sort of a Jewish state in Poland – a Hitler homeland for the Jews” which she said “is at least interesting.
1939: Hitler declared that Będzin would be among the Polish territories annexed by Germany which marked the start of the resettlement of 30,000 Jews from other communities in the Polish city.
1939: Germany annexed Western Poland marking the next level of the downward spiral that would come to be known as the Final Solution.
1939: At the annual conference of the Order of the Sons Of Zion a resolution was adopting terming Hitler’s reported plan to establish a Jewish State in Polish territory “a hypocritical scheme fraught with the gravest of dangers to European Jewry.”
1939: Pastor John Hayes Holmes of the Community Church delivered a sermon giving reasons for the United States to remain neutral based in part on the unworthiness of the government of Poland “a place where Jews were a little more miserable than in Germany.”
1939: The NBC Blue radio network broadcast the first episode of “The Colgate Sports Newsreel,” starring Bill Stern.
1940: Dr. Louis L. Mann, the rabbi of Temple Sinai, is scheduled to officiate at the funeral of Henry Horner, the Governor of Illinois. Follow the funeral, the Governor will be interred at Mount Mayriv Cemetery in a grave next to his mother.
1941(17th of Tishrei, 5702: Third Day of Sukkoth
1941(17th of Tishrei, 5702): Fifty-four year old Koblenz born, Chicago raised Gustav Gerson Kahn, known as “Gus Kahn” the lyricist for such “standards” as “Yes Sir, That’s My Baby,” “It Had to Be You” and “Dream a Little Dream of Me” who went on to create musicals in Hollywood while being married to Grace Kahn with whom he had one son, Donald, passed away today.
1941: “The Auschwitz II extermination camp, better known as Auschwitz-Birkenau” was founded today.
1941(17th of Tishrei, 5702): Fifty-four year old lyricist Gus Kahn who wrote an untold number of hit songs during the 1920’s and 1930’s and was the father of songwriter Donald Kahn passed away today.
1941(17th of Tishrei, 5702: The Vitebsk (Belorussia) Ghetto is liquidated; more than 16,000 Jews are killed.
1941: “The prosecutor, Gaston Cassagneau, handed Leon Blum an “additional indictment” that included a lengthy critique of the Popular Front and ended with these words: “Because the unjustifiable weakness of M. Léon Blum’s government compromised both production in the short run and the moral state of the producers, he betrayed the duties of his office.”
1941: “49th Parallel,” a British war movie based on an original story by Emeric Pressburger who wrote the screenplay and starring Leslie Howard premiered in London today.
1942: The USS Drum, the ship on which Maruice Rindskopf spent all of World War II, contacted a convoy of four freighters, and defying the air cover guarding the ships, sank one of the cargo ships before bombs forced her deep.
1943(9th of Tishrei, 5704):Erev Yom Kippur
1943: This morning, one day after he had passed funeral services are scheduled to be held for sixty-four year old Lithuanian native Ephraim Caplan, the “religious editor of the Jewish Morning Journal,” long-time director of the Jewish National Fund of America and President of the Council for Orthodox Jewish Education who was the husband of Eva Caplan with whom he had one daughter, Martha and “three sons, Dr. Leon Caplan, Dr. Joseph Caplan” and Saul Caplan who served with the U.S. Army in WW II, followed by burial in Mount Judah Cemetery.
1943(9th of Tishrei, 5704):: Three thousand Italian prisoners of war are murdered by the SS and Ukrainian guards at La Risiera di San Sabba, Italy, south of Trieste. Of 1,920 Jews in Trieste, 620 are murdered by the SS.
1943(9th of Tishrei, 5704): On the eve of the Jewish Day of Atonement, several thousand ill or weak Jewish men are gassed at Auschwitz.
1943: Sixty-four year old Lithuanian native Ephraim Caplan, the “religious editor of the Jewish Morning Journal,” long-time director of the Jewish National Fund of America and President of the Council for Orthodox Jewish Education who was the husband of Eva Caplan with whom he had one daughter, Martha and “three sons, Dr. Leon Caplan, Dr. Joseph Caplan” and Saul Caplan who served with the U.S. Army in WW II, was buried today at the Mt. Judah Cemetery in Queens .”
1943: Birthdate of R.L. Stine. Born Robert Lewis Stine, the author is known for his science fiction works.
1944(21st of Tishrei, 5705): Hoshana Rabbah
1944: The Gestapo began arresting members of the anti-Nazi Ehrenfeld Group.
1945(1st of Cheshvan, 5706): Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan
1945(1st of Cheshvan, 5706): Seventy-six year old author, Felix Salten, born Siegmund Salzmann at Pest (what would be Budapest), best known as the creator of Bambi who fled the Nazis which meant spent the last years of his life in Switzerland and who in 1901 married Ottilie Metzl with whom he had two children – Paul and Anna -- passed away today.
1945: As part of the protest against British treatment of the Jews in Palestine and those trying to reach Palestine Rabbis throughout Palestine are scheduled to add Psalm XX which beings “Let the King hear us when we call” to the daily prayer service.
1945: As part of the protest against British policy in Palestine, 50,000 Jews attended a rally in Tel Aviv and tens of thousands more attended a rally at Edison Hall in Jerusalem where they demanded an end to the White Paper.
1945: In an attempt to spare European Jewish refugees another winter in displaced person camps, Zionist leaders spent two and half hours with the new Colonial Secretary, Arthur Creech Jones, discussing ways to improve British-Jewish relations” in Palestine.
1945: In a sign of Jewish frustration with the continued British enforcement of the White Paper, the Stern Gang reportedly resorted to a new wave of violence tonight with attacks that resulted in the death of two British soldiers and the wounding of scores of others.
1945: “The Seventh Veil” a melodrama with a score by Benjamin Frankel was released today in the UK.
1946(15th of Tishrei, 5710): Shabbat and Sukkoth
1948(5th of Tishrei, 5709): Eighty-seven year old New York native and CCNY grad Albert Ulmann, an author and member of the New York Stock Exchange passed away today.
1948: In Egypt, “the issuance of export and import licenses to Jewish merchants was forbidden,.”
1948: A group of settlers from Hungary founded Kibbutz Ga’aton in the hill country east of Nahariya. According to some it is named for the Ga’aton River which flows nearby. According to others, it is named for a town thought to have existed in the area before the Babylonian exile. Regardless, the kibbutz fell under immediate attack from Arabs shooting from the surrounding hills.
1949: The curtain came down temporarily on “Lend an Ear” a musical revue featuring sketches by Joseph Stein ending its run at the Broadhurst Theatre so it could move to the Schubert Theatre.
1950: The Third Maccabiah, the first one to be held in the state of Israel, came to an end today.
1951: “The third government of Israel was formed by David Ben-Gurion.
1952(19th of Tishrei, 5713): Fifth Day of Sukkoth
1952: “The Four Poster” the film version of the play produced by Stanley Kramer, directed by Irving Reis with music by Dimitri Tiomkin and co-starring Lili Palmer was released today in the United States.
1952: In Chicago, Ruth Ellen (née Reich) and Allen Zwick gave birth to Harvard graduate and director/screenwriter/producer Edward Zwick who directed such gems as Glory and Legends of the Fall but shared in the Oscar for the fluffy “Shakespeare in Love.”
1952: The Jerusalem Post reported that Dov Shilansky, Gavriel Lichtman, a taxi driver, and Ya'acov Lotan, a regular contributor to the Herut newspaper, were remanded by police in connection with the attempt to sabotage the Israel-German reparations agreement by bombing one of the Foreign Ministry buildings in Jerusalem's Hakirya.
1953(29thof Tishrei, 5714): Seventy-nine year old Junction City, Kansas native Saul Henry Ganz, the “president and Treasurer of D. Lisner and Company, wholesalers and importers of jewelry,” the husband of Ruth Ganza and the father of Paul and Victor Ganz passed away today.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1953/10/10/110067724.pdf
1953: ABC broadcast the first episode of “Where’s Raymond” a sitcom produced by Stanley Shapiro.
1956: In Game 5 of the 1956, Don Larsen of the New York Yankees pitched the fall classics first perfect game while playing against the Brooklyn Dodgers which meant that a lot of Jews were either sad or happy since each of these team had a disproportionally large Jewish fan base. (Editor’s note – Although living in Washington I was an ardent Dodger fan while my older sister and younger brother rooted for the Bronx Bombers)
1956: Today sports broadcaster Bob Wolff provided the radio play by play of Game 5 of the 1956 World Series in which Yankee Don Larsen pitched a perfect game against the Brooklyn Dodgers.
1959: LA Dodgers beat Chicago White Sox, 4 games to 2 in 56th World Series. The Dodgers team featured two Jewish players who were brothers – the pitcher Larry Sherry and the catcher Norm Sherry. Larry Sherry was a rookie who appeared as a relief pitcher in all four of the Dodgers’ victories.
1961: “Actors Joyce and Byrne Piven gave birth to movie director Shira Piven, the sister of actor Jeremey Piven.
1962(10th of Tishrei, 5723): Yom Kippur
1964(2nd of Cheshvan, 5725): Seventy-one year old Viennese born film producer Isadore Goldsmith who continued his career in Great Britain after the Nazis came to power and was the husband of novelist Vera Caspary passed away today in Putney, VT.
1964: “Outrage,” a western film directed by Martin Ritt, with a script by Michael Kanin and starring Paul Newman, Laurence Harvey, Edward G. Robinson, William Shatner and Howard Da Silva (so many Jews) was released today in the United States by MGM.
1966: Birthdate of Memphis native David Frank Kustoff, the University of Memphis alum and Republican political leader who served as a United States Attorney before taking office as “the member of the United States House of Representatives for Tennessee’s 8th congressional district” in 2017 and is the husband of fellow attorney Roberta Kustoff with whom he “has two children.
1966(24th of Tishrei, 5727): One day after Simchat Torah, the cycle begins again – Parashat Bereshit
1966(24th of Tishrei, 5727): Seventy-eight year old Ukrainian born cellist and composer Gdal Saleski passed away today in Los Angeles.
1967: Joseph Brodsky, a victim of anti-Semitism who was expelled from the Soviet Union in 1972 and won the Nobel Prize for leadership and painter Marina Basmanova gave birth to their son Andrei whom Brodsky registered under Marina’s name to spare him attacks by the authorities.
1969: “The Monitors” a sci-fi comedy starring Avery Schreiber and Larry Storch and featuring Adam Arkin, Alan Arkin and Stubby Kaye was released in the United States today.
1969(27th of Tishrei, 5730): Sixty-seven year old Dr. Joseph Quincy Jonas, the New York born son of Goldie and John J. Jonas the husband of Irene Jonas passed away today.
1973: During the Yom Kippur War, two Israeli attempts to reach the east bank of the Suez were beaten back by Egyptian soldiers equipped with Soviet supplied anti-tank weapons. IDF forces facing Syria were more successful. Although outnumbered, the IDF forces halted the advance of the Syrians into Israel and by the end of the day have driven them back to the 1967 Armistice Lines and beyond.
1973: During the Yom Kippur War, Gabi Amir's armored brigade attacks Egyptian occupied positions on the Israeli side of the Suez Canal, in hope of driving them away. The attack fails, and over 150 Israeli tanks are destroyed.
1973: Buoyed by initial Egyptian and Syrian military success, numerous Moslem and Arab states offered aid and support to the aggressors. The Algerians sent squadrons of planes. The King of Morocco called on soldiers in his army to volunteer to fight with the Egyptians. Idi Amin ordered all Ugandan officers in Egypt to join in the fight. And the Prime Minister of Bangladesh sent telegrams stating the his 75 million countrymen supported the Egyptians and the Syrians “in your just cause”
1973: Israelis were alarmed by news from the front, which was fragmentary and not good. Their fears were heightened when a civil defense spokesperson urged Israelis who did not have a shelter to start digging one and that those who had small shelter should enlarge them. The only good news was Australian volunteers were arriving to perform the work of civilians who had been mobilized and that American Jews had already raised $100 million for the Israeli war effort.
1973: After touring both battle fronts, Maj. Gen. Haim Bar-Lev and Minister Yigal Allon reported to Prime Minister Meir this evening that the Israeli forces' situation is beginning to improve, while the enemy forces are beginning to suffer serious damage."What they achieved today as compared to yesterday is enormous," Allon said. "The front was breached yesterday. If the Syrians had been more daring, they'd have made significant gains."Bar-Lev explained the Egyptian and Syrian successes as being partly due to technological superiority. "Both have the new Soviet tank plus infrared," he said. "They have an advantage there. On the first night we were surprised; we only knew they had it in theory ... Today we know about it and take it into account."
1973: The 17th Battalion of the Golani Brigade moved up the slopes of Mt. Hermon in the opening round of the Second Battle of Mount Hermon.
1973:Tonight, the Israeli missile boats repeated their success of last night off the Egyptian coast, with three Egyptian missile boats sunk and no Israeli vessel hit. For the remainder of the war, neither the Syrian nor Egyptian fleets would venture out again, enabling more than 100 freighters carrying vital supplies to safely reach Israel, which was in the throes of a brutal, two-front ground war.
1973: Kobi Hayun, Micahel Dvir, Shabtai Ben-Shua, Yoram Peled and Boaz Lerner all made it safely back to Israeli lines when their F-4E Phantom Jets were shot down Syrian SAM’s or Egyptian Anti- Aircraft fire.
1973: Yoram Shachar was taken prisoner after his F-4E Phantom Jet was shot down by a Syrian Surface to Air Missile.
1973: As the Vale of Tears Battle entered its third day the outmanned and outgunned 7thBrigade fought off attacks by the 7th Infantry Division, the 3rdArmored Division and the Assad Republican Guards which by the end of the day left the Israelis with at least fifty dead, untold more wounded and less than 45 working tanks but the IDF continued to blunt the Syrian advance.
1974: NBC broadcast “Where Have All the People Gone?” a sci-fi thriller written by Sandor Stern and co-starring Verna Bloom.
1975: “Hearts of the West” a comedy directed by Howard Zieff and co-starring Alan Arkin was released in the United States today.
1976: Paramount releases “Marathon Man,” the movie version of the book by William Goldman starring Dustin Hoffman.
1977: White supremacist Joseph P. Franklin shot and killed three people outside of a suburban St. Louis synagogue including Gerald Gordon.
1978(7thof Tishrei, 5739): Seventy-six year old Eliyahu Sasson, the native of Damascus who made Aliyah in 1927 who filled several ambassadorial positions, served as an MK and cabinet minister passed away today.
1979: In a case of “poetic justice” “two Palestinian terrorists were injured attempting to plant a bomb near the Tomb of the Patriarchs.”
1980(28thof Tishrei, 5741): Seventy-three year old David I. Arkin, an innocent victim of the McCarthy Red witch hunt and the father of actor Alan Arkin whose most famous musical effort was the song “Black and White” which celebrated the 1954 Supreme Court Decision that put an end to the legal prop for racially segregated schools passed away today.
1981(10th of Tishrei, 5742): Yom Kippur
1981(10th of Tishrei, 5742): Heinz Kohut an Austrian-born American psychoanalyst best known for his development of Self psychology, an influential school of thought within psychodynamic/psychoanalytic theory which helped transform the modern practice of analytic and dynamic treatment approaches passed away.
1981 ABC broadcast the first episode of Taxi’s Fourth Season directed by James Burrows.
1983: “My Favorite Year,” a comedy directed by Richard Benjamin, produced by Michael Gruskoff and featuring Bill Macy, Lainie Kazan, Selma Diamond, Adolph Green and Lou Jacobi was released in the United States today.
1985(23rd of Tishrei, 5746): Simchat Torah
1985: Today, on the island of Djerba, a Tunisian police officer who had” allegedly “lost a brother” in the attack on the PLO headquarters at Hammam Chott, Tunisia, “fired into a synagogue during Simchat Torah services, killing three people
1985: “An English-language production of Les Misérables” which was a product of a collaboration of Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schönberg premiered in London at The Royal Shakespeare Company’s Barbican Theatre.
1985: The hijackers of the Achille Laurocruise liner surrendered after the ship arrived in Port Said, Egypt. Before surrendering, the hijackers threw Leon Klinghoffer, a wheel-chair bound passenger, over the side of the boat.
1986: The Providence Journal "Navy Rabbi To Join Iceland Team: Russian immigrant's grandson picked to lead staff services,” a story about the role of Rabbi Arnold E. Resnicoff, the U.S. Navy Chaplain sent to Iceland to lead services during the meetings laying the groundwork for the Reagan-Gorbachev Summit.
1987(15th of Tishrei, 5748): Sukkoth
1988: “Jamie Sue Gangel, a network television correspondent for NBC News, and Daniel Silva, a writer and producer for CNN, both in Washington, were married today at the Mayflower Hotel.”
1988: NBC broadcast the first episode of season four of Golden Girls, a sitcom starring Beatrice Arthur and Estelle Getty with theme music by Andrew Gold.
1988: NBC broadcast the first episode of the sitcom created by “Empty Nest” created by Susan Harris (née Spivak).
1990: Israelipolice kill 17 Palestinian rioters. The riots occurred at the Temple Mount and were part of the orchestrated violence against Israelis now known as the First Intifada. For those of you who like symmetry or have a sense of irony, the Second version of this organized terror would begin in the same place at the same time of the year when Arafat rejected Barak’s peace offer.
1991: Birthdate of singer and actor Kobi Marimi, the Mizrachi native of Ramat Gan who “studied in the Nissan Nativ Acting Studio” after serving in the IDF.
1992: Willy Brandt, former Chancellor of Germany, passed away. The winner of the Nobel Peace Prize had opposed the Nazis when he was a youth living in Germany. In 1970, Brandt made a highly emotional visit to Warsaw where he fell to his knees in front of the Memorial to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. This silent act of contrition spoke volumes to the world about the new Germany and the willingness take responsibility for its past. In writing about the trip Brandt said, “An unusual burden accompanied me on my way to Warsaw. Nowhere else had a people suffered as in Poland. The machine-like annihilation of Polish Jewry represented a heightening of bloodthirstiness that no one had held possible. On my way to Warsaw [I carried with me] the memory of the fight to the death of the Warsaw ghetto.” As moving as these words were then, they are even more so now as another generation of leaders has risen filled with inclination to minimize their personal pasts and the Jewish element that made the Holocaust unique.
1993: Edward Rothstein gives a less than an enthusiastic review of Ezra Laderman’s “Marilyn” which was “a City Opera commission” that “opened a world-premiere festival in honor of the company’s 50th anniversary.”
1993: Seventy-five year old Robert Constant Moses, a native of Phillip, SD, a graduate of Beloit High School who was a WW II veteran, a draftsman at Barber Coleman and the father of Nancy Margulis, who became a pillar of the Cedar Rapids Jewish community, was laid to rest today at the Mt. Tabor Cemetery.
1993: “Mr. Jones,” a romantic drama written by Eric Roth was released in the United States today by TriStar Pictures.
1993: “Gettysburg” a massive Civil War epic co-produced by Robert Katz, featuring John Rothman and with a memorable score by Randy Edelman was released today in the United States.
1994: In a letter written today to Sir Martin Gilbert, fourteen and half year old Hirsch Dorbian wrote that he had been “among the thousands of prisoners liberated by the British in the camp at Neustadt earlier that month and that on VE Day, May 8, 1945, “was spent by him in a clean and white bed for the first time three years.
1997(7th of Tishrei, 5758): American architect Bertrand Goldberg best known for the Marina City complex in Chicago, Illinois, the tallest residential concrete buildings in the world at the time of completion passed away.
1999: “The Last Day” an Oscar winning documentary that ‘tell the story of five Hungarian Jews during the Holocaust” was released today in the United Kingdom.
2000(9th of Tishrei, 5671): Erev Yom Kippur
2000:The Sunday New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or on topics related to Judaism including Quarrel & Quandry: Essays by Cynthia Ozick,Einstein In Love: A Scientific Romance by Dennis Overbye, Dream Catcher: A Memoir by Margaret A. Salinger and The Second Coming of Steve Jobs by Alan Deutschman
2000: In “Flash Point: Temple Mount is Holy Ground; Muslims Must Recognize Shrine’s Importance to Judaism” published today Aron U Raskas of the Baltimore Sun wrote “Ten days ago, former defense minister had the good fortune to be able to do that which Jews dispersed for centuries in the diaspora could only hope, dream and pray for: On the eve of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year - the liturgy of which is replete with recollections of [Abraham]'s selfless act on the Temple Mount and with prayers for a restoration of the divine presence to this site - Sharon dared to peacefully tread upon this hallowed Jewish ground. The second lesson is that, even after seven years of delusional thinking by Pollyannaish Israelis, the Palestinian people and their leaders are completely unwilling to recognize the Jewish legacy of the Temple Mount, the historic connection of Jews to that place and their inalienable right to worship on that holy ground.”
2001: Forbes published an article entitled “Riklis Driving” that described how Meshulam Riklis drained assets from Dylex Limited, one of Canada’s largest retailers and funneled them into other companies he controlled.
2001(21st of Tishrei, 5762): Hoshana Rabah
2001(21st of Tishrei, 5762): Isidore A. Becker, the husband of Adele Becker, who was an active member of the UJA Federation of New York and the Fifth Avenue Synagogue, passed away today.
2002: “Fighting between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas increased fears of a civil war” between the Arab factions.
2004(23rd of Tishrei, 5765): Simchat Torah
2004: Haaretz reported that at least thirty-five people were killed and over 100 injured in three separate attacks on holiday resorts in the Sinai Desert that were packed with Israelis celebrating the holiday of Sukkoth.
2004: Fiamma Nirenstein was an official speaker at the Boston Conference of on 'Anti-Semitism, the Press and Europe'.
2004: “Friday Night Lights” the movie version of Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream by H. G. Bissinger, ,directed by Peter Berg who wrote the screenplay along with David Aaron Cohen and produced by Brian Grazer was released in the United States today.
2005(5th of Tishrei, 5766): Shabbat Shauvah is observed by Jews all over the world.
2005: Award winning singer-songwriter, musician, poet, and novelist Leonard Cohen sued Kelley Lynch, alleging that she had misappropriated over US $5 million from Cohen's retirement fund leaving only $150,000.”
2005: Hundreds of Jews lit candles and prayed near the Babi Yar ravine, where the Nazis killed tens of thousands of Ukrainian Jews during World War II, as Jewish leaders expressed concern over recent anti-Semitic acts in the former Soviet republic.
2005: Jonathan Mandell of Chicago took a photograph of a Hebrew inscription in the Cathedral of Monreale which is a testimony to the 1400 years of Jewish settlements in Sicily.
2005: Thanks to Katrina, Rita, OPEC, et al, Americans are confronted with paying record high prices of gasoline and natural gas. Now, American Jews face an additional financial threat. According to The Jerusalem Post, people will be paying record high prices for their lulavs this year. Following Egyptian moves to limit the export of Lulavs, one Israeli importer has “cornered the market” by surreptitiously importing 250,000 Lulavs. Because of his almost complete control of the limited supply, Avi Belali is charging wholesalers five dollars for an item that usually costs one dollar. Retailers claim they will have to charge as much as twenty dollars to break even and that does not include the cost of the Etrog. Unbeknownst to most Americans, the lulav industry is “a pretty shady business” where various tricks are tried each year by dealers looking for a way to make a fast buck. Some Israeli Rabbis are so concerned about profiteering that they have issued a special Halachahic dispensation allowing for the use of branches from the more numerous canary dates may be used for Lulavs. Apparently, the sages don’t just know about the Law of Moses, they also know about the law of supply and demand.
2006(16thof Tishrei, 5767): Second Day of Sukkoth
2006: The Washington Post featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Primo Levi’s Auschwitz Report andDaniel Mendelsohn’s The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million and an essay written by Elie Wiesel under the title “Why Memory?”
2006: The Sunday New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or on topics related to Judaism including The Shakespeare Wars: Clashing Scholars, Public Fiascoes, Palace Coupsby Ron Rosenbaum and Five Germanys I Have Known by Fritz Stern.
2006: The Israeli Interior Ministry ruled that Valery Dubinin, who had made Aliyah from the Ukraine seven and half years ago, is not a Jew. This case is newsworthy because the Interior Ministry was overruling the Petah Tikva Rabbinical Court which had provided documents attesting to his Jewishness.
2006(16th of Tishrei, 5767): Second Day Sukkoth; since the first of Sukkoth fell on Shabbat this is the first time, blessings are recited over the Lulav and Etrog.
2006: Services will be held today at the Society for the Advancement of Judaism to honor the memory of Selma Judith Levy Toback.
2007:Shelley Cohn, the former Executive Director of the Arizona Commission on the Arts, is the recipient of the Actor Equity Association’s 2007 Arizona Theatre Service Award. The award was presented to Ms. Cohn at the Union's membership meeting at the Phoenix Theatre
2007: Time Magazine features an article about Jerry Seinfeld entitled “Jerry Seinfeld Goes Back to Work” and reviews of The Coldest Winter by David Halberstam and Exit Ghosts by Phillip Roth.
2008(9th of Tishrei, 5769: Erev Yom Kippur; Kol Nidre is chanted.
2008:A riot in Acre shattered the Yom Kippur calm on Wednesday night as hundreds of the city's Arab residents vandalized Jewish-owned property.
2009: In New Haven, Yale University presents a double-header with an address byTzipi Livni, former Foreign Minister, Member of Knesset and head of the Kadima party, will speak as a Chubb Fellow and a talk by Brandon Friedman, Research Fellow at the Center for Iranian Studies at Tel Aviv University, entitled "Iran: Ideology and Foreign Policy"
2009: In New Britain, CT,Ethan Bronner, the New York Times' Israel Bureau Chief delivers a talk entitled "Israel & Palestine: What Happens in 2009?" at Central Connecticut State University, during which he examines what has happened, and what to expect.
2009:As tensions flare once again over a Jerusalem holy site claimed by Israel and Palestinians as their own, one of the most influential leaders of Israel's religious community told the president today that Jews should not make pilgrimages to the Temple Mount so as not to evoke global outrage. "According to halacha (Jewish religious law), it is forbidden to ascend to Temple Mount," Rabbi Yosef Sholom Elyashiv is quoted by Israel Radio as telling President Shimon Peres.
2009:Romania unveiled a monument in memory of 300,000 Jews and Gypsies killed during the Holocaust in the country, which at times in the past had denied that the extermination even occurred.
2009: In San Francisco, “Torah scribe Julie Seltzer began work on a Sefer Torah.”
http://jwa.org/thisweek/oct/08/2009/julie-seltzer
2010(30th of Tishrei, 5771): Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan
2010(30th of Tishrei, 5771): Eighty-two Chicago born, Yale educated James Emanuel “Jim” Fuchs the winner of bronze medals in shot put at the 1948 and 1952 Summer Olympics passed away today in New York.
https://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/18/sports/18fuchs.html
2010:The 92Y Resource Center for Jewish Diversity and the Ethiopian Jewish community in New York are scheduled to co-host a festive and authentic Ethiopian Shabbat dinner. The scheduled feast will include traditional Ethiopian dishes such as Doro Wat (chicken stew), Injera (pancake bread) and much more. Diners will be able learn about Ethiopian Jewish history and traditions from Prof. Ephraim Isaac of the Institute for Semitic Studies, Princeton, N.J. The evening is scheduled to include special guests from Israel, Kessotch (Ethiopian rabbis) Pirdo Imhara and Vanda Eli Mentesenout and members of the renowned Ethiopian-Israeli Beta Dance Troupe.
2010: The Telegraph (UK) reported that Professor Mary Beard of Cambridge University has condemned the appointment of historian and presenter Simon Schama as the Coalition Government's new history tsar. She described the announcement as an example of Michael Gove, the education secretary, "playing to the populist gallery". She described Schama as “a celebrity.” She did not mention the fact that he was Jewish.
2011(10th of Tishrei, 5772): Yom Kippur
2011(10th of Tishrei): In a tribute to diversity and inclusion, congregants at Temple Judah in Cedar Rapids will be able to attend either a Reform or Traditional Yom Kippur Service. The Traditional Service is rooted in Beth Jacob - a synagogue founded 105 years ago. Temple Judah is preparing to celebrate its 90th anniversary. When one considers the fate of Jewry in many of America’s small cities and towns, this is quite an accomplishment.
2011: Kenny G. (Kenneth Bruce Gorelick) appeared tonight on “Saturday Night Live with his soprano sax.”
2011(10th of Tishrei, 5772): Eighty-two year old Allen “Al” Davis who played a major role in re-shaping the National Football League as the owner and general manager of the Oakland Raiders and as the commissioner of the AFL passed away today.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/09/sports/football/al-davis-was-a-maverick-until-his-death.html?_r=2&scp=1&sq=Amy%20Trask&st=cse
http://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-al-davis-20111009-story.html
2011:Hours after far-right-wing graffiti was reported to police in Muslim and Christian cemeteries in Jaffa, a Molotov cocktail was thrown at a synagogue in the area today. The projectile struck the roof of the Rabbi Meir synagogue in the city. No damage or injuries were reported in the attack. Earlier tonight, police said that far-right-wing graffiti was found spray painted in Muslim and Christian cemeteries in Jaffa, but later said they were not convinced the graffiti was actually spray-painted by right-wing extremists.The messages "price tag" and "death to Arabs" were written on the tombstones. However, police later reported that the slogan "death to Russians - G.A. 02" was also spray painted in the cemetery, adding that this graffiti was "linked to a soccer group."
2012(22nd of Tishrei, 5753): Shemini Atzeret
2012(22nd of Tishrei, 5763): One hundred year old Eda Mirsky Mann, the mother of Erica Jong passed away today.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/erica-jongs-mother-eda-mirsky-mann-dead-at-100/
2012: In the United States, observance of Columbus Day which means, for once, the Jewish and Gentile worlds will be celebrating holidays on the same day, even though they are of a completely different nature.
2012: The Alexandria Kletztet is scheduled to play at the Simchat Torah service for Congregation Etz Hayim in Arlington, VA.
2012:Palestinian terrorists in the Gaza Strip fired more than 30 rockets and mortars — with some Israeli media outlets reporting over 50 rockets — into southern Israel early this morning, causing damage to a residential building
http://www.timesofisrael.com/palestinians-fire-barrage-of-mortars-into-southern-israel/
2013: The Charles E. Smith Life Communities which seeks “to fulfill Jewish values by providing a continuum of quality services for elders and their families” is scheduled to sponsor “An Evening with Tony Kornheiser” at Woodmont Country Club.
2013: Under the leadership of Ed Miliband, Labor MP Luciana Berger began serving as “Shadow Minister for Public Health” today.
2013: The Consulate General of Israel in New York co-hosts this evening’s scheduled screening of “Blues by the beach.”
http://bluesbythebeachfilm.com/
2013: A staged reading of the new play “Stealing Home: The Mystery of Moe Berg” is scheduled to be performed today by member of the Actors Studio in New York.
2013: Howard Epstein completed his service as a member of the Nova Scotia House of Assembly “representing the provincial riding of Halifax Chedbucto.”
2013: In Washington, DC, Mark Cohen, author of Overweight Sensation: The Life and Comedy of Allen Sherman is scheduled to speak at The Hyman S. & Freda Bernstein Jewish Literary Festival
2013: Today, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences “announced the full list of nations that had submitted a movie for consideration for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film including “Yuval Adler’s “Bethlehem,” which explores a difficult relationship between a Shin Bet agent and a Palestinian teenager and “Transit,” a Philippine film about foreign workers in Israel. (As reported by Debra Kamin)
2013: Eighty-year old Holocaust survivor François Englert, a Sackler Professor by Special Appointment in the School of Physics and Astronomy at Tel Aviv University won the 2013 Nobel Prize
2014(14th of Tishrei, 5775): Erev Sukkoth
2014: The Center for Judaic Studies and Contemporary Jewish Life at the University of Connecticut is scheduled to sponsor a noontime “Yiddish Tish”.
2014: Friends and family celebrate the birthday of author Noam Friedlander the daughter of Evelyn Friedlander and Rabbi Albert Friedlander
2014:SukkahPDX, an annual juried outdoor design competition held in Portland, OR, at the Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust Education in partnership with Mittleman Jewish Community Center is scheduled to begin today.
2014: The Lunar Eclipse featuring a Blood Moon will be visible throughout much of the United States today. (As reported by Edmond J. Rodman)
http://www.timesofisrael.com/sukkot-lunar-eclipse-is-an-omen-some-say/
2014:“Argentinian anti-terror police today arrested a man suspected of planning to attack a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires.”
2015: The Jewish Museum of London is scheduled to host “Books at Lunchtime” where a Waterstones Camden bookseller “will share what's new, what's hot, and read extracts from recommended books and bestsellers.
2015: The Oxford University Jewish Society is scheduled to host “Fresh Jews and Fresh Juice.”
2015: JCC Manhattan is scheduled to host an evening with “Vertigo, Israel’s top dance company” where “choreographer Noa Wertheim will talk about her artistic process, including the creation of the group's eco art village outside of Jerusalem.”
2015: Eva Moskowitz will not be running for Mayor of New York saying today “that she wanted to redouble her focus on her charter school network…and the task of creating ‘transformation change’ in education.”
2015: During an interview with Wolf Blitzer on CNN, “Republican presidential hopeful Ben Carson…said fewer people would have been killed by the Nazis had been armed” in an apparent attempt to blame “gun control for the extent of the Holocaust.”
2015: “Junun” a film that “dcouments the making of the album of the same name by the Israeli composer Shye Ben” was released today at the New York Film Festival
2015: The Center for Jewish History is scheduled to host “A Special Evening Commemorating the 30th Anniversary of the Murder of Leon Klinghoffer Aboard the Achille Lauro.”
2015(25thof Tishrei, 5776): Ninety year old Henry Krystal who survived the Holocaust to become a Professor of Psychiatry at Michigan State University passed away today.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/15/science/henry-krystal-holocaust-trauma-expert-dies-at-90.html?hpw&rref=obituaries&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=well-region®ion=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well&_r=0
2016(6thof Tishrei, 5777): Shabbat Shuva
2016(6thof Tishrei, 5777): Eighty-six year old “Emmy Award-winning documentarian” Morton Silverstein passed away today.
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/12/arts/television/morton-silverstein-dead.html?hpw&rref=obituaries&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=well-region®ion=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well&_r=0
2016(6thof Tishrei, 5777): Ninety-six year old Peter Allen, who introduced the Saturday afternoon broadcasts from the Met passed away today.
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/10/arts/music/peter-allen-a-voice-on-the-radio-for-the-met-opera-dies-at-96.html?hpw&rref=obituaries&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=well-region®ion=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well&_r=0
2016(6thof Tishrei, 5777): Eight-four year old Professor Jacob Neusner, the prolific and ground-breaking Biblical scholar passed away today in Rhinebeck, NY.
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/11/us/jacob-neusner-judaic-scholar-who-forged-interfaith-bonds-dies-at-84.html?_r=1
http://www.timesofisrael.com/jacob-neusner-renowned-jewish-scholar-dies-at-84/
2016: SERET DC. “a celebration of contemporary Israeli cinema is scheduled to host a screening of
“Abulele.”
2016: Today’s session of “German Iowa and the Global Midwest” is scheduled to present: Tobias Brinkmann speaking on "Small Town Stopover: Jewish Immigrants from Central Europe in the Rural Midwest 1850-80"; Kit Belgum: speaking on “German and Jewish: Civic Connections in Nineteenth-Century Iowa" and Jeannette Gabriel speaking on "We Were German Too: Finding Jewish Women's Voices in Iowa's German Past"
2016: “Exposed” a “six week contemporary dance and physical theatre featuring Israeli and local artists” is scheduled to open in the Metro Atlanta, GA Area today.
2016: “Keeping Up with the Jones,” a spy-spoof featuring Gal Gadot premiered in Los Angeles today.
2016: The 15th International Henryk Wieniawski Violin Competition, named in honor of Lublin born violinist and composer Henryk Wieniawski is scheduled to begin today.
2016: As those living on the southeast coast of the United States deal with Hurricane Mathew “many synagogues are shuttering for Shabbat” including “Temple Emanuel located on the barrier islands of Palm Beach which has cancelled Shabbat morning services.”
2017: The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including The Rise and Fall of Adam and Eve by Stephen Greenblatt and the recently published paperback edition of The Gustav Sonata by Rose Tremain.
2017(18th of Tishrei, 5778): Sukkoth Chol Ha’moed
2017: Edith Schumer, a native of Stockstadt, Germany, who “was one of the “1,000 children,” a group of approximately 1,400 German Jewish children who were allowed to come unaccompanied to the United States via an organized rescue effort that occurred nine months prior to the start of World War II” is scheduled to speak at the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center.
2017: Author and architectural historian Clare Lise Kelly is scheduled conduct a tour that will explore the Montgomery County work of Cohen, Haft & Associates, a leading modernist architecture firm in the D.C. area whose projects have included several Jewish-owned buildings, such as B'nai Israel Congregation and the Charles E. Smith Life Communities campus
2018: Yemen Blues and Lara Bello are scheduled to perform this evening at the American Sephardi Music Festival at the Center for Jewish History.
2018: In Jerusalem, Mercaz Hatarbuyot is scheduled to host an evening Klezmer, Jazz and Classical Music featuring “virtuoso clarinetist Ira Goyfeld” and “concert pianist Eliah Zabaly,” the winner of the “1st Prize of the Paris National Conservatory of Music.”
2018: Today is the deadline for submitting applications for a fellowship “at the Frankel Institute for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Michigan.”
http://yiddish-sources.com/news/fellowship-opportunity-yiddish-matters-frankel-institute-advanced-judaic-studies-university-mic
2019 (9th of Tishrei, 5780): Erev Yom Kippur; for more see http://downhomedavartorah.blogspot.com/
2019: “According to the regulations in force among Orthodox Jews, marriages may not be solemnized today because it is “the day preceding the Fast of Atonement.”
2019: The Wilderness Torah is scheduled to host the first of a “Two-day Yom Kippur Retreat” beginning with a trip to the mikveh and a pre-fast meal.