August 16
1027: The King of Georgia, Giorgi I, passed away. Jews were among the subjects of this monarch who ruled over a country situated in the Caucuses, on the eastern edge of the Black Sea. Leonti Mroveli, an eleventh century chronicler of Georgian history, offers various dates for the arrival of the Jews including the period after the destruction of the First Temple or after the destruction of the Second Temple. Other sources claim that the first Jews arrived during the time of Alexander the Great or during the Sixth Century of the Common Era when they were fleeing persecution of the Byzantines. No matter which source you choose to believe, The Jews were there when King George died and remain there to this day.
1097: Peter I married Bertha of Aragon in Huesca, marking the transfer of the Aragonese capital from Jaca.
1157: Ramiro the Monk died. Petronilla succeeded him as queen regnant of Aragon.
1284: A year before he began his reign as King of France, Philip IV, who expelled the Jews from his realm to avoid paying his debts began his reign as King of Navarre and Count of Champagne.
1419: Wenceslaus IV, the Emperor who failed to continue the Imperial protection of the Jews of Luxembourg which led to their expulsion in 1391 passed away today.
1458: Coronation of Ferdinand I of Naples, who provided a refuge for Jews expelled from Spain.
1486: Twenty men and five women were burned after being sentenced at an auto-de-fe in Toledo on the charge of Judaizing. Among them were Dr. Alonso Cota and many other notables of the town. They were marched through town being humiliated wearing the dreadful san benito, with their hands tied to their neck behind their backs.
1648(28thof Av, 5408): Rabbi Joshua Höschel ben Joseph passed away in Cracow. Born at Vilnius in 1578, he studied both the Kabbalah and the Talmud. He wrote Maginne Shelomoh and She'elot u-Teshubot Pene Yehoshua'
1532: John Frederick I began his reign as Elector of Saxony during which, four years later in August of 1536, in response to the teaching of Martin Luther “issued a mandate that prohibited Jews from inhabiting, engaging in business in, or passing through his realm.”
1599(25thof Av, 5359): Isaiah Menahem Ben Isaac passed away today while serving in the rabbinate in Cracow.
1664: Sixty-five year old Christian Hebrew language student and author Johannes Buxtorf the Younger who “employed Abraham Braunschweig to purchase Hebrew books for him and for many years corresponded with the scholarly Jacob Roman of Constantinople regarding the acquisition of Hebrew manuscripts and rare printed works” passed away today.
1648(28thof Av, 5408): Rabbi Joshua Höschel ben Joseph, a student of Rabbi Samuel ben Phoebus of Cracow and Rabbi Joshua Falk whose students included Rav Shabbatai HaKohen, passed away today.
1675: Ukrainian leader Bogdan Chemlnicki (with the blood of over 300,000 Jews on his hands) died.
1724: In London, Bavarian immigrants Yehezkel (Ezekiel) and Judah Hirsh gave birth to their son Aaron Hart. The family changed their name from Hirsh to its English version, Hart. Hart would go on to become a successful businessman and “is considered the father of Canadian Jewry.”
1755: Today, one of the son’s of Veitel Ephriam, the “Jeweler to the Prussian Court” who had successfully operated the Konigsberger mint, took charge of the mint in Cleves.
1772: In New York City, Joseph Abrahams and his wife gave birth to Abraham de Lyon Abrahams who reported lived in Savannah, GA from 1791 to 1795 but who should not be confused with Abraham de Lyon who settled in Savannah in 1733 when James Oglethorpe was founding the colony of Georgia.
1772: Israel Abbady was appointed Chazan in Barbados – a position he held until 1794 when he was replaced by David Sarfaty De Pien
1776(1stof Elul, 5536): Rosh Chodesh Elul; for the first time the shofar is sounded in the newly independent United States of America.
1799(15thof Av, 5559): Tu B’Av
1799: “The Prague Jew Pzřibram bought a house in the village of Hanichen (Hanychov) from Joseph Porsche but was ordered by Count of Clam-Gallasto sell it within a year to a gentile.”
1799: In Amsterdam, Rachel Cornelia Bernard and Abraham Levy gave birth to future Houston resident Lewis A. Levy, the husband of Mary A Levy whom he married at London in 1817.
1807: During the “Gunboat Wars” which helped lead to the “complete emancipation of the Danish Jews, the British began the bombardment of Copenhagen.
1807: Today, under the chairmanship of Samuel Marx, the Jewish community of Trier held a celebration in honor of Napoleon.
1817(4thof Elul, 5577): Parashat Shoftim
1817(4thof Elul, 5577): Benjamin Mendez Seixas, the Newport, RI born son of Isaac Mendez Seixas; who was a prominent merchant in Newport, Philadelphia, and New York, and was one of the founders of the New York Stock Exchange passed away today.
1834: In Amsterdam, Joseph Barend Stokvis, Jr., a Jewish physician and obstetrician and his wife gave birth to Barend Joseph Stokvis a physician and professor of physiology and pharmacology at the University of Amsterdam who was the husband Julia Elisabeth Wertheim and a leader of the Dutch Jewish community.
1837(15thof Av, 5597): Tu B’Av
1837: Birthdate of German native Joseph Cahn, the “husband of Miriam Cahn” and the father of Bertram, Army, Stella and Morton Cahn.
1840: During the Damascus Affair, in a move supporting the Jewish prisoners, the British led European powers issued a stern warning to the Egyptian Khedive that he should move his forces away from the Turkish frontier.
1842: In Canterbury, England, Fanny Nathan and Joel Abrahams gave birth to Fanny Abrahams.
1842: Birthdate of Jakob Rosanes, the native of Brody who gained fame as a mathematician and chess master.
1843(20th of Av, 5603): “Polish banker and philanthropist Jacob Epstein, the founder of the Jewish hospital at Warsaw whose service as an officer in the insurrectionist army during the Polish uprising did keep him from being apponted “banker of the treasury commission of the Kingdom of Poland” and named as a “hereditary honorary citizen” by Czar Nicholas I passed away today.
1845: In Bonnevoie, Luxembourg, Miriam Rose (Lévy) and Isaïe Lippman, the manager of the family glove-making business gave birth to Gabriel Lippman, French physicist who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1908.
https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1908/lippmann-bio.html
1845: In what might have been the first mention of potato blight in the British Isles, today Gardeners' Chronicle and Horticultural Gazette reported "a blight of unusual character" in the Isle of Wight the home of the Isle of Wight Jewish Society
1847: A day after she had passed away, 71year old Grace (nee Da Costa) Cohen, the widow of Judah Cohen was buried today in the Brady Street Jewish Cemetery.
1848: William Flatau married Rebecca Meseena today.
1849: Birthdate of Sibylle Riqueti de Mirabeau, the French anti-Semite and “anti-Dreyfusard” who wrote under the pseudonym of GYP. While testifying in a court case she “gave her profession as ‘anti-Semite’ rather than ‘writer.’”
1851: In Buffalo, VA, Robert and Anna Harvey gave birth to William Hope "Coin" Harvey the populist leader who wrote the anti-Semitic Tale of Two Nations, “the story of a wealthy London banker, Baron Rothe, who engineers a plot to keep the United States from ever using a silver as currency.”
1852: In reporting on the clash between Sir Robert Peel and Benjamin Disraeli over the issue of Free Trade "Items of Foreign News" column published today quotes the following disparaging remarks that appeared in The Morning Chronicle. "When Mr. Disraeli attempts to trade on the policy of Sir Robert Peel, it will be difficult to refrain from challenging him in the words of the Hebrew prophet, 'Hast thou killed and also taken possession.'" [Editor's Note: the quote is from 1 Kings 21:19]
1855: Birthdate of Russian born chemist Harry Mann Gordin, the holder of a Ph.D. from the University of Berne who served on the faculty of Northwestern in Evanston, Illinois.
1858: In Konigsberg, Prussia, Michaelis Spicker and Flora Rosenthal gave birth to Max Spicker the pianists and conductor who came to the United States in 1883 where he eventually became the “Musical Director at Temple Emanu-El in New York City.
1859(16thof Av, 5619): Loeb Bendel, the son of Henry and Mary Anker Bendel passed away today after which he was buried in Beth Emeth Cemetery in Loudonville, NY.
1859: In London, birthdate of “communal worker” Ernest Louis Franklin
1860: David Wemyss Jobson was found guilty of libeling the character of Sir James Furgurson in the London Central Criminal Court today. Among the many prominent witnesses to appear was Benjamin Disraeli. When asked by the Defendant “Are you a Jew now or not?” Mr. Disraeli repIied, “I am what I always was -- a Christian.” This is an interesting answer since Disraeli was actually born a Jew. Was he being disingenuous or was he taking poet license in writing his own biography.
1861: Jacob Miller, who would be killed at South Mountain in 1862 began serving in Company A of the 45th Regiment.
1862: The Chicago Tribune published a tribute to the Jews of Chicago.
1864: Two days after he had passed away, sixty-one year old John Levy, the son of David Levy and Hannah Solomons was buried today the “Brompton (Fulham Road) Jewish Cemetery.”
1868(28th of Av, 5628): Fifty-five year old Ruben Joseph Wunderbar the author who succeeded Max Lilienthal as principal the Jewish school at Riga passed away today in his hometown of Mitau.
1872: In the Ukraine, Phillip and Fishberg and Gittel Mauerman gave birth to Maurice Fishberg, who came to the United States in 1890 and earned his medical degree from New York University in 1895 after which he married Bertha Fishsberg with whom he had two children – Dr. Arthur Maurice Fishberg and Dr. Harriet Fishberg – and became “a professor of clinical medicine of the University and Bellevue Hospital Medical College.”
1873: Lipman “Lip” Pike, one of the first Jewish major league baseball players, “raced a fast trotting horse named Clarence in a 100-yard sprint at Baltimore's Newington Park, and won by four yards with a time of 10 seconds flat, earning $250 ($4,570 today).”
1873: It was reported today that the Governor of New York has offered a $500 reward for the apprehension of Emil Lowenstein who allegedly murder John Weston in Albany, NY. Mrs. Weston has already been arrested for her role in the killing. Lowenstein, a German Jewish barber’s assistant, is thought to be headed for an unnamed “Western city.”
1875(15thof Av, 5635): Tu B’AV
1875: It was reported today that of the 57,200 children attending primary schools in Algeria, 5,646 “are native Jews.’
1875: In Prague, Moritz Moses Piesen and Rosalia Piesen gave birth to Hugo Peisen the husband of Annie Piesen and treasurer of the Brooklyn Federation of Jewish Federation.
1875: It was reported today that 40 year old Joseph Samuels and 15 year old Sallie Mossheim were arrested in New Jersey. This tangled tale of two Jews includes a married man (Samuels) and the daughter of a successful businessman, who fell in love and ran off together. The case is complicated by the fact that Sallie’s father reported that $500 was missing from his safe and this same amount was found in his daughter’s possession.
1878: Birthdate of Adolph Lebovitz, the husband of Charlotte “Sadie” Lebovitz and broth of “Molly and Dora Lebovitz.”
1879: In Indianapolis, Indiana, Mark C and Rebecca Davis gave birth Indiana Law School trained attorney Lawrence Bowen Davis, a member of the law firm of Newberger, Simon and Davis and a member of the Indianapolis Hebrew Congregation who was the husband of Isabel Haas.
1880: Sir Saul Samuel completed his second term as a Member of the Legislative Council of New South Wales
1880: “Hebrew Poetry” published today provided a detailed review of The Historical Poetry of the Ancient Hebrews, a two volume work by Michael Heilprin.
1880: Based on information that originally appeared the Journal de St. Petersburg it was reported today that Jews account for 0.22 of the illegitimate births in the European portion of the Russian Empire
1881: In Washington, IN, Sigmund and Lena Sterberger Eckhouse gave birth to future New Jersey resident Elmer Louis Eckhouse who married Lillie Rothschild Eckhouse in 1905.
1881: It was reported today that Count Kutisoff, who is investigating the causes of the anti-Jewish riots met with a deputation of Jews from Kharkoff. The Jews told him that the causes were not just economic. The count said that the government was determined to stop the violence. He said that they needed “to regulate the abnormal conditions” in the Western provinces where “the Jews outnumber the Christians and monopolize trade.” (The Western provinces included the Pale of Settlement and it is inconceivable that the Russian leader did not know that there were so many Jews there because that is where the government had confined them)
1882(1stof Elul, 5642): Rosh Chodesh Elul
1882: It was reported today that the speech by Congressman Cox on the persecution of Russian Jews that appears in the Congressional Record was in fact never given since Congress had already adjourned. Cox had apparently taken advantage of the time honored practice of entering remarks in the Record that has gone into the 20th century.
1884: In Luxembourg City, “Berta (Durlacher), a housewife and Mortiz Gernsbacher, a wine maker” gave birth to Hugo Gernsbach, “an inventor, author, editor and publisher who has been called the father of modern science fiction.”
1885: Birthdate of Kiev native and New York City “merchant” Jacob Ravinovich.
1885: Beth Hamedresh Hagadol, an Orthodox congregation formed by Polish Jews 30 years ago, dedicated its new sanctuary on Norfolk Street this afternoon. Rabbi Abraham Ash, the spiritual leader of the congregation, was the driving force behind the project.
1885: The Associate Members’ Literary Society of the Young Men’s Hebrew Association held a Grant-Montefiore Memorial Meeting this evening in New York City. G.A. Ettinger delivered a speech in which compared both of these saying that although one was a man of war and the other a man of peace, “they were alike in one respect, that both labored for the emancipation of the human race.”
1886: Based on information that first appeared in the Warsaw Courier two Polish peasants have been sentenced to six months in prison after having been found of disinterring two Jewish corpses, cutting off their hands and then grinding them into “little morsels for…medicinal purposes.”
1886(15thof Av, 5646): Tu B’Av
1886: “Last of the Roman Ghetto” published today reported that within the next couple of weeks the Jew’s quarter of Rome, “a picturesque piece of antiquity” will disappear. The reporter of the Pall Mall Gazette (a British publication) described the ghetto as a place where “the Jews had made themselves…a sort of second fatherland” where they could observe “their habits and traditions…in a little town” they had all to themselves.
1887: Joseph Froehlich of Davenport, Iowa donated $4.00 to the Union of American Hebrew Congregations.
1887: The will of Jonas Heller which was filed for probate today gave $10,000 for the Home for Aged and Infirm Hebrews on the condition that the Directors erect a prominently placed tablet saying “In Memory of Jonas Heller, Trustee, from______ to ______ Bequeathed Ten Thousand Dollars.”
1888: It was reported today that Levi Davis, a prominent Jewish citizen living in New Brunswick, NJ, has filed a suit seeking $10,000 in damages from Charles Scheede “for ruining his daughter Jennie.” Schweede, who is a partner in the clothing firm of Schweede Brothers denied the charge.
1888: It was reported today that Siegfried Porter, a native of Bohemia who is now an American citizen, testified before Congressman Ford’s Immigration Committee that he was now able to earn seven or eight dollars a week as a cigar maker because of the influx of Russian and Polish Jews. According to the embittered witness the Jews were willing to work for four or five dollars a week and that they lived in such poor conditions that they were able to save three dollars of that.
1888: Birthdate of T.E. Lawrence, known to history as “Lawrence of Arabia.” In the popular mind, Lawrence is remembered as a driving force behind Arab nationalism. However, Lawrence was not anti-Zionist. In “The Changing East” he wrote of the way in which the Zionist settlers would help improve the economic and social condition of the Arab population. “In 1919 he drafted a letter for Emir Feisal for a meeting with Felix Frankfurter, a leader of American Zionists. In his letter Feisal wished ‘the Jews a hearty welcome home’ and asserted ‘our two movements complete one another.’ ‘There is room in Syria for both of us’ he concluded.”
1889: Birthdate of Maurice Copisarow, the Russian born Chemist who came to England in 1908 where he received his education and co-authored a paper with fellow chemist Chaim Weizmann.
1889: Birthdate of Chicago native and University of Michigan Law School graduate Sigmund David.
1890(30thof Av, 5650) Rosh Chodesh Elul
1890: Rabbi Gustave Gottheil is scheduled to deliver a sermon today entitled “Who Needs Converting?”
1890(30thof Av, 5650): On Shabbat, New York attorney Montague L. Marks passed away today.
1891: The funeral for Emilie J. Frank, the widow of Joseph Frank, is scheduled to be held at the home of her daughter Mrs. William Rosenberg at 40 West 95thStreet.
1891: As local merchants expressed their indignation over the high-pressure tactics of sales person working for the “Jewish Times” the publishers said that the agent had sent in the ads but that they “were not aware of his making false representations” to obtain them.
1891: “Russian Jew Question” published today described the impact the articles that George Kenan has written on this subject have had including Prime Minister Gladstone urging Continental to conduct “a full and fair” investigation of the issue.
1892: “Charges Against Edward Pollock” published today described events surrounding Meyer Reinherz’s an agent of the United Hebrew Charities, decision to file a complaint against Edward Pollock for allegedly attacking him while writing stories for Austro-Hungarian newspapers.”
1893: A circular was disturbed today setting forth the rights of the thousands of unemployed Jewish workers and the wrongs done to them and calling for a mass meeting tomorrow at the Walhalla Hall on Orchard Street.
1894(14thof Av, 5654): Just two days before her 74th birthday Elisa “Elka” Hirschfelder Bodenheimer, the daughter of Fradel and Jakob Hirsch Moses Hirschfelder and the wife of Hermann Bodenheimer with whom she had eight children passed away today in Germany
1895: In Massachusetts, the Worcester Hebrew Benevolent Society which had been founded in 1891 received its charge today.
1895: Birthdate of novelist Albert Cohen. A native of Greece, Cohen worked for various international organizations located in Switzerland. He became a Swiss citizen after World War I and based some of his fiction on experiences with the League of Nations. The Greek native, who was a Swiss citizen, wrote in French.
1896: In Lemberg, Austria, “Louis and Ethel (Schaumann) Salpeter gave birth to art dealer and art critic, Harry Salpeter, the husband of Betty Berkowitz.
https://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/harry-salpeter-papers-9052
1896: Birthdate of Buffalo native wood engraving artist Asa Cheffetz.
http://rogallery.com/Cheffetz_Asa/cheffetz-biography.html
https://www.nga.gov/collection/artist-info.3742.html
1896: “Heat and the Babes” published today described various steps being taken to beat the August heat including the decision of the Hebrew Institute to open a free roof garden on the top of its building.
1897: Birthdate of Sir Hersch Lauterpacht the Austro-Hungarian born British Jurist who served as a member of the United Nations Internal Law Commission and a Judge of the International Court of Justice.
1897: In Missouri, Russian born Joseph Lazarus Kranson and Caroline Kranson gave birth to Bernard J. Kranson today.
1898: Children are being removed from the Hebrew Orphan Asylum at 138thStreet and Amsterdam Avenue because of an epidemic of dysentery.
1898: “For Jewish Worshippers” published today described a letter J.E. Bloom, Assistant Adjutant General, Third Brigade, Second Division, Third Army Corps wrote to the President and Executive Committee of the Young Men’s Hebrew Association in New York suggesting that they raise funds to be used to “provide a large tent for holding religious services for Jewish soldiers” attending the re-union at the Chickamauga Battlefield this Fall.
1898: “Great Charity Enterprise” published today described plans for a fundraiser to be sponsored by the Young Men’s Hebrew Charity Association in Chicago. Half of the funds will go to Michael Reese Hospital and the other half will go to the United Hebrew Charities.
1899: It was reported today that “the leading Jews of Europe are” planning on holding a meeting “in Switzerland in order to form an international association for their defense against the crusade of the anti-Semites and to protect the Jews in France after the Dreyfus court-martial is ended.”
1899: The New York Federation of Zionists met at Cooper Union tonight. “They adopted resolutions against anti-Semitism and for the rejuvenation of Zion.”
1899: “Jews Aid The Dewey Home Fund” published today described the “considerable interest” that the Jews have shown in raising money to buy a home for the Hero of Manila Bay. “At least one-fourth of the names making up the list of contributors so far are Jews.”
1899: In South Africa, President Kruger “has issued a brochure supporting his proposal regarding the removal of religious disabilities” which would the discrimination against the Jews by the Protestant dominated government.
1899: Julius P. Witmark, J.W. Bratton, Sager Midgley, J. Leslie Gossing, J.J. Raffael, Miss Alic Magil, Smith O’Brien, Miss Grace L. Weir and Fred Rycroff proved the entertainment tonight at the Arverne Hotel Casino where a fund-raiser was held for the benefit of the Hebrew Infant Asylum.
1899(10th of Elul, 5659): Abraham Cohen Labatt, native of Charleston, SC who founded several Reform Congregations from South Carolina to Louisiana to California to Texas passed away in Galveston.
http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fla72
1900: The Fourth Zionist Congress comes to an end in London.
1901: “Items from Philadelphia” took note of the recent publication by Edward Stern and Company of A Rabbi’s Impressions of the Oberammergau Passion Play by Rabbi Joseph Krauskopf of Philadelphia.
1902: In Dvinks Latvia, Mendel and Sarah (Einhorn) Siegel.to philosopher, educator, founder of Aesthetic Realism Eli Siegel
https://aestheticrealism.org/about-us/eli-siegel-founder/
1902: Several thousand persons greeted Samuel Gompers, President of the American Federation of Labor, at Mountain Lake Park, Maryland where he delivered an address before the Chautauqua Assembly on "Labor and Capital -- the Workman's Side of the Story."
1903(23rdof Av, 5663): Seventy-one year old Moses Polock “a well-known and somewhat eccentric antiquarian bookseller” who was the maternal uncle of Abraham Simon Wolf Rosenbach as well as mentor passed away today.
1903: In Newark, NJ, The Young Ladies’ Zionist Society hosted an ice cream festival this evening at Foresters’ Hall where several “well-known Zionists” addressed the attendees.
1903: Herzl stopped in Vilna where a tremendous ovation is awaiting him. Old Reb Shleimele lifted his hands over Herzl and pronounces the Priestly Benediction. After one day of rest in Altaussee, Herzl left for Basle and the Sixth Congress.
1903: In Brooklyn, NY, “the annual ice cream festival of the Shosanath Zion was held” today “at the Arion Hall.”
1904: “Reports from the Governors of Radom and Syedlets, Russian Poland, which have been received by the Police Department of the Ministry of the Interior, state that the reports of Jewish massacres in the small Polish towns of Parchevo and Ostrovetz arose from affrays between the Jewish and Christian inhabitants, in which the Jews in both cases were the aggressors.”
1905(15thof Av, 5665): Tu B’Av1905(15th of Av, 5665): Seventy-six-year-old Yetta Hacks the Bavarian born daughter of Zidone Wald and Joseph Hacks and the wife of Louis Stix who she marred at Cincinnati in 1852 and with whom she had ten children, passed away today in Far Rockaway, NY
1905(15thof Av, 5665): Tu B’Av
1905: The “District Grand Lodge No 1 of the Independent Order of the Free Sons of Israel, the larger Jewish fraternal institution in the United States is scheduled to hold its annual picnic” today “at the Manhattan Casino.”
1906: A telegram sent today from Warsaw to the Jewish Chronical says “250 Jews were killed or wounded by the soldiery” and “in an orgy pf blood in the Jewish quarter” more than 300 “persons were clubbed or bayoneted…”
1906: In Philadelphia, “disturbances occurred between Jewish strikers and the non-Jewish workingmen” who had been hired to replace them.
1907: “Reminiscences of the Breslau Seminary: Leyser Lazarus” appeared today in “Jewish Comment.”
1908: Birthdate of Philadelphia, PA native Fannie Turnoff Belsky the wife of Abraham Belsky
1909: La Divorziata, the Italian version of Die geschiedene Frau (The Divorcée), “an operetta in three acts by Leo Fall with a libretto by Victor Léon” opened today “at the Teatro Lirico Internationale in Milan.”
1909 (29th Av): Rabbi Samuel “Shmuel” Salant Chief Ashkenazic Rabbi of Jerusalem, who was a leading Talmudist and a friend of Moses Montefiore passed away and was buried on the Mount of Olives.
1910: “Striking demonstrations by Nathan Straus of the efficacy of his method of saving babies lives” which included the drop in the death at Sandhausaen after Mr. Straus established an infant milk depot that began supplying pasteurized milk “aroused great interest at the German Imperial Health Office.
1911: Rabbis David de Sola Pool and H.Z. Masliansky and laymen Louis Lipsky and Reuben Brainin were among those who spoke at “a mass meeting at the Educational Alliance” marking the opening of the Tenth Congress of the Federation of American Zionists.
1912(3rdof Elul, 5672): Seventy year old Elias Landauer who with “his spouse, Bertha Bodenheimer Landauer, immigrated from Germany in 1866 settled in Harrisonburg, Louisiana where he operated a retail supply business for 22 years before coming to New Orleans and opening Landauer & Meyer, a wholesale hat store” passed away today.
1913: “Potash and Perlmutter” a British comedy “featuring the characters Abe Potash and Mawruss Perlmutter, who are business partners in the garment industry” opened today in New York at the George M. Cohan Theatre.
1913: In “Brest, a town called Brest-Litovsk, then part of the Russian Empire, but today Belarus” Zeev and Hassia Biegun” gave birth to Menachem Begin, Prime Minister of Israel and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. The life of Menachem Begin is too colorful and controversial to be covered in this brief guide. His life became one of many contradictions. Consider that this political heir to Jabotinsky, the man who waged violent war against the British in the last years of the Mandate was the man who signed the peace accord with Sadat.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/begin.html
http://www.biography.com/people/menachem-begin-37331
1914: As WW I expanded, the BEF (British Expeditionary Force) which would later include Dr. Michael Adler as the first Jewish chaplain to serve with the British Army overseas, landed in France today
1915: It was reported today that Louis D. Brandeis and Nathan Straus will address the upcoming national meeting of Jews to be held at Cooper Union.
1915: Among those who were reported today to have addressed the mass meeting aimed at raising money for Jews in the war zone were Dr. M.S. Margolies, President of the Union of Orthodox Rabbis of New York, Dr. Moses Hyamson the rabbi of Congregation Orach Cahim in New York and Rabbi Aaron Tietelbaum of Jerusalem.
1915: A lynch mob from Marietta, GA arrived at the prison in Milledgeville. After cutting the telephone wire emptying the gas from the prison’s automobiles and handcuffing the warden, they seized Leo Frank and drove away from the prison.
1916: Today, DePauw University graduate and University of Chicago trained attorney Benjamin Blumberg the son of Max and Theresa Blumberg who served as an officer realty and investment companies while being a member of Temple Israel and the Temple Israel Men’s Cub married Fannie Louise Burgheim,
1916: Neutral Romania continued its negotiations with the Entente Powers, as the Allies try to get her to declare war on the Central Powers – a move that could have profound effect on the suffering Jewish population of that eastern European nation.
1917: Two after she was killed in air raid along with her husband during WW I, Leah Cohen, the wife of John Cohen was buried at the Plashet Jewish Cemetery in London.
1917: Two days after he was killed in an air raid along with his wife, 54 year old John Cohen was buried at the Plashet Jewish Cemetery in London.
1917: The State Department instructed Ira Nelson Morris, the American Minister to Sweden “to forward $25,000 for the continuation of soup kitchens and relief of Jews in Turkey.”
1917: In the East New York section of Brooklyn Benjamin and Bertha Taubman gave birth to “Dorothy Taubman, who developed a method to help pianists strengthen their techniques and avoid repetitive strain injuries.” (As reported by Vivien Schweitzer)
1918(8th of Elul, 5678): Sixty-eight year old Dr. Adolf Rosenzweig, the rabbi at the New Synagogue (Neue Synagoge) in Oranienburger Straße, Berlin passed away today and was buried under a gravestone on which was written "The law of truth was in his mouth, and unrighteousness was not found in his lips" (Malachi 2:6).
1918: It was reported today Joseph Duveen, “a well-known member of the Anglo-Jewish Community” has offered to provide the funds for a National Gallery for modern foreign art that had been planned for by a committee chaired by Lord Curzon in 1915.
1919: “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion” is distributed in Germany and the United States.
1920(2ndof Elul, 5680): Adolf Kahn, the son of Jacob Kohn and Franziska Kahn and the husband of Elsie Kahn passed away today in Vienna.
1920: Morris Abrams, “who ran a successful company that produced machinery and factory tools” and the former Freda Sugarman gave birth to Dr. Herbert Leroy Abrams “a radiologist at Stanford and Harvard universities and a founder of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, which won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985 for its work in publicizing the health consequences of atomic warfare.” (As reported by William Grimes)
1921: In London, The Times published the first in a series of articles by it “Constantinople Correspondent” that “incontrovertibly demonstrated that ‘The Protocols’ consist in the main of ‘clumsy plagiarisms’ from a French political pamphlet directed against Napoleon III and published in Brussels in 1865 by a French Lawyer named Maurice Joly and entitled ‘Dialogues in Hell between Machiavelli and Montesquieu.’”
1921: Rabbi Joseph Hertz, who had been the Chief Rabbi of the United Kingdom from 1913 completed his tour of Canada today after giving a final lecture on the Bible in St. John, New Brunswick.
1922: Birthdate of Herbert Vogel, the New York born postal clerk, who, along with his wife, became “fabled art collectors. (As reported by Douglas Marin)
1922: “Theatrical release of ‘Up and at ‘Em’” a silent film which “marks the first Hollywood screenplay” by Lewis Mileston.”
1923: Rabbi Meir Shapiro “introduced his idea” of “a daily regimen” of studying the Babylonian Talmud “one day at a time in a cycle of seven and a half years” “at the First World Congress of the World Agudath Israel in Vienna” today.
1923: Birthdate of Shimon Peres, Zionist leader who would hold numerous positions including President of the Jewish state. There are as many views of Peres as there are candles on his birthday cake.
1924(16thof Av, 5684): Parashat Vaetchanan
1924: A copy of the law which has been described as “the most important legislation enacted in Palestine…because it removes custom duties from all machinery intended for industrial purposes imported into the Holy Land arrived in New York today.
1925: The Palestine Foundation Fund reported that it had spent $8,646,750 in the economic rebuilding of Palestine during its four years of existence, just concluded. More than 60 per cent of this sum has come from American Jews, according to the statement, the balance being collected from fifty-two other countries. $2,570,785 was expended on farming enterprises and $1,624,695 for Hebrew education. Samuel Untermeyer is President of the American branch of the fund.
1926: Sephardic and Oriental Jews at a Zionist conference in Vienna had their delegates gather for the purpose of furthering Zionist interests among their peoples.
1927(18thof Av, 5687): Forty-eight year old Jennie Weiner passed away today after which she was buried at the Waldheim Jewish Cemetery in Cook County, Illinois.
1927(18thof Av, 5687): Seventy-five year old Leopold Pick, the husband of Betty Pick passed away today.
1928: “Jewish colonization work in Crimea for which a sufficient sum will be made available through the $10,000,000 Rosenwald fund was given further impetus and opportunity by the decision of the All-Russian Zik, the Central Executive Committee, to allot an additional area in Crimea of 109,000 hectares where 15,000 Jewish families may be settled as farmers.”
1929: In Amsterdam, neurologist “Herman H. DeJong” and psychologist “Marianna (Witteboon) De Jong whose “Jewish roots made them targets of the Nazis” gave birth to Evelyn Yvonne DeJong who gained fame as corporate gadfly Evelyn Y. Davis. (As reported by Emily Flitter)
1929: Although warned by the Zionist Executive that the Arabs were preparing to attack the Jews of Jerusalem in massive riots, High Commissioner Sir John Chancellor refused to cut his vacation short, declaring that relations between the sides were improving. After Friday prayers on the day after the ninth of Av, two thousand Arabs attacked Jews praying at the Western Wall. One Jewish youth was stabbed in the back. The British Government refused to condemn the attack leading the Arabs again to believe that the British supported their riots.
1930: “Dreyfus” or “The Dreyfus Case, “as it would be known when released in the United States, based on a novel about the French officer directed by Richard Oswald and starring Fritz Kornter in the title role was released today in the Weimar Republic (Germany)/
1930(22ndof Av, 5690): Gustave Frohman who along with his brothers Charles and Daniel worked together as theatrical producers and advanced men passed away.
http://www.jta.org/1930/08/19/archive/gustave-frohman-eminent-theatrical-figure-dead
1931: Birthdate of “piano prodigy” Michael “Mickey” Leonard the native of Rockville Center, NY who became a leading composer and arranger. (As reported by Daniel L. Slotnik)
1932: In Washington, DC, “Marceline Gray and George Jackson Eder, a lawyer and economist who for a time worked in the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt” gave birth to Richard Gray Eder the New York Times foreign correspondent who “won a Pulitzer Prize for his book reviews in The Los Angeles Times.”
1933: Following a baseball game in Toronto, six hours of violence broke out between Harbord Playground, which was predominantly Jewish, and St. Peter's, a baseball team sponsored by a church at Bathurst and Bloor that became known as the Christie Pitts Riot.
http://epe.lac-bac.gc.ca/100/205/301/ic/cdc/polyphony/sports_art2.html
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2013/08/10/remembering_the_christie_pits_riot_dimanno.html
http://missingplaque.tao.ca/christiepits
1933: In New York, more than seventy thousand workers joined a strike called by the ILGWU under the leadership of David Dubinsky.
1933: In Berlin Kurt Maschler, a successful publisher’s representative and Rita (Lechner) Maschler gave birth to Thomas Michael Maschler, the refugee from Nazi Germany and swashbuckling British publisher who fostered the literary careers of more than a dozen Nobel laureates and conceived the coveted Booker Prize to promote fiction…” (As reported by Sam Roberts)
1933: Three hundred Polish Jews including a group of 140 chalutzim leave for Palestine.
1933: Local authorities in East Prussia inform Jews that they must call for their mail because Nazi postmen will be humiliated in delivering mail to Jews.
1934: In Liverpool, a homemaker Violet Greenberg and Harry Buxton, a jewelry trader in Leeds, gave birth to Angela Buxton, a granddaughter of Russian Jews who had fled the pogroms in the early 1900s, who forged barrier breaking relationship with fellow tennis player, Althea Gibson.
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2020/aug/19/angela-buxton-obituary
1934: Birthdate of Dr. Daniel Norman Stern “a psychiatrist who increased the understanding of early human development by scrutinizing the most minute interactions between mothers and babies” (As reported by Douglas Martin)
1936: The 1936 Olympics came to an end in Berlin. Calls for boycotting the Hitler Olympics fell on deaf ears.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005680
http://www.ushmm.org/museum/exhibit/online/olympics/detail.php?content=jewish_athletes_more&lang=en
1936: The New York Times published a lengthy review of Jewish Studies in Memory of George A. Kohut, 1874-1933, edited by Salo W. Baron and Alexander Marx.
1936(28th of Av, 5696): An eight year old Jewish boy “was killed and nineteen Jews were injured by the explosion of a bomb thrown by an Arab from a train window into one of the principal streets of Tel Aviv today as the train was passing the city en route to Jaffa.” In the last three days ten Jews – 7 adults and 3 children – have been killed in Safed, Haifa and on the highway between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Authorities fear that this latest in a series of attacks that began four months ago will finally provoke the Jewish population into acts of violence aimed at their attackers.
1936(28thof Av, 5696): “Julius Vagshall, an employee of the Palestine Electric Company was shot by assailants from the darkness near Mikveh Israel” and two others were wounded in what was the climax to a night of terror in which at least twenty people were wounded including British constable.
1936: “Saar Now Shares Reich Hardships” published today described the deteriorating conditions of the territory seized by the Germans 18 months ago including a scarcity of capital for investment that “has been greatly intensified by the emigration of approximately 5, 000 Jew…who under the Rome protocol were allowed to take all of their property with them…”
1936: In Cleveland, Ohio, between 25,000 and 30,000 followers of Father Charles E. Coughlin heard him this afternoon in Municipal Stadium describe “his disillusionment in President Roosevelt” and “challenge the Jews of America to accept the doctrine of Christian brotherhood…”
1936: According to the Palcor Agency, the Palestine Government “was accused of negligence in the protection of Jews from Arab violence.”
1936: “The World Jewish Congress decided tonight to incorporate as a permanent organization in Switzerland” with offices in Geneva, Paris and New York that should be financed by the $75,000 that will be raised in 1937.
1936: “A Yiddish Novel” published today provided a review of Noah Pandrewritten by Salman Schneour and translated by Joseph Leftwich.
1936: “Studies in Memory of George Kohut” published today provided a review of Jewish Studies in Memory of George A. Kohut edited by Salo W. Baron and Alexander Marx
1936: It was reported today that “all efforts of Emir Abdullah to mediate between the Palestine Government and the Arabs have been futile” because “none of the older Arab leaders dare accept the British Government’s proposal of a royal commission in the fact of the militant Nationalist youths” who have been attacking Arabs who oppose them.
1936: It was reported today that “a reign of terror is prevailing throughout Palestine” where “Arab leaders, especially Arab police officer are just as exposed to the bullets” of Arab terrorists “as Britons and Jews.”
1936: In “Habimah in Emek,” published today Arthur Settel describes a recent performance of “Jew Suss” in Ain Taun a village in the Valley Of Jezrel on the northern plain of Palestine.
1937: “Hammer Icons” published today tells the story of Armand and Victor Hammer, “two of the most startling characters in the U.S. art world.
1937: The 20th World Zionist Congress comes to an end with a resounding vote of support for Dr. Chaim Weizmann who was re-elected as President with only 8 delegates voting against him
1937: Talks are proceeding between Americans of Jewish and of Arab origin with a view to-exploring the possibilities of bringing peace between their peoples in Palestine by applying the American federal principle, it was revealed by Adil Arslan, one of the Arab High Committee's two delegates here.
1938(19thof Av, 5698): Arabs killed three people when they kidnapped a Jewish family today at Atlit.
1938: Andrej Hlinka, a Catholic Priest, a leader of the Slovak National Party and “a symbol of Slovak fascism” passed away. He opposed the democratic principles of Czechoslovakia and was an admirer of Hitler and Mussolini. Although he died before the war, he was considered to be the spiritual “godfather” of Slovak nationalism that sent 70,000 Jews to the concentration camps, most of whom perished.
1938: Russian born, British trained Harry Mordecai Freedman began serving as the “rabbi of the Melbourne Hebrew Congregation at South Harra.”
1939: More than 600 Zionists from all parts of the world attend the twenty-first World Zionist Congress, which opens in Geneva today. The congress will last thirteen days.
1939: Birthdate of American banjo player Eric Weissberg best known for “Dueling Banjos” which provided the musical background for “Deliverance.”
1939(1st of Elul, 5699): Rosh Chodesh Elul
1940: “Foreign Correspondent” a spy film produced by Walter Wanger, with music by Alfred Newman and filmed by cinematographer Rudolph Maté was released in the United States today.
1940: The Vichy (France) government prohibited aliens from practicing as physicians, dentists or pharmacists. This destroyed the livelihood for numerous Jews who had fled to France before the war and/or were not living in Vichy at the time of the French surrender to the Nazis. The Jews living in Vichy France would learn that anti-Semitism was part and parcel of the Petain government.
1940: Today the building at 770 Eastern Parkway in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn, New York was purchased by Agudas Chassidei Chabad (the Chabad-Lubavitch community) to house the living quarters, study and office, Yeshivah, and synagogue of the sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn who had arrived in New York (following his rescue from Nazi-occupied Warsaw) five months earlier [It would later serve as the headquarters of his son-in-law and successor, the Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, and become the vortex of Chabad-Lubavitch's global network of institutions of Jewish education and outreach.]
1941(16thof Av, 5701): Parashat Eikev
1941: Birthdate of Brooklyn native Vivian Hoffman who gained famed as Vivian Stromberg a champion of women’s rights around the world and founder of Madre.
1942: In the Warsaw Ghetto at today’s selection only two members of Władysław Szpilman’s family “were passed as fit to work” while “the rest of the family was taken to the Umschlagplatz.
1942: Tonight, all the members of Władysław Szpilman’s family were shipped from Warsaw to Treblinka where they were murdered.
1943: Nazi troops enter the Jewish ghetto at Bialystok, Poland and over the next four days destroy the more than 30,000 Jews inside. Hundreds of Resistance fighters, led by Mordechai Tenenbaum-Tamaroff and Daniel Moszkowicz--who battle back with small arms, axes, and bayonets--are annihilated. Those who survive are transported to death camps, where 25,000 are killed
1943: Inmates revolt at the slave-labor camp at Krychów, Poland.
1943: During World War II, the keel for the SS Oscar Strauss was laid today.
1943: Maurice H. Rindskopf was among the officers serving on ehe USS Drum, an American submarine as she left Brisbane on her seventh war patrol
1943: The Spanish government stated that they would allow more repatriated Jews to come to Spain, "only if those in Spain already left." The obvious lack of sentiment on the part of Spain was apparent to the Joint Distribution Committee, which went ahead and placed a "priority" on emigration of "these so-called Sephardics." The Jews who did make it to Spain were not in any way treated like citizens.
1944: A train arrived at Birkenau from Athens with 1,651 Jews from Rhodes and 94 from Kos. Upon arrival and then separation, Sidney Fahn would see his wife and young child for the last time. Only 151 of these Jews would survive.
1945: In Chicago, Illinois, Eleanor (née Pottasch) and Elmer Balaban, who owned several movie theatres and later was a pioneer in cable television gave birth to Robert Elmer “Bob” Balaban the “actor, author, producer and director who gave one of his most memorable roles in “The Monuments Men” as Private Preston Savitz.
1945: Today, “President Truman called…for the free and open settlement of Palestine by Jews to the point consistent with the maintenance of civil peace.” For the first time he revealed that that U.S. government has informed the British who are attending the Big Three’s Berlin Conference. (The Big Three were the U.S., U.K. and U.S.S.R.)
1945: Former Iowa Senator Guy Gillette who is President of the American League for a Free Palestine expressed his “disappointment at the inconclusive nature of the American position” about Jewish settlement “as outlined by” President Truman today. According to Gillette, millions of displaced persons have been returned to their homes. Yet, the Jews, who suffered the most, have been denied a clear solution to their plight. The League of Nations had already had already designated that Palestine should be a free and independent nation. According to Gillette, Palestine “is the historic national territory of the Hebrew people and their right to enter it should no longer be challenged.
1945: “Dr. Abba Hillel Silver of Cleveland, Ohio and Rabbi Stephen S. Wise of New York were elected member of the executive board of the Jewish Agency for Palestine by the general council of the World Zion Conference today in London, UK.”
1946: In New York City, “Margot (née Verblow), a singer, and William Warren, a real estate agent whose original surname was "Warrenoff" gave birth to act Academy Award nominated actress Lesley Ann Warren.
1947(30thof Av, 5707): Parshat Re’eh: Rosh Chodesh Elul
1947: ‘Lewis Neikrug, director of overseas activities, of the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, said today he had been informed that the Australian Government had in the last few days asked organizations dealing with Jewish immigration not to send any Jews to Australia on ships flying American, British or Panamanian flags.’
1948: Birthdate of Patrick Balkany, the native of Neuilly-sur-Seine, who is a member of the National Assembly of France
1948(11th of Av, 5708): Sixty-seven year old “Yiddish dramatist and novelist Peretz Hirschbein” lost his three year battle with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (Lou Gehrig’s Disease), and passed away today in Los Angeles
http://www.yivoencyclopedia.org/article.aspx/Hirshbeyn_Perets
1948(11th of Av, 5708): Fifty-five year old Harry Dexter White passed away today after having answered accusations before HUAC that he was a communist and a traitor.
http://spartacus-educational.com/Harry_Dexter_White.htm
http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/wp/2000/wp00149.pdf
1948: Three months after the establishment of the State of Israel, an agreement was signed between the Bank Leumi and the temporary Government. The official charter appointing the Bank as the Government's financial agent was signed by Hoofien and the Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion. On that very day, the official bank notes of the new state, bearing the name of the Anglo-Palestine Bank and the signatures of Hoofien and Barth, were distributed. The Israeli pound becomes legal tender.
1949: Herzl's remains are transferred to Jerusalem and reburied on Mount Herzl.
1949: Netiv HaLamed-Heh ( נְתִיב הַל"ה, Path of the 35) a kibbutz in central Israel located in the Valley of Elah, was established today by demobilized members of the Daled Company of the Palmach's Harel Brigade. It was initially named Peled (an acronym for Plugot Daled, lit. Daled Company) It was later renamed after the 35 Haganah soldiers killed in a convoy to resupply the Gush Etzion kibbutzim during the 1947–1948 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine (Lamed-Heh is 35 in Hebrew numerals).
1950: “No Way Out” a film noir directed by Joseph L. Mankeiwicz with music by Alfred Newman was released in the United States today by 20th Century Fox.
1951: “The Guy Who Came Back” featuring Zero Mostel was released in the United States today by 20th Century Fox.
1955: Funeral services are scheduled to be held today at “The Riverside” for Louis H. Sobel, the executive director of the Jewish Child Care Association
1956(9thof Elul, 5716): A squad of Fedayeen attacked Egged Bus 391 traveling from Tel-Aviv to Eilat murdering three soldiers and a female civilian passenger and wounding an additional three civilian passengers. (Editor’s Note – Fedayeen was the 1950’s name for the terrorists. The names have changed over the decades but the deadly attacks remain the same.)
1959: In Rochester, NY, at Temple Bethel, Rabbi Abraham Karp officiated at the wedding of Naomi Kitty Sachran, the daughter of former New York State Supreme Court Justice Goodman Sacharan and University of Michigan trained Engineer Warren Singer.
1959(12th of Av, 5719): Harpsichordist and composer Wanda Landowska, who was credited with the 20th-century revival of harpsichord music passed away.
http://jwa.org/thisweek/aug/16/1959/wanda-landowska
1960: Cyprus gains its independence from the United Kingdom (Great Britain). Jews have lived on the island of Cyprus since the days of the ancient Greeks. In modern times, Cyprus provided a haven for Jews trying to escape from Hitler’s Europe. After the war, the British set up internment camps on the island where they detained Jews trying to run the blockade and reach pre-Israel Palestine. Israel established diplomatic relations with Cyprus and the Israeli embassy served as focal point for the small Cypriot Jewish community.
1961: Frank Robinson hit a homer off of Larry Sherry as the Jewish pitcher and the Dodgers came out on the short end of game with the Reds losing 6 to 0. (Sherry was Jewish; Robinson was not)
1965(18th of Av, 5725): Eighty-four year old Russian born NYU Law School graduate Harry Handler, “the principal of the Stone Avenue Talmud Torah in Brooklyn” for 39 years and the husband of “the former Esther Liskowsky” passed away today while “visiting his son Dr. Archie Handler.”
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1965/08/18/101562176.pdf
1965: David Katz, “the founder of the Queens Symphony Orchestra” and Jeanne Dale Katz, the founder of “the Queens Council of on the Arts gave birth to St. John’s University School of Law trained attorney Melinda R. Katz, the former New York City Councilwoman who went on to serve as the Queens Borough President.
1966: Simon and Garfunkel record “the 59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin’ Groovy” as the 6th cut on side one of “Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme.”
1969(2ndof Elul, 5729): Parashat Shoftim
1969(2ndof Elul, 5729): Portrait painter Henry R. Rittenberg, the 1929 winner of the Thomas R. Proctor portrait prize at the National Academy of Design and husband of Rachel Rittenberg whose best known work may be his paint of “President Harry S. Truman in a group at the Potsdam Conference in 1945” passed away today.
1971(25thof Av, 5731): Seventy-six year old Edward Anthony, the former director of public relations during Herbert Hoover’s successful presidential campaign and magazine editor passed away today.
1972: “Two British girls, unaware that the gramophone given them by 2 Arab acquaintances in Rome was booby trapped” carried it on board an El Al Flight bound for Lod” where it exploded in the luggage compartment causing “slight damage.” (Jewish Virtual Library)
1973(18th of Av, 5733): Selman Waksman, Ukrainian-born American biochemist and recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine passed away.
http://www.jewoftheweek.net/?s=Selman+Abraham+Waksman+&submit=Search
1975(9thof Elul, 5735): Parashat, Ki Teitzei
1975(9thof Elul, 5735: Ninety-nine-year-old “Balance Frank Ittleson, a pioneer in mental health care” and the “the widow of Henry Ittleson, founder of the Commercial Credit and Investment Company” passed away today.
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/ittleson-blanche-frank
1976: In Washington, the national convention of Hadassah continued for a second day.
1978: Pitcher Ross Baumgarten makes his major league debut with the White Sox.
1978: In Moscow, the government continued its “anti-Zionist trials” today with Alexander Podrabinek as the prisoner in the dock.
1980(4th of Elul, 5740): Parashat Shoftim
1980: “The Israeli Government is pressing the Carter Administration to reach agreement before the November election on guidelines clarifying the American pledge to sell oil to Israel during an emergency.”
1984: Hadassah leader Bernice S. Tannenbaum brought “a five-member delegation” to the White House where they “met with President Ronald Reagan for 40 minutes over tea, coffee and cookies, to lobby against the resolution linking Zionism and racism.” Reagan agreed “to publicly repudiate” “the United Nations resolution defining Zionism as a ‘form of racism and racial discrimination’” and “that the U.S. delegation would walk out of” the U.N. Conference at Nairobi “if the Zionism-equals-racism resolution was included in the final conference declaration.”
1985: Lieutenant General Sidney T. Weinstein, one of the highest ranking Jewish soldiers at that time, began serving “as the Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence, Headquarters Department of the Army
1985: Birthdate of Bensiyon Songavkar, the Indian born Jewish professional cricketer.
1988(3rd of Elul, 5748): Auckland City Councillor Harold Goodman, the husband of Dame Barbara Goodman, passed away.
1988: Ed Koch, the Jewish Mayor of New York City says he plans to wipe out street-corner windshield washers
1988: The New York Times included reviews of Confessions of a Good Arab by Yoram Kaniuk, translated by Dalya Bilu and The Road to Ein Harod by Amos Kenan, translated by Anselm Hollo.
1989: 15th of Av, 5749): Tu B’Av
1989: Today, the Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs sent a telegram to Israeli security forces warning that Hezbollah terrorists were on their way to Brazil “in order commit attacks on diplomatic representatives of Israel.”
1991(6thof Elul, 5751): Sixty-six year old “Dr. Gerson D. Cohen, chancellor emeritus of the Jewish Theological Seminary” and the husband of scholar Naomi Choen passed away today.
1992: In Buenos Aires, Ricardo and Silvana Schwartzman gave birth to Tennis Champion Diego Schwartzman known as “El Peque.”
http://jewishnews.timesofisrael.com/diego-schwartzman-into-world-top-20-after-winning-rio-open/
1993: The two men who kidnapped Harvey Weinstein, a formalwear manufacturer and chairman of Lord West Formal Wear are arrested in New York when the go to pick up the ransom. Weinstein survives and lives to the ripe old age of 82.
1993(29th of Av, 5753): Eighty-eight year old grand prix driver Rene Dreyfus passed away today.
1994: The first ever Papal Nuncio to Israel presented his credentials in Jerusalem
1994(9thof Elul, 5754): Seventy-two year old Pennsylvania born WW II Army Veteran Alfred Sachs, the longtime employee of the “Maryland Toll Authority’s Harbor Tunnel” and husband of Dorothy Sachs passed away today.
1995(20thAv, 5755): Sixty-six year old newspaper executive Stanley Asimov, the brother of Isaac Asimov passed away today.
1995: Seven months after premiering at Sundance, “The Usual Suspects” a dark crime movie directed by Bryan Singer and filmed by cinematographer Newton Thomas Sigel was released in the United States today.
1996(1st of Elul, 5756): Rosh Chodesh Elul
1996(1stof Elul, 5676): Forty-seven year old composer Miles Goodman passed away today.
http://america.pink/miles-goodman_3015112.html
1996: “The Fan” a film that takes a dark look at celebrity produced by Wendy Fineman, with music by Hans Zimmer and co-starring Ellen Barkin was released in the United States today by TriStar Pictures.
1998: The New York Times featured a review of The Father of Spin: Edward L. Bernays and the Birth of Public Relations by Larry Tye. Bernays is the Austrian born Jew who was the nephew of Sigmund Freud.
2000(15th of Av, 5760): Tu B’Av observed for the first time in the 21st century.
2000(15th of Av, 5760): Rabbi Chanoch Dov Padow, the Galician born son of Toybe Padwa and R’Eleazar Wolf Padwa” the Jerusalem rabbi who led London’s Haredi Jewish community for half a century passed away today.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1368138/Rabbi-Chanoch-Padwa.html
2000:A documentary film entitled “The Ballad of Rambling Jack Elliot” about the life of Brooklyn native Elliott Adnopoz the son of a middle class Jewish doctor who transformed himself into a musical iconoclast opens at the Film Forum. The film was written and directed by his daughter Aiyana Elliot.
2001: Osama el-Baz “1Egypt's top foreign policy official warned today that the Bush administration's ''inaction'' in the Middle East could allow extremists to take hold in moderate Arab countries” and “this would be a consequence far graver than the administration's apparent fear, he said, of risking its prestige with an Israeli-Palestinian peace initiative.”
2002: “The Adventures of Pluto Nash” a comedy produced by Martin Bregman released in the United States today.
2002: As proclaimed by Mayor Martin O’Malley and Governor Parris N. Glendening today was observed as Eli Siegel Day.
https://aestheticrealism.org/eli-siegel-day-carrie-wilson-edward-green/
2002(8th of Elul, 5762): Martin Deutsch the American physicist who studied positronium passed away. Positronium is a temporary state in the decay of the positron which is the antiparticle of the electron (and that is more than I really know about this.)
2003: Idid Amin, the former President of Uganda who had been trained as a paratrooper by the Israelis and who provided a safe haven for the Palestinian hijackers in 1976 passed away today.
2004: As “the ferment” produced by “Israel’s intention to withdraw unilaterally from the Gaza Strip in a year” “Yasir Arafat survived the latest challenge to his authority from a younger generation of frustrated politicians, outmaneuvering an American favorite, Muhammad Dahlan, 42, a former security chief.” (As reported by Steven Erlanger)
2005: The evacuation of Gaza continued for a second day.
2005: The Jerusalem Post reported that Britain had played a major role in Israel’s development of a nuclear capability in the late 1950’s.
2006: As part of the cease-fire agreement, Israeli troops turn control of territory in Lebanon over to UNIFL.
2007: Israel and the United States signed a Memorandum of Understanding on the new American defense package for Israel
2008: At Temple Judah in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Bar Mitzvah of Daniel Finn.
2008:Today, Itai Magidi will be the first Israeli to take part in the athletics competitions, running the 3000m Steeplechase qualifiers and all seven of Israel's sailors are scheduled to race at the Beijing Olympics.
2008, Martha Nussbaum—University of Chicago professor and Boston Review contributing editor—became a bat mitzvah “in a service at Temple K. A. M. Isaiah Israel in Chicago's Hyde Park, chanting from the Parashah Va-etchanan and the Haftarah Nahamu, and delivering a D'var Torah about the connection between genuine, non-narcissistic consolation and the pursuit of global justice.”
2009: The Washington Post features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Rashiby Elie Wiesel.
2009:The Massachusetts secretary of state’s office has rejected a proposed settlement by an investment firm to repay nearly $6 million to state investors who lost money in Bernard L. Madoff’s fraudulent investment scheme.
2009: “Can Game Theory Predict When Iran Will Get the Bomb” published today describes Bruce Bueno de Mesquita’s answer to this question.
2009: Led by his widow, Betty Levin, a true Ashish Chayil, the family and friends of Dr. Jacob Levin, of blessed memory, gather to dedicate a classroom named in his honor at North Suburban Beth El Synagogue. Dr. Levin taught in this room for several years and his time as a Religious School teacher was but one example of his contributions to the Jewish community. He will always be missed. He will always be remembered.
2010:KlezKanada is scheduled to open in Lantier, Quebec.
2010:An IDF soldier was lightly wounded today in clashes with Palestinian terrorists in the Gaza Strip.
2010:A bomb squad checked out two unattended suitcases outside the Israeli consulate this morning, the Los Angeles Police Department said
2011: Today is the release date for The Gift of Rest: Rediscovering the Beauty of the Sabbath by Senator Joe Lieberman
2011: Today, “in a jailhouse interview with Yahoo! Sports, Nevin Shaprio” who was imprisoned for running a huge Ponzi scheme” made good on the promise for the revelations exposing a lack of NCAA-mandated institution oversight at” the University of Miami “which allowed his illegal and unethical behaviors to continue unimpeded for years.”
2011: The 2ndAvenue Deli reopened at its new location on 1st Avenue and 75th Street in the Upper East Side much to the joy of those who enjoy the best kosher meat knishes and tongue sandwiches imaginable.
2011: Wendy Turman, JHSGW Curator/Archivist is scheduled to deliver “an illustrated lecture tracing the history of the Jewish community in the Washington area from the arrival of the first Jewish Washingtonian in 1795 to today, when the region's Jewish community has grown to more than 215,000 people.
2011:Representatives from the National Union of Israeli Students and leaders of the tent city protest movement met this morning with former chief rabbi of Israel and current Head Rabbi of Tel Aviv Yisrael Lau, where they held a discussion on the ongoing social justice protests.
2011:Israel's parliament interrupted its summer recess today to debate popular protests against high living costs but there seemed to be little sense of urgency among the smattering of lawmakers, some of whom tapped away on mobile phones and iPads
2012: The Knesset is scheduled to convene in a special session during its summer recess to approve Avi Dichter as Home Front Defense Minister (As reported by the Jerusalem Post.)
2012(28th of Av): Yarhtzeit of Larry Rosenstein – gone too soon but never forgotten
2012(28th of Av): HaRav Akiva Ehrenfeld, president of the Chasam Sofer Institutions in the U.S. and President of Kiryat Mattersdorf passed away tonight at Shaare Zedek Medical Center and was buried that night on Har HaMenuchot near the grave of his father
http://www.chareidi.org/archives5772/shoftim/arehrnfldshf72.htm
2012: Bulgarian police released a computer-generated image and a fake driver's license photo of a man believed to be an accomplice in the bombing of an Israeli tour bus in Burgas that killed six. (As reported by JTA)
2012: “Shimon Peres, Israel’s president and elder statesman, spoke out against the prospect of a lone Israeli military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, a message that contradicts the hawkish, go-it-alone line emanating from the offices of Israel’s prime minister and defense minister.” (As reported by Isabel Kirshner)
2012: Police resumed searching for the remains of Grad rockets in the desert outside Eilat this morning, hours after two loud blasts rocked the resort town.
2013: In Montgomery, AL, the Capri Community Film Society is scheduled to show “Fill the Void,” a cinematic treatment of the life of a Chasidic family from Tel Aviv.
2013: Amir Levy is scheduled to perform at the New York International Fringe Festival.
2013: Seven months after premiering at the Sundance Film Festival, “Jobs” a biopic co-starring Jose Gad as “Steve Wozniak” and featuring Brett Gelman and Lesley Ann Warren was released in the United States today.
2013: In Herndon, VA, Congregation Beth Emeth is scheduled to host a special Shabbat Community BBQ where everybody can meet the new Rabbi – Michelle Goldsmith.
2013: In “Israel Keeps a Wary Eye on Turmoil in Egypt” published today, Isabel Kershner describes the Jewish state’s reaction to the violence going on within its neighbor with which it signed a peace treaty that has held for more than three decades.
2014: In Mandeville, LA, the Northshore Jewish Congregation (NJC) is scheduled to host “Havdalah on the River” to help welcome Rabbi Deborah Zecher who will be leading the congregation’s High Holiday Services.
2014: The Historic 6th& I Synagogue is scheduled to host #NoFilter featuring Grace Helbig, Hannah Hart and Mamrie Hart
2014: “A Hamas official today threatened Israel with a prolonged war of attrition if the group’s terms for a permanent ceasefire agreement, currently being negotiated in indirect talks in Cairo, are not met.” (As reported by Times of Israel)
2014: Following a declaration by Fatah’s military wing to “increase its terror attacks against Israeli citizens” tonight Arab terrorists threw a Molotov cocktail at an Israeli car near Bethlehem inflicting first and second degree burns on the 40 year old driver who was also hit by stones.(As reported byUzi Baruch and Ari Yashar)
2014: “Over ten thousand people assembled in Tel Aviv’s Rabin Square tonight for the largest pro-peace rally the country has seen since the start of the war in Gaza in early July.”
2014: By today, the 101st anniversary of the birth of Menachem Begin, the Israel State Archives, the Israel State Archives will have published “a collection of documents on the life the former Prime Minister best known as the leader of the Irgun and the signatory for the 1973 peace accords with Egypt.
2015(1st of Elul, 5775): Rosh Chodesh Elul
2015(1st of Elul, 5775): Eighty-two year old art collector Melva Bucksbaum, whose first hubsband had been Iowa shopping center and real estate mogul Martin Bucksbaum, passed away today. (As reported by Sam Roberts)
2015(1st of Elul, 5775): Sixty-eight year old Jacob Bekenstein, the “physicist who revolutionized the theory of Black Holes” passed away today. (As reported by Dennis Overbye)
2015(1st of Elul, 5775): One hundred fourteen year old, “Goldie Steinberg, reportedly the world’s oldest Jew” passed away today.
http://www.tabletmag.com/scroll/192938/goldie-steinberg-reportedly-the-worlds-oldest-jew-dies-at-114
2015: The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Patricia Drucker’s Sophie and the Sibyl in which “a novelist imagines an incident that inspired George Eliot’s Daniel Deronda which portrayed the concepts of what would become Zionism in a positive light and Alice Hoffman’s The Marriage of Opposites, “a novel inspired by the painter Camille Pissarro’s parents.”
2015: UK Jewish Film which “aims to develop a culture where Jewish and Israeli film is recognised and enjoyed by the widest possible audience, and to bring Jewish related film to the heart of British culture” is scheduled to host a screening of “She’s Funny That Way.”
2015: In Kiryas Joel, the school year is scheduled to begin for the children whose parents have signed an affidavit stating “We the parents are confirming in writing that our cellphones/smartphones are in accordance to the rules of the community and yeshiva, according to the guidance of our holy grand rabbi and the judge. We also confirm that we do not possess in our home another cellphone/smartphone except for the ones mentioned above.” (A reported by Brian Shaefer)
2015: The Illinois Holocaust & Education Center is scheduled to present “Soviet Composers Discovering A Jewish Sound” featuring violinist David Lisker, pianist Ani Gogovo and cellist Richard Hirschl.
2015: The Jewish Museum of Maryland is scheduled to show “An American Tail,” the classic animation that “follows the story of Fievel a young Russian mouse, who while emigrating to the United States, gets separated from his family and must relocate them while trying to survive in a new country.”
2016: Today, “The Beth Din of America was added to the list of defendants in a $100 million class action suit against Rabbi Barry Freundel, the prominent Washington, D.C., spiritual leader who was convicted of secretly videotaping women in his synagogue’s ritual bath, and several Jewish institutions.”
2016: In Memphis, TN, Temple Israel is scheduled to host a session of “Don’t Worry, Be Happy! - The Spiritual Wisdom of Judaism in Reducing Stress.”
2016: “Jewish-American gymnast Aly Raisman won the silver medal at the 2016 Rio Games today, competing against teammate and reigning world champion Simone Biles who took gold.”
2016: “The Kind Words” a film by Shemi Zarhin which has been “nominated for 12 Ophir Awards” is scheduled to be shown in Tacoma, Washington.
2017: Avraham Tal, a judge on Voice of Israel is scheduled to host Rishon LeZion born singer and rapper Muki at the Jerusalem Arts and Crafts Fair.
2017: “Jerusalem’s Tower of David is scheduled to host a White Night of music, art, and design in the largest event of its kind in Israel this evening.
2017: In Cedar Rapids, the Hadassah Book Club is scheduled to discuss Certain Girls by Jennifer Weiner.
2017: The “organizers of the March for Racial Justice” issued “a lengthy statement in which it said that the group “was unaware that the September 30 date it chose for its march” was the Jewish Day of Atonement but that the date which has just been announced a few days ago could not be changed.
2017: Stephen Allen Schwarzman, the founder of The Blackstone Group completed his service as the Chairman of the Strategic and Policy Forum today.
2018: In London, JW3 is scheduled to host the final screening of “Through Lotte’s Lens” a documentary that tells the extraordinary story of the ‘Hitler Émigrés’, the refugees – mainly Jewish who escaped the Nazi regime in the 1930s and found refuge in the UK.”
2018: The report of “police officers foiling a stabbing attack in Jerusalem’s Old City last week” “was cleared for publication today.
2018: “At the Security Cabinet Meeting” today “Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu presented a document titled "Security model 2030" which outlines the new budgetary additions to the country's security budget, has been formulated by Netanyahu over the past couple of years.” (As reported by Itamar Eichner)
2018: At UIHC, during GI/Hepatology Division Grand Rounds, Dr. Robert Silber was the presenter for “Didactic: ‘Reflective Analysis of Clinical Behavior.’”
2019(15thof Av, 5779): Tu B’Av or in English simply the 15th Day of Av which was “originally a post-biblical day of joy, that served as a matchmaking day for unmarried women in the second Temple period which went virtually unnoticed for almost 2,000 years before being “rejuvenated in recent decades, especially in Israel as Jewish Day of Love which at least one sabra likened to Valentine’s Day but which has “no formal legal status.”
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/tubav.html
http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/53680/jewish/15th-of-Av.htm
http://www.israeldailypicture.com/
2019: One-hundred sixth anniversary of the birth of Menachem Begin, the Nobel Peace Prize winner who went from leading the Jewish revolt against British rule to gambling on the promises of the Egyptian President that he would keep his word about peace after he got back the Sinai.
2019: In Tel Aviv, “the Whiskey Bar Milk and Honey” is scheduled to host “a fun-filled romantic Valentine’s evening sipping local whiskey.”
2019: In Seattle, WA, the Crest Cinema is scheduled to host a special screening of “The Spy Behind Home Plate.”
2019: The JCC of Northern Virginia is scheduled to lead a tour of the “Queens of Egypt” at the National Geographic Museum.
2020: In an interview with YNET today, Dr. Ronni Gamzu, “Israel’s coronavirus czar” criticized what he said was the Arab community’s failure to prevent the spread of the virus and the later “apologized” saying his words had been misunderstood.” (As reported by JTA)
https://www.jta.org/quick-reads
2021: Judy Batalion, author of The Light of Days: The Untold Story of Women Resistance Fighters is scheduled to speak on the Nonfiction and Creative Nonfiction panel at the Bryant Park Reading Room in New York.
2021: At the virtual “Diller Teen Tikkun Olam Awards Ceremony” 15 exceptional teens from across the nation are scheduled to be honored for their leadership and philanthropy work and awarded with a $36,000 stipend each.
2021: Jonathan Sarna is scheduled to be one of the speakers at the National Educators Institute sponsored by the National Museum of American Jewish History which begins today.
2021: Based on reports published last night that coronavirus infection rates among Israelis over the age of 60 seemed to have declined in recent days, today Israel has the hope that “its vaccine booster shot campaign may succeed in staving off severe illness.” (As reported by Yaron Druckman,and Adir Yanko)
2022: In Boston, the Jewish Alliance For Law and Social Actions is scheduled to present “An Evening of Art and Activism.”
2022: The Museum on Eldridge Street is scheduled to host another session of “Make Yourself at Home! Home, Exile, and Return in the Hebrew Bible,” a lecture by Scholar-in-Residence Dr. Regina Stein.
2022: The Illinois Holocaust Museum, the Nancy & David Wolf Holocaust & Humanity Center; Evanston Public Library; The Selfhelp Home are scheduled to host a lunch and learn “The Watchmakers,” a “conversation with Scott Lenga in which he recounts the moving and harrowing story of the Holocaust through the eyes of his father and two uncles – the Lenga brothers, three young men whose watchmaking skills, rudimentary tools, and an entrepreneurial spark – helped them survive Nazi concentration camps and stay together despite the odds.
https://www.ilholocaustmuseum.org/events/lunch-learn-the-watchmakers/
2022: The Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History is scheduled to host the second session of the National Educators Institute which will cover “The Art and Science of Teaching Jewish History in America.”
2022: While Israelis bask in the glow of yesterday’s track triumphs at the Euro Championships in Munich, they must also deal with last month’s “increase in consumer price index which brings Israel’s yearly inflation rate to 5.2%.”