April 8
73(15th of Nisan,
3833): The Great Revolt came to an end today when the defenders of Masada
completed their murder/suicide pact
217: Assassination of
Roman Emperor Caracalla. Some Romans may
Caracalla who was officially known as Antonius, as a disgrace to his
office. Caracalla extended the right of
citizenship to all of those living in the empire as a way of raising additional
taxes. Under the “law of unintended
consequences” this improved the status of the Jews. While Caracalla showed no special affection
for his Jewish subjects, he did not single them out for any special
disabilities or punishments except for one matter of taxation. This was an
improvement over life under some of his predecessors and many of his
successors. When it came to taxes, Caracalla took as much as he could. Since the time of Julius Caesar, the Jews of
Palestine had been exempt from paying certain taxes during the Sabbatical
Year. The taxes were paid in produce
which was used to feed the army.
Caracalla put an end to the exemption. Caracalla was fighting the
Parthians in 216 which was a Sabbatical Year.
Rabbi Janni, a contemporary of Judah haNasi, ruled that it was
permissible for the Jews of Palestine to grow crops during the Sabbatical Year
so that they could pay these taxes. He
made it clear that this was a special exemption and in no way was intended as
an abrogation of the Sabbatical Year.
426: Emperors
Theodosius II and Valentinian III decree that Jewish parents and grandparents
cannot disinherit any children and grandchildren who convert to Christianity. This was designed to enhance the spread of
Christianity since under the decree those who converted to other religions
could be disinherited.
1094(19th of Nisan):
Mathematician and astronomer Rabbi Isaac ben Baruch Albalia, author of “Kuppat
ha-Rochlin, passed away.
http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/112370/jewish/Rabbi-Yitzchak-Ben-Baruch-Albalia.htm
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/Albalia.html
1139: Roger II of Sicily is excommunicated. Roger
may have had his problems with Innocent II, but for a monarch of his time, the
Jews benefited from his rule. Roger
allowed the Jews to be tried under their own legal system; the same privilege
that he had extended to his Greek and Saracen subjects. One of his close advisors was known to be
sympathetic to the Jews going so far as to visit their synagogues and to donate
money for the support of the community.
Finally, Roger brought a significant contingent of Greek Jews to
Palermo, the capital of Sicily, who were supposed to tend silk-worms in an
attempt to develop the silk trade.
1484: Local farmers
of Arles, France, led by the town's monks attacked the Jewish section of the
town. A number of people were killed, and 50 men were forced to accept
Christianity.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/vjw/Arles.html
1492: Forty-three-year-0ld Lorenzo de’Medici around whose court included
Abraham ben Mordecai Farissol, “the Jewish-Italian geographer, cosmographer
scribe and polemicist” passed away today.
1559: “Dominican monks distributed inflammatory pamphlets in Cremona,
Italy, urging the populace to kill the Jews.” (As reported by Abraham P. Bloch)
1594: The two acting groups, Sussex’s Men and Elizabeth’s Men, performed
the “Jew of Malta” today.
1582: Today, Giles
Fletcher, the Eton and Cambridge educated “poet, diplomat and MP” who while
serving as the English “minister of Musovy claimed to have discovered the Ten
Lost Tribes among the Tartars” and his wife Joan had their son Phineas baptized
today.
1661: Today, Henrque
de Caceres who had been living in England for approximately the last fifteen
years and Benjamin de Caceres “petition the king to permit them to live and
trade in Barbados and Suriname.
1730: In New York,
the (first) Mill Street Synagogue which is known as Shearith Israel was
consecrated. It was the first structure designed and built to be a synagogue in
continental North America. During the time the congregation was at Mill Street,
the Sephardic leadership worried it might become Ashkenazic. The compromise
within the Jewish community was they agreed the president of the congregation
would be Ashkenazi, while the services would remain under the traditional
Spanish and Portuguese rite, under the guise of a Sephardic chazzan. It is now
known as the Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue. One of its most famous
leaders was Gershom Menes Seixas, a patriot during the Revolution, who had to
leave when the British took the city. A 1744 visitor noted that congregation's women "of whom some were
very pretty, stood up in the gallery like a hen coop."
1744(7th
of Iyar, 5504): Today, in South Carolina, “the Charles-Town, one of the Government’s
Gallies, having sailed over the Bar to convoy a Sloop, met with a sudden Gale
of Wind, overset and sunk, 10 men were drowned, and among them was Mr. Hart the
Jew.”
1754(16th
of Nisan, 5514): Second Day of Pesach
1754: As Jews munched on their matzah, a, party
of French soldiers continued its march to stop the English from building a fort
at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers (modern day
Pittsburgh) which would lead to the battle in May in which George Washington
led the British forces and which is considered by historians to being the start
of the French and Indian War.
1762(15th of Nisan, 5522): Pesach
1768(21st of Nisan, 5528): Seventh
Day of Pesach
1768:Haham Moses Cohen d'Azevedo, the Amsterdam born
son of Daniel David Cohen d'Azevedo and Sara Cohen d'Azevedo and his wife and
Sara de Haham Moses Cohen D'Azevedo gave birth to Abigail Dias and wife of and the wife of Isaac Haim de Abraham de Jacob Dias with whom she had six
Children
1769(1st of Nisan, 5529): Parashat
Tazria; Rosh Chodesh Nisan; Shabbat HaChodesh
1769: As the Jews greet the month in which they
celebrate their freedom from bondage, the Inquisition continues to find fresh
ground to grow as two parties of Spaniards continue their march across “Alta
Califrona” where they are to build forts and missions.
1772: Ester Alvares
and Bordeaux native Daniel Nones gave birth to Leah Nones
1773(15th
of Nisan, 5633): Pesach
1773: Raphael Hayyim
Isaac Carregal, the native of Palestine who was reported to be the first
ordained Rabbi to visit the colonies that would become the United States was
described by Ezra Stiles as wearing "a high Fur Cap, exactly like a
Woman’s Muff, and about 9 or 10 Inches high, the Aperture atop was closed with
green cloth" at Passover services today.
1774: Jitte
Glückstadt, an unmarried Jewish woman in Altona, had her last will and
testament recorded today.
1775(8th
of Nisan, 5535): Parashat Metzora; Shabbat HaGadol
1775: In Savannah,
GA, Judith Polock and Philip Minis who were married in 1774 at Newport, RI,
gave birth to Abigail Minis.
1779(22nd
of Nisan, 5539) Eighth Day of Pesach is observed while the French and Americans
are conducting negotiations with Spain that will, in four days, lead to the
signing of a secret treaty that will make all three of them allies in the war
with Great Britain.
1780(3rd
of Nisan, 5540) Parashat Tazria
1780: Today, during
the American Revolution, General Schuyler wrote to Alexander Hamilton, who was
thought to be Jewish because his mother was Rachel Levine and because he went
to a Jewish school since he had never been baptized, about a variety of
subjects including the general’s prediction that the war would be over with the
year.
1790: According to
some sources, birthdate of Ruth Luzzatto, who gained fame as “Rachel Morpurgo:
Queen of the Hebrew Sonnet.”
http://www.mishpacha.com/Browse/Article/1435/Rachel-Morpurgo-Queen-of-the-Hebrew-Sonnet
1792(16th
of Nisan, 5552): Second Day of Pesach
1797(12th
of Nissan, 5557) Parashat Tzav; Shabbat HaGadol
1797: Birthdate of
Hesekias Stern, the son of Levy Stern and husband of Guthel Adler with whom he
had two children – Jette and Rebecca Stern.
1798: Miriam Levy and
London native Samuel Hyams who settled in Louisana gave birth to Moses
Kosciusko Hyams who passed away in Pointe Coupee, a Parish near Baton Rouge,
LA.
1801: Soldiers rioted and killed 128 Jews in
Bucharest.
1803(16th
of Nisan, 5563): Second day of Pesach; first day of the Omer
1805: Birthdate of
London native Mathilda Simmonds, the wife of Jacob Daniel Levy with whom she had
eleven children, the first three of whom were born in London and the last eight
of which were born in New York City.
1806(20th
of Nisan, 5566): Sixth Day of Pesach observed that Lewis and Clark wrote about
the violent winds they encountered at Dalton Point, OR.
1811(14th
of Nisan, 5571): Ta’anit Bechorot; erev Pesach
1817(22nd of Nisan, 5577): 8th day of
Pesach observed on the same day that Thomas Jefferson wrote to James Monroe
congratulating him on ascending the Presidency of the United States three days
earlier.
1819: A traveler who
stopped in Joannina (Yanina), Greece acknowledged the following:
"In going out of the village this morning, soon after the sun rose, we
passed a Turk, richly dressed, sitting upon a carpet, under a fig tree just
budding…I know of no European habit of life so picturesque, as the Eastern one.
Greek, Turk, and Hebrew enjoy nearly an equal protection."
1830(15th
of Nisan, 5590): Pesach
1833(19th
of Nisan, 5593): Fifth Day of Pesach
1836(21st
of Nisan, 5596): Seventh Day of Pesach
1841: In London,
Rachel and Joseph Rosinbloom, both of whom were natives of Poland, gave birth
to Harriet Rosinbloom.
1843(8th
of Nisan, 5603): Parashat Metzora; Shabbat HaGadol celebrated as The Great
Comet continues, which is now only visible in the Southern Hemisphere,
continues to move away from the earth.
1844(19th
of Nisan, 5604): Fifth Day of Pesach observed for the last time during the
Presidency of John Tyler.
1845(1st
of Nisan, 5605): Rosh Chodesh
1845(1st
of Nisan, 5605): Solomon Rosenthal, the younger son of Naftali Rosenthal -one
of the most important leaders of Hungarian Jewry- who was “active in Haskalah
and Jewish culture life” passed away today in Pest.
1847(22nd
of Nisan, 5607): Eighth Day of Pesach
1847: Birthdate of
Karl Wittegenstein, the Austrian steel tycoon who was often compared to his
friend Andrew Carnegie. Like so many 18th
European Jews, Wittegenstein converted.
For him Vienna was apparently well worth a Mass.
1848(5th
of Nisan, 5608) Parashat Tazria
1851:
Abraham Abrahamsohn arrived in San Francisco.
A baker by trade, Abrahamsohn had left his wife and children in
Pomerania (Germany) to seek his fortune in America. On his first day in San Francisco, he “set up
a canvas-roofed store” on the Long Wharf” where he made $85 in one day. After several exciting years, Abrahamson
returned to Germany where he published Interesting Accounts of the Travels
of Abraham Abrahamsohn to America and Especially to the Gold Mines of
California and Australia in 1856.
1853:
One day after he had passed away, 9 month old John Hart, the “infant son of
Aaron Hart” and Rebecca Crawcour was buried today in the Lauriston Road Jewish
Cemetery.
1855:
Birthdate of Amsterdam native William Philip de Jongh who settled in London
some time before his death three months before his twentieth birthday.
1856:
Birthdate of New York native, composer and theatrical manger Rudolph Aaronson.
https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/1811-aronson-rudolph27
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1919/02/06/106359373.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0
1857:
Birthdate of Albany native Henry Emanuel Stern, “a senior member of the law
firm of Stern and Hirschfeld” and a “former City Court judge.”
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1937/09/26/96749391.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0
1857:
In New York City, Rabbi Simon Brenner and Caroline Alexander gave birth to
Jacob Brenner, the product of the Brooklyn public schools and Chairman of the
Executive Committee of the Kings County Republican Committee who served as a
city magistrate in New York City, Commissioner of Jurors of Kings County, NY
and President of Temple Beth-Elhoim and was the husband of Louise Blumeanu,
“the daughter of real estate developer of Levi Blumenau.
1859:
In San Francisco, Regina Wasserman and August Wasserman, the native of Munich
and graduate of the University of Munich who came to San Francisco in 1849
where he founded the Alaska Commercial Company gave birth to New York Stock
Exchange member Edward Wasserman the founder of Wasserman Brothers York
stockbroker, husband of Emma Seligman, with whom he had three children – Jesse,
Renee and Edward Jr. – and son-in-law of financier Jesse Seligman.
1860(16th
of Nisan, 5620): Second Day of Pesach; First Day of the Omer
1860:
Count István Széchenyi who organized the National Casino, which when it reached
minority nationalities including Jews which “contributed to national divisions
in Hungary’s ethnically diverse population” passed away today.
1863(19th
of Nisan, 5623): 5th Day of Pesach
1863:
Birthdate of Jules Huret who authored Sarah
Bernhardt, a biography of the famous Jewish performer
https://archive.org/details/sarahbernhardt00rapegoog
1867:
Rabbi Joseph Perles, the Munich born on of Ethelka and Rabbi Baruch Asher
Perles and his wife Rosalie Perles gave birth to Dr. Max Perles.
1868(16th
of Nisan, 5628): Second Day of Pesach3
1868:
Birthdate of Paul Bornstein, the native of Berlin where he earned his Ph.D. and
published and edited numerous works, the most important of which “was an encyclopedic
review of achievements in every sphere of activity and thought in Germany
during the nineteenth century.”
1869:
Jacob Bibo, an orphan who was the brother of Isaac R. Bibo and who had been
working for a pawnbroker in the Bowery after leaving the Hebrew Orphan Asylum
“went out on the Bowery to meet some other boys of his own aged” tonight “and
has never been seen or heard of by any of his friends or relatives since.”
1871: In Buffalo, NY, Samuel and Marie Weil
Desbecker gave birth to Louis Eugene Desbecker
1872:
In Hungary, Edward and Johanna (Neulander) Roth gave birth to NYU trained
physician Henry Roth, the husband of Rebecca Low who was the consulting
physician at Rockaway Beach Hospitial and clinical professor of surgery at
Fordham University Medical School who was “author of numerous articles on
surgical subjects” and a member of Temple Rodoph Sholom.
1873:Sir Julius Vogel
begins serving his first term as Prime Minister of New Zealand. Vogel was the first practicing Jew to hold
this position.
1873:
In Minsk, Gute Lubalin and Mayer David Zvirin gave birth to NYU Law School
graduate and journalist Nathan Zvirin the husband of Ida Levine and starting in
1921 a practicing attorney who had previously worked as a writer for the
Forward, assistant city editor of the Jewish Daily News and editor of the
Bronx-Harlem Press while serving as a vice president of the Jewish National Workers
Alliance of America and vice president of the National Advisory Council of
HIAS.
1875:
In Syracuse, NY, Solomon Silverstein and Esther Shevelson gave birth to Albert
Silverstein the Yale graduate, “the assistant professor Orthopedic Surgery at
the Denver and Gross College of Medicine” who served in the medical department
of the United States Army…during the Spanish-American War and the Filipino
Insurrection.”
1876(14th
of Nissan, 5636):“Passover:
The Jewish Feast of Unleavened Bread” published today stated that “this evening
will be marked by the peculiar ceremonies incident to the Jewish festival of
"Pesach" or Passover. This festival, which is also known as the
"feast of unleavened bread," continues for eight days, and, with the
exception of the New-Year feast and the Day of Atonement, is more generally
observed than any of the very numerous festal days in the Hebraic calendar.”
1876:
In Amsterdam, Karel Abraham Wertheim and Henriette van Heikelom gave birth to
Gustav Abraham Wertheim van Heukelom
1877:
Two days after she had passed away, 84 year old Katherine Van Noorden, the wife
of Moses Ezekiel Van Noorden with whom she had had ten children was buried
today at the “Brompton (Fulham Road) Jewish Cemetery.”
1879(15th
of Nisan, 5639): Pesach
1879(15th of Nisan, 5639): In New York, Rabbi Frederick
De Sola Mendes delivered the sermon at Shaarai Tefilla, Rabbi Henry S. Jacobs
delivered the sermon at B’nai Jeshurun and Rabbi H.P. Mendes delivered the
sermon at Shearith Israel.
1880(27th of Nisan, 5640): Eight
days before his 35th birthday, Solomon Brachman passed away today
after which he was buried at the Hills of Eternity of Memorial Park in Colma,
CA.
1880: Birthdate of Minsk native Leopold Dubov,
“the founder and first executive director of the Jewish Braille Institute of
America who was blind since the age of six and raised on son, Mark, with his
wife Regina.
1884: The Turkish government issed a
proclamation today “forbidding the immigration of Jews of any nationality,
except for pilgrims who were restricted to a stay of thirty days.”
1884: In New York, German native Marks Arnheim
and Fannie Arnheim gave birth to Minnie Z. Arnheim.
1885: In New Haven, CT, Helen Bretzfelder and
Isaac L. Kleiner the Yale educated biochemist and husband of Alma Kempner who
was a pioneer in the field of insulin.
1887(14th of Nisan, 5647): Ta’anit
Bechorot; erev Pesach
1887(14th
of Nisan, 5647): Rabbi Gustav Gottheill led the well-attended Passover eve
services at Temple Emanu-El in New York City.
1887:
Prince Ferdinand of Bulgaria was “among the mourners at Lucien Hirsch’s
funeral” which was held today.
1887:
Birthdate of Walter Supper, the native of Hamm who refused to divorce his
Jewish his wife which ended his successful career as a screenwriter,
1887(14th
of Nisan, 5647): “The Feast of the Passover” published today stated that “the
celebration of Pesach, or the Passover, will begin at sunset this evening. The feature of the celebration is the
substitution of the matzoth or unleavened cakes for bread…”
1888:
The tenth annual meeting of the Hebrew Orphan Asylum Society of Brooklyn was
held today
1888:
As of today there were 57 boys and 20 girls living at the Hebrew Orphan Asylum
in Brooklyn.
1890:
Among the victims of a riot by 8,000 unemployed workers in Vienna were the
several shops owned by Jews which were plundered by the mob.
1890:
Twenty-eight-year-old Julius Rosenwald, the Springfield, IL born son of Samuel
and Augusta Rosenwald, the future president of clothing manufacturers Rosenwald
and Weil and Vice President and Treasurer of Sears, Roebuck and Company married
Augusta Nusbaum today in Chicago.
1891:
In Australia, Sir John Monash, who would lead the Aussies during World War I,
married Hannah Victoria Moss. Their only child, Bertha, would be born 2 years
later in 1893.
1891:
John Duncan is the architect for the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society’s
building now being built by Lynd Brothers. The new building will be 66 feet
wide and 125 feet and will enable the society to double its capacity from 400
t0 800 orphans. The $90,000 cost will be
covered by raised by board members and prominent supports including Philip J.
Joachimsen, the founder of the society and Moses Lauterbach, Chairman of the
Advisory Board.
1891:
U.S.N. Lt. Jonathan M. Emanuel, the native of England and current resident of
Philadelphia retired today having served at sea for 15 years and 3 months.
1891:
It was reported today that the self-inflicted gunshot wounds have proven to be
fatal in the case of Siegfried Lewisohn, 28-year-old German Jewish cheese
importer who fired two bullets into his left breast after having grown
despondent over the death of his wife.
1892:
In the “Persecuted Jew” published today, a writer using the nom de plume
“American Girl” expresses her belief that we can do more for the Jews whom she
describes as persecuted outcast than answer “their call for bread” and calls
upon the press to help right the wrongs done against these people.
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=FB0810F9355515738DDDA10894DC405B8285F0D3
1892:
In Leopoldstadt, Vienna, Samuel Neutra, the “proprietor of a metal foundry” and
Elizabeth “Betty” Glaser Neutra gave birth to “Austrian-American architect
Richard Joseph Neutra.
http://www.transatlanticperspectives.org/entry.php?rec=28
1892:
During today’s lecture on Jerusalem and the Holy land, John L. Stoddard
displayed a large, rare photographic collection that included views of Jaffa
and Jerusalem not seen by most Americans.
1892:
Birthdate of Austrian native Michael Blaustein who moved to London sometime
before his death in 1918.
1893(22nd
of Nisan, 5653): 8th day of Pesach
1893:
Birthdate of Ft. Wayne, Indiana native Samuel James Pearlman the graduate of
the University of Chicago and Rush Medical College, the ear, nose and throat
specialists who practiced in Chicago after serving in the Army during WW I both
a Camp Grant and the U.S.A. base hospital at Sarenay, France.
1893:
Karl Luger, a deputy in the Austrian parliament addressed an anti-Semitic rally
in Vienna tonight “at which the Jews were violently denounced.”
1893:
Cardinal Herbert Alfred Vaughn was appointed Archbishop of Westminster.
According to Lawrence Jeffrey Epstein, once when Vaughn was having lunch with
Dr, Hermann Adler, the Chief Rabbi of the British Empire, he asked "Now,
Dr. Adler, when may I have the pleasure of helping you to some ham?" The
rabbi responded: "At Your Eminence's wedding".
1895:
Birthdate of Barney Gorodetsky who gained fame as comedian Bert Gordon known as
“the Mad Russian.”
1895:
“A package of clothing addressed to the United Hebrew Charities” was sold for
$23 at today unclaimed parcels auction held by the American Express. It was the highest price paid for any of the
unclaimed items.
1895 (14th of Nisan, 5655): “The Feast of the
Passover” published today describes the current status of the observance of
Pesach. “The celebration of Pesach…will
be begun by the Jewish people throughout the world this evening…Those of the Jewish
community who still cling to the orthodox observances of the Hebraic ritual
continue the celebration of the festival for eight day, the first two and last
two days of that period being observed as strict holy days. Those who have accepted the modern or reform
ritual celebrate only the first and the last day of the festival.”
1896: Lewis May, President of Temple Emanu El
has sent “a communication” the Union Veteran Hebrew Association offering the
use of the city’s synagogues for memorial services. Among those planning for the Memorial Day
celebration are Isaac Eckstein, Isaac J. Siskin and Otto Lassner.
1896: A committee of the New York State Board
of Charities that has been investigating the Ladies’ Deborah Nursery and Child
Protectory submitted its report this afternoon.
1896: “Jews In Our Wars” published today
provided a detailed review of The American Jew As A Patriot, Soldier and
Citizen, a book written to counter the claims of anti-Semites had shirked
their role as soldiers in the United States.
1896: “Scenes in the Orient” published a review
of A Cruise Under the Crescent a travel book that includes descriptions
of visits to Jerusalem, by Charles Warren Stoddard in which the author “tells
of that vexation all travelers feel as the authenticity of the shrines in
Palestine”
1897(6th of Nisan, 5657): Eighty-two-year-old Hungarian
rabbi and Talmudic scholar Samuel Low Brill passed away.
1897: Birthday of Zhovka native Sir Hersh
Lauterpacht, “a member of the United Nations' International Law Commission from
1952 to 1954 and a Judge of the International Court of Justice from 1955 to
1960.”
1897: Karl Lueger, the anti-Semitic politician,
began his services as Mayor of Vienna. Historians do not agree as to the depth
of Lueger’s anti-Semitism. Some,
including Amos Elon contend it was more of a political ruse designed to garner
votes and power.
1897: Birthdate of Jo Swerling, the native of
Berdichev who grew up on the Lower East Side and became a leading lyricist and
writer.
1897: In an article
describing the Jewish observance of the Blessing of the New Sun, the New York
Times reports that synagogue records “show that the new sun service has been
conducted by orthodox Hebrews in this country at intervals of twenty-eight years
for 180 years.”
1898(16th
of Nisan, 5658): Second Day of Pesach
1898: Birthdate of E Y "Yip"
Harburg. Born Isidore Hochberg, to Orthodox Jewish parents on New York's
lower east side, Harburg appears to have enjoyed a reasonably happy childhood
with his parents exposing to him art, literature and the Yiddish theatre.
After trying his hand at everything from journalism to selling appliances,
Hochberg began a successful career as a lyricist during the depths of the Great
Depression. His first financial and artistic angel was Ira
Gershwin. Harburg wrote the words to the Depression hit "Brother Can
You Spare A Dime." While you may not know his name, anybody who has
seen the Wizard of Oz, has heard several Harburg hits. Harburg's career
disintegrated during the Red Scare of the 1950's. He died in an
automobile accident in 1961.
1899: “The Young
Folks’ League of the Hebrew Infant Asylum” is scheduled to “give its fourth
annual amateur performance” this “evening at the Lexington Opera House.”
1899: The
approximately 10,000 members of various trade unions who were taking part in
the Socialist and Organized Labor Day Parade paused at Greene Street and
Washington Place, and stood in front of the ruins of the Asch Building where
145 people many of them young Jews lost their lives in the recent Triangle
Shirtwaist Factory Fire.
1899: A review
published today of The Bible and Its Transmission by Dr. W.A. Coplinger
which is an historical and bibliographical view of the Hebrew and Greek texts,
notes that it contains illustrations from the first printed portion of the
Hebrew Bible which was completed in 1447 in Bologna
1899: Benjamin
Weinstein and official of the Hebrew Trades Union was among the speakers who
addressed those participating in the Socialist Labor Day Parade.
1900: Birthdate of
Gavriel Mullokandov, the native of Samarkand who was regarded by some “as the
greatest Bukharian Jewish singer and musician.”
1901(19th
of Nisan. 5661): Fifth Day of Pesach
1901: As Harriman and
Hill fought for control of the Union
Pacific, the Great Northern, the Great Northern and Burlington Railroad,
following yesterday’s contentious meeting Schiff, Harriman and Hill, Jacob
Schiff wrote a letter to his long-time friend James Hill expressing his desire
to continue their friendship regardless of the outcome of the business deals
relating to control of a major block of the American railway system.
1901: In Sommerville,
TN, Louis and Hattie Lipsky gave birth to Dr. Merrill David Lipsky, the surgeon
and member of the NYU faculty who was married to Judith Doniger.
1901(19th
of Nisan, 5661): Forty-nine-year-old I.H. Goldblatt who resided at 154 Attorney
Street passed away today
1902: In Pensacola,
FL, Solomon and Nettie Kahn gave birth to Tulane alum and retail grocer Lewis
Kenneth Cahn, the husband of Eulalie Turer and the father of Leah Kahn.
1902: Birthdate of
Josef Alois Krips the Austrian conductor and violinist who left his homeland
during the Nazi period because his father’s Jewish would have precluded him
from pursuing his career (and might have led to an eventual trip to a
concentration camp.)
1903: Birthdate of Boston native and Harvard trained
geologist Arnold Hoffman, the mining engineer and President of the Mesabi Iron
Company whose brother David died during WW I and who was married to the former
Patricia McGreevy with whom he had a two children, Michael and Jacqueline.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1962/08/26/90578021.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0
1903: “A Servian Coup
D’Etat “published today described King Alexander’s moves to undermine the
Serbian Constitution which would lead to his assassination in June of 1903
which would lead to the assassination in 1914 that started the flow of blood,
including Jewish blood that did not stop until the end of the Holocaust.
1904(23rd
of Nisan, 5664): In Frankfort-on-Main, author Chaim M. Horowitz passed away.
1905(3rd
of Nisan, 5665): Parashat Tazria
1905(3rd
of Nisan, 5665): Seventy-seven-year-old Philadelphian Barnett Phillips, the son
of London native Isaac Phillips and husband of Sarah Moss who was a banker,
member of the Philadelphia City Council and founder of the American Jewish
Historical Society passed away today.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1905/04/09/101324100.pdf
1906(11th
of Nisan, 5666): Solomon Marks, the London born son of “Elizabeth and George
Joel Marks” and the husband of Benvenida “Welcome” Marks passed away today in
the United Kingdom.
1907: A meeting of
the Executive Committee of the Federation of American Zionist was held this
evening in New York where the attendees discussed “the finances of the
Federation and the upcoming convention at Tannersville.
1908: Harvard
University votes to establish the Harvard Business School. Among its Jewish
graduates are Donna Dubinksy, Gabi Ashkenazi, Len Blavatnik, Michael Bloomberg,
Stephen Allen Schwarzman and Robert Kraft.
1908:
The Passover Relief Association of Harlem distributed 2,000 pounds of Matzah,
300 pounds of coffee and other items necessary to celebrate the upcoming
holiday of Passover to the needy east side Jews today.
1909:
“A special dispatch received” in St. Petersburg “from Pyatigorsk, a town in
Ciscaucasia said the that he Governor…has issued orders that Jews are to be
denied admission to the heal restorts in the Caucasus during the coming season”
and that “Jewish musicians are barred from playing in Government Orchestras.
1910:
In New York City Saul Henry Ganz, a native of Junction City, KS and Ruth Ganz
gave birth to Paul Henry Ganz.
1910: Large Jewish
owned mercantile houses in Salonika announce 1% of all cash takings will go
toward the cost of new Turkish warships.
1911: In St. Paul,
MN, Russian immigrants Elias Calvin and Rose Herwitz gave birth to Nobel Prize
Winner Melvin Ellis Calvin.
http://www2.lbl.gov/Science-Articles/Archive/Melvin-Calvin-obit.html
https://www.nytimes.com/1997/01/10/us/melvin-calvin-dies-at-85-biochemist-won-nobel-prize.html
1911: In the Bronx,
Morris Kaplan a candy store owner who worked as a textile cutter and his wife
gave birth to Judge Benjamin Kaplan, “who as an Army officer helped craft the
indictment of the Nazi war criminals who were tried at Nuremberg, and who later
became a Harvard law professor and served nine years on the Massachusetts
Supreme Judicial Court.” (As reported by Bruce Weber)
1912(21st
of Nisan, 5672) Seventh Day of Pesach
1912(21st
of Nisan, 5672): Sixty-four-year-old Andrew Sachs, the Baltimore born son of
Helena and William Saks and founder of Saks Fifth Avenue who was the husband of
Jennie
Rohr with who he had two sons William and Horace who “sold a majority interest
in Saks & Company to Gimbel Brothers, Inc. for $8 million which included
Saks & Company's $4.5 million flagship store that was under construction”
and a daughter Leila Saks Myer who survived the sinking of the RMS Titanic but
whose husband Edgar J. Meyer did not, passed away today in New York City.
1912: A Congressman
from Missouri introduced a bill today supported by Jewish and other charitable
organizations that would create “a special board of inquiry to examine those
aliens who have failed to pass the tests imposed by immigration officials.
1913: Twenty-nine-old
Rabbi Samuel Buchler, the Budapest born son of Morris and Fanny (Reiner)
Buchler and chaplain at Sing Sing Priso who served as deputy attorney general
for the State of New York who was disbarred after having been charged with
grand larceny for taking money from clients and then not performing the
promised services married Ida Frost today.
1913: Today, Dr.
David Monash married Edith Mayer, the daughter of Ida Mayer at her home at 3814
Grand Blvd.
1914: In the Bronx,
William Popper, the Vienna born son of Johanna and Herman Joseph Popper and his
wife “Annie Popper” gave birth to Herman Popper.
1915(24th
of Nisan, 5675): Sixty-five-year-old New York William Gans who had been a
partner with fellow attorney Samuel B. Hamburger for 35 years and who was
active in numerous Jewish charities and fraternal organizations including the
Maimonides Library of which he was President, passed away today.
1916: As of today, The Special Million Dollar Fund of the American Jewish
Relief Committee “is nearing the $4,000,000 mark.”
1917(16th of Nisan, 5677): Second Day of Pesach as the United
States gears up to fight in World War I.
1917: Dr. Felix Adler delivered a talk on “The National Crisis” today in
which he expressed his “disagreement with the pacifists and upheld the
country’s right to enter the war” as long as American did not lose “their
horror of war and fought with a sense of shame that the state of the world was
such they had to fight.”
1917: “The Jewish League of American Patriots announced that Samuel
Untermyer, head of the league” will be going to Washington, D.C. “to confer
with the Secretary of War.”
1917: The Jewish League of American Patriots “sent a request to the Park
Department” in New York City, “for the use of Seward Park and Jackson Park for
drilling grounds.”
1917: “Ambassador Gerard spoke for a few minutes” today “at a fair and
concert at the Star Casino” which was being held to “raise $5,000 for Jewish
war sufferers at Warsaw” and “said he had made arrangements before leaving
Switzerland for continuation of the transmission of funds to Jewish victims of
the war in Poland.”
1917: Today, Herbert S. Goldstein announced “his resignation as Associate
Rabbi Congregation Kehilath Jesharun at 117 East Eighty-Fifth Street.
1917: Sir Mark Sykes
wrote to the British Foreign Secretary, Lord Balfour, “That the French were
hostile to the notion of bringing the United States into Palestine as a patron
of Zionism.”
1917: Chaim Weizmann
cabled Louis Brandeis, advising that "an expression of opinion coming from
yourself, and perhaps other gentlemen connected with the Government in favor of
a Jewish Palestine under a British protectorate would greatly strengthen our
hands."
1918: The Immigration
Restriction League was instrumental in getting Congress to consider a
legislation that was designed to reduce the number of immigrants coming from
Southern Eastern Europe including the large number of Russian and Romanian Jews
whose co-religionists had been finding refuge in the United States since the
1880’s.
1918: University of
Cincinnati grad and HUC trained rabbi,Henry Joseph Berkowtiz the Philadelphia
born son of Clara Landman and Albert Berkowitz married Claire Henle who in 1925
became the spiritual leader of Temple B’nai Jehudah in Kansas City, MO.
1918: During World War I, Charlie Chaplin led a group of
Hollywood stars in selling war bonds on the streets of New York City’s
financial district.
1919: According to a message received in Copenhagen today
from the Press Bureau, “the German national government will not recognize the
new Soviet Republic of Bavaria” whose leaders included Ernst Toller.
1920(20th of Nisan, 5680): The Sixth Day of
Pesach
1920: After days of Arab rioting, Jews in Jerusalem are able
to observe a day of the holiday in peace.
1921: A dispatch today from Jerusalem said, that following a
conference between Winston Churchill, the Minister for the Colonies and Nahun
Sokolow, Chairman of the Zionist World Executive Committee, it was announced
that “the Zionist organization will support a number of Jewish regiments in
Palestine in order to relieve the British administration of some of its
financial obligations.”
1922(10th of Nisan, 5682): Parashat Tzav
1922(10th of Nisan, 5682): Seventy-one-year-old
Fanny A. Amberg Hart, the daughter of Moses and Sophia Neumann Amberg, the wife
of Sidney A. Hart and the mother of Moses and Walter Hart passed away today
after which she was buried at the Woodmere Cemetery in Detroit, Michigan.
1923(22nd
of Nisan, 5683): 8th day of Pesach observed for the last time during
the Presidency of Warren Harding who would die in office in August of 1923.
1924:
The first meeting of new Construction Fund Committee which is taking over the
worked carried out by the American Joint Distribution Committee is scheduled to
take place in London today.
1924: The
London Times correspondent reported from Jerusalem that “the work of the
Jewish Palestine Exploration Society in the ancient cemeteries to the east of
Jerusalem has made interesting progress during the past month” and that “the
cleaning up of the so-called tomb of Absalom and the tomb of St. James – which
Jewish tradition believes to be the leper house of King Azariah but which
proves to be the burial place of the Jewish priestly family of Khezer – has
been completed and various small adjacent rock tombs have been cleared of the
rubbish accumulated during the last 2,000 years.”
1925(14th
of Nisan, 5685): Fast of the First Born; Erev Pesach
1925: In
New York, Temple Emanu-El held a Seder for its members “under the auspices of
the Women’s Auxiliary of which Mrs. Jacob Wertheim is President and Mrs.
William Cowen is chairman 1926: “Mrs. Abram I. Elkus, Chairman of the Women’s
Division in the United Jewish Campaign in New York to raise $500,000 of the
city’s $6,000,000 quota fro relief and rehabilitation of Jews in Eastern Europe
announced” today “that Mrs. Alfred E. Smith, the wife of the Governor and Mrs.
James. J. Walker, wife of the Mayor, would in association with Mrs. Jacob H.
Schiff as honorary chairman of the Women’s Division in” New York City.
1925: CCNY
and Columbia educated chemist, Dr. Harry Langman, the chief statistician of the
Ocean Accident and Guarantee Corporation and the New York born son of Eva Lifflander
and Max Langman married Rebecca Javitz today.
1926: On the north
side of Chicago, Carl and Bessie Greenfield gave birth to Fred Sheldon Greenfield
who gained fame as
comedian Shecky Greene.
1927: “Bishop Dunn
Praises Work In Palestine” published today described the views of “The Right
Reverend John J. Dunn, Bishop Auxiliary of the Diocese of New York who had just
returned to the United States who “spoke with enthusiasm of the improvements brought
about” in Palestine “by the Zionists” and said “it is impossible to say enough
for the work done there” under the leadership of Nathan Straus which will
“within ten years” make “Palestine…one of the most thriving sections of the
world.
1928: In Manhattan, Anna
Evelyn (née Gritz) and Harry Ebb the lyricist best known for his work with
composer John Kander which gave the world the long-running Broadway musical
“Cabaret.”
1929: In Tel Aviv,
Sir John Chancellor, the High Commissioner to Palestine, presided over the
opening of the fourth Palestine and Near East exhibition.
1930: Mickey Cohen
fought his first professional bout in Cleveland, Ohio
1930: During a visit
to Palestine where he is gathering material for a novel based on Jacob and
Joseph, Nobel Prize winning author Thomas Mann compared Zionism “in its ideals
and purposes to the Romantic movement among the Germans in the 19th
century.” Mann was especially impressed
by the Jews of Tel Aviv who seemed “freer and happier” than Jews living
elsewhere. “He believes that Tel Aviv
has a bright future because of the wide-awakeness and intellectuality of its
people.”
1931(21st
of Nisan, 5691): Seventh Day of Pesach
1931: Publication of
“When Judge Cardozo Writes” by Felix Frankfurter, a case of one future Jewish
Supreme Court Justice writing about another future Jewish Supreme Court
Justice.
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/politics/when-judge-cardozo-writes
1932: It was reported
today that Supreme Court Justice Alfred Frankenthaler has “reserved decision on
the application to have a receiver appointed for the New York State asses of
the New York United Hotels, Inc.
1932: In Frankenburg,
Germany, Paula and Walter Jacobson gave birth writer and painter Ruth Jacobse
who survived the Holocaust by being hidden by Christian families in the
Netherlands after which she was reunited with her parents who committed suicide
and who came to the United States where she began her career as a “textile
designer and film projectionist.
https://www.lbi.org/collections/ruth-jacobsen/
https://archives.cjh.org/repositories/5/resources/20060
1933: Ludwig Kaas met
Vice Chancellor Von Papen who was on his to offer a Reichskonkordat to the
Vatican met on the train to Rome
1933: The Nazi German
Student Association “drafted it twelve ‘theses’ which attacked ‘Jewish intellectualism’”
and which claimed they were “a response to a worldwide Jewish smear campaign
against Germany.”
1934: “A threat to
organize Jewish householders of New York into a one-night-a-week boycott of
gas, electric and telephone service unless public utilities abandon alleged
discrimination against Jews at their employment office were made today by
attorney Samuel Leibowitz.”
1935: Birthdate of
Broadway lyricist Fred Ebb. Along with
John Kinder he created numerous musicals including Chicago and Cabaret.
1935: “Sanders of the
River” produced by Alexander Korda and directed by Zoltán Korda, who received
“the first of his four nominations for Best Film at the Venice Film Festival”
for this effort was released today in the United Kingdom.
1935: Congressional
legislation created the Works Progress Administration, which developed millions
of jobs for the unemployed. WPA agencies placed 8.5 million Americans on the
federal payroll, including hundreds of Yiddish actors, writers, scene designers
and theater directors hired for the administration’s Federal Theatre Project. Among
those directly employed by the WPA was economist Solomon Adler.
1936(16th of Nisan, 5696): 2nd day of
Pesach; 1st day of the Omer
1936(16th of Nisan,
5696):Robert Bárány, who won the Noble Prize for Medicine
in 1914, passed away.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/barany.html
1936: “A total world
Jewish population of 16, 240,000 of whom 5,000,000 or 30 percent live in the
Americas was reported to by the Jewish Scientific Institute.”
1936: “A feature of
Reich Bishop Ludwig Mueller’s Germanization of Christ’s Sermon on the Mount is
the elimination of all references to Jerusalem, King Solomon, Pharisees and
scribes, laws and prophets and the Ten Commandments as made in the Gospel according
to Mathew” because “these references were held to be Jewish and therefore to be
rejected.”
1936: It was reported
today that effective April 12, Easter Sunday, “all Jewish school children from
6 to 14 years of age must leave public schools.”
1936: For the second
day in a row Mr. and Mrs. Joseph L. Buttenweiser opened their home to the
public where visitors paid a dollar to view their art collection with the
proceeds going to the fund being raised in the United States to settle Jewish
refugees from Europe in Palestine.
1937:
Birthdate of Seymour Hersh. A graduate of the University
of Chicago, Hersh is a Pulitzer Award winning reporter for the
New York Times.
1937: The
Palestine Post reported from London that there was some concern among
members of the House of Commons over rumors of the possibility that the Royal
(Peel) Commission on Palestine might propose partition. Col. J.C. Wedgwood, MP,
declared that the proposed partition of Palestine into a Jewish and an Arab
state meant "the scuttling of British responsibilities under the
Mandate."
1938: In Laupheim, Germany as the Nazis tightened
the economic noose around the neck of the Jews, “the Jewish cattle traders were
allocated a separate part on the weekly cattle market
1938: It was reported today that Louis Blaustein, a
leader in the oil industry whose estate was valued at $1,500,884 left a half
million dollars for “charitable foundation to be known as the Louis and
Henrietta Blaustein Foundation” and left the rest of the estate to his wife
Henrietta, a son Jacob and two daughters, Ruth and Fanny.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1938/04/08/96812661.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0
1939(19th of Nisan, 5699): Shabbat Shel
Pesach
1939(19th of Nisan, 5699): Erhard Mayer
who had “been elected chairman of the administrative board of the Zionist
Organization” in New Orleans in 1930 passed away today.
1939: In Philadelphia, PA, Margaret Doris Bruck and
Albert H. Schart gave birth to Trina Schart Hyman, artist and book illustrator
who won the Caldecott Medal in 1985.
1939: In Hungary, “the First Jewish Bill was tabled
today about a month after the annexation of Austria.”
1940: Soviet troops began the massacre of what
would finally total 26,000 Polish officers in Katyn Forest near Smolensk,
Russia. Many Jews were among the victims.
1940: Just weeks after the end of the Winter War in
which the Soviet Union successfully attacked and defeated Finland in New York,
the Consul General of Finland and the President of Manischewitz attended a
ceremony where it was announced that the company was donating 5,000 pounds of
unleavened bread that is being shipped to the little country’s Jewish
population just in time for the observance of Passover.
1940: At 1:00 pm today FDR had lunch with New York
Governor Herbert H. Lehman at Hyde Park.
1941: According to some sources the Nazis
established Kielce (Poland) ghetto today. Others report that the ghetto was
actually established on March 31, 1941. Regardless, there is no conflict
that the ghetto was liquidated in August, 1942 when 21,000 Jews were
sent to Treblinka. A remnant was shipped to Auschwitz in August
of 1944. Kielce's real claim to fame is that on July 4, 1946, the
returning Jews were subjected to "an old-fashioned Nazi Pogrom"
complete with tales of the blood libel.
1942: Two year old Eldad Davidovics was deported
from Brno to Terezin today.
1942: The Crimean Peninsula was declared Juednfrei
or Jew Free. When the Nazis and their allies took the Crimea (part of the
Soviet Union) in October of 1941, the Jewish population numbered between fifty
and sixty thousand. The Einsatzgruppen Units (special squads assigned to
murder Jews) with the help of the local population took part in what was to
date, the worst "ethnic cleansing" of the war.
1942:Nora Kaye's performance as Hagar in the world
premiere of "Pillar of Fire" at the Ballet Theatre established her as
one of the world's prima ballerinas.
1943(3rd of Nisan, 5703):Itamar Ben-Avi the son of Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, who revived Hebrew as a
modern language, passed away while working as journalist in New York City. (For
more see Itamar Ben-Avi by Frederick P. Miller)
1943(3rd of Nisan, 5703): The Nazis began executing
Jews near Ternopol in the Ukraine. By
the time they finish on the following day, one thousand Jews will have been
murdered. One thousand Jews are executed near Ternopol, Ukraine.
1943: In Buffalo, NY, Helen Ternoff who was Jewish
and her husband Salvatore DiFiglia who was not gave birth to Michael Bennett
DiFiglia who gained fame as seven-time Tony Award winning choreographer Michael
Bennett.
http://www.nytimes.com/1987/09/30/arts/from-friends-and-associates-a-tribute-to-michael-bennett.html
1944(15th of Nisan, 5704): Pesach
1944: The Jewish Agency telegraphed from Istanbul to
Jerusalem that the steamship Maritza carrying 244 Jewish refugees from Romania
had arrived that day in the Turkish port and that the passenger would be
leaving in two days’ time by train for Palestine.
1945: At Buchenwald at noon Polish engineer Gwidon Damazyn, an inmate since March 1941, and
Russian prisoner Konstantin Ivanovich Leonov sent the Morse code message
prepared by leaders of the prisoners' underground resistance.
1945: Hans von Dohnányi, who would be recognized as
one of the Righteous Among the Nations, was executed today at Sachsenhausen
concentration camp for his role in resistance to Hitler.
This included smuggling Jews out of Germany, seeing
to it that their funds were transferred to where they could access them and for
his role in the plot to kill Hitler.
1945: Betty Warner and Milton Sperling gave birth to
their second child Karen who was one of the granddaughters of Harry Warner.
1945: On the night before he was hung by the Nazis,
along with General Hans Oster and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Admiral
Wilhelm Canaris “tapped out a coded message on the wall of his cell on the
night before his execution, in which he denied he was a traitor and said he
acted out of duty to his country
1946: Golda Meir, a leader of the Jewish Agency
received the following telegram. “We are
1100 Jewish refugees. We sailed from
Spezia for Palestine-our last hope.
Police arrested us on board. We
won’t leave the ship! We demand
permission to continue to Eretz-Israel Be warned: we will sink with the ship if we are not
allowed to continue to Palestine, because we cannot be more desperate.”
1946: Margaret and Hans Rey (the creator of Curious
George) became United States Citizens. [Louise Borden has written a cute,
fascinating tale about the Rey’s entitled “The Journey That Saved Curious
George”.
1947: Henry
Ford, the creator of the Model-T passed away.
Ford may have had his moments as an industrialist, but he proved to be a
notorious anti-Semite. Among other
things, he published and disseminated untold numbers of copies of the Protocols
of the Elders of Zion. Ford actually
believed this notorious fabrication. His
later apology was treated with various degrees of belief and disbelief. For several decades, there were many Jews who
would not by a Ford product.
1948: In New York, about 1,500 large concern in the
garment and needle trades industries closed shop at 4 P.M. to per employees to
part in” “the special services of prayer and intercession for Palestine” being
held in temples and synagogues throughout the city.
1948: “Rabbi Irving Miller, chairman of the administrative
council of the Zionist Organization of America “denounced the arms embargo that
forbids the shipment of weapons to the Jewish people in Palestine” while
“speaking at the Congregation Sons of Israel at Woodmere, Long Island.
1949: “Again” a popular song with music by Lionel
Newman which had been recorded by Mel Tormé reached the Billboard magazine Best Seller chart today and lasted 15 weeks on
the chart, peaking at #11
1949: Mel Tormé
recording of “Blue Moon” by Rogers and Hart reached the Best Seller chart today
where it lasted for five weeks.
1950(21st
of Nisan, 5710): Seventh Day of Pesach and Shabbat
1950: In Tel Aviv,
Australian Jack Harper won the singles title of Israel’s International Open
Tennis Tournament.
1950: After 380
performances the curtain came down on the original Broadway production of “Miss
Liberty” directed my Moss Hart and choreographed by Jerome Robbins
1950: As the condition of the Jews in Iraq worsened,
today, "the Zionist organization in Iraq call on all Iraqi Jews who wished
to do so to register for emigration” to Israel. The plight of the Jews of this
ancient community had become so desperate that within three weeks "47,000
Jews" would present "themselves at registration centers in the main
synagogues. They did so despite the fact that they had to sign a
declaration renouncing their Iraqi citizenship forever and effectively
surrendering most of their property and goods.
1951(2nd of Nisan, 5711): Sixty-eight-year-old
Chicago native Harry Salinger, the Jenner Medical College trained physician who
pursued a career a banking which led him to be Vice President of the First
National Bank of Chicago who married Ciel Gruneweald after the death of his
first wife Rae Davis passed away today.
1952: It was reported today that Hungarian born author
and playwright Ferenc Molnar had died intestate and that his third wife Lili
Darvas Monar and his daughter Martha were seeking to be recognized as the heirs
to his estate.
1952: The Jerusalem Post reported from The
Hague that reparations talks were suspended after Germany found only a
$750m.justification for the joint Jewish-Israeli claim for $1,000m. Later
Germany expressed surprise at the Israeli claim that the talks were suspended.
The Israeli delegation reported that it had found the German statement
completely unsatisfactory and that it would report fully to the Israeli
government for consideration, review and decision.
1952: The Jerusalem Post reported that The IDF
graduated 600 cadets of all services, the largest number ever trained to become
officers
1953: Sixteen-year-old
J. David Bleich walked outside of his father’s synagogue in Lewiston, PA where
he joined congregants in Birkat Hachmah, Blessing the Sun.
1955(16th
of Nisan, 5715): Second day of Pesach; first day of the Omer
1955(16th
of Nisan, 5715): Eighty-five-year-old Mathilde Fanta, the Czech born daughter
of Julie and Josef Kahn and the wife Emile Fanta, the Doctor of Jurisprudence
passed away today in Brooklyn, NY.
1956(27th of
Nisan, 5716): Seventy-five-year-old “Jacob M. Pincus board chairman of Pincus Brothers,
Inc, the Philadelphia clothing manufacturers” which has retail outlets in
several cities including Pittsburgh and Detroit passed away today at “his winter
home in Miami Beach.”
1956(27th
of Nisan, 5716): Sixty-seven-year-old Lithuanian native Zee (Wolf) Gold who
served as a rabbi for congregations in Chicago, San Francisco and New York
passed away today.
http://yleksikon.blogspot.com/2015/05/zeev-wolf-gold.html
1957: Four years
after opening on Broadway with the help of Anna Sakolow, “Camino Rea”l opened
in London today.
1957(7th
of Nisan, 5717): Eighty-eight-year-old NYU and Oskaloosa College (IA) alum
Rabbi Adolph Spiegel the Galicia born son of Mathias and Sarah Leah (Fassberg)
Spiegel and the husband of Anna Krebs whose quarter of a century of as rabbi included
serving as a chaplain during the Spanish American War during which he “started
the first Jewish Congregation in Puerto Rico” passed away today.
1958(18th
of Nisan, 5718): Fourth Day of Pesach
1958(18th
of Nisan, 5718: Seventy-six-year-old Cornell University trained drama critic
and magazine editor George Jean Nathan the Fort Wayne, IN born son of Ella
Nirdlinger and Charles Naret Nathan, the co-founder of The American Mercury and
The American Spectator who was the husband of Jule Haydon passed away
today.
1959: Paul Newman and
Joanne Woodward gave birth to Elinor Teresa “Nell” Newman who run’s “Newman’s
Own Organics.”
1960: “Wake Me When
It’s Over” directed and produced by Mervyn LeRoy and co-starring Dick Shawn was
released in the United States today.
1961(22nd
of Nisan, 5721): Eighth Day of Pesach and Shabbat
1961: In Sheffield,
UK, South African-born psychiatrist Professor Issy Pilowsky and his wife Marl
gave birth to Lyn Sara Pilowsky who followed in her father’s footsteps and
became a doctor of psychiatry.
http://www.theguardian.com/news/2007/sep/20/guardianobituaries.health
1962: Governor Ralph
M Paiewonsky of the Virgin Islands and son of Jewish Lithuanian immigrants who
had settled in the Danish West Indies of expressed gratification today over the
message President Kenney sent to Congress recommending that the islands get the
right to elect their own Governor.”
1962(4th
of Nisan, 5722): Lwow native and University of Lemberg trained doctor of
jurisprudence Dr. Adolf Berger, the author of the Encyclopedic Dictionary of
Roman Law and lecturer on Roman Law at the University Berlin who “came to the
United States in WW II, joined the Ecole Libre es Hautes Etude as a Professor
of Roman Law” and joined the faculty of CCNY in 1922 where he served until his
death ten years later passed away today.
https://www.abaa.org/book/63120617
https://www.jstor.org/stable/25776413
1963(14th
of Nisan, 5723): Ta’anit Bechorot and Erev Pesach
1963(14th
of Nisan, 5723): Rayle Schupper, the former head of the Women’s Division of the
American Jewish Committee who as “a member of its foreign affairs department
attended the founding meeting of the United Nations in San Francisco in 1945”
and “helped to establish the European Office of the American Jewish Committee
Paris” passed away today at her home on 61st in Manhattan.
1963: “Harry
Weinberg, lead of the group that won control of the Fifth Avenue Coach Lines in
1962as ousted as chairman of the board today by some of his former associates.
1964: “The Strangler”
produced by Samuel Bischoff was released in the United States today.
1965(6th
of Nisan, 5725): Sixty-seven-year-old Manitoba native and U. CA. trained
attorney Henry Joseph Sapper, the social worker with the YMHA and the Jewish
Commission for Personal Service passed away today in Oakland, CA.
https://oac.cdlib.org/search?style=oac4;titlesAZ=h;idT=UCb239063090
1966(18th
of Nisan, 5726): Fourth Day of Pesach
1966(18th
of Nisan, 5726): Attorney Jacob Gilbert, the husband of the former Susan
Brandeis who was his law partner with whom he had three children – Louis, Alice
and Frank -- and the son-in-law of Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis and who
along with his wife Susan Brandeis Gilbert was deeply committed to the founding
of Brandeis University passed away today.
1966: Al Davis became
Commissioner of the American Football League today.
1966: At a time when
theologians such as Richard Rubenstein were questioning the role of God in a
post-Holocaust world, Time magazine published its famous “Death of God” issue
today.
1967(27th
of Adar II 5727): Parashat Tazria; Shabbat HaCodesh
1968(10th of Nisan, 5728): Sixty-nine
year old Bialystok
native Jacob Perlman who came to the United States in 1912, earned all three of
his college degrees at the University of Wisconsin and went on to become a
world class economist while raising two children with “his wife, the former
Helen Aronson” passed away today.
1968: In the
aftermath of the riots that followed the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther
King, Jr. Larry Rosen, the owner of Smith’s Pharmacy in Washington, D.C.
returned to find his family-owned business gutted by looters.
1969(20th
of Nisan, 5729): Fifth Day of Pesach
1969: The Montreal
Expos Baseball team, which were owned by Charles Bronfman from the team's
formation in 1968 until 1990, beat the Mets at Shea Stadium in the team’s first
game.
1970: During “The War
Of Attrition” while carrying out a bombing mission that struck an “Egyptian
military target west of the Suez Canal, the IAF mistakenly hit a school at Bahr
el-Baqar killing 46 school children and injuring another fifty.
1970: “Entertaining
Mr. Sloane,” a comedy filmed by cinematographer Wolfgang Suschitzky was
released in the United Kingdom today
1970: “Cry for Us
All” directed by Albert Marre with music by Mitch Leigh opened on Broadway at
the Broadhurst Theatre.
1971(12th
of Nisan, 5731): Eighty-eight-year-old Norman Bentwich “a British barrister,”
committed Zionist, who “was the British-appointed attorney-general of Mandatory
Palestine” passed away today.
1971: San Francisco
Giants pitcher Steve Stone appeared in his first major league baseball game.
1972(24th
of Nisan, 5732): Parashat Shmini
1972(24th
of Nisan, 5732): Eighty-three year old Benjamin Sivitz (Binyamin ben Harav
Moshe Shimon), the son of Rabbi Moses Simon Sivitz and Maita Banke Sivitz ,the
brother of Sam Sivitz and the father of Florence and Sanford Sivitz passed away
today in Pittsburgh after which he was buried at the Shaare Torah Cemetery in
Whitehall, PA.
1974(16th
of Nisan, 5734): Second Day of Pesach
1974(16th
of Nisan, 5734): Eighty-five-year-old Columbian trained hematologist Dr. Lester
Unger “who head the Blood and Plasma Exchange Bank” passed away today in New
York.
1974(16th
of Nisan, 5734): Sixty-four-year-old Chicago born Illinois graduate and Dr. of
Ophthalmology passed away today in Palm Springs, CA.
1975(27th
of Nisan, 5735): Yom HaShoah
1977: The Jerusalem Post reported that Prime Minister
Yitzhak Rabin had resigned from his post and said that he would not lead the
Labor Party into the May elections. Rabin took this decision in the wake of new
revelations concerning the illegal bank account he and his wife Leah held in a
US bank. Defense Minister Shimon Peres was expected to be nominated as the
Labor Party's candidate for premiership. (Author’s note: During the
promising days of the Oslo Accords, many forgot that Rabin had been Prime Minister
once before. He was forced out of office over a financial scandal
stemming from his days as Ambassador to the United States. This
seemingly minor matter not only sidetracked his career, it opened the way for
the first victory of the Likud Party.)
1977: The Jerusalem Post reported that
Tel Aviv Maccabi won the European basketball championship in a thrilling
victory, 78-77, over Mobilgirgi of Varese, Italy.
1980(22nd
of Nisan, 5740): 8th day of Pesach
1980(22nd
of Nisan, 5740): Fifty year old Vanderbilt University Phi Beta Kappa graduate
Peter Farb, the linguist and author of such books as Man’s Rise to
Civilization and Word Play: What Happens People Talk, the New York
City born son of Solomon and Cecilia Farb and the husband of the former Oriole Horch with whom he had two
sons – Mark and Thomas – passed away today.
https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1980/04/09/111149566.pdf
1981: Rabbi J. David
Bleich, a professor at Yeshiva University, climbed to the roof a converted
brownstone that doubled as a small synagogue on the Upper East Side of
Manhattan to lead the service Birkat Hachamah.
1981(4th
of Nisan 5741): Eighty-four-year-old Duquoin, IL native and Washington
University trained attorney Milton Tucker, a veteran of WW I and a director of
the Jewish Federation St. Louis, MO passed way today.
1982(15th
of Nisan, 5742): Pesach
1982: According to
his notebook, Daniel
Shechtman, made his break through discovery while studying a metal mix of
aluminum and manganese. Shechtman, a professor of materials science at Technion
went on to win the Noble Prize for Chemistry.
1984: At the Kane Street Synagogue in Brooklyn,
Rabbi Jonathan Ginsburg officiated at the wedding of Legal Aid Yale trained
attorney Laura Ellen Potter and Morton David Cahn 2d, the New England
Conservatory of Music grad turned “computer consultant.”
1984: CBS broadcast the first episode of the
miniseries “George Washington” co-starring Stephen Macht as “General Benedict
Arnold.”
1985(17th of Nisan, 5745): Third Day
of Pesach
1985: “Leader of the Pack,” a musical with
lyrics and music by Ellie Greenwich and co-starring Dinah Manoff which New York
Times reviewer called “an embarrassment” opened on Broadway at the Ambassador
Theatre.
1986(28th of Adar II, 5746): Lithuanian
born American Labor activist Pauline Newman who as a child work at the infamous
Triangle Shirtwaist Factory and “the first woman general organizer of the
International Ladies Garment Worker, who should not be confused with the
American jurist with same name, passed away today.
1986: The funeral for Yiddish actor Pesach
Burstein is scheduled to be held today at Riverside Memorial Chapel.
http://www.nytimes.com/1986/04/08/obituaries/pesach-burnstein-yiddish-star-dies.html
1988: “18 Again!” a comedy co-starring George
Burns and Red Buttons and featuring Pauly Shore was released today in the
United States.
1989: After having been diagnosed with liver
cancer, Dahn Ben-Amotz“held a farewell party
at the "Hamam" club in Jaffa, to which he invited 150 acquaintances”
including “Amos Keinan (a former rival), Amos Oz, Meir Shalev, Gila Almagor,
Yaakov Agmon, Shlomo Artzi, Yosef Lapid, Yehudit Ravitz and Nurit Galron” after
which “he made a trip to the US, to say goodbye to his children from his first
marriage.
1991: Michael Landon
announced he has inoperable cancer of the pancreas.
1991: Jerome Apt was
one of two astronauts who “made the first scheduled EVA since Mission STS-61-B
in November 1985.”
1991: “I Hate Hamlet”
written by Paul Rudnick premiered at the Walter Kerr Theatre today.
1993: Eli
Ben-Menachem became Deputy Minister of Housing and Construction.
1994:Pope John Paul II
welcomed the Chief Rabbi of Rome to the Vatican today as guest of honor at a
concert to honor the memory of the victims of the Holocaust.
1994: “Leprechaun 2”
a slasher film directed by Rodman Flender was released in the United States
today.
1995: A staged
concert of “Anyone Can Whistle, a musical with a book by Arthur Laurents and
music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim” “was held at Carnegie Hall in New York
City as a benefit for the Gay Men's Health Crisis that “was recorded by
Columbia Records, preserving for the first-time musical passages and numbers
not included on the original Broadway cast recording.”
1996(19th of Nisan,
5756):Argentine film director León Klimovsky passed away.
“A trained dentist, born in Buenos Aires on October 16, 1906, his real passion
was always the cinema. He pioneered Argentine cultural movement known as
cineclub and financed the first movie theater to show art movies. He also
founded Argentina's first film club in 1929. After participating as
scriptwriter and assistant director of 1944's Se abre el abismo he filmed his
first movie, an adaptation of Fyodor Dostoyevsky's The Player. From this first
phase, it can be also highlighted the adaptations of Alexandre Dumas' The Count
of Monte Cristo and Ernesto Sabato's The Tunnel. On the 1950s Klimovsky settled
in Spain, where he becomes a "professional" director. He went into
spaghetti westerns and so-called exploitation films, filming in Mexico, Italy
and Egypt. Perhaps he is best remembered for his contribution to Spain's horror
film genre, beginning with La noche de Walpurgis. León Klimovsky confessed to
have always dreamt of doing great vanguard movies but ended on filming
commercial ones, but without remorse, as doing cinema was a vocational mandate
for him. On 1995 he won the "Honor Award" of the Spanish Film
Director Association. He died in Madrid of a heart attack. He was brother to
the Argentine mathematician and philosopher Gregorio Klimovsky.”
2000: “Israel Plans a
Test for Wagner” published today described plans for an upcoming concert by the
Israel Orchestra of Rishon Lezion which will include Richard Wagner’s
“Siegfried Idyll.”
2001(15th
of Nisan, 5761): American Jews observe the first Pesach under President George
Bush.
2001: The New York
Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special
interest to Jewish readers including “Spontaneous Mind: Selected Interviews,
1958-1996” by Allen Ginsberg; edited by David Carter, “Neighbors: The
Destruction of the Jewish Community in Jedwabne, Poland” by Jan T. Gross and
“After Progress: American Social Reform and European Socialism in the Twentieth
Century” by Norman Birnbaum.
2002: Prime Minister
Ariel Sharon conveyed the goals to the Knesset as being "to catch and
arrest terrorists and, primarily, their dispatchers and those who finance and
support them; to confiscate weapons intended to be used against Israeli
citizens; to expose and destroy facilities and explosives, laboratories,
weapons production factories and secret installations. The orders are clear:
target and paralyze anyone who takes up weapons and tries to oppose our troops,
resists them or endangers them - and to avoid harming the civilian
population."
2002(26th
of Nisan, 5762): During Operation Defensive Shield “St.-Sgt. Matanya Robinson,
21, of Kibbutz Tirat Zvi, and Sgt. Shmuel Weiss, 19, of Kiryat Arba were killed
by terrorist in Jenin
2002:Efraim "Effi” Eitamwas appointed Minister without Portfolio
2002:“Just after the conclusion of Passover, United Jewish Communities, a
national group of 160 Jewish federations, announced a special Israel emergency
fund. The organization has already collected $100 million.
2003(6th of Nisan,
5763): Eighty-eight-year-old Franz Rosenthal, the Sterling professor emeritus
of Arabic at Yale, passed away today.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/20/nyregion/franz-rosenthal-88-interpreter-and-scholar.html
2004: Three days
after he had passed away funeral services are scheduled to be held for Abraham
Altus, the husband of Lillian AltusZ”L and “esteemed member” of The
Hewlett-East Rockaway Jewish Center at the Boulevard Riverside Chapels.
2005: “Defense
Minister Shaul Mofaz said that Israel should consider not demolishing the
evacuated buildings in the Gaza Strip, with the exception of synagogues (due to
fears of their potential desecration, which eventually did occur), since it
would be more costly and time consuming. This contrasted with the original plan
by the Prime Minister to demolish all vacated buildings.”
2005:The alphabetic ordering of leaders during the funeral of Pope John Paul
II resulted in Moshe Katsav sitting near Iranian President Mohammad Khatami
who, like Katsav, was born in the Iranian city of Yazd
2006: Observance of
Shabbat Hagadol.
2006: Harvard grad
and Marine Corps veteran Joel David Kaplan began serving was White House Deputy
Chief of Staff for Policy today.
2006: Haaretz reported that Algeria, Israel and Morocco have agreed
to join NATO counter-terrorism naval patrols in the Mediterranean, the
organization. The announcement was made in Rabat after the NATO group’s first
meeting in an Arab country.
2007: At The Jewish Museum of Maryland an exhibition styled “The Other
Promised Land: Vacationing, Identity, and the Jewish - American Dream” closes.
This exhibition, the first of its kind in the U.S., evokes
the experiences and meanings in Jewish vacationing from the 1880s to the
present. The Other Promised Land highlights legendary "Jewish"
vacation destinations including Miami Beach, Atlantic City, and the
Catskills -- showing how vacations represented the excitement and promise of
America while shaping notions of Jewish and American identities.
A full-color, book-length catalog accompanies the exhibition.
2007: The Sunday Washington Post book section
featured a review of The Grand Surprise:
The Journals of Leo Lerman written by Leo Lerman and edited by Stephen
Pascal and My Holocaust by Tova Reich, “a shocking novel rips those who
trivialize the Holocaust.”
2007: The New York
Times reviewed books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish
readers including “The Polish Woman” by Eva Meker “a meticulous, raw study of
the uneasy relationship between Catholic and Jewish Poles. In New York in 1967,
Karolina Staszek, a Polish immigrant, becomes consumed with the suspicion that
she is a Jew who had been placed with a Catholic family during World War II.
The Jewish family in question, the Landaus, find the story seductive but
improbable — until Karolina reveals a battery of memories unlikely to be the
invention of even the canniest con artist. Told without artifice or irony,
Mekler’s story of multigenerational immigration owes more to coolly composed
novels like Lore Segal’s “Her First American” than to impressive acts of literary
contortion like Nicole Krauss’s “History of Love.” Despite its literary
trappings, “The Polish Woman” is also a straightforward mystery, littered with
clues, red herrings and narrators who always know less than the reader. When
Karolina first confides in Philip Landau, he suddenly recalls the warning of
his parents, who escaped Poland: “The Poles were the worst, they’d declared
over and over, with the pain and bitterness of personal betrayal, the worst.”
When the two eventually travel to Poland to prove Karolina’s claim, they are
also chasing these brief flashes of recognition, which tell the story of their
shared past better than a tattered birth certificate — and explain why they
have both become phantoms in their own lives. By the time the ending veers into
John Grisham territory, Mekler has already transcended plot in favor of
uncompromising examination.”
2008(3rd
of Nisan, 5768): Eighty-five-year-old Bible scholar David Noel Freedman passed
away. (As reported by Barry Jagoda)
http://ucsdnews.ucsd.edu/archive/newsrel/general/04-08FreedmanObit.asp
2008(3rd
of Nisan, 5768): Thirty-two-year-old Major Mark Rosenberg was today,
in Baghdad when his vehicle was struck by a makeshift bomb. (As reported by Maia Efrem)
Read more: http://www.forward.com/articles/135331/profiles-of-our-fallen/#ixzz1rOSSPxsW
2008: The Foreign Affairs Symposium at Johns Hopkins
University hosts a lecture by Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz
co-author of “The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq
Conflict”, at the university's Homewood Campus in Baltimore, Md.
2008: Standing up
to the Madness: Ordinary Heroes in Extraordinary Times by Amy and David
Goodman was published today.
2008: Today, schools from kindergarten through 12th grade
participate in a nationwide Home Front drill simulating a surprise missile
attack during which a warning siren will sound for a minute and a half.
2008: Publication of the paperback edition of A Tragic
Legacy by Glenn Greenwald.
2008: “Rothko Kin Sue to Transfer His Remains” published today describes the
dispute over attempts to move the body of Mark Rothko, the Jewish abstract
expressionist.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/08/arts/design/08roth.html?pagewanted=all
2009: In “A Bread Line (Unleavened, Please) for Passover”
published today, Alison Cowan described the baking of matzo in 19th
century New York as well as the distribution of this Pesach necessity to the
city’s Poor.
2009: Birkat Hachamah
– Blessing The Sun (once every 28 years)
2009: At 6:22 a.m. this
morning the sun will peak over the imposing 800-million-year-old mountains of
Edom, bathing the Arava Valley below in light, and triggering one of the rarest
and least-known Jewish rituals: Birkat Hahama, the Blessing of the Sun, is
celebrated every 28 years in Jewish communities around the world, across the
spectrum of Jewish observance
2009 (14th
of Nissan 5769): Anniversary of the
Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
2009(14th
of Nissan, 5769: Fast of the First Born; In the evening, first Seder
2010: David Remnick
appeared on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart where he promoted “The Bridge,” his
biography of Barak Obama.
2010: An exhibition
entitled “Painting to Remember: The Destroyed Synagogues of Germany by
Alexander Dettmar” sponsored by the Leo Baeck Institute is scheduled to open
tonight.
2010:A Qassam rocket fired by Palestinian militants today hit an open area
along the coast of Ashkelon..
2010: Paul Goldberger
delivered the keynote address “Preservation: Where Do We Go From Here?” at the
Indiana State Preservation Conference.
2010: A month after
previews had begun at the Lunt-Fontaine Theater, “The Addams Family” with music
and lyrics by Andrew Lippa and a book by Marshall Brickman with Bebe Neuwirth
as “Morticia” and Jackie Hoffman as “Grandma Addams” officially opened tonight
on Broadway.
2011: “The biggest
sports event in Israel” is scheduled to take place today with the running of
the Tel Aviv Marathon.
2011:Esterika Gourmet
Cuisine and Larry & Mindy are scheduled to celebrate the end of winter and
coming of spring with a culinary and musical Kabbalat Shabbat in Jerusalem.
2011(14th of Nisan, 2011): Fast of the
First Born
2011(14th of Nisan, 2011): Hedda Sterne, “an
artist whose association with the Abstract Expressionists became fixed forever
when she appeared prominently in a now-famous 1951 Life magazine photograph of
the movement’s leading lights” passed away today at the age of 100. (As reported by William Grimes)
2011(14th of Nisan, 2011): Sixty-six-year-oldEddie Phillips, a
successful liquor industry entrepreneur and the son of classic advice columnist
Dear Abby, (aka Pauline Phillips), died at home in Minneapolis today. Phillips
was active as a philanthropist, expanding the Phillips Family Foundation of
Minnesota started by his grandfather and pouring money into community needs,
African-American heritage and medical research, including engineering a $10
million donation for research into Alzheimer’s at the Mayo Clinic after his
mother contracted the ailment.
http://tcbmag.com/news/articles/2011/mn-businessman-edward-phillips-dies-at-66
2011(4th
of Nisan): On the Jewish calendar,
Yahrzeit of the 77 civilian doctors, nurses and other medical workers who were
murdered by Arab attackers as they drove to Hadassah Hospital on Mt. Scopus in
Jerusalem.
2011:Four additional rockets were fired at Ashkelon today and three were
intercepted by the Iron Dome defense system, the IDF announced, adding that it
had bombed the terror cell that had fired the rockets, identifying a direct hit.
2011:Today marks the 100th birthday of French-language aphorist Emil Cioran,
and the celebrations in Paris include the publication of “Cioran: Mystical
Short Prayers,” a philosophical appreciation by Stéphane Barsacq from Les
Éditions du Seuil. A colloquium, “Cioran: Jubilatory Pessimism,” was held at
this year’s Paris Book Fair.
2011: In an air strike
that was executed this afternoon, IAF jets bombed smuggling tunnels in Rafah.
Palestinian sources reported that a fire broke out in the area, and postulate
that the bomb hit a pipeline through which fuel was being smuggled.
2012: The New York Times featured reviews of
books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including ‘No
Time Like the Present’ by Nadine Gordimer.
2012(16th
of Nisan): Second Day of Pesach; first day of the Omer
2013(28th
of Nisan, 5773): Yom Hashoah
2013(28th
of Nisan, 5773): Fifty-one-year-old Greg Kramer passed away.
2013: The
Yiddishspiel Theater is scheduled to hold a ceremony to mark 70 years since the
Warsaw Ghetto Uprising on the morning of Yom Hashoah, with actors reading and
telling about the days prior to the rebellion
2013: The Mediatheque
Theater in Holon is scheduled toperform Gila Almagor’s autobiographical play,
“Summer of Aviya,” about a summer in the life of child of survivors, during the
early days of statehood.
2013: “50 Children:
The Rescue Mission of Mr. and Mrs. Kraus,” is scheduled to be aired this
evening. on HBO.
2013: Much of Israel
stood still for two minutes this morning in memory of the six million Jews who
were killed during the Holocaust.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-stops-to-remember-6-million-killed-in-shoah/
2013: IDF Chief of Staff Benny Gantz led today’s
March of the Living ceremonies at Auschwitz-Birkenau, along with Tel Aviv’s
Chief Rabbi Israel Meir Lau, himself a child survivor of the camp.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/march-of-the-living-sets-out/
2014:
“Israeli superstar” is scheduled to deliver “an intimate piano performance at
the Edmond J. Safra Hall at the Museum of Jewish Heritage.
2014:
“An 18-year-old Jewish student in Gothenburg spoke out about anti-Semitic abuse
in her high school, reading aloud the slurs she’s received on social media,
including “Go gas yourselves, you Jew bastards,” and death threats from
classmates. “I have been in hell,” she tells a local TV station. “I feel bad,
can’t sleep, and have nightmares.” (As reported by Yair Rosenberg)
2014:
“Zaytoun” is scheduled to be shown at the JCC Rockland International Jewish
Film Festival.
2014:
“Ida” and “Eagles” are scheduled to be shown at the Westchester Jewish Film
Festival.
2014:Holocaust
Survivor, Cesare Frustaci whose appearance is sponsored by the Thaler Holocaust
Memorial Fund is scheduled to speak at Kirkwood Community College and Mt. Mercy
University in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
2015:
Holocaust survivor Henry Greenbaum is scheduled to speak about his experiences
at United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.
2015(19th
of Nisan, 5775): Fifth Day of Pesach
2015(19th
of Nisan, 5775): Ninety-eight-year-old Jean-Louis Crémieux-Brilhac the director
of Free French propaganda broadcast from Britain during WW II, passed away
today.
2015:
The Westchester Jewish Film Festival is scheduled to open at the Jacob Burns
Film Center.
2015:
A small plane erupted into flames before takeoff at the Ben Gurion
International Airport today. The plane was scheduled to take off for Russia at
noon. The six passengers aboard the aircraft escaped without injuries.
2015:
“An IDF soldier was stabbed in the neck and seriously injured near the West Bank
settlement of Shiloh today, and a second was stabbed and lightly injured.”
http://www.timesofisrael.com/idf-soldier-stabbed-in-west-bank-attacker-shot/
2016(10th
of Nisan): “According to the Book of Joshua the Israelites crossed the Jordan
River into the Promised Land today ending their 40 years of wandering in the
desert.”
2016(10th
of Nisan, 5776): Israelis are scheduled to observe the first ever Aliyah Day, “an
official day of national celebration in which Jewish immigration to Israel is
honored and noteworthy immigrants are recognized for their contributions to the
nation
2016: In Asheville, at Congregation Beth HaTephila,Rabbi David
Ellenson, chancellor emeritus of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of
Religion in Cincinnati, Ohio, will reflect on “A Time to Pause and Remember, A
Time to Celebrate and Look Ahead — Reflections on a 125th Anniversary," at
7:30 p.m. today.
2016: “Raise the Roof” and “Bulgarian Rhapsody” are scheduled to
be shown at the Northern Virginia Jewish Film Festival.
2016: “Tamar Ettun and The Moving Company” are scheduled to
perform in Bryant Park.
2016(29th of Adar II, 5776): Seventy-nine-year-old Charles S.
Hirsch the “September 11 Coroner” passed away today. (As reported by Sam
Roberts)
2016: “Youth” is scheduled to be shown at the Westchester Jewish
Film Festival.
2017: The first Charlotte Jewish Playwriting Contest is
scheduled to take place at the JCC in Charlotte, NC.
2017(12th of Nisan, 5777): Shabbat Hagadol;
2018: The reception marking the official opening of “City of Numinous
Light” featuring “the urban impressionism of Lawrence Kushner is scheduled to
take place this afternoon in the Isaacs Gallery at the Osher Marin JCC in San
Rafael.
2018: In Des Moines, IA, Tifereth Israel is scheduled to host
the “Community-wide Holocaust Remembrance Program” this afternoon
2018: The New York Times
published reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to
Jewish readers including The Common Good by Robert B. Reich, Russian
Roulette: The Inside Story of Putin’s War on America and the Election of Donald
Trump by Michael Isikoff and David Corn, Never Remember: Searching for
Stalin’s Gulags in Putin’s Russia by Masha Gessen with photographs by Misha
Friedman and The Female Persuasion by Meg Wolitzer.
2019: The Yeshiva University Museum and the YIVO Institute for
Jewish Research are scheduled to present “literature scholar Ruth Wisse on a
Yiddish-language tour of Lost & Found, exploring the remarkable story of a
pre-war family photo album that was owned by a woman (Wisse’s aunt) who was
deported from the Kovno Ghetto in 1943.”
2019” The Temple Emanu-El Streicker Center hosted screening of
“Three Identical Strangers.”
2019: The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum is scheduled
to host “The Unwanted: America, Auschwitz, and a Village Caught in Between.”
https://www.ushmm.org/online-calendar/event/maunwantedppgdc0419
2019: The Skirball Center is scheduled to host the first session
of Dr. Diane Sharon’s “Other Gods Before Me: Ancient Near Eastern Myths and the
Evolution of the God of Israel.”
2019: The Jerusalem Arts Festival is scheduled to come to a
close this evening.
2019: The London School of Jewish Studies is scheduled to host
“The Four Daughters of Seder Night” with Rabbi Dr. Raphael Zarum.
2019: In “How Gold’s Horseradish Came to Be a Passover Staple”
published today Joan Nathan provides background on the “chrain that on your
best tablecloth leaves a stain.”
2019: The Center for Jewish History is scheduled to present an
evening of conversation with Robert Alter, author of The Hebrew Bible: A
Translation with Commentary and The Art of Bible Translation.https://books.wwnorton.com/books/detail.aspx?ID=4294996777 and https://press.princeton.edu/titles/13444.html
2019:
As most Israelis wait to go to the Polls and vote tomorrow, ballots have
already been cast by Israeli military personnel thanks to the 643 ballot boxes
that were set up for this purposed by the Central Elections Committee.
2020(14th
of Nisan, 5780): Ta’anit Bechorot; Erev Pesach;
2020(14th
of Nisan, 5780): Yahrzeit of Rabbi Chaim Heller
https://www.yu.edu/riets/about/mission-history/historic-roshei/chaim-heller
2020:
The Chabad Jewish Center of Petaluma, CA is scheduled to host “A Seder Warmup”
on Zoom where participants can “set up our Seders together, talk about the
Passover story, the four questions, and more.”
2020:
Among the many venues offering virtual Seders, Congregation Shir Hadash in Los
Gatos, CA is scheduled to host a “Don’t Be Alone Seder Night” during which Rabbi
Melanie Aron and Cantor Devorah Felder-Levy will lead a Zoom Seder using the Haggadah
“A Different Night.”
2020:
Due to the Pandemic, “Israelis will not be permitted to leave their houses this
evening, the night of the Passover Seder, from 6 p.m. until 7 a.m. the
following day, April 9/ (As reported by Mary Oster.)
2020(26th
of Nisan, 5781): Yom Hashoah
2021:
In one of those “calendar coincides,” at the same time that Yom Hashoah is
being observed, “Two of Germany’s top athletics officials are advocating a
joint Berlin-Tel Aviv bid to host the summer Olympics in 2036, so as to send “a
strong signal of peace and reconciliation” a full century after the infamous
Nazi-hosted Olympic Games in the German capital.”
2021:
In Cedar Rapids, IA, Temple Judah is scheduled to host a virtual Yom Hashoah
Serving during which attendees will a number of readings in remembrance of the
Six Million and will be encouraged to light a Yahrzeit Candle.
2021:
JWA is scheduled to host via Zoom a Book Club talking with “Judy Batalion,
author of The Light of Days, on women resistance fighters, in
commemoration of Yom Hashoah
2021:
In Palm Beach Gardens, FL, Temple Judea is scheduled to host a “morning Minyan
lead by Abbie Straus honoring Yom HaShoah, followed at noon by Keerryn Lehman,
who will share her grandmother’s stories “from life in the Kovno Ghetto and the
five concentration camps” to which the Germans shipped her.
2021:
The Jewish Heritage Museum is scheduled to co-sponsor Chhange's annual Yom
HaShoah Program “Rescuers during the Holocaust featuring Dr. Deborah Dwork, the
founding Director of the Center for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide and
Crimes Against Humanity and author of Saint and Liars.
2021: Holocaustmemorial events will
begin with a two-minute siren that will sound throughout Israel at 10 am.
2022: Kan KolHamusika is
scheduled to broadcast a Young Artist Concert with David Roth, violin; Shira
Shushan, viola; Hadas Atzmon, cello and Malachi Rozenbaum, piano.
2022: In Wellesley, MA, Temple
Beth Elohim is scheduled to present an evening with Hazzan Alberto Mizrahi,
world-renowned cantorial artist, who will share Jewish music from around the
world.
2022: The Boston
Philharmonic Orchestra (BPO), under the direction of conductor Benjamin Zander,
is scheduled to conclude its 43rd season with Gustav Mahler’s “Symphony No. 3,”
the Jewish composer’s expression of the essence of his relationship to nature.
2022: As Jews gather to
begin the observance of Shabbat, they mourn the loss of Tomer Morad 28, Eytam
Magini 27 and Barak Lufan, 35 who were murdered in Tel Aviv last night, the
latest in a string of terrorist attacks that have claimed eleven victims and
pray for a “perfect healing” for those wounded in this murderous attack.
2022: Eytan Meir Stibbe “an
Israeli former fighter pilot, businessman and commercial astronaut” “took off
for the International Space Station (ISS) from Cape Canaveral as a space
tourist. Stibbe is the 583rd space traveler in the world” making him “the
second Israeli in space, after Ilan Ramon, who died onboard Columbia while
returning from space.”
2022(7th
of Nisan, 5782): Barak Lufan, 35, the head coach on Israel’s national kayak
team and the married father of three children passed away today after having
been shot by a terrorist in Thursday’s night attack in Tel Aviv.
2023(17th
of Nisan, 5783): Shabbat Shel Pesach
2023:
Bank Hapoalim is scheduled to continuing sponsorship of free entrance to 170
museums, national parks, and heritage sites in Israel, including ANU - Museum
of the Jewish People.
2023:
At Temple Judea, Rabbi Feivel Strauss is scheduled to lead a morning Torah
study.
2023:
The Asya Geisberg Gallery and New Discretions is scheduled to present
"Epic, Heroic, Ordinary" for the last time.
2023:
Israelis and all decent people pray for the “perfect healing” of the mother who
was wounded when terrorists attacked the car in which she was riding – an
attack that left her two daughters dead.
2024:
The 92nd Street Y in New York is scheduled to host Arab-Israeli news
anchor Lucy Aharish and Avi Issacharoff, journalist and co-creator of Netflix’s
Fauda, as they go behind the headlines for an in-depth examination of the state
of Israel post-October 7.
2024:
Lockdown University is scheduled to host a lecture by William Tyler on “Roman
Palestine.”
2024:
In another lecture in the online lecture series "The Character of
Joseph", Bilha Ben-Eliyahuwill is scheduled to read together with Assaf
Ofekin the story "The Mistress and the Peddler" after which “both
will talk about the tremendous power of the story that attracts and stirs the
heart to this day.”
2024:
“Picking up a recent initiative begun in Israel, where volunteers at Hadassah
Hospital Ein Kerem and Hostages Square painted nails yellow as an act of
solidarity designed to raise international awareness to #EndTheSilence. Today
marks the first day of push by Hadassah that includes painting fingernails in a
bright, bold yellow; posting a photo of the painted nails on social media pages
and including the hashtags #EndtheSilence#Hadassah. https://www.hadassah.org/endthesilence
2024:
The Stuart & Suzanne Grant Center for the American Jewish Experience and
Tulane's Jewish Studies department are scheduled to host a a screening of the
Israeli film, Late Summer Blues, “an Israeli feature film directed by Renen
Schorr, written by Doron Nesher and produced by Ilan de Vries.”
2024:
As April 8th begins in Israel, the Hamas held
hostages begin day 185 in captivity.
(Editor’s note: this situation is too fluid for this blog to cover so we
are just providing a snapshot as of the posting at midnight Israeli time.)