September 9
384: Birthdate of Honorious, one of the Roman Emperors who prohibited the practice of burning an effigy of Haman on Purim because early Christians saw it “as a disguised attempt to re-enact the death of Jesus and ridicule the Christian faith.”
As early as the fifth century, there was a custom to burn an effigy of Haman on Purim.[32] The spectacle aroused the wrath of the early Christians who interpreted the mocking and "execution" of the Haman effigy as a disguised attempt to re-enact the death of Jesus and ridicule the Christian faith. Prohibitions were issued against such displays under the reign of Flavius Augustus Honorius (395–423) and of
1087: William the Conqueror, first Norman king of England, passed away. The first verifiable Jewish population moved from Rouen in France to the British Isles in the wake of William’s victory at the Battle of Hastings in 1066. Based on the continued acceptance of Jews in the kingdom by William’s son, the Jews were not there by accident. Rather, the new English rulers saw them as a source for developing trade and commerce in their new domain.
1379; The Treaty of Neuberg was signed splitting the Austrian Habsburg lands between the Habsburg Dukes Albert III and Leopold III. According to historian Jacqueline Shields, “The position of the Jews became increasingly precarious during the reigns of Albert III and Leopold III starting in the middle of the 14th century and lasting into the early years of the 15thcentury.
1516: “A Judeo-conversa named María López” and her daughter Isabel were put trial on trial during the never-ending Spanish Inquisition for allegedly performing acts that were tantamount to observing Shabbat and the dietary laws.” (As reported by Renee Levine Melammed)
1553(1stof Tishrei, 5314): Under the auspices of Cardinal Caraffa, later to be Pope Paul IV, a “rabid” leader of the counter-Reformation, the Talmud was confiscated and publicly burned in Rome. The Cardinal chose the day of Rosh Hashanah of that year specifically so the Jews would feel the grief more strongly. Talmud burning would soon spread across many other parts of Italy.
1751: Joseph Solomon Ottolenghe wrote a letter describing his arrival in Savanah, GA.
1759: Rebecca Tema Ansel, who passed away on Shabbat, was buried today at the Hoxton Old Jewish Burial Ground.
1774: At Frankfurt-am-Main, Mayer Amschel Rothschild and Gutlé Schnapper gave birth to their third child and second son Salomon Mayer von Rothschild the founder of the Viennese branch of the “House of Rothschild” who passed away in 1855 while visiting in Paris.
1793(3rdof Tishrei, 5554): Tzom Gedaliah
1793: One day after she had passed away, Hannah Jacobs, the wife of Jacob Jacobs was buried today at the “Alderney Road (Globe Road) Jewish Cemetery.”
1796: The National Assembly of the Batavian Republic accorded equal rights to the Jews of the Netherlands.
1812(3rd of Tishrei, 5573): Jews in the UK and the US are divided by war between their two countries but they share in hunger as they observe Tzom Gedaliah
1820(1stof Tishrei, 5581): Two months before Americans elect James Monroe in the least contested Presidential Election in the history of the U.S. Jews celebrate Rosh Hashanah
1826: In Karlsruhe, “Grand Duke Leopold and his wife Grand Duchess Sophie” gave birth to their third son Frederick who as Grand Duke “appointed the Durlach lawyer, Moritz Ellstaetter, his minister of finance, making him the first German Jew to hold a ministerial position.”
1828: Birthdate of Russian author, Count Leo Tolstoy. Tolstoy’s attitude towards Jews is a mixed bag. He signed a petition sent to Alexander III protesting pogroms in 1881. He strongly condemned the Kishnev Pogrom writing, “The outrages at Kishinev are but the direct result of the propaganda of falsehood and violence which our government conducts with such energy.” At the same time he blamed Russia’s defeat in the war with Japan on Russia becoming a “pseudo-Christian civilization.” In this civilization “the struggle for money and success in so-called scientific and artistic pursuits” becomes the dominant factor. And it is the society in which “the Jews got the edge on the Christians in every country and thereby earned the envy and hatred of all.” As old age crept up on him he wrote, “I should like to write something to prove how the teachings of Christ, who was not a Jew, were replaced by very different teachings of the apostle Paul, who was a Jews.” But in the end, Tolstoy noted that his physician Dushin Makovitsky would have been a saint except for one flaw – his hatred of Jews.”
1836: Members of Congregation B'ne Israel dedicated the first synagogue built in Cincinnati, Ohio.
1838: Birthdate of Congressional Medal of Honor recipient Leopold Karpeles, the native of Prague who earned the honor while serving the Color Sergeant in Company E, 57th Massachusetts during the Wilderness Campaign in 1864
1839(1stof Tishrei, 5600): Rosh Hashanah
1839: The Jewish community of Melbourne, whose members had begun arriving in 1835, held their first High Holiday services.
1841: One day after he had passed away, 61 year old Richard Solomon, the husband of Leah Solomon, was buried today at the “Brady Street Jewish Cemetery.”
1843: Three days after he had passed away, Louis Abelson, the husband of the former Julia Lazarus, was buried today at the “Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery.”
1845: Birthdate of Ignatz Acsady, the Hungarian Jewish historian whose works include The Common State Law and the History of Politics and Jewish and Non-Jewish Hungarians after the Emancipation.
1850: California joins the Union adding a 33rdstar to the U.S. flag. A year before California joined the Union there were enough Jews to hold Yom Kippur Services in San Francisco. By the end of the decade there were ten congregations in San Francisco and one in Sacramento. During this time there were two Jewish associate justices of the state court and at least one Jew was serving in the state legislature.
1850(3rd of Tishrei, 5611):Tzom Gedaliah
1852: In Charleston, Rabbi Lyons officiated at the marriage of Simond Hoseau of Pouseau and Mrs. Dorohea Abramowitch of St. Petersburg, Russia.
1857: Hermann Mayer Salomon Goldschmidt discovered Asteroid 56 Melete.
1858 (1st of Tishrei, 5619): As Lincoln debates Douglas in the Illinois Senate Contest, Jews observe Rosh Hashanah
1858: The City Items column published today reported “The most important of the annual religious festivals of the Jews, the "Rosh Hashannah," commenced today. It is not only one of the most important, but also one of the most ancient of Hebrew celebrations.” The writer then quoted the verses from Chapter XXII of Leviticus that describe the commands related to the observance of the holiday.
1859: Dr. Maurice Raphall “the most celebrated Rabbi in the United States” delivered the Rosh Hashanah sermon at the Greene Street Synagogue. Dr. Samuel Adler delivered the sermon at Temple Emanu-el. Dr. Bondi, the new rabbi at the Norfolk Street Synagogue, delivered his first Rosh Hashanah sermon in New York.
1860: Hermann Mayer Salomon Goldschmidt discovered Asteroid 61 Danae.
1861(5thof Tishrei, 5622): Italian historian Samuel Romanin who became a college professor at Venice, passed away today having completed only three volumes in a projected nine volume History of Venice.
1861: As the Civil War entered its sixth month reports were published today that “there is a universal stampede of Jews southward, who have been engaged in running goods into the Southern Confederacy, caused by a report that the trains on the Louisville and Nashville Railroad would probably be stopped to-morrow.” This would not be the first, nor the last, attempt to connect Jews with war profiteering. These stories primarily emanated from the western theatre of fighting. The author of this particular item shows an ignorance of the pro-Union sentiment among Jews living in Kentucky as exemplified by Louis Naphtali Dembitz of Louisville who was one of the three men who placed Lincoln’s name in nomination for the Presidency.
1863: Mr. J. L. De Cordova, the humorist and author is delivered his famed lecture, "Fairy Land and the Fairies," at Dodworth's Hall this evening. The proceeds will be given to the Hebrew Free Sunday School Teachers' Association.
1864: In New York City, Gustave Pessels and Aloine Steenbock gave birth Constance Pessels, who studied at the University of Texas before earning a Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins in 1894, taught English at the University of Texas and whose works included “The Religious and Ethical Import of Judaism” published in the Proceedings of the 28th annual session of District Grand Lodge No. 7 of the Independent Order of B’nai B’rith.
1864: In Kaschau, Hungary, Henrietta A. Weintraub and Rabbi Albert Bettelheim gave birth to Rebekah Bettelheim who as Rebekah Bettelheim Kohut, the wife of Rabbi Alexander Kohut, became one of the pioneering leaders in the fields of “in the areas of education, social welfare, and the organization of Jewish women” (As reported by Karla Goldman)
1867: In Farnworth, Widnes, Lancashire, German born chemist and industrialist Ludwig Mond and Frida Löwenthal gave birth to British chemist and archaeologist Sir Robert Mond, the brother of Sir Alfred Mond, first Baron Melchett.
1870: In Philadelphia, PA, Rabbi Marcus Jastow was serving as the spiritual leader of Rodeph Shalom, a German Jewish Congregation, which dedicated its new sanctuary on Broad and Mt. Vernon Streets today. It replaced the congregation’s first synagogue that had been located on Julianna Street.
1872(6thof Elul, 5632): Sixty-six year old Johanna Katharina Diamant, the wife of Herman Diamant passed away in Pest, Hungary.
1873: G.L. Fox played Goliath in tonight’s performance of “The Wandering Jew” at the Grand Opera House in New York City. “The Wandering Jew” or “Le Juif Errant” is an opera by Fromental Halevy’s based on the medieval Christian legend that claims a Jew who taunted Jesus at the Crucifixion is destined to wander the world until the Second Coming.
1873: Birthdate of Maximilian Goldmann, who gained fame as director Max Reinhardt who fled Hitler’s Europe and settled in the United States where he passed away in 1943.
1877(2ndof Tishrei, 5638): Second Day of Rosh Hashanah
1877: Despite claims that it was too small, the little synagogue in Chatham square in New York City held Rosh Hashanah services in room that could hold anywhere from 300 to 400 people that could be accessed by a four-foot wide stairway which provided a satisfactory route for worshippers to enter and leave.
1879: Birthdate of Julius Pensak, the native of Gortlitz, Poland who came to the United States in 1883 where he pursued a career as an oral surgeon in Brooklyn after graduated from NYU Dental School.
1879: In Glasgow, “the finished Garnethill Synagogue was officially opened” to day with Rabbi Hermann Adler leading the consecration and officiating at the first worship service.
1881: “Russian Immigrants” published today described plans that are being made by prominent New York Jews to deal with the more than 500 Jewish refugees from Russia that are expected to arrive at Castle Garden in the next three months. It is estimated that it will take more than $50,000 to meet their initial needs.
1883: Anti-Jewish riots broke out in Agram, the city in the Austro-Hungarian Empire which is also known by its Croatian name – Zagreb.
1884: A group of Polish and Hungarian miners from Montana, PA, attacked a Jewish clothier and chased him and his assistants out town after stealing their packs.
1885(29th of Elul, 5645): Erev Rosh Hashanah
1885: Rabbi Henry S. Jacobs led services this evening at the new synagogue on Madison Avenue at 65th Street in Manhattan which had opened last March.
1889: “The Jews of London” published today provides a review of Reuben Sachs: A Sketch by Amy Levy.
“Reuben Sachs is a London lawyer whose political aspirations do not include marriage to Judith Quixano, the daughter of a respectable but unexceptional family. But without Reuben, a woman like Judith might have a bleak future in mid-19th century England: a loveless marriage or lifelong dependency are apparently her only options…” Amy Levy was 19th century Jewish author who led what was called at the time “an unconventional life.”
1890: Birthdate of Dr. Kurt Lewin, the German born American psychologist.
1890: “The St. Petersburg correspondent of the London Daily Graphic” noted today that there are “no less than 125,000 Jews in the military forces of the empire” and that “next year’s draft will…amount to no fewer than 50,000” which means that military service is one of the few rights of citizenship the Jews are allowed to enjoy and that the Czar’s government see nothing “strange in arming a body of men habitually oppressed by the State.”
1890: Joseph Ansell married Zillah Cohen D’Azevedo today.
1891: It was announced today that Rabbi Solomon Sonnenschein of Temple Israel has resigned because of health problems and will be returning to Germany. He must have recovered his health because in 1905 he was the Rabbi at Temple B’nai Yeshrun in Des Moines, Iowa.
1891: Yesterday’s ceremony dedicating Temple Beth-Jacob’s new facility was described today as an ecumenical affair since the speakers included Rabbis De Sola Mendez and A.S. Isaacs as well as Reverenc R. H. Barr of the Associate Reformed Church.
1891: Russian born American gynecologist for whom the Hiram N Vinerberg Research Fund is named married Lena Bernheim today.
1892: Today, “the New Orleans correspondent for the American Israelite discussed the work of elite Jewish women on behalf of Touro Infirmary and the Jewish Home for Widows and Orphans including Mrs. I.L. Leucht, Mrs. Charles Newman and Caroline Dreyfous, the wife of Abel Dreyfous. At this time, Caroline was the second vice-president of the Ladies Aid and Sewing Society. The correspondent singled out Caroline as one of three women deserving special mention.
1892: Rabbi Hirsch officiated at the dedication of a new synagogue located at on 50thStreet between 3rd and Lexington Avenues which was originally founded 34 years ago by French speaking Jews from Alsace when they started worshipping at a sanctuary on 45th Street between Second and Third Avenues
1892: “Driven From Their Homes” published today relied on first evidence supplied by a group of Russian Jews passing through Paris on their way to Canada to describe the plight of their co-religionists who were being expelled by Czar’s government.
1892: The Jewish Chronicle reported that “in response to our appeal Mr. A. Leon Emanuel of Southsea has offered to lend a sefer for the ensuing holydays.” (Rosh Hashanah, 5653 fell on September 22, 1892)
1893: Morris Goodhart has been elected President of the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society to replace the late Priscilla J. Joachimsen who was the driving force behind creation of the society which oversees the Hebrew Orphan Asylum and has been its only President.
1893: Birthdate of Minsk native Naftoly H.J. Riff who came to the United States in 1916, who served as the Rabbi of the Orthodox Sons or Israel “from the early 1920’s through the late 1960’s.”
1894: Abraham Cahan addressed a mass meeting of tailors affiliated with the Knights of Labor at the Windsor Theatre.
1894: There were enough Jews at tonight’s mass meeting of tailors held at the Thalia Theatre that some of the speeches had to be delivered in Hebrew.
1894: Birthdate of Arthur Freed, the Charleston, SC, native who gained fame as a songwriter and movie producer whose work included the 1951 re-make of “Showboat” based on the novel by Edna Ferber.
1896(2ndof Tishrei, 5657): Second Day of Rosh Hashanah
1896: The Fourth Assembly District Convention was held this evening at 8 p.m. two hours after the end of the Jewish New Year. All other district conventions had been held yesterday, but this one was postponed until this evening because the district has a large Jewish population and they would not participate in an event on Rosh Hashanah.
1898(22ndof Elul, 5658): Seventy-seven year old “London wool broker” Maurice Bedding, the son of Esther Moses and Henry Moses who left “an estate of £500,000 at his death” and the husband of Hannah Maria Beddington who “was a founder of the Central Synagogue” and “a vice president of the Jew’s Hospital and Orphan Asylum passed away today.
1898: Alfred Aloe was commissioned today as a 2nd Lt. in the U.S. Army and assigned to the 18th Infantry.
1898: In Washington, DC, the Turkish Legations issued statement banning the entrance of foreign born Jews into Palestine.
1899: “Changing the Commandments” published today described a revision in the Decalogue of which the Jewish World is the authority so that now “By order of the Minister of Education in Russia, the fifth commandment shall read ‘Honor thy father and they mother, the Emperor and his officials that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee” leaving one to wonder if a Russian Jew declined garbling the text of the commandments” would he be sent to be a worker on the Trans-Siberian Railroad.
1899: In Rennes, crowds of anti-Dreyfusards expressed their pleasure at today’s verdict by marching through the streets shouting “Vive l'armée” and “Down with the Jews.”
1899: When J.M. Francoeur who plays the part of a French officer in the French far “The Girl from Maxim’s” playing at the Criteriorn Theatre first came on stage in his army uniform the audience show its anger over the verdict in the Dreyfus case by booing, hissing and calling out “Vive Dreyfus.”
1899: Tonight, after hearing of the verdict in the Dreyfus case, New York Deputy Assistant District Attorney Maurice B. Blumenthal began organizing “a committee of citizens” regardless of their religion, “including clergymen of all denominations” which would hold a mass protest meeting and send a committee to President McKinley requesting that he intervene with French President Loubert on behalf of Dreyfus.
1899: At tonight’s meeting in Kansas City, MO, the women of the Hebrew Relief Association adopted the following resolution: “We do hereby pledge ourselves not to visit the territory of the French Republic, buy or handle any merchandise or other thing manufactured or grown in any territory or possession of said republic until the truth of the innocence of Capt. Alfred Dreyfus shall be shown to the world by a fair and impartial trial.”
1899: Among the books listed today as having been received this week were The Modern Jew by Arnold White and The American Jewish Year Book: 5660edited by Cyrus Adler.
1899: Sixty-five year old James Biddle Eustis who had first-hand knowledge of the Dreyfus Affair because he had been the U.S. Ambassador to France from 1894 through 1897 passed away today before he could complete his book on the affair.
1899: Anti-Jewish riots occurred in Algeria.
1901: Toulouse-Lautrec passed away who painted Reine de joie, moeurs du demi-monde(Queen of Joy, The World of Easy Virtue) which depicts “Baron de Rozenfeld, a Jewish banker, a fictional allusion to the French Baron Alphonse de Rothschild”
1903: For one of the first time, “Jewish self-defense units appearing during the pogrom in Gomel, Mogilev Province, Russia. (As described by John Klier)
1904: “The Catch of the Season” which was produced by American Charles Frohman opened at the Vaudeville Theatre in London.
1904: In the United Kingdom the will of pawnbroker Isaac Aarons, the husband of Kate Aarons was probated today. (As reported by David Alexander)
1905: Birthdate of movie producer Joseph Levine who founded Embassy Pictures that produced such interesting flics as “A Bridge Too Far” and “The Lion in Winter.”
1906: Ohev Sholom Congregation, which had been formed by “Russian immigrants in 1886 during the administration of Grover Cleveland,” moved to its third “location at 500 I Street, NW” in Washington, D.C. “where it remained for the next fifty years.
1906: In Louisville, KY, the three day ceremonies dedicating a new temple came to an end.
1907(1stof Tishrei, 5668): Rosh Hashanah
1907: In Columbus, GA, the local newspaper that it “looked odd to see how many stores are closed” today “and that the number of closed businesses…reflected ‘how prominently the Jews are identified with city’s business life.’”
1908: Joseph and Pauline Canter gave birth to Edward Leo Canter, the father of Alan S. Canter.
1910: In Paris, Alice B. Toklas moves into the home of Gertrude Stein. [Do you think these two daughters of Israel kept a kosher kitchen?]
1910: El Desperter a new Ladino newspaper appears in Tetuan. It is the first Jewish newspaper in Morocco. 1910: The Turkish government placed a tax on sales of kosher meat by local communities. Proceeds were promised to go to philanthropic purposes. Governors of all vilayets (provinces) informed and directed to assist chief rabbis in enforcing payment
1911: In New York Barnett and Augusta Goodman gave birth to writer and social commentator Paul Goodman.
1911: The first party of Jewish farmers arrived in Salt Lake City Utah, on their way to the Piute Project, to colonize Southern Utah.
1912: Twenty-six year old Joseph Josephson, the native of Vilnius who lived in Sweden and England before arriving today at Fremantle, Australia.
1912(27thof Elul, 5672): “Educator” Rosalie Moses passed away today in New York.
1912: In Batavia, NY, a year after “Orthodox Jews purchased a house on Liberty Street to use as a synagogue,” they began using their new building “Shomrei Emunah Temple” today.
1915(1stof Tishrei, 5676): Rosh Hashanah
1915: Sculptor Victor David Brenner, Director of the United Hebrew Charities Morris D. Waldman, Dr. Marcus A. Rothschild, John Levy, Joseph Shay and Samuel Lovenberg are among those attending Rosh Hashanah services at the newly founded “The New Synagogue” a liberal congregation on the West Side.
1915: In New York “in addition to the regular services at the temples and synagogues” additional services will held “in the auditorium of the Young Men’s Hebrew Association at Lexington Avenue and at the Young Women’s Hebrews Association Building.”
1915: Dr. Maurice N. Harris delivered a sermon on “The Arrested Sacrifice of Isaac” at Temple Israel in Harlem in which he said “it is difficult to say which is the harder lot, that of 400,000 Israelites fighting at the front, sacrificing their lives on the altar of nationalism or of the non-belligerents, women, the aged and children driven from their homes and their towns as each city falls into the hands of the conqueror” on the Eastern Front.
1915: Dr. Joseph Silverman delivered a Rosh Hashanah sermon on “The Greatest Need for Humanity” at Temple Emanu-El.
1915: At Temple Beth-El, Rabbi Samuel Schulman delivered a sermon on “The Destiny of the Jew in the Light of the World War.”
1915: At Temple Rodoph Sholom, Rabbi Rudolph Grossman delivered a sermon on “Peace” in which “he declared that those who believed that patriotism was responsible for the present war had a false conception of patriotism.”
1915: “Speaking before the Fee Synagogue in Carnegie Hall” on Rosh Hashanah “Dr. Stephen S. Wise declared the Jew must be something rather than have something” and “he must stand for something” as “evil’s resistless foe.”
1915: Based on dispatch from The Daily Telegraph’s correspondent in Petrograd, it was reported from London to that “complete cessation of religious persecution” and “removal of restriction upon the Jews” were “among the reforms in the program adopted by the progressive parties of the united Duma which control 300 out of the 439 votes in the House” which are now being considered by the Council of Minsters whose approval is necessary if the reforms are to become law.
1915: In Philadelphia founding of Tifereth Israel.
1915: An American doctor who arrived in New York from Liverpool today described conditions in Turkey including the government’s order for all Jews, Greeks and Armenians to leave Asia Minor which has meant that over 200,000 refugees have been sent to Nineveh.
1915: The Associated Press Correspondent reported from Lodz today that “the Jews of Russian Poland, now in the hands of the Austrians and Germans appear to have suffered, prior to the Russian retirement more than normal hardship imposed by war” as could be seen by “a rather promiscuous execution by the Russians of Jews accused of espionage” and the “plundering of Jewish shops and houses by the Russian soldiery.”
1916: Second baseman Sam Bohne made his major league debut with the St. Louis Cardinals.
1916: In “For the Poor of Palestine” published today, A.B. Beaumont asked why students at Cornell could not “get up some entertainment or something and send the proceeds to help the destitute Arabian Jews.”
1916: Today, during the Battle of the Somme, Jack Melnick “a rifleman in the 12thLondon Regiment” and the father of Eva Melnick” “was listed as wounded and missing.
1916: Birthdate of Montague Ullman, the psychiatrist who founded the Dream Laboratory at Maimonides Medical Center.
1917: The New York Times reviewed The Holy Scriptures According to the Masoretic Text: a New Translation and The Story of Bible Translation by Max L. Margolis. Dr. Cyrus Adler chaired the committee that was responsible for the translation and the late Dr. Solomon Schechter played a key role in this effort as well.
1918(3rdof Tishrei, 5679): In the waning days of The Great War, Jews divided by combat were united in the observance of Tzom Gedaliah
1919: “Many Jews” were among the large group of intellectuals who gathered in Paris to form the “French League of Youth.
1920: In South Bend, Indiana, Samuel and Sophie Novak Plotkin gave birth Albert Plotkin, the graduate of Notre Dame and Hebrew Union College and Rabbi at Congregation Beth Israel in Phoenix who played a key role in the development of the “Jewish Studies Program at Arizona State University.”
1920: Final day of registration for the Hebrew School of Congregation Petach Tikvah in New York.
1920: Second and final day for the Fall Entrance Examinations for admission to the Teacher’s Institute of the Jewish Theological Seminary.
1920: A memorial service was held in New York in honor of Rabbi Bernard Cantor and Dr. Israel Friedlander, a professor at the Jewish Theological Seminary who had been murdered outside of Kiev while brining aid to the hundreds of thousands of Jews who were suffering as a result of WW I and the Russian Revolution.
1922: Birthdate of Hartford, CT, native Pulitzer Prize winning historian Bernard Bailyn.
1923: Birthdate of David Rayfiel, the native of Corinth, NY a screenwriter who in a long creative relationship with the director Sydney Pollack and Robert Redford collaborated on many of their most successful films, including “Three Days of the Condor,” “Out of Africa” and “The Way We Were. ” (As reported by William Grimes)
1926(1st of Tishrei, 5687): Rosh Hashanah
1926: Thanks to a directive from the Director of Public Safety, Jewish policemen and firemen are to be excused from active duty today because of the High Holidays.
1926: As Jews in New York observed Rosh Hashanah, they contemplated the following message from Governor Alfred E. Smith, who would be the first Catholic to run for President of the United States in 1928.
"The minority of intolerant people in our land are soon hushed by the chorus of disapproval which arises when intolerance and hatred raise their voices. True Americanism does not tolerate anything so un-American and unpatriotic as intolerance of any race or any religion. Once again at the approach of the Jewish New Year, I want to extend to the Jewish citizens of the State my cordial and heartfelt greetings. I appreciate the sacredness of the time and have many memories of the deep solemnity with which my old friends and neighbors observed these Holidays. In our busy lives it is an inspiring thing to set aside days on which we take thought of our actions and our life during the past year and prepared for the future. Communion with God in the deepest spiritual sense is the basis of all true religion. I profoundly believe in the separation of church and State as a basic American principle and I could not believe otherwise. But I do not believe in the separation of religion from daily life. Each of us observes the requirements of his religion in his own way but together we are all children of the one God. The minority of intolerant people in our land are soon hushed by the chorus of disapproval which arises when intolerance and hatred raises their voices. True Americanism does not tolerate anything so un-American and unpatriotic as intolerance of any race or any religion. The Jews are notably a people of peace and in wishing my fellow Jewish citizens of the State of New York a good New Year, I hope that their prayers will join with mine that our Universal Father help us all to strengthen the time-honored American principles of toleration and religious freedom." (As reported by JTA)
1926:The New York Board of Jewish Ministers issued a New Year message, in which it declared:
"With Rosh Hashanah begins Israel's most solemn season of the year, culminating in Yom Kippur, the sacred Day of Atonement. It is a hallowed usage in the House of Israel that this season is a time for noting and estimating the individual and the collective situation."Crowded synagogues will once more attest to the call of the Faith which summons the Jew to scrutinize his soul and take inventory of his spiritual condition. May the Heavenly Father send light and guidance upon the path of every sincere supplicant who implores help from On High. "The celebration of the 150th anniversary of American independence brings vividly to mind the privilege as well as the responsibility with which the Jew has been entrusted in this blessed land. He has shared fully in the life of the nation, from its beginning, having made many sacrifices and received many benefits. Among the patriots who achieved the success of the Revolution, the Jewish names were plentiful, though the Jewish population was meager. The Jew therefore feels thoroughly at home in the land which he has helped to defend in times of war and to upbuild in times of peace. He appreciates the bounties, material and spiritual, which he, together with all American citizens, here enjoys; and with the same fervor that he prays for his personal well-being, he prays also for the well-being of the United States of America, its civil leaders, its citizens, and its institutions. "The collective situation of the House of Israel abroad gives promise of better things for the coming year." The lot of the Jew in Europe and in Palestine is showing measurable improvement. As the European nations regain their composure, the Jew regains his safety. The Peace and Welfare of Israel is intimately bound up with the Peace and Welfare of Humanity. Therefore the Prophetic Proclamation of the Holy Day season, 'Peace, Peace, afar and near,' is Israel's constant prayer."May the wounds of sorrow and suffering everywhere be healed. "May the New Year 5687 bring Peace and Blessing to Israel and to all Humanity."
1926: Establishment of the National Broadcasting Company. NBC (first in radio and then in television) was the network dominated by David Sarnoff, Chairman of RCA. With William Paley owning CBS, this meant that two Jews were at the top of the two major broadcasting networks. Contrary to what the anti-Semites claim, having two Jews at the top did not translate into a Jewish controlled media; one look at the programming of these two broadcasters will tell you that these men aimed most of their programming at middle-brow, Middle America.
1928: “Anybody Here Seen Kelly?” a silent film directed by William Wyler and produced by Richard Wyler was released today in the United States.
1928: In Pittsburgh, PA, Irwin and Esther Zwerling, Jewish emigrants from Austria and Romania, respectively, gave birth to “American character actor” Darrel Zwerling, the younger brother of Bernice Zwerling.
1929: “Joseph Absuhdid, one of the Jews wounded in Hebron during the massacre now recovering in a Jerusalem Hospital was taken by the police to Hebron where he identified eighty prisoners as a part of the mob which perpetrated the massacre on August 24.”
1932: Sehnsucht 202 (Longing 202) “a German musical comedy” that marked the debut of Luis Rainer was released in Austria today.
1933: In Bradford, Ontario, Harry and Anne Tulchinsky gave birth Jacob Joseph Tulchinsky the historian and author who specialized in the field of the History of the Jews of Canada. (As reported by Ron Csillag)
1933(18th of Elul, 5693): Hirsch Smulowitz, who although 109 years old only had twenty-seven birthdays because he was born on Feb. 29, died in his sleep at the New York Guild for Jewish Blind on St. John's Avenue today. He was one of the oldest men in the State.
1935: “Awake and Sing” a play by Clifford Odets, directed by Harold Clurman with a cast that included Luther Adler, Stella Adler, Morris Carnovsky, John Garfield and Sanford Meisner re-opened for a second run on Broadway.
1935: Birthdate of Chaim Topol, the native of Tel Aviv best known to American audiences for playing Tevye in the film version of "Fiddler on the Roof."
1936: In Le Pontet, France, “Sarah Levendel and her husband Max who owned a small haberdashery shop gave birth to their son Isaac the author of Not the Germans Alone: A Son’s Search for the Truth of Vichy
1936: “David Dubinsky, president of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union urged twenty-seven labor leaders at a luncheon” today “in the Hotel New Yorker to support an exhibition soccer match between the Maccabee Palestine and local all-star team” which will raise money for the relief of Jews in Poland.
1936: Tonight at the Nazi Party Congress in Nuremberg, Hitler made “another savage attack on the Jews” that included coupling Judaism with democracy both of which he said were “destructive to civilization.”
1936: “More than 3,000 men and women filled Carnegie Hall” tonight “to hear the reports of sixteen American delegates to the World Jewish Congress held in Geneva last month” which was attended by representatives from 32 nations.
1937: The Palestine Post reported that the National Arab Congress, attended by delegates from Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Palestine and Egypt, started its deliberations in a small summer resort of Bludan, in Syria. The Palestine Postwas the pre-Independence name of the Jerusalem Post. It was only after the establishment of the state of Israel that the term Palestinian came to refer to Arabs.
1937: The Palestine Post reported that the stabbed and mutilated body of a young unidentified Jew was found in the Yarkon River. Another Jew, Willy Weiss, was robbed and killed by five armed Arabs on the Haifa-Nazareth road. His passenger, Michael Dubowsky, was also wounded and robbed, but left alive.
1937: The Palestine Post reported that during the first seven months of 1937, Ha’avara Trust Office transferred 18.8 million marks of Jewish capital from Germany to Palestine. The transfers were about 11m. in 1933-1934, 17.1m. in 1935, 20m. in 1936. Parts of the transfers consisted of goods, machines and raw materials.
1938: Premiere of “Boys Town” which told the story of Father Edward Flanigan directed by Norman Taurog and script co-authored by Dore Schary.
1938(13thof Elul, 5698): Eighty-four year old Joseph Schulen, the Munich banker who went into the brewery business in 1895, when he took over Munich’s bankrupt Unionsbrauerei and in 1904 “acquired Münchner Kindl, another failing brewery in Munich passed today as the Nazis sought to “Ayranize” his business holdings. (As described by Yardena Schwartz)
1938: Ahron Opher who for the last three years has been serving “as rabbi and director of religious education at the Hebrew Guardians Sheltering Society in Pleasantville, NY and the Hawthorne School of the Jewish Board of Guardians” was named today as the rabbi of “the Hebrew Tabernacle of Washington Heights.”
1938: In response to “the newly decreed race prohibitions which are applied by blood and not religion,” “the Italian Government announced today that separate elementary schools for Jewish children would be opened this Fall” thus assuring “schooling for all Jewish children, especially those of Jews converted to Catholicism. (Editor’s note - This puts to the lie the contention that the Italians did not follow the lead of the Nazis since this prohnition moves in lockstep with the Nuremberg Race Laws.)
1939: Birthdate of Reuven “Rubi” Rivlin, a native of Jerusalem who is a member of Likud and Speaker of the Knesset.
1939: Birthdate of literary agent Edward Victor, the Bronx born son of Russian Jewish immigrants “who was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for his services to literature” in 2016. (As reported by Sam Roberts) https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/12/business/media/ed-victor-dead-literary-agent.html?hpw&rref=obituaries&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=well-region®ion=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well
1939: Harry F. Guggenheim and his journalist wife launched Newsday, a tabloid designed to serve metropolitan New York City.
1940: Louis Werfel who graduated from Yeshiva College in 1937 and would be known as “The Flying Rabbi” while serving in the U.S. Army in WW II married Adina Gerstel whom he had met at the college’s cafeteria.
1940: Italian planes bombed Tel Aviv. One hundred seventeen people were killed. The Jews of Palestine posed a threat to the fascists. With much of the Arab world supporting the Nazis, the area controlled by the Yishuv provided a safe area for British forces in the Middle East. The oil refineries at Haifa were of great value to the Allies and were subject to bombing raids by the Italians. At the outset of the war Weitzman had pledged the support of the Yishuv to the Allied cause. Ben-Gurion spoke for many when he said the Jews would fight the White Paper (the closing of immigration) as if there were no war and fight the war as if there were no White Paper.
1940: The Ordinance Judenkodex (Jewish Code) was adopted in Slovakia. This was part of a series of law designed to strip Jews of their sources of livelihood.
1942: The Vichy Government (Unoccupied France) ordered the arrest of all Catholic priests who were sheltering Jews.
1942(27th of Elul, 5702): Two thousand Jews were assembled at Kislovodsk, sent to nearby Mineralnye Vody, marched to a ditch and shot dead. There were no survivors among the 2000. Kislovodsk is located in southern Russia. In 1987 Kislovodsk took part in a pioneering U.S. - Soviet venture in peaceful relations by becoming a sister city to Muscatine, Iowa. (You have to live in Iowa to really appreciate this one.)
1942(27thof Elul, 5702): Margarete Schiff, the daughter Dr. Josef Bauer whose works laid the foundation for the therapy that came to known as psychoanalysis, died today at Theresienstadt, a fate her sister Dora had avoided by committing suicide.
1942: Two thousand Jews are deported from the camp in Lublin, Poland, to Majdanek.
1944: Allied forces liberated Luxembourg today. Of the 3,500 Jews living there in 1939, 1,555 survived, by fleeing, hiding, or surviving in the camps; 1,945 were murdered, a third in the camps to which they had been deported from Luxembourg, and the rest in the country itself or in other occupied countries to which they had fled or been deported. (As reported by Yad Vashem)
1944: At the Chelmno Death Camp in Poland, an inventory was reported of 775 wrist watches and 550 pocket watches which had been collected since July from the victims of the Lodz ghetto cleansing. At one level, the Holocaust was an economic venture with what might be called a reallocation of resources. In other words, the Germans and their allies took the property of the Jews and gave it to themselves. During the 1950's there was great deal of hoopla over the German Economic Miracle - the name given to quick recovery of the West German economy after the devastating defeat in 1945. How much of this "miracle" was actually funded by the wealth confiscated from the victims of the Holocaust remains one of the great unasked and unanswered questions of the post war world.
1944: The U.S.N. Drum (SS-228) began its 11th war patrol that would take it to the enemy controlled Luzon Straits in the Philippines. The submarine was under the command of Maurice H. Rindskopf who would earn the Navy Cross for his gallantry and intrepidity on this patrol. The Jewish “sailor” would rise to the rank of Rear Admiral before his retirement in 1972.
1944: The Germans established a weather station on Svalbard which almost a year to the day later would be the scene of the last surrender of Nazi forces.
1944: Major Ronald Edmond Balfour, “the Monuments Officer for the First Canadian Army” “arrived in Rouen today “and made his first report, carefully recording the city’s damage from the German air bombardment in 1940, the Allied bombardment in 1944, and the retreat of German forces.”
1944: In Philadelphia, PA Morris and Sally Seitz gave birth to their younger daughter Judith Seitz who gained fame as Judith Rodin, the 12th President of the Rockefeller Foundation and the wife of a former dean of the Tulane School of Law.
1945(2nd of Tishrei, 5706): Second Day of Rosh Hashanah
1945: It was reported today that American Jews have received greeting from Dr. Joseph H. Hertz, chief rabbi of the British Empire in which he paid “tribute to the 1,000,000 Jews who fought in the Allied Armies, acknowledged “the more than 5,000,000 Jews killed by Hitler’s assault on civilization” and “said that the establishment of Palestine as a free commonwealth with equal rights and opportunities for Jew and Arab would be a ‘historic act of Justice to Israel’s survivors from Nazi extermination.’”
1945: “At Shaare Zedek Synagogue, Rabbi Morris H. Goldberg declared that this Rosh Hashanah “impels us to determine to fashion an international society which will do justice to the nations of the earth but at the same time control the aggression of nations.”
1945: At Congregation B’nai Jeshuru, Rabbi Israel Goldstein declared that “if during the New Year the British and American Governments will proclaim as their policy the establishment of Palestine as a Jewish state it will be the world’s most moral act of statesmanship in nineteen centuries.”
1945: “Rabbi Philip Harris Singer urged his congregation at the West Side Institutional Synagogue to pray for the final breakdown of Godless state sovereignty and self-deifying power adoration and for its replacement by an enthusiastic subordination of all nations of the earth under the unifying Kingdom of God.”
1945: At Congregation Ohab Zedek, Rabbi Zev Zahavy “asserted that even though the war was over the basic struggle of humanity was continuing unababted.”
1945: At Ansche Chesed, Rabbi Joseph Zeitlin “declared that the Atomic Age had prodigious power for good or evil and he urged mankind to release the spiritual energy it possess in the direction of truth, justice and peace so that the dream of world cooperation and blessing can be fulfilled.”
1945: Lt. Col. Louis Geffen, a judge advocate in the US Army, led Rosh Hashanah services on a naval transport crossing the Pacific Ocean.
1946: Birthdate of Glasgow native Gordon David Plotkin, “a theoretical computer scientist in the School of Informatics at the University of Edinburgh who is probably best known for his introduction of structural operational semantics (SOS) and his work on denotational semantics.”
1947: In Camden, NJ, Louis L. Goldman oversaw the ceremonies during which Dr. Max Artz installed Philip L. Lipis as the rabbi at Congregation Beth El.
1950: Gimbel’s began selling sports coats from Tel Aviv this afternoon, making it the first New York Department store to sell clothes designed and manufactured in Israel. The coats cost $98 plus tax.
1951: The draft of a mining law designed to promote oil exploration in Israel by foreign petroleum companies has been drawn up and will be submitted for Government consideration as soon as a new Cabinet is formed. According to a report prepared by U.S. Petroleum engineer Max Ball, three are geological in three different locations in Israel that suggest the presence of oil. The area of greatest interest is in the Negev.
1951: Today Leonard Bernstein married Costa Rican born actress Felicia Montealegre-Cohn; an event which occurred during the same month when he was appointed Professor of Music at Brandeis University, Waltham, Mass.
1951: “A basic reorganization of the United Palestine Appeal and other American Zionist fund-raising agencies is the principal item on the agenda of a forthcoming national conference to be called by the United Palestine Appeal, Rudolf G. Sonneborn, U.P.A. national chairman, announced today upon his return from a two-month stay in Israel. Mr. Sonneborn, who was a delegate to the recently concluded World Zionist Congress in Jerusalem, declared that "the conference which will be convened as soon as possible in Washington, D.C., must implement the basic decision of the Congress to streamline and consolidate the Zionist Funds."
1951: The newspaper Le Monde reported today that of 7,700 newspapers and periodicals published in the Soviet Union in 109 different languages not one is being published in Yiddish.
1952: The Jerusalem Post reported that West Germany approved the terms of The Hague Reparations Agreement. Chancellor Konrad Adenauer and his government hoped that this act, apart from the contribution to the economic recovery of Israel will build a bridge of reconciliation. Parliamentary circles in Bonn believed that full diplomatic and commercial relations with Israel will be necessary to warrant the agreement¹s safe realization.
1954: Birthdate of Dr. Martin Seth Kramer, the Washington, DC who developed an expertise on the politics of Arabs and Islam
1954: In London premiere of “Sabrina” a classic directed and produced by Billy Wilder who co-authored the script with Ernest Lehman
1956(4thof Tishrei, 5717): Tzom Gedaliah observed on Sunday since the third of Tishrei fell on Shabbat.
1957: Alfred K. Stern and his wife Martha Dodd Stern “were indicted in absentia on espionage charges.” (Martha Dodd’s father was the first U.S. Ambassador to serve in Germany during the Hitler era. She got to see the Nazis up close and this transformative experience shaped the rest of her life.)
1957: President Eisenhower signs the Civil Rights Act of 1957, the first such legislation enacted since Reconstruction. Congressman Emanuel Celler was a driving force behind the act having introduced it into the House. Celler would play a similar key role when it came to passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
1958: French Premiere of “The Goddess” with a script by Paddy Chayefsky and featuring Steven Hill as John Tower.
1960: Twenty-seven year old Abraham “Abe” Cohen the native of Plymouth, PA who played college football for the University of Tennessee, Chattanooga Mocs played today for the Boston Patriots (later the New England Patriots) in the first game of the American Football League.
1963: Funeral services were scheduled to be held today at the Riverside chapel for eighty-four year old Hungarian born Rabbi Morris David Waldman, the “professional head of the American Jewish Committee, the President of the National Conference of Jewish Communal Service and father of “Lynn Pearlstein, Pearl Glaser and Helen Eliezer.
1963(20th of Elul, 5723): Sixty-eight year old German-American historian Ernst Hartwig Kantorowicz, the German Army veteran whom Norman Cantor “suggested that, but for his Jewish heritage, Kantorowicz (at least as a young scholar in the 1920s and 1930s) could be considered a Nazi in terms of his intellectual temperament and cultural values” passed away today.
1964(3rdof Tishrei, 5725): Tzom Gedaliah
1964: Birthdate of documentary filmmaker Eyal Sivan, the native of Haifa who was raised in Jerusalem
1965: While on his way to start his freshman year at Tulane University, David Levin “rides out” Hurricane Betsy in a parked railroad car in Slidell, Louisiana as the storm makes its second landfall near the Crescent City, leaving 76 dead and $1.42 billion ($10-12 billion in 2005 dollars) in damages, becoming the first hurricane to top $1 billion in unadjusted damages
1965: The most famous Jewish player, Sandy Koufax pitched his 4th no-hitter; a perfect game in which the Dodgers beat the Cubs 1 to 0. (Hank Greenberg rates as the second most famous.)
1966: In Brooklyn, Judith "Judy" (née Levine), a nursery school teacher, and Stanley, an electrical engineer” gave birth to actor and comedian Adam Sandler who was raised in Manchester, NH.
1966: In London, opening of the Destruction in Art Symposium chaired by Gustav Metzger
1966: Schocken Books, Inc. is scheduled to publish today "Two Tales" by S.Y. Agnon, the Israeli who has been acclaimed as today's leading writer in Hebrew and has been nominated for the Nobel Prize. It will be the first English translation of a book by Mr. Agnon since 1948, and it will mark 50 years of association between the writer and the Shocken family.
1968(16thof Elul, 5728): Sixty-two year old New York City native and Pratt Institute graduate Louis A. Peirez, the “President of Viewlex, Inc,” manufacturers of “audiovisual, photographic and sound equipment” who “was a member of the national board of directors of the Anti-Defamation League” and the husband of Alexandra S. Nininger Peirez with whom he had two children – Helen and David – passed away today.
1969: Operation Raviv, a ten hour raid mounted against Egypt under the command of General Avraham Adan and Admiral Arvaham Botzer successfully destroyed a radar site at Ras Saafrana while playing havoc with Egyptian forces on that nation’s Red Sea Coast.
1970: A British airliner is hijacked by the Popular From for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and flown to Dawson Field in Jordan. The names of the Palestinian terrorist groups may change but the goals remain the same; remove western influence from the Arab worlds and destroy the state of Israel.
1972(1st of Tishrei, 5733): Rosh Hashanah
1972: “During the 10-day period of the High Holy Days” that begins with Rosh Hashanah “the El Mole Rachamim (God Full of Mercy) the solemn prayer for the dead will be intoned for the athletes killed by Arab terrorists at Munich.”
1972: “Leaders of major Jewish secular and religious groups in their annual messaged cited the symbolic significance of Rosh Hashanah and called for the equality among all peoples and the restoration of full rights in the Soviet Union.”
1972: In a highly unusual move the National Conference of Catholic Bishops…called for prayers…on behalf of the Israeli athletes who were murdered by Arab terrorists” saying that “decent people everywhere can only be appalled by the tragic and outrageous killing at the Olympic Games.”
1972: A Syrian military spokesman said that “Syrian fight bombers inflicted heavy damage and casulaities today on Israeli position in the Golan Heights” after which three of the Soviet-built Sukohi 7’s and three Israeli Mirage jets were shot down in ensuing dogfights and by ground fire.”
1972: In an interview to be published today Chancellor Will Brandt said that it was his “deep conviction that we cannot allow the impression to arise and that we have to put all our cards on the table” when it comes to investigating events surrounding the Munich Massacre.
1972: “German newspapers complained today that the program for the Olympic closing ceremony did not take sufficiently into account the massacre of Israeli athletes by Arab” terrorists which took place “less than a week ago.”
1973(12th of Elul, 5733): American playwright and screenwriter Samuel Nathaniel Behrman passed away.
1974(22ndof Elul, 5734): Sixty-two year old award winning bio-chemist Gertrude Erika Perlmann passed away today.
1975: CTV broadcast the first episode of The Bobby Vinton Show” a creation of Chuck Barris Production.
1975: “Professor Aryeh Dvoretsky of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and President of the Israel Science Academy, lectured at a Jewish scientific seminar in Moscow, led by Alexander Voronel.”
1975: “British 35’s Women’s Committee launched a global campaign to collect 12 million signatures in 42 countries on behalf of persecuted Soviet Jewish women.”
1978(7th of Elul, 5738): Eighty-six year old Jack Warner, founder of Warner Brothers Studio, passed away.
1980(28thof Elul, 5740): Seventy-eight year Harold Edgar Clurman one of the three founders of “New York City’s Group Theatre, influential drama critic and former husband of Stella Adler passed away today.
1982: The New York Times reviewed books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Leo Rosten’s Hooray For Yiddish!
1983(2ndof Tishrei, 5744): Second Day of Rosh Hashanah
1983(2ndof Tishrei, 5744): Ninety year old Samuel C. Feuerstein, “the Chairman of the Board of Malden Mills, the founder of “Torah Umesorah, the National Society for the Development of Hebrew Day Schools” and the husband of the “former Mitzi Landau with whom he had five children – Moses, Aaron, Felix, Irma and Juliette – passed away today in Boston.
1983: Today, President Reagan nominated Martin Feldman “to a seat on the United States District for the Eastern District of Louisiana.
1986: CBS broadcast the first episode of “The Wizard” starring David Rappaport as “Simon McKay.”
1987: “Late Nite Comic,” a musical produced by Philip Rose premiered at the Garde Theater in New London, Connecticut.
1988: “Running On Empty” directed by Sidney Lumet, written by Naomi Foner and starring Judd Hirsch and Steven Hill was released in the United States today.
1991(1stof Tishrei, 5752): Rosh Hashanah
1993: Aryeh Gamliel completed his term as Deputy Minister of Housing and Construction.
1993: The Palestine Liberation Organization officially recognizes Israel as a legitimate state. Future events would seem to indicate the PLO really did not do this. In point of fact no copy of the PLO’s National Charter has been published without the “many clauses declaring the creation of the state of Israel "null and void", since it was created by force on Palestinian soil calling for the destruction of the state of Israel.”
1995(14th of Elul, 5755): Eighty-nine year old Biblical archaeologist Benjamin Mazar passed away. (As reported by Joel Greenberg)
1995: In Dayton, The Ohio State Korean War Veterans monument which is “adjacent to the Jewish Temple” will be dedicated today. The memorial which overlooks the Great Miami River is the culmination of a six year effort that included the work of innumerable volunteers.
1995: “Unstrung Heroes” a comedy featuring Maury Chaykin as Arthur Lidz was released in the United States today by Buena Vista Pictures.
1997(7th of Elul, 5757): Gertude Lookstein passes away at the age of 90. Gertrude S. Lookstein, who with her husband, Rabbi Joseph H. Lookstein, was a leader in the New York Orthodox community and was active in a number of organizations. Her maternal grandfather, Rabbi Moses Z. Margolies, was the leader of Congregation Kehilath Jeshrun in Manhattan. He was succeeded by her husband, who served also as president, then chancellor, of Bar-Ilan University in Ramat Gan, Israel, until his death in 1979. Their son, Haskel, succeeded his father in the rabbinate in Kehilath Jeshrun. Mrs. Lookstein was a national board member and New York chapter president of Amit Women. She was also involved in fund-raising for the Yeshiva University Women's Organization, the U.J.A. Federation and the Women's Branch of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America.
1997: “Two Girls and a Guy” a comedy “written and directed by James Toback and co-produced by Edward R. Pressman” was released today in the United States.
1999: “The Last Days” a documentary that “tells the stories of five Hungarian Jews during the Shoah” was released today in Hungary.
1999: “The Last Days” a documentary that “tells the stories of five Hungarian Jews during the Shoah” was released today in Hungary.
1999(28thof Elul, 5759): Seventy-six year old actress Ruth Roman the daughter of Lithuanian Jewish immigrants Mary Pauline (née Gold) and Abraham Roman passed away today.
2000: Abu Mazen delivered a speech at the meeting of the Palestinian Central Council in which he articulated the PLO’s view of peace negotiations.
2001(21stof Elul, 5761): Yigal Goldstein, 47, of Jerusalem, Morrel Derfler, 45, of Mevaseret Zion amd
Daniel Yifrach, 19, of Jerusalem were murdered today when a Hamas terrorist detonated a bomb in the Nahariya Railway Station in Nahariya, Israel
2001: A Hamas terrorist injured 17 people when he detonated a bomb Beit Lid Highway Junction in the Sharon region of Israel.
2002: Slovakia observed its first Holocaust Remembrance Day.
2002: At the Toronto International Film Festival, premiere of “Evelyn” a dramatic film co-starring Julianna Margulies.
2002: At the Toronto International Film Festival, premiere of “The Emperor’s Club” co-produced by Marc Abraham and starring Kevin Klein whose father was Jewish.
2003(12th of Elul, 5763): Physicist Edward Teller passed away. Teller is known as the "Father of the H-Bomb." With Oppenheimer as the "Father of the Atomic Bomb" and Rickover as the "Father of the Atomic Submarine" it is obvious that the Jews played a primary role in providing the United States with the nuclear deterrent during the Cold War. (As reported by Walter Sullivan)
2003(12thof Elul, 5763): Senior Warrant Officer Haim Alfasi, 39, of Haifa; Chief Warrant Officer Yaakov Ben-Shabbat, 39, of Pardes Hanna; Cpl. Mazi Grego, 19, of Holon; Capt. Yael Kfir, 21, of Ashkelon; Cpl. Felix Nikolaichuk, 20, of Bat Yam; Sgt. Efrat Schwartzman, 19, of Ganei Yehuda; Sgt. Yonatan Peleg, 21, of Moshav Yanuv and Cpl. Prosper Twito, 20, of Upper Nazareth were murdered this evening and 31 people of one of whom would later die from his wounds, were injured today when Hamas terrorist detonated a bomb at a bus stop “near Tzrifin,” a military compound.
2003(12thof Elul, 5763): Dr. David Applebaum, 51, of Jerusalem – head of the emergency room at Shaare Zedek Medical Center; Nava Applebaum, 20, of Jerusalem – David Applebaum's daughter who was to have been married the day after the bombing; David Shimon Avizadris, 51, of Mevaseret Zion;
Shafik Kerem, 27, of Beit Hanina; Alon Mizrahi, 22, of Jerusalem – the Café Hillel’s coffee security guard; Gila Moshe, 40, of Jerusalem and Yehiel (Emil) Tubol, 52, of Jerusalem were murdered today by a Hamas terrorist at the Café Hillel, a Jerusalem coffee house.
2003: Publication date for Bringing Down the House: The Inside Story of Six MIT Students Who Took Vegas for Millions by Ben Mizrachi the “son of Molli Newman, a lawyer, and Dr. Reuben Mezrich, a chairman of radiology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine” who raised him in a conservative Jewish household.
2004: On the same that “Israeli forces continued a major operation in Gaza’ which was designed to suppress rockets being fired into Israel, Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom “again warned that they were considering exiling” Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat.
2005: “Campfire” an Israeli film written and directed by Joseph Cedar which “won five Israeli Academy Awards and was Israel's official submission for the 77th Academy Awards in the Best Foreign Language Film category” was released today.
2005: Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf praised Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon as “courageous” for ordering the withdrawal of Jewish settlements from Gaza, but doesn’t plan to follow up a recent diplomatic breakthrough between the countries by meeting him at the United Nations this month.
2005: In a manner reminiscent of the American Judicial System, the Israeli justice system seemed to be sending mixed messages concerning the treatment of women. Former defense minister and retired army general Yitzhak Mordechai will not be stripped of his rank, despite his two convictions for sexual misconduct. The three general panel felt he had been punished enough. The government can appeal the decisions. At the same time a” panel of High Court judges ruled Thursday that employers are not permitted to fire female workers for absence from work if this is due to their undergoing fertility treatment. However, the judges decided that the law does not provide women with general immunity against being dismissed for other disciplinary reasons, or if the fertility treatment does not justify absence from work.”
2006:“Riding the Wave,” an Ashdod arts festival celebrating the beachside city's 50th anniversary which was held at Ashdod's Monart Center came to an end after three days with a singing contest.
2007: Ryan Braun hit a home run today helping “the Brewers to become one of only three teams in major league history to start a game with three straight homers.”
2007: The Sunday Washington Post book section featured a review of The Indian Clerk by David Leavitt and reported that two of the three books that the Post describes as “the most anticipated books of the season” are the products of Jewish authors – Alan Greenspan and Philip Roth.
2007: The Sunday New York Times book section features reviews of World War IV
The Long Struggle Against Islamofascismby Norman Podhoretz former editor of Commentary,
Diane Ackerman’s The Zookeeper’s Wife, which chronicles Antonia and Jan Zabinski’s successful efforts to save three hundred Warsaw Jews during the Holocaust and God’s Harvard: A Christian College on a Mission to Save America by Hanna Rosin a Jewish Israeli born writer who has been covering religious issues for the Washington Post for ten years.
2007:Israeli archeologists announced that they've stumbled upon the site of one of the great dramatic scenes of the Roman sacking of Jerusalem 2,000 years ago: the subterranean drainage channel Jews used to escape from the city's Roman conquerors. The ancient tunnel was dug beneath what would become the main road of Jerusalem in the days of the second biblical Temple, which the Romans destroyed in the year 70, the dig's directors, archaeology Professor Ronny Reich of the University of Haifa and Eli Shukron of the Israel Antiquities Authority, told a news conference. The channel was buried beneath the rubble of the sacking, and the parts that have been exposed have been preserved intact. The walls - ashlar stones one meter deep - reach a height of 3 meters - in some places and are covered by heavy stone slabs that were the main road's paving stones, Shukron said. Several manholes are visible, and portions of the original plastering remain, he said. Pottery shards, vessel fragments and coins from the end of the Second Temple period were discovered inside the channel, attesting to its age, Reich said.
The discovery of the drainage channel was momentous in itself, a sign of how the city's rulers looked out for the welfare of their citizens by organizing a system that drained the rainfall and prevented flooding, Reich said. The discovery "shows you planning on a grand scale, unlike other cities in the ancient Near East," said anthropologist Joe Zias, an expert in the Second Temple period who was not involved in the dig. But what makes the channel doubly significant is its role as an escape hatch for Jews desperate to flee the conquering Romans, the dig's directors said.
Historian Josephus Flavius indicated in "The War of the Jews" that numerous people took shelter in the channel and lived inside until they fled the city through its southern end. "It was a place where people hid and fled to from burning, destroyed Jerusalem," Shukron said. Tens of thousands of people lived in Jerusalem at the time, but it is not clear how many used the channel as an escape hatch, he said.The discovery of the channel was unintended. Shukron said excavators looking for Jerusalem's main road in the time of the Second Temple happened upon a small drainage channel. That discovery led them to the massive tunnel that archeologists say lies beneath that road. "We were looking for the road and suddenly we discovered it," Shukron said. "And the first thing we said was, 'Wow."' The icing on the cake, he said, is that archeologists now know in what direction the road lies. About 100 meters of the canal have been uncovered so far. Reich estimates its total length will approximate one kilometer, stretching north from the Shiloah Pool at the Old City's southern end to the Temple Mount. Archeologists think the tunnel leads to the Kidron River, which empties into the Dead Sea.
2008: “A Friend In Deed” published today describes the little known story of the relationship of Lyndon Johnson and the Jewish people; a relationship that stretched from the Hill Country to Capitol Hill.
2008:The Leo Baeck Institute presents “Shadows in Paradise” a film that recreates the stories of the exiled German and Austrian composers and writers who fled the Nazi regime, hoping to make a living in the movie industry in Hollywood.
2008: “An exhibition, "Erfurt: Jewish Treasures from Medieval Ashkenaz," went on display at the Yeshiva University Museum of the Center for Jewish History in New York City” today.
2008: The first criminal charges were filed against the owners of the country’s largest kosher slaughterhouse, Agriprocessors, in connection with a May immigration raid at the plant.
2008:Following the filing of criminal charges against Agriprocessors, the Orthodox Union announced today that it would withdraw certification from the kosher meat company, the nation's largest, unless new management is hired.
2008: Avigdor Levin Tel Aviv city official said today that a 215-year-old Jewish manuscript stolen from a Tel Aviv library a decade ago will be returned by the German library where it surfaced.
2009 (20th of Elul): Yahrzeit of Dr. Jacob Levin who, if the legend of the 36 Righteous Men is true, certainly qualified. He will always be missed. He will always be remembered. He will always be loved.
2009: In Pittsburgh, PA, the local klezmer-jazz ensemble The Ortner-Roberts Duo kicks off the Jewish Community Center of Greater Pittsburgh’s Opus Concert Series this year with a “High Holiday Klezmer Fest Kickoff” concert.
2009: Sam Tanenhaus, the editor of the New York Times Book Review and the paper's Week in Review section, discusses and signs his new book, The Death of Conservatism, at the Sixth & I Historic Synagogue.
2009: A rare Hebrew manuscript written in 14th century Germany is going on display for the first time, just before the Jewish New Year, Israel Museum officials said today. The text, called the Nuremberg Mahzor, is one of the largest surviving medieval texts in the world. Written in 1331 in Germany, the prayer book remains mostly intact - only seven of its original 528 leaves are missing. Officials said the 1,042-page manuscript will be on display at the Israel Museum starting next Tuesday, days before Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year holiday, which begins Sept. 18.
The book has 22 illuminations inlaid with gold and silver. The text includes one of the largest collections of handwritten Ashkenazi, or northern European, prayers and liturgical poems. About 100 have never before been published. Also, rabbinical commentary is printed in the margins.
The manuscript is one of the heaviest surviving texts from the period, weighing more than 57 pounds (26 kilograms). It probably took about one year to complete, said Michael Maggen, the head of the paper conservation laboratory at the Israel Museum. "Mahzor" is Hebrew for holiday prayer book. The Nuremberg Mahzor got its name from its home for more than 300 years - the Nuremberg municipal library in Germany. The manuscript was originally commissioned for private study and synagogue use by a Jewish patron and was most likely used by the Nuremberg community after 1499. Sometime during the 19th century, 11 leaves were removed from the prayer book by Napoleon's army, museum officials believe. The Israel Museum spent about six months restoring the text after it was stored for 50 years in the Schocken Institute for Jewish Studies in Jerusalem. Salman Schocken, a German-Jewish publisher and book collector, acquired four of the missing leaves in the 1930s after he fled Nazi Germany. He received the Nuremberg Mahzor as post-World War II restitution in 1951 for property confiscated by the Nazis.
Six leaves remain missing, and one is in a private collection. The exhibition is the latest at the museum's Shrine of the Book, where the Dead Sea Scrolls and other ancient manuscripts are displayed.
2010: Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu was a prisoner of his security detail over Rosh Hashanah, unable to go to the nearby Great Synagogue in Jerusalem because of security considerations that would seriously have inconvenienced the other worshipers. So instead of going to hear the shofar on the holiday, the shofar came to Netanyahu, with Eli Yaffe, director of the synagogue’s choir, going to Netanyahu’s official residence to sound the shofar blasts so the prime minister and his family would fulfill the commandment.
2010: Michael Kinsley “joined the staff of Politico as one the publication’s first opinion columnist.
2010: Jacques Attali was appointed as a member of the directorate of the Musée d’Orsay.
2010: Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas called Netanyahu and President Shimon Peres to wish them a happy Rosh Hashana. During their conversation, Abbas told Peres that [the Palestinian people] want a peace agreement with Israel and hope that Israeli inhabitants will be able to achieve a peace that will include all Arab nations.” Peres told Abbas that “No one is more fitting than you to achieve peace for your people and the entire region.” He also wished Abbas and Muslims well on Id al-Fitr.
2010(1st of Tishrei, 5771): Rosh Hashanah 5771
2011: Steve Ross is scheduled to present a Special Cabaret Concert featuring songs by George and Ira Gershwin, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin and Noel Coward at the 14thJerusalem International Chamber Music Festival.
2011: Jack Weinstein, the Commander, Twentieth Air Force, Air Force Global Strike Command, and Commander, Task Force 214, U.S. Strategic Command was promoted to the rank of Major-General.
2011: The Gilad Hekselman Quartet is scheduled to appear at The Falcon in New York City.
2011: Rabbi Shira Stutman and Sheldon Low are scheduled to lead 6thin the City Shabbat in Washington, DC.
2011: Standard & Poor's Ratings Service announced it was raising Israel's credit rating today, citing Israel's response to a global recession. Israel's new credit rating is A+ "with a stable outlook
2011: An Egyptian protester pulled down the Israeli flag today at the Jewish state's embassy in Cairo, the second time in less than a month. A protester climbed the building, where the Israeli embassy occupies the top floor, and took down the flag, witnesses said.
2011: “About 100 people gathered in” Pushkin, “a suburb of St. Petersburg – believed to be the northernmost point where the Nazis implemented their plan to annihilate the Jews – to remember the brutal killings that took place here 70 years ago.”
2012: The 2012 London Paralympics, in which a 25 person Israeli team has been competing, are scheduled to come to an end today. (As reported by Aaron Kalman)
2012: As the NFL kicks off its first Sunday slate games some of the Jewish owners and executives include Bob Kraft (Patriots), Marv Levy (Bills). Stephen Ross (Dolphins), Daniel Snyder (Redskins) as well as a cadre of players
2012: The Los Angeles Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Vagina: A New Biography by Naomi Wolf and The End of Men by Hanna Rosin.
2012: “Zaytoun” an “Israeli adventurer film directed by Eran Riklis premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival.
2012 The New York Times featured reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or of special interest to Jewish readers including Telegraph Avenue by Michael Chabon and Domestic Affairsby Bridget Siegel.
2012: The Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court sentenced four people today to between nine months and four years imprisonment for stealing Jewish ritual and holy objects worth approximately $1 million from the Great Synagogue of Milan.
2012: School was canceled for students in Beeresheba and Ashdod today after two Grad rockets were fired towards southern Israel from Gaza a little after 2 a.m. this morning.
2013: In Rockville, MD, Temple Beth Ami is scheduled to host MK Rabbi Dov Lipman who will speak about “The Future of Religious Cooperation In Israel.”
2013 (5th of Tishrei, 5774): Seventy-seven year old documentary filmmaker Saul Landau passed away today. (As reported by Douglas Martin)
2013: Traces of the wild polio virus were detected in Jerusalem’s sewage system, the Health Ministry announced today. (As reported by Ilan Ben Zion)
2013: “Finding Vivian Maier” a documentary about the photographer “executive produced by Jeff
Garlin” and co-starring Joel Meyerowitz premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival.
2013: Today Hebrew University researchers announced the discovery of a rare trove of Byzantine-era gold and silver artifacts, the most impressive of which is a 10-centimeter solid gold medallion emblazoned with a menorah and other Jewish iconography. (As reported by Ilan Ben Zion)
2014: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum historian Edna Friedberg is scheduled to lead a discussion entitled “Some Were Wives, Some Were Mothers: Female Perpetrators during the Holocaust.”
2014: In Chicago, the US Holocaust Memorial Museum is scheduled to honor Fern and Manny Steinfeld with the National Leadership Award at luncheon where Doris Kearns Goodwin is the featured speaker.
2014: “Today Israel tested the latest upgrade to its "Arrow 2" missile defense system, in conjunction with the Missile Defense Agency of the US Department of Defense” without making any comment “how successful the test had been.” (As reported Yoav Zitun)
2014: TCM Presents the Jewish Experience on Film. Tonight is the second in this series. Starts tonight at 6 p.m. with a movie about Eddie Cantor and lasts until 5 a.m. with Judgment at Nuremburg. For more see http://www.tcm.com/projectedimage/
2014: “The United States has no information indicating beheaded was "sold" to Islamic State militants by moderate Syrian opposition rebels, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said on today. Sotloff family spokesman Barak Barfi told CNN last night the family believed Islamic State paid up to $50,000 to rebels who told the militant group the 31-year-old journalist had entered Syria.”
2014: The Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington is scheduled to host a trip the National Museum of American Jewish History that will included a tour of the exhibition “Chasing Dreams: Baseball and Becoming American.”
2015: “Rabbi Haskel Lookstein of Congregation Kehilath Jeshurun in New York is scheduled to fly to Washington, DC to lobby Congress to reject the Iran deal.”
2015: Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon “told a close meeting of about 20 young Likud party members” today “that the defense establishment knows who firebombed the Dawabseh home in the West Bank village of Duma that claimed the life of 18 month old Ali Dawabsha.
2015: Vice President Joe Biden said today that “officials in Washington plan to meet with Israeli counterparts to discuss how the U.S. can ensure Israel’s military advantage over its enemies.”
2015: Barry Fruendel’s “letter of apology” was posted today on the website of the Washington Jewish Week.
2015: “Into the Light: The Healing Art of Kalman Aron” is scheduled to open at the Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust.
2016: “Portugal, The Last Hope: Sousa Mendes’ Visas for Freedom” an exhibition sponsored by the American Sephardi Federation is scheduled to come to an end today.
2016: “Demon” a horror film based “on the Jewish legend of the dybbuk” is scheduled to open at the Lincoln Plaza Cinema.
2016: Rescue workers at the site of a collapsed garage in Tel Aviv tonight removed a fifth body from the rubble, four days after the four-story underground complex caved in, burying construction workers under a pile of sand and debris
2016: Temple Judah is scheduled to hold its first Musical Shabbat of the year featuring Shir Yehuda.
2016(6thof Elul, 5776): Sixty-four year old former New York Times executive Daniel H. Cohen passed away today. (As reported by Sam Roberts)
2017(18thof Elul, 5777): Parashat Ki Tavo;
2017: The Stephen Wise Free Synagogue is scheduled to host a Tot Shabbat.
2017: In Passaic, NJ, Congregation Ahavas Israel is scheduled to host its “End of Summer Ice Cream Kiddush.”
2017: Samuel Maoz’s “Foxtrot” won the Grand Jury Prize at the Venice Film Festival today. (As reported by Jessica Steinberg)
2017: In New Orleans, Hadassah is scheduled to host its “Free the Tatas” Disco Ball this evening.
2017: The Levins are scheduled to perform the Repairing the World Concert at Temple Beth Shalom in Hudson.
2018: The New York Times features reviews of books by Jewish authors and/or special interest to Jewish readers including 21 Lessons for the 21st Century by Yuval Noah Harari and the recently released paperback edition of Thanks, Obama by David Litt.
2018: The Center for Jewish History is scheduled to close at 2:00 PM today for Erev Rosh Hashanah
2018(29thof Elul, 5778): Erev Rosh Hashanah 5779; for more see http://downhomedavartorah.blogspot.com/