August 19 43 BCE: Octavian. later known as Augustus compels the senate to elect him Consul. As the first Emperor of Rome (in fact, if not in name) Augustus would follow the policies of “moderation and accommodation” towards Judea begun by his uncle, Julius Caesar 14CE: Augustus, Roman Emperor passed away. For the Jews, Augustus was a comparatively benign ruler. He left Judea under a Jewish king (even if it was Herod) and only converted the homeland of the Jews to a province during the turmoil that followed Herod's death.  Under Augustus Roman governors were ordered to follow policies that would not antagonize the Jews including.  They were not to permit pagan altars to be built in Jerusalem and their troops were not to parade through the city carrying standards with the picture of the Emperor. He followed a similarly benign policy towards the Jews in the Diaspora including allowing them to contributions to support the Temple and exempting Jews from appearing in court on the Sabbath, starting with Friday night. 1099: The armies of the First Crusade defeated the Saracens at the Battle of Ascalon (an historic Palestinian city on the Mediterranean), one month after they had captured Jerusalem. Neither the Jews nor the Moslems fared well at the hands of the Crusaders.  They slaughtered the Jews of Europe as they marched away and slaughtered the Jews of Jerusalem when they took the city.  The Crusaders did win the Battle of Ascalon, but they actually did not capture the city of Ascalon due to a quarrel between two of the Crusader leaders.  The city remained in the hands of the Moslems and would become a base from which Jerusalem would be attacked in subsequent campaigns.  This would not be the last time that initial victories by Western armies fighting in the Middle East did not result in long term conquests. 1203: “A fire started by Flemish crusaders burned down the Jewish quarter of Constantinople including the synagogue.” (History of the Jewish People) 1263: King James I of Aragon takes the lead in one of the earliest recorded instances of Christian censorship of Jewish writings. 1270: Today, three months after having “agreed to reconfirm Magna Carta and to impose restrictions on Jewish moneylending” to gain Parliaments permission to levy additional taxes, King Edward I, the king who would later expel the Jews from his realm, sailed from Dover for France on the first leg of what was to become the Ninth Crusade,. 1274: Coronation of King Edward I of England. Under Edward’s reign things went from bad to worse.  For example, in “1279 and edict imposed the death penalty on Jews accused of uttering blasphemy about Christianity.  In 1280, “Edward ordered Jews to listen to Cominicans preaching conversion.”  In one of his “last acts of extortion…he arrested the heads of Jewish families and demanded their communities…raise a 12,000 pound ransom payment.”  Finally, in 1290, the King ordered the expulsion of all Jews from his realm.  He would be the last ruler of England to officially deal with the Jewish people until the days of Oliver Cromwell. 1338: Host desecration riots destroyed the Jewish community of Wolfsberg, Austria. The Jews were accused of having stolen the Eucharist, making it bleed, and trying to burn it. Over 70 Jews were burned at the stake and the community destroyed. The community was never revived. 1439: Frederick III, the Holy Roman Emperor passed away today.  “To his last hour” he “protected those outlawed by all the world,” a reference to the Jewish people.  “He had a Jewish physician” and made Jacob ben Yehicel Loans a knight.  On his deathbed, “Frederick is said to have strongly recommended the Jews to his son, enjoining on him to protect them, and not to listen calumnious accusations, whose falsity he had fathomed. (As reported by Graetz) 1509: The Battle of the Books took place in Frankfurt (Germany): Johann Pfefferkorn, an apostate Jew, convinced Maximilien I to destroy all Jewish books, especially the Talmud. The books were defended by a gentile, Johann von Reuchlin, a noted humanist, scholar and student of the Zohar. The battle was decided in his favor, and the decree was rescinded. Such challenging of the Church by Christian scholars - on its own ground - helped bring about the Reformation and the revolt against the Church. 1555: First printing of Orech Chaim a section of the Shulchan Aruch in Eretz Yisrael. The Shulchan Aruch (The Set Table in English) is a major compilation of Jewish Law created by Rabbi Joseph Caro.  He began writing the work while living in western Turkey in 1522.  He finished it while living in Safed, the gathering place for scholars and mystics in Eretz Israel.  The Shulchan Aruch is divided into four sections the first of which is Orech Chaim.  Orech Chaim deals with laws concerning prayer, Synagogue, Shabbat and holiday observances. It would take approximately five years for all subsections to be printed. 1629: Rabbi Yom-Tov Lipmann Heller was dismissed from office today and imprisoned at the order of the imperial court of Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II for “insulting Christianity” – a charge which led to a fine of being levied on the rabbi, one fifth of which was paid for by Jacob Bassevi von Treuenberg, the financier and “Court Jew” who served three different emperors including Ferdinand II. 1654: Gershon Shaul Yom Tov Lipman Heller, "Tosfot Yom Tov" passed away today. “He served as chief Rabbi of Prague and of Vienna.  His most famous work was a commentary on the Mishnah entitled Tosafot Yom Tov.  The word Tosafot is translated as “additions.”  There are those who contend that the Tosafot are not actually “additions” or commentaries on the Talmud but commentaries on Rashi’s commentary.  Regardless Yom-Tov Lipmann Heller was a great scholar, sage and communal leader.” http://www.yivoencyclopedia.org/article.aspx/Heller_Yom_Tov_Lipmann 1662: French philosopher and mathematician Blaise Pascal passed away.  Unlike some other French philosophers Pascal thought highly of the Jewish people as the following quote proves, "It is certain that in certain parts of the world we can see a peculiar people, separated from the other peoples of the world and this is called the Jewish people…. This people is not only of remarkable antiquity but has also lasted for a singularly long time… For whereas the people of Greece and Italy, of Sparta, Athens and Rome and others who came so much later have perished so long ago, these still exist, despite the efforts of so many powerful kings who have tried a hundred times to wipe them out, as their historians testify, and as can easily be judged by the natural order of things over such a long spell of years. They have always been preserved, however, and their preservation was foretold… My encounter with this people amazes me…." 1751: Birthdate of David de Leon the son of Abraham de Leon 1758(15th of Av, 5518): Parashat Vaetchanan; Tu B’Av 1760: Birthdate of Sarah Isaacs, the Easthampton born daughter of Aaron Isaacs who converted and was the wife of William Payne and the mother of William Howard Payne, the creator of “Home Sweet Home.” 1761; Today, in London, at “a meeting of the chief synagogue”  a resolution was adopted condemning the formation of “ a society calling themselves a Congregation of Bricklayers” and warning all ministers and congregants to avoid any contact with this institution. 245 Jews of England 1763(10th of Elul, 5523): Judah Hays, the Netherlands bon son of Joannoe and Michael Hays, the husband of Rebecca Hays and the “ather of Bertha Hays; Phila Nunes; Moses Michael Hays; Reyna Malcha Touro; Meleg Hays; Caty Jacobs; Rachel Michaels; Sarah Hays and Jochabed (Josy) Pinto” passed away today in New York City. 1764(21st of Av, 5524): “Merchant and shipowner” Judah Hays who was an “officer at Shearith Israel” passed away today in NYC. 1770: Israel Lyons a silversmith living in Cambridge where he taught Hebrew to students at the university, wrote Observation and Enquiries Relating to Various Parts of Scripture History and raise two children - Israel, an “astronomer, botanist and mathematician, and Judith – passed away today. http://rsnr.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/56/3/275 1772: Grace Mears and Moses Raphael Halevi gave birth to Samson Levy, the husband of Martha Lamplugh with whom he had eight children.  1781: George Washington and his French allies under the command of Rochambeau began their secret forced march that would end at Yorktown and lead to the eventual American victory and independence for a nation that provided a home and haven to millions of Jews. 1794: In the Netherlands, Abraham Salomon and his wife Marretje gave birth to Grietje Abraham Cohen Verveer 1796(15th of Av, 5556): Tu B’Av observed for the last time during the presidency of George Washington. 1800: Birthdate of “German poet” Michael Beer “brother of Giacomo Meyerbeer, the composer, and of Wilhelm Beer, the astronomer.” 1803: Six days after he had passed away, Simeon Hart Myers, the son of Naphtali Hart Myers and the former Hester Moses, was buried today at the “Holly Road burial ground.” 1807(15th of Av, 5567): Tu B’Av 1807: Jacob Aaron married Catherine Benjamin today at the Great Synagogue. 1807: Lewis Isaacs married Caroline Pyke today at the Great Synagogue. 1809: In Alsace, Isaac Dreyfus, the son of Jacob Dreyfus and his wife Gertrude “Julie” Dreyfus gave birth to Rosine Dreyfus who became Rosine Picard after she married Louis Picard with whom she had three children – Achille, Caroline and Lucien. 1809: Birthdate of Daniel Joseph Jaffe, the father of Martin, John, Alfred and Otto Jaffe. 1810: Moses Alexander and his wife gave birth to Dinah Alexander, the wife of Jacob David Davis whom she married in London’s “Great Synagogues.” 1818: Joseph Michaels married Rebecca Harris today at the Hambro Synagogue. 1826(16th of Av, 5586): Shabbat Nachamu 1826(16th of Av, 5586): Amsterdam native Marianne Abraham Groenteman, the wife of Joseph Isaac Cohen Presser whom she married in 1779 and with whom she had three children passed away today. 1827: One day after he had passed away, 69 year old Nathan Nathan was buried at the “Brompton (Fulham Road) Jewish Cemetery” today. 1830: In Germany, Deborah and Marcus Kleinert gave birth to Isaak Benjamin Kleinert, the husband of Virginia Kleinert and Catherine Kleinert. 1835: A Jew Bill (legislation intended to complete the political and civil emancipation of English Jews) passed its first reading in the House of Lords. 1840: Today, Israel B. Kursheedt who had “played a key role in the establishment of Hebra Terumath Hakkodesh, which aided the poor of Israel, chaired a gathering of New York’s Jewish community to protest” the arrest of several Jews living in Damascus on charges of having killed a Franciscan friar so that they could use his blood for Passover in what is called the Damascus Affair.’ 1842: In Dlazov,  Dr. Issac Joachim Weintraub and Theresia Weintraub gave birth to Anna Henrietta, the wife of Rabbi Dr. Aaron Albert Siegfried Bettelheim and Itzak Meisler and mother of Paul Bettelheim; Minnie Thalhimer; Rebekah Regina Kohut; Sidonia Cyd Bettelheim; Felix Albert Bettelheim; and Esther Adler. 1843: In Strasbourg, Alsace, France, Louis and Babette Block gave birth to Adolphe Bloch, the husband of Noémie Bloch whose children included Marcel Dassualt, a leader in the French aviation industry. 1845: In the Paris suburb of Boulogne-sur-Seine, Haut-de-Seine, James Mayer Rothschild and Betty von Rothschild gave birth to their youngest child Baron Edmond Benjamin James de Rothschild 1848:  The California Gold Rush really gets under way as news of the strike appears in the New York Herald alerting Americans living in the East that “there is gold in them thar hills.”  Jews joined the thousands of others who streamed west looking for fortune.  According to Pioneer Jews by Harriet and Fred Rochlin, local newspapers provided documentary proof of the Jewish presence: “The Cohen claim at Vallecito made another whopping clean-up.”  “Nathan Rhine has one of the best ledges…He expended about $8,000 to develop it.”  “A Jew named Heyman and several others have worked for some weeks some claims on the new ledge.  These claims were jumped by a man named Moore.”  Jews and gentiles discovered that there were more ways to make their fortunes than digging and panning.  Of course, the most famous Jew to strike it rich was Levi Strauss whose pants not only won the West but our now a household brand around the world. 1850(11th of Elul, 5610): Sixty-eight-year-old Moravian born physician and chemists Nicolaus Wolfgang Fischer who earned his medical degree at Erfut and professor of chemistry at the University of Breslau passed away today in Breslau. https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/6152-fischer-nicolaus-wolfgang 1851: Birthdate of Ferdinand-Camille Dreyfus the French journalist and office holder who was not related to Captain Alfred Dreyfus but who ended up fighting a duel with the notorious anti-Semite, the Marquis de Mores at the same time that the embattled French captain was being railroaded. 1852: In Wilkes-Barre, PA, Abraham Strauss and Emilie Bodenheimer gave birth to Joseph Seligman Strauss, the husband of Miriam Weiss, who took time from his legal practice to serve as a member of the Wilkes-Barre School Board and a member of the Executive Committee of B’nai B’rith. 1853(15th of Av, 5613): Tu B’Av 1853: In Frankfurt, Germany, “Wilhelm Carl von Rothschild and Mathilde Hannah von Rothschild of the Naples branch of the Rothschild family” gave birth to Adelheid von Rothschild, the wife of her cousin Baron Edmond James de Rothschild and the mother of James, Maurice and Miriam de Rothschild who “became involved in her husband’s life work in Palestine.” 1856: Birthdate of Harold Frederick, the native of Utica, NY, who wrote The New Exodus: A Study of Israel in Russia which displayed a sympathy for the subject – the way in which the Czar’s government treated its Jewish subjects. 1861: Derogatory stereotypes were part of the American linguistic landscape as can be seen in this report published in the Charleston Courier describing an episode among Union prisoners being held at Richmond. A newsboy who had been in the habit of selling his papers at three, suddenly ran his price up to five cents, and on making his accustomed sale in the morning to one of the prisoners, the latter first refused to "come down." The young vender was equally inexorable, and finally carried his point, and received the amount of his demand. This rise in stocks was reported to the Yankee conclave, whereupon the question was raised whether it was right for the man to jew the boy, or the boy to jew the man. The discussion thus commenced in the social circle was carried into the debating society, and after the usual pros and cons, it was finally decided that the boy, being the sole and undisputed owner of the property, and the said property not being contraband of war, and no concatenation of circumstances having arisen to obstruct the right thereby vested in the original possessor of the aforesaid vehicle of information, the right was undoubtedly inherent in the adolescent merchant to determine for himself the incipient value of his goods, and to charge for the same accordingly, ad valorem duties to the contrary notwithstanding. 1861(13th of Elul, 5621): Joseph Oterman, the Dutch born Texas financier married to Rosanna Dyer, the brother-in-law of Major Leon Dyer and the uncle of Dr. Joseph Osterman Dyer was accidently shot today and suffered wounds that would led to his death a few days later. https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fos09 1862: Philadelphian Joseph A. Davidson, who will be killed during the Battle of Fredericksburg, began serving with Company I of the 134th Regiment. 1862: Birthdate of Auguste-Maurice Barrès, the French author and politician who could not be convinced by Leon Blum that was Dreyfus was innocence because, as he wrote in one of his anti-Semitic pamphlets, "That Dreyfus is guilty, I deduce not from the facts themselves, but from his race." 1863: In Los Angeles Hannah Pessah Cohn and Abram Wolf Edelman, “the first rabbi to serve Congregation B’nai B’rith in Los Angeles” gave birth to architect Abram M. Edelman who designed several buildings that are listed on the National Register of Historic Places including the El Mio House. 1867: Birthdate of Rumanian born New York “wholesale shoe merchant” Bernard Lebovitz, “one of the founders and a former president of B’nai Jacob Synagogue in South Brooklyn” and “the executive director of the Jewish Chronic Disease Hospital” who was the husband of Hedvig Lebovitz.” https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1955/09/13/92640182.pdf 1869: In Buffalo, NY, Siegmund Nathan Levy, the Moisling, Germany born son of Moses Nathan Levy and Hannchen Levy and his wife Marie Emilie Ulrike Levy gave birth to Otto D. Merpall. 1870: Birthdate of Bernard Baruch financier and unofficial adviser to several U.S. Presidents.  He passed away in 1965. Born in South Carolina, Baruch's family moved to New York City.  He graduated from City College of New York.  He began working as an office boy at three dollars a week. However, by the age of 30 he had amassed a fortune thanks to successful speculation in the Stock Market.  He was an adviser to President Wilson during World War I and accompanied him to the Paris Peace Conference after the war.  Thanks to shrewd financial skills, including knowing when to get out of the stock market, Baruch's wealth survived the Crash of 1929.  Baruch was a supporter of the New Deal.  He served Presidents Roosevelt and Truman.  He authored the Baruch Plan, which was an attempt to avoid nuclear war by having an international agency control Atomic Energy.  Baruch is credited by some with first using the term "Cold War" to describe the conditions that existed between the Soviets and the United States after World War II. Baruch was one of those truly colorful characters in American whose life is better described by a novelist than a historian. more like it was created by novelist than a historian. https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/bernard-baruch https://blogs.baruch.cuny.edu/bernardbaruch/ 1870: “A Hebrew Church Schism” published today described a case that is being heard  by Judge Pinkney in the Circuit Court which centers around a dispute among the members of the Baltimore Hebrew Congregation on the corner of Lloyd and Watson streets over the introduction of changes in ritual that the plaintiffs claim were not adopted in accord with the charter of the congregation. 1871:In Frankfurt am Main, Robert Moses Jesais Cohn, the Altona, Germany born son of Doris and Rabbi Ruben Simon Cohn, and his wife Rosa Cohn gave birth to future Copenhagen resident Dora Samson, the husband of Abraham Samson. 1871:In Frankfurt am Main, Robert Moses Jesais Cohn, the Altona, Germany born son of Doris and Rabbi Ruben Simon Cohn and his wife Rosa Cohn gave birth to Aron Arnold Cohn, the husband of Bella Cohn. 1872: In Jerusalem, dedication of Tiferet Yisrael Synagogue which would serve as the Chasidic house of worship until the Arabs demolished it in 1948 that is also known the Nissan Beck Shul in honor of Nisan Beck, the leader of the Chassidic community in Palestine until his death in 1889 who was responsible for the construction of the building under extremely adverse conditions. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissan_Beck#/media/File:Synagogue_Tiferet_Israel.jpg 1872: Three days after she had passed away, 61 year old Hannah (Marks) Somers, the widow of Isaac Somers, and mother of Miriam H. Somers, was buried today at the “Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery” today. 1872(15th of Av, 5632): Seventy-three-year-old Karl Feust, the son of the Chief Rabbi of Bamberg who decided to be a lawyer, despite all of the obstacles facing a Jew in that profession,  and who also served as the secretary of the Jewish community passed away today. 1872:“The Bells,” a “one act play that tells the story of a man named Mathias who secretly murdered a Jew 15 years ago and the consequences of his act” opened tonight at Booths Theatre in New York City. 1873: Birthdate of Elizavetgrad native and neurologist  George Boris Hassin, who in 1902 came to the United States where he served in WWI and was on the faculty of the University of the Illinois.                         1874(6th of Elul, 5634): Seventy-four-year-old Aaron Lopez, the Charleston born son of David Lopez who was the husband of Eleanor Cohen and “prominent in the affairs of Georgetown, SC” passed away today in Memphis, TN. 1874: The Grand Lodge of the ancient Jewish Order Kesher Shel Barzel met at Albany, NY, today.  Of the 5,404 members, 4,934 are men and 530 are women. During the past year, Lodge has paid $23,000 to “the heirs or legal representatives of twenty-three deceased brethren.”  The Lodge has $7,000 on hand “to pay the endowment of he next seven deaths.” 1875: Birthdate of Joseph Whyl, the husband of Yorkshire native Rosa Phillips. 1876: In New York, Fannie Myer and Isaac Goldmann gave birth to Nathan Goldmann, the president of Isaac Goldmann Realty and since 1920 the president of Isaac Goldmann Company which was founded by his father in 1876 who was the husband of Pauline Levy and a member of the Businessmen’s Council of the Jewish Philanthropic Societies of New York; 1876: Thirty-six-year-old George Smith, the translator of the Epic of Gilgamesh whose study of ancient Assyrian texts “threw light” on material contained in the Bible passed away at Aleppo, Syria after having suffered from a bout of severe dysentery. 1877: “The Polish Jews and Where They Worship described the dissatisfaction which “some of the prominent Jews of this City, of the class which is represented by the Jewish Messenger, have” expressed because of “the freedom with which certain rabbis and other Hebrews of importance with their people among the Polish Jews, and the other poorer classes of Israelites “ on the lower east side “marry and divorce members of their congregations without regard to the laws of the State of New York.” 1877: It was reported today that many Jewish immigrants from Russia and Poland do not trust the civil courts and look to their rabbis for decisions in legal matters. 1877: It was reported that the Jews in the United States have access to 15 newspapers and magazines devote to Judaism.  One of them is printed in German while others have German departments. 1877: It was reported that there are 15 Jewish newspapers and/or magazines published in the United States.  One of them is printed in German and “others have German departments.” 1878: As New Orleans was in the grip of a Yellow Fever Epidemic, New York City Alderman Lewis received the following telegram from some of the prominent Jewish resident of New Orleans, LA:The following telegram from prominent Hebrew residents of New-Orleans was received today by Alderman Lewis: “Sickness, disease and suffering among the poor increasing daily.  Our funds are nearly exhausted in this sad calamity.  We deem it our melancholy duty to appeal to the sympathies of our brethren throughout the United States for speedy aid.” 1879(30th of Av, 5639): Rosh Chodesh Elul 1879: The Commissioner of Emigration took the three Neumann brothers – Joseph,10; Ignatz,8; Max, 7 – to Justice Flammer to the Police Court in the Tombs.  He “committed them to a Hebrew charitable institution to be educated and cared for.”  Peter Groden of Castle Garden had found the three boys huddled together three weeks ago in Battery Park where they were trying to sleep.  They said their mother had died and they had no food and not place to go.  Groden took them to the Emigration Commissioners who found out that that the boys’ father “had abandoned them and gone to the West.” Since there were no other friends or relatives, the court system was the only other alternative. 1879: “Mysteries of the Royal Arch” published today described he connection between the Masons and the ancient Hebrews including the fact that their initiation room “is a representation of the tabernacle erect on the old site of the Temple” built in the time of Haggai, Joshua and Zerubbabel. 1880(12th of Elul, 5640): Fifty-nine-year-old Herman Bodek, businessman and Hebraist who wrote These Are the Words of Covenant, “a catechism of the ritual signs, allegories, and objects of Freemasonry” passed away today in Leipzig. 1881: It was reported today that based on figures collected in Germany, there are 6,139,662 Jews living in the world.  Of these, over 5 million live in Europe and slightly more than 300,000 live in America.  In Europe Russia, with 2,552,594 has the most Jews and Norway with 34 has the fewest. 1882: Two Russian Jewish girls named Mary and Hannah Rabeteck arrived in New York from Hamburg aboard the SS Cimbria.  The two girls who are aged 6 and 8 respectively, claim they have an uncle with the same last name living in the city, but do not know his first name so they will have to stay at Castle Garden for the time being. 1882: Burglars stole $250 worth of materials from the workshop of Meyer Norden on Broome Street in New York.  Norden is Jewish and his shop is closed on Saturday which appears to be why the thieves chose today to steal the silk and velvet cloth. 1882: “Obreight To Be Released” published today described the travails of Samuel Obreight whose family has had him confined to an asylum because he was “a lunatic” – a contention they based, in part, on “the indignation of his Jewish relatives at his marriage to a Christian woman.” 1883: “Murderer Disappointed” published today described the failed attempt by Theodore Hoffman to escape from prison.  Hoffman is sentenced to die for murdering Zife Marks, a Jewish peddler, who worked the area around Port Chester, NY. 1883: In Constantinople, Annetta and Pinchas Moses Papier gave birth to Emily Papier. 1884(28th of Av, 5644): Seventy-five-year-old Jacob Strauss passed away.  Born in Frankfort, he has lived in New Orleans for the last 50 years where he engaged in money-lending.  At the time of his death, he lived on Carondelet Street. http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9B01E5DD1338E033A25753C2A96E9C94659FD7CF 1885: In Austria, Shmuel Meyer Stettner and Rachel Stettner gave birth to Nettie Stettner who became Nettie Kinsbruner when she married David (Aubie) Kinsbruner. 1887: Gus Katz and Emanuel Sturm of Clinton, Illinois, each contributed $1.00 to the Union of American Hebrew Congregations. 1887: A hearse sent by the United Hebrew Charities took the body of Julius Weisbaden from the morgue to the Marble Cemetery in New York where it was interred without flowers or services. 1888(12th of Elul, 5648: Eighty-year-old historian Meyer Isler who earned a doctorate and then began teaching at the school founded by his father Israel Abraham Meyer passed away today in Hamburg. 1889: The funeral of Lewis Arnheim, a member of the Georgia State Legislature took place in Atlanta today. He is survived by his wife, the former Ida Mayer, daughter of David Mayer and two children. 1886: Birthdate of Khiva, Russia native and Boston University trained attorney Elihu Alex Hershenson who in 1895 came to the United States where member of the city council in Peabody, MA and director of the YMHA. 1890: Justice Duffy has ordered Samuel Cohen to be held for trial on charges of falsely representing himself at he received five dollars from Morris Beckwitz who thought he was making a contribution to the Hebrew Aid Society. 1891(15th of Av, 5651): Tu B’AV 1891: In Brussels, the International Socialist Workmen’s Congress adopted a resolution “condemning both anti-Semitism and Jewish financial tyranny.” 1891: “Goldwin Smith and the Tribal God of the Jews” published today included J.S. Moore’s expression of dissatisfaction with Goldwin Smith’s contention that the Jews only worship a tribal God and “that there is no hope for the Jews as to their social position as long as they adhere to this tribal God.’ (Smith was a British born anti-Semitic Canadian history professor) 1892: A hearing will be held today in response to a complaint filed by Meyer Reinherz an agent of the United Hebrew Charities against Edward Pollock who allegedly attacked him. 1892: In, Minneapolis, “Joel Levi and Jennie (Groll) Erman gave birth to Chicago College of Medicine and Surgery trained physician Jacob Martin Erman,  a U.S. Army surgeon assigned to Base Hospital 64 in France during WW I and husband of  Emma Ruth Dobrtin who settled in Omaha where he was a member of B’nai B’rith and the “Omaha Hebrew Elks.” 1892: Leonard Stiebel, the son of Ada and Daniel C. Stiebel was buried today at the “Balls Pond Road Jewish Cemetery.” 1892: In Des Moines, IA, “Isaac and Bertha (Meyer) Riegelman gave birth to Cornell alum and Columbia trained attorney who rose to the rank of Major while fighting at “St. Mihiel and The Argonne” after which he married Gladys B. Bleiman and practiced law in NYC. 1893: Throughout the Lower East Side, an area occupied by Russian and Polish Jewish thousands of circulars printed in Hebrew calling on “Workingmen!!  Organized and Not Organized!  All Suffering and Wretched Ones!” to bring their wives and children to attend a mass meeting at Union Square to be held this evening. 1893: Charles Wilfred, a self-described “anarchist-communist” who had worked with Jewish tailors during their strike in London addressed a meeting at Thalia Hall which was held to celebrate the release of Emma Goldman from Blackwell’s Island. 1893: In Bialystok, Harris and Amelia (Malinsky) Bloom gave birth to Julius Harry Bloom who in 1905 came to the United States where he became a merchant in Greenville, SC, served as President of Congregation Beth Israel and served in combat with the A.E.F. during WW I after which he married Leonora Shatenstein. 1893: Birthdate of Springfield native Edward Adaskin, the brother of Herman Adaskin and President and Treasurer of the Adaskin Furniture Company who “was a member of the Board of Fellows of Brandeis University and president of Temple Beth-El. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1951/12/10/96226027.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0 1894: One day after he had passed away, 21 year old Edward Jacobs, the son of Solomon Jacobs and Sarah Cohen was buried today at the West Ham Jewish Cemtery. 1894: In Newburgh, NY, founding of the Newburgh Progress Club which met every Sunday and for which Sigismund Samuels served as President. 1895: Birthdate of “Forestville, CT” native labor organizer Vera Buch Weisbord, whose autobiography A Radical Life was published in 1977, the same year when her radical husband Albert passed away. https://jwa.org/thisweek/aug/19/1895/this-week-in-history-birth-of-vera-weisbord-radical 1895: Eleven-year-old Sarah Russell, who had appeared in the Court of Sessions on three charges of pickpocketing, was sent to the Hebrew Juvenile Asylum because she “was not properly cared for at home” and could “receive proper training” 1896: It was reported today that the bands of the Hebrew Orphan Asylum and the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Orphan Asylum will perform at The Summernight’s Festival 1897: Julies Harburger and Raphael Rosenberg of the Independent Order Free Sons of Israel have expressed their support for New York Mayor William Strong to become the first mayor “Greater New York” (what we call New York City). 1897: Birthdate of Roman Vishniac, the Russian born American photographer his many accomplishments included creating a pictorial record of the Shtetl life. http://www.nytimes.com/1990/01/23/obituaries/roman-vishniac-92-a-biologist-and-photographer-of-jews-dies.html http://vishniac.icp.org/roman-vishniac 1897: One day after she had passed away 42-year-old Sarah Bieberkraut, the wife of Abraham Bieberkraut, was buried today at the Plashet Cemetery in London. 1897: “Charity Funds Squandered” published today described a letter that “J.S. Koenigsberg, the Secretary of the Jewish Society of Denver” received from Edwin W. Wallace the American Consul at Jerusalem  claiming that funds sent for indigent American Jews who have moved to Palestine “to spend their last days”  are being “squandered by the native Jews who live in luxury.” 1897: Two days after she passed away, 34-year-old Annie Landau was buried at the Plashet Jewish Cemetery in London. 1899: “Picquart Gives His Evidence” published today described the five hours of the Colonel’s testimony in which he proved details of the plots against Dreyfus and confronts Generals Roget and Mercier. 1899: Joseph Weiler conducted an action today that raised over $200 to aid the Hebrew Sanitarium of Rockaway, New York. 1899: In Rennes, three witnesses, all “enemies of Dreyfus – Major Cuignet, Gener de Bolsdeffre and General Gonse –“testified from 6:30 until 11 A.M.  Their testimony was mainly a reiteration of the evidence they had given before.” 1900: Abe, The Little Hebrew" Attell’s fought his first fight today. He knocked out Kid Lennett in two rounds. His mother, who strongly opposed Attell's idea of being a boxer, later became one of Attell's staunchest supporters, even betting on her son to win. He gained the nickname "The Little Hebrew" in these early fights. 1901(4th of Elul, 5661): On the Jewish calendar yahrzeit of German Reform rabbi who passed away in 1860 1902: Twenty-nine-year-old Rutgers University trained entomologist Jacob Kotinsky, the Ukraine born son Joseph and M. Bessie (Sitkin) Kotinsky married Sara Levin today in Philadelphia. 1902(16th of Av, 5662): Sixty-one-year-old Abraham Mendes Chumaceiro, the native of Amsterdam who “moved to Curaçao in 1856, studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1872” passed away today. 1903: Today Jacob de Haas and his fellow Zionists were traveling on train from Paris that would take them straight to Basle. 1904(8th of Elul, 5664): on the Jewish calendar yahrzeit of “Talmudic scholar and scientist” David Gans who passed away in 1613. 1905(18th of Av, 5665): Parsashat Eikev 1905(18th of Av, 5665): Eighty-year-old German born French Orientalist and Astrologist Jules Oppert whose accomplishments included making the first definitive identification of the “site of ancient Babylon” while on expedition to Mesopotamia in 1851. http://www.aibl.fr/membres/academiciens-depuis-1663/article/jules- 1906: “The National Anti-Semitic Assembly of Bulgaria met a Philippopolis” today. 1906: The newly formed Hebrew Congregation of Cuba changed its name to the United Hebrew Congregation (UHC) of Cuba, and Robert Diamond was elected treasurer. The pressing need for a Jewish cemetery was unfortunately highlighted a month later when Diamond passed away suddenly. Joseph Steinberg was appointed the new treasurer. 1907: Slain at Bialystok published today described the assassination of Colonel Schroetter, the Commander of the Bialystok Military Station who “was accused of organizing and helping to carry out the recent attacks on the Jews” in this region. 1908: The strike by students at the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary Association continued because they “have received the $3.50 a week which they are supposed to be paid while learning to be rabbis. 1909: It was reported today that ex-Police Commissioner Bingham recanted his statement his statement that “about 50 per cent of the Jews” were crooks 1910: Two days after she passed away, funeral services are scheduled to be held for sixty-five-year-old Anna Madeline Graff Kahn, the German born wife of Sol Kahn which she will interred at the Hebrew Rest Cemetery. 1910: In Asia Minor, Ritual murder charges were raised against Jews in Aiden. 1911(25th of Av, 5671): Parashat Re’eh 1911: Anti-Jewish riots began in Tredegar, New South Wales, Great Britain.  This was the worst outbreak of anti-Semitic violence to take place in the British Isles in modern times.  The riots came at the end of the miners’ strike and were so intense that the Home Secretary invoked the Riot Act and called for the military to control the attackers. 1911: It was reported today that Justice Leon Sanders is the head of “a union of Jewish immigrant aid societies in the United States and Canada which has been formed” in New York City. 1912: Rabbi J. L. Magnes, the President of the Kehilla “aroused enthusiasm at a meeting of that organization tonight when he declared that the agencies investigating the Rosenthal case would bear watching. 1913(16th of Av, 5673): Forty-five-year-old Simon Stein, the Pennsylvania born son of Daniel and Amelia Stein, the brother of Gertrude Stein of literary fame, passed away today. 1914: At the beginning of WW I Albert Einstein, the recently appointed director of the Institute of Physics writes from Berlin, “Europe, in her insanity, has started something almost unbelievable.  In such times one realizes to what a sad species of animal one belongs. I quietly pursue my peaceful studies and contemplations and feel only pit and disgust. 1914: Birthdate of Rose Heilbron who became the first woman judge to sit at the Old Bailey in London. 1915: Practically everybody attending the meeting at Cooper Union tonight voted “in favor of the resolution for” “holding a Jewish Congress” that would unite Jews in an effort to abolish Jewish disabilities in Russia and to establish “a Zionist State in Palestine at the close of the war.” 1915: The Imperial German Chancellor delivered a speech before the Reichstag today in which he described the Russian scorched earth policy in which for once Christians and Jews suffer the same fate as all Russians “are transported to uninhabited regions to the East” or left to “perish in the morasses of Russian roads.”(Editor’s Note – The Germans liked to portray themselves as protectors of Western civilization in the face of the Slavic masses, but as far as the Jews were concerned, in Poland, a year later they were faced with a level of starvation that forced them to seek aid for soup kitchens from Jews in Switzerland and the United States) 1915: Three days after he had passed away, Isaac Levy was buried at the Plashet Jewish Cemetery in London. 1915: It was reported today that when the leader of the lynch mob asked Leo Frank, “We want to know whether you are guilty or innocent of killing little Mary Phagan,” Frank replied, “I think more of my wife and my mother than I do of my own life.”  These were the last words he spoke. 1915: It was reported today that after the mob agreed not to mutilate the body of Leo Frank, they cut him down and then vied to get pieces of the rope for souvenirs. 1916: “The Joint Distribution Committee of the Funds for Jewish War Sufferers which is made up of representatives from the American, the Central and the People’s Relief Committees, the three largest organizations for distributing America’s contribution to Jewish relief announced today that between January 20 and August 15, it had sent $3,891,613” overseas which did not include the $342,359.71in remittances that the committee’s Transmission Bureau had sent to friends and relatives living in the War Zone or Palestine. 1916: “Motion Picture Publicity Men Organize” published today described the founding of the Association of Motion Pictures whose original members included Frohman Amusement Company, Paramount Pictures,  Adolph Zukor’s  Famous Players Film Company and Ben Schulberg. 1917(1st of Elul, 5677): Rosh Chodesh Elul 1917: In London, “the Zion Association” adopted a resolution expressing disapproval of the formation of a Jewish Legion because of the “harmful effects” such a move could have on the interest of the Jews in Turkey and Palestine. 1917: Seventy-five-year-old Edward Thomas O’Dwyer, the Roman Catholic Bishop of Limerick, who after meeting with a delegation led by Saul Goldberg, denounced the anti-Semitic pogrom in that Irish city – a denunciation which had little effect since  Fr John Creagh CSSR, spiritual director of the Arch Confraternity of the Sacred Heart, the leader of the anti-Semitic riots was beyond his ecclesiastical control passed away today. 1917: The Central Committee for the Relief of Jews Suffering Through the War acknowledged receiving gifts of $100 or more including $380 from Congregation B.I.A.S. in Brooklyn, $1,153 from the Young Peoples Hebrew Association in Windsor, Ontario and $115 from Ohave Emnuna in Cleveland, Ohio. 1918: Birthdate of Sy Gomberg, an Oscar-nominated film screenwriter and producer who taught screenwriting to University of Southern California students for over ten years. 1918: “Famous Advocate Slain in Russia” published today described the recent assassination Henry Sliosberg, the jurist and leader of the Jewish community who was an opponent of the Bolsheviks. (Editor’s note – Only problem was that this report was erroneous and Slisoberg would not pass away until 1937.) 1918: Approximately 150 service men are in training to take part in “Yip, Yip, Haphank,” a musical revue written by Sergeant Irving Berlin that is scheduled to begin a week long run in New York City today the proceeds of which will be used “for the erection of a community house at Camp Uptown. 1919: According to summary of the bequests of the late Ludwig Dreyfus the United Hebrew Charities will receive $627,000 and the Federation for the Support of Jewish Philanthropic Societies will receive $210,000. 1919: Today, Julius Harry Bloom, the Bialystok born son of, Harris and Amelia (Malinsky) Bloom who in 1905 came to the United States where he became a merchant in Greenville, SC, served as President of Congregation Beth Israel and served in combat with the A.E.F. during WWI married Leonora Shatenstein. 1919: Performances of “La La Lucille,”  a George Gershwin were suspended today when Actor’s Equity went out on strike. 1919: Afghanistan gains full independence from the United Kingdom. Jews have lived in what is now known as Afghanistan for more than two thousand years before the last family fled while the Taliban held sway in Kabul. 1920: “The Checkboard,” produced by Morris Gest premiered tonight at the 39th Street Theatre in New Yorik 1920: In Manhattan Louis and Martha Peskin Wershba gave birth to “Joseph Wershba, who as a CBS television reporter working with Edward R. Murrow revealed the story of Lt. Milo Radulovich, whose dismissal from the Air Force because of his relatives’ leftist leanings became a symbol of the anti-Communist witch hunts of the 1950’s.”  (As reported by Dennis Hevesi) 1921(15th of Av, 5681): Tu B’Av 1921: Birthdate of Gene Rodenberry, the creator of sci-fi cult his “Star Trek” staring those two Jewish spacemen – William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk and Leonard Nimoy as Mr. Spock. 1922(25th of Av, 5682): Parashat Re’eh 1922: Purdue University trained Chemical Engineer Raymond V. Rosenbaum, the Robinson, Il son of Lydia Myers and Edward Rosenbaum married Margaret M. Ten Eyck in Springfield, MO today. 1923: Assistant Professor of Hebrew Literature and holder of a Ph.D. from Yale Pinkhos Chugrin, the son of Debosha Hochstein and Rabbi Jonah Churgin married Rosetta Seligson today in New York. 1923: Twenty-three-year-old Harry Schultz, the Sebastopol born son of Lipman and Elizabeth Schultz who attended Columbia for a year and whose artwork was shown in Sweden, Russia and America married Sonia Tcherniack today in Petrograd. 1923: Birthdate of New York City native and Pratt Institute trained graphic artist Tony Schwartz, the husband of Reenah Lurie Schwartz with who he had two children – Anton and Michaela --  and  the “sound archivist, sound designer, pioneering media theorist, and advertising creator” who was known as the "wizard of sound" and who is “perhaps best known for his role in creating the controversial "Daisy" television advertisement for the 1964 Lyndon B. Johnson campaign.’ https://tonyschwartz.org/ 1924: Today, Moe “Berg was loaned to the Toledo Mud Hens, a poor team ravaged by injuries after which he was immediately inserted into the lineup at shortstop which led Major league scout Mike González sending a telegram to the Dodgers evaluating Berg with the curt, but now famous, line, "Good field, no hit." 1925: Funeral services are scheduled to be held today for eighty-three-year-old James Evan Creamer the husband of Sarah Florence Sheftall Creamer  and the son-in-law o Emanuel and Jane L. Theiss Sheftall who will be interred in Laurel Grove Cemetery, North in Savannah, GA 1925: In Cracow, Hirsch and Mita (Rosenbaum) Karmel to Ilona Karmel, the Holocaust survivor who wrote Stephania and An Estate of Memory 1926:  Birthdate of businessman Arthur Rock, the man who supposedly coined the term “venture capitalism.” 1926(1st of Elul, 5686): Rosh Chodesh Elul 1926(1st of Elul, 5686): Harris Abelow, the son of Sholom and Rachel Bayle Davidson Abelow, who married Sophie Abelow a year after his first wife Hannah had died passed away today in Brooklyn. 1927: “The Conference of Jewish Rights after a prolonged debate today accepted proposals of the Organization Committee for the creation of a new body to supersede the committee of Jewish delegations, dating from Paris peace conference days.” 1928: The conference of the Mizrachi World Organization is scheduled to open in Danzig (As reported by JTA) 1929: Following attacks by Arabs on Jews praying at the Western Wall Erev Shabbat and other attacks on Jews in Jerusalem, a meeting was held last night at the home of Professor Joseph Klausner, the chairman of the Pro-Wailing Wall Committee.  The committee decided to issue an appeal to the Christian world describing the attacks and asking for intervention on behalf of the Jews.  “We ask to be given back what has always been ours, that which saturated with the blood and tears of hundreds and thousands of the children of Israel.  Christians throughout the world, you know and realize the meaning of religious sanctity, you who know how to respect century-old traditions and painful longing for sacred religious shrines, please intervene and help us recover the Western Wall, so sacred and holy to us.” 1930: In Austria,  labor researcher Kathe Pick who was murdered at Ravensbruck in 1942 and Otto Leichter, a leading member of Austria’s Social Democrats gave birth to Franz Sigmund Leichter the Harvard trained attorney who gained fame as “a maverick New York State legislator for three decades whose progressive views on abortion, gay unions and the decriminalization of marijuana eventually became law in the state…” (As reported by Joseph Berger) https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/12/nyregion/franz-s-leichter-dead.html?action=click&module=Well&pgtype=Homepage&section=Obituaries 1930: It was reported today that the Palestine Emergency Fund collected $2,083,818 in the United States and Alaska last August. 1931: “Baron Edmond de Rothschild, a leader of the Palestine movement and only living grandson of Mayer Amschel Rothschild” celebrated his 86th birthday today quietly at his home” in Paris. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1931/08/20/96380590.html?pageNumber=7 1932: The anti-Communist movement in Argentina  has developed into an anti-Semitic campaign, which was described in the Chamber of Deputies this afternoon as alarming and threatening to public order. 1933: In Toronto, Mayor Stewart forbids display of swastika in the city. 1933: In Santiago, Zionist-Socialist party is organized in connection with the campaign for Labor Palestine that has raised 15,000 pesos. 1933: The Jiidische Rundschau, official organ of the German Zionist Federation, is suspended for six months because it replied editorially to an attack on the Zionist Congress by Alfred Rosenberg, Nazi leader. 1934(8th of Elul, 5694): Russian born and Jefferson Medical College trained physician Max Green the Hebrew scholar who came the United States at the age of 18 where he first worked as a Hebrew teacher and who was translating “Boaz” by S.L. from Hebrew into English passed away today in Philadelphia, PA. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1934/08/21/94558328.pdf?pdf_redirect=true&ip=0 1934: A plebiscite in Germany approved the vesting of sole executive power in Adolf Hitler as Fuhrer. 1934: Congressman Henry Thomas Rainey who in 1906 attended a mass meeting held to protest the “atrocities in Russia” and told the audience that the Romanoffs “are inflaming the populace against the helpless Jews – and already the blood of 100,000 Jews cries out for vengeance” passed away today while serving as the 40th Speaker of the United States House of Representatives. (Editor’s note – we should always remember those who had the courage to stand with the underground for that is the real “Profile in Courage.;) 1935: More than 2,400 delegates from forty-three countries had registered here tonight for the opening of the nineteenth biennial Zionist Congress being held in Lucerne, Switzerland. 1936(1st of Elul, 5695): Rosh Chodesh Elul 1936(1st of Elul, 5695): Three days after the end of the Olympics, forty-year-old Captain Wolfgang Fürstner who was identified as “one of the last non-Aryan officers to retain his rank in the new German Army” committed suicide today after he “had learned that according to the Nuremberg Laws he was classified as a Jew and was to be dismissed from the Wehrmacht. 1937: Birthdate of Ann Valerie, Lady Solti (née Pitts) a supporter of the Jewish Music Institute and wife George Solit, who though not Jewish was violently against any anti- Semitism and spoke loudly and clearly on behalf of the Jewish community and many other Jewish institutions” 1937: “Confession” directed by Joe May with a script by Julius J. Epstein was released in the United States today by Warner Brothers. 1937(12th of Elul, 5697): Author Abraham M. Dorfman passed away today in Philadelphia. 1937: The British government recommended to the Permanent Mandates Commission of the League of Nations that if the Royal (Peel) partition plan is accepted, a provisional cantonization of Palestine should be imposed during the transitional period, immediately after the termination of the Mandate. If such an arrangement would not be possible, an alternative was suggested, namely that two separate Mandates should be held, one for the Jewish, and one for the Arab state. 1938: Hadassah, the Women's Zionist Organization of America, announced today that Great Britain has issued 825 certificates for the immediate transfer to Palestine of Jewish children from Germany and Poland. 1938: “In Strasbourg, France, fifty-one-year-old Polish born shoe manufacturer” and 27 year old Friederike "Fritzi" Passweg gave birth to Joseph Langerman who gained fame as “off the wall radio personality” Joe Frank.  (As reported by Richard Sandomir) https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/19/obituaries/joe-frank-spinner-of-strange-radio-tales-is-dead-at-79.html?hpw&rref=obituaries&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=well-region&region=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well 1938: In Scarsdale, NY Rabbi Lawrence W. Schwartz of the Jewish Community Center of White Plains officiated at the wedding Ruth Aileen Aronson and Peter Meyer. 1938: Switzerland closes its borders to Jews fleeing Nazi persecution in Austria. 1938: The Swiss Federal Council ordered the closing of their border to refugees from the Third Reich, constituting a death sentence for many Jews. (Editor’s Note - But not all Swiss officials obeyed the ruling. Swiss Police Commander Paul Grüninger—known by many as the “Oscar Schindler of the Swiss-German border region”—used bureaucratic loopholes to allow more than 3,000 Austrian Jews to enter the country. This drama, based on the true story, unfolds like a suspense thriller as we witness the war of wits between the commander and his superiors in the police force of officially neutral Switzerland. It’s almost impossible to watch The Grüninger File and not think about the difficult moral questions around today’s refugee asylum seekers.) 1939: As Stalin seeks to improve relations with Hitler, “the 1939 German-Soviet Commercial Agreement” was signed today – an agreement that would move  the two one step closer to the non-aggression pact that would provide the Nazis with their green light for WW II and give the Communist dictator half of Poland. 1939: In an impassioned speech frequently interrupted by hecklers, Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver of Cleveland, Ohio, appealed today to the delegates attending the twenty-first session of the World Zionist Congress here to do nothing that might bring the Jews in Palestine into conflict with the British Government. 1940(15th of Av, 5700): Tu B’Av 1940(15th of Av, 5700): Thirty-one-year-old Henry H. Fleisher, Jr. passed away today after which he was interred at Mt. Sinai Cemetery in Philadelphia. 1940: Malvina Parnes, age 11, saw the Statue of Liberty from the deck of the Quanza, a Portuguese cargo ship.  Parnes and her family were fleeing from Hitler’s Europe and were allowed entry into the United States thanks to the personal intervention of Eleanor Roosevelt, wife of the President of the United States. 1941: Einsatzkommando 8 as well as local collaborators in Mogilev, Belorussia, kill more than 3000 Jews. 1941: Eighty-six-year-old Gustaf Hermann Dalman, “a German Lutheran theologian and orientalist. He did extensive field work in Palestine before the First World War” who “was appointed by Kaiser Wilhelm II as director of the Deutsches Evangelisches Institut für Altertumswissenschaft des heiligen Landes zu Jerusalem (German Evangelical Institute for Ancient Studies of the Holy Land in Jerusalem)” passed aay today. 1942 Twenty-nine-year-old New York native Aaron Bank enlisted in the Army and despite what some considered an “advanced agent” became a field operative for the Office of Strategic Services. 1942: An allied force crosses the English Channel in what came to be known as the Dieppe Raid. One thousand troops, mostly Canadian perished in this ill-begotten venture.  It proved to the English and the Americans that a cross-channel invasion of Europe was going to be a very difficult task that would take massive amounts of man and supplies.  More importantly for the Jews of Europe whose only hope of survival lay in liberation, such a landing would be at least a year if not more in the making.  In fact, almost two years would pass between the disaster at Dieppe and the success at Normandy.  Unfortunately for most of the Jews of Europe this necessary two year hiatus meant death on an unheard of scale. 1942: Nazis murder the children of the Rembertów (Poland) Ghetto. The town's adult Jews, more than 1000, are assembled for deportation to the Treblinka death camp. About 300 of the people are ordered eastward along the road to Wesola. Before they walk a mile, the 300 are murdered. The 700 who remain are ordered to march south, and as the group passes the town of Anin, one woman melts into a crowd of non-Jewish Polish onlookers and escapes. Forty-five others are machine-gunned at Anin, ostensibly because they attempted escape. Hours later the marchers reach the ghetto at Falenica, where Jews already have been forcibly assembled; those who are discovered in hiding are shot. Inside the ghetto, two Jews resist, using an axe to kill the first German who steps through the doors of their apartment. 1942 At the Belzec extermination camp, 700 to 800 Jews herded into a gas chamber wait in torment for nearly three hours until a balky diesel engine can be started and the chamber filled with deadly exhaust. SS gas/disinfectant expert but anti-Nazi Kurt Gerstein is on hand to observe 1942: For four days 17,000 Jews from Lutsk, Ukraine, are taken to Polanka Hill and executed. 1942: Esther "Etty" Hillesum went to visit her parents at Deventer for the last time. 1942: “The first large-scale aktion in the Łuck Ghetto took place today” when “about 17,000 Jews were rounded up by Nazi Orpo police and the Ukrainian Auxiliary Police during a four-day period, assembled at the square by the pharmacy, and taken in lorries along with women and children, to the Górka Połonka forest on the outskirts of Łuck” where] “they were shot into the prepared trenches.” 1942: In Bar, Ukraine, 3,000 Jews were herded together and held without food or water while in a nearby cemetery the Nazis murdered 1,742 Jews. (Jewish Virtual Library) 1942: Fourteen-year-old Shmuel Shilo, the future Israeli actor, survived today’s action that liquidated the Łuck, Ghetto by hiding “in a cellar with mother and siblings.” 1942: Today, “the remaining 43 Jews” living in Laupheim were transported to Theresienstadt, marking the end of 200 years of Jewish habitation in this German town. 1943: The Treblinka death camp receives its final trainload of Jewish deportees. They come from Bialystok, Poland. 1943: Nir Am “was established today by immigrants from Bessarabia who were members of the Gordonia youth movement. 1944(30th of Av, 5704): Parashat Re’eh; Rosh Chodesh Elul 1944: The Liberation of Paris begins as the Resistance in Paris rises against German occupation with the help of Allied troops. The long nightmare for the Jews of France is about to end.  Jews played an active part in the Resistance.  Contrary to the popular myth, a significant portion of the French population collaborated with the Nazis and the Vichy French worked tirelessly to ship French Jews to the death camps. 1944: Birthdate of Mordechai "Motaleh" Spiegler, the native of Scohi, in the former Soviet Union who became a leading “Israeli footballer and manager.” 1945: In Chicago, George and Sylvia Kalnitsky gave birth to University of Iowa trained award-winning Spanish teacher at Marion High School Kathe Goldstein, the wife of Gary Goldstein, who was a leader of Temple Judah in Cedar Rapids and an ardent Democrat. https://www.thegazette.com/obituaries/kathe-goldstein/ 1945: “Special services have been arranged for this morning for Jewish congregations in response to President Truman's proclamation setting today aside as a day of prayer…” 1946: Ninety-eight known Nazis were rounded up in Tirschenreuth by the military government officers and after having been given picks and shovels, “they unearthed 36 bodies of Jews” who had died on a forced march from Buchenwald to Flossenburg. 1947: Today “His Eminence Haim Nahum Effendi Grand Rabbi of Egypt & Sudan reminded his Alexandria audience that Jews had lived in Egypt for over 2,000 years and that the oldest known synagogue (Ben Ezra) exists in Old Cairo.” 1947: Today, in Weehawken, NJ, two Jewish physicians gave birth to Julliard School of Music graduate Gerard Schwartz the husband of Jody Greitzer with whom he had four children and  who gained famed as Gerry Schwartz “an American symphony conductor and trumpeter who ‘serves as the Artistic and Music Director of Palm Beach Symphony and the Director of Orchestral Activities and Music Director of the Frost Symphony Orchestra at the Frost School of Music at the University of Miami.” http://www.gerardschwarz.com/ 1948: Three-hundred-seventeen Jews who are “believed to the Last batch of immigrants permitted to leave Cyprus during the Palestine truce,” tonight “sailed from Famagusta for Palestine aboard the Jewish immigrant ship Hatikvah.” 1948: “The Angel with the Trumpet,” the movie version of the novel by the same name written by Ernst Lotha, the husband of actress of Adrienne Gessner who escape to the United States after the Anschluss. 1949: James McDonald, the United States Ambassador to Israel and his wife arrived in New York aboard the Il de France and which Mr. McDonald will continue on his trip to Washington where he will discuss events that have transpired during the last 13 months of his posting and talk about future problems including housing in Israel. 1950(6th of Elul, 5710): Parashat Shoftim 1951: A four-year agricultural development plan costing $610,000,000 and designed to feed an Israeli population of 2,000,000 was introduced to the World Zionist Congress today by Levi Eshkol, treasurer of Jewish Agency Executive, Israel... 1951:Arthur Cremin, president of the Music Lovers League announced today that the league was setting up an annual $500 scholarship in memory of Leopold Prince, the deceased vice president the league. 1952: The Knesset voted by 70 to 11 for an increase in the period of compulsory military service to 30 months. 1952: The S.S. Negba brought 112 immigrants from Hungary and 222 from North Africa to Israel. According to the new arrivals there were some 100,000 Jews left in Hungary, 80 percent of them in Budapest. 1952: Officials in Washington agreed with Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion that the solution of Arab-Jewish difficulties would be of great economic benefit to both sides and certainly help toward strengthening peace in the world. The US State Department had made it clear in numerous background announcements that it did not believe the Arabs could be returned to their former homes in Israel. It felt, however, that some compensation ­ although not complete ­ for the dispossessed might considerably ease the tension. 1953: The Knesset passed a law establishing the Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Authority known as Yad Vashem (a monument and a memorial) which takes it name from a verse from Isaiah 1953: Israel's parliament conferred Israeli citizenship posthumously on all Jews killed by the Nazis during the years of the Holocaust (1933-45) in Europe.   1953: An Arab terrorist from Gaza killed a restaurant owner in Ashkelon severely injured his 25 year old daughter. 1954(20th of Av, 5714): Fifty-one-year-old Hamburg born American art collector who left Nazi Germany in 1934 and established what became the Curt Valentin Gallery passed away today. https://www.moma.org/research-and-learning/archives/finding-aids/Valentinf 1954: Today, a press release announced that WNBC would be broadcasting the first radio performance of Maria del Carmen (Granados) and Concerto for Trombone and Orchestra by Nathaniel Shilkret, 1955:  Birthdate of actor Peter Gallagher.” 1955:  “Female on the Beach” a crime film directed by Joseph Pevney and starring Jeff Chandler was released in the United States today. 1956:  In Brooklyn, “actor, director and writer Alan Arkin and his first wife Jeremy Yaffe gave birth to Adam Arkin who has been honored with Tony nominations and Emmy awards for his work as any actor and director. 1956: In Philadelphia, Rabbi Abraham L. Poupko officiated at the wedding

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