By Barrett Holman Leak in San Diego, California
“American Jewish history is a history of rapid social mobility. African American history has been a history of enslavement and institutional racism. At what point in the alliance are those two differences going to be seen?” — Professor Marc Dollinger
Strange Fruit
It is easy to wonder how Gates chose what material to include and what to leave out. This second installment of Henry Louis Gates, Jr.’s documentary is a masterful, often heartbreaking exploration of the 1920s through the 1950s. It moves beyond the “Golden Age” myths of the Black-Jewish alliance to show a relationship forged in the fires of jazz, the Great Depression, and the existential threat of global fascism.
The Invention of Hollywood
There is so much good stuff here. For film buffs like me, it was both familiar and informative to hear about the beginning of Hollywood and how both immigrant American Jews and formerly enslaved African Americans built Hollywood and the entertainment industry.
In the early 20th century, the established “White Anglo-Saxon Protestant” (WASP) elite viewed the motion picture industry as a tawdry, low-brow form of entertainment, largely disdaining it as a “gutter profession.” This social exclusion left a vacuum that was filled by ambitious Jewish immigrants—men like Louis B. Mayer, Samuel Goldwyn, and the Warner brothers—who had been shut out of traditional industries like banking or insurance. By taking control of this “disdained” medium, these moguls didn’t just build studios; they essentially invented the “American Dream” on screen. The episode notes the irony that these outsiders, in an effort to assimilate and avoid the sting of antisemitism, created the very imagery of “ideal” American life that the world would come to emulate.
While the Jewish moguls were building the studio system, the documentary highlights the paradoxical and often painful role African Americans played in the industry’s infancy. The show reveals that Black actors were frequently relegated to the periphery, forced into stereotyped “servant” roles, or used as background texture to satisfy the racial hierarchies of 1930s and 40s cinema. However, it also uncovers a subversive undercurrent: Black performers like Paul Robeson and Lena Horne often used these limited roles to display immense talent and dignity that transcended the scripts (i.e., Hattie McDaniel’s historic Oscar win. Furthermore, the episode explores the “Race Film” industry—independently produced films by and for Black audiences—which served as a vital, though underfunded, counter-narrative to the mainstream Hollywood portrayals. This segment underscores the tension of the era: while Jewish immigrants were finding a way to integrate into American life through film, African Americans were largely being used as tools to define a “whiteness” they were systematically excluded from.
Cultural Synergy
The episode’s emotional core is the story of the song “Strange Fruit.” It highlights a remarkable trifecta of collaboration:
● The Writing: Written by Abel Meeropol, a Jewish schoolteacher, who moved to protest after seeing a photograph of a lynching.
● The Performance: Breathed into life by the incomparable Billie Holiday.
● The Production: When major labels were too terrified of the political fallout to record it, Milt Gabler (founder of Commodore Records) stepped up to produce it.
Through excerpts of an interview with Gates, director/producer/actor nd comedian Billy Crystal (Gabler’s nephew) provides a bridge to this era. He shares intimate family memories of “Lady Day” herself—recounting how Holiday was his first babysitter and even took him to see Bambi. Through Crystal, the documentary illustrates that these weren’t just business transactions; they were deeply personal, integrated lives lived in defiance of Jim Crow.
Global Diplomacy: Ralph Bunche and the Birth of Israel
The episode takes a significant turn into the late 1940s, examining the monumental role of Ralph Bunche, a brilliant African American diplomat and UCLA alum.
● The 1948 Conflict: Following the assassination of the original UN mediator, Bunche took over the task of negotiating an end to the 1948 Arab-Israeli War.
● The Armistice Agreements: Working on the island of Rhodes, Bunche facilitated the 1949 Armistice Agreements. His unique ability to navigate the intense distrust between the parties was the catalyst that stabilized the borders of the newly formed modern State of Israel.
● The Nobel Peace Prize: For this historic achievement, Bunche became the first person of color to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1950.
The “Uncomfortable Truths”
The episode centers on the tension noted in Professor Marc Dollinger’s quote regarding divergent historical trajectories. While Jews were often able to utilize “rapid social mobility” in the post-war era, Black Americans remained sidelined by embedded institutional racism.
● It examines the economic imbalances where Jewish individuals often held power as landlords or managers in Black neighborhoods.
● It discusses the divergent paths to “whiteness” or social acceptance that became available to Jewish Americans after WWII (such as the GI Bill), while Black veterans returned home to systemic exclusion and institutional racism baked into American society, which has had a lasting negative impact on Black Americans
The documentary details how African American military members routinely were part of liberating concentration camps and extending humane compassion to Jewish victims of the Holocaust death camps, but were also disproportionately unfairly given other-than-honorable discharges
To fill in this gap and make it more understandable for those who do not know the facts, here are more details on how this situation played out:
A widespread and insidious tool used to deny Black veterans their benefits was the “Blue Discharge.” Historical records from the World War II era (which the documentary touches upon in this time period) show that Black service members were indeed disproportionately targeted with administrative discharges that effectively barred them from the GI Bill.
The “Blue Ticket” Phenomenon
Between 1941 and 1945, the military issued “Blue Discharges” (named for the blue paper they were printed on). These were neither “Honorable” nor “Dishonorable”—they were “Other Than Honorable” administrative separations.
● Disproportionate Impact: Black Americans made up only about 6.5% of the Army, yet they received over 22% of all Blue Discharges issued.
● The “Catch-22”: Because these weren’t “Dishonorable” discharges, they didn’t require a court-martial, meaning soldiers had no legal right to an attorney or a formal defense.
● Benefit Denial: Despite the 1944 GI Bill stating that anyone “other than dishonorably” discharged should be eligible, the Veterans Administration (VA) frequently used the “Blue Ticket” as a justification to deny home loans, unemployment insurance, and education benefits.
Institutional Barriers to the GI Bill
Even for the Black veterans who did receive Honorable Discharges, the implementation of the GI Bill was designed to be “locally administered,” which allowed systemic racism to flourish:
● The “Rankin” Influence: Rep. John Rankin, an arch-segregationist who helped craft the bill, ensured that benefits were handled by local offices rather than the federal government.
● Mortgage Redlining: While the VA guaranteed loans, Black veterans had to find a bank willing to lend to them. In 1947 Mississippi, for example, out of 3,229 VA-backed loans, only two were granted to Black veterans.
● Educational Exclusion: Many universities in the North had “quotas” for Black students, and in the South, they were barred from white universities entirely, causing massive overcrowding at HBCUs.
Correcting History
The documentary highlights that this wasn’t just a “social difference” but a deliberate economic exclusion. This created a massive wealth gap which continues to this day, affecting the children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of African American veterans. While American Jewish and white European Americanveterans were using the GI Bill to move into the new middle-class suburbs, many African American veterans were left in the same economic position they occupied before the war. There is currently legislation being discussed in Congress (the GI Bill Restoration Act) to provide benefits to the descendants of Black WWII veterans who were denied them.
Final Verdict
Episode 2 of this four-part PBS series is a nuanced look at a period where art and activism were inseparable, and the groundwork was laid for the civil rights movement of the 1950s, 1960s, and early 1970s. From the Commodore Record shop to the UN negotiations in Rhodes, the formation of Hollywood and the development of the middle class in America, it reminds us that the “Interwoven History” of American Jews and African Americans is one of both shared trauma and shared triumph.
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Barrett Holman Leak is a freelance writer based in San Diego.
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