Jewish History

Today’s Jewish Birthday: Leo Szilard

In 1938, Szilard moved to the United States, where he worked at Columbia University to demonstrate the concept of nuclear fission.  He drafted a letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, which he got his more famous mentor, Albert Einstein, to sign warning of Germany’s nuclear weapons project.  This eventually prompted the creation of the Manhattan Project at the University of Chicago. [SDJW Staff]

Today’s Jewish Birthday: Leo Szilard Read More »

Antisemitism, International, Jewish History, San Diego County, Science, Medicine, & Education, Staff and Bylined Contributors, Today's Jewish Birthday, USA

Alex Grass: Rite Aid’s Success Led to His Many Philanthropies

Editor’s Note: This is the 21st chapter in Volume 3 of Publisher and Editor Donald H. Harrison’s 2022 trilogy, “Schlepping and Schmoozing Along the Interstate 5.” All three books as well as others written by Harrison may be purchased from Amazon.com. Schlepping and Schmoozing Along the Interstate 5, Volume 3, Exit 49 (Tamarack Avenue): Rite

Alex Grass: Rite Aid’s Success Led to His Many Philanthropies Read More »

Ben Dishman, Business & Finance, Donald H. Harrison, International, Israel, Jewish History, Philanthropy & Volunteerism, San Diego County, Science, Medicine, & Education, Staff and Bylined Contributors, USA

Our Shtetl San Diego County: Dealing with Workplace Antisemitism

The regional office of the Anti-Defamation League is offering to bring workshops to places of employment in San Diego and Imperial Counties on such topics as 1) Jewish identity; 2) Contemporary and historical manifestations of antisemitism; 3) Comparing and contrasting antisemitism with other forms of hate; 4) The rise in antisemitism and hate post-October 7th, and 5) Tools to be upstanders against antisemitism and hate. [SDJW staff]

Our Shtetl San Diego County: Dealing with Workplace Antisemitism Read More »

Antisemitism, Business & Finance, Israel, Jewish History, San Diego County, Staff and Bylined Contributors, USA

Florida Holocaust Museum to Permanently House Elie Wiesel’s Collection

The Florida Holocaust Museum has been chosen as the permanent home of Elie Wiesel’s entire collection, including his Nobel prize, the  contents of his personal office and library, unfinished manuscripts, letters from world leaders and other luminaries, and a variety of artworks, photographs, recordings – some of which have never been seen. [Press Release]

Florida Holocaust Museum to Permanently House Elie Wiesel’s Collection Read More »

Holocaust, Jewish History, Press Release, Science, Medicine, & Education, USA

Today’s Jewish Birthday: Martin Buber

In 1923, Buber wrote his famous essay on existence, Ich und Du, which was translated into English as I and Thou. Ich-Du relationships involve the concepts of ‘encounter,” “meeting,” “dialogue,” “mutuality,” and “exchange,” where as in Ich-Es (I and It) relationships, there is no dialogue or exchange, there is only monologue. Other things or people exist only to serve the interests of the individual in question. [SDJW staff]

Today’s Jewish Birthday: Martin Buber Read More »

Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Holocaust, Jewish History, Staff and Bylined Contributors, Today's Jewish Birthday, USA

Commentary: Two Local Jewish Elected Officials Vote Against Israel

At the San Diego County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday, Imam Mohamed Taha Hassane of the Islamic Center of San Diego was reappointed to the Leon L. Williams County’s Human Relations Commission over the objections of an ad hoc group called Stand With Israel whose members decried the local Muslim leader’s defense of the October 7th massacre of Israeli civilians by Hamas. [Donald H. Harrison]

Commentary: Two Local Jewish Elected Officials Vote Against Israel Read More »

Antisemitism, Donald H. Harrison, International, Israel, Jewish History, San Diego County, Shanda File, Staff and Bylined Contributors, USA

Jewish Biography: Banker Ludwig Bamberger Almost Was Hanged as a Revolutionary

“The Red Jew” was probably the richest revolutionary in history. His range of occupations was immeasurably broad, and his activities were full of attempts to improve Germany and to forget the Jewish people. He became one of the first statesmen of a united Germany, but remained an outsider in the society of which he aspired to be a full member. [Alex Gordon, Ph.D]

Jewish Biography: Banker Ludwig Bamberger Almost Was Hanged as a Revolutionary Read More »

Alex Gordon, International, Jewish History, Staff and Bylined Contributors

Symposium Told a New Strategy Needed to Combat Antisemitism

America’s Jewish community always knew that there was no vaccine or antidote for the disease of antisemitism, but prior to Oct. 7th, it felt the disease could be kept in check.  “We developed a containment strategy, a firewall, to make sure that here we could keep it in the sewers, with the covers on,” Abe Foxman told a “Standing Together” symposium Sunday that was jointly sponsored by the American Jewish Committee and the Jewish Federation of San Diego. [Donald H. Harrison]

Symposium Told a New Strategy Needed to Combat Antisemitism Read More »

Donald H. Harrison, Holocaust, International, Israel, Jewish History, San Diego County, Sandi Masori, Staff and Bylined Contributors, Technology, USA

Today’s Jewish Birthday: Betty Friedan

In 1963, she wrote The Feminine Mystique, which described the “problem that has no name” at the beginning of the book: “The problem lay buried, unspoken, for many years in the minds of American women. It was a strange stirring, a sense of dissatisfaction, a yearning [that is, a longing] that women suffered in the middle of the 20th century in the United States. Each suburban [house]wife struggled with it alone. As she made the beds, shopped for groceries … she was afraid to ask even of herself the silent question – ‘Is this all?’ ” [SDJW staff]

Today’s Jewish Birthday: Betty Friedan Read More »

Jewish History, Staff and Bylined Contributors, Today's Jewish Birthday, USA

Our Shtetl San Diego County: Rose Schindler’s Hologram Addresses Students

In technology similar to that seen at such presidential museums as the Richard Nixon Library in Yorba Linda, the Schindler family has preserved the memory of the late Holocaust survivor Rose Schindler by creating a hologram of her that can answer questions from students or other audience members. [SDJW staff]

Our Shtetl San Diego County: Rose Schindler’s Hologram Addresses Students Read More »

Holocaust, Israel, Jewish History, Lawrence Baron, Middle East, Obituaries & memorials, San Diego County, Shanda File, Staff and Bylined Contributors, Theatre, Film & Broadcast, USA

Today’s Jewish Birthday: Nathan Straus

He and his wife Lina Gutherz privately funded the Nathan Straus Pasteurized Milk Laboratory to combat infant mortality, and opened in Lakewood, New Jersey a Tuberculosis Preventorium for Children. During the Panic of 1893, his milk stations sold coal for the low price of 5 cents for 25 pounds. He opened homeless shelters for 64,000 people who paid a nickel each to get a bed and breakfast. He funded 50,000 meals for one cent each. At Abraham & Straus, he established a subsidized company cafeteria. [SDJW staff]

Today’s Jewish Birthday: Nathan Straus Read More »

Business & Finance, International, Israel, Jewish History, Staff and Bylined Contributors, Today's Jewish Birthday, USA

Jews and Palestinians, History and Memory

When I watched the unwatchable news on October 7, and then later doom scrolled through November and December and into 2024, inhaling episodes of rape and slaughter and captivity, but also excruciatingly moving scenes of incomplete family reunions, of young soldiers breaking down at funerals, and, of course, of women and children blown to bits in Gaza City and Khan Younis, a whispered prayer sometimes escaped my lips, “God, we don’t need any more stories.” [Rabbi Philip Graubart]

Jews and Palestinians, History and Memory Read More »

Holocaust, Israel, Jewish History, San Diego County, Staff and Bylined Contributors

Commentary: White supremacy and Holocaust denial have deep roots in the Midwest

Published by Chicago Tribune In a recent interview on the CNN podcast “The Axe Files,” crime writer Sara Paretsky talked about the antisemitism she faced growing up in a Jewish family in Kansas in the 1950s — antisemitism that limited what neighborhoods she and her family were allowed to live in. Paretsky noted that Jews

Commentary: White supremacy and Holocaust denial have deep roots in the Midwest Read More »

Antisemitism, Holocaust, International, Jewish History, Nordot