Judaism

Female rabbis assume leadership of Rabbinical Assembly

By Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal SAN DIEGO–On Thursday evening I returned from attending the International Rabbinical Assembly Convention. For the first time in its history, this year’s RA Convention was held at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York City. JTS is the premiere academic institution of the Conservative Movement and many  JTS scholars, as well […]

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Jewish Religion, Middle East, USA

Breitbard’s philanthropy and family ties emphasized at funeral service

Related story by Joey Seymour By Norman Greene SAN DIEGO– During his life time, Bob Breitbard, 91, who passed away in his sleep at Seacrest Village Retirement Home in Encinitas on Monday, May 17, was already a San Diego legend. As a dreamer and visionary sportsman who built a community arena, a museum to honor

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Obituaries & memorials, San Diego County, Sports & Competitions

Old Louis Rose might have kvelled over National City Marine Terminal

By Donald H. Harrison NATIONAL CITY, California – Observing the National City Marine Terminal from the top deck of M.V. Jean Anne, a 13,000-metric ton ship that transports automobiles and other cargo between San Diego County and the Hawaiian Islands, I could imagine four 19th Century San Diego pioneers standing there with me and nudging each

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Donald H. Harrison, Jewish History

Eva Schloss, stepsister of Anne Frank, writes intriguing memoir

Eva’s Story by Eva Schloss (with Evelyn Julia Kent), William B. Eerdman Publishing Co, 2010, 226 pages. By Donald H. Harrison SAN DIEGO—This is an updated version of the memoirs of Eva Schloss, who was the posthumous stepsister of the immortal Anne Frank.  Originally published in 1988, the current edition brings readers up to date

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Jewish History

3-Year-Old’s Lag b’Omer haircut indicative of a return to tradition

By Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal SAN DIEGO–Thursday evening my wife Judy and I returned from visiting our son, daughter-in-law, and two grandsons. Shortly after our first grandson, Neriya, was born, his mother  called and asked us to reserve Lag B’Omer of this year for his upshirin. My son, Rabbi Adam Rosenthal, and his wife, Sarah, were

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Jewish Religion, Travel and Food

San Diego’s Historic Places: San Diego Automotive Museum

  By Donald H. Harrison SAN DIEGO—There are many automotive museums around the world, interpreting their missions in a variety of fashions. Some collect, wanting to obtain representative automobiles of every make, nationality, or year. Others love to show the marriages of art and technology, form and function, and marketing and self-perceptions all shaping people’s

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Donald H. Harrison, Jewish History, USA

Another paradigm for historians: Jewish life on the West Coast

By Joellyn Zollman Jews of the Pacific Coast: Reinventing Community on America’s Edge. Ellen Eisenberg, Ava F. Kahn, and William Toll. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2009, 309pp. SAN DIEGO–The New York Jewish experience has long served as the template for understanding American Jewish history. In Jews of the Pacific Coast, historians Ellen Eisenberg, Ava

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Jewish History

San Diego’s Historic Places: Veterans Memorial Museum hosts exhibit on Japanese-American members of the Armed Forces

  By Donald H. Harrison SAN DIEGO—Probably no event has seared into the consciousness of the Japanese-American community more painfully than their forced relocation from their homes on the West Coast of the United States to internment camps in the interior of the country during World War II.   This is the central portion of

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Donald H. Harrison, Jewish History, USA

Judaism’s chain of tradition impacts on a daily basis

By Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal SAN DIEGO–Terms such as the “chain of Jewish tradition” and “Jewish continuity” have been so overused that they are in danger of becoming trite. However, once in a while something happens that makes me pause and reflect on how our tradition is truly ancient and unbroken. One such moment occurred for

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Jewish History, San Diego County

San Diego’s Historic Places: 19th Coast Artillery at Cabrillo National Monument

  By Donald H. Harrison SAN DIEGO—It is commonplace to see elementary school classes walking through Cabrillo National Monument on history field trips. But similar field trips to Cabrillo may also be appropriate for high school trigonometry classes – especially for those students who wonder, “What’s the point of this stuff? When would we ever

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Donald H. Harrison, Jewish History, USA

Roseville section of San Diego to reinstall historic marker on La Playa Trail

SAN DIEGO (Press Release) — Members of the La Playa Trail Association will place a monument at 10:15 a.m., Thursday, April 29, at the corner of Rosecrans Street and Avenida de Portugal to mark the location where the town of Roseville was founded in 1869 by Louis Rose. The monument duplicates one that had been erected

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Donald H. Harrison, Jewish History

A moral code for those people and companies making headlines and the rest of us

By Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal SAN DIEGO — On Mondays and Thursdays, the market days of times gone by, we read the Torah during daily minyan. We normally read the first three aliyot of the parasha of the approaching Shabbat. On Thursday a member of our minyan nudged me during the Torah reading and said, “I

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Jewish Religion