Today’s Jewish Birthday

Today’s Jewish Birthday: Chaim Soutine

Among his friends in Paris was Amedeo Modigliani, who became another famous Jewish artist. They painted portraits of each other. After art dealer Albert Barnes purchased 60 of Soutine’s paintings in 1923, Soutine celebrated by hiring a taxi to drive him from Paris to nice, more than 400 miles away. [SDJA staff]

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Today’s Jewish Birthday: Jared Kushner

When Ivanka’s father, Donald Trump, became U.S. President in 2017, Jared became a senior advisor in the White House and director of the Office of American Innovation. He was put in charge of Trump’s initiative in the Middle East, which resulted in the Abraham Accords among Israel, United Arab Emirates, Sudan, and Morocco.[SdJW staff]

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Today’s Jewish Birthday: Soupy Sales

The national Soupy Sales Show featured non-stop jokes, slapstick, and signature pie-in-the-face routines.  Famous musicians often appeared as guests on the show, which also featured such puppets as  “White Fang,” “Black Tooth,” “Pokie the Lion,” and “Hippy the Hippo.” [SDJW staff report]

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Today’s Jewish Birthday: Adolph Zukor

He invested in a chain of theaters, leading in 1912 to Zukor establishing the Famous Players Film Company, later through mergers to become Paramount Pictures, with studios on both coasts.  Zukor purchased chains of movie theaters, guaranteeing audiences for the films he produced with such well-known stars as  Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks. (SDJW staff report]

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Today’s Jewish Birthday: Bonnie Franklin

Bonnie Franklin (January 6, 1944-March 1, 2013) was remembered for her role as the single mother Ann Romano in the 1975-1984 television series One Day at a Time. Created by Norman Lear, the series addressed a variety of social issues including premarital sex, sexual harassment, and suicide. [SDJW staff report]

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Today’s Jewish Birthday: Kevin Pillar

Scaling the left field wall on April 15, 2015 to rob the Tampa Bay Rays of a homerun was voted as the play of the year by Pillar’s Toronto Blue Jays fans. Less than two months later, Pillar hit two home runs in the same game off Max Scherzer of the Washington Nationals. [SDJW staff report]

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Today’s Jewish Birthday: Victor Borge

One routine involved adding a number to any word containing the sound of a number, so, for example, “wonderful” became “twoderful” and “anyone for tennis?” became “any two for elevennis?”  Another shtick was reading books aloud, making special sound effects to indicate punctuation. [SDJW staff report]

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Today’s Jewish Birthday: Isaac Asimov

The family immigrated to the United States in 1923 and owned candy stores, where, as youngsters, Isaac, his sister Manya, and brother, Stanley, all worked. The stores stocked science fiction magazines and newspapers, perhaps accounting for Isaac becoming a science fiction writer and Stanley a vice president of Long Island Newsday. [SD Jewish World staff]

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Today’s Jewish Birthday: J. D. Salinger

The Catcher in the Rye, featuring the adventures of the cynical Holden Caulfield, was greeted enthusiastically by literary reviewers and by high school teachers, but in other parts of the country, it was denounced as smut because of Salinger’s frequent use of such words as “goddamn,” bastard,” “Chrissakes.”[SDJW Staff report]

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