Tag Archives: American Jewish History

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: Ban on Blackface in the Mummers Parade

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In mid-December 1963, members of the Philadelphia chapter of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) approached Elias Myers, the city appointed director of the 1964 Mummers Parade, to demand that blackface be banned from the upcoming event. Myers announced on December 16 that the use of blackface would be prohibited, but this decision did not sit well with some Mummers and Myers soon found his home picketed by over a hundred dissenters. The city tried to reach a compromise, but a few days later the ban on black face was rescinded.

Demonstrators protest ban of blackface in Mummers parade, December 19, 1963, Philadelphia Evening Bulletin Photograph Collection

1963 had been a turbulent year, punctuated by imagery of police dogs and fire hoses turned on young African American protesters, church bombings, mass civil rights demonstrations, and the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. It was in this context of activism and struggle, that the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) filed a petition in court on December 30 seeking to have the use of blackface by the Mummers banned. The NAACP argued that permitting ridicule of a large percentage of the city’s population was unacceptable given that the parade was subsidized by taxpayers and subject to the issuance of a city permit.

At the hearing, Jules Cohen, Executive Director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Philadelphia (JCRC), offered this testimony, “Not too long ago, the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Philadelphia and other Jewish organizations were constrained to take action to end the caricaturizing of Jews on the vaudeville stage, in plays and movies. Stereotyping through the use of blackface in the Mummers Day Parade is an insult to the Negro community and offensive to Negro and white citizens alike.” Nevertheless, the court denied the petition on the basis that there was no law prohibiting the wearing of blackface and that the Mummers’ intent was not to ridicule.

Members of the Hammond Comic Club, 2nd and Mifflin Streets, January 3, 1964, Philadelphia Evening Bulletin Photograph Collection

Due to bad weather on New Year’s Day, the Mummers Parade was postponed until January 4, which allowed tensions over the controversy to rise to alarming heights. Reports surfaced that Mummers, motivated by what they saw as an intrusion on their traditions, intended to have over 1,000 marchers wearing blackface at their parade. Meanwhile, CORE announced their intent to disrupt the march, and Police Commissioner Howard Leary was informed that he should expect demonstrators to arrive from across the Mid-Atlantic. As fears of a violent confrontation escalated, Philadelphia’s Council on Human Relations spearheaded talks on how to resolve what they feared was an impending disaster peacefully.

Officers of the JCRC participated in talks with representatives of the Greater Philadelphia Council of Churches, the Board of Rabbis of Greater Philadelphia, and the Roman Catholic Archdiocese. This resulted in a new court petition on January 2 emphasizing the threat to public safety and seeking to ban the use of blackface as well as prevent any protests at the parade. The petitioners were chosen to represent an interfaith consensus and included JCRC’s Vice-President, Fanny Goldsmith. The court issued an injunction, citing the “clear and present danger” to the city, and as a result the parade was held on January 4 without blackface or significant disruptions.

Civil Liberties Committee meeting minutes, January 29, 1964. Jewish Community Relations Council Records

On January 6th, Jules Cohen wrote a report to the Council of National Jewish Agencies that stated in part:   “By New Years Eve, those of us close to the picture were convinced that rioting and disorder were inevitable. All of the ingredients for an explosion were present–an issue about which both sides felt strongly…. I am satisfied the police could not have controlled these extraordinary crowds and that granting of the injunction prevented property damage, physical harm and perhaps even some killings. Such an explosion would have set us back 100 years in civil rights and it would have done untold economic damage to the city in the loss of conventions and other business.”

Following these events there was widespread discussion in the press over the controversy and whether or not the prohibitions on both blackface and protest went too far. Indeed, the JCRC’s Civil Liberties Committee expressed mixed feelings about the outcome in a statement that both sympathized with the motivations of those involved, but also worried about the implications of a court decision that infringed on the right to protest.

–Kenneth Cleary, Project Archivist, SCRC

This is the second post of an occasional series highlighting the work of Philadelphia’s Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC). The records of the JCRC, housed in Temple University Libraries’ Special Collections Research Center, are currently being processed and will be available for research in early 2018.

 

What in the World is a Vertical File?

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Libraries and archives often maintain what they arcanely call “vertical files,” defined by Merriam-Webster as “a collection of articles (as pamphlets and clippings) that is maintained (as in a library) to answer brief questions or to provide points of information not easily located.” Other definitions note that the items in the file are too minor to require individual cataloging. And “vertical” refers to the actual storage orientation of the file folders—upright, often in a filing cabinet.

These files are simultaneously rich and idiosyncratic in content. A user never knows what might turn up and learns to enjoy the serendipity of finding a rich file, while being resigned to the disappointment of a skinny one.

Franklin Theater Program., circa 1930

Temple University Libraries’ Special Collection Research Center maintains several such files. In the Philadelphia Jewish Archives, there are the Vertical Files on the Jewish Community of Greater Philadelphia which is an accumulation of items that document Jewish history in Philadelphia. The collection include photocopies of newspaper articles, pamphlets, family histories and genealogies, ephemeral items such as brochures, flyers and event programs and other miscellaneous materials relating to persons, places, organizations, and topical subjects. The files provide background information on cultural and historical events, businesses, and community members of the Jewish community in the Greater Philadelphia region and parts of southern New Jersey.

Russell and Sarah Conwell

The inventory to the Temple University Archives Vertical File  was recently put on line. It documents Temple’s founder Russell Conwell and many aspects of the University’s history. The collection contains publications, pamphlets, flyers and event programs, newspaper clippings, and other materials gathered from university offices and various news sources relating to persons, places, organizations, and topical subjects that document Temple University.

We’re reviewing the Science Fiction Collection Vertical File and the Dance Collection Vertical Files and hope to have information available about their contents soon.

Archbishop Tutu at Temple, January 14, 1986

Are these vertical files going the way of the dinosaur? At the moment, they are often superior to any search engine—or at least as good as the staff who faithfully gather and file the items—and serve as a great starting point and resource for many topics. Did you want to know about the Temple-Community Charrette of 1970; the model UN Conference that began at Temple in 1946; what Desmond Tutu said to the Temple community when he received an honorary degree in 1986? Start with the vertical file!

 

–Margery Sly, Director, SCRC

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: Police Squad Thwarts Tolerance Raiders

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Bureau of Police complaint report excerpt, March 16, 1939

On March 14, 1939, Detective Sergeant Jacob H. Gomborow assigned six detectives from the Philadelphia Bureau of Police’s radical squad to attend a meeting organized by the Committee for Racial and Religious Tolerance held at the West Philadelphia branch of the YMCA at 52nd and Sansom Streets. The committee was an interfaith group sponsored by well-known clergy and politicians including Daniel A. Poling, Rufus M. Jones, C. Davis Matt, and Francis J. Myers. Prior to the meeting, Gomborow had received information that a group of Nazis were planning to infiltrate the tolerance gathering and instructed detectives to sit in the audience to monitor the meeting for any disturbances. The detectives witnessed a number of persons heckling the speakers, making slanderous remarks against Jews, and nailing anti-Semitic literature and posters to the walls. One of those men, William J. Rigney, stood up repeatedly during the meeting, interrupting the speaker, proclaiming that “Hitler is right in what he is doing to the Jews” and “it is the Jews own fault.” The meeting was abruptly adjourned as a result of the disorder caused by these men. As they left, the detectives observed these same men distributing leaflets promoting racial and religious hatred and pasting anti-Jewish stickers on cars and store windows in the surrounding neighborhood.

“Attention, American Gentiles!” flier issued by Thomas Blissard Sr., March 1939

Detectives arrested eleven of the “Nazi strong armers” who were subsequently charged with inciting a riot. In the early morning hours of March 15, three others were arrested at City Hall, including Thomas A. Blisard, Jr. and Joseph A. Gallagher, while they were attempting to secure the release of those arrested outside the tolerance meeting. Joseph A. Gallagher, chairman of the Anti-Communist Society of Philadelphia, a group founded by the West Philadelphia High School teacher and Nazi sympathizer Bessie “Two Gun” Burchett, protested the arrests, claiming they were a “frame-up.” Gallagher also denied the literature found in his car, which included copies of the Father Charles E. Coughlin publication Social Justice, was anti-Semitic propaganda. Thomas A. Blisard, Jr. (aka Blissard or Blizzard) and his family were well known in the community and to police as rabid anti-Communists and self-described Coughlinites. At the time, Blisard was chairman of the Philadelphia Committee for the Defense of Constitutional Rights, a group originally formed to protest against the radio station WDAS. The station had dropped Father Coughlin’s broadcasts when he refused to provide advance scripts of his addresses. Blisard’s father made use of tolerance meeting arrests to further their cause, printing and circulating fliers publicizing the “persecution of gentiles” suffered at the hands of an “organized gang of Jews.”

Recently prepared for research use, the Jacob H. Gomborow Papers, housed in Temple University Libraries’ Special Collections Research Center, document Gomborow’s activities as an officer and detective in Philadelphia’s Bureau of Police, responsible for leading the bureau’s radical squad in their investigations of anti-Semitic, subversive, and radical groups in the 1920s, 30s, and 40s. View the online finding aid or catalog record to learn more about the Jacob H. Gomborow Papers or to request access to the collection in the SCRC reading room on the ground floor of Paley Library.

Jessica M. Lydon, Associate Archivist, SCRC

“We Ought to Have Our Fences Up”: Nativism and Xenophobia in the Progressive Era

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An immigrant couple and their children., circa 1910. Philadelphia Jewish Archives photograph collection

As early as the 1890s, immigration bills with provisions for literacy tests were introduced in Congress as legislative measures to control the influx of immigrants into America. On several occasions these proposed literacy tests were passed by both houses of Congress, only to be vetoed later by the President.  In 1897, for example, Grover Cleveland rejected a proposed literacy law on the basis it was “unnecessarily harsh and oppressive.”

Beginning in 1907, the United States Immigration Commission, under the leadership of Vermont Senator William Paul Dillingham began its work to address the growing nationalist concerns over the ever increasing numbers of immigrants (over 1 million annually between 1905 and 1907) arriving each year. The Dillingham Commission completed its work in 1911 and concluded that immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe posed a serious threat to American society and culture and should therefore be greatly reduced. It further called for regulation of the “kind” or “type” of immigrants admitted to the U.S.

Dillingham Bill (S. 3175), March 1, 1912, Louis Edward Levy Family Papers

The Dillingham Commission’s work was part and parcel of a wave of xenophobic and nativist sentiment in the early twentieth century, which saw numerous immigration restriction bills introduced to Congress with measures that included not only literacy tests, but also head taxes and specification of “barred” or “undesirable” immigrants by geographic and ethnic origin, physical and mental health status, and socioeconomic means. As the twentieth century unfolded, this nativist sentiment drove a progression of severely restrictive immigration legislation.

William Howard Taft vetoed a 1913 bill including a literacy test, as did Woodrow Wilson in 1915, asserting that “it excludes those to whom opportunities of elementary education have been denied without regard to their character, their purposes, or their natural capacity.” Wilson vetoed a restrictive immigration bill containing a literacy test provision for the second time in 1916; however Congress was successful in overriding that veto.   On August 17, 1916, in support of the bill, Republican Senator William E. Borah of Idaho stated “we ought to have our fences up and be thoroughly prepared to protect those in this country who will be brought into competition with the hordes of people who will come here.”

The Immigration Act of 1917 enacted the literacy test as law and expanded the list of “undesirables” barred from entering the country including all persons originating from a geographic area termed the “Asiatic Barred Zone,” a region that included much of East and Southeast Asia and the Pacific Islands.

Letter to Congressman J. Hampton Moore, February 28, 1912, Louis Edward Levy Family Papers

Many individuals and organizations engaged in debates on immigration as this legislation was introduced, including Louis Edward Levy, a prominent figure of Philadelphia’s Jewish community. Levy spoke out against the literacy test as a prerequisite to entry into the United States. He did so both as a private individual and as President of the Association for the Protection of Jewish Immigrants, in published writing and in speeches and testimony. Recently prepared for research use, the Maxwell Whiteman Collection of Louis Edward Levy Family Papers, housed in Temple University Libraries’ Special Collections Research Center, includes some of these writings, extensive correspondence, and accounts of speeches that Levy gave on the subject.

The Levy Family Papers document the activities of Louis Edward Levy, the Association for the Protection of Jewish Immigrants, and other local and national immigrant aid societies and their efforts to mobilize and coordinate collective action against immigration restriction in favor of more liberal immigration policies. To use the Levy Family Papers, request materials from the finding aid  for use in the SCRC Reading Room in Paley Library, or view a digitized selection of files from the papers.

Anastasia Chiu, Resident Librarian
Jessica M. Lydon, Associate Archivist, SCRC

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: “The Levittown Problem”

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On August 13, 1957, William and Daisy Myers and their three children, an African American family, moved into the all-white community of Levittown, Pennsylvania, and shortly thereafter found themselves confronted by angry residents displeased with their arrival. Large crowds gathered during the day and hurled insults towards the home, while at night, cars drove by flashing their lights and honking their horns. The situation escalated over the course of eight days, with rocks being thrown through the windows of the Myers’ home and another stone knocking a local police officer unconscious. In response, the Pennsylvania State Police were sent to Levittown to restore order, where they would remain for nearly two months before a semblance of calm returned.

Crowd protests first black family moving into Levittown, August 17, 1957, Philadelphia Evening Bulletin Photograph Collection

 

The events in Levittown attracted the attention of the national press and a wide range of civic and religious organizations that shared a common mission to combat prejudice and discrimination. One of these organizations was Philadelphia’s Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC), which frequently worked to promote fairness and equal opportunity in housing for African Americans throughout Philadelphia. The JCRC would not take a direct role in events taking place in Levittown, but correspondence between JCRC executive director Maurice Fagan, and several other regional Jewish organizations, demonstrates the level of interest they shared. On October 18, Stephen Remsen, the director of the Philadelphia based Jewish Labor Committee, wrote to Fagan saying, “The pressures of time and the fact that my Levittown file is at home preparing itself for some more speeches to everybody and his brother make it difficult for me to do justice to your request.”

The apparent request was for an account of the role of Levittown’s Jews in response to the unrest. The letter praises the activities of the local Jewish Community Council, which worked in cooperation with Protestant and Quaker groups to actively support the rights of the Myers.  Remsen notes that there were some “individual” Jews who were either neutral or opposed to the racial integration of their community, yet also stresses that he could find no evidence that any Jew took part in any of the protests or acts of mob violence. Perhaps the most interesting comments in the letter come when Remsen expresses concern to Fagan about the way Jews are sometimes perceived and how this could influence events in Levittown.

Remsen writes: “If there was any problem, it was the identification of the Myers move-in as a Negro-Jewish-Quaker movement and cause. While the Rabbi and all the others of Jewish faith who were in this fight tried to remain in the background, it was impossible to do this. I am convinced that the enemy – smelling one Jew in the community – would have played the anti-Semitic game even if that one Jew did nothing but study the Torah.”

Letter to JCRC executive director Maurice Fagan, October 18, 1957

Fred Grossman, director of the regional Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith, also wrote to Fagan on October 18 about his assessment of events in Levittown. Grossman describes some of the harassment endured by the Myers family and their supporters over the previous weeks and similarly lauds the work of Jewish groups, despite, “reports of anti-Semitic comments and instances of hostility from non-Jewish neighbors previously friendly or at least indifferent.”   Grossman also makes it clear that Jewish support for racial integration was not universal, and, in terms that are a bit more stark than Remsen’s, says that, “Although there are many Jews who are strongly opposed to integration and who resent the Myers, few if any of these agree with the violence or the attrition techniques aimed at driving the Myers out.”

Following these letters, Fagan submitted a report on October 23, 1957, to the JCRC board of directors that outlined what he saw as four key reasons why Jews had a stake in Levittown: “(1) the family which sold the home [to Myers] is Jewish; (2) the friendly family next door is Jewish; (3) organized Jewish groups and synagogues were called upon to make a public stand; and (4) Levitt of Levittown is Jewish.”

“The Levittown Problem and the Jewish Community” report, October 23, 1957

A local group, the Levittown Citizens Committee, took the lead in organizing support for the Myers and appealing for peace in their community. Comprised of Levittown residents, as well as local rabbis, Protestant ministers, and members of the Society of Friends, the group lent direct support to the embattled Myers and campaigned against the racism on their streets. Before it was over, the Myers and their friends would endure numerous forms of intimidation, including the burning of several crosses and the painting of “KKK” on the home of Myers’ Jewish neighbor. For several weeks, a vacant house situated next to the Myers’ home was occupied by members of the Levittown Betterment Committee–a hastily organized group that wanted to preserve Levittown’s whiteness. This vacant house was used as a rallying point for the demonstrators, which featured a Confederate flag flying above and the loud broadcast of songs, such as “Old Man River” and “Dixie.”

Eventually, William and Daisy Myers appealed to the Pennsylvania State Attorney General and charges were filed against members of the Levittown Betterment Committee, followed by a court ordered injunction issued on October 23, 1957–the same day as Fagan’s report. Records show that the JCRC was ready to lend aid if called upon, but no such request came from Levittown’s Jewish community, which had no formal relationship with their organization. The JCRC’s board of directors issued formal resolutions of commendation to both the Levittown Citizens Committee and the Levittown Jewish Community Council on December 20, 1957. Their commendation to the Levittown Jewish Community Council read, in part:

“The Philadelphia Jewish Community Relations Council notes with pride and gratification the courage, dignity and integrity with which the Jewish Community of Levittown, in the main under the leadership of the Levittown Jewish Community Council, expressed its regard for human dignity and democracy when the Myers family was threatened by mob harassment and violence.”

Letter to Levittown Jewish Community Council, December 20, 195

The events that took place in Levittown, Pennsylvania, are a small chapter in the larger story of American’s struggle over civil rights, but in many ways it represents themes that would reverberate in numerous communities across the country. While not all Jews took up the fight against segregation, in many cases American Jews could be found either on the front lines or working to support the efforts of those who were.

Additional photographs of crowds protesting the Meyers’ family move to Levittown, PA, can be found in the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin photograph collection.

To learn more about the Levittown communities in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, see Suzanne Lashner Dadyanim’s essay on The Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia’s website.

–Kenneth Cleary, Project Archivist, Philadelphia Jewish Archives Collection, SCRC

This is the first post of an occasional series highlighting the work of Philadelphia’s Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC). The records of the JCRC, housed in Temple University Libraries’ Special Collections Research Center, are currently being processed and will be available for research in early 2018.

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: Friend-Finding Service for Refugees

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The task of acclimating to a new environment can be daunting for anyone relocating or settling in a new city or country. In addition to establishing a home, finding work, accessing health care and other services, and possibly learning a new language, developing friendships is an important part of feeling connected to a new community. In an increasingly technologically-dependent world, social networking tools and friend finder apps like Wiith, Hey! VINA, LykeMe, and Meetup can make easy work of connecting to like-minded individuals with similar interests. The challenges associated with establishing a social network in an unfamiliar place are certainly not new.

Recently, while processing and cataloging the records of the Philadelphia based social service agency Jewish Family Service held in the Special Collections Research Center, I discovered a card file containing profiles of WWII refugees. The profile cards were created by the Philadelphia Refugee Resettlement Committee, a committee established in February 1937 by the Jewish Welfare Society (later renamed the Jewish Family Service) to support the economic and social adjustment of individuals and families displaced by the war.

The Refugee Resettlement Committee saw one of the most basic social skills—the ability to make friends—as a necessity for the positive adjustment of refugees arriving in Philadelphia. To aid this process, the committee created a service staffed by volunteer “friendly visitors.” The committee would interview these “new Americans” after their arrival, creating a profile card summarizing the individual or family’s background and social preferences. Volunteers were then matched with refugees based on shared interests in the hopes of fostering a friendship.

Lauer family profile card, 1939

Max and Fridericka Lauer and their two sons were just one of the many families who were matched with Refugee Resettlement Committee volunteers between 1938 and 1941. The Lauers’ profile card indicates the eldest son, Lothar, immigrated to Philadelphia in September 1938 and enrolled as a student at Temple University prior to his family’s arrival in March the next year. Described as a cultured family, the following excerpt from the Lauers’ profile provides some insight into the challenges they faced in creating a social network on their own:

“Mr. and Mrs. Lauer have always been interested in music, the theatre, the opera–but have been unable to partake of these activities in this country because of a financial inability, and a lack of friends with whom to share these interests. Mrs. Lauer is also interested in bridge but states that the women she has met in her neighborhood are old Jewish women whose sole interest is the house, thus giving her very little in common with them. Mrs. Lauer does not speak English at all, Dr. Lauer speaks quite poorly. It would therefore be necessary to find a German-speaking volunteer for this family.”

–Jessica M. Lydon, Associate Archivist, SCRC

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: Philadelphia’s Holocaust Memorial

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Monument at 16th and Benjamin Franklin Parkway, April 27, 1964

As we enter the Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust and Yom Hashoah, the Special Collections Research Center asked Natasha Goldman, Research Associate and Adjunct Lecturer in Art History at Bowdoin College, to share her recent experiences at the SCRC and the connections she made that led to Temple’s acquisition of a previously “hidden collection.”

Goldman writes:  “In 2011, I started research on Nathan Rapoport’s Monument to the Six Million Martyrs (1964), arguably the first public Holocaust memorial in the US, located in Philadelphia at the corner of 16th St., Arch St. and Benjamin Franklin Parkway. Designed by artist Nathan Rapoport, famous for his Warsaw Ghetto Uprising Monument (1948), the sculpture has largely been ignored in the literature of Holocaust memory in the US.

Abram Shnaper, a Holocaust survivor, had initiated the monument’s commission on the behalf of the Association of Jewish New Americans, a Philadelphia survivor organization that he had founded in 1954. Together with the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, the groups raised $47,000 for the monument. Shnaper painstakingly documented the entire process, from raising funds, to writing letters to the artist, to sending telegrams to Israel to invite Israeli officials to the dedication ceremony. When I visited him in his home in 2011, Shnaper conveyed to me his wish that the documents stay in Philadelphia, close to the monument. 

After Shnaper’s passing, I visited his collection once again, this time at the offices of his son-in-law. I also visited the Temple University Libraries’ Special Collections Research Center, where I found the documents of the Jewish Community Relations Council—including files relating to the committee responsible for the monument in the decade after its installation. When Shaper’s son-in-law asked me where he should donate Abe’s papers, I immediately knew that Temple University would be the best home for his collection. It was Shnaper’s greatest wish that young people learn about the Holocaust so as to pass on the legacy of the six million and of the survivors. Finally, students at Temple University and scholars from near and far have direct access to these rich primary documents. They demonstrate the dedication of diverse Jewish communities to create one of the earliest US Holocaust monuments in public space.”

Selections from the Shnaper papers

Acquired by the SCRC in 2014, the Abram Shnaper Papers on the Monument to the Six Million Jewish Martyrs are open and available for research. View the online finding aid or catalog record for a description of the collection’s contents and to request access to the materials in the SCRC reading room.

Natasha Goldman’s article on Rapaport’s memorial, “Never bow your head, be helpful, and fight for justice and righteousness: Nathan Rapoport and Philadelphia’s Holocaust Memorial (1964),” will be published in the Summer 2016 in the Journal of Jewish Identities, issue 9, number 2. The article will also appear in her forthcoming book, Holocaust Memorials in the United States and Germany: From Grass-Roots Movements to National Debates (under advance contract; Temple University Press, Spring 2017).

— Jessica M. Lydon, Associate Archivist, SCRC

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: Editorial Cartoons of Stu Goldman

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Stu Goldman business card, undated

Stu Goldman, an award winning syndicated editorial cartoonist, produced illustrations for the Philadelphia newspaper, The Jewish Exponent, from 1981 until his retirement in 2009. For many years, Goldman also served as a regular and feature cartoonist for a variety of periodicals:  Centre Democrat (Bellefonte, PA), Prince George’s Sentinel (Hyattsville, MD), and the predecessor to the alternative press publication, Philadelphia Weekly, previously known as Welcomat, which featured “Eavesdrawing,” a cartoon illustrating eavesdropped true-life conversations heard throughout the city.

[Jewish Voter Roll] political cartoon, 1988

At the height of syndication, Goldman’s editorial cartoons were featured in over 70 publications. Similar to the work of fellow Philadelphia newspaper cartoonist Samuel R. Joyner, also held by the Special Collections Research Center, Goldman’s cartoons used political satire to comment on issues that affected his own community as well as those of national and international importance. During the 1988 presidential campaign season, for example, Goldman drew a number of cartoons depicting the struggle between then Massachusetts Governor Michael S. Dukakis and then Vice President George Herbert Walker Bush to attract the Jewish vote.

Dr. Who Convention, February 23, 1985

In addition to his editorial cartoons, Goldman’s papers also includes his sketchbooks, many of them produced during his travels in the United States and abroad. His sketchbooks contain images on a range of subjects from the 1984 annual meeting of the American Jewish Press Association in Washington D.C. to a 1985 Dr. Who Convention at the Valley Forge Convention Center.

To learn more about Stu Goldman’s Editorial Cartoon Collection, contact the Special Collections Research Center at scrc@temple.edu .

 

 

— Jessica M. Lydon, Associate Archivist, SCRC

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: Jewish Beneficial Associations of Philadelphia

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Association newsletter, May 1954, Boslover Ahavas Achim Belzer Association Collection, SCRC 183, Special Collections Research Center

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Jewish immigrants arriving in the US from the same town or shtetl in Central and Eastern Europe often banded together to form fraternal organizations. In addition to providing assistance to recently arrived landsleit, these member associations offered social events, medical and death benefits, and arranged for cemetery burial plots. Beneficial society records often include meeting minutes, membership ledgers, newsletters, event programs, correspondence regarding benefit disbursements, and cemetery plot reservations. Many of the early meeting minutes are written in Yiddish or German. The archives of five beneficial association collections housed at the Special Collections Research Center are ready for research use:

American Hebrew Society Collection
The American Hebrew Society was founded in 1901 as the Roumanian Workingmen’s Beneficial Association. The organization was later known as the Roumanian Hebrew Beneficial Association, and later, the American Hebrew Society. The collection includes correspondence, member dues ledgers, meeting minutes, and permits and cemetery plot reservations for Har Jehuda and Mt. Sharon Cemeteries.
Boslover Ahavas Achim Belzer Association Collection
The Boslover Ahavas Achim Belzer Association was organized as the Boslover Beneficial Association in 1903 by immigrants from Bohuslav, Ukraine. In 1952, they merged with the Ahavas Achim Belzer Beneficial Association, a fraternal organization that had merged with the Belz-Bessarabia Beneficial Association in the late 1940s. The collection contains newsletters, photographs, and the Boslover Beneficial Association charter.

Krakauer-Yampoler Beneficial Society Records
The Krakauer-Yampoler Beneficial Society is the merged organization of the Krakauer Beneficial Society and the Yampoler Beneficial Association. The Krakauer Beneficial Society was founded in 1876 by a group of Jewish immigrants from Krakow, Poland. From 1882-1946, the organization was called the Krakauer Beth Elohim Beneficial Society before changing its name to the Krakauer Beneficial Society. In 1997, the Society merged with the Yampoler Beneficial Association, an organization founded in 1925 by immigrants from Yampol, Ukraine. This collection contains correspondence, meeting minutes, membership ledgers, and newsletters.

Prushin-Shershow Beneficial Association Records
The Prushin-Shershow Beneficial Association was organized in September 1889 by immigrants from the modern-day Belarusian shtetls of Pruzhany and Shereshov. The collection contains correspondence regarding benefits and cemetery plot reservations, meeting minutes, membership ledgers, and roll books.
Zitomirer Beneficial Association Records
The Zitomirer Beneficial Association was organized in 1916 by immigrants from Zhytomyr in present day Ukraine. The collection contains membership ledgers and material related to Mt. Lebanon Cemetery, including reservation plot lists and a map.

-Jenna Marrone, Project Archivist, SCRC

Einstein Medical Center History

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Illustration of Jewish Hospital and Home designed by Frank Furness and George W. Hewitt, Fourteenth Annual Report of the Jewish Hospital, 1879

On September 23, 1865, Jewish leaders in Philadelphia incorporated the Jewish Hospital Association of Philadelphia, now known as Einstein Medical Center. In the aftermath of the Civil War, the association’s officers, led by Alfred T. Jones, Isadore Binswanger, Samuel Weil, and Mayer Sulzberger, sought to erect a hospital under Jewish auspices in response to the lack medical care afforded to members of the Jewish community and the employment discrimination Jews were subject to at other area hospitals. The preamble to the constitution of the Jewish Hospital Association states “It is the duty of Israelites to take care of the suffering and needy ones among them, and as the sick are especially objects of charity and public solicitude, and since there is no institution now in existence within the State of Pennsylvania under the control of Israelites wherein they can place their sick, and where these can enjoy during their illness all the benefits and consolations of our religion.”

On August 6, 1866, the Jewish Hospital opened for the reception of patients. The original building was located at Haverford Road and 56th Street in West Philadelphia with room for twenty patients–ten for the sick and ten for inmates of the Asylum for the Aged, Infirm, and Destitute. Philadelphia’s Jewish Hospital was the third such hospital to be established in the United States after the Cincinnati Jewish Hospital (1849) and the Jews’ Hospital of New York (1852). In its first five months of operation, the hospital treated twenty-eight patients including three “non-Israelites.” Nonsectarian from its inception, the Jewish Hospital was committed to “reducing or eliminating the attitudes and prejudices that mixed medical practice with religious and moral views.” Unlike other hospitals in Philadelphia at the time, the Jewish Hospital was “was free of charge to all poor and worthy applicants without regard to nationality or creed.”

Nurses, resident physician Dr. Edwin Jarecki, and Dr. Knipe, Jewish Hospital, York and Tabor Roads, 1896

To learn more about the history of the Albert Einstein Medical Center and its predecessor, the Jewish Hospital, use the hospital archives and these resources in the Special Collections Research Center:   Mankind and Medicine: A History of Philadelphia’s Albert Einstein Medical Center by Maxwell Whiteman; Edwin A. Jarecki, M.D. Resident Physician Jewish Hospital of Philadelphia, 1892-1934 by William I. Heine; and History of the Jewish Hospital Association of Philadelphia by Henry N. Wessel.

-Jessica M. Lydon, Associate Archivist SCRC