Another Successful Jewish American Heritage Month

We've wrapped up another successful Jewish American Heritage Month, again showing our role as the source for community history!

You may have seen Arthur Welsh, the first American Jewish aviator, featured in the "Flashbacks" comic in the Sunday Washington Post. Our efforts led to this feature and the Society was mentioned in the final strip! You can now view the entire six-part series.

Executive Director Laura Apelbaum and board member Diane Wattenberg were featured in The Federation's Jewish Food Experience blog -- read the post about the winning National Spelling Bee word: knaidel.

We partnered again this year with the National Archives on a very special program featuring Holocaust survivor Gerda Weissman Klein.

We were also featured in Moment Magazine (download article) and we were out in the community a great deal:

   - Exhibition, Jewish Life in Mr. Lincoln's City, was on display at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library

   - Led 8 walking tours:
         - Washington Hebrew Congregation’s 6th grade, EntryPointDC’s young professionals group, and a public tour of Downtown DC
        - Arlington National Cemetery for the public, Women of Temple Rodef Shalom, and a Jewish school from North Carolina
        - Old Town Alexandria for the Adas Israel Congregation Sisterhood and Jewish Federations of North America staff

   - Presented 5 talks on topics about local Jewish heritage for:
        - OASIS at Montgomery Mall
        - U.S. Customs and Border Protection
        - EntryPointDC’s Shavuot Study Night
        - Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library
        - Jewish Community Center of Greater Washington's annual meeting (related blog post)

Synagogue Story Focus @ White House

Who could imagine that a long ago research inquiry would culminate with the President speaking at the White House about how President Ulysses S. Grant became the first sitting president to attend a synagogue service when he attended the dedication of Adas Israel's first synagogue--now the Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum?

In 1994, I contacted Dr. John Y. Simon, the editor of the Grant papers, to ask if there were any documents among those papers that related to Grant's visit to the synagogue. That's how I first learned that among Grant's papers housed at the Library of Congress was an original receipt for the $10 donation the president made to the synagogue's building fund in June 1876.

Since then we have used a facsimile copy of this marvelous document in our exhibits and educational programs. When we learned that the Library of Congress was mounting a comprehensive exhibit about American Jewish life in 2004, we alerted the curators to the existence of the receipt in their collection. It was included in their exhibit, From Haven to Home, next to Grant's Civil War expulsion order, the infamous Orders No. 11.

Earlier this year, I met the new national coordinator for Jewish American Heritage Month, Jennifer Mooney. I suggested to Jennifer that perhaps an appropriate theme this year would be Grant's issuance of Orders No. 11 and President Abraham Lincoln's revocation of that order. This is after all the 150th anniversary year of General Orders No. 11 issued December 17, 1862.

Me with Gary P. Zola, Director of the American Jewish Archives--and the Library of Congress documents relating to General Orders No. 11!

Our staff, board members, and supporters should be gratified to know that yesterday the story of Orders No. 11 was front and center at the White House's annual reception celebrating Jewish American Heritage Month. Upon entering the White House, the Library of Congress' Hebraic Section Chief and past president of JHSGW, Peggy Pearlstein, stood watch over a case of precious documents from the LOC--a letter of complaint from a Missouri B'nai B'rith chapter, the back of the envelope from that letter on which Abraham Lincoln wrote his revocation instructions, and the receipt from the Adas Israel Congregation thanking President Grant for his donation to the building fund of its new synagogue!!

Upstairs in the East Room as members of Congress and dignitaries gathered, President Obama spoke about this little known chapter in American history--giving it context by explaining each of the documents and calling on us to remain vigilant against anti-Semitism and prejudice in our country.

This is such a wonderful validation of our work at the Society and Museum. We work to uncover, tell, and educate lesser known chapters in American Jewish history for our visitors and the general public. We should be proud that our message is receiving national attention and our role on the national stage is bringing these stories to the fore.

And we should be most proud of our ongoing work to protect and preserve our special historic synagogue--the one that President Grant attended--which has this powerful story to tell.

Here's the president's speech.

A Successful Jewish American Heritage Month!

Chairman Brown addresses the crowd
Photograph by Betty Adler

Our Jewish American Heritage Month programs culminated at City Hall last month, where we celebrated with D.C. Council Chairman Kwame Brown, the D.C. Council, and even the mayor.  This special event, co-organized with the Jewish Community Relations Council, included a kosher deli lunch and our exhibition, Jewish Life in Mr. Lincoln’s City, which was on view in the Wilson Building atrium.


During May we served 625 people through our programs.  Countless others viewed our exhibitions.

Debbie Linick of JCRC,
D.C. Attorney General Irvin Nathan,
JHSGW Executive Director Laura Apelbaum,
and D.C. Mayor Vincent Grey
Photograph by Betty Adler

• We ran 7 adult programs including a walking tour of Jewish Sites in Arlington National Cemetery
• We served 4 youth groups—from as far away as New Jersey and Chicago—through synagogue tours, youth programs, and our living history show
• We partnered with 7 organizations: Jewish Community Relations Council, Foundation for Jewish Studies,

  

  Joan Nathan and Spike Mendelsohn
  speaking at the National Archives

  National Archives, Ford’s Theatre, Historical Society of Washington, D.C., Jewish Community Center of Northern Virginia, and Jewish Theological Seminary
• We responded to 6 research requests ranging from a German graduate student, to George Washington University professor to Ohev Sholom rabbi.
• We displayed 3 exhibitions: Jewish Life in Mr. Lincoln’s City, Through the Lens: Jeremy Goldberg’s Washington, and Ties That Bind: Washington-Area Jews and the Birth of Israel.
• We hosted a graduation event for Context.
• We hosted members of the Shomrim Society, a Jewish police fraternity, during National Police Week (seen below)



Photograph by Pat Fisher

• We contributed to Jewish American Heritage Month’s 50 States/50 Stories project by submitting the story of Washingtonian Chaplain Alexander Goode, one of the Four Chaplains who gave their lives during WWII.  Our submission led to President Obama referring to Rabbi Goode in his JAHM proclamation.

Click on photos to enlarge.

Challah Month

This morning, our director Laura's husband, Perry, delivered 40 loaves of challah! Since May 2009, we've sold challah in the neighborhood as part of the celebration of Jewish American Heritage Month. This picture shows the challah before we sent it out.

Interested in buying some? Click here to order--you can still get challah for the next 3 weeks for $15. If you order 5 per week in an office or building, we can deliver in the Penn Quarter area.

And don't forget about the other ways you can join us in celebrating Jewish American Heritage Month!

White House Reception a First

Nearly forgot to write about the amazing experience I had at the first ever Jewish American Heritage Month (JAHM- pronounced "JAM") reception hosted at the White House by President and Mrs. Obama. That's me (below on the far rt) with Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz (4th from the left) the original cosponsor of the JAHM resolution.

Above, I'm on the far right with the JAHM national steering committee in the Blue Room. A total thrill to be included among the smallish crowd-- I serve on the national steering committee for JAHM-- the only representative from a local Jewish museum or historical society. Since JAHM's inception 4 years ago, JHSGW has been at the forefront-- annually cosponsoring an event on Capitol Hill.

Along with colleagues from across the country, we continue to plan activities to get the word out about JAHM and the contribution of our community to our country. Thrilling at this event to be in the same room as baseball great Sandy Koufax, baseketball great Dolph Schayes, the TeaEO of Honest Tea and even the CEO of Spanx not to mention the owners of Manischewitz.

Challah delivery!

Yesterday, I had the privilege of accompanying program committee members Donna Bassin and Frank Spigel to the DC Central Kitchen to donate challah.

Last May we sold and distributed challah in our Penn Quarter neighborhood during Jewish American Heritage Month. We offered the option to purchase challah to donate to the DC Central Kitchen. 19 people took that option, and yesterday Frank, Donna, and I dropped off 19 loaves. Kitchen Director Jerald Thomas was on hand to accept our donation.

Thanks to Donna for coordinating the challah pickup from Bethesda and drop-off at the DC Central Kitchen. We'll have challah available again in May this year, $5 for a single loaf or $20 for the month. If you want to donate challah to the Central Kitchen this year, email us at info@jhsgw.org!