DECEMBER 15 In History
37: Birthdate of Nero Claudius Augustus Germanicus 5th emperor of
Rome
. While legend remembers him as the emperor who fiddled while
Rome
burned, Jews will remember him as the ruler who was emperor when the Great Revolt began in 66. Nero had appointed several of the incompetent governors who had helped create the conditions for the revolt. He also chose Vespasian as the general to put down the rebellion. Nero died in 68 during the rebellion. His untimely death bought the Jews some breathing space as Vespasian broke off the combat to take part in a coup that would put him on the throne. It was his son, Titus who actually destroyed the
Temple
when combat.
921(6th of Tevet, 4682): Rav Saadiah Gaon today cautioned the Jews of Egypt by telling them to reject the religious calendar adopted by Rabbi Aaron ben Meir, head of the Palestinian yeshiva in Ramleh
1583: Fifty-year old Judah Abravanel passed away at Ferrara.
1640: Coronation of King John IV of Portugal. Don Fernando Mendes, a Marrano, was his court physician. He was also the court physician to Catrina, King John's daughter who married King Charles II of England. Don Fernando also served the English King making him one of the few physicians to ever serve three reigning monarchs.
1647: Isaac de Castro was put to death at an auto-de-fe by the Inquisition for the crime of teaching Judaism to conversos. De Castro had arrived in
Bahia
(then under Portuguese control) from
Amsterdam
through Dutch Brazil.
1734: Daniil Pavlovich Apostole who was the Hetman of the Cossacks on both sides of the Dnieper River passed away. When Catherine I expelled the Jews from the Ukraine in 1727, Apostol led a move to modify the law. He and the other Cossacks had learned the hard way that they needed Jewish merchants if their economy was to grow. Thanks to his efforts, the edict was modified so that the Jews could participate in the various fairs held in the area.
1751: Benedict XIV issued “Probe te memisse,” a papal bull establishing the rules for baptizing Jews. In case there was any doubt about this Pope’s attitude towards Jews, 4 years later he published “Beatus Andreas” which beatified Andreas von Rinn a child who was the alleged victim of a ritual murder committed by Jews in 1462. The allegation of ritual murder was the key requirement for this beatification,
1772 (19th of Kislev, 5533): Reb Dov Ber, the Maggid of Mezeritch second leader of the Chassidic movement, successor to the Baal Shem Tov and spiritual mentor of Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, known for his scholarship, piety, and asceticism passed away. There is no way that we can do justice to the contribution of this sage and urge you to spend time studying about him.
1791: The Bill of Rights, the first
10 am
endments to the U.S. Constitution, took effect following ratification by
Virginia
. From a parochial point of view, the First Amendment with its statement on religion was the most important of the ten amendments to the Jews of the new nation. Unlike
Europe
, with its deeply rooted anti-Semitism, acceptance of Jews was a given from
America
’s earliest days. Jews have been very vigilant in using the First Amendment to ensure separation of church and state. Unfortunately, there are some shortsighted Jews who have been willing to blur the line for short term political or financial gains.
1806: Rothschild wrote to the Landgrave pledging his support to the German prince and offering to intercede on his behalf when Napoleon visits Frankfurt.
1831: Seventy-six year old Hannah Adams, a Christina author who wrote History of the Jews in 1812, passed away in Brookline Mass.
1812: In London, Moses Levy and Helena Moses gave birth to Joseph Moses Levy the founder of the London Daily Telegraph. He passed away in 1888.
1857: The opera “Travatore” was performed tonight in New York with procedes for the evening going to the Hebrew Benevolent Society.
1858: During “The Mortara Affair,” the New York Times published a letter U.S. Secretary of State Cass had written to Mr. Hart in which he compared President Buchanan’s decision not to join with the nations of Europe to bring pressure on the Catholic Church to return the boy to his parents with the activisits behavior of the United States during “the persecution of the Jews of Damascus” in 1840.
1859: Birthdate of Dr.Ludwig Lazarus Zamenhof, the Russian born Jewish linguist who created Esperanto.
1861: President Abraham Lincoln wrote a letter to Arnold Fischel of New York's Congregation Shearith Israel, saying “"I find there are several particulars in which the present law in regard to chaplains is supposed to be deficient, all which I now design presenting to the appropriate Committee of Congress. I shall try to have a new law broad enough to cover what is desired by you in behalf of the Israelites." Fischel had gone to Washington to get Lincoln’s support to change the law so that Jews could serve as Chaplains in the Union Army.
1864: During the Civil War, the Battle of Nashville (TN) begins. Among the Union units are the 79thIndiana commanded by Colonel Frederick Knefler.
1871(3rd of Tevet, 5632): 8th day of Chanukah
1873: It was reported today that The Jewish Chronicle has expressed support conferring peerages on Sir Moses Montefiore and Baron Lionel Rothschild
1876: It was reported today that a translation of the Greek New Testament into Hebrew is about to be published at Leipzig “for the use of the Orthodox Jews of Eastern Germany and Poland.” [No mention is made of why an Orthodox Jew would want a copy of the New Testament.]
1879(30thof Kislev, 5640): Rosh Chodesh Tevet
1879: It was reported today that the Young Men’s Hebrew Association will celebrate Chanukah with a reception at the Academy of Music.
1880: It was reported today that “the third reception” hosted by “the Young Men’s Hebrew Union will be held on Christmas evening.”
1881: The Young Men’s Hebrew Association hosted its annual Chanukah Ball this evening at the Academy of Music. (The celebration was held today, a Thursday, because Chanukah in 1881 began on Friday night and you could not have a ball on Shabbat)
1882: Birthdate of Helena Rubinstein famed American cosmetic manufacturer.
1883: Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise, the President of the Hebrew Union College delivered a lecture tonight on the subject of intermarriage in which he said “such marriages are not forbidden Mosaic law.”
1883: In Rochester, NY, Sabbath morning services at Berith Kodesh will be conducted in English for the first time.
1883: In a note published today, Ignatz Fishcel, a 23 year old unemployed German Jewish immigrant blames his decision to commit suicide on his sister and her husband
1884: It was reported today that the Hebrew Free School Association is now serving 1,959 children as compared to the 520 that it served when it began in 1876.
1884: It was reported today that newly elected officers of the Hebrew Free School Association included President M.S. Isaacs, Vice President Uriah Herrmann and Secretary Henry S. May.
1884: It was reported today that while speaking at event marking the 16thanniversary of the Presbyterian Hospital in New York, Reverend John Paxton said, “We are indebted to the Jews for many things, for human law and their teaching of the sacredness of life but not for hospitals. These are the sole creation of Christianity.” And then, in what can only be considered a bit of genteel anti-Semitism, he said that the “first hospital was founded…by the good Samaritan.”
1884: It was reported today that the officers of the newly formed Tenth Ward Society include: Joseph Blumenthal – President; Isaac Bernheimer and E.R.A. Seligman – Vice Presidents; Frederick Nathan – Treasurer; Lee Kohns – Secretary. The society will be conducting an audit of conditions of tenements in an area surrounded by Houston Street, Division Street, Norfolk Street and the Bowery. A report of the needed improvements and/or the failure to make them will be sent to the Board of Health and the Grand Jury. (This was part of an over-all attempt to improve conditions for immigrants. This particular ward had a large Jewish population which may have accounted for the makeup of the officers.)
1884:It was reported today that Ludovic Halevy, the son of Leon Halevy, has been elected as a member of the French Academy.
1885: The Ladies’ Fair, a fund-raiser designed to raise money for the Kindergarten and Industrial Schools of the Hebrew Free School Association opened this evening at the Metropolitan Opera House.
1887: It was reported today that in London a barber named Serne who is a Flemish Jew is on trial having been charged with setting fire to his shop on the Strand to collect on the insurance. Unfortunately, both of his sons died in the fire as well.
1888: “The model of the Nicaragua Interoceanic Canal which had been built by Vauix Carter, a Professor of Mechanics at the Hebrew Technological Institute” in Brooklyn has proven to be one of the most popular items on display at the annual fair sponsored by the American Institute
1891(14th of Kislev, 5652): Jacob Judelsohn who had served as Secretary of the Jewish Immigrant Protective Society passed away. Mr Judelsohn was born in Marionpol, Russia in July of 1855. He came to the United States in 1879 and settled in Phildelphia where he became a leader in the Jewish community taking an active role in meeting the needs of the newly arrived immigrants from Russia and Poland. He moved to New York City where he continued his work until his death.
1891: James Naismith introduces the first version of basketball, with thirteen rules, a peach basket nailed to either end of his school's gymnasium, and two teams of nine players. While Basketball may have had quintessential gentile origins it quickly became a part of Jewish life. According to Peter Levine, “Jewish involvement in basketball, especially between 1900 and 1950 was greater than in any other sport.” “By the late 1930’s...sportswriter identified it as the ‘Jewish’ game. According “Paul Gallico, the longtime sports editor the New York Daily News ... ‘Jews flock to basketball by the thousands’ because it placed ‘a premium on an alert, scheming mind.. flashy trickiness, artful dodging and general smart aleckness’ traits naturally appealing to the ‘Hebrew with his Oriental background.’”
1894: A revival of Quite an Adventure, a one-act comic opera by Edward Solomon opened at the Savoy Theatre.
1897:The Federation of American Zionist Societies of New York, (FAZ) was formed today with Richard Gottheil as President and Herman Rosenthal and Rabbi Joseph T. Bluestone as vice presidents. Most remarkable and fortunate for the nescient American Zionist movement was the choice of secretary for the FAZ. Gottheil had been advisor, sponsor and friend to a young Columbia student who energetically and dynamically became the first Zionist secretary. His name was Rabbi Stephen Wise. For the next 45 years, Wise would become one of the enshrined, respected leaders of the American Zionist and World Zionist movements.
1899: Birthdate of Harold Abrahams, English athlete and Olympic gold medalist. Abrahams passed away in 1978. Abrahams gained posthumous fame when his Olympic exploits were portrayed in the film hit “Chariots of Fire.”
1903: Funeral services for Solomon Loeb who passed away on December 12thare scheduled to be held at his residence in New York at 9:30 this morning.
1906: During the strike aimed at breaking the Beef Trust the butchers in Brownsville who have been on strike will continue to keep their shops closed today if the Williamsburg Retail Kosher Butchers and the New York and Harlem Retail Kosher Butchers have joined in the strike.
1909: In New York City "Miss Julia Richman, Superintendent of Schools on the Lower East Side has sent out an appeal for clothing for school children." Miss Richman is concerned that children lack warm clothing which is contributing to poor health.
1913: Birthdate of Muriel Rukeyser a challenging poet whose work mixed together radical politics and a spiritual quest. Rukeyser grew up in a middle-class home in
New York City
that for her was marked by silences and the absence of books. Rukeyser sought to experience the richness and messiness of life and to depict that richness and mess in her poetry. Her father's bankruptcy during the Great Depression cut short her college education, but in 1935, at the age of 21, she won the Yale Younger Poets Award for her first book, Theory of Flight. Her poetry brought her much success and much criticism. Embracing left-wing politics, she covered the second Scottsboro Boys trial and the Spanish Civil War. She traveled to
North Vietnam
and
Korea
and was jailed for protesting the war in
Vietnam
. She confronted the red-baiting of the McCarthy era and the strictures of conventional sexuality. Her poem "Letter to the Front" (1944) presented the challenge of modern Jewish identity with these words:
To be a Jew in the twentieth century
Is to be offered a gift. If you refuse,
Wishing to be invisible, you choose
Death of the spirit, the stone insanity.
Accepting, take full life.
1915: A fund raising campaign headed by Jacob Schiff is scheduled to come to an end.
1916: Greeks call up all Jews ranging from age19 to 30 for military service. The response was overwhelming.
1916: French troops defeated the Germans at the Battle of Verdun during World War I. In the 1930’s monuments were erected to Jewish and Christian soldiers who were killed at
Verdun
. In May of 2004 the memorial to Jewish soldiers who died in the Battle of Verdun was vandalized. Nazi slogans and symbols were scrawled on the memorial. In November 2004, a 22-year-old man was sentenced to a year in prison for perpetrating the attack. In June of 2006, a concert by the Ensemble Musique Oblique was held at the
Verdun
synagogue in memory of the Jewish soldiers of
Verdun
. French forces were commanded by General Petain. The victory at
Verdun
cemented his position in the pantheon of French military prowess. Petain would use this reputation to make peace with the Germans in World War II and to lead the government at
Vichy
which actively collaborated with the Nazis in bringing the Holocaust to
France
.
1917:
Russia
concluded an armistice with the Central Powers. Over 350,000 Jews served in the Russian army and an estimated 70,000 were killed during World War I. This armistice would take the new Communist Russian government out of the war. It would help ensure the Communist rule over
Russia
and all that that meant for Russian Jewry. At the same time, it enabled the Germans to move their troops to the Western Front where they made one last push to defeat the Allies. This effort failed which led to the defeat of
Germany
, the Versailles Treaty, the rise of Hitler and the Final Solution.
1918: Birthdate of Jeff Chandler. Born Ira Grossel in
Brooklyn
NY
, this classically handsome matinee idol played everything from the Indian chief Cochise Broken Arrow to the workaholic skipper in the World War II thriller Away All Boats. To paraphrase one critic, goyisha face on a yiddisha kup.
1918: First meeting of the American Jewish Congress. An advocacy group, the American Jewish Congress supports a variety of causes including civil rights for all minorities and women as well as causes one might normally associate with a Jewish organization.
1918: Efforts to break the monolithic opposition to Zionism of Jerusalem’s Orthodox community met with success at the founding meeting of a group of senior rabbis, who in defiance of the ultra-Orthodox rabbis set up a Joint Sephardic - Ashkenazi Council which was the first breach in the Orthodox community’s strong and united opposition to Zionist institutions.
1918: Addressing the campaign workers for the $5,000,000 Jewish War Relief drive at the Hotel Biltmore, Felix M. Warburg, Chairman of the Campaign Committee, advocated that campaigns of a sectarian character be hereafter abolished and announced that the drive would be extended for two days.
1919: Birthdate of Max B. Yasgur, the son of Russian Jewish immigrants whose farm was the site of the famous Woodstock Happening in 1969.
1922: Birthdate of DJ Alan Freed, the man who claimed to have coined the term “rock-n-roll” and who lost out in the payola scandal of the 1950’s.
1923:Birthdate of Gotthard Glass who would gain famed as Uziel “Uzi” Gal. The German-born Israeli gun designer best remembered as the designer and namesake of the Uzi submachine gun. Gal was born in Weimar, Germany. When the Nazis came to power in 1933 he moved first to England and later, in 1936, to Kibbutz Yagur in the British Mandate of Palestine. In 1943 he was arrested for illegally carrying a gun and sentenced to six years in prison. However he was pardoned and released in 1946, serving less than half of his sentence. Gal began designing the Uzi submachine gun in 1948, shortly after the Israel War of Independence. In 1951 it was officially adopted by the Israeli Defense Force and was called the Uzi after its creator. Gal did not want the weapon to be named after him but his request was ignored. In 1955 he was decorated with Tzalash HaRamatkal and in 1958, Gal was the first person to receive the Israel Security Award, presented to him by Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion for his work on the Uzi. In 1975 Gal retired from the IDF, and the next year he moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, so that his daughter Tamar, who had serious brain damage, could receive special medical attention. Gal continued his work as a firearms designer until his death from cancer in 2002.
1924: Birthdate of Polish-born British violinist Ida Haendel.
1927: The struggle for work turned violent during the citrus harvest in Petah Tikvah. Jewish workers, seeking employment, protest against the hiring of Arab labor by the farmers. Demonstrations and an attack on the Agricultural Committee lead to the intervention of the British police. Workers are beaten and injured. Some are arrested and sentenced to several weeks’ imprisonment.
1928: In New York City, Anna and Irving Rosenthal gave birth to Stanley Herbert Ross, the producer-engineer who co-founded Hollywood's Gold Star Recording Studio, which has a storied place in rock history as the home of Phil Spector's innovative "Wall of Sound" technique.
1930(25thof Kislev, 5691): As the Great Depression worsens, the first day of Chanukah
1930: Seventy-five year old Meier Dizengoff sought re-election as Mayor of Tel Aviv in contest that pits him against Laborite Joseph Aronwitz. Dizengoff was one of the original founders of the city in 1909 and is noted for donating his salary to municipal projects not funded by the city.
1932: Birthdate of composer Elaine Barkin.
1936(1st of Tevet, 5697): Rosh Chodesh Tevet
1936: “Zionist worries over one of the two dangers confronting the future development of the Jewish national home -- the proposed law restricting Jewish land purchases, a danger equal only to the suggested curtailment of Jewish immigration in Palestine -- loomed large at today's session of the British Royal Commission. Dr. Bernard Joseph…testified that he believed there was no justification for restricting the sale of land by small holders…He that in fifty years Jews ha bought about 5 per cent of the total area of Palestine. At that rate…it will take 150 years to buy half the land in the country if Beersheba is excluded.”
1937: The Palestine Post reported that 13 Jews were wounded when Arab terrorists ambushed a bus between
Haifa
and Nahalal. Another bus was fired on near Castel. Arab terrorists tried to kill the mayor of
Nablus
, Suleiman Tukan.
1937: A Jewish guard, Haim Berger, was wounded in Tiberias, and Eliahu Gadi was shot and wounded near Kibbutz Ramat Rahel. Two Arabs were sentenced to death for the murder of Mendel Mintz on
February 1, 19
37
.
1938: The Dutch government closed its border to refugees which had an especially detrimental effect on Jews seeking to escape from Hitler’s Germany, its next door neighbor.
1939: Gauleiter Hans Frank launched an action aimed at shipping rural Jews to large Polish cities where they would be the tight control of the SS. Tens of thousands of Jews would be rounded up, transported or force-marched into specially designated urban ghettos.
1939: World premiere of "Gone with the Wind" in
Atlanta
,
Georgia
. This is another example of Jews creating an icon of American culture. Consider the following: David O. Selznick was he Producer. Leslie Howard played Ashley Wilkes. Ben Hecht helped to write the screenplay. And Max Steiner wrote the music. There may be more but this is all that I could find for sure.
1939: In his continued challenge of the White Paper, Churchill, who is now a member of the British War Cabinet, wrote to Malcolm MacDonald seeking to limit the “draconian restrictions on future Jewish land purchases” contained in the new Land Ordinance.
1941(25th of Kislev, 5702): First Day of Chanukah; in the evening kindle the second candle
1941: Members of a Latvian SD guard platoon, units of the 21st Latvian police battalion, and members of the Schutzpolizei-Dienstabteilung (German security police) under the command of the local SS and Police Leader Fritz Dietrich began a two day killing spree during which they murdered almost 3,000 Jews at Skede, Latvia. (As recorded at Yad Vashem)
http://www1.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/this_month/december/06.asp
1941: On this first day of Chanukah, 15 Jews are shot to death in the courtyard of the Warsaw Ghetto prison.
1941: Forty Polish Jews were shot by the Nazis on Chanukah in
Paris
.
1942: Faked, upbeat postcard messages arrive at Jewish homes in
Holland
from friends and relatives interned at
Auschwitz
and the Theresienstadt,
Czechoslovakia
, camp/ghetto.
1944:In a speech given on the floor of the United States Senate, Guy M. Gillette of Iowa urged that all possible steps be taken to rescue the approximately 1,500,000 Jews whom he said were still living in territory held by the Axis. Senator Gillette also urged that the Allies adopt a resolution making crimes against Jews in Europe punishable as war crimes
1945: Birthdate of Fiamma Nirenstein, Italian born journalist who, although a resident of Gilo would be elected to the Italian Parliament in 2008.
1945: At approximately
1:45 P.M.
, about 20 fighters of the Haganah - the pre-state underground Jewish militia - seized a British truck south of
Acre
. The men, armed but wearing civilian clothing, confiscated about half a ton of documents, packed into eight sealed steel containers and 12 sacks of diplomatic mail. The documents had been sent from the British legation in
Beirut
to
Haifa
Port
, from which they were to be transported to
Britain
. The truck was taken to an unknown location. The driver and armed guards were later found in an abandoned building near Kiryat Ata. The British tried to minimize the importance of the captured documents, claiming that most of them concerned economic matters of the British Mission in
Beirut
, headed during World War II by General Edward Spears. But the reaction of the British, the French and the Haganah itself to the event clearly suggests that the papers removed from the truck were, in fact, of far greater consequence. Immediately after the incident, the French consul in
Jerusalem
came to Tel Aviv. The French were given classified documents from the truck that were of great operational importance to them. The British Mandate authorities censored reports of the event, prohibiting Hebrew or British newspapers from publishing any details about the Haganah operation. The documents were eventually returned to the British, but about one percent of them remained in the hands of the Haganah. The French considered the remaining so documents to be so valuable that they entered into with the Yishuv to get more of them. The British were so determined to get their hands on the remaining documents that they attempted to seize them through clandestine military action in May and June of 1948
1946(22nd of Kislev, 5707): Maud Nathan passed away. Born in 1862, she was an American social worker, labor activist and suffragist for women's right to vote. “She came from a prominent New York family, descended from Gershom Mendes Seixas, minister of New York's Congregation Sherith Israel during the Revolutionary War. Her sister was the author and education activist Annie Nathan Meyer and her cousins the poet Emma Lazarus and Supreme Court Justice Benjamin Cardozo. Her nephew was the author and poet Robert Nathan.”
1946: The World Zionist Congress suspends six members of Zionist Revisionist Union of America for unauthorized request to UN for discussion of Palestinian problem.
1947: Nearly 25,000 children, the number brought to
Palestine
through the Hadassah Youth Aliyah immigration movement since its inception thirteen years ago, will enter
Palestine
in the coming year, Dr. Vera Weizmann, wife of Dr. Chaim Weizmann, scientist and Zionist leader, said today
1948:Israel breaks off negotiation for local truce agreements and demands future peace talks for all of Palestine.
1949: The UN Trusteeship Council proposes to censure Israel for moving its government. It also asks Israel to help UN draft charter for city.
1950: Birthdate of Jeffrey Katzenberg, former Disney executive who help found DreamWorks.
1952: The Jerusalem Post reported that the Israeli army headquarters compiled a list of all
US
citizens serving in the IDF who would lose their
US
citizenship on
December 24, 19
52
, in accordance with the McCarran Act. The army announced that all such reservists would be released and all other cases would be judged on their merits. Many soldiers applied to the US Consulate for guidance and were supplied with letters endorsing their plea for an immediate release.
1952: The Jerusalem Post reported that Dov Shilansky was sentenced to 21 months' imprisonment for trying to bomb the Ministry of Foreign Affairs building in
Jerusalem
in protest against the acceptance of German reparations.
1955: A torch commemorating the victory of the Maccabees over their Syrian oppressors was kindled at a special Hanukkah festival at Madison Square Garden.
1958(4th of Tevet, 5719): Wolfgang Pauli passed away. Born in 1900, Pauli was an Austrian-born American winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1945 for his discovery in 1925 of the Pauli Exclusion Principle, which states that in an atom no two electrons can occupy the same quantum state simultaneously. This principle clearly relates the quantum theory to the observed properties of atoms.
1960: Release date for the film “Exodus.”
1961: United Artists released “One, Two, Three” a comedy written by I.A.L. Diamond and Billy Wilder and directed and produced by Wilder.
1961: Former Nazi official Adolf Eichmann was sentenced to death by an Israeli court. Eichmann had been convicted of crimes against humanity and would be the only person sentenced to by
Israel
to date.
1963: Birthdate of actress Helen Slater. Born Helen Schlacter she is best known for her work in Supergirl.
1969:Ze'ev Sherf succeeded Mordechai Bentov and Minster of Housing and Construction.
1969: Yosef Goldschmidt became an MK as a replacement for Yosef Burg.
1968(25thof Kislev, 5729): As the country awaits the transition from Lyndon Johnson to the newly elected Richard Nixon, first day of Chanukah
1971(27th of Kislev, 5732): Paul Pierre Lévy passed away. Born in 1886, he was a French mining engineer and mathematician. He contributed to probability, functional analysis, partial differential equations and series. He also studied geometry. In 1926 he extended
Laplace
transforms to broader function classes. He undertook a large-scale work on generalized differential equations in functional derivatives.
1973: Under the leadership of newly elected president Dr. Alfred M. Freedman, the board of trustees the American Psychiatric Association voted 13 to 0, with two abstentions, in favor of the resolution, which stated that “by itself, homosexuality does not meet the criteria for being a psychiatric disorder.” This was a landmark step on the path to declaring that homosexuality was not a mental illness.
1974(1st of Tevet, 5735): Rosh Chodesh Tevet
1974(1st of Tevet, 5735): Cartoonist Harry Hershfield passed away at the age of 89.
http://www.lambiek.net/artists/h/herschfield_h.htm1974(1st of Tevet, 5735): Erich Walter Sternberg German-born Israeli composer passed away in Tel Aviv at the age of 83. The Berlin native was one of the early contributors to what would become the Israeli musical world having begun his work in the pre-state days of the 1930’s and 1940’s.
1975(11th of Tevet, 5736): Anatole Litvak, Ukrainian-born, American filmmaker passed away. “Anastasias” – a film bas