May 16 In History
0942(21stof Iyar, 4702): Saadia Gaon passed away. Born in 882, Saadia Gaon was the head of the Talmudic Academy of Sura (Babylonia). He was a recognized authority on the Talmud, and a profound student of philosophy and philology. Saadia was forced to deal with the challenge of assimilation of the upper-class Jews of Babylonia who were attracted to the Greek philosophers whose works had been translated into Arabic. Saadia wrote a philosophic work, The Book of Beliefs and Opinions, in magnificent flowing Arabic. In it, he defended the rational underpinnings of Judaism and showed logically that every rational Jew could believe in the Torah as well as Aristotle and Plato. He wrote the first Hebrew grammar book which explained how the holy language worked. He provided a Hebrew dictionary plus a compendium of rhyming words for Hebrew poets. He was the first to write an Arabic translation of the Bible. He included commentaries, explanations, and grammatical notes as well. His translation continues to be the authoritative Bible for Jews in Arab lands. He also led a successful fight against the Kararites, a sect which rejected Rabbinic commentary as law.
1165: Maimonides and his family arrived at Acre, Palestine. Having been forced to leave Spain because he would not convert to Islam, Maimonides and his family settled in Fez, Morocco. His work with Jews who had been forced to convert to Islam attracted attention of the local authorities and the family moved on to Palestine. Do to the poverty of the land and the uncertain conditions there, Maimonides finally settled in Egypt where he served both as a physician and leader of the Jewish Community.
1474: Minister Pacheco of Spain used an attack he organized against "new Christians" as a diversion in order to enable him to capture the citadel of Segovia (and maybe the King). Although the plot was discovered in time, the Marranos were attacked by the organized mob, and men, women and children were murdered.
1477: Abraham dei Tintori produced the first printed edition of the book of Job with a commentary by Levi ben Gerson was published today in Ferrara, Italy
1487: Joseph Solomon Sonciino produced the first printed edition of Seder Tahanunim at Soncino, Italy
1527: Florentines drove out the Medici for a second time and re-established a republic The recreation of the Republic led to the expulsion of the Jews. This event took place in the Jewish year 5300 (a year with Jewish mystical connotations), fueling messianic hopes helping to layer the ground for the rise of Solomon Molcho.
1573: Today Polish nobles elected Henry, as the first elected monarch of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. However, the Lithuanian nobles boycotted this election, and it was the Lithuanian ducal council who confirmed his election. Poland elected Henry, rather than Habsburg candidates, partly in order to be more agreeable to the Ottoman Empire (a traditional ally of France through the Franco-Ottoman alliance), with which a Polish-Ottoman alliance was also in effect.. He owed his election to Solomon Ashkenazi, a “Rabbi” who was an advisor to the Sultan. He was in effect the Sultan’s foreign minister. In an unusually blunt statement, Ashkenazi wrote Henry “I have rendered you majesty most important service in securing your election; I have effected all that was done here.” The last statement refers to his behind the scenes work at the Sultans Palace. See Volume 4 p 605 0f Graetz
1611: Birthdate of Pope Innocent XI. During his papacy, “Innocent showed a degree of sensitivity in his dealings with the Jews within the Italian States. He compelled the city of Venice to release the Jewish prisoners taken by Francesco Morisini in 1685. He also discouraged compulsory baptisms which accordingly became less frequent under his pontificate; but he could not abolish the old practice altogether. More controversially in 1682 he issued an edict by which all the money-lending activities carried out by the Roman Jews were to cease. However ultimately convinced that such a measure would cause much misery in destroying livelihoods, the enforcement of the edict was twice delayed.”
1648: During the great Cossack uprising which brought death and destruction to hundreds of thousands of Jews, Bohdan Khmelnytsky's forces overwhelmed and defeated Commonwealth forces under the command of Stefan Potocki at the Battle of Zhovti Vody.
1746(26th of Iyar, 5506): Moshe Chaim Luzzatto passed away. Born in 1707, this Italian rabbi known by the Hebrew acronym RaMChal was noted philosopher and student of kabbalah.
1754: Fire ravaged the Ghetto in Prague.
1785(7th of Sivan): Rabbi Chaim Abraham ben Moses Israel of Ancona, author of “Bet Avraham” passed away.
1790: Anti-Jewish riots broke out in Warsaw.
1801: Birthdate of William H. Seward who served as Secretary of State under Presidents Lincoln and Johnson (1861-1869). Shortly after he assumed office, Seward met with Henry I. Hart, President of the Board of Delegates of American Israelites and assured him that he would continue the push to end the discrimination practiced by the Swiss against American Jews. In 1863, Seward instructed American diplomats to do all that they could to stop the attacks on the Jews of Morocco.
1845: Birthdate of Ilya Ilyich Mechnikov, also known as Eli Metchnikoff. Born in the Ukraine, he was a Russian microbiologist best remembered for his pioneering research into the immune system. Mechnikov received the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1908, for his work on phagocytosis. He passed away in Paris in 1916.
1853: The New York Times provided more information about outbreaks of violence that had occurred in Jerusalem during Holy Week (Palm Sunday thru Easter). A group of English missionaries were forced to leave the Church of the Holy Sepulcher because “they behaved in an unseemly manner when the Procession of the Host passed on Good Friday.” One of the missionaries delivered a sermon outside of a synagogue while the Jews were attending services in which he used “invectives” in talking about the Talmud. One of the Jews reportedly threw a dead cat at the missionary and a fight broke between the rest of the missionaries and the Jews who sought to defend their religious beliefs.
1853: The New York Times reported that the recent defeat of the Jewish Disabilities bill in the House of Lords had bitterly disappointed supporters of the measure since they had anticipated that the Lords would follow their usual path and approve legislation that had been approved by the House of Commons. The action of the Lords, according to the Times, shows the great gulf between the aristocracy and the rest of the citizenry. Despite the prominence of such families as the Rothschilds, “the Jew in England is no better off than he was in the days of King John.”
1853: The New York Times reported that thousands of Prussians including Alexander Von Humboldt have petitioned the Second Chamber (one of the two houses of their bi-cameral legislature) demanding that Jews be allowed to hold government jobs and allowing for full freedom of religious opinion. The petitions were in response to vote by the First Chamber to exclude Jews from public employment.
1854(18th of Iyar, 5614): Lag B’Omer
1854: According to an article published today the American Society for Meliorating the Condition of the Jews reported that there are 17 synagogues in New York City that show a membership totaling 25,000. The last census shows that there are 46,000 Jews in the entire United States. The society believes that the census figure is a case of underreporting because it only records people as being Jewish if they self-report. “It is a well-known fact that one-half or more of the Jews in this country call themselves Frenchman, German, Poles, Hungarians and Englishman and never make themselves known as Jews in governmental connections.”
1863(27th of Iyar, 5623): Jonas Ennery passed away. Born in 1801 at Nancy he became head of the Jewish school at Strasbourg. He served as a Deputy in the French Parliament and compiled a Dictionnaire Général de Géographie Universelle, He was the brother of Marchand Ennery, the chief rabbi of Paris.
1864: Birthdate of Nathan Birnbaum the Austrian journalist, Jewish philosopher and founder of a Jewish nationalist organization "Kadimah." Kadimah was formed ten years before Theodor Herzl became the leading spokesman of the Zionist movement. Birnbaum is credited for coining the term "Zionism". He died in 1937.
1864: In New York, the "Open Board of Stock-Brokers" adopted its constitution. Among the signatories was Mendez Nathan, the son of Seixas Nathan.
1868: President Andrew Johnson was acquitted in his impeachment trial in the United States Senate. According to one source, Johnson made several virulent anti-Semitic statements during his political career prior to becoming President. Considering the fact that the “Tarheel Tailor” was illiterate until adulthood, his anti-Semitic statements may be more a case of ignorance than anything else.
1875: The Board of Trustees of B’nai Jeshurun met today in New York City and approved a proposal to allow members of the opposite sex to sit together in the same pews during services. This put an end to the separate seating that had been the rule at the synagogue since its founding. The decision would be contested by Israel J. Solomon a member of the congregation who brought a suit in the Court of Common Pleas to over-turn the decision. His suit would fail.
1877: As the constitutional crisis in France came to a head, 363 parliamentary deputies passed a vote of no confidence in the new government championed by Royalist President Patrice MacMahon. The leaders of the opposition would be defended by Raphael Basch a liberal French Jewish political leader and journalist. Basch was the father of Victor-Guillaume Basch who would be murdered by the Vichy French in 1944.
1880(6th of Sivan, 5640): Shavuot
1881: Birthdate of Amy Loveman, a founding editor of the Saturday Review.
1881: A comic melodrama entitled “Sam’l of Posen, or The Commercial Drummer” premiered at Haverly’s Fourteenth Street Theatre in New York.
http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/27502012?uid=3739640&uid=2&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=21102217661721
1888(6th of Sivan, 5648): Shavuot
1890: It was reported today that former President Grover Cleveland, Oscar Straus and Joseph Blumenthal will be among those who have purchased boxes for the upcoming Strawberry Festival, a fund raiser sponsored by the Young Men’s Hebrew Association.
1891: It was reported today that among the bequests made by the late Nathan Littauer were$1,500 to Mt. Sinai Hospital for the permanent endowment of a bed in memory of his daughter Louise; $1,000 each to the Hebrew Benevolent and Orphan Asylum Society and the Home for Aged and Infirm Hebrews; $500 to the Board of Relief of the United Hebrew Charities.
1892: Justice George C. Barrett officiated at the wedding of Albert Kohn and Sophie Kupfer. The nuptials which were one of the most fashionable events in the Jewish community, took place at the home of Henry Kupfer on east 78th Street.
1893: George Kennan, the explorer and newspaper man who has become a critic of the Czar and advocate for Russian democracy stated his belief that Polish and Russian Jews will be coming to the United States as a result of the edicts of expulsion issued by the Russian government.
1893: “Myer S. Isaacs, Chairman of the Trustees of the Baron Hirsh Fund for the aid of Russian Jews” in the United States said today that he and his associates “had not considered the question of an influx of Polish Jews” because they did not except any abnormal increase in immigration from that region. (Editor’s note – Based on contemporary reports there was a great deal of disagreement about Russian edicts of expulsion and the potential major influx of Jews from Poland and Russia)
1894: It was reported today that while Herman Rosenblatt stood in the smoldering ruins of his crockery store, a local ruffian pointed at the Jew and shouted “There is the man who set the fire” causing a mob yelling “Lynch him” to chase after Rosenblatt. Rosenblatt outran the mob and found sanctuary in the 47th Street Police Station.
1896: In a cable from London, Harold Frederic provided a scoop for the New York Times when he broke the news about Baron Hirsch’s grandchild, who is the daughter of the Baron’s son Lucienne and a French governess. As confirmed by a copy of the Baron’s will, the child will inherit a large portion of the Hirsch millions.
1898: The Daughters of Jacob are hosting a Strawberry Festival at Terrace Garden for the benefit of a Home for Aged Hebrews of the down-town east side. They have already sold 3,000 tickets at fifty cents each, and have received presents of large quantities of goods that will be sold at the festival.
1898: Joseph J. Corn, the Vice President Temple Culture Society spoke yesterday about the purpose of the society. He said “that in these days of cheap philosophy and what has come to be known as ethical culture there is a need for Jewish culture. In an effort to combat the notion that religious education ended with confirmation, the society is holding weekly meetings devoted to the study of Jewish history and Jewish philosophy. Among other things, the programs should help Jews answer the question “Why are you Jews in this Christian world and yet not of it?”
1899(7th of Sivan): Jewish historian Jacob Ezekiel passed away
1903: At a meeting held under the auspices of the English Zionist Federal a resolution was adopted “declaring that the establishment of a home in Palestine was the only practical solution of the Jewish question.” Israel Zangwill had given an impassioned speech in support of the motion during which he invoked the bloody images of the atrocities committed against the Jews of Romania and Kishineff.
1904: Herzl's diary breaks off with a report to Jacob Schiff. Schiff was a successful banker and financer. He was one of the leaders of the Jewish community in the 19th and early 20th century. He actively intervened on behalf of the Jews suffering in Tsarist Russia. Although he had reservations about Zionism, he was increasingly drawn to Herzl’s concept of a Jewish homeland in Palestine as a practical way of lessening the suffering of Russia’s Jews.
1909: Birthdate of Yehiel Feiner whom the world would come to know as Yehiel De-Nur or Dinur, a survivor of Auschwitz who used his experience as the basis for several books including “The House of Dolls.”
1911: Masliach Effendi of the Turkish government ridicules the idea that Jews could become a menace to Turkey. He suggests appointment of committee to examine the whole question of Zionism.
1912: Birthdate of Rita Kanarek. In her senior year at N.Y.U. she married Alex Hillman founder and President of Hillman Periodicals. Mrs. Hillman became president of the Alex Hillman Family Foundation where she pursued her passions as an art collector and philanthropist. Among the beneficiaries of her largesse was the Phillips Beth Israel School of Nursing in Manhattan. She passed away at the age of 95 in November, 2007.
1912: Birthdate of author, historian and broadcaster, Studs Terkel. “My family was Jewish but not religious. My mother went through the rituals; my father didn't. He was a freethinker.” He passed away at the age of 93.
1914 20th of Iyar): Isaac Halevy (Rabinowitz) author of “Dorot ha-Rishonim” passed away
1916: Birthdate of Ephraim Katzir, former President of Israel. Born Katchalski in Kiev, Katzir came to Palestine in 1925. A biophysicist, Katzir taught at Hebrew University and served as department hair at the Weizmann Institute in Rehovot. One result of his research was the creation of a synthetic fiber for internal surgery that can be dissolved by body enzymes. He served as Israel's fourth President (a largely ceremonial position) from 1973 to 1978
1916: The will of Shalom Aleichem was published in the New York Times and read into the Congressional Record of the United States.
1919: The first Estonian Congress of Jewish congregations which had been convened on May 11 to discuss the new circumstances Jewish life was confronting came to a close today. This is where the ideas of cultural autonomy and a Jewish Gymnasium (secondary school) in Tallinn were born. Jewish societies and associations began to grow in numbers. The largest of these new societies was the H. N. Bjalik Literature and Drama Society in Tallinn founded in 1918. Societies and clubs were established in Viljandi, Narva, and elsewhere. In 1920, the Maccabi Sports Society was founded and became well-known for its endeavors to encourage sports among Jews. Jews also took an active part in sporting events in Estonia and abroad. Sara Teitelbaum was a 17-time champion in Estonian athletics and established no less than 28 records. In the 1930s there were about 100 Jews studying at the University of Tartu. In 1934, a chair was established in the School of Philosophy for the study of Judaica. There were five Jewish student societies in Tartu Academic Society, the Women’s Student Society Hazfiro, the Corporation Limuvia, the Society Hasmonea and the Endowment for Jewish Students. All of these had their own libraries and played important roles in Jewish culture and social life. Political organizations such as Hasomer Hazair and Beitar were also established. Many Jewish youth traveled to Palestine to establish the Jewish State. The renowned kibbutzim of Kfar Blum and Ein Gev were set up in part by Jews from Estonia.
1923: Birthdate of economist Merton Miller, winner of the 1990 Nobel Prize for Economics.
1923: Birthdate of Manuel D. Plotkin, the native of Chita, Russia who was appointed Director of the Census Bureau by President Carter in 1977.
1923: The first aerial display in Palestine took place at Ramleh today, a squadron of 14 aeroplanes of the British Royal Air Force participating. The exhibition program included flying, air races, a baloon hunt, mimic air fighting and a bombing demonstration. The aerial derby was over the circuit of Ramleh, Raselain, Jaffa, Ramle... Lieut. Martyn, flying a Vickers Vimy biplane, won the air race covering a distance of twenty-seven miles.
1926: Dr. James Simon will preside over today’s celebration marking the 25th anniversary of the establishment of the Hilfsverein der deutschen Juden, a “German Jewish organization founded in 1901 to improve social and political conditions of Jews in Eastern Europe and Orient.”
1927: It was reported today that four thousand six hundred and twenty-eight persons are now living in 41 settlements in Palestine created by the Keren Hayesod, according to the latest figures given out by the Department of Agricultural Colonization of the Palestine Zionist Executive. Sixty-five per cent of this population are workers, and the remainder children. (JTA)
1928: Three Jews who are reported to be Communists, were scheduled to be deported from Palestine. One of the deportees “was found guilty in Jerusalem of belonging to an illegal organization” while the other two were being deported after having served short jail terms for participating in “May Day riots in Tel Aviv.”
1929: In Baltimore, MD, Arnold Rice Rich and Helen Gravely Jones Rich gave birth to Adrienne Rich, a poet of towering reputation and towering rage, whose work — distinguished by an unswerving progressive vision and a dazzling, empathic ferocity — brought the oppression of women and lesbians to the forefront of poetic discourse and kept it there for nearly a half-century. Her father was Jewish. Her mother was not. (As reported by Margalit Fox)
1929: The 1st Academy Awards ceremony, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), honoring the best films of 1927 and 1928 and took place on May 16, 1929, at a private dinner held at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, in Los Angeles, California. The awards, popularly known as Oscars, were created by Jewish movie mogul Louis B. Mayer, founder of Louis B. Mayer Pictures Corporation.
1932: The Nazis are demanding the removal of Bernhard Weiss from his post as the Vice-President of the Berlin Police Force. Their objections are two-fold: Weiss is Jewish and he ordered the arrest of four Nazis for their role in attacking a former Nazi named Schotz who had left the party.
1935: “A convention of delegates from national Jewish youth organizations will meet tonight in room 327 of the Chanin Building, 122 East Forty-second Street, to consider the syllabi which will be presented to the seminars to be held on June 9 at the Metropolitan Conference of Jewish Youth Organizations. The meeting, under the auspices of the youth division of the American Jewish Congress, will consider such problems as anti-Semitism, boycott of the 1936 Olympics, Zionism, Jewish youth and economic discrimination and Jewish education.” (JTA)
1936(24th of Iyar, 5696): A bomb thrown by Arabs kills three Jews at the Edison cinema in Jerusalem. The Haganah demands permission to retaliate, but Ben Gurion refuses. The Edison Cinema was not just a movie theatre. It was a “citadel of secular European culture in Jerusalem. It opened in 1932 with a performance of Felix Mendelssohn’s “Elijah” sung in Hebrew. The Edison was the third largest cinema in the city and popular sport for British soldiers and officials.
1936: “Steel helmeted police maintained comparative quiet in the Holy Land today following” demonstrations that had broken out yesterday when the Arab campaign of civil disobedience officially began.
1937(6th of Sivan, 5697): Shavuot
1937: The Polish government launched two investigations into the attacks on Jews that took place last week in Brzesc, which was known as Brest-Litovsk, the site of the peace negotiations between the Germans and the Russians that resulted with the latter surrendering to the former.
1937: Dr. Bernhard Kahn and David J. Schweitzer, European director and vice-president, respectively, of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee issued a report today that described “the role of the cooperative credit system established by the American Jewish Joint Reconstruction Foundation in aiding some 500,000 Jews in eleven European countries by facilitating issuance of $28,000,000 in credits in nine months
1938: The Palestine Post reported on the continued fighting between the police and British army units in the Acre District. At least 23 terrorists were killed there and numerous arrests were made. Jewish settlements repulsed numerous terrorist attacks, but complained that they were supplied with insufficient arms and too small a number of supernumerary constables for a successful defense. The Iraq Petroleum Co. pipeline was again set on fire.
1938: After two and half weeks of touring the country, Britain’s Palestine Partition Commission began its first official session. Because of the continued Arab violence, the meeting was held “in camera under heavy guard.’ While Arab leaders continued to boycott the commission, Jewish leaders Chaim Weizmann, David Ben Gurion, Moshe Shertok and Dr. Bernard Joseph met with the British to discuss possible implementation of partition proposals.
1943: The famous Tolmatsky Synagogue of Warsaw was dynamited by order of General Jurgen Stroop. It marked the last German "major operation" in the liquidation of the Warsaw ghetto uprising.
1943: SS-Brigadeführer Jürgen Stroop reports the final liquidation of the Jewish ghetto at Warsaw, although some Jews remain in hiding. The Germans reportedly lost 300 troops. Amazingly the Jewish resistance had proved fierce, by comparison than that of the French Army in 1940. The number of Jewish dead does not matter, since they would have perished in the showers and ovens any way. Death was not the question; the manner of death was the matter of choice. There were a few survivors of the Ghetto, one of them being the mother of Marsha Fensin, the former Cantor of Temple Judah.
1943(11th of Iyar 11): Yiddish author Chaim Zhitlowsky passed away
1944: The first of more than 180,000 Hungarian Jews reached Auschwitz.
1948: In New York City, the American Zionist Emergency Council sponsored a celebration of the creation of the Jewish state at Madison Square Garden that was so well attended 75,000 people had to be turned away.
1948: Based on a telegram from David Ben Gurion and Moshe Sharett, Abba Eban and not Mordechai Elisah, is to be Israel’s chief spokesman at the the United Nations.
1948: Israel issued its first postage stamps.
1948: At the Landsberg DP Camp, survivors of the Holocaust held a celebratory parade in honor the creation of the state of Israel
http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/this_month/may/16.asp
1948: Chaim Weizmann was chosen Chairman of the Provisional State Council of Israel which effectively made him the first president of the State of Israel.
1948: The Egyptian army suffered its first defeat at Nirim, in the Negev.
1948: The Egyptians entered Gaza. They would not “leave’ until 1967.
1948: At approximately one o’clock in the morning Syrian artillery began shelling Kibbutz Ein Gev. At dawn, Syrian aircraft attacked the Kinarot valley villages. Later in the day “Syrian aircraft made bombing runs on Masada, Sha'ar HaGolan, Degania Bet and Afikim.” This was the opening round in the Syrian attempt to sweep the Jews from the Galilee. To any one observing events of that day, it would appear that the victory would go to the Syrians with their tanks, artillery and combat aircraft.
1948: Christopher Mayhew, the future Lord Mayhew, an anti-Zionist ally of British Foreign Minister Ernest Bevin, writes in his diary, “I must make a note about Ernest’s anti-Semitism, which has come out increasingly sharply these past few weeks with the appalling crisis in Palestine. There is no doubt to my mind that that Ernest detests Jews. He makes the odd wise-crack about the ‘chosen people’ and declares that the Old Testament is the most immoral book ever written…” This view of Bevin is fascinating when his role in enforcing the White Paper and his opposition to a Jewish homeland is being considered.
1948: An article published today “JEWS IN GRAVE DANGER IN ALL MOSLEM LANDS; Nine Hundred Thousand in Africa and Asia Face Wrath of Their Foes” described the precarious position of the 900,000 Jews living “Arab and Moslem countries stretching from Morocco to India.” “There is a tendency” in some Moslem states “such as Syria and Lebanon” “to regard all Jews as Zionist agents and fifth columnists. There are indications that that the stage is being set for a tragedy of incalculable proportions” which the United Nations has done nothing to prevent. These fears are based in part on Arab League announcements that at some unspecified date, “all Jews except citizens of non-Arab states, would be considered ‘members of the Jewish minority state of Palestine.’ Their bank accounts would be frozen and used to finance resistance to ‘Zionist ambitions in Palestine.’ Jews believed to active Zionists would be interned and their assets confiscated.” In Syria, “virtually all” Jewish civil servants have already been fired and in Iraq Jews are not allowed to leave the country without posting a $20,000 bond to guarantee their return. However bad conditions are now, it is predicted that in the event of an all-out war in Palestine, “the repercussions will be grave for Jews all the way from Casablanca to Karachi.”
1949: Milton Berle appeared on the cover of Time Magazine.
1950: Out of a large collection of 120 styles of knit fashions brought to this country from Israel, for merchandising, forty were shown this afternoon at the Plaza Hotel to buyers. The presentation, under the auspices of Service for Palestine, Inc., 2 Park Avenue, was its first show to promote Israel-made products in the American market.
1955: Birthdate of actress Debra Winger, the star of “Officer and a Gentleman.”
1955: Birthdate of Edgar Bronfman Jr., CEO of Seagram and Warner Music
1960: Theodore Maiman operates the first optical laser at Hughes Research Laboratories in Malibu, California.
1967: General Fawzi, the Egyptian chief of staff, sent a message to the commander of the UN Emergency Force, General Rikhye of the Indian Army requesting the withdrawal of the UNEF from Egypt. The Egyptian Foreign Minister sent a cable to U Thant, UN Secretary General tell him that the Egyptian government ad decided to immediately terminate the presence of UNEF in Egypt and the Gaza strip.
1968(18th of Iyar, 5728); Lag B'Omer
1969: Barbra Streisand appeared at a Friars Club Tribute
1973: Birthdate of actress Tori Spelling.
1973(14th of Iyar, 5733): Famed Cubist sculptor Jacques Lipchitz passed away. His body was flown to Jerusalem for burial.
1974: Despite a terrorist attack the previous day on a school at Ma’alot, Prime Minister Golda Meir tells Secretary of State Kissinger that talks with the Syrians will continue. After a one day hiatus, she says, “We had all better back to peacemaking.
1975(6th of Sivan, 5735): Shavuot
1977: "Boulevard Montmartre, in the Afternoon Rain," by Camille Pissarro the son of Frederick Pissarro, a Sephardic Jew, was sold today, at Christie's in New York for $275,000
1978: The Jerusalem Post reported that in his 28th Annual State Comptroller's Report Dr. Yitzhak Nebenzahl called for a "Ministry of Administration." He said that while there are many links that tie people to its government, in Israel the administration is the weakest link in this chain. "A government," he explained, "is like an automobile. No matter how fine the car is, it will not ride well unless all four wheels are intact." The Report claimed a massive maladministration, and was specifically highly critical of the Treasury.
1984(14th of Iyar, 5744): Comedian Andy Kaufman passed away. Born in 1949, Kaufman is best remembered for his many appearances on ‘Saturday Night Live’ and for his portrayal of Latka on the television hit “Taxi.” He was diagnosed with a rare form of lung cancer and was 35 at the time of his death.
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