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The department store of the Mendel brothers in Chicago, Illinois, USA. Postcard, 1900s
The department store of the Mendel brothers in Chicago, Illinois, USA. Postcard, 1900s

The Jewish Community of Chicago

Chicago

City in Northeastern Illinois, USA.

Early History

Chicago was incorporated as a city in 1837 and had at the time a population of some 5,000 inhabitants. Between 1840 and 1844 about twenty Jews settled in the city, most of them immigrants from the German regions of Bavaria and the Palatinate. On October 3, 1846, fifteen Jews founded the first Jewish congregation in the city, Kehilat Anshe Maarav (The Congregation of the People of the West), subsequently referred as K.A.M. They practiced the traditional Minhag Ashkenaz and worshiped in a room above a clothing store. By the middle of the century, ten additional community organizations came into being, which operated until WW2. In 1861 the Reform congregation Sinai was founded. At this time Russian and Lithuanian immigrants from Eastern Europe began to arrive in the city. They spoke Yiddish and peddling was their chief occupation. As early as the autumn of 1862 the Eastern European Jews organized congregation B’nai Jacob, and a year later, Beth Hamedrash Hagodol . In 1867 both congregations merged under the name Beth Hamedrash Ub’nai Jacob .

When the American Civil War hostilities began, the Jewish community in Chicago had increased to the extent that it was able to recruit a complete company of a hundred Jewish volunteers to join the 82nd Regiment of Illinois Volunteers. The Jewish community of Chicago quickly recovered from the great fire of 1871, which affected the neighborhood of the German Jews, and from the fire of 1874, which affected mostly East European Jews. The neighborhood of the Russian and Polish Jews received the cognomen “The Ghetto” and that of the German Jews “The Golden Ghetto”.
In the 1860s German Jews began to enter the medical and legal professions, some also went into banking, even founding Jewish banking houses. The new Russian immigrants of the 1880s preferred factory work and small business. The greatest number of them, 4,000 by 1900, entered the tobacco industry, primarily the cigar trade. The growth of sweat shops in the needle trade in the 1880s with their unsanitary conditions and excessive hours were the determining factors in the development of the Jewish Socialist movement and the Jewish trade-union movement. The Chicago cloak-makers union, predominantly Jewish, was the first to protest against child labor, which persisted despite compulsory education. They succeeded only in establishing a 14-year old age limit and limiting any sweatshop to the members of one family. It was the strike in 1911 that established collective bargaining in the clothing industry. It laid the foundations for a new and lasting union, the amalgamated clothing workers of America. An alternative to sweat shops and peddling was provided for a few by the Jewish Agriculturists Aid Society of America , founded in Chicago in 1888. From the 1880s to the 1920s the Jewish Population Grew from 10,000 to 225,000, or from 2% to 8% of the general population.

From the 1930s to the 1950s, Jews relocated their residences to the northern part of the city and in the suburbs to its north. In 1969 West Rogers Park and suburban Skokie were the largest Jewish communities, each with a Jewish population of 50,000, constituting about 70% of the total population of the area. To a considerable extent the development of these new communities with religious, educational, cultural, and social service facilities was the result of a conscious effort to perpetuate Jewish group cohesion. Community leaders held the opinion that a modicum of Jewish education and voluntary segregation in a high-status residential area would forestall assimilation.


The Community in the 1960s

In 1961 Chicago had 43 Orthodox synagogues, 25 Conservative, 16 Reform, and five traditional. The Chicago Board of Rabbis , supported by the Jewish Federation and Jewish Welfare Fund, sponsored all programs of Jewish content on radio and television, and the Chaplaincy Committee , which served hospital and penal institutions. During the 1960s there were also three mikvaot , two Battei-Din (Rabbinical courts) – one Orthodox and one Conservative. The Battei-Din were concerned primarily with issuing religious divorces (gittin) and conversions. In 1969 it was estimated that about 15% of the Chicago Jewish Community was foreign-born and about 5% still used Yiddish as their vernacular. About 3% to 5% were strict Shabbath observers, but synagogue affiliation was less than 50% in the city and about 60% in the suburbs.

In 1968 the Jewish Federation and the Jewish Welfare Fund of Metropolitan Chicago, including the United Jewish Appeal, united as the Jewish United Fund of Metropolitan Chicago. In addition to national and overseas aid, the Jewish United Fund served many communal Institutions, such as the Family Community Service, child development and day-care centers, and medical centers. There have been two Jewish hospitals dedicated in 1881, and Mount Sinai, founded in 1918 as a successor to Maimonides hospital, which had been incorporated in 1910.
Many Jews have occupied high government positions, both locally and nationally, among them Arthur Goldberg, former Justice of the United States and ambassador to the United Nations. The social and cultural integration of Chicago Jews into the life of the city is best illustrated by the fact that the presidents of three institutions of higher learning in 1970 were Jewish.

Cultural life

A bibliography of Hebrew and Yiddish publications published in Chicago between 1877 and 1950 shows 492 titles. The Yiddish press in Chicago was most prolific. The Hebrew press in Chicago was not as successful as the Yiddish press. It made its debut in 1877 with the weekly Heikhal Ha-Ivriyyah, which was a supplement to the Israelitishe Press and was published until 1879. Keren Or, a monthly followed in 1889. In 1897 the weekly Ha-Pisgah made its appearance, and was replaced in 1899 by the Ha-Techiyyah. The first Jewish periodical to appear in Chicago was the weekly Occident in 1873, which continued publication until 1895. In 1969 there was one Anglo-Jewish weekly, The Sentinel , founded in 1911, A Chicago edition of The Jewish Post and Opinion, The Chicago Forum, a quarterly, founded in 1942, and The Jewish Way, appearing before every major Jewish holiday, founded in 1948.

Jewish Population in Greater Chicago Area

In 1999 the Jewish population of Greater Chicago Area (all of Cook and DuPage counties and a portion of Lake County) was estimated at 261,000 inhabitants being the forth largest Jewish center in the USA. There are numerous agencies, organizations, institutions taking care of every aspect of Jewish life, from family and community support and senior assistance through religious needs, health care, cultural activities, and education, up to volunteer work and charity. The community is deeply involved in the life of the American Jewry and indeed its impact is felt far beyond all over the Jewish world, including Israel.
Some 30,000 Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union choose to settle in Metropolitan Chicago during the last 25 years. Many received the assistance of the Jewish Federation at the start of their new life in the USA.

Education

Strengthening the Jewish identity, assuring its continuity while preserving its rich heritage is one of the main concerns of the Jewish Federation. The Jewish Federation’s total allocations on education amounted to more than 20% of the total thus emphasizing its important role in maintaining Jewish life during the coming generations.
Jewish education in Greater Chicago area is advanced by a large number of schools and non formal educational institutions providing various courses and programs for children of all ages as well for youngsters and families. They all have in common a desire to promote Jewish values and heritage, to stimulate new Jewish creativity and to help preserve a distinct Jewish identity while preparing the younger generations towards the challenges posed by a constantly changing society.
The various educational options are provided by many Hebrew, Sunday and day schools, and also numerous informal institutions for adults and families encompassing programs as diverse as day care programs, higher education, and camps and summer schools.
Chicago is the home of the Hebrew Theological College , Yeshiva High School and Teachers Institute, The College of Jewish Studies , a branch of the Telz yeshivah, The Chicago Jewish Academy.
Primary day schools include the Akiba-Schechter Jewish Day School, the Kinderland/Hebrew Academy , the Sephardic Hebrew Day School, and Hillel Torah North Suburban Day School, and of the secondary day schools a mention should be made of Ida Crown Jewish Academy and Bais Yaakov High School of Chicago, among others. Sachs-Skora Community Hebrew School, Consolidated Traditional Hebrew School are only two of the many primary Hebrew Sunday schools that function in the Greater Chicago area.
Family education is promoted by a number of institutions, among them the various Jewish community Centers of Chicago, the Marvin N. Stone Centre for Jewish Arts & Letters , the Spertus Institute of Jewish Studies – a liberal arts college. Spertus also houses the Zell Holocaust Memorial whose resources help children and adults to better comprehend the Holocaust.

Jewish Periodicals

The Jewish periodicals published in Chicago include the weekly Chicago Jewish News, with an online edition, the fortnightly Chicago Jewish Star distributed free of charge - both based in Skokie, the quarterly Jewish Community News that started publication in 1941, and the annual JUF News & Guide to Jewish Living in Chicago published jointly by the Jewish United Fund and the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago. Jewish Image is a monthly family magazine based in Chicago and is distributed free of charge all over United States. Kosher Consumer is published by the Chicago Rabbinical Council six times a year and contains information on kosher products.

Radio, TV and e-media

Jerusalem Online – WCFC-TV 38, is a half-hour magazine broadcast from Jerusalem on Fridays at 20:00 and rebroadcast on Sundays at 13:00. Sanctuary - WLS-TV7, is a talk-show focused on Jewish issues and produced by the Jewish Television Commission – a joint venture of the Jewish Federation and of the Chicago Board of Rabbis.
The Torah Radio Network broadcasts an array of programs on Jewish issues.
Israel News by Phone – 847-679-9374, offers daily updates Sunday through Friday, in English, from the Israeli Arutz-7 radio station.
The Moshe and Esther Brandman Memorial Tape Library makes possible to listen to edifying and informative lectures by Torah scholars.

Religious life

The religious needs of the Jews living in the Greater Chicago are served by numerous of institutions, organizations, and synagogues belonging to all Jewish movements. All other aspects of Jewish life, like kosher food, mikveh , Bar and Bat Mitzvah celebrations, to list only a few are provided by the various congregations and by the Jewish Federation. Jewish Burial Society and Chicago Jewish Funerals provide Jewish funerals, among others.
Religious life is coordinated by the Chicago Rabbinical Council which takes care of the different aspects and necessities of Orthodox Judaism and by the Union of American Hebrew Congregations UAHC – Chicago for the Reform Judaism. The United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism (USCJ) is overseeing the activities of the Conservative congregations setting guidelines for their social, educative, and religious programs.

Synagogues

Of the Conservative synagogues a special mention should be made of the veteran Anshe Emet Synagogue located in the Lakeview neighborhood and which represents a landmark in the Jewish history of Chicago. Other Conservative congregations include Temple Har Zion in River Forest, Congregation Am Chai in Hoffman Estates, Congegation Rodfei Zedek , and B’nai Emunah in Skokie. Temple Menorah, Emanuel Congregation, and Congregation Or Chadash in Chicago belong to the Reform movement as well as Temple Beth Israel in Skokie, Congregation B’nai Jehoshua Beth Elohim in Glenview, and Congregation B'nai Yehuda Beth Sholom in Homewood, to name only a few of the more than 20 Reform temples located in Metropolitan Chicago.
Among the Orthodox synagogues Congregation Adas Yeshuron Anshe Kanesses Israel and Anshe Sholom B’nai Israel are located in Chicago and Congregation Or Torah is situated in Skokie.
Skokie has also a Reconstructionist congregation – Ezra Habonim Niles Township Jewish Congregation , additional Reconstructionist congregations are located in Evanston – Jewish Reconstructionist Congregation , in Naperville – Congregation Beth Shalom, and in Northbrook – Shir Hadash Reconstructionist Synagogue.

Ties with Israel

Within the framework of the Partnership 2000 project that strives to establish and develop close relationships between Jewish communities in the Diaspora and Israeli towns and villages, the Jewish Federation and the Jewish United Fund in Chicago are connected with the Lachish area in the Negev region of Israel providing its inhabitants with assistance in development as well as with an informal opportunity to foster direct contacts between the two communities.
General Assembly of the United Jewish Communities
During November 10-15, 2000, the Jewish Federation of Chicago hosted the annual General Assembly (GA) of the United Jewish Communities with some 5,000 delegates expected to gather from US, Canada, South America, Israel and Europe.

Early 21st century

The city of Chicago is home to the fifth largest Jewish population in the United States. According to a 2010 study published by the Berman Jewish Databank, approximately 291,000 Jews live in the Chicago metropolitan area. By 2013, the Jewish community comprised nearly 10% of the city’s total population (2.7 million).

Located across Chicago are a number of organizations which serve the city’s Jewish community. Many of these were established during the mid 20th century, but as the Jewish community continued to change with each passing generation, the need for specialized programs led to the development of several foundations and support groups. Serving the more than 145,000 Jewish households living in Chicago are organizations such as The United Hebrew Relief Association (UHRA), EZRA, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society of Chicago, Avodah: The Jewish Service Corps, and the Jewish Family & Community Service Virginia Frank Child Development Center. The JUF Café provides the community’s poor with kosher meals and ARK, a non-profit community-funded agency, offers many social services including housing, food, medical care, and employment assistance. There are also those which focus on Holocaust victims such as the Holocaust Community Services, the Association of Descendants of the Shoah-Illinois (ADSI), and the Holocaust Education Foundation. Often working in tandem with various organizations are the city’s several Jewish councils. These include The Council for Jewish Elderly, West Rogers Park Jewish Community Council, and the Midwest Jewish Council.

Founded in 1977, The Chicago Jewish Historical Society preserves the history of Chicago’s Jewish community. The society collects and maintains a variety of written, spoken and photographic records. They sponsor lectures, events and tours of the city’s Jewish historical sites. Some of Chicago’s famous Jewish landmarks include the Kehilat Anshe Maarav at the Isaiah Israel Congregation in Hyde Park, the site of the old Maxwell Street Market located in one of Chicago’s oldest residential neighborhoods, the headquarters of the Jewish United Fund on Ben Gurion Way on S. Franklin, the Chicago Loop Synagogue, and the historic neighborhood of Lawndale.

About twenty six percent of Chicago’s Jews identify as orthodox or traditional. Thirty five percent identify as conservative while another thirty percent or more identify as reform. By 2004, there was an estimated 140 synagogues in the Chicago metropolitan area. Nearly every movement within modern Judaism is represented. There are 39 orthodox, 31 conservative, 36 reform, 14 traditional, 3 reconstructionist, 1 humanist, and about 7 non-denominational congregations. There are also 4 mikva'ot and 2 rabbinical courts.

The Jewish community of Chicago hosts a variety of educational programs and institutions. Many of these are supported by the Jewish Federation with different allocations and grants. Jewish education in Chicago spans from day care to the college level. Eighty percent of Chicago's Jewish children receive Jewish education. In addition to several day schools and yeshivot are institutions such as the Ida Crown Jewish Academy, Associated Talmud Torahs, Anne Blitstein Teachers Institute of Women, and the Board of Jewish Education. Courses of higher learning are offered at The Spertus Institute of Jewish Studies, the Rorh Jewish Learning Institute (JLI) and the Hebrew Theological College.

Other sources of Jewish education can be found within the city's museums, centers and memorials, particularly, the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Educational Center, the Chicago Jewish Historical Society, the Chicago Hebrew Institute and the Kohl Children's Museum.

For students and young professionals are a number of Jewish clubs and associations. Some are committed to community outreach while others bring people together. Avodah, the Jewish service corps, advocates for poverty while Club 1948 works to connect Israelis with Jewish Americans. There is also a variety of programs for Jewish singles and young Jewish professionals as well as multiple Jewish Community Centers, B'nai Brith and Kum Kibbutz.

Throughout the city of Chicago are several Jewish enclaves. The largest is West Rogers Park. Also known as the Golden Ghetto, since 1930, Rogers Park has had a significant Jewish population and the largest Hasidic community in the Midwest. During the 1960s, it became home to a thriving community of Russian Jews. This neighborhood has more than 20 congregations and a number of kosher butchers, bakeries, restaurants, markets and grocery stores. Another notable community was located in North Lawndale. For much of the first half of the 20th century, this historic neighborhood was home to one of Chicago’s most vibrant Jewish communities. Remembered simply as Jewish Lawndale, it was the core of Chicago’s Jewish West Side. Following World War II, much of the Jewish population relocated into suburban areas. By 1995, there were more than 150,000 Jews living in the suburbs of Chicago. Jewish neighborhoods are located throughout the Northern, Western and Southern districts. Large populations can be found in Petersen Park, Hollywood Park and Hyde Park-Kenwood, which is home to the oldest congregations in Chicago.

Providing medical need to Jewish children and families are many healthcare facilities including hospitals and support centers. Many of these, like the Michael Reese Hospital, were established by the city's oldest Jewish communities. Mount Sinai is one of the city's best hospitals and is heavily supported by the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago. The JCFS (Jewish Children & Family Services) offers a variety of services for families with special needs. They additionally provide programs for education, employment and counseling. The Chai Lifeline offers free year-round support to children and families.

Other facilities include the Jewish Healing Network of Chicago, the Jewish AIDS Network and the Center for Jewish Genetics. Medical centers such as these are largely supported by community-based organizations and private donors. Philanthropy has continued to be a major part of the Jewish Federation following their merge with the Jewish Welfare Fund in 1974. Several of Chicago's Jewish organizations and programs receive funding from the Federation every year.

In a city as large as Chicago and with one of the largest Jewish communities in the United States, there is no shortage of Jewish media. Across all channels, from television and radio to newspapers and online magazines, are several sources of Jewish news and entertainment. Circulating throughout Chicago is the Chicago Jewish Star, a twice-monthly newspaper. There is also Schmooze Magazine, a student-run Jewish publication. Online periodicals include Chicago Jewish News, Oy! Chicago, Kveller and JUF News.

Milton Mezzrow (1899-1972) Jazz clarinetist and saxophonist. Born in Chicago, Illinois, he became a prominent representative of the Chicago style, mainly as a leader of jazz bands. Mezzrow, nicknamed Mezz, was among the first white musicians to perform with black musicians, including Tommy Ladnier and Sidney Bechet, with whom he appeared in New York and Paris.
Mezzrow composed, among other works: REALLY THE BLUES; ROYAL GARDEN BLUES; COMIN’ ON WITH THE COME ON; REVOLUTIONARY BLUES (all 1938); GONE AWAY BLUES; and OUT OF THE GALLION (both 1945). He wrote his autobiography, entitled Really the Blues (1946).

Bobby Fischer (1943-2008), chess master, considered by many to be the greatest chess player of all time. He was born in Chicago, USA, in 1943 and brought up in Brooklyn where his mother moved after she was divorced in 1945. He learned to play chess at the age of 6 and soon became deeply absorbed in the game. At the age of 13 he became the youngest national junior chess champion in the USA and at the age of 14 he became the youngest senior US Champion. In 1958, at the age of 15, he became the youngest Grandmaster in the history of chess.

He broke the Soviet domination of the World Championship when he became the first American to win the title by defeating Boris Spassky of the USSR in Reykjavik, Iceland, in 1972. During the Cold War, as the Iron Curtain divided Europe, he became a hero. In 1975 the world chess federation refused to meet Fischer's conditions for a World Championship match with the Soviet Anatoly Karpov and Fischer refused to play. Consequently the federation awarded the title of World Champion to Karpov. Only after getting a phone call from then secretary of state Henry Kissinger was he persuaded to get on the plane. “This is one of the worst chess players in the world speaking to the best,” Kissinger allegedly said. “America wants you to go over there and beat the Russians”. Fischer lost the first point by forfeit, but two months later, America could celebrate its new champion. After this dispute Fischer vanished from public eye for twenty years and moved to Europe.

Twenty years after their legendary face-off, Fischer and Spassky played an exhibition match in Yugoslavia. Because he violated economic sanctions against a country at war, Fischer was prohibited from returning to the United States. He became profoundly anti-American. He went so far as to say that the September 11, 2001, attacks were “wonderful news.”

Arthur Joseph Goldberg (1908-1990), labour lawyer, supreme US court judge and US Ambassador to the United Nations, born in Chicago, USA, the youngest of eleven children born to Russian immigrant parents. His father was a peddler who delivered fresh vegetables and fruit by horse-drawn wagon until his death in 1916. After their father's death, the older children were forced to leave school and go to work to support the family. However, as the youngest child, Arthur Goldberg was permitted to continue his education. Nevertheless, by the time he was aged twelve, he was working at odd jobs, such as wrapping fish, selling shoes, and selling coffee. When he graduated from Benjamin Harrison Public High School at the age of sixteen, Goldberg had shown himself to be an excellent pupil. He was determined to study law. At age 18 he entered Northwestern Law School, continued to work and still finished at the top of the class of his class.

Goldberg took a job in a top Chicago law firm, but resigned when he was assigned to foreclose mortgages. Championing underdogs, Goldberg opened his own small office and began taking social justice cases. Among Goldberg's clients was the American Newspaper Guild which, in 1938, organized a strike against the Hearst newspapers in Chicago. For eight months, Goldberg represented the strikers without charging any fee. In the end, Hearst recognized the union. Goldberg became a workingman's hero, and eventually serving as general counsel to the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) and the United Steelworkers of America. In 1955, Goldberg masterminded the legal aspects of the merger between the CIO and the American Federation of Labor (AFL), becoming chief counsel of the newly formed AFL-CIO. A brilliant negotiator and conciliator, he preferred compromise as a way to resolve disputes. Goldberg drew the AFL-CIO into the emerging civil rights movement by filing briefs with the Court in desegregation cases. In 1961, President John F. Kennedy appointed him Secretary of Labor, where he was considered among the most energetic members of the Cabinet. A year later, Kennedy nominated Goldberg for a seat on the Supreme Court.

Perhaps his most important contribution to the Supreme Court was an opinion which he had written and which had the effect of establishing the constitutional right of a suspect to have a lawyer present during their interrogation. It confirmed the rights of individuals to have a right to be left alone by government, unless it had been specifically abrogated by legislation.

In 1965, President Lyndon Johnson asked Justice Goldberg to replace Adlai Stevenson, who died suddenly, as United States Ambassador to the United Nations. He seems to have believed that he could bring his negotiating skills to the UN to help end the Vietnam War. Of course, he was frustrated in not being able to end the war. The highpoint of his tenures at the United Nations was during the Six Day War, when he repeatedly and successfully argued the American position calling for a ceasefire without first insisting on a Israeli withdrawal. For this he was accused by the Arabs of influencing American foreign policy on behalf of the Jews.

When Goldberg retired from government in 1968 and became president of the American Jewish Committee, he said, "I am proud of my Jewish heritage; I don't like any American who is not proud of his heritage". The link between his Judaism and his liberalism appeared particularly at Passover seder nights, where he retold the story of the Israelites in a way that made their struggles sound like the civil rights struggles of the 1960s. He was also chairman of the Jewish Theological Seminary's board of overseers from 1963-1969.

Rosalyn Tureck (1914-2003), pianist, born in Chicago, Illinois (USA). She first studied from 1925-1929 with Sophia Brilliant-Liven, assistant to Anton Rubinstein at the St. Petersburg Conservatory in Russia, and then (1929-1931) with pianist Jan Chiapusso. In 1931-1935 she furthered her studies at the Juilliard School of Music in New York with pianist Olga Samaroff. She later taught at the Philadelphia Conservatory (1935-1942), the Juilliard School (1943-1955), and the University of California in San Diego (1966-1972) among others. Tureck made her debut at Carnegie Hall in New York performing Brahms’ 2nd Concerto with the Philadelphia Orchestra conducted by Eugene Ormandy. From the late 1930’s she gave successfully recitals of Bach’s keyboard music. In 1947 she made her debut in Europe and became far more famous there than in America. She was the first woman ever to simultaneously play and conduct Bach’s concerts, and the first woman ever to conduct the New York Philharmonic. Later she conducted many major orchestras. She devoted herself mainly to the music of Bach, wrote the book An Introduction to the Performance of Bach (1960), and founded the International Bach Society (1966). Died in Riverdale, Bronx, New York.

Alfred Wallenstein (1898-1983) Cellist and conductor. Born in Chicago, Illinois, USA, he played already in his childhood in theater orchestras in California. He studied cello and medicine in Europe, returned to the USA and became principal cellist of the New York Philharmonic under Toscanini (1929). From 1931 Wallenstein conducted radio orchestras. From 1933 he founded the radio orchestra Wallenstein Sinfonietta, known for its high standards. In 1943-1956 Wallenstein conducted the Los Angeles Philharmonic and in 1952 was appointed also as music director of the Hollywood Bowl. Died in New York.

Abraham Solodar (1890-1967), poet, born in Zhmerynka, Ukraine (then part of the Russian Empire), he went to Eretz Israel in 1911, and emigrated to the United States in 1926. Among those who encouraged him in his literary efforts were H.N. Bialik, in Odessa, and J.H. Brenner, in Tel Aviv. Solodar edited the children weeklies Alummot (1922-1923) and Olam ha-Yeladim (1927-1928). In 1934 he edited a Hebrew literary quarterly in Chicago.
His collected poetry was published posthumously, in 1939, entitled Shirim. He died in Chicago, USA.

László (Ladislaus) Moholy-Nagy (born as Laszlo Weisz), (1895-1946), painter, designer and photographer born in Borsod, Hungary (Thden part of Austria-Hungary). In 1914 he was inducted into the Austro-Hungarian army. In 1917 he was severely wounded on the Russian front. During his convalescence he began drawing portraits and landscapes. Upon his discharge from the army he returned to Budapest, where he obtained the degree of Doctor of Law.

In Berlin he contributed paintings to the Sturm exhibits (1922-25). He taught at the Bauhaus Art University at Weimar, later at Dessau (1923-28), Germany. Under the pressure of political developments in Germany he left the Bauhaus and traveled throughout Europe (Hungary, Switzerland, Finland, Norway, France, Greece, Italy, Amsterdam). Subsequently he went to London, England, where he did publicity work for Imperial Airways and the London Transport Board. From 1937 on he lived in the United States.

From 1937 to 1938 he was principal of the New Bauhaus, Chicago, a school for the education of designers and architects, coordinating art, science and technology, sponsored by the Association of Arts and Industries. When the school closed after one academic year, Moholy-Nagy continued the work, upon enlistment of new faculty members, under the name of School of Design in Chicago which, through its teaching methods, becamne influential in art education in the United States.

In his own work Moholy-Nagy sought to use light as a medium of expression especially in photography and film and to analyze light in his paintings (exhibited in Paris and London, 1937), causing the functions of art and applied art to overlap. His film effects were used in H. G, Well's motion picture "The Shape of Things to Come". In Germany he had designed stage settings. Both in two- and in three-dimensional art he demanded that the creative artist know and use the possibilities afforded by science and technology. Experiments and theories were graphically embodied in such books as "Malerei-Photography-Film" (1925); "Vom Material zur Architektur" (1929); "The New Vision" (New York, 1931 and 1938).

Moholy-Nagy died in Chicago.

Max Thorek (1880-1960), surgeon, born in Budapest, Hungary (then part of Austria-Hungary). He went to the USA in 1900, and received his medical degree from Rush Medical College, University of Chicago in 1904. In 1943, Thorek was professor of clinical surgery at the Cook County Graduate School of Medicine, surgeon-in-chief at the American Hospital and consulting surgeon of the Municipal Tuberculosis Sanitarium in Chicago. He carried out pioneering work in the endocrinology of the testes. Thorek was decorated as a chevalier of the Legion of Honor of France, and received the Chevalier Order of the Crown in Italy. In 1942 he was awarded the Distinguished Citizens' Medal of the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Detroit.

Thorek's books include: “The Human Testis and its Diseases” (1924); “Surgical Errors and Safeguards” (1931); “Modern Surgical Technic” (3 vols., 1941). In addition, he translated “Surgery of the Brain and Spinal Cord”, by Fedor Krause (1912), and was author of more than one hundred articles and papers in American and European medical journals.

Maurice Oppenheim (1876-1949), physician, dermatologist, born in Vienna, Austria, a descendent of the court factor, Samuel Oppenheimer. He received his M.D. degree from the University of Vienna in 1899 and after being assistant professor he became full professor in 1915. During World War I he served in the Austrian-Hungarian army as a surgeon major. From 1927 on he was acting professor of dermatology and siphilology at the University of Vienna. He was also head of the department of skin and venerקal diseases of the Wilhelminen Hospital (1918-1938).

In 1939, after the annexation of Austria to Nazi Germany, Oppenheim immigrated to the United States, where he became full-time professor and head of the dermatological department of Chicago Medical School. Oppenheim was a member of many dermatological societies and he received several gold medals and distinctions for his research on occupational disorders of the skin. A major part of his publications dealt with skin diseases which derived from vocational or circumstantial causes, including "Die Schaadigungen der Haut durch Beruf und Arbeit" (3 volumes; Ullmann and Pille, co-authors; 1922); "Die Schaadigungen der Haut durch Beruf, Sport, Jahreszeiten, Kosmetik und erste Hilfe bei ploetzlichen Hautschaadigungen" (1937).

Oppenheim died in Chicago, USA, in 1949.

The department store of the Mendel brothers
at the center of Chicago, Illinois, USA
Postcard, early 1900s
(Tel Aviv, Gross Family Collection)
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The Jewish Community of Chicago

Chicago

City in Northeastern Illinois, USA.

Early History

Chicago was incorporated as a city in 1837 and had at the time a population of some 5,000 inhabitants. Between 1840 and 1844 about twenty Jews settled in the city, most of them immigrants from the German regions of Bavaria and the Palatinate. On October 3, 1846, fifteen Jews founded the first Jewish congregation in the city, Kehilat Anshe Maarav (The Congregation of the People of the West), subsequently referred as K.A.M. They practiced the traditional Minhag Ashkenaz and worshiped in a room above a clothing store. By the middle of the century, ten additional community organizations came into being, which operated until WW2. In 1861 the Reform congregation Sinai was founded. At this time Russian and Lithuanian immigrants from Eastern Europe began to arrive in the city. They spoke Yiddish and peddling was their chief occupation. As early as the autumn of 1862 the Eastern European Jews organized congregation B’nai Jacob, and a year later, Beth Hamedrash Hagodol . In 1867 both congregations merged under the name Beth Hamedrash Ub’nai Jacob .

When the American Civil War hostilities began, the Jewish community in Chicago had increased to the extent that it was able to recruit a complete company of a hundred Jewish volunteers to join the 82nd Regiment of Illinois Volunteers. The Jewish community of Chicago quickly recovered from the great fire of 1871, which affected the neighborhood of the German Jews, and from the fire of 1874, which affected mostly East European Jews. The neighborhood of the Russian and Polish Jews received the cognomen “The Ghetto” and that of the German Jews “The Golden Ghetto”.
In the 1860s German Jews began to enter the medical and legal professions, some also went into banking, even founding Jewish banking houses. The new Russian immigrants of the 1880s preferred factory work and small business. The greatest number of them, 4,000 by 1900, entered the tobacco industry, primarily the cigar trade. The growth of sweat shops in the needle trade in the 1880s with their unsanitary conditions and excessive hours were the determining factors in the development of the Jewish Socialist movement and the Jewish trade-union movement. The Chicago cloak-makers union, predominantly Jewish, was the first to protest against child labor, which persisted despite compulsory education. They succeeded only in establishing a 14-year old age limit and limiting any sweatshop to the members of one family. It was the strike in 1911 that established collective bargaining in the clothing industry. It laid the foundations for a new and lasting union, the amalgamated clothing workers of America. An alternative to sweat shops and peddling was provided for a few by the Jewish Agriculturists Aid Society of America , founded in Chicago in 1888. From the 1880s to the 1920s the Jewish Population Grew from 10,000 to 225,000, or from 2% to 8% of the general population.

From the 1930s to the 1950s, Jews relocated their residences to the northern part of the city and in the suburbs to its north. In 1969 West Rogers Park and suburban Skokie were the largest Jewish communities, each with a Jewish population of 50,000, constituting about 70% of the total population of the area. To a considerable extent the development of these new communities with religious, educational, cultural, and social service facilities was the result of a conscious effort to perpetuate Jewish group cohesion. Community leaders held the opinion that a modicum of Jewish education and voluntary segregation in a high-status residential area would forestall assimilation.


The Community in the 1960s

In 1961 Chicago had 43 Orthodox synagogues, 25 Conservative, 16 Reform, and five traditional. The Chicago Board of Rabbis , supported by the Jewish Federation and Jewish Welfare Fund, sponsored all programs of Jewish content on radio and television, and the Chaplaincy Committee , which served hospital and penal institutions. During the 1960s there were also three mikvaot , two Battei-Din (Rabbinical courts) – one Orthodox and one Conservative. The Battei-Din were concerned primarily with issuing religious divorces (gittin) and conversions. In 1969 it was estimated that about 15% of the Chicago Jewish Community was foreign-born and about 5% still used Yiddish as their vernacular. About 3% to 5% were strict Shabbath observers, but synagogue affiliation was less than 50% in the city and about 60% in the suburbs.

In 1968 the Jewish Federation and the Jewish Welfare Fund of Metropolitan Chicago, including the United Jewish Appeal, united as the Jewish United Fund of Metropolitan Chicago. In addition to national and overseas aid, the Jewish United Fund served many communal Institutions, such as the Family Community Service, child development and day-care centers, and medical centers. There have been two Jewish hospitals dedicated in 1881, and Mount Sinai, founded in 1918 as a successor to Maimonides hospital, which had been incorporated in 1910.
Many Jews have occupied high government positions, both locally and nationally, among them Arthur Goldberg, former Justice of the United States and ambassador to the United Nations. The social and cultural integration of Chicago Jews into the life of the city is best illustrated by the fact that the presidents of three institutions of higher learning in 1970 were Jewish.

Cultural life

A bibliography of Hebrew and Yiddish publications published in Chicago between 1877 and 1950 shows 492 titles. The Yiddish press in Chicago was most prolific. The Hebrew press in Chicago was not as successful as the Yiddish press. It made its debut in 1877 with the weekly Heikhal Ha-Ivriyyah, which was a supplement to the Israelitishe Press and was published until 1879. Keren Or, a monthly followed in 1889. In 1897 the weekly Ha-Pisgah made its appearance, and was replaced in 1899 by the Ha-Techiyyah. The first Jewish periodical to appear in Chicago was the weekly Occident in 1873, which continued publication until 1895. In 1969 there was one Anglo-Jewish weekly, The Sentinel , founded in 1911, A Chicago edition of The Jewish Post and Opinion, The Chicago Forum, a quarterly, founded in 1942, and The Jewish Way, appearing before every major Jewish holiday, founded in 1948.

Jewish Population in Greater Chicago Area

In 1999 the Jewish population of Greater Chicago Area (all of Cook and DuPage counties and a portion of Lake County) was estimated at 261,000 inhabitants being the forth largest Jewish center in the USA. There are numerous agencies, organizations, institutions taking care of every aspect of Jewish life, from family and community support and senior assistance through religious needs, health care, cultural activities, and education, up to volunteer work and charity. The community is deeply involved in the life of the American Jewry and indeed its impact is felt far beyond all over the Jewish world, including Israel.
Some 30,000 Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union choose to settle in Metropolitan Chicago during the last 25 years. Many received the assistance of the Jewish Federation at the start of their new life in the USA.

Education

Strengthening the Jewish identity, assuring its continuity while preserving its rich heritage is one of the main concerns of the Jewish Federation. The Jewish Federation’s total allocations on education amounted to more than 20% of the total thus emphasizing its important role in maintaining Jewish life during the coming generations.
Jewish education in Greater Chicago area is advanced by a large number of schools and non formal educational institutions providing various courses and programs for children of all ages as well for youngsters and families. They all have in common a desire to promote Jewish values and heritage, to stimulate new Jewish creativity and to help preserve a distinct Jewish identity while preparing the younger generations towards the challenges posed by a constantly changing society.
The various educational options are provided by many Hebrew, Sunday and day schools, and also numerous informal institutions for adults and families encompassing programs as diverse as day care programs, higher education, and camps and summer schools.
Chicago is the home of the Hebrew Theological College , Yeshiva High School and Teachers Institute, The College of Jewish Studies , a branch of the Telz yeshivah, The Chicago Jewish Academy.
Primary day schools include the Akiba-Schechter Jewish Day School, the Kinderland/Hebrew Academy , the Sephardic Hebrew Day School, and Hillel Torah North Suburban Day School, and of the secondary day schools a mention should be made of Ida Crown Jewish Academy and Bais Yaakov High School of Chicago, among others. Sachs-Skora Community Hebrew School, Consolidated Traditional Hebrew School are only two of the many primary Hebrew Sunday schools that function in the Greater Chicago area.
Family education is promoted by a number of institutions, among them the various Jewish community Centers of Chicago, the Marvin N. Stone Centre for Jewish Arts & Letters , the Spertus Institute of Jewish Studies – a liberal arts college. Spertus also houses the Zell Holocaust Memorial whose resources help children and adults to better comprehend the Holocaust.

Jewish Periodicals

The Jewish periodicals published in Chicago include the weekly Chicago Jewish News, with an online edition, the fortnightly Chicago Jewish Star distributed free of charge - both based in Skokie, the quarterly Jewish Community News that started publication in 1941, and the annual JUF News & Guide to Jewish Living in Chicago published jointly by the Jewish United Fund and the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago. Jewish Image is a monthly family magazine based in Chicago and is distributed free of charge all over United States. Kosher Consumer is published by the Chicago Rabbinical Council six times a year and contains information on kosher products.

Radio, TV and e-media

Jerusalem Online – WCFC-TV 38, is a half-hour magazine broadcast from Jerusalem on Fridays at 20:00 and rebroadcast on Sundays at 13:00. Sanctuary - WLS-TV7, is a talk-show focused on Jewish issues and produced by the Jewish Television Commission – a joint venture of the Jewish Federation and of the Chicago Board of Rabbis.
The Torah Radio Network broadcasts an array of programs on Jewish issues.
Israel News by Phone – 847-679-9374, offers daily updates Sunday through Friday, in English, from the Israeli Arutz-7 radio station.
The Moshe and Esther Brandman Memorial Tape Library makes possible to listen to edifying and informative lectures by Torah scholars.

Religious life

The religious needs of the Jews living in the Greater Chicago are served by numerous of institutions, organizations, and synagogues belonging to all Jewish movements. All other aspects of Jewish life, like kosher food, mikveh , Bar and Bat Mitzvah celebrations, to list only a few are provided by the various congregations and by the Jewish Federation. Jewish Burial Society and Chicago Jewish Funerals provide Jewish funerals, among others.
Religious life is coordinated by the Chicago Rabbinical Council which takes care of the different aspects and necessities of Orthodox Judaism and by the Union of American Hebrew Congregations UAHC – Chicago for the Reform Judaism. The United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism (USCJ) is overseeing the activities of the Conservative congregations setting guidelines for their social, educative, and religious programs.

Synagogues

Of the Conservative synagogues a special mention should be made of the veteran Anshe Emet Synagogue located in the Lakeview neighborhood and which represents a landmark in the Jewish history of Chicago. Other Conservative congregations include Temple Har Zion in River Forest, Congregation Am Chai in Hoffman Estates, Congegation Rodfei Zedek , and B’nai Emunah in Skokie. Temple Menorah, Emanuel Congregation, and Congregation Or Chadash in Chicago belong to the Reform movement as well as Temple Beth Israel in Skokie, Congregation B’nai Jehoshua Beth Elohim in Glenview, and Congregation B'nai Yehuda Beth Sholom in Homewood, to name only a few of the more than 20 Reform temples located in Metropolitan Chicago.
Among the Orthodox synagogues Congregation Adas Yeshuron Anshe Kanesses Israel and Anshe Sholom B’nai Israel are located in Chicago and Congregation Or Torah is situated in Skokie.
Skokie has also a Reconstructionist congregation – Ezra Habonim Niles Township Jewish Congregation , additional Reconstructionist congregations are located in Evanston – Jewish Reconstructionist Congregation , in Naperville – Congregation Beth Shalom, and in Northbrook – Shir Hadash Reconstructionist Synagogue.

Ties with Israel

Within the framework of the Partnership 2000 project that strives to establish and develop close relationships between Jewish communities in the Diaspora and Israeli towns and villages, the Jewish Federation and the Jewish United Fund in Chicago are connected with the Lachish area in the Negev region of Israel providing its inhabitants with assistance in development as well as with an informal opportunity to foster direct contacts between the two communities.
General Assembly of the United Jewish Communities
During November 10-15, 2000, the Jewish Federation of Chicago hosted the annual General Assembly (GA) of the United Jewish Communities with some 5,000 delegates expected to gather from US, Canada, South America, Israel and Europe.

Early 21st century

The city of Chicago is home to the fifth largest Jewish population in the United States. According to a 2010 study published by the Berman Jewish Databank, approximately 291,000 Jews live in the Chicago metropolitan area. By 2013, the Jewish community comprised nearly 10% of the city’s total population (2.7 million).

Located across Chicago are a number of organizations which serve the city’s Jewish community. Many of these were established during the mid 20th century, but as the Jewish community continued to change with each passing generation, the need for specialized programs led to the development of several foundations and support groups. Serving the more than 145,000 Jewish households living in Chicago are organizations such as The United Hebrew Relief Association (UHRA), EZRA, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society of Chicago, Avodah: The Jewish Service Corps, and the Jewish Family & Community Service Virginia Frank Child Development Center. The JUF Café provides the community’s poor with kosher meals and ARK, a non-profit community-funded agency, offers many social services including housing, food, medical care, and employment assistance. There are also those which focus on Holocaust victims such as the Holocaust Community Services, the Association of Descendants of the Shoah-Illinois (ADSI), and the Holocaust Education Foundation. Often working in tandem with various organizations are the city’s several Jewish councils. These include The Council for Jewish Elderly, West Rogers Park Jewish Community Council, and the Midwest Jewish Council.

Founded in 1977, The Chicago Jewish Historical Society preserves the history of Chicago’s Jewish community. The society collects and maintains a variety of written, spoken and photographic records. They sponsor lectures, events and tours of the city’s Jewish historical sites. Some of Chicago’s famous Jewish landmarks include the Kehilat Anshe Maarav at the Isaiah Israel Congregation in Hyde Park, the site of the old Maxwell Street Market located in one of Chicago’s oldest residential neighborhoods, the headquarters of the Jewish United Fund on Ben Gurion Way on S. Franklin, the Chicago Loop Synagogue, and the historic neighborhood of Lawndale.

About twenty six percent of Chicago’s Jews identify as orthodox or traditional. Thirty five percent identify as conservative while another thirty percent or more identify as reform. By 2004, there was an estimated 140 synagogues in the Chicago metropolitan area. Nearly every movement within modern Judaism is represented. There are 39 orthodox, 31 conservative, 36 reform, 14 traditional, 3 reconstructionist, 1 humanist, and about 7 non-denominational congregations. There are also 4 mikva'ot and 2 rabbinical courts.

The Jewish community of Chicago hosts a variety of educational programs and institutions. Many of these are supported by the Jewish Federation with different allocations and grants. Jewish education in Chicago spans from day care to the college level. Eighty percent of Chicago's Jewish children receive Jewish education. In addition to several day schools and yeshivot are institutions such as the Ida Crown Jewish Academy, Associated Talmud Torahs, Anne Blitstein Teachers Institute of Women, and the Board of Jewish Education. Courses of higher learning are offered at The Spertus Institute of Jewish Studies, the Rorh Jewish Learning Institute (JLI) and the Hebrew Theological College.

Other sources of Jewish education can be found within the city's museums, centers and memorials, particularly, the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Educational Center, the Chicago Jewish Historical Society, the Chicago Hebrew Institute and the Kohl Children's Museum.

For students and young professionals are a number of Jewish clubs and associations. Some are committed to community outreach while others bring people together. Avodah, the Jewish service corps, advocates for poverty while Club 1948 works to connect Israelis with Jewish Americans. There is also a variety of programs for Jewish singles and young Jewish professionals as well as multiple Jewish Community Centers, B'nai Brith and Kum Kibbutz.

Throughout the city of Chicago are several Jewish enclaves. The largest is West Rogers Park. Also known as the Golden Ghetto, since 1930, Rogers Park has had a significant Jewish population and the largest Hasidic community in the Midwest. During the 1960s, it became home to a thriving community of Russian Jews. This neighborhood has more than 20 congregations and a number of kosher butchers, bakeries, restaurants, markets and grocery stores. Another notable community was located in North Lawndale. For much of the first half of the 20th century, this historic neighborhood was home to one of Chicago’s most vibrant Jewish communities. Remembered simply as Jewish Lawndale, it was the core of Chicago’s Jewish West Side. Following World War II, much of the Jewish population relocated into suburban areas. By 1995, there were more than 150,000 Jews living in the suburbs of Chicago. Jewish neighborhoods are located throughout the Northern, Western and Southern districts. Large populations can be found in Petersen Park, Hollywood Park and Hyde Park-Kenwood, which is home to the oldest congregations in Chicago.

Providing medical need to Jewish children and families are many healthcare facilities including hospitals and support centers. Many of these, like the Michael Reese Hospital, were established by the city's oldest Jewish communities. Mount Sinai is one of the city's best hospitals and is heavily supported by the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago. The JCFS (Jewish Children & Family Services) offers a variety of services for families with special needs. They additionally provide programs for education, employment and counseling. The Chai Lifeline offers free year-round support to children and families.

Other facilities include the Jewish Healing Network of Chicago, the Jewish AIDS Network and the Center for Jewish Genetics. Medical centers such as these are largely supported by community-based organizations and private donors. Philanthropy has continued to be a major part of the Jewish Federation following their merge with the Jewish Welfare Fund in 1974. Several of Chicago's Jewish organizations and programs receive funding from the Federation every year.

In a city as large as Chicago and with one of the largest Jewish communities in the United States, there is no shortage of Jewish media. Across all channels, from television and radio to newspapers and online magazines, are several sources of Jewish news and entertainment. Circulating throughout Chicago is the Chicago Jewish Star, a twice-monthly newspaper. There is also Schmooze Magazine, a student-run Jewish publication. Online periodicals include Chicago Jewish News, Oy! Chicago, Kveller and JUF News.

Written by researchers of ANU Museum of the Jewish People
Milton Mezzrow

Milton Mezzrow (1899-1972) Jazz clarinetist and saxophonist. Born in Chicago, Illinois, he became a prominent representative of the Chicago style, mainly as a leader of jazz bands. Mezzrow, nicknamed Mezz, was among the first white musicians to perform with black musicians, including Tommy Ladnier and Sidney Bechet, with whom he appeared in New York and Paris.
Mezzrow composed, among other works: REALLY THE BLUES; ROYAL GARDEN BLUES; COMIN’ ON WITH THE COME ON; REVOLUTIONARY BLUES (all 1938); GONE AWAY BLUES; and OUT OF THE GALLION (both 1945). He wrote his autobiography, entitled Really the Blues (1946).

Bobby Fischer

Bobby Fischer (1943-2008), chess master, considered by many to be the greatest chess player of all time. He was born in Chicago, USA, in 1943 and brought up in Brooklyn where his mother moved after she was divorced in 1945. He learned to play chess at the age of 6 and soon became deeply absorbed in the game. At the age of 13 he became the youngest national junior chess champion in the USA and at the age of 14 he became the youngest senior US Champion. In 1958, at the age of 15, he became the youngest Grandmaster in the history of chess.

He broke the Soviet domination of the World Championship when he became the first American to win the title by defeating Boris Spassky of the USSR in Reykjavik, Iceland, in 1972. During the Cold War, as the Iron Curtain divided Europe, he became a hero. In 1975 the world chess federation refused to meet Fischer's conditions for a World Championship match with the Soviet Anatoly Karpov and Fischer refused to play. Consequently the federation awarded the title of World Champion to Karpov. Only after getting a phone call from then secretary of state Henry Kissinger was he persuaded to get on the plane. “This is one of the worst chess players in the world speaking to the best,” Kissinger allegedly said. “America wants you to go over there and beat the Russians”. Fischer lost the first point by forfeit, but two months later, America could celebrate its new champion. After this dispute Fischer vanished from public eye for twenty years and moved to Europe.

Twenty years after their legendary face-off, Fischer and Spassky played an exhibition match in Yugoslavia. Because he violated economic sanctions against a country at war, Fischer was prohibited from returning to the United States. He became profoundly anti-American. He went so far as to say that the September 11, 2001, attacks were “wonderful news.”

Arthur Joseph Goldberg

Arthur Joseph Goldberg (1908-1990), labour lawyer, supreme US court judge and US Ambassador to the United Nations, born in Chicago, USA, the youngest of eleven children born to Russian immigrant parents. His father was a peddler who delivered fresh vegetables and fruit by horse-drawn wagon until his death in 1916. After their father's death, the older children were forced to leave school and go to work to support the family. However, as the youngest child, Arthur Goldberg was permitted to continue his education. Nevertheless, by the time he was aged twelve, he was working at odd jobs, such as wrapping fish, selling shoes, and selling coffee. When he graduated from Benjamin Harrison Public High School at the age of sixteen, Goldberg had shown himself to be an excellent pupil. He was determined to study law. At age 18 he entered Northwestern Law School, continued to work and still finished at the top of the class of his class.

Goldberg took a job in a top Chicago law firm, but resigned when he was assigned to foreclose mortgages. Championing underdogs, Goldberg opened his own small office and began taking social justice cases. Among Goldberg's clients was the American Newspaper Guild which, in 1938, organized a strike against the Hearst newspapers in Chicago. For eight months, Goldberg represented the strikers without charging any fee. In the end, Hearst recognized the union. Goldberg became a workingman's hero, and eventually serving as general counsel to the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) and the United Steelworkers of America. In 1955, Goldberg masterminded the legal aspects of the merger between the CIO and the American Federation of Labor (AFL), becoming chief counsel of the newly formed AFL-CIO. A brilliant negotiator and conciliator, he preferred compromise as a way to resolve disputes. Goldberg drew the AFL-CIO into the emerging civil rights movement by filing briefs with the Court in desegregation cases. In 1961, President John F. Kennedy appointed him Secretary of Labor, where he was considered among the most energetic members of the Cabinet. A year later, Kennedy nominated Goldberg for a seat on the Supreme Court.

Perhaps his most important contribution to the Supreme Court was an opinion which he had written and which had the effect of establishing the constitutional right of a suspect to have a lawyer present during their interrogation. It confirmed the rights of individuals to have a right to be left alone by government, unless it had been specifically abrogated by legislation.

In 1965, President Lyndon Johnson asked Justice Goldberg to replace Adlai Stevenson, who died suddenly, as United States Ambassador to the United Nations. He seems to have believed that he could bring his negotiating skills to the UN to help end the Vietnam War. Of course, he was frustrated in not being able to end the war. The highpoint of his tenures at the United Nations was during the Six Day War, when he repeatedly and successfully argued the American position calling for a ceasefire without first insisting on a Israeli withdrawal. For this he was accused by the Arabs of influencing American foreign policy on behalf of the Jews.

When Goldberg retired from government in 1968 and became president of the American Jewish Committee, he said, "I am proud of my Jewish heritage; I don't like any American who is not proud of his heritage". The link between his Judaism and his liberalism appeared particularly at Passover seder nights, where he retold the story of the Israelites in a way that made their struggles sound like the civil rights struggles of the 1960s. He was also chairman of the Jewish Theological Seminary's board of overseers from 1963-1969.

Rosalyn Tureck

Rosalyn Tureck (1914-2003), pianist, born in Chicago, Illinois (USA). She first studied from 1925-1929 with Sophia Brilliant-Liven, assistant to Anton Rubinstein at the St. Petersburg Conservatory in Russia, and then (1929-1931) with pianist Jan Chiapusso. In 1931-1935 she furthered her studies at the Juilliard School of Music in New York with pianist Olga Samaroff. She later taught at the Philadelphia Conservatory (1935-1942), the Juilliard School (1943-1955), and the University of California in San Diego (1966-1972) among others. Tureck made her debut at Carnegie Hall in New York performing Brahms’ 2nd Concerto with the Philadelphia Orchestra conducted by Eugene Ormandy. From the late 1930’s she gave successfully recitals of Bach’s keyboard music. In 1947 she made her debut in Europe and became far more famous there than in America. She was the first woman ever to simultaneously play and conduct Bach’s concerts, and the first woman ever to conduct the New York Philharmonic. Later she conducted many major orchestras. She devoted herself mainly to the music of Bach, wrote the book An Introduction to the Performance of Bach (1960), and founded the International Bach Society (1966). Died in Riverdale, Bronx, New York.

Alfred Wallenstein

Alfred Wallenstein (1898-1983) Cellist and conductor. Born in Chicago, Illinois, USA, he played already in his childhood in theater orchestras in California. He studied cello and medicine in Europe, returned to the USA and became principal cellist of the New York Philharmonic under Toscanini (1929). From 1931 Wallenstein conducted radio orchestras. From 1933 he founded the radio orchestra Wallenstein Sinfonietta, known for its high standards. In 1943-1956 Wallenstein conducted the Los Angeles Philharmonic and in 1952 was appointed also as music director of the Hollywood Bowl. Died in New York.

Abraham Solodar

Abraham Solodar (1890-1967), poet, born in Zhmerynka, Ukraine (then part of the Russian Empire), he went to Eretz Israel in 1911, and emigrated to the United States in 1926. Among those who encouraged him in his literary efforts were H.N. Bialik, in Odessa, and J.H. Brenner, in Tel Aviv. Solodar edited the children weeklies Alummot (1922-1923) and Olam ha-Yeladim (1927-1928). In 1934 he edited a Hebrew literary quarterly in Chicago.
His collected poetry was published posthumously, in 1939, entitled Shirim. He died in Chicago, USA.

Laszlo (Ladislaus) Moholy-Nagy

László (Ladislaus) Moholy-Nagy (born as Laszlo Weisz), (1895-1946), painter, designer and photographer born in Borsod, Hungary (Thden part of Austria-Hungary). In 1914 he was inducted into the Austro-Hungarian army. In 1917 he was severely wounded on the Russian front. During his convalescence he began drawing portraits and landscapes. Upon his discharge from the army he returned to Budapest, where he obtained the degree of Doctor of Law.

In Berlin he contributed paintings to the Sturm exhibits (1922-25). He taught at the Bauhaus Art University at Weimar, later at Dessau (1923-28), Germany. Under the pressure of political developments in Germany he left the Bauhaus and traveled throughout Europe (Hungary, Switzerland, Finland, Norway, France, Greece, Italy, Amsterdam). Subsequently he went to London, England, where he did publicity work for Imperial Airways and the London Transport Board. From 1937 on he lived in the United States.

From 1937 to 1938 he was principal of the New Bauhaus, Chicago, a school for the education of designers and architects, coordinating art, science and technology, sponsored by the Association of Arts and Industries. When the school closed after one academic year, Moholy-Nagy continued the work, upon enlistment of new faculty members, under the name of School of Design in Chicago which, through its teaching methods, becamne influential in art education in the United States.

In his own work Moholy-Nagy sought to use light as a medium of expression especially in photography and film and to analyze light in his paintings (exhibited in Paris and London, 1937), causing the functions of art and applied art to overlap. His film effects were used in H. G, Well's motion picture "The Shape of Things to Come". In Germany he had designed stage settings. Both in two- and in three-dimensional art he demanded that the creative artist know and use the possibilities afforded by science and technology. Experiments and theories were graphically embodied in such books as "Malerei-Photography-Film" (1925); "Vom Material zur Architektur" (1929); "The New Vision" (New York, 1931 and 1938).

Moholy-Nagy died in Chicago.

Max Thorek

Max Thorek (1880-1960), surgeon, born in Budapest, Hungary (then part of Austria-Hungary). He went to the USA in 1900, and received his medical degree from Rush Medical College, University of Chicago in 1904. In 1943, Thorek was professor of clinical surgery at the Cook County Graduate School of Medicine, surgeon-in-chief at the American Hospital and consulting surgeon of the Municipal Tuberculosis Sanitarium in Chicago. He carried out pioneering work in the endocrinology of the testes. Thorek was decorated as a chevalier of the Legion of Honor of France, and received the Chevalier Order of the Crown in Italy. In 1942 he was awarded the Distinguished Citizens' Medal of the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Detroit.

Thorek's books include: “The Human Testis and its Diseases” (1924); “Surgical Errors and Safeguards” (1931); “Modern Surgical Technic” (3 vols., 1941). In addition, he translated “Surgery of the Brain and Spinal Cord”, by Fedor Krause (1912), and was author of more than one hundred articles and papers in American and European medical journals.

Maurice Oppenheim

Maurice Oppenheim (1876-1949), physician, dermatologist, born in Vienna, Austria, a descendent of the court factor, Samuel Oppenheimer. He received his M.D. degree from the University of Vienna in 1899 and after being assistant professor he became full professor in 1915. During World War I he served in the Austrian-Hungarian army as a surgeon major. From 1927 on he was acting professor of dermatology and siphilology at the University of Vienna. He was also head of the department of skin and venerקal diseases of the Wilhelminen Hospital (1918-1938).

In 1939, after the annexation of Austria to Nazi Germany, Oppenheim immigrated to the United States, where he became full-time professor and head of the dermatological department of Chicago Medical School. Oppenheim was a member of many dermatological societies and he received several gold medals and distinctions for his research on occupational disorders of the skin. A major part of his publications dealt with skin diseases which derived from vocational or circumstantial causes, including "Die Schaadigungen der Haut durch Beruf und Arbeit" (3 volumes; Ullmann and Pille, co-authors; 1922); "Die Schaadigungen der Haut durch Beruf, Sport, Jahreszeiten, Kosmetik und erste Hilfe bei ploetzlichen Hautschaadigungen" (1937).

Oppenheim died in Chicago, USA, in 1949.

The department store of the Mendel brothers in Chicago, Illinois, USA. Postcard, 1900s
The department store of the Mendel brothers
at the center of Chicago, Illinois, USA
Postcard, early 1900s
(Tel Aviv, Gross Family Collection)