Look to thc Fock ,.eom attl,ich l.t t uteee he.un E lJrri, 1tJ-5t tgrtrt cbtcoco Jeal)lsl') brstonrcol soctetJ Vol.2l,No. 8, winter, 1997 ,{{'j,,, : ,:'r i,, ; iu" :i.;, :!', 'iffl;1!i" # ffiffiffiffi Prof.Paula Zionist Odd Couple: Pfefferto WhenChaim WeizmanPersuaded Albert DeliverFirst Einstein to Join Him in a Lecture Tour that Brought the TwoMen to Chicago,He Set OrlinskyTalk in Motion One of the More Unlikely PaulaPfeffer, associate professor Pairings in Zionist ActiviQ History of histon at Loyola Universityof By Walter Roth Chicago,rvill deliver the first rn a seriesof annuallectures honoring the hicagosaw many of Europe'smost prominent Zronists pass through long-time Board memoryof Society in theearly decades of tlrecentury, but it is possiblethe most unusual member and rvell-knolm Chrcago oarrof all wasAlbert Einstein and Chaim Weizman. When Aaron activistElsie Orlinsky. Aaronsohn,Shmariyahu Levin, Vladimir Jabotinsky,and Weizmanhimself Pfeffer'stalk is titled,"A Homefor cameto Chicago,each was a seasonedZionist speakerand public figure Evelr'Baby. a Babyfor EveryHome: a politicalpositions Jewishadoption in Chicago." whose would havebeen farniliar to mostin their audiences. Pfeffcr will Einstein, in contrast, was a Zionist unknown. The most onpaEe 3) famousscientist in the world, he was onlyjust beginning onpase t) speak at Lovola Goktinued Gontinued Rabbi Alex J. Goldmanhas won the 1996 Alex Goldman Doris Minsky Memorial Award. His Inside: mutsscript, My Father, Myself A Son'sMem- roral HistoryExcerpt of NamedSixth oir ofhis Father,Rabbi YehudaD. Goldman, Conversationwith Rabbi will be publishedand distributed to all Society LeonardMishkin Winnerof the membersby this Fall. Goldman'smemoir is essentiallya biogra- lFragmentsof the Life MinskyAward phy crossedwith an autobiography.In it, he of ChicagoRabbi Chaim recountshis own expenencesgrowing up in Mednick for Memoirof Chicago.training for therabbinate, and serving rJewishWar Veterans as one of the country's leadrngconsewative Selfand Father (continuedon page I2) CelebrateCentennial to seeing the many uses to rvhich members of our Societ_vand other Chicago-areahistorians can put it. Closer to home- however, I hale While not to be locatedin Chicago.a Thesefour major resourceswill be neu's of sadnessto report. As 1996 ne\\, center for housedtogether in a new edifice being drew to a close,Chicago lost one of its Jenish Leamingar.rd formed out of trvo existing ManJrattan great Jewish scholars.Rabbi Leonard Culturebeing built in buildingslocated on ll6th and llTth Mishkin. Nes York Cit1 streets-just westof Fifth Avenue. On December 29, 1996. Rabbi should be a great The Center will house over 80 Mishkrndied tragicalll . Heheld r arious resource for million archivalitems. 500-000 library leadership roles as a teacher and Chicago-based volunres-and thousands of artworksand administratorin the Orthodox Jcrvish scholars. teachers. artifacts. community-but u'as equalll noted for andstudents of c\ er] Somepcople are alreadrreferring to his historicalcollections. Walter Roth facet of American it as the "Library of Congress and He was a national authorig' on Jerrish history, SmithsonianInstitution of the Jeu'ish AmericanJewish history. and he owned scholarship.art. and people." It should prove to be an a comprehensivelibrary of Yiddish and culturc. unparalleledresource for the country Hebrew publications. manJ-of them Thc nel institutionis called The andthe rvorld. originatingin Chicago. Ccnterlbr Jorish Histon- and-b1'the For communitiessuch as ours- the Both as a tributeto his memon and cndol' 1997-it l ill houscthc collections technicalinfrastructure being designed as a meansof presentingaccounts of of lour natioualJclish organizations:for the Centershould be of greatvalue. Chicago Jewish history, ue are Thc Amcrican Jesish Historical A tailored computer netw'ork should publishingan excerptof an oral history gave Socrctl.rrlrrch spccializcs irt Amcrican make it possible for Chicagoansto he to Societymembers in 1978-and publishing Jcrn rrrdol rrlrch our Socichis an accessthe collections b1 computer. we are also an accountof the al'llliatc:tlrc Lco BaeckInstitutc- lhich The Centcralreadv plans to provide life of Rabbi ChaimMednick that Rabbi couccntrJtcs oll Genuan-speakinga numberof lntemetresources. including Mishkin had a hand in recolering lrorn page Jc\ n : thc YIVO Inslilutefor Jewish digitized archires and computerized obscuritl. See 12 for the oral Rcscarch.rr hich focuses on East databasesthal rvill lurther the rvork of historyexcerpt and page 8 for the article Europcan Jor ish Histoq: and the local researchers- students. and on Rabbi Mednick. Ycshrra Unircrsitr Museum"dedicated historicalsocieties. We extendour deepest sympathies lo 10 lntcrprottngJclish arl. cultrtrc-and The Centerpromises to be a resource Rabbi Mishkin's family and manv hlston. for theentire countn'- and I look fomard friends. tr ing Journal. Wrong. Il ilas the Mr Fishbeinsays- "Ml mothcr canrc Letters: Jev,ishCourier locatedat l2 l4 South from ... Polandcalled Plaunch." Thc "Plonsk." To thc Societl: HalstedStreet. correct spelling should be ln thc last eclitior of (hicago.leu,- TheMorning Joutzal was a Yid- from the Russian. His father's home t:h Hittor.t (Vol. 21. No.7. Fall- dish periodical (daily-)available by tovvnshould be spelled"Stashor'" not 1996)-I loundsone errorsand/or orer- subscriptionor on the neustandsrn "Stasich." You should find both of sights in thc oral histon excerpts of Chicagobut publishedin Nel York. thesetowns listed in the ShtetlFinder \cllazcl r Jack Fishbcut (A Mr. Milner rvasa Chicagorepre- and perhapsDr. ln,ing Cutler's rccenl In ;olrrnrnonc on pagc') I bclicre sentatiYefor that nervspaper.) book should have those shtctlach 'fhe that in listing Chicago uelspapers at Jau,ish l)ailv Forv,ard ttas listed. rhc tinrc- N'lr Fishbein omitted the publishedin Chicago (The Chicago ln fact. Chicagohad trlo largc ( htctr,qol.tcntng ['o.tt a:ndt\e Herald- Edition). and ilas localedin its orvn landsmenshaften:one was thc Ploi?.sler l.xonincr Thc cditor should hare burldingon the conler of KedzieAr. Verein andthe otherwas the Indcpen- nladc r notc to thal cf'fcct emrcand l3th Street. The cxact ad- dent,\|q.\ h ov e r Ver ei n. In colurun 2. in listing Yiddislt dresssas I25(r SouthKedzie Ai- I sincerell hope that the mistakes nc\\spapcrs in Chicago.Fishbein could enue. JacobSiegel las the editor of rvill be conectedso that the archival not rccall tlic rlamcofthe nervspaperat the Chicagoedition. Morris Seskind datarvill not har.ethese errors. lirh rnd Halstcd Tlrc editor'snote in rvasthe laboreditor. l):rr(nthcsrs slalcs llrat it rras thcM0l ir- On pagc li) of thc samea(icle. Fugel R. Ilntcrntun Randolph, a founder of the civil Elsie Orlinsky was a founding Pfeffer rights movement. boardmember and a long-timeactive conthued.fron page one In addition,she is at work on a memberof the Society. biographyof Esther Loeb Kohn, a Her family and friends have University's Crown Center descendantof a pioneer Jewish establishedthe Elsie Orlinsky Fund Auditoriumon February9. The talk family who worked closely with as a meansof celebratrngher life and beginsat 2 p.m.,and there will be a immigrant communities in adding to the telling of Chicago socialhour starting at I p.m. conjunctionswith JaneAddams of Jewishhistory. Loyola Hillel is co-sponsoringtlre Hull House. TheFund provides an honorarium talk and will be providing both the Pfeffer has previouslytaught at for an annual talk given on some hall andsome of the refreshments Mundelein College, Northwestem, aspectof Jewishhistory. Pfeffer'sareas of specialization and NortheasternIllinois. She Thereis no chargefor the talk and are United States history and receivedher B.A. and M.A. fiom it is opento the public. We encourage sociologyof etlnic groupleadership. Northeastemand her Ph.D. from membersto attend and to brins Shehas written often about A Philip Northwestem in 1980. guestswith them. withoutsuch time-consurning *ork, InfOfm^tion ReqUeSt: BoardMember Dr. muchof the infonnationremains inac- cessibleto historianswho might U" Seeking Matefials N. SueWeiler to interestedin it. ChairOral History Inone efrort to make the material of On Synagogues Of the oral histories more widely avail- The Society announceswith plea- able, the Society recently tumed over the Old WestSide sure that board member Dr. N. Sue stewardshipof them to the Asher Li- The ChicagoJewish Historical Soci- Weiler has agreedto assumethe chair brary of the SpertusInstitute of Jewish ety is seekinginformation about the syn- of our oral history conxnittee. Studies. agogues that were operational on Weiler takes over leadershipof the Anyone interestedin exanining our Chicago'sWest Side. project from long-time board member existing oral history collection can do As part of a project to preservethe andchair Sidney Sorkin. so by going to 618 South Michigan history ofthe many large and small con- Sorkin has recently resigned from Avenue. Fifih Floor. gregations that flourished on the West the board- bul he remains an active Anyone interestedin volunteering Side in the early half of this century, u€ memberand an active participant in the to help in the Society's effort to con- are interested in heanng from anyone oral historyproject. trnue the oral history project should with historical accountsor archival ma- The Society'soral historyproject is contactthe Societyoffice at (3 l2) 663- terial. an effort to have individuals recount 5634. o While the greater Lawndale area is their experiencesin