31 Days of Jewish American Facts and Firsts
Although we officially celebrate Jewish American Heritage for just one month, there's a lot more to Jewish history than May's 31 days can contain. We've tried to capture the richness and sheer depth of the Jewish American experience with a sampling of firsts and facts slightly off the beaten path. Keep in mind that our Jewish American Heritage Month calendar cannot possibly represent all of the diverse, groundbreaking, or admirable achievements of Jews. Rather, you can use this calendar as the basis for further exploration of our history and impact around the globe. In most cases, the events outlined did not necessarily happen on that specific date. The calendar is merely a tool in honor of Jewish American Heritage Month.
May 1	In 1903 "The New Colossus" by Emma Lazarus was added to the base of the Statue of Liberty. Lazarus was born in 1849 in New York City into a Portuguese Sephardic Jewish family. Her poem, most recognized for its iconic lines, "Give me your tired, your poor/Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free," is available to view in its entirety by clicking here.
May 2	In 1843, citing "the deplorable conditions of the Jews in our newly adopted country," Henry Jones and a small group of his friends met and formed an organization whose purpose was to improve these newest immigrants' lives. The site was New York's Lower East Side and the organization was to become B'nai B'rith International.
May 3	Golda Meir, who was later to become the Prime Minister of Israel, was born on this date in 1898 in Kiev. She came to the United States in 1906 and later became a U.S. citizen. In 1921, she and her husband immigrated to Palestine to help found a Jewish state. Golda Meir was one of 24 people (and one of only two women) who signed the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel on May 14, 1948. She became Prime Minister on March 17, 1969, served until 1974, and died in 1978. She is the only former American citizen to become Prime Minister of Israel.
May 4	In 1654, 23 Dutch-Jewish refugees came to what was to become New York City seeking refuge from Brazil and established the first American Jewish community. A century later, New York opened the first all-day Jewish school.
May 5	B'nai B'rith Youth Organization (BBYO) celebrates its Founders Day in May. Alumni, including Leonard Nimoy, William Shatner, and Edward Asner. The organization was founded 1924 when B'nai B'rith adopted a fledgling Jewish high school fraternity, Aleph Zadik Aleph.
May 6	When you sing along during the seventh inning stretch, remember Harold Arlen, who wrote lyrics and music for "Take Me Out to the Ball Game." Other songwriting geniuses who contributed to what has been called "The Great American Songbook," include George and Ira Gershwin ("I Can't Give You Anything But Love, Baby") and Irving Berlin ("God Bless America" and "White Christmas").
May 7	Judah P. Benjamin, formerly a United States Senator, was appointed secretary of state of the Confederacy in 1862. Four years later, the first Jewish military cemetery in the U.S. was established in Richmond, Virginia, serving as a resting place for Jewish Confederate soldiers.
May 8	After humble beginnings as the son of German Jewish immigrants in Ohio, Adolf Simon Ochs bought The New York Times in 1896. Fighting against the age of "yellow journalism," Ochs slogan became "All the news that's fit to print."
May 9	During the May "sweeps week," remember the Jewish men and women, present at the start of TV. People bought those strange new boxes to watch Milton Berle, Jack Benny, George Burns, Gertrude Berg, Sid Caesar, and Groucho Marx. Behind the scenes, icons such as David Suskind, Carl Reiner, and Fred Silverman played major roles.
May 10	Jewish contributions to public service include some of the greatest justices on the Supreme Court including Louis D. Brandeis, Benjamin Cardozo, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg and some of the most outspoken voices in the U.S. Senate and House, including Bella Abzug , Abraham Ribicoff, and Barney Frank. Innumerable Jewish Americans have served key roles as Cabinet officers, including former B'nai B'rith International President Philip M. Klutznick, who served as Secretary of Commerce under President Carter; Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau Jr.; and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. Many other Jews served in influential roles. Perhaps the most legendary of these was Bernard Baruch, who played a key advisory role in the government of the early 20th century.
May 11	Many American Jews worked tirelessly on behalf of civil rights. Leaders included Arthur Spingarn, president of the NAACP in the 1950s and 1960s; feminist spokespeople, Gloria Steinem and Betty Friedan; gay activist and San Francisco City Council member, Harvey Milk; and suffragist Ernestine Rose.
May 12	In 1875, the first college designed to train American rabbis was founded. But, it was not until the 1940s that Yeshiva College became the first undergraduate degree-granting Jewish institution in the United States.
May 13	Basketball was the game of the urban streets in early 20th century. The most famous Jew associated with basketball was Red Auerbach, cigar-chomping coach of the Boston Celtics during their glory days of the '50s and '60s. Nat Holman distinguished himself as a star player on the original Celtics and on the New York Whirlwinds, and Red Holzman was a force to be reckoned with on the court and as a coach, as well.
May 14	Anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel. A B'nai B'rith member, Eddie Jacobson, longtime friend and business partner of Harry Truman, convinced the President to meet secretly with Chaim Weitzmann. This changed Truman's mind about partition and helped bring about American support for the State of Israel.
May 15	Football and Jews don't naturally come to mind together, partly because of quotas placed on Jews by most of the elite universities that fielded the better college football teams in the early 20th century, But three stars do stand out: Benny Friedman, who is generally considered football's first great passer, was selected all-pro for four consecutive years from 1927 to 1931. Marshall "Biggie" Goldberg, a legendary offensive and defensive back, had a brilliant career with the Chicago Cardinals where he was named to the All-Pro team from 1946 until 1948. And Sid Luckman helped the Chicago Bears win four National Football League (NFL) championships in the 1940s. Viewed as the greatest quarterback of his generation, he was famous for his pinpoint accuracy, and was elected to the NFL Hall of Fame in 1965. A number of Jews have had exceptional football careers as coaches and as owners, including coaches Sid Gillman, Marv Levy, and Allie Sherman, and owners Al Davis, Carrol Rosenbloom, and Sonny Werblin.
May 16	The Yiddish-language newspaper, The Daily Forward, first published by Abraham Cahan, stands out for its role in easing the entry of new Jewish immigrants into American society. At its peak, The Daily Forward reached almost a quarter million new Jewish Americans.
May 17	The first synagogue in the U.S. was dedicated in Newport, Rhode Island in 1763. The Touro Synagogue is the only surviving synagogue from the colonial era, and was designated as a National Historic Site in 1946. The synagogue gained eternal recognition in 1790, when George Washington sent a letter to the congregation thanking them for good wishes to him and his administration. Washington wrote: "The Government of the United States… gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance."
May 18	Educator Rebecca Gratz established the first Jewish "Sunday" school in the United States, in Philadelphia, in 1838.
May 19	The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) of B'nai B'rith was founded in 1913, partially in response to the lynching of Leo Frank, president of B'nai B'rith Gate City, Georgia Lodge. In an antisemitic atmosphere, Frank was convicted of murdering a 14-year-old girl, though he was cleared 75 years later. He was sentenced to life in prison, but an angry mob in Marietta, Georgia kidnapped him from prison and hanged him. The group responsible for the hanging later became known as the Ku Klux Klan.
May 20	In the 1930s, Hank Greenberg, first baseman and outfielder for the Detroit Tigers, led the American League in home runs for four years and in RBIs (runs batted in) for five years. He became the first Jewish player elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame, and gained vital exposure in 1934 when he refused to play on Yom Kippur, even though his team was in a tight pennant race. A similar situation transpired in 1963, when the great Hall of Fame pitcher, Sandy Koufax, refused to pitch for the Los Angeles Dodgers in the first game of the World Series because it fell on Yom Kippur.
May 21	David Levy Yulee was the first Jew to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives in 1841. He later became a United States Senator from Florida from 1845-1851.
May 22	In 1907, Albert Michelson became the first American scientist to receive the Nobel Prize. However, there is no name more widely associated with American Jewish scientists than Albert Einstein, who fled Nazi Germany in 1933 and began a brilliant career on the Manhattan Project developing the atomic bomb. Another great American Jewish scientist, J. Robert Oppenheimer, directed the project.
May 23	After World War II, opportunities opened up for Jewish scientists. This was the era of Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin, who developed vaccines that virtually eliminated polio. Among the thousands of other Jews who have excelled in the world of science are famed psychoanalyst Erik Eriksson; astronaut Judith Resnik; father of the atomic submarine, Hyman Rickover; and astronomer Carl Sagan.
May 24	In 1884, after teaching in New York City schools for more than 20 years, Julia Richman became the first Jewish elementary school principal. The tradition of Jewish impact on American education and intellectual life continued, as Hannah Arendt, the first woman to receive full professorship at Princeton, became one of America's most outspoken thinkers.
May 25	In the world of classical music and opera, greats such as Arthur Fiedler, Vladimir Horowitz, Artur Rubenstein, Jascha Heifetz, Pinkas Zukerman, Isaac Stern, and Itzak Perlman would be on anyone's list of the greatest classical music personalities. No opera buff's collection would be complete without works from Beverly Sills, Roberta Peters, and Robert Merrill.
May 26	Rabbi Benjamin Frankel implored B'nai B'rith in 1923 to adopt a new organization, Hillel, to sponsor facilities on college campuses where Jews could freely pray, attend classes on Jewish subjects, and socialize with fellow Jewish students.
May 27	The three Soyer brothers – Moses, Raphael, and Isaac – built upon European ideas and combined them with a new perspective to become early innovators in the Realist School of painting and sculpture. They were joined by Ben Shahn, who became more widely known for his Hebrew calligraphy and Jewish-themed art. After World War II, many of the great figures of European art immigrated to the United States and New York City became the new international center of art. This new crop of included new modern artists such as Marc Chagall and Jacques Lipchitz, who introduced the concept that art could be an intellectual pursuit as well as an artistic one. New York gallery owners and photographers Alfred Steiglitz and Edward Steichen were famous for showcasing Modernists such as Max Weber, and for introducing American audiences to many great photographers such as Alfred Eisenstadt, who fled the Nazis in 1935 and took many of Life Magazine's most well-known photos. More recently, Richard Avedon, Irving Penn, and Diane Arbus startled the world with their photos of fashion, protests, and poverty that represented much of American culture.
May 28	For the first time, in 1862 the United States Army appointed Army chaplains to serve Jews.
May 29	Francis Salvador was killed in a skirmish with the British in 1776, becoming the first Jew to die for American independence. Salvador was also the first known Jew elected to an American colonial legislature, and the only Jew to serve in a colonial congress in the revolutionary period.
May 30	For the U.S. centennial in 1876, B'nai B'rith erected the Statue of Religious Liberty in Philadelphia, sculpted by renowned Jewish artist Moses Jacob Ezekial.
May 31	Judah Touro is believed to be the first large-scale Jewish American philanthropist – some even consider him the father of Jewish American philanthropy. In 1796 he began a very successful series of businesses in New Orleans, including real estate and shipping endeavors. When he died in 1854, he left a bequest of nearly half a million dollars, endowing every traditional synagogue in the United States, a hospital and a synagogue in New Orleans, and much more.