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AJHS Collections

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Selling Chanukah in America

By Cassia Kisshauer
Senior Reference Services Librarian, Special Collections

Selling Chanukah in America

As Chanukah transformed in 20th century America from a smaller, home-based festival to a popular public holiday, businesses saw an opportunity to manufacture and market decorations and gifts to Jewish consumers.

In the mid-19th century, new waves of German Jewish immigrants focused on Christmas as a winter holiday, in order to…

Center for Jewish History
Center for Jewish History
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Blog Post

“Yours very respectaly, M. Blum”: Correspondence between a New Jersey Jewish Farmer and the Industrial Removal Office, 1902-1905

By Lauren Gilbert, Director of Public Services, Center for Jewish History

“Yours very respectaly, M. Blum”: Correspondence between a New Jersey Jewish Farmer and the Industrial Removal Office, 1902-1905

In response to the massive waves of Jewish immigration from Eastern Europe around the turn of the 20th century, leaders of the German-Jewish community in New York City founded the rather forbiddingly named Industrial Removal…

Center for Jewish History
Center for Jewish History
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Blog Post

Death Masks at the Center for Jewish History

By Lauren Gilbert
Director of Public Services, Center for Jewish History

Death Masks at the Center for Jewish History

Death masks, molded from plaster in the first hours after death before the features have stiffened or atrophied, were used for centuries to preserve the appearance of nobility and other eminent persons as models for posthumous sculptures or painted portraits. In the 19th century,…

Center for Jewish History
Center for Jewish History
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Blog Post

German-Jewish Americans at Home at the Turn of the Last Century: A Late 19th-Century Photo Album

German-Jewish Americans at Home at the Turn of the Last Century: A Late 19th-Century Photo Album

“. . . the [Jewish) religion which was to be prized and saved is fast becoming a watery Unitarianism, and its adherents are allowing themselves, where permitted, to become completely assimilated. Reform Judaism which began as a compromise is ending as surrender.”

—Marvin Lowenthal, “Zionism: A Menorah…

Center for Jewish History
Center for Jewish History
Blog Post

Coffee & Bagels as Organizing Tools: the Tzedek, Tzedek Collective and Wholly Bagel Coffeehouse

Coffee & Bagels as Organizing Tools: the Tzedek, Tzedek Collective and Wholly Bagel Coffeehouse

The late 1960s and early 1970s were, in part, characterized by the counterculture that swept through the United States during those years. Catapulted by the growth of social movement activism was an increased awareness of and desire to fix the problems plaguing American society, such as racism, sexism, poverty and…

Center for Jewish History
Center for Jewish History