Port Murals To Dock In New Museum Beginning in the mid-1600s, tiny Jewish communities took root in port cities along North America's East Coast. Composed primarily of Sephardic Jews who traced their lineage to Spain and Portugal, these settlers joined other Europeans living in the American colonies. There, Jews found new opportunities for civic engagement and employment.These scenes of the early life of Jewish settlers in the American colonies begin the exhibition being created for the Museum's new home, scheduled to open in November 2010.
As the building itself nears completion, Design and Production Incorporated, the Museum's exhibit fabricator, will begin installing next week a first mural for the exhibition, one that will help the Museum tell the story of Jewish life in America in the 17th century.
The specially designed mural will be located on the fourth floor of the new core exhibition, titled "Foundations of Freedom, 1654 to 1880." Located in a gallery that focuses on Jewish life in colonial America, the mural depicts a harbor scene, meant to evoke the Eastern Seaboard communities in which Jews settled during the 17th and 18th centuries. Visitors to the gallery will learn personal stories about life and work, as well as how Jews integrated into colonial society and the ways in which Jews maintained Judaism and Jewish culture in a land far removed from the European centers of Jewish life.
D & P will also be installing murals in other galleries on the fourth floor, including one depicting towns and cities across America in which Jews settled during the 19th century and one with a landscape of the Old West.
Their work on the fourth floor will continue through September. Installation of murals on the third floor will also start in May.
For an up-to-date picture of the construction site that refreshes every 15 minutes, view our Museum-Cam. To see additional photos of the Museum's construction like those above, click here.
Seventh Generation Rabbi Supports Museum Campaign
Harold Brockman was a sixth-generation rabbi, born in Riga, Latvia, not the most welcoming of places for a Jew at the turn of the 20th century. An ardent Zionist, Rabbi Brockman immigrated to Palestine in the 1920s, but life there was difficult for the rabbi. For example, he couldn't get kosher food, according to his son, Rabbi Herbert Brockman.
Next stop, the United States.
"Ironically, my father ended up coming to Ameri
ca to be Jewish," said Herbert Brockman, who has led Congregation Mishkan Israel in Hamden, Conn. for 25 years.
Herbert Brockman, a seventh-generation rabbi, recently made a Founding Membership Gift to the National Museum of American Jewish History, in recognition of the Museum's important role in telling the rich stories of American Jewish history.
Rabbi Brockman joins the growing list of more than 7,000 people who have supported the Founding Membership Campaign of the Museum. By making a Founding Membership gift, individuals are supporting what will be an iconic institution on Independence Mall, as well as a leading national education and cultural center.
"I think that this is one of the great Jewish communities in our history," Rabbi Brockman said. "It's educated, it's creative and it's supportive of other Jewish communities. Now we'll have a Museum that will share these aspects in a way people will know it. About Alexandria, one of the great ancient Jewish communities, we know very little. But through the efforts of the Museum, posterity will know about America. We are writing history for the future."
Founding Memberships may be purchased for your family or others with a gift of $54. Founding Members who make a minimum gift of $90 will receive a limited edition print depicting world-renowned architect James Polshek's design for the new Museum. Founding Members will be able to participate in the Museum's opening celebrations and to visit the NMAJH free whenever they choose throughout the membership term. Their names will also be permanently listed in the Museum.
The new Museum is scheduled to open in November 2010.
Visit the Museum's website for information on becoming a Founding Member and about the benefits provided at each level of donation, or call the Development Office at 215.923.3811 x 104
For information on ways to participate in the Museum's Capital Campaign, contact Irv Hurwitz, the Museum's director of institutional advancement, at 215.923.3811 x 133 or via email at ihurwitz@nmajh.org.
Zionism Addressed In Museum Exhibition
Louis Brandeis, the future Supreme Court Justice, once declared, "To be good Americans, we must be better Jews, and to be better Jews, we must become Zionists." Brandeis embraced Zionism in 1912 and became America's most prominent Zionist, serving as the president of the Provisional Committee for Zionist Affairs from 1914 to 1918.
The poster seen here advertised an address by Brandeis on Sunday May 9, 1915 titled "The Aims of the Zionist Movement" and will be displayed on the third floor of the new Museum in a gallery concentrating on politics between the first and second world wars.
During the 1920s a growing number of American Jews embraced the dream of establishing a Jewish homeland in Palestine, partly as a haven for those restricted from entering the United States. Driven by the hope of revitalizing Jewish life in Palestine, American Jews saw no contradiction between Zionism and American patriotism.
Justice Brandeis is also one of the 18 prominent Jewish Americans being featured in the Museum's Only In America Gallery/Hall of Fame.
The Museum is currently seeking artifacts for the collection related to Zionism.
The premise of NMAJH collecting is that history affects all people and that everyone has valuable stories to tell. The wide variety of artifacts in the collection vividly evokes the diversity of the American Jewish experience.
If you have an object you would like the Museum to consider for donation, please contact Rebecca Levine, the Museum's associate registrar, at rlevine@nmajh.org or at 215.923.3811 x 138.
Interactive Exhibit Invites Visitors To Share Their Stories
Visitors are now offered the rare opportunity, until May 18, to help the Museum test out two interactive exhibits. Finished versions of each will be installed in the Museum's new building on Philadelphia's Independence Mall, set to open in November of 2010.
On display is "It's Your Story," a video recording booth that invites visitors to tell their own stories, share family histories, and react to some of the new Museum's central themes.
The booth accommodates up to four visitors at one time.
In the new Museum, after visitors record their stories, they will be emailed a web link that they can share with their friends and family or embed on a Facebook or YouTube page. In addition, every video will be preserved by the Museum and a selection will be accessible to anyone visiting the Museum.
In addition to the video recording booth in the current location, there is a "Contemporary Issues Forum," where visitors will be asked to respond to such provocative questions such as "Is intermarriage a threat to the American Jewish community?" "Does antisemitism exist in the United States?" and "Should religion play a role in American politics?"
In addition, people's opinions, their handwriting, and their physical image, will be projected into the space.
Both exhibits will be installed in the second floor of the new Museum. The theme of the second floor is "Choices and Challenges of Freedom" and explores American Jewish history from the 1940s to the present day.
Museum Shop Increases Visitors' Discount During Blowout Sale
The Museum Shop is currently holding a blowout moving sale, offering E-Newsletter subscribers 30 percent off almost every item in stock now through May. The Museum Shop, which will be expanded, will be moving to the new Museum building opening November of this year.
The Museum Shop carries Judaica from a variety of artists in an array of styles. Items for every major Jewish holiday adorn the shelves as do childrens' toys, ceremonial and religious books, tallitot, kippot, a variety of hand crafted Jewelry and much more.
The sale does not apply to ketubot and silver ceremonial items.
Please mention that you are a subscriber when making your purchase.
Shop in person or browse items online at
www.judaicashop.net. Online items must be in stock for the discount. For more information e-mail
Eva Schlanger or
Elaine Silverman, or call the Museum Shop at 215.923.0262.
The Museum Shop is open Mondays -Thursdays, 10 a.m. - 5 p.m.; Fridays, 10 a.m.-3 p.m.; and Sundays, 12 noon - 5 p.m.
Proceeds from the Museum Shop support the National Museum of American Jewish History. Show Tickets And Art Exhibition Catalog Offered To Museum Subscribers
The Museum is teaming up with 1812 Productions and the Institute of Contemporary Art to provide E-Newsletter subscribers with two special offers. The ICA is offering five copies of their current exhibition catalog and 1812 Productions is offering three pairs of tickets to "An Evening Without Woody Allen"
"An Evening Without Woody Allen" features the work of an American comedy master. It features classic tales like "The Whore of Mensa," "The Kugelmass Episode," and
"A Brief But Helpful Guide to Civil Disobedience" among many other hilarious accounts of nebbishes, yentas, and schnooks.
The show runs through May 16 at Plays & Players Theatre located at 1714 Delancey Street, Philadelphia.
Be one of the first three people to e-mail tyler@1812productions.org, to receive a pair of tickets. Please include your name and address in the body of the e-mail. For more information call 215.592.9560 or visit www.1812productions.org.
The Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Pennsylvania is offering five copies of their current exhibition's catalog to E-Newsletter subscribers. The ICA's current exhibition, "Maira Kalman: Various Illuminations (of a Crazy World)," is the first major museum survey of the artist's work
. An illustrator, author and designer, Kalman illuminates contemporary life with a profound sense of joy and unique sense of humor. This exhibition features a selection spanning 30 years of original works on paper and design production, along with less widely seen aspects of Kalman's work in photography, embroidery, textiles, and performance.
This catalog is fully illustrated and includes an essay by ICA Senior Curator Ingrid Schaffner.
The first five subscribers to e-mail katzj@upenn.edu will receive a copy of "Various Illuminations (of a Crazy World)." Please include Kalman in the subject line and your name and address in the body of the e-mail.
Only winners will be notified.
