Moses Reeb (1835-1891) 
Haas-Lilienthal Family Christmas Party - 1959 
Postcard: Purim Greetings from China, 1940s 
Work at the Offenbach Archival Depot: The "Pinson Hall" 
Ira Gershwin's Contribution A project of the Magnes conceived and curated by Francesco Spagnolo, PhD, director of Research and Collections
The Jewish Digital Narratives of the Magnes explore the networks of Jewish life in California and beyond.
The more we look at Jewish history and culture, the more we hear the resonance of the ancient term, haggadah. Narration is at the heart of the Jewish experience, and the holdings of the Magnes, which span archive, library and museum collections, tell many stories from the four corners of the world. To us, the meaning of a narrative approach to Jewish cultural history lies in the particular, in the intricacies of its many interweaving cultures, but it also represents a paradigm that can often be applied to other cultures and interactions.
The Jewish Digital Narratives make a creative (and at times unintended) use of current technologies and social networking tools to organize, showcase and share what the Magnes has collected in almost half a century. How the objects, texts and documents in our collections reached Northern California is in itself a captivating story, which has only be partially told by the founders of the Magnes.
Digital images generated by the Magnes staff, or collected through programs like the Memory Lab, are first organized in a narrative form, on the basis of a detailed storyboard. The results are presented on the Magnes website in an interactive learning environment created with the innovative software, MemoryMiner. The narratives are also uploaded to popular networks like Flickr, where users can comment, provide feedback, tag images and circulate information. Research and collection information will soon be accessible through our Archive-Library-Museum (ALM) database.
The Jewish Digital Narratives are the result of meticulous research by our curatorial staff, by guest curators and scholars, and by an energetic pool of interns, for whom our collection represents an invaluable training ground.
Supporting Israel in Northern California: Israel Bonds Initiatives (1950s-1960s)
The Development Corporation for Israel (Israel Bonds) was founded in 1951 to raise money from the American public for the fledgling Israeli state, which, at the time, was struggling to build an infrastructure and economy to support its growing population. The first Israel Bonds sales drive was launched in New York by David Ben-Gurion, Israel's first prime minister. Ben-Gurion's coast to coast tour of the United States would raise 52.6 million dollars by the end of 1951. The funds raised by the sale of Israel Bonds in 1951 and in subsequent years and decades were key factors in establishing a sound Israeli economy.
This exhibition is also available for viewing on Flickr.
Jewish Cemeteries in the California Gold Rush: The Sonora Hebrew Cemetery
Founded in 1853, the Sonora Hebrew Cemetery was the first cemetery in the Gold Rush Region. The first burial dates from 1853, and the last was in 1977. On January 13, 1974, it was rededicated as a historic site. The cemetery includes 43 visible gravestones, and two possible burial mounts. Records indicate that a mortuary building may have existed on the cemetery grounds, although no evidence of such a structure exists. The cemetery is enclosed by a stone wall built in the 1850's, and is surrounded by Italian cypress trees.
The photographs of the gravestones presented here are part of the “Ira Nowinski Photographs” Collection of the Magnes (WJHC 1968.36).
This exhibition is also available for viewing on Flickr.
Christmas Parties at 2007 Franklin Street (1954-1971): American-Jewish Family Life in the Haas-Lilienthal House of San Francisco
Elizabeth Lilienthal Gerstley's "Christmas Parties" album contains 201 photographs taken inside the Haas Lilienthal House at 2007 Franklin Street, San Francisco, between 1954 and 1971. These images portray members of the Haas, Lilienthal, Bransten and Gerstley families and their guests during their annual Christmas celebrations, and depict their gatherings and the interiors of the Haas Lilienthal House in vivid detail.
The story of the Haas Lilienthal House is part of a larger history of family construction among San Francisco's “Jewish aristocracy.” Built in 1886 by William and Bertha (Greenebaum) Haas, the house at 2007 Franklin Street can be seen as a material embodiment of the financial success many German-Jewish immigrants were finding in the western United States. The Haas Brothers wholesale grocery, a dominant force in the commercial world of nineteenth-century California, was one of a group of important businesses owned and operated by increasingly wealthy and socially prominent Jewish families, including, among others, the Lilienthals, the Gerstles (Gerstleys), and the Brandensteins (Branstens). These families often intermarried, creating formidable social and business networks.
The celebration of Christmas by Jews, in Europe after the Emancipation, and in California following their immigration since the Gold Rush, is a known "tradition" that draws upon the ongoing dialogue between Jewish and native cultures in the Global Diaspora.
This exhibition is also available for viewing on Flickr.
Far From Where? Jews and China in Modern Times
Jewish roots in China can be traced from the 9th century when Jewish merchants thought to be from Persia reached China by way of the Silk Road, and settled in Kaifeng. These Jews remained secluded for hundreds of years, eventually integrating into Chinese society.
The holdings of the Magnes include many primary sources documenting the Jewish experience in China in modern times. Personal papers, photographs, books and artifacts kept in the Archive, Library and Museum collections present minute details about individuals, families, organizations, events and living conditions in China, as well as the emigration of Jews to California.
This exhibition is also available for viewing on Flickr.
On Hitler's Balcony: Koppel Pinson and the Rescue of Jewish Books in Post-War Germany
Koppel S. Pinson (1904-1961), a professor at Queens College of the City University of New York, was an historian who specialized on the origins of German nationalism. At the end of the Second World War, Professor Pinson joined the U.S. Army, and actively participated in the efforts to help Jewish survivors of the Holocaust living in Displaced Person's camps across Germany.
Between 1945 and 1946, Koppel Pinson left New York City and lived in Germany, working in Offenbach, near Frankfurt am Main. There, under the command of Colonel Seymour J. Pomrenze, he was charged with sorting through the millions of Jewish books, in Hebrew, English, and other languages, that had been looted by the Nazis during their occupation of Germany and had been gathered in the Offenbach Archival Depot.
Koppel Pinson's work, and that of his staff and of German volunteers, was to identify the books and their original owners, so that the restitution process could take place and these valuable cultural assets could be repatriated. Thousands of books, however, could not be identified, and in many cases their legitimate owners had been murdered during the course of the Holocaust.
These documents present us with a unique insider's look into the daily life at the Offenbach Archival Depot, the experience of relief organization workers and, most importantly, with the material and emotional landscape of post-war Europe, when a world that had been undone was being rebuilt, piece by piece, by the concerted effort of committed individuals. A world in which a Jewish professor from America could stand on what had been "Hitler's balcony," in Berlin, and help repairing what had been broken.
This exhibition is also available for viewing on Flickr.
Making Things Happen: The American Premiere of Darius Milhaud's Opera "David" (1956)
On February 22, 1956, the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California, was filled by a crowd of opera-goers, rushing to attend the American premiere of Darius Milhaud's opera, David.
The French-Jewish composer, Darius Milhaud (b. Aix-en-Provence, 1892; d. Geneva, 1974), wrote David in 1954 as a personal tribute to the State of Israel for the 3000th anniversary of King David's founding of Jerusalem.
First performed in Jerusalem, David was staged at La Scala, in Milan (Italy) in 1955. California was the natural destination of this opera, given that Darius Milhaud had been on the faculty of Mills College, in Oakland, since 1940.
In 1970, the archive of the Western Jewish History Center of Magnes Museum in Berkeley acquired a small collection of primary sources about Milhaud's opera (Coll. WJHC 1970.002). In 2007, Seymour Fromer donated a new set of papers documenting the activities of the Festival of Faith and Freedom Committee.
These documents paint the fascinating image of a grandiose production, designed in pure 1950s Hollywood style, which succeeded in bringing Jewish history and culture before a wide and diverse audience.
This exhibition is also available for viewing on Flickr.