2/20 | Birthday of Meir Balaban
Today in Yiddishkayt… February 20 Birthday of Meir Balaban, Jewish Historian Meir Balaban (Majer Bałaban in Polish spelling) was born on February 20, 1877 in Lemberg, (later Lvov, Lwów, and today Львів, Ukraine). In 1900, Balaban began his studies in history at the city’s university. He studied under Ludwik Finkel, author of a classic bibliographic work on Polish history and editor of the leading journal Kwartalnik Historyczny (History Quarterly). It was in that journal that in 1903, Balaban published the first annotated bibliography of historical literature on Jews in...
Read More2/17 | Birthday of Ossip Dymov
Today in Yiddishkayt… February 17 Birthday of Ossip Dymov (Yosef Perelman), Yiddish Writer Yosef Perelman was born on February 17, 1878 in Białystok. In 1902, Perelman graduated from the Forestry Institute in Saint Petersburg where he earned a degree in land surveying. He took an interest in literature and began writing under the pseudonym Ossip Dymov, named after a character in Anton Chekhov’s classic short story “Grasshopper.” His literary career began as a columnist for a Saint Petersburg weekly called Театр и искусство (Theater and...
Read More2/15 | Birthday of Irena Sendler
Today in Yiddishkayt… February 15 Birthday of Irena Sendler, Polish Resistance Member & Savior of Children in Warsaw Ghetto Irena Sendler (Sendlerowa in Polish) was born Irena Krzyżanowska to a Polish Catholic family in Warsaw on February 15, 1910. Her father, a physician, died from typhus that he contracted during an epidemic in 1917. He was the only doctor in his town of Otwock (about 15 miles southeast of Warsaw) who would treat the poor, mostly Jewish community suffering with this disease. After his death, the Jewish community offered to pay for...
Read More1/27 | International Holocaust Remembrance Day
Today in Yiddishkayt… January 27 Liberation of Auschwitz International Holocaust Remembrance Day In 2005 the UN General Assembly designated January 27—the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau—as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. On this annual day of commemoration, every member state of the UN has an obligation to honor the victims of the Nazi era and to develop educational programs to help prevent future genocides. This year’s theme is “Children and the Holocaust.” Auschwitz was the largest camp established by the Germans. Located 37 miles west of...
Read More1/22 | Birthday of Moïse Kisling
Today in Yiddishkayt… January 22 Birthday of Moïse Kisling, Artist Moïse Kisling was born in Krakow, Galicia (now Poland) on January 22, 1891. He began to draw as a very young child and entered the Art Academy of Krakow when he was fifteen. He studied under a professor who introduced him to French Impressionism and encouraged him to go to Paris. In the 1890s artists coming to Paris began to settle in le Bateau-Lavoir, a commune in the Montmartre area where small studios were rented. It became a haven for Fauvists and Cubists. Among other artists, André Derain, Henri...
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