Carol K. Ingall - The Women Who Reconstructed American Jewish Education, 1910-1965

Shulamit Reinharz, General Editor
Sylvia Barack Fishman, Associate Editor

THE HBI SERIES ON JEWISH WOMEN,
created by the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute, publishes a wide range of books by and about Jewish women in diverse contexts and time periods. Of interest to scholars and the educated public, the HBI Series on Jewish Women fills major gaps in Jewish Studies and in Women and Gender Studies as well as their intersection.

THE HBI SERIES ON JEWISH WOMEN is supported by a generous gift from Dr. Laura S. Schor. For the complete list of books that are available in this series, please see www.upne.com.

Carol K. Ingall, editor,
The Women Who Reconstructed American Jewish Education, 19101965

Gaby Brimmer and Elena Poniatowska, Gaby Brimmer

Harriet Hartman and Moshe Hartman, Gender and American Jews: Patterns in Work, Education, and Family in Contemporary Life

Dvora E. Weisberg, Levirate Marriage and the Family in Ancient Judaism

Ellen M. Umansky and Dianne Ashton, editors,
Four Centuries of Jewish Womens Spirituality: A Sourcebook

Carole S. Kessner, Marie Syrkin: Values Beyond the Self

Ruth Kark, Margalit Shilo, and Galit Hasan-Rokem, editors, Jewish Women in Pre-State Israel: Life History, Politics, and Culture

Tova Hartman, Feminism Encounters Traditional Judaism: Resistance and Accommodation

Anne Lapidus Lerner, Eternally Eve: Images of Eve in the Hebrew Bible, Midrash, and Modern Jewish Poetry

Margalit Shilo, Princess or Prisoner? Jewish Women in Jerusalem, 18401914

Marcia Falk, translator, The Song of Songs: Love Lyrics from the Bible

Reconstructed

BRANDEIS UNIVERSITY PRESS

WALTHAM, MASSACHUSETTS

PUBLISHED BY

UNIVERSITY PRESS OF NEW ENGLAND HANOVER AND LONDON

BRANDEIS UNIVERSITY PRESS
Published by University Press of New England
www.upne.com
2010 Brandeis University
All rights reserved

For permission to reproduce any of the material in this book, contact Permissions, University Press of New England, One Court Street, Lebanon NH 03766; or visit www.upne.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The women who reconstructed American Jewish education, 19101965 / Carol K. Ingall, editor.
p. cm. (HBI series on Jewish women) Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-58465-856-6 (cloth: alk. paper) ISBN 978-1-58465-855-9 (pbk.: alk. paper) ISBN 978-1-58465-909-9 (eBook)
1. JewsEducationUnited StatesHistory20th century. 2. Women educatorsUnited StatesHistory20th century. 3. Jewish educatorsUnited StatesHistory20th century. I. Ingall, Carol K.
LC741.W66 2010
370.8992'4073dc22 2009047978

This project was published with the generous support of the Lucius N. Littauer Foundation.

The author is grateful for permission to use material from the following sources: ric Zinner of NYU Press for material that originally appeared in Shuly Rubin Schwartzs The Rabbis Wife (2006).

Taylor and Francis for material that originally appeared in Miriam Heller Sterns Ladies, Girls, and Mothers: Defining Jewish Motherhood at the Settlement House, Journal of Jewish Education 69, no. 2 (2003): 2234, and Carol K. Ingalls Anna G. Sherman: A Benderly Girl? Journal of Jewish Education 70, nos. 12 (2004): 3239.

Patrick Dunn of Taylor and Francis for allowing the reprint of Carol K. Ingall, Hava nHalela: Tzipora Jochsberger and Her Vision for the Hebrew Arts School, Journal of Jewish Education 71, no. 2 (2005): 20117.

The following archives also gave permission for use of their material: American Jewish Historical Society, New York and Newton Centre, Mass.; Hadassah, the Womens Zionist Organization of America, Inc., New York; Jacob Rader Marcus Center of the American Jewish Archives, Cincinnati, Ohio; Judah L. Magnes Museum, Berkeley, Calif.; Western Reserve Historical Society, Cleveland, Ohio.

TO MY GRANDDAUGHTER,

From 1881 to 1924, when millions of east European Jews were pouring into the United States, it often seemed that the primary educational challenge to immigrants and their children was learning how to be American. However, by the end of the period of mass immigration, it became apparent that if Jewish culture were to be transmitted, Jewish educational institutions would be needed to facilitate that transmission. Jews had to create new institutions and new educational models. Thus, it should come as no surprise that Carol K. Ingall dubs the period between 1910 and 1965 the golden age of American Jewish education. As she says in the acknowledgments, it was a time when the regnant progressive pedagogy of the day... was molding the teaching of Hebrew language and classic Jewish texts. New educational movements, ideas, and initiatives were being formulated that were essential to keeping the American Jewish population interested in sustaining Jewish life.

As Carol Ingall writes in her introductory chapter, the men who were influential in shaping American Jewish educational trends are often the subject of scholarly interest and popular awareness, but much less has been written about the unsung heroines in this book who kept Hebrew and Hebrew nationalism alive through education, not only in the Talmud Torah schools and in the first decades of the suburban synagogue schools, but also in childrens literature, camps and youth groups, adult Jewish education for women, and cultural arts programs for all ages. These are extraordinary achievements, and they should be acknowledged and appreciated. Moreover, in discussions of the roots of Jewish education in the United States, the following names should regularly appear: Ethel Feineman, Grace Weiner, Jessie Sampter, Rebecca Aaronson Brickner, Libbie Braverman, Mamie Gamoran, Sadie Rose Weilerstein, Anna G. Sherman, Temima Gezari, Tzipora Jochsberger, and Sylvia Ettenberg. Each of these women made a mark on an aspect of Jewish education, whether in arts, camping, textbooks, or adult education.

The eight contributors to this book trace the evolution of Jewish education in America not only in terms of the dynamics of Jewish organizational life, but also in ways in which Jewish education was influenced by important education theorists. As Carol Ingall notes, these immigrants had to create their own pathways to becoming Americans while ensuring that they and their descendants would remain Jews. The formidable nature of the task facing Jewish education is underscored by the fact that, despite the efforts to professionalize the field, much work remains. Even today, when asked about their Sunday and Hebrew school experiences, some Jews assert that they learned nothing, that it was a waste of time, that Hebrew school was merely a training ground for bar or bat mitzvah or a holding pattern for children who were not going to Jewish day schools. According to these complaints, some Jewish schools may have been responsible for departure from, rather than retention in, the Jewish community. How extraordinary, then, are the accomplishments of the women who are this books heroines. They battled impressive odds and often managed to transform educational practice in a difficult environment.

This book will not answer the question about what went wrong, but it will describe what went right in the period from 1910 to 1965. The eleven women singled out in this book were ahead of their times. Their belief in what Jewish education might accomplish is an inspiration to those who look to Jewish education to energize contemporary Jewish life. We are pleased to have