“Wasserman Schultz: ‘10 Things You Didn’t Know About Jewish Americans’”

Aaron Keyak — May 14, 2009 – 4:59 pm | Civil Rights | Congress | Democrats | Health Care Comments (1) Add a comment

Representative Debbie Wasserman Shultz (D-FL) put together a piece on the “10 Things You Didn’t Know About Jewish Americans.”

An excerpt:

10. The first Jewish Member of Congress was from Florida. In 1841 David Levy Yulee became the first Jew to serve in Congress and to become a United States Senator. As a member of Congress he represented North Florida. Both Yulee and Levy County, Florida are named for him.

9. Dodgers Pitcher Sandy Koufax Missed a Game of the World Series for Yom Kippur. Reaching the World Series is the ultimate honor for baseball players. But for one, the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur came first. Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Sandy Koufax was scheduled to pitch the first game of the 1965 World Series against the Minnesota Twins. Since Yom Kippur is the holiest day on the Jewish calendar, Koufax refused to pitch and went to Temple instead. He did come back and pitch games two, five and seven, though, and helped the Dodgers win the championship.

8. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) was co-founded by American Jews. The 1950s and ‘60s were trying times for African-Americans in this country. Many from the American Jewish community supported them during the civil rights movement. In fact, several of the co-founders of the NAACP were Jewish.

7. An American Jew was part of the First Group of Settlers in Roanoke Island. The first recorded Jew in Colonial America was Joachim Gans. In 1584, Sir Walter Raleigh recruited him to join an expedition to found a permanent settlement in the Virginia territory of the New World. Sir Richard Grenville, the leader of the expedition founded the infamous Roanoke Colony on Roanoke Island off the coast of North Carolina in 1585. Because the royal mining company failed to resupply colonists who were also becoming increasingly fearful of conflicts with Native Americans, they accepted an offer from Sir Francis Drake in June 1586 to sail them back to England. It was good that they did, since the second group of colonists disappeared from Roanoke, leading to the continuing mystery known as “The Lost Colony”.

6. There was a Jewish Paul Revere. On July 31, 1776, Francis Salvador, a plantation owner from South Carolina, was killed in a British-incited skirmish with Native Americans. He was the first Jew killed in the Revolutionary War. Salvador was nicknamed the “Paul Revere of the South” because on July 1, 1776, he mounted his horse and rode 30 miles to warn the settlers that the Cherokee Indians, angered by the British, were attacking the frontier.

5. “G-d Bless America” was written by a Jewish American. The patriotic song is often sung at sporting events, recitals, and other public events. But did you know it was written by a Jewish American man? Irving Berlin wrote the original score in 1918. In 1938, he revised it because of the rise of Adolf Hitler.

4. A Jewish Man Discovered the Vaccine for Polio. Until 1955, polio was considered the most frightening public health problem of the postwar era. Annual epidemics kept getting worse and victims were usually children. By 1952 it was killing more of them than any other communicable disease with over 57,000 cases reported that year. Thanks to Jonas Salk we now have a vaccine. Salk introduced it to the world in 1955 and since then it has saved countless lives.

3. A Jewish Woman Helped Ignite the Women’s Movement. Betty Friedan was central to the reshaping of American attitudes toward women’s lives and rights. Friedan’s l963 book, The Feminine Mystique, detailed the frustrating lives of countless American women who were expected to be fulfilled primarily by the achievements of husbands and children. The book made an enormous impact, triggering a period of change that continues today. She was a founder of the National Organization for Women, a convener of the National Women’s Political Caucus, and a key leader in the struggle for passage of the Equal Rights Amendment.

2. Gold Medal Olympian Mark Spitz was Jewish. It’s a record that stood for many years and many never thought it would be broken – in 1972, swimmer Mark Spitz won 7 gold medals at the Munich Olympics. Spitz set a new world record in each of the seven events: the 100 meter freestyle, 200 meter freestyle, 100 meter butterfly, 200 meter butterfly, 4 x 100 meter freestyle relay, 4 x 200 meter freestyle relay, and the 4 x 100 meter medley relay. It was not until the summer of 2008 that his record was broken, by American swimmer Michael Phelps, who won 8 gold medals in the Beijing Games.

1. Many of our Nation’s Public Servants are Jewish. Today Jews make up 7.5% of the U.S. Congress—31 serve in the U.S. House of Representatives and 13 serve in the Senate. They hail from the states of Florida, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois, Kentucky, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Virginia, Tennessee and Wisconsin.

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