Detailed
Description |
|
An illustrated report on progress of the Beth Jakob [Bais Yaakov] educational program for girls with many photos. Included are articles (all in German) by Rebekka Kohut, Dr. Leo Deutschlander, and Dr. Judith Rosenbaum. Also included is a listing of Rabbinical supporters of the Beth Jacob movement,and their apporbations, including R. Israel Meir Hakohen (the Chofetz Chaim), the Gerer Rebbe, R. Chaim Oiser Grodzenski, The Sadagorer Rebbe, R. J.H. Hertz( the Chief Rabbi of England), R. Dr. Leo Jung , Dr. Nathan Birnbaum, et al. The report also includes a listing of all the cities where a Beth Jacob school exists, and the name of the teacher. A listing of income and expenditures is available as well.
Included with this printed report are three typewritten pages (two of which seem to be carbon copies of the originals). This is a report, also in German, from the Beth Jacob Comitee of Hamburg-Altona, dated January 12, 1932, and signed in ink by the secretary of the committee, Elise Lerner, assistant to Sara Schneier, founder of Beth Jacob. This brief report, from a committee of 11, attests to new developments in the Beth Jacob movement. For exampke, it mentions that 4 new schools were opened in Romania. The report also mentions that Dr. Deutschlander will be in Hamburg to deliver a lecture on "Jewish thought on the Goethe year" [a loose translation of the German].
Beth Jacob schools were a network of religious schools for girls organized in Poland in the post-World War I era with the aid of Agudat Israel, an ultra-Orthodox organization whose schools for boys were to be found in every community. While the boys' schools were of the old traditional type, the newly formed schools for girls combined Jewish traditional studies and industrial training.
The first school was founded in Cracow in 1917 by Sara Schnirer. The school in Cracow had an enrollment of only 30 pupils, but the success of this early venture in imparting religious Jewish studies, some secular learning, and vocational training led to the formation of a large number of schools in a number of countries. By 1929 there were 147 such schools in Poland, and 20 schools in Lithuania, Latvia, and Austria. The Beth Jacob school system included teachers' training institutes founded in 1931 and post-graduate courses (1933). Two periodicals were published: Beth Jacob Journal and Der Kindergarten.
With the invasion of Austria, Poland, Lithuania and Latvia by the Nazis and subsequently by the Russians, the activities of the Beth Jacob schools were discontinued. At the end of World War II Beth Jacob schools were opened in Israel, England, Switzerland, Belgium, France, Uruguay, Argentina, and the United States. In Israel there are 92 schools, and about 15 in other countries. In the U.S. the Beth Jacob National Council was organized in 1943. By 1947 there were eight schools under their aegis. In 1951 two teacher-training schools were established and in the late 1950s two high schools were founded. |
