48
Friday, July 4, 1975
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
AJC IEF Lauded for Efforts
S/A/CE1,965,1/00 gRAEL
EDUCAT/ON FUND HAS
BEEN RESPONSX8LE FOR
THECONSTR1/6770N OF
45 1//01/ ZI/OOLS
AND /40 OTI/ER
EDUCATIONAL AND
CULTURAL FAO/ L/T/ES.
INV&
11 1 1 1 1 11 111 1 1 11 1 El ill g
OLIC 1
-
in National UJA Cash Drive
1 / Z
1111111
United Jewish Appeal national cash chairman Gerald S. Colburn,
left, congratulates Detroit's Allied Jewish Campaign-Israel Emergency
Fund associate chairman Dr. Leon Fill on the community's effort in the
national UJA cash mobilization drive. Dr. Fill had brought a Jewish
Welfare Federation check for $500,000 to Washington during Israel
Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin's June visit to the United States. That
$500,000 payment was part of Detroit's announced goal of $4 million
cash to be collected within the next few weeks. Louis Berry and I. Wil-
liam Sherr are spearheading the Detroit cash push.
Bunker Hill Marker Rebuilding Aided by Jew
By LEO SHAPIRO
`had it not been for the ap-
Had it not been for the in- prehension that his real
tense patriotic fervor of a motives would have been
misunderstood."
merchant-philanthropist
When the finished mon-
member of a distinguished
ument
was dedicated June
Jewish family, which early
settled in the United States, 17, 1843, there was a ban-
the Bunker Hill Monument quet in Faneuil Hall hon-
- — the famous historic Bos- oring Lawrence and
ton landmark — might Touro. Daniel Webster
the orator. President
never have been completed. was
j
ohn Tyler attended and
Construction of the mon- Gov. Morton, who could
ument, commemorating the 1 lot be present, wrote a
Battle of Bunker Hill, June s pecial poem for the occa-
17, 1775, whose 200th anni- s ion.
versary has just been cele-
Touro repeatedly showed
brated, was actually given h is public spirit by assisting
up at one point, according to c MC and patriotic move-
data on file at the head- m ents whenever they were
quarters of the American b rought to his attention,
Jewish Historical Society in o bserves Leon Huhner in his
Waltham, Mass.
The Life of Judah Touro."
This was in 1840. Work J udah Touro quietly and
had stopped some years be- h onestly amassed a fortune
fore on the memorial, whose w hich he used, largely in his
cornerstone was laid by La- w
to relieve distress _and
fayette on the 50th anniver- n iisfortune, without regard
sary of the battle.
o race, color or creed.
In 1839, Amos Lawrence
When a Presbyterian,
of Boston had offered to la ter a Unitarian church in
give $10,000, half the a growing business section
amount needed, provided 6 f New Orleans was forced
that the balance was sub- to sell its property because
scribed "but there was no it could not raise required
response despite the elo- ft. Inds, Touro outbid every
quent pleas of Edward p rospective buyer, turned
Everett and Daniel Webs- th e keys over to the minis-
ter."
to r, and paid for the addi-
The shortage came to the ' ti onal expense of keeping
attention of Judah Touro in th e building in repair.
New Orleans. A former resi-
The minister, the Rev.
dent of Boston, born in T heodore Clapp, said that
Newport, R.I., June 16, T ouzo had been urged sev-
1775, he had always been et- al times to tear the build-
proud of the fact that he had
in g down and build a block
been born on the eve of the of stores and that on one oc-
great battle.
ca sion he told a man who
He responded imme- ha d made a very liberal of-
diately but with the stipula-
fe • for the property that
tion that the donor's name
th ere was not enough
remain anonymous. That m oney in the world to buy it
was not possible, however, an d that if he could have his
and the fact that the funds w ay there should be a
were at last available was
ch arch on the spot "to the
the cause of general rejoic-
en d of time."
ing throughout the country.
Touro continued for a
Touro was so unhappy
pe riod of 28 years to give
that his name had been pub- m oney, in small sums, to
lished that he is reported to
th e tune of $20,000 and
have told friends that he
w hen the church burned
would have revoked his gift do wn he came to its aid
,
again, purchasing a small
Baptist chapel for the use
of the congregation until
he could put up a larger
building.
According to Pastor
Clapp, "With generous pro-
fusion he scattered his fa-
vors broadcast over the wide
field of humanity," al-
though, he added, Touro
"knew well that many of the
recipients of his bounty
hated the Hebrews and
would, if possible, sweep
them into annihilation."
Touro died Jan. 13, 1854,
at the age of 79. Church
bells tolled as the communi-
ty's dignitaries attended
and throngs were outside
who couldn't get in to the
house of worship which his
father, Isaac Touro, had
served as hazan — cantor —
more than 80 years before.
And when he was bur-
ied, earth brought from
Jerusalem especially for
that purpose, was scat-
tered over his grave.
An early Zionist, he was
one of the first Americans
to contribute to the coloni-
zation of Palestine, through
Warder Cresson of Philadel-
phia, who established a Jew-
ish agricultural colony near
Jerusalem about 1850. He
also vas instrumental in
founding a Hebrew Foreign
Mission Society in 1853 to
help Jews in foreign lands.
secure to them the inestima-
Touro's will, which dis- ble privilege of worshipping
tributed some $500,000 to the Almighty according to
Jewish and Christian insti- our religion, without moles-
tutions and some individu- tation."
als, included a total of
He bequeathed another
$143,000 to congregations, $10,000 to the North Amer--
religious schools, benevolent can Relief Society for the
societies and Jewish hospi- Indigent Jews of Jerusalem.
tals in 17 cities: Boston, The larger fund was to be
Hartford, New Haven, New administered by Sir Moses
York, Philadelphia, Balti- Montefiore of London, who
more, Richmond, Charles- used the money to build
ton, Savannah, Mobile, houses in the first Jewish
Memphis, Louisville, Cin- suburb outside the walls of
cinnati, Cleveland, St. Jerusalem for the use of
Louis, Buffalo and Albany. needy Jewish families.
He left $50,000 "to ame-
liorate the condition of our (Special feature released
unfortunate Jewish breth- by the American Jewish
•en in the Holy Land and to Historical Society).
Kisch's Desert Water Plan Weakened Nazis
By DAVID SCHWARTZ
(Copyright 1975, JTA, Inc.)
Now that it's July 4, how
about a nice little war story
for the holiday?
In the Middle East during
World War II, desert battle
presented one factor differ-
ent from elsewhere. Besides
the fight against the enemy,
there was the fight on
thirst. The Germans prepar-
ing for the battle picked
men with strong powers of
endurance and trained them
for weeks in hot houses, ac-
customing them to subsist
on microscopic portions of
water. The British relied on
tanks of water brought into
the service. The number of
men the British could put in
action was therefore limited
to the number of tanks.
A Palestine Jew, Brig.
Frederick H. Kisch, chief of
the Eighth Army Corps of
Engineers, conceived the
idea of laying pipes in the
rocks through the entire
desert, connecting the pipe-
line with the waterworks in
Alexandria.
Brig. Kisch had the
pipes made secretly in Tel
Aviv. With the completion
of the pipeline, the number
of troops the British could
now bring in was unlim-
ited.
Kisch gave orders for test-
ing of the line to make sure
there was no defect. Kisch
was a cautious man. Even
now, he didn't propose to
waste good water. He or-
dered that for the test salty
sea water could be used.
The Nazis' reconnaissance
had discovered the laying of
the pipes and as soon as the
line was finished, the Ger-
mans made a beeline for the
pipes, tapping the water
secretly.
They drank of it. It was
salty, but they were burning
with thirst. They drank the
sea water which after mo-
mentarily refreshing them
intensified their thirst to
the point of *delirium.
Then a strange thing
occurred. More than 1,000
Germans came walking
over the British lines with
their hands held high in
surrender. They could
stand it no longer. The salt
water had driven them
mad.
The battle of El Alamein
was continued and Kisch
died in action there, but this
was the beginning of the
end — the first great victory
of the Allies — the turning
point of the war.
Oh yes — the day, accord-
ing to Maj. Ranier, an aide
of Brig. Kisch, who wrote a
book about it — was July 4.
FREDERICK KISCH