THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
12 Friday, October 1, 1976
Jewish Book Fair to Celebrate Silver Anniversary
Happy
Jewish Book Fair will
celebrate its silver an-
niversary Nov. 13-22 at
the Jewish Community
Center in West Bloom-
field and will be_present-
ing an outstanding roster
of authors, speakers and
events, including a bonus
day with a surprise guest
speaker.
In 1952, book fairs in
New Year
Michigan Jewish
Singles Council
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other cities. were held in
conjunction with Na-
tional Jewish Book
Month. , and generally
consisted of displays of
books, occasional. book
reviews and only some-
times, sales. Since the
purpose of Book Fair is to
acquaint the community
with Jewish books, and
more importantly, to en-
courage the reading of
these books, it was felt by
Irwin Shaw, executive di-
rector of the Jewish
Community Center, that
a great deal more effort
was required to ac-
complish this goal.
In order to sell these
books, a large variety in
sufficient quantity would
be needed. The Book Fair
sales people had to be
knowledgeable about the
books.
Shaw was able to take
advantage of a conference
trip to New York to visit 60
publishing houses to con-
vince them to send their
books to the Detroit Book
Fair on a consignment
basis. Thirty-two agreed to
supply at' least one of their
Judaica selections, al-
though none of. the Jewish
publishers were willing to
do so because of some un-
happy experiences with
book fairs in other cities
and the mistaken notion
that they would be giving
unfair competition to local
Jewish book dealers.
Nevertheless, on the
basis of these initial
BEST WISHES FOR A
HEALTHY AND PROSPEROUS
NEW YEAR
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DISTINCTIVE APPAREL
NORTHLAND (lot E) • GRANDLAND (Fenkell & Gd. River) • LIVONIA (Farmington &,7 Mile)
- GERTRUDE OBERSTEIN
Three generations of Book Fair volunteers include
Sarah Friedman, right, who has been active through all
25 Book Fairs, her daughter Betty Sarkowitz, left, and
granddaughter Julie Shiffman. They are all serving on
this year's Book Fair steering committee.
commitments, a Book
Fair committee was or-
ganized under the lead-
ership of Mrs. Harry- L.
Jackson, the first Book
Fair chairman, and Mrs.
George Rubin, the first
Book Fair staff-
coordinator.
The First Annual Book
Fair was inaugurated
Nov. 9-10, 1952. Mrs.
Jackson's and Mrs. Ru-
bin's efforts in mobilizing
volunteers and enlisting
the participation of other
organizations launched
the Book Fair as a com-
munal cultural endeavor.
That first Book Fair
proved a success with two
out-of-town speakers,
musical programs; read-
ings, children's prog-
rams, and other events.
The Second Annual
Book Fair ran for three
days instead of two and in-
volved 260 volunteers and
34 local organizations.
Included among the
many authors who have
participated in the Fairs
are: Charles Angoff,
Meyer Levin e Irving
Howe, Jacob Gladstein,
Mordecai Kaplan, Chaim
Grade, Louis Goulding,
S.L.A. Marshall, Marvin
Lowenthal, Edward Wal-
lant, Marie Sirkin, Milton
Himmelfarb, David Po-
len, Arnold Foster, Ira
Hirschman, E. L. Dok-
torow, Elie Wiesel, Chaim
Potok, Robert St. Jolin,
Sam Levenson, Chaim
Herzog, Gerald Green
and many others.
One of the early inno-
vations took place during
the fifth Annual Book
Fair. Rabbi Abba Hillel
Silver had just come out
with his book "How
Judaism Differed" but he
could not arrange to come
to Detroit and participate
in person. The Jewish
Community Center ar-
ranged with Michigan
Bell Telephone Co. to
have him talk from his
study in Cleveland and to
have his voice transmit-
ted over the public ad-
dress system in the
Hymen C. Broder au-
ditorium of the Dexter-
Davison branch.
A panel, consisting of
Rabbis Max Kapustin,
Richard C. Hertz and
Jacob Chinitz- and- moder-
ated by Philip Slomovitz,
carried on a discussion
with Rabbi Silver which
the .audience- was able - to
join.
Encouraging children's
interest in Jewish books
has been a prime goal of
every Fair. A special chil-
dren's section with story
telling, poster contests,
and puppet shows have all
been used to whet the
child's appetite for Jewish
books.
The Fairs have always
included a special section
for Hebrew and Yiddish
.books in addition to spe-
cial programs conducted
in these languages.
Over the years there
have been thousands of
volunteers who have par-
ticipated. Mrs. Morris
Friedman has been
chairman of the Yiddish
Committee for every one
of the 24 Book Fairs. Mrs.
Harry Oberstein, the pre-
sent book selection
chairman, has partici-
pated since the first Book
Fair in 1952. In addition
to Mrs. Harry L. Jackson,
the Book Fair chairmen
have been (in order) Dr.
Norman Drachler, Morris
Garvett, Mrs. Arthur
Rice, Mrs. Arthur Gould,
Mrs: Victor Shiffman,
* * *
Jewish Book
Month Selected
NEW YORK — Jewish
Book Month will be celeb-
rated this year from Nov.
12 to Dec. 12, it was an-
nounced by the Jewish
Book Council of the
Jewish Welfare Board.
The JWB Jewish Book
Council sets the dates of
Jewish Book Month, pro-
vides program materials
and suggestions, and of-
fers consultation services
to local communities
marking the month.
For the second succes-
sive year, the theme will
be "The Jewish Book in
America — A Bicenten-
nial Celebration." The
theme was selected to call
attention to literature
dealing with Jewish life in
America during the past
200 years.
PAULINE JACKSON
PHYLLIS SCHWARTZ
Mrs. Julian Tobias, Mrs.
Henry Berris, Mrs.
Charles Abramson, Mrs.
Samuel Babcock, Mrs.
Gerald Bloom, Mrs. Stan-
ley Burkoff, Mrs. Grace
colton.This year's chair-
man is Mrs. Sheldon
Schwartz.
Book Fair coordinators
in addition to Mrs. George
Rubin have been Abraham
Kastenbaum, Aaron
Zucker, Frank Lowenberg
and Dr,. Morton Plotnick,
and foi the last 10 years,
Mrs. Edith Rudner.
From the "First An-
nual Jewish Book Fair"
which ran for two days _
with an attendance
1,500 in 1952, the fairs ar
now eight days long haNic.----
20 guest authors and at- .
tract an attendance of
more than 15,000. Pub-
lishers now call the Book
Fair committee to tell it
what books will be coming
out and what authors will
be available as speakers.
Several other com-
munities.' including
Houston, Minneapolis, St.
Louis and Toronto, are
beginning to evalute the
Detroit format.
The Iraqi scholar,
Ishmael of Ukbara,
founded a sect of Jewish
vegetarians in the Ninth
Century.