14 Friday, June 17, 1977 THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS IBM Jewish Information Bureau Is Alive and Well typewriters Selectric etc. l'Add '400 'n Type 342.7800 399-8333 342-1221 By ALBERT FRIEDMAN man served for many years referral center, a guide to on the board of directors the perplexed, as it were, and as secretary of the Jew- through the entangling pro- ish Information Bureau. He fusion of organizations and is presently an editor of the 5agencies. Jewish Week in Washing- To explain who does what ton, D.C.) in American Jewish life WASHINGTON—One today—and where and morning several years ago, why—is no small service in Judah A. Richards, an itself, when you consider ebullient publicist and ad- that multitudes of Ameri- vertising man, stepped into can Jews can't tell you the the cluttered two-room of- difference between the fice of the Jewish Informa- American Jewish Com- tion Bureau at 250 W. 57th mittee and the American St. - New York City. This Jewish Congress, or the po- was the day when he was to litical distinctions among arrange for the liquidation the various Zionist groups. (Copyright 1977, JTA, Inc.) (Editor's note: Albert Fried- 13 S. Main St., Clawson, Mi, 48017 585-0555 Rental — Sales of Convalescent equipment, Everest & Jennings Wheel Chairs, Ostomy Supplies — Hollister, United, Davol, Coloplast Jobst Garments, T.E.D. Stockings, Professionall i fitting of Surgical Garments, Dr, Scales.; WE ACCEPT MEDICARE RENTAL ASSIGNMENTS • Abe Cheraw, Says: ,mr- ; ,,,, WE BUILD FURNITURE THAT NOT ONLY SUITS YOUR TASTE AND . NEEDS BUT 'FURNITURE THAT FITS YOU. WE BUILD FURNITURE THE EXACT SIZE YOU WANT. BEFORE YOU MAKE ANY DECISION ABOUT YOUR FURNITURE -YOU OUGHT TO CALL ME. I CAN DO MORE FOR YOU. ARTISTIC UPHOLSTERERS INC. 5755 SCHAEFER RD. (1 block North of Ford Rd.) Dearborn LU 4-5900 Open Daily 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. • • • • • • • • 00 •• , ,k. „ '''' : , ,... ., 4mwt, , t ,,.', ABE CHEROW, President CALL LU 4-5900 of the small, busy agency. His father, the late Bernard G. Richards, founded it in 1932. . The elder Richards, known to thousands as BGR, had died in 1971 at the age of 94 after somehow keeping the agency afloat in shallow financial waters for 39 years. The coopera- tion of friends and some modest grants had been helpful but, for the most part, the bureau's survival was a tribute to the per- ennial enthusiasm and de- termination of BGR. Primarily an information- dispensing agency, that daily answers inquiries of astonishing variety and scope from Jews and non- Jews in every walk of life, it also provides students and scholars with materials and working facilities— however limited—for study and research. Not least, it functions as an information •0• 0 00 0 00000 0 000000. •• o ° • • • • •• • • • • • S • S S o • • • • • • • • • • • • NEW! 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Shoes & Rose Jewelers The range of requests for information that deluges the bureau by mail and tele- phone may be appreciated by the following traffic of a typical week: A woman in Romania wanted to know how she could find the address of a relative in New York; a television program director asked whom to contact for help for a program on Jew- ish holidays; a grand- mother wanted to know what agency she should con- tact to help her settle in Is- rael; a Texas fundamen- talist preacher requested the titles of some recent books on Jewish history and Israel; a student wanted to know the transliterated spelling of several Yiddish words; a young Christian student i wanted to join a Hebrewt class; a Jewish stu- dent in Boston asked for help for a term paper on the Jewish attitude toward birth control; and a can- tor's wife asked where there are courses in Hebr- ew calligraphy—and so it goes. Obviously, the bureau's usefulness did not end with the demise of BGR. In- quiries continued to arrive uninterruptedly, as they had throughout the past 45 years and, in fact, a stead- ily increasing volume was evident. So Judah Richards found that he couldn't, in good conscience, dispose of the bureau by distributing its book collection to family members who wanted /them and donating other mate- rials, including valuable clippings, many from pub- lications long defunct, to Jewish research and educa- tional agencies. In con- sultation with his sister, Ruth Eisenstein, Richards decided that the bureau must endure. He therefore applied his considerable organizational skills and his long expe- rience in the Zionist move- ment, as well as his per- suasive outgoing temper- ament, to the enterprise and, on occasion, reached into his own pocket to meet deficits. He rounded up many friends in public life and, with their counsel and support, set forth plans for an expanded, multi-faceted membership organization. Richards called upon dis- tinguished scholars, some of whom had served the bu- reau din the past, to join an advisory council. And no- tables from the rabbinate and the worlds of business, literature and the profes- sions were recruited to aug- ment the bureau's board of directors. With continuing grants from' several foundations and institutions, and moder- ate membership dues, the bureau managed to finance a learn-and-earn program for a rotating staff of young researchers, each knowl- edgeable in varied aspects of Jewish life: Jonathan Waxman, Bruce Graeber, Jeffrey Kaplan, Ellen Fried- land and Claire Sauerhoff, graduate students in Jewish studies, and .others. pendent and nonpartisan identity—in New York City. Nothing came of his occa- sional efforts to negotiate a satisfactory arrangement so, toward the end of his life, he concluded that the bureau would have to be de- cently dissolved. Plans call for additional part-time student research- ers, the leasing of added of- fice space, the up-dating of the bureau's files and the acquisition of essential of- fice equipment, including a duplicating machine. In the works is a series of semi- nars featuring scholars and communal leaders from a cross-section of American- Jewish intellectual, cultural and organizational life. Judah Richards' accom- plishment in saving the bu- reau can only be appre- ciated by those who remem- ber the role of the founder. BGR had devoted his lif an effort to bring unity coherence to the turbulent, individualistic cross-cur- rents of American-Jewish life. As a founder and organ- izer of the American Jew- ish Congress and an associ- ate of many leading Jewish personalities in the rabbi- nate, the professions, and the arts, he was a sharp ob- server of the events of his time. In addition, he was a col- lector of clippings, period- icals and data of all kinds that are still available as the raw material of modern American Jewish history. In fact, the bureau's major asset during his life- time was BGR himself, es- pecially his streamlined ap- paratus for recall. He was a human retrieval system without peer. Even in. his 905, he could dredge forth names and dates that col- leagues 50 years younger had forgotten. When answer- ing telephoned inquiries, he seldom had to consult files or books; his astonishing memory was always on tap , for instant information. Plans are also afoot- for a 45th-anniversary celebra- tion. Another major project will be the reissuance of the bureau's quarterly pub- lication, Index, a newsletter designed to keep readers abreast of the enormous out- put of print media dealing with matters of Jewish in- terest. Purchase of addition- al reference materials is a further part of the overall plan. Richards and his associ- ates hope to accomplish many of these objectives on an outlay for 1977 of under $18,000—hardly • a princely budget. Needless to say, the bu- (It should be noted that reatfs upbeat outlook would have delighted Bernard G. BGR was also an ,in- Richards. In his later tellectual gadfly, whose roll- wit was always years, he had become less icking ready to puncture pompo- than sanguine about the 'Sides and absurdities in agency's future, because it high places. His articles on existed almost as a one- the issues and problems in man operation and because Jewish life—along his funds had always been diffi- dialogues centering with on the cult to get. 1.414, From time to time, he had considered the transfer of the bureau intact to an academic institution or to arrange for its in- corporation with other agencies. However, he did not want to• accept an offer that would entail the bu- reau's relocation outside the New York metropolitan area, the center of Jewish population, and even less did' he relish- any . arrange- ment whereby the bureau ,would be absorbed s by .a large organization. If the bu- reau were to survive, he felt it had to retain its inde- droll character Keidansky and his lively companions— gently ridiculed the as- sorted idiocies of his time.) The Jewish Information Bureau cannot be the same today as it was during the pervasive directorship of BGR. But it is as dynamie and useful as ever. Having survived four _and a half decades on a lean fi- nancial diet, it appears . to be in excellent health. Its vital functions are sound, its heart is in the right place and its prospects are bright. In short, it seems destined for new decades of effective service. Mexican Jews to Fight Blasi. MEXICO CITY (JTA)—A growing Arab propoaganda drive against Israel and the Jewish people in general is a matter of increasing con- cern to the local Jewish community. The subject was on the agenda of a spe- cial meeting of the execu- tive board of the Central Jewish Committee Tuesday at which recent examples of Arab propaganda' were cited. Marwan Tahboub, the local representative of the Palestine Liberation Organi- zation, was interviewed at length in Revista de Riv- istas, a weekly produced by the Excelsior publishing house. Tahboub was also inter- viewed in the daily Heraldo de Mexico where he was quoted as saying that only the establishment of a "democratic secular Palesti- nian state" could bring a just peace to the Middle East. The daily Excelsior pub- lished a statement by Dib Seman and Mohammed Mustafa Bulhosen of the "Arab League of Mexico," declaring that Israel has shown "its true face to the world" by electing "terror- ist Menahem Begin" as its Prime Minister. -1