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Coming To America

PBS documentary isn't perfect but still shows how
Jews are interwoven in the fabric of American history.

GEORGE ROBINSON

Special to the Jewish News

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4/6
2001

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SINCE 1920
THE TRADITION CONTINUES

A

mericans are notorious for

their short historical memo-
ries. Jews are repeatedly
instructed to remember by
their sacred texts. What of
American Jews — do they
know their own history:
Even those who do would
probably be hard put to discuss
Jewish-American history prior to the
1880s, when the first big wave of
Russian and Eastern European Jews
arrived, swelling the Jewish population
of the United
States to some-
thing vaguely
resembling its
current propor-
tions. But there
have been Jews in
this country since
1654.
For those look-
ing for a brief
introduction to
the first 220
years of Jewish-
American history,
you could do
worse than to
watch They Came

ice of some thematic unity.
Faced with the prospect of covering
a period of more than two centuries,
all of which rook place before the
invention of the motion picture,
Nowak and Starr were understandably
compelled to follow the formula.
Logically, they took as their theme
the ongoing tensions of main-
raining Jewish identity in a
nation that permitted and even
encouraged assimilation. Their
roster of historians includes all the right
people: Deborah Dash Moore, Henry
Feingold, Hasia Diner, Rabbi Marc
Angel, Eli Faber and others.

Workers pose in _front of the Boston Matzo Baking Company,
For Good: A
_from
"Taking Root, 1820-1880."
History of the Jews
in the United
Many of the stories they tell in the
States. The first two parts air April 8
rwo-hour
span of these episodes are
on WT\"S-Channel 56, Detroit's PBS
fascinating, even inspiring. You'll hear
affiliate.
about the success of Sephardic pio-
Produced and directed by Amram
neers like Aaron Lopez and the death
Nowak from a script by the late
of
Francis Salvador, the first Jew to die
N'Ianya Starr, the two episodes being
in the American Revolution.
htinc,
fia
broadcast, "Present at the Creation,
Also,
Rebecca
Gratz, a pioneering fig-
b
o
1654-1820" and "Taking Root,
1820-
ure
in
Jewish
education
in the United
1880," cover this less-well-known peri-
States,
and
Uriah
Levy,
a
controversial
od in a superficial but entertaining
U.S. naval commander who waged a
manner.
career-long battle against the use of
By now, Ken Burns has, for better or
flogging on American ships.
worse, perfected the model for PBS
The presence of Jews in the California
historical series: lots of period photos
Gold
Rush and in the general westward
and art, a bunch of talking-heads his-
movement
of white settlers is another
torians, musical recreations or evoca-
subject
area
that gets considerable atten-
dons, and famous voices reading docu-
tion
(in
the
second
episode).
ments, diaries or letters, all in the serv-
Much of this will be unfamiliar to
viewers, whether Jewish or not, and
George Robinson, author of the book
"Essential Judaism," is a New York-
COMING To AMERICA on page 82
based freelance writer.