Mandell "Bill"

Berman looks

at a Chronicle

page, shown by

DJN Foundation

President and JN

Publisher Arthur

Horwitz, that

features Berman's

father during

World War I.

Historic Launch

DJN Foundation celebrates launch
of digitized Detroit Jewish Chronicle.

I

IR a L-
6353 Orchard Lake Rd. • West Bloomfield, MI 48322

248-851-1260
ORCHARD MALL • WES LOOMFIELD,

ORCHARD LAKE ROAD • NORTH OF MAPL

AUTHENTIC CHINESE CUISINE

MIDTOWN

UPTOWN

4710 Cass Avenue
Detroit, Michigan 48201

6407 Orchard Lake Road
(15 Mile & Orchard Lake)

313.974.7669

248.626.8585

DAILY DIM SUM &SUSHI

DAILY DIM SUM

uptownshangri-la.com

18 November 5 •2015

JN

t was fitting that the Detroit Jewish

News Foundation chose the Walter
P. Reuther Library on the campus of
Wayne State University for the launch of
the digital Detroit Jewish Chronicle. The
library is the repository for many of the
memories of Detroit's Jewish community,
including the papers of Max Fisher and
Phil Slomovitz, the founding publisher
and editor of the Jewish News.
On Oct 29, the DJN Foundation
invited Asher Tilchin, brother of the late
Chronicle publisher Seymour Tilchin, to
the Reuther Library to be the first person
to search the Chronicle archives, now
available for free at www.djnfoundation.
org.
Asher shared memories of his brother,
who was born in Belarus in 1908 and
was "a wellspring of Zionism:' Seymour
Tilchin came to Detroit in 1920 and
started a career as a teacher before
becoming a lawyer. "He was a passionate
advocate for civil rights, his clients and,
above all, Zionism:' Asher said.
Asher said his brother's Zionism was
what led him to purchase the Chronicle.
In May of 1948, Seymour Tilchin chaired
the Detroit Jewish community's celebra-
tion of the founding of Israel.
He sold the Chronicle to Slomovitz in
1951, which Asher remembers because it
was the first legal transaction of his own
career as a lawyer. The Chronicle was
then absorbed into the Jewish News.
Tilchin was in ill health, according to
his brother. He moved to Florida after
the sale and shortly after suffered a
stroke. Seymour Tilchin died in 1964.
"He was overlooked in our com-
munity, but not anymore said Arthur
Horwitz, DJN Foundation president and
publisher of the Jewish News.
Asher thanked Horwitz for digitizing
the pages of the Chronicle, which span
from 1916-1951. "You don't know where
you're going until you know where you

came from," he said.
Mandell "Bill" Berman, a chair of the
foundation's honorary board of directors,
learned a little bit more about where he
came from during the presentation that
followed Tilchin's speech.
After searching for his father Julius'
name in the pages of the Chronicle,
Berman, 97, learned for the first time,
from the Dec. 28, 1917 edition of the
Chronicle, the actual birthdate and place
of his father (Jan. 14, 1880, in Suwalk,
Russia). Eli Saulson, a director of the
William Davidson Foundation, after
which the archives are named, was
there and shared with Berman that the
Saulson family came from the same
hometown as his father.
Anecdotes like this are what the
digital archives of the Jewish News and
Chronicle are all about, according to
Horwitz. "Ifs not just about digitizing
the content. Ifs about bringing history to
life *

Asher Tilchin, brother of last Chronicle

owner Seymour Tilchin, initiates the

ceremonial first search on the DJN

Foundation website, as Arthur Horwitz

looks on.