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Rabbi David Goldstein and Shannie Goldstein Papers

 Collection — Container: Consolidated Box P26, Folder: P-918
Identifier: P-918

Scope and Content Note

The collection is arranged in two series.

Rabbi David Goldstein and Shannie Goldstein’s collection contains materials reflecting their work on behalf of Jews in the Soviet Union. The materials include notes, correspondence, fliers, news clippings and photographs.

Dates

  • Creation: undated, 1982-1984, 1987-1989, 2005, 2007
  • Creation: Majority of material found in 1983 - 1983

Creator

Access Restrictions

The collection is open to all researchers, except items that may be restricted due to their fragility, or privacy.

Use Restrictions

No permission is required to quote, reproduce or otherwise publish manuscript materials found in this collection, as long as the usage is scholarly, educational, and non-commercial. For inquiries about other usage, please contact the Director of Collections and Engagement at mmeyers@ajhs.org.

For reference questions, please email: inquiries@cjh.org

Biographical and Historical Note

The Papers of Rabbi David Goldstein and Shannie Goldstein represent one collection housed within the Archive of the American Soviet Jewry Movement (AASJM). These papers reflect the effort, beginning in the 1960s through the late 1980s, of thousands of American Jews of all denominations and political orientations to stop the persecution and discrimination of Jews in the Soviet Union. The American Soviet Jewry Movement (ASJM) is considered to be the most influential Movements of the American Jewish community in the 20th century. The beginnings of the organized American Soviet Jewry Movement became a model for efforts to aid Soviet Jews in other countries, among them Great Britain, Canada, and France. The movement can be traced to the early 1960s, when the first organizations were created to address the specific problem of the persecution and isolation of Soviet Jews by the government of the Soviet Union.

Rabbi David S. Goldstein was born in Princeton, New Jersey, attended Miami University of Ohio and the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR), where he was ordained a rabbi and received the degree of Ph. D. from St. Mary’s Seminary and University of Baltimore, in consortium with the Baltimore Hebrew University. Rabbi Goldstein served as a chaplain in the U.S. Navy stationed in Japan. He is an Adjunct Professor of Jewish Studies at Tulane University and is a Rabbi Emeritus of the historic Touro Synagogue in New Orleans. As a board member of National Conference for Soviet Jewry and a Chairman of the Community Relations Committee of the Jewish Federation of Greater New Orleans Rabbi Goldstein worked to liberate Jews in the U.S.S.R. He and his wife visited Soviet Union three times to meet with the Refuseniks and support clandestine Jewish and Hebrew studies suppressed by the Soviet regime.

Shannie Goldstein was born in Lowell, Massachusetts. She is an adjunct professor of Hebrew language at Tulane University and a licensed clinical social worker in private practice. She became active in the Soviet Jewry movement in the early 1970s by assisting Soviet Jewish immigrants to settle in Baltimore. On her trips to the Soviet Union with Mrs. Goldstein smuggled in Hebrew-language materials to distribute among the Refuseniks she and her husband had met there. She devised ways to bring back to U.S. valuable information on Jews in the Soviet Union and to attract media attention to their plight.

Extent

4 Linear Feet (1 folder, 2 oversize boxes)

Language of Materials

English

Abstract

Papers of Rabbi David Goldstein and Shannie Goldstein contain materials reflecting their work on behalf of Jews in the Soviet Union. The materials include notes, correspondence, fliers, news clippings and photographs. The bulk of the collection consists of oversized cardboard-mounted photographs taken by Rabbi Goldstein on the trip to the Soviet Union in 1983.

Physical Location

Collection is located in Consolidated Box P26.

Acquisition Information

Donated by Rabbi David Goldstein and Shannie Goldstein in 2007.

Related Material

The Papers of Rabbi David Goldstein and Shannie Goldstein is one individual collection within the Archive of the American Soviet Jewry Movement (AASJM) located at the American Jewish Historical Society (AJHS). Other Soviet Jewry Movement collections at AJHS include the records of Action for Soviet Jewry (I-487), the National Conference on Soviet Jewry (NCSJ; I-181 and I-181A), the Union of Councils for Soviet Jews (I-410, I-410A), Houston Action for Soviet Jewry (I-500), Bay Area Council for Soviet Jews (I-505), Seattle Action for Soviet Jewry (I-507), Medical Mobilization for Soviet Jewry, the papers of Joel Ackerman (P-787), Julia Mates Cheney (P-806), Jerry Goodman (P-863), Laurel and Alan J. Gould (P-866), Carolyn W. Sanger (P-870), Leah Lieberman (P-869), Si Frumkin (P-871), Elaine Pittell (P-873), Sanford A. Gradinger (P-880), Shaul Osadchey (P-882), Leonard S. Cahan (P-883), Doris H. Goldstein (P-887), David H. Hill (P-888), Margery Sanford (P-889), Pinchas Mordechai Teitz (P-891), David Waksberg (P-895), Pamela B. Cohen (P-897), Moshe Decter (P-899), William Korey (P-903), Morey Schapira (P-906), Charlotte Gerper Turner (P-907), Myrtle Sitowitz (P-908), Kathleen M. Hyman (P-911) and Babette Wampold (P-912).

Individual accounts of activities within the Soviet Jewry Movement are preserved in the UJA Oral History Collection (I-433), which includes accounts from members of the following organizations: the Union of Councils for Soviet Jews, Bay Area Council on Soviet Jews (BACSJ), Seattle Action for Soviet Jews, Houston Action for Soviet Jews, Chicago Action for Soviet Jews, Colorado Committee of Concern for Soviet Jews and the National Conference on Soviet Jewry. Interviewees include accounts by Lillian Forman (BACSJ), Ann Polunsky, Morey Schapira, Myrtle Sitowitz, Deborah Turkin, David Waksberg, Sylvia Weinberg and Dolores Wilkenfeld. In addition, posters related to the Soviet Jewry Movement can be found in the Jewish Student Organizations Collection (I-61).

Additional materials from other collections include records dealing with the Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry (SSSJ) located within the North American Jewish Students Appeal (NAJSA, I-338) and the records of the National Jewish Community Relations Advisory Council (NJCRAC, I-172). Related records are also located at the AJHS in Boston, MA including memorabilia and ephemera of the New England Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry (I-237) and the Records of the Student Coalition for Soviet Jewry – Brandeis University (I-493).

Title
Guide to the Rabbi David Goldstein and Shannie Goldstein Papers, undated, 1982-1984, 1987-1989, 2005, 2007 *P-918
Status
Completed
Author
Processed by Andrey Filimonov
Date
© 2011
Description rules
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description
English
Script of description
Latin
Language of description note
Description is in English.

Revision Statements

  • November 2020: RJohnstone: post-ASpace migration cleanup.

Repository Details

Part of the American Jewish Historical Society Repository

Contact:
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New York NY 10011 United States