Article on Alaskan Jewish History at
http://www.joyfulnoise.net/JoyAlaska1.html
[February 2002] "Eighty-one percent of Alaskan Jews today live in
the three largest cities, Anchorage, Fairbanks, and Juneau. The
remaining 19% live in rural small cities (Sitka, Kenai, Homer,
Nome, Ketchikan, Kotzubue, Soldotna, Haines, and Bethel) with
populations of less than 10,000 and Jewish populations of 1 to
71. In at least 9 Alaskan cities, one or more formal Jewish
communal organizations exist, serving a statewide Jewish
population of some 3,500-4,000." [August 2005]
How to Find Your Gold Rush Relative: Sources on
the Klondike and Alaska gold rushes, 1896-1914. Compiled by
R. Bruce Parham, May 1997 (Updated April 2001)
National Archives and Records Administration-Pacific Alaska
Region
Anchorage, Alaska http://www.library.state.ak.us/hist/parham.html
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Alaskan Jews a Rare Breed: Brandeis Professor
Charts Jewish in 'Last Frontier,' by Michael Gelbwasser,
Jewish Advocate, December 14, 1995
Bloom, Jessie S. (1963), The Jews of Alaska
(American Jewish Archives, Cincinnati, OH, Vol. XV, No. 2,
November 1963. pp. 97-116.
Chihuly: The Jerusalem Wall of Ice, by
William Warmus, Artfocus magazine, Winter/Spring 2000 http://www.warmus.com/chihuly_wall_of_ice.htm From Fairbanks to Anchorage, Alaska
Surprisingly Jewish, by Lewis E. Lachter, MetroWest Jewish
News, August 17, 1995
Glanz, Rudolph (1953), The Jews in American
Alaska, 1867-1880 (H.H. Glanz, New York).
Gruber, Ruth (2002), Inside of Time: My Journey
From Alaska to Israel, (Carroll and Graf Publishers, New
York).
Reisman, Bernard (1999), 'Alaskan Jews Discover the
Last Frontier,' Sander L. Gilman & Robert and Jessie Bloom Papers 1897-1980
Manuscript Collection No. 93 Inventory, Jacob Rader Marcus
Center of the American Jewish Archives. <http://www.huc.edu/aja/Bloom.htm>
Milton Shain, eds., Jewries at the Frontier,
(University of Illinois Press, Urbana & Chicago, 1999).
THE CEMETERIES
ANCHORAGE: Anchorage Borough
Congregation Beth Sholom, 7525 E. Northern Lights Blvd.,
Anchorage, AK 99508-3904 (907-338-1836); FAX (907-337-4013),
Rabbi Harry Rosenfeld. Source: Lisa S. Greene, 49 W 12th St. NY,
NY 10011 and Rosanne Leeson: leeson1@attglobal.net
http://www.frozenchosen.org/
(Reform) [February 2002]. "Today more than half of Alaska's Jews
live in Anchorage, where Jew Leopold David was the city's first
mayor, serving three terms from 1920 when the city was
incorporated. Zachary J. Loussac, a Moscow Jew, served
as mayor of the city in 1948 and established a trust fund that
enabled building of the city's municipal library, which bears his
name today. At Elmendorf Air Force Base outside Anchorage,
Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform Jewish chaplains rotated tours
of duty from the early 1940s to mid 1980s, providing Shabbat
services and serving Jewish residents in Anchorage and other
areas. A mikvah for the wife of the chaplain was built on the
base in 1974 and demolished in 1999. Reform Congregation Beth
Sholom was established by 20 members of the Anchorage community
in 1958. A first synagogue was erected in 1964; by 1982 with a
membership that had quadrupled, a new synagogue on five acres was
erected to house worship services, study, education center, camp,
religious school, and sports. From 1984 until 2000, Rabbi
Harry L. Rosenfeld was Beth Shalom's rabbi. The City of
Anchorage proclaimed October 1, 1994 Rabbi Harry Rosenfeld Day as
the state legislature honored him for his ten years of service to
the Alaskan people. Alaska's first Chabad Center and only
orthodox congregation, Shomrei Ohr of Anchorage was established
in 1991 by Chabad emissaries Rabbi Yossi and Esty
Greenberg. Three locations in the city are home to worship
services, Hebrew school, adult classes, library, preschool, and a
recently built mikvah. Chabad also has established a kosher
section of a local supermarket, intends to open a future
community center and is seeking grants for a culture and history
archive." http://www.joyfulnoise.net/JoyAlaska5.html [August
2005]
Anchorage Jewish Cemetery: at same site as Congregation
Shomrei Ohr Lubavitch (1210 E. 26th Ave. Anchorage, AK
99508-3904) is a small Lubavitch cemetery. Also houses a
Lubavitch Jewish Center of AK and a Jewish Funeral Society.
Source: Rosanne Leeson: leeson1@attglobal.net .
FAIRBANKS: Fairbanks North Star Borough
Congregation Or Ha Tzafon (Reform), P.O. Box 74863 Fairbanks,
Alaska 99707. Located at 1744 Aurora Drive, Fairbanks, Alaska.
(907) 479-2165. http://www.mosquitonet.com/~orhatzafon/
[february 2002]
A small Jewish community formed in Fairbanks in 1904 just two
years after significant gold was found there. Pioneering Jewish
merchants organized the Congregation Bikkur Cholim in 1908 with
intermittent services at members' homes. Lithuanian Jew Robert
Bloom, one of the congregation founders, had arrived in the
Klondike in 1898 and served as one of the Yukon's first lay
rabbis for nearly half a century. Peddling goods on his back and
later from a general store until 1941, he became chairman of
Alaska's Jewish Welfare Board, instrumental in the establishment
of an Air Force base in Alaska, a founder of the University of
Alaska (1918) and a charter member of its Board of Regents. His
wife, Jessie Spiro Bloom of Dublin, for whom the Fairbanks
Girl Scout Training Center is named, established the Fairbanks
kindergarten and the first Alaskan Girl Scout chapter (1925). The
Blooms co-founded the Fairbanks Airplane Company, were active in
Alaskan conservation efforts and the establishment of wilderness
preserves in Alaska, and served as unofficial chaplains for
Jewish servicemen stationed in Alaska during WWII. Fairbanks'
courthouse is named for Jay A. Rabinowitz, Superior Court
Judge in 1960, appointed to the state Supreme Court in 1965,
serving for 32 years, four terms as Alaska's Chief Justice. The
First Jewish Congregation of Fairbanks was established in 1980 to
serve some 300 Jews in the city with worship services and a
religious school at the Fort Wainwright Army Post Chapel. Renamed
Or HaTzafon (Light of the North) in 1992, the congregation
acquired property for a first synagogue and affiliated with the
Reform movement." http://www.joyfulnoise.net/JoyAlaska5.html [August
2005]
NOME: Nome Census Area (no organized borough)
see http://www.alaska.net/~sholom/nome.html
[February 2002]
"The Nome Jewish community had its own torah
brought by Sam Bayles and some sixty Jews in 1900
who attended the world's most western and northern Rosh HaShanah
services. Nome established the state's first Jewish congregation
in 1900 and the Hebrew Benevolent Society in 1901 to assist the
less fortunate. The isolated community declined with the
consolidation of shipping and supply lines by the Swiss-German
Jewish Guggenheim family after WWI and the Bayles Torah was
transferred to Beth Shalom Synagogue in Anchorage." http://www.joyfulnoise.net/JoyAlaska5.html [August
2005] Steinacher, Sue and Graham, KJ (2000) 'Jewish History in
Nome," Sue Steinacher, The Nome Nugget, 2000. <http://www.yukonalaska.com/Special/baylestorah.htm>
[August 2005]
WHITEHORSE: see Yukon Territory
Jewish population of approximately 15-20. The
Jewish President of the Whitehorse Chamber of Commerce, Rick
Karp, can be reached through the Whitehorse Chamber of
Commerce.
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