FOCUS ON: JEWISH CINCINNATI BICENTENNIAL
‘Renewal & Resilience’ Cincinnati Jews look forward by honoring the contributions of their ancestors Reader version for devices
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his year marks the 200th anniversary of Jewish community life in Cincinnati, which formally began with the founding of Chestnut Street Cemetery. The Jewish community and the City of Cincinnati will commemorate this milestone through public celebrations, multi-generational programs and interactive experiences. Through connecting with the organizers of the bicentennial, who also are leaders in organizations throughout the city, we gained insight into Cincinnati’s past and visions for our future. We learned how personal connections to Judaism have influenced their faith, values and love of Cincinnati, as they shared perspectives on subjects from the universality of immigrant contributions to our culture, to anti-Semitism, and much more in between.
David Harris
A death signifies the birth of a Jewish community in Cincinnati
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By Madeline Anderson
t all started in 1821 on Chestnut Street in the West End, when the earliest Jewish settlers to Cincinnati founded the first Jewish cemetery west of the Allegheny Mountains. The Chestnut Street Cemetery not only established a final resting place for Cincinnati’s Jewish people, but began 200 years of rich Jewish tradition in the region. “It’s not just the cemetery that we’re commemorating, but really the birth of an organized Jewish community here,” said David Harris, executive director of Jewish Cemeteries of Greater Cincinnati. JCGC was founded in 2008 to oversee 25 Jewish cemeteries in the region. Harris manages the day-to-day operations as well as its strategic planning and nonprofit functions. He said he feels called by a sense of tradition and duty to maintain these sacred resting places for his community. “We are really the keepers of the history and 32
SEPTEMBER 2021
Movers & Makers
‘Plum Street Temple, Cincinnati, 1866-present,’ by J. Miles Wolfe David Harris in the Chestnut Street Cemetery
David Harris
the heritage of the community as a whole,” Harris said. It was Harris who first recognized the significance of the Chestnut Street Cemetery’s anniversary. “Despite certainly having their own religious culture and tradition, Jewish Americans have been active and engaged members of American society since they arrived here,” he said. “The community is more, I always say, than just the sum of its individuals. Some of the people who are buried here have played such an important role in the history of the city in its philanthropic life, in its political life, in the art community. There must be some ethos to the city that allowed for the Jewish community to thrive in the way that it has here.” Together, JCGC and the Jewish Federation of Cincinnati developed the yearlong Jewish Bicentennial celebration to engage the whole city and recognize the contributions immigrant and minority groups have made to both the city and the country as a whole. The bicentennial’s kickoff celebration will begin with the rededication of the Chestnut Street Cemetery on Sept. 26. Visitors will be able to admire the cemetery’s improvements, as well as an education plaza about early settlers, complete with an official Ohio Historical Marker. Throughout the year, JCGC programming will focus on: genealogy, complete with an event for families to interview their grandparents; photography, as an initiative for young photographers
to display their work; mourning and burial customs, for many faiths to share their end-oflife traditions; and tours of the cemeteries this spring. Harris particularly loves sharing the history of the cemeteries during tours. Though not originally from Cincinnati, Harris loves experiencing the city’s current cultural renaissance. “It’s really great to be a part of a city that is experiencing so many of the things that I know are going to make it a great place in the future,” he said. “And we’re really looking forward to the opportunity to share this occasion with the city as a whole.”
Danielle Minson
Holding true to the past while making changes for the future
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By Madeline Leesman
s president and interim CEO of the Jewish Federation, Danielle Minson will be a presenting partner within the Jewish Bicentennial celebration this year. Minson, raised in the Jewish faith in Cincinnati, has been in her faith-driven career for 25 years. Her work with the Federation in Cincinnati spans 20 years, and she spent a few years in the early 2000s with the organization’s Philadelphia chapter. Minson’s deep-rooted family ties to the city and to her faith have inspired her to