The Israelite, edited by Isaac Mayer Wise, Cincinnati: Bloch & Co., 1856-1857

Vol. 2 (July 13, 1855-April 25, 1856) (16 x 10 ½ in.; 406 x 266 mm). 40 issues, each comprising eight leaves, missing nos. 25-26 (December 28, 1855 and January 4, 1856); owner’s stamp on p. 1, owner’s signatures on pp. 1, 9. Front flyleaf and p. 1 loose in binding; a few minor marginal tears, not affecting text; marginal tape repair, p. 44, pinholes, pp. 71-2, 119-20, affecting a few letters; lower corner creased, pp. 303-4. Very light browning at margins; foxing to some issues. Marbled paper on pasteboard; joints weak, paper label on spine. Tied.

Vol. 3 (July 11, 1856-July 3, 1857) (15 ¾ x 10 5/8 in.; 400 x 269 mm.), 50 issues, missing no. 5 (August 8, 1856) and no. 35 (March 6, 1857); owner’s blind stamps on pp. 1, 416; tears, pp. 111-2 affecting a few words, pp. 297-8 tear in outer margin repaired, affecting a single letter. Foxing to some issues. Marbled paper on pasteboard; upper board detached, rebacked in duct tape, joints cracking.

Barbara Straus Reed, “The Early American Jewish Press,” trans. by Eldad Salzman, Kesher 16 (November 1994): 57-79 (in Hebrew).

The Israelite was founded in Cincinnati on July 15, 1854 by Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise (1819-1900), the father of Reform Judaism in America, shortly after he relocated there from New York in order to assume religious leadership of the Lodge Street Synagogue. The periodical was the only Jewish newspaper published west of the Alleghenies and among the first Jewish weeklies in the United States. Originally published by Charles F. Schmidt, it was quickly turned over to the Bloch Publishing Company after losing $600 in its first year (Bloch’s name appears first on the issue of July 27, 1855; the two previous issues were self-published by Wise). The paper was aimed from the start at a national audience and soon attracted a large circulation, especially in the Midwest and South, and played an important role in helping the Reform movement spread throughout North America and in keeping Jews in far-flung cities in touch with their Jewish identities and with Jewish affairs around the world.

Still published today, The American Israelite (renamed in 1874), is the longest-running English-language Jewish newspaper in the United States, though its focus today is largely on local Cincinnati Jewish news.

The present lot includes a nearly unbroken run of volumes 2-3 of the newspaper, covering the date range July 13, 1855-July 3, 1857, with only occasional lapses. In addition to their scarcity, these volumes also bear distinguished provenance, having once belonged (in the case of volume 2) to Rev. James Koppel Gutheim (1817-1886), an important leader of the Reformer movement who served several Jewish communities, most prominently Cincinnati and New Orleans, in the mid-nineteenth century. They both subsequently found their way into the Saul Silber Memorial Library of Hebrew Theological College in Skokie, IL.