history
What looked from a distance like several innocuous mounds of dirt were actually unmarked graves, set apart from the rest of the cemetery. (Photo by Eric Lidji)
History
On the ground with the Daughters of Israel
By Eric Lidji
A notice for the Daughters of Israel Cemetery Association prompts an expedition to the First Podolier Independent Society.
What looked from a distance like several innocuous mounds of dirt were actually unmarked graves, set apart from the rest of the cemetery. (Photo by Eric Lidji)
September 25, 2026, 12:36 pm
On the ground with the Daughters of Israel
A notice for the Daughters of Israel Cemetery Association prompts an expedition to the First Podolier Independent Society.
By Eric Lidji
Tillie Ellovich and her son Philip in 1910, a few years after the family immigrated to Pittsburgh from their native Romania. (Photo courtesy of the Rauh Jewish Archives)
September 20, 2026, 10:48 am
Seven Romanishe organizations
Who were the Daughters of Israel Cemetery Association?
By Eric Lidji
The Troy Hill Cemetery in Reserve Township is the oldest Jewish communal property in Western Pennsylvania, established in 1847. (Rauh Jewish Archives).
August 24, 2026, 5:32 pm
The missing vowel
The name of the Bes Almon Society is a puzzle.
By Eric Lidji
The Irgun ship Altalena burning off the Tel Aviv beach after being shelled by the IDF on June 22, 1948. (Photo by Hans Pinn via Wikimedia)
August 24, 2026, 12:35 pm
Israel locates Altalena shipwreck off coast 78 years later
The Heritage Ministry found the sunken Irgun vessel intact at a depth of 1,650 feet.
By Joshua Marks | JNS
As part of a series of paid political advertisements in the Jewish Chronicle, Ivan Itkin promoted his effort to stop the proposed Squirrel Hill Tunnel bypass.
July 22, 2026, 12:17 pm
‘Stop Them At The Bypass’
A short-lived plan to bypass the Squirrel Hill Tunnel animated Jewish involvement in local politics in the early 1970s.
By Eric Lidji
The Posner Center at Carnegie Mellon University. (Photo courtesy of Carnegie Mellon University)
July 21, 2026, 1:19 pm
At CMU’s newly reopened Posner Center, history is hidden in the margins
Since reopening in November 2025, the Posner Center has welcomed more than 8,000 visitors.
By Octavia Liku
(Photo by KristineKaren via iStock)
July 1, 2026, 9:24 am
Why Pinhas is the perfect parasha for the semiquincentennial of the United States
What parasha could be more appropriate for the 250th anniversary of our nation’s founding ... than a parasha centering one of the key tools of our democracy?
By Tammy A. Hepps
America at 250 (By Yafa Negrete)
July 1, 2026, 8:28 am
250 years: Since the beginning, part of the American journey
These Pittsburgh-connected individuals and families represent a small sample of the many Jewish Americans whose work helped shape both our city and our country.
By Yafa Negrete
Sayeret Matkal with the Mercedes they used to deceive the Ugandans (Photo courtesy of IDF Spokesman, via Wikimedia Commons). עברית: חיילי צה"ל עם שובם ממבצע אנטבה. המדליה ניתנה לכל הלוחמים במבצע
June 29, 2026, 3:31 pm
‘Zero hour is coming’: How Israel went from negotiating over hostages to the daring raid at Entebbe
The Entebbe rescue operation, whose 50th anniversary is approaching, is the stuff of Israeli legend. A new trove of archival documents shows how the government took the fateful decision — despite the risks
By Ben Sales and Stav Levaton
A pen and ink portrait of Mordecai Moses Mordecai on bone, c.1750, from the Sheftall Family Trust and Congregation Mickve Israel in Philadelphia and the John L. Loeb, Jr. Database of Early American Jewish Portraits
June 25, 2026, 9:28 am
A semiquincentennial tribute
Mordecai Moses Mordecai and his family came to the Forks of the Ohio before the Declaration of Independence to start a life on the frontier. Or, maybe not.
By Eric Lidji
The home plate from Forbes Field in the floor of Posvar Hall (Photo courtesy of Eric Lidji)
May 18, 2026, 9:20 am
My own memory lane
Revisiting a core memory with help from the historic record
By Eric Lidji
Daniela Gerson is the author of "The Wanderers." Photo by Kait Lavo
May 15, 2026, 11:47 am
‘The Wanderers’ tells the story of Poland’s Holocaust survivors who fled to the Soviet Union
Daniela Gerson was surprised to learn that most survivors, like her grandparents, survived not in concentration camps, ghettos or forests, but in the mountains of Sibera.
By Shira Li Bartov
In its heyday in the 1930s, the Lechem Aniyum Society gathered weekly in the old Beth Jacob synagogue to prepare some 200 boxes of food for local delivery. (Image courtesy Rauh Jewish Archives)
April 20, 2026, 9:18 am
Meat out of the pot
Before the New Deal and the Great Society, the Lechem Aniyum Society met a simple need: delivering kosher food to those who could not afford it.
By Eric Lidji
Of the 58 volumes from the Goodwill Collection placed at the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, only three are easily discoverable today. (Photo courtesy of Eric Lidji)
March 18, 2026, 9:22 am
The Goodwill Collection
In the last era of turmoil overseas and rising threats at home, one Jewish communal leader sent Jewish books to libraries across the region.
By Eric Lidji
HFLA's board of directors gather at Rodef Shalom Congregation in 2023. (Photo courtesy of Amanda Hirsh)
March 11, 2026, 8:52 pm
Anniversary brings rebrand and recommitment to Hebrew Free Loan Association
More than century after organization's start, HFLA remains 'focused on finding all the ways that we can be a valuable resource to help people in our community'
By Adam Reinherz
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