Sitting in the National Library in Jerusalem 35 years ago, I was holding an original Henry Frank Haggadah printed in New York in 1858.
I said to myself that maybe I will xerox the entire Haggadah. That was the beginning, and it became the text of my American Heritage Haggadah published in Jerusalem in 1992.
A few months later, back at the National Library, where I spent a lot of time generally and much more doing research on the Haggadah, I ordered a book titled Jewish Welfare Board in World War I, New York 1920, one of the initial publications of the Jewish Welfare Board (JWB). In it, I found a picture of the “Train Seder.”
In April 1919, a Seder was held in a Pullman car on a siding in the railroad yards in Detroit, Michigan. Soldiers returning from Europe were on their way to Camp Grant, near Chicago, Illinois, for Passover. However, they couldn’t make it to Illinois in time for the onset of Passover. The JWB, in a most inventive manner, arranged for a Seder for those soldiers on the train route, still in Detroit, and hired a rabbi to officiate.
When the Gulf War ended in 1991, my late wife Rita, said, “David, stop moaning and groaning. Go to the US and raise the money, do the research, and finally bring to life your long-awaited Haggadah.” Rita, dear, the Haggadah exists because of your love for me.
The legacy and impact of the American Heritage Haggadah
Prof. Jonathan Sarna, the leading professor in the field of Jewish Americana, explains my Passover volume of 33 years’ vintage.
“Your American Heritage Haggadah evidences the central place of Passover in American Jewish life. Every major event and trend in American Jewish life – wars, social movements, religious innovations and much more – have been reflected in the ways Passover has been celebrated. New technologies have likewise transformed everything from the production of matzah to the way Passover products are distributed and marketed.”
Even the patriarch of our family, Rav Tuvia Geffen of Atlanta, Georgia, participated in this holiday beverage process when he wrote his noted Coca-Cola teshuva in 1935, emphasizing what he had done to assure that the popular soft drink would be kosher and kosher for Passover.
He has become the “Coca-Cola Rabbi” in 200 websites throughout the world.
“As your Haggadah demonstrates,” Sarna noted, “the celebration of Passover has changed dramatically in America from pre-Civil War days to the present. What has not changed is the Passover story itself. It continues to move, teach, and inspire Jews, year in and year out.”
Living in Jerusalem, with our family Seders, really inspired me to collect images and texts of Passover Americana. I recalled with love the Seders with my Zaide the rabbi, my Bubbie Sara Hene, and my parents, Anna and Louis. At the end of the Seder, my Bubbie led us as we stood and sang “God Bless America” by Irving Berlin; the American national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner”; and Israel’s “Hatikvah.”
One of the first people I met as the serious work on my Haggadah began was Ambassador Stuart Eizenstat, from Atlanta, Georgia, who was speaking in Jerusalem. I shared with him a few illustrations I had selected to use in the Haggadah. He reacted positively, asking me to visit him when my trip through the archives in the US was completed. In his office in Washington, DC, he asked to write the introduction, which is in the Haggadah.
Eizenstat put into perspective that historic Seder for all of us. He said, “In 1889, on the centennial of George Washington’s inauguration as America’s first president, the George Washington Seder was held.” Then he referred to what happened in the American Jewish community. “During that centennial year, free pictures of Washington were given for every purchase of ten pounds of matzah.” He stressed how the picture of George Washington was placed near the door, awaiting Elijah’s arrival.
The Haggadah includes the story of how my grandfather Rabbi Tuvia convinced the governor of Georgia, Eugene Talmadge, to order the release of a Jewish prisoner, unfairly charged, from the Georgia Chain Gang in 1933. I named that event “The Matzah Pardon,” since the basis for his release began with a letter he wrote to my grandfather with a request for matzah and a Haggadah.
Traveling in the south from Atlanta to Charleston, South Carolina, I spent time in the city’s famous Reform synagogue Kahal Kadosh. There, Rabbi William Rosenthal had a personal collection of images from American Jewish history. In my search among the drawings, I located what I consider the oldest illustration of a Seder in the United States. Drawn in 1858, the Seder table has a Passover plate with all the items which are to be used. The father is speaking to his son, in a high chair, about the exodus from Egypt, with the Hebrew words “Ve’higadata Le’bincha.” The striking part of that illustration is that the father looks exactly like Abraham Lincoln. A historian of the Civil War explained to me that many men may have looked and dressed like Lincoln.
At the Magnes Museum in Berkley California, is a black-and-white photograph from 1907. In it, you see the Heppner family sitting around the Seder table. Next to the father is a large sign that reads, “One year after the earthquake.” Behind the Seder table are the American flag and the Magen David flag (the pre-Israeli flag). The participants on that Passover night, 118 years ago, are nicely dressed, and the father is wearing a tall black kippah. This photograph led an exciting life as part of Yale University Library’s display of Haggadot.
Most exciting are colorful photos from a Seder for Jewish military personnel in Bahrain in 1991 during the Gulf War, celebrated on an R&R recreation ship for soldiers on leave. This Seder was held on a ship because alcoholic drinks were forbidden in Bahrain but not offshore. An English ship sailed in, anchored offshore, and was used for the soldiers’ enjoyment. The participants stayed on the ship for the first two days of Passover and had a wonderful time during that break in the war.
In the group of color reproductions is the first Hebrew map of Eretz Yisrael published in the US in 1840. During his trip to America, a man from Hebron, sent to solicit funds for the poverty-stricken Jews of Palestine, had located a Hebrew map of Palestine in Livorno, Italy. When he arrived in the US, he performed early Photoshop, putting a picture of himself on the map in place of a printed seal. Even more fascinating, he utilized hand-written letters he had in Hebrew and Arabic and printed them on the map to prove its authenticity. He sold copies of the map to American Jews to raise funds for all those suffering in Palestine. Technically, the map is a forgery, but its uniqueness – the only surviving copy is in the Library of Congress – brought it great prominence in the library’s Jewish Treasures exhibition 25 years ago.
Through friends and family, the Haggadah is found in the presidential libraries of Jimmy Carter, George H. Bush, and Bill Clinton.
I worked hard to fulfill my dream, and thankfully I was successful. Some 7,000 copies are used at Seder tables throughout the world.■