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(New York Jewish Week) – Born in 1905, Rebecca Rubin was a Russian-Jewish immigrant who lived on the Decrease East Aspect. Typical of ladies her age, she attended public college, lit Shabbat candles together with her siblings, watched her father conduct enterprise at his shoe retailer and liked going to the films.
And now, this Sunday, the Museum of Jewish Heritage-A Residing Memorial to the Holocaust will host a family-friendly occasion designed to rejoice her life and that of different younger Jewish immigrants. On the occasion’s agenda are particular excursions, crafts and a panel dialogue about Rebecca’s story, in addition to others like her who lived in New York within the early Twentieth century.
However right here’s the factor: Rebecca Rubin just isn’t an actual individual. She is an 18-inch tall American Woman doll — who, just like the others within the model’s uber-popular collection of historic dolls, represents the lifetime of a lady who lived throughout an necessary interval of American historical past. The intention of American Woman, which launched in 1986, is to encourage “women to develop up with braveness, confidence and energy of character,” in accordance with its website, and invitations younger kids to study historical past on their very own phrases.
That mission, because it occurs, dovetails properly with that of the Battery Park-based museum. “We rejoice Jewish life earlier than, throughout and after the Holocaust, and immigration is a giant theme of what we do,” stated Joshua Mack, the Museum of Jewish Heritage’s vp of promoting. “I had been occupied with our immigration items and methods to get folks into the museum in order that they’ll uncover what we do, particularly youthful folks. What’s wonderful about American Woman dolls is how traditionally related they’re. It’s a approach for thus many kids to get correct historical past, so it completely matches into our lane.”
Sunday’s “Rebecca Day” is the museum’s first-ever occasion devoted to a doll. The concept originated practically 10 years in the past when Mack took his personal baby, Willa, to the Tenement Museum — a Decrease East Aspect “residing historical past museum” that tells the story of New York’s immigrants by recreating the situations they lived in — they usually toted alongside their Rebecca doll.
“It appeared like a good way to rejoice Jewish heritage and get followers and fans to go to us and be taught extra concerning the museum,” Mack stated of Rebecca Day, including that when he pitched his group — who’re largely Gen-Z and millennials — they instantly latched onto it.
As considered one of 12 historic dolls within the lively lineup of historic American Women, Rebecca was the primary American Woman doll with a Jewish story when she got here on the scene in 2009. (This spring, American Woman launched Nineties twin dolls Isabel and Nicki Hoffman, whose father is Jewish.) “The much-anticipated newest addition to the American Woman collection of historic characters, Rebecca goes on sale Could 31 together with six books about her life,” JTA’s Sue Fishkoff wrote on the time. “No low cost date, she prices $95 with one e book, or $118 if accompanied by the entire set.” (Inflation has been type to American Woman: The Rebecca set at present prices $146.)
Every of the dolls within the collection comes with interval clothes and accessories to flesh out her life story, in addition to a set of books that describes the yr of their lives after they flip 10. Rebecca’s line contains props like a menorah, Shabbat candles and a Russian-style scarf, in addition to a purple bouclé outfit and satin purple hat.
Sunday’s occasion can also be additionally designed to get folks within the constructing to view the museum’s new exhibit, “Braveness To Act: Rescue in Denmark,” its first-ever exhibit geared in direction of kids, Mack stated. The interactive exhibit tells the story of how Jewish and non-Jewish communities in Denmark banded collectively to avoid wasting 95% of the Danish Jewish inhabitants from the Nazis, together with by transporting them on rescue boats to Sweden — an endeavor helmed by 22-year-old Henny Sinding Sundø.
Rebecca Day — which is free, although $10 donations are inspired — contains kid-friendly guided excursions of the museum’s reveals, in addition to a festive lunch of latkes for teenagers and their dolls on the Lox Cafe, the museum’s restaurant, and Hanukkah crafts like dreidel-decorating.
A spotlight of the occasion is a dialogue with Jacqueline Dembar Greene, the writer of 11 American Woman novels that includes Rebecca Rubin. She plans to reply questions on Rebecca’s story and about what life was like as an immigrant in 1914. A number of the analysis she did for the books was carried out on the Museum of Jewish Heritage 15 years in the past, Dembar Greene advised the New York Jewish Week, including that different tales had been lifted from her circle of relatives’s expertise as Russian Jewish immigrants within the Twenties.
“I attempted to put in writing it as if there have been readers who didn’t know a lot of something,” Dembar Greene stated. “However then, for the children who had been Jewish, I needed to be sure that they felt that they discovered a little bit additional one thing and see their very own lives mirrored in a few of the traditions.”
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American Woman just isn’t sponsoring Rebecca Day on the museum. However spokesperson Julie Parks stated the corporate is “excited” concerning the occasion, significantly the truth that Dembar Greene “will probably be available to share how Rebecca, a first-generation Jewish American rising up in early Twentieth-century New York Metropolis, made her personal optimistic mark on the world.
“American Woman is a model rooted in story,” Parks stated, “and every of our beloved characters, like Rebecca, has helped to create a way of connection and group amongst our followers.”
Dembar Greene stated one of many largest challenges in writing the Rebecca books was nailing simply how observant the Rubin household may need been — Rebecca’s father opens his shoe retailer on Shabbat, for instance, however her mother and father wouldn’t let her go to a film then — whereas acknowledging that a part of the immigrant expertise at the moment was assimilating to American tradition. It’s one of many themes that Rebecca contends with all through the collection.
“I attempted to mirror that an important factor within the households, that was not changeable, was the acceptance of ethical traditions,” she stated, including that “tikkun olam, making the world a greater place, and the way in which you deal with different folks,” are main components in each Rebecca’s story and Jewish life generally.
“Partly why these books are nonetheless fashionable and nonetheless very related, though the story relies so way back, is that we now have new immigrants coming in and contributing to the American story their power, their drive, their contemporary concepts and new methods of issues that drive progress,” she added.
“Rebecca Day” will happen on the Museum of Jewish Heritage at 36 Battery Pl. on Sunday, Dec. 3 from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Register right here.
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