sandy koufax – Smithsonian Affiliations

Summer is upon us, which means the baseball season is literally in full swing. Nothing says America more than a sunny afternoon at the ballpark with a hot dog and ball cap, cheering on your favorite team.

Now baseball fans can share their passion outside the ballpark too, with a new initiative launched by the National Museum of American Jewish History, our Affiliate in Philadelphia. The museum is inviting fans of all ages and backgrounds to submit artifacts, photos, and memorabilia that illustrate their connections to the game. This collecting effort and national conversation will support a major exhibition opening at the Museum in spring 2014 called Chasing Dreams: Baseball and Jews in America.

Dodgers pitcher Sandy Koufax during the 1966 World Series

This exhibition (which is expected to travel around the country) is the first major exhibition to weave together the history of American sport, leisure and national identity with the story of Jewish immigration and integration into American life. The exhibition will also tell the stories of other minority groups – including African-Americans, Latinos, Italian and Japanese immigrants – for whom baseball provided an important sense of belonging and pride.

The public is invited to share stories and memories of how baseball has affected generations of fans and their communities through the Museum’s site – chasingdreamsbaseball.tumblr.com. Here, fans can post images of their memorabilia and share their stories with the Museum’s curators and fellow baseball aficionados.

Sandy Koufax’ glove, on view at NMAJH, 2010-2012

Those who have visited the National Museum of American Jewish History in the past have likely seen Sandy Koufax’s glove, on loan from the Smithsonian and on view in Philadelphia when the Museum opened in its current location in 2010.

For more information on the exhibition or public collecting initiative, please read the press release, or visit the Museum’s website at www.nmajh.org.

Just think, here’s something else you can do during the seventh inning stretch!

The new National Museum of American Jewish History hosts its grand opening celebration this weekend. And you’ve probably already heard the buzz that VIPs such as Bette Midler, Jerry Seinfeld and Vice President Joe Biden will be on hand for the opening. But did you know there will be some quieter stars sticking around long after opening weekend concludes? Thanks to loans from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History and National Museum of the American Indian, 13 amazing artifacts from the Smithsonian collection that document the history and achievements of Jewish Americans will be on view for visitors long after the fanfare ends. Here’s a few of the Smithsonian artifacts visitors will encounter:

Albert Einstein’s pipe
One of only 18 Jewish Americans to be featured in the Museum’s prestigious “Only in America” gallery, Albert Einstein, creator of the theory of relativity, Nobel Prize winner, and striver for world peace, is almost as well known for his physical appearance as for his epochal work in theoretical physics. Characteristic of that appearance was a pipe. Although in his later years he restricted his smoking on doctors’ orders, he couldn’t bear to give up the tactile experience of a pipe itself. This one, in fact, gives evidence of Einstein’s long usage in a hole he wore through its bit.

Polio vaccine vial
Jonas Salk first tested his polio vaccine on humans in July 1952 when he inoculated thirty children at the D. T. Watson Home for Crippled Children near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. This vial contains residue of polio vaccine from these first tests, which had a profound effect on American medical history.

Sandy Koufax’s Rawlings Mickey Mantle Professional Model mitt
Sandy Koufax was signed to his hometown Brooklyn Dodgers in 1955 and started pitching regularly for them when they moved to Los Angeles. In 1961, with a wicked curve ball, Koufax won 18 games and triggered one of the most exciting five-season performances ever seen on a mound. This included the lowest earned-run average in baseball for five straight years, a no-hitter in each of four consecutive seasons, and three World Series championships. Koufax used this left-hander’s glove during his career with the Dodgers.

Shofar (Central Europe, 19th century)
This shofar, a Jewish ceremonial instrument made from a ram’s horn, was the first object of Judaica collected by former curator Cyrus Adler for the (Smithsonian) National Museum in 1889. Want to hear what one sounds like? Click here to listen at Smithsonian Folkways!

Irving Berlin’s Uniform Jacket from WWI
Irving Berlin’s jacket will be exhibited in a gallery devoted to telling the American Jewish experience during WWI. While a doughboy in WWI, Berlin wrote songs and presented musicals which raised money for Camp Upton.

Did you know that the character of Superman was created by Jewish Americans? Smithsonian artifacts such as a Superman doll, a gold rush coin, sheet music and more, add an important complement to the Museum’s exhibitions, which chronicle 350 years of American Jewish history. The Smithsonian could not be prouder to be part of this historic opening event.

The National Museum of American Jewish History officially opens to the public on November 26. For more information about this museum, visit https://nmajh.org/

Interested in more headlines about the museum’s opening? See our blog post, Affiliates in the News, for more info.

All images courtesy National Museum of American History.

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take me out to the ballgame

Smithsonian artifacts help tell the story at new National Museum of American Jewish History