For Immediate Release

HARTFORD, Conn., Aug. 30 -- In a joint venture between two of Hartford’s most venerable institutions, The Endowment Foundation of the Jewish Federation of Greater Hartford, Inc. has awarded three grants totaling $7,000 to Trinity College to establish a Yiddish book collection at the school. The rich literary heritage of European Jewry will thereby find a new home in Trinity College’s growing Judaica collection.

The collection consists of approximately 500 Yiddish volumes, and constitutes the core of an undergraduate collection in Yiddish language, literature, and research materials. It includes reference works and texts in history, biography and memoir, folklore and sociology, politics and non-fiction, together with literary anthologies and representative works of Yiddish prose, poetry, drama, and literary criticism. The books, which include the collected works of Sholom Aleichem, Mendele Mokher Seforim, and Der Nister, were acquired in cooperation with the National Yiddish Book Center of Amherst, MA.

"The acquisition of such a collection is critical to the undergraduate program in Jewish Studies at Trinity College, and we are grateful to the Endowment Foundation for its support, " said Ronald Kiener, an associate professor of religion and director of the Jewish Studies Program at Trinity.

Established in 1998, the inter-departmental Jewish Studies Program at Trinity College provides students with the opportunity to explore the varied dimensions of Jewish culture, history, and religion. In conjunction with Wesleyan University, Trinity College offers a unique semester program in Jerusalem, Israel. In any given year, more than 100 Trinity students enroll in over a half dozen Jewish Studies courses.

The Endowment Foundation, which operates as the Jewish community foundation for Greater Hartford, made its largest grant of $6,000 from the Frances Solomon Feingold Memorial Fund. The gift was made in honor of Gustave Alexander Feingold, who received a bachelor’s degree from Trinity in 1911 and a master’s degree from the College in 1912. Feingold had a long career in the Hartford public school system, serving as principal of Bulkeley High School from 1926 until his death in 1948.

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