1. Josephine Joel Heyman
2. Stella Steinheimer Bauer
3. Ida Natkoff Goncher
5. Rebecca Mathis Gershon
4. Annie Teitlebaum Wise
The Stories of the Quilt The Women of Valor, 1850–1950 Legacy Quilt,
6. Esther Kahn Taylor
a project of The Breman spearheaded by Pat Pugrant, is a traveling educational
7. Rhoda Kaufman 8. Evelyn Greenblatt Howren
9. Catherine Alhadeff Cohen
10. Fannie Spielberger Boorstin
11. Rebecca Solomons Alexander
resource available for on-site programs. To bring the quilt to your organization, please contact Breman archivist Sandy Berman: 404-870-1862 or sberman@thebreman.org; or Pat Pugrant: 770-394-3986.
1. Josephine Joel Heyman (1901–1993) was a native Atlantan. She attended Smith College and graduated in 1923. In 1924 she married Atlanta attorney Herman Heyman and immersed herself in charitable “good works.” She assisted in a hospital program for babies whose mothers could not nurse by taking sterilized bottles to lactating women, usually African-American, and returned the filled bottles to the hospital. She worked for the betterment of others through her involvement with The Temple Sisterhood, The National Council of Jewish Women, The Association of Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching and The League of Women Voters. She was also a founding member of The United Nations Association of Atlanta and in 1942, 1945, 1950, 1953 and 1969 served as chair or co-chair of the Women’s Division of the Atlanta Jewish Federation.
5. Rebecca Mathis Gershon (1899–1987) was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee. She graduated from Smith College in 1919 and moved to Atlanta after she married Harry Gershon in 1921. An adventurous traveler who went to many exotic places in her travels around the globe, she was one of Atlanta’s first women to work towards the betterment of race relations in Atlanta. In the 1930s, she belonged to the Commission of Interracial Cooperation and to The Association of Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching. She also encouraged the Atlanta Section of NCJW to organize the New World Club, a club for new Americans that taught English to Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany. An ardent supporter of Hadassah, she was awarded the Myrtle Wreath in 1973. Small in stature, she was described as “a quiet person who worked behind the scenes, never in the limelight, but committed to the core.”
2. Stella Steinheimer Bauer (1875–1959) was a native Atlantan. “Mama Stella” as she was affectionately called by her family was president of the sisterhood of The Temple on Pryor and Richardson Streets and The National Council of Jewish Women. The Temple women actively supported the war effort, and the Atlanta Section of NCJW helped immigrant women who were settling in Atlanta during the early 1920s. As a devoted advocate of Jewish education, Stella spoke about the importance of continuing Jewish education. Today, Tichon Atlanta proudly brings together high school students from nine synagogues each week, carrying on traditions and values she advocated.
6. Esther Kahn Taylor (1905–1992) was born in Atlanta and began music lessons at an early age. Her love for music continued to play an important role throughout her life. She attended Juilliard School of Music, studied in Paris and brought music education through radio programs to the children of Atlanta. An ardent Zionist and president of the Atlanta Chapter of Hadassah in 1933, she also was active in The League of Women Voters, The National Council of Jewish Women and ORT, starting an Atlanta chapter of ORT. She made the important humanitarian contribution of establishing the first location for Planned Parenthood in Georgia.
3. Ida Natkoff Goncher (1892–1962) was born in Bialystok, Poland and immigrated to the United States, settling in Atlanta in 1908. She was very concerned about the assimilation of immigrants, and she organized Americanization classes in her home. She also opened her home to allow the Fulton County Health Department to immunize neighborhood children. From 1930 to the early 1950s, Ida was foster mother to many children needing a home, including Holocaust survivor Benjamin Hirsch, the architect who designed the Holocaust Gallery at the Breman Museum.
7. Rhoda Kaufman (1888–1956) was born in Columbus, Georgia. She graduated from Vanderbilt in 1909 and she moved to Atlanta to carry out her progressive ideas about the underprivileged. She worked with Associated Charities of Atlanta to bring about the Children’s Code Commission and a state commission to aid the mentally retarded. She became assistant secretary and eventually executive secretary of the Welfare Department. She was a powerful advocate for social reform whose voice was heard from Georgia’s domed capitol to the White House. Her career was cut short by her resignation after harassing attacks by the Ku Klux Klan, which opposed state and federal welfare programs. President Hoover acknowledged her accomplishments by inviting her to speak at the National Conference of Social Work in 1932. She was named Georgia’s Woman of Achievement in 1998.
4. Annie Teitlebaum Wise (1866–1929) was born in Hungary and immigrated with her family to Atlanta in 1871. After graduating from grammar school, she attended Girls High School and three years later was named to the faculty. In 1910, the business education section of the business school at Girls High School became a separate institution, and she was hired as the first principal of Commercial High School. She was the first female instructor at Georgia Tech in 1919, far in advance of the next woman faculty member hired in 1960. She was instrumental in the establishment in 1920 of the Opportunity School that enabled thousands of Atlanta boys and girls to attend evening classes after work.
8. Evelyn Greenblatt Howren (1918–1998), a graduate of Vanderbilt University, was captivated with pursuing a career in flying. In 1939, she started taking flight instruction at Candler Field, and she received her private flying rating in 1941. One month after becoming a pilot, she joined the newly formed Civil Air Patrol. In 1942, she became one of thirty members of the first class of Women’s Air Service Pilots (WASPs) trained
as pilots to ferry aircraft and fly B-25 bombers with troops and supplies. The WASP pilots did not fly in combat missions but did tow targets at which male gunners shot to gain practice. By winning their wings, the Women Air Service Pilots dispelled the belief that army flying was only for men. In owning her flying school, Flightways, Inc., Evelyn became a model for female entrepreneurs. 9. Catherine Alhadeff Cohen (1889–1987) was born on the Isle of Rhodes and immigrated to the United States in 1913, choosing Atlanta because she had cousins there. She met and married Ruben Cohen and had four daughters. Widowed at the age of 31, she relied on her Sephardic traditions to sustain her. She was an active member of Congregation Or Ve Shalom, a Sephardic synagogue, and was known by her Ladino name, “Cadena.” She supported her family without welfare assistance, riding the trolley from Edgewood Avenue to Marietta for her job on the assembly line at the Bell Bomber Plant. When World War II began, Cadena was Atlanta’s own “Rosie the Riveter.”
10. Fannie Spielberger Boorstin (1898–1986) was born in Atlanta. When she tried to find a place for an elderly Jewish woman to live in 1941, she became aware of that the only place available for the Jewish aged not living with their children was a rented room in a Kosher home. Her concern for the social isolation of the Jewish elderly and knowledge of their housing plight spurred her to begin a campaign with her good friend Ida Goncher to better the lives of Atlanta’s Jewish elderly population. Finally, through the efforts and determination of the two, the first Jewish Home was completed at 240 14th St. in 1951. Volunteerism has always been an important element in the character of The Jewish Home, echoing the efforts of their first volunteer, Fannie Boorstin. 11. Rebecca Solomons Alexander (1854–1938) was born in Charleston, South Carolina. When the Civil War began, she firmly supported the Confederacy. She moved to Atlanta following her marriage. She was the first President of the Atlanta Section of the National Council of Jewish Women (NCJW) and remained president until 1902. Under her direction, NCJW was actively involved in founding the Atlanta Free Kindergarten Association housed in the Jewish Educational Alliance, forerunner to today’s Marcus Jewish Community Center of Atlanta. She also established a Sabbath School on Decatur Street for the children of arriving immigrants.
The Breman is a proud recipient of the 2004 Governor’s Award in the Humanities and the 2005 Hosea Williams Award for Community Activism. A local grantee of the Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta The Blonder Family Fund The Lillian & A.J. Weinberg Fund for Holocaust Education The Elinor & William Breman Endowment Programs made possible in part by the following endowments: Spring & Thomas J. Asher The Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation Lois & Jerry Blonder Elinor Breman Laura & Marshall Dinerman Gail Evans Shirley & Sherwin Glass Elliot & Harriet Goldstein S. Jarvin Levison The Breman is grateful to our President’s Council charter members for generously supporting our operations and programs:
Women of Valor, 1850–1950
Josephine Joel Heyman • Stella Steinheimer Bauer Ida Natkoff Goncher • Annie Teitlebaum Wise Rebecca Mathis Gershon • Esther Kahn Taylor Rhoda Kaufman • Evelyn Greenblatt Howren Catherine Alhadeff Cohen • Fannie Spielberger Boorstin Rebecca Solomons Alexander
1440 Spring Street NW (at Spring & 18th) • Atlanta, Georgia 30309 678-222-3700 • thebreman.org
THE LEGACY QUILT