FROM OUR ARCHIVES
65 YEARS AGO
October 17, 1952
The formal opening of the first kibbutz ulpan for 50 students from English-speaking countries would be held in a few days’ time at Ma’aleh Hahamisha. The ulpan course would run for six months and the students would study Hebrew, Jewish history, geography and related subjects. They would learn half a day and work the other half.
Large quantities of “Lakol” enameled kitchen utensils would soon be freely marketed at official prices ranging from IL 1.30 to IL 1.90. The free sale would be the first phase in the general program of the Commerce Ministry’s Heavy Industry Department to produce large quantities of “austerity” kitchen utensils. The department had already stopped allocating raw materials for the manufacture of utensils which were considered “luxury,” although “luxury” was not clearly defined.
Deciding to give her torn mattress an airing, Mrs. Ruth Goldschlanger hung it over her balcony in Tel Aviv. She forgot, however, to remove 32 gold sovereigns which she had tucked away in the bedding. They were promptly stolen.
50 YEARS AGO
October 17, 1967
Egypt’s grand rabbi, Haim Douek, said that about 400 of Egypt’s 2,500 Jews had been jailed for security reasons since the outbreak of the Six Day War, though many had already been released. He added that Jews had not been persecuted by the Nasser regime before the war. The rabbi also said that nearly all the Jews left in Egypt were “Egyptian Jews – Jews who have decided to stay here because this is their homeland.”
The grottoes at Rosh Hanikra would be opened to the public in about two months’ time. A 110 meter-long cable-car system would be built from the top of the 70-meter-high rock to the grottoes.
Some 4,000 Arab farmers and farm hands from the West Bank toured a farming demonstration and exhibition near Jenin that was organized by the Agriculture Ministry and the military government. Israeli as well as former officials of the Jordanian Ministry of Agriculture showed the deeply impressed fellahin modern methods of plowing, use of insecticides and above all, olive cultivation. A hundred thousand dunams [10,000 hectares] would be sown in the West Bank that year with specially selected seeds that the ministry would supply to farmers on a special “kilo for kilo” deal, i.e. a kilo of grain for each kilo of wheat from the current crop. The mayor of Jenin, Hushri el-Suki, said such meetings were a bridge of goodwill between farmers.
15 YEARS AGO
October 17, 2002
Jerusalem’s open-air markets and downtown area would get some relief from the stench caused by the garbage collectors’ strike, as the municipal workers’ union agreed to collect overflowing garbage there to reduce the risk of a terrorist bomb being planted amid the refuse. The police reported that fewer people were reporting suspicious objects, because of garbage in the streets. However, most of the country was still holding its nose to avoid the stench from rotting organic material. The Health Ministry urged parents to prevent their children from burning garbage, which was especially common in the more densely populated haredi neighborhoods. Piles of garbage attracted mice and rats, which in some places were so big that they scared away the cats.
– Daniel Kra