Organizations and Institutions

Emilie M. Bullowa

As a lawyer and activist, Emilie M. Bullowa devoted her life to justice for the disenfranchised. Her colleagues, as well as many judges, respected her attitude as a woman in a field then dominated by men: She took pride in being a lawyer, rather than in being a female lawyer.

Saidye Rosner Bronfman

Saidye Rosner Bronfman was a first-generation Canadian who used her wealth to benefit numerous Canadian Jewish organizations and philanthropies. Beginning in 1929, she served as the president of Montreal’s Young Women’s Hebrew Association for six years. In 1943 she was recognized by the British Empire for her philanthropic contributions to the war effort.

Britain: Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries

Since being allowed to resettle in 1656, Jews in Great Britain have established deep community ties throughout their diverse community. Class differences between early Sephardic settlers and the later wave of Ashkenazi immigrants gave rise to numerous Jewish charitable organizations, in which women played a key role.

Jeanette Goodman Brill

As the first woman magistrate in Brooklyn and the second in New York, Jeanette Goodman Brill believed women had an aptitude and responsibility to judge cases involving women and children.

Fanny Fligelman Brin

A riveting public speaker, masterful politician, skilled organizer, and administrator, Fanny Fligelman Brin, who served two terms as president of the National Council of Jewish Women, from 1932 to 1938, is best remembered for her work on behalf of world peace during the interwar years.

Brazil, Contemporary

Brazil is home to the second largest Jewish community in South America. Jewish women played important roles in the absorption of Jewish immigrants from Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa, and also made important contributions to Brazilian intellectual and artistic life.

Rose Brenner

As president of the National Council of Jewish Women, Rose Brenner focused on inclusion of people who were often marginalized—the deaf, the blind, and those isolated in rural areas.

Florence Meyer Blumenthal

Florence Meyer Blumenthal, an extraordinary philanthropist and arts patron, organized her own arts foundation in Paris, and donated millions of dollars to established institutions and public charities in America and France. Blumenthal’s foundation funded hundreds of promising artists and allowed them to focus on pursuing their craft.

B'nai B'rith Women

Created at the beginning of the twentieth century, B’nai B’rith Women expanded its role during both World Wars. Although gender roles after World War II reverted to a more conventional structure, in the 1960s BBW shifted its efforts to reflect the antipoverty and feminist campaigns of the period.

Madeleine Borg

Madeleine Borg, a juvenile rights advocate, is known for reframing juvenile rehabilitation efforts in both Jewish and non-Jewish communities. Borg founded the American Big Sisters movement in 1912 and went on to establish the Council Home for Jewish Girls.

Anna Pavitt Boudin

A dentist by career, Anna Pavitt Boudin is remembered for her prominent role in the American’s Women ORT. While maintaining her own private dental practice, Boudin became the founding president of Women’s American ORT, an organization that grew to be one of the largest Jewish women’s organizations in the United States.

Birth Control Movement in the United States: 1912-1960

In the 1910s, Margaret Sanger began the family planning movement in the United States. While Sanger was not Jewish, Jews had an enormous impact on her activism, and her activism indelibly shaped the lives of Jewish women in America.

Rebecca Thurman Bernstein

Rebecca Thurman Bernstein was lauded by local and national organizations for her efforts to improve health care, literacy, and Jewish life in Portland, Maine. Bernstein was proud of her Jewish heritage and worked for many Jewish causes, but her interests were not limited to or by her Jewishness.

Clementine Bern-Zernik

A lawyer by training, Vienna-born Clementine Bern-Zernik produced broadcasts for the US Office of War Information in London during the war, served as the director of a Displaced Persons Camp in post-war Germany, and spent the last 50 years of her life as a UN liaison to the New York Public Library. Throughout her life she maintained a strong Austrian identity and was a founding member of the Austrian-American Federation.

Meta Pollak Bettman

Meta Pollak Bettman was an untiring volunteer in Jewish and civic causes in the early twentieth century.

"Professor Romeo" Front Cover by Anne Flieschman Bernays

Anne Fleischman Bernays

Anne Fleischman Bernays is an American editor, novelist, and nonfiction writer. Her literary work is notable for its exploration of Jewish experiences of America, the pressure of assimilation, and the then-taboo subject of sexual harassment.

Dorothy Lehman Bernhard

Dorothy Lehman Bernhard made great contributions to the causes dearest to her, including child welfare, the arts, and the Jewish community, both by overseeing over 30 organizations and, more directly, by becoming a foster parent.

Timeline Showing the Major Organizations of Jews in Germany, 1893-1943

Cora Berliner

Cora Berliner was an economist and social scientist who held leadership positions in several major Jewish organizations in Germany between 1910 and 1942. These organizations included the Association of Jewish Youth Organizations in Germany, the Reich Representation of German Jews, and the League of Jewish Women.

New England Hospital for Women and Children

Fanny Berlin

A courageous, motivated pioneer in medicine, in the late 1800s Fanny Berlin became one of the first Jewish women to practice surgery in the United States and the respected chief surgeon of a major hospital.

Helen Bentwich

Helen Bentwich was an active community organizer, activist, and local politician. She and her husband, Norman, aided in helping people escape Nazi persecution and split their time between Palestine and England for many years.

Rahel Yanait Ben-Zvi

Rahel Yanait Ben-Zvi was the second First Lady of Israel, wife to President Yizhak Ben-Zvi. Before and after Ben-Zvi’s tenure, she was active in the labor movement in Palestine and Israel and in the independence movement, as well as a prolific writer and recorder of her experiences in Erez Israel.

Rebecca Reuben's Hebrew Class at the Huzurpaga High School for Indian Girls, circa 1913

Bene Israel

The Bene Israel is one of three Jewish communities in India. Bene Israel women were the producers and preservers of Bene Israel culture in India, and many were very influential leaders in their communities, academia, and religious life.

Hadassa Ben-Itto

Hadassa Ben-Itto was a jurist and best-selling author. In addition to serving in multiple prestigious positions, she is best known for her book The Lie that Will Not Die: One Hundred Years of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion (Hebrew, 1998).

Yehudit Ben-Natan

Yehudit Ben-Natan is most known for her time as the head of the Israel Defense Forces’ Women’s Corps, where she waged a fierce campaign against the conservatism that marked everything related to the opening to women of new military occupations. She was particularly active in promoting women serving in the career army and tried to integrate women into combat units.

Mina Ben-Zvi

Mina Ben-Zvi was among the first women to serve in the military in Palestine, first as part of the British Auxiliary Territorial Service, then in local Zionist paramilitary organizations that eventually became the Israeli Defense Forces. She became the first commanding officer of the IDF’s Women’s Corps in 1948.