TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction

Biographical Sketch

Scope and Content Note

Arrangement Note

Restrictions

Administrative Information

Search Terms

Box Folder Listing

Series A. United States Jewish Community Files. 1871-2005.

Series B. Congregation Sherith Israel (Cincinnati, Ohio). 1830-1997.

A Finding Aid to the Abie I. Ingber Papers. 1830-2005.

Manuscript Collection No. 792

Funding, in part, for the arrangement and description of this collection was provided by the National Historical Publications and Records Commission.

Biographical Sketch

Born in Montreal, Canada, in 1950, Abie Ingber received his ordination from the Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion in 1977, and served for over thirty years as the executive director and senior rabbi of the Hillel Jewish Student Center in Cincinnati. He currently serves as adjunct professor of theology at Xavier University and lecturer in homiletics at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, and is the founding director of Xavier University’s Office of Interfaith Community Engagement.

Ingber is a strong advocate on behalf of social justice. In 1969, as one of the founders of the student movement for human rights for Soviet Jewry, he convinced John Lennon and Yoko Ono at the height of their “Love-In” to sign his petition for Russian Jewish emigration. He has since traveled to Darfur with the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, and had audiences with both Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI. As a result of this interfaith work, he co-convened the first Catholic-Jewish Lay Conference at the Vatican, and co-created the award-winning exhibit, “A Blessing to One Another: Pope John Paul II and the Jewish People.” Ingber is also a founding board member of the Brueggeman Center for Dialogue at Xavier University, and in 2009, delivered 31,099 prayers written by exhibit visitors to Jerusalem’s Western Wall.

Ingber has four daughters.

--Adapted from http://www.xavier.edu/interfaith/about-rabbi-ingber.cfm (accessed November 2, 2011), and http://www.globalcincinnati.org/SpecialistDetails.aspx?Name=Abie%20Ingber (accessed November 2, 2011)

Scope and Content Note

This collection consists of files of Jewish communities in the United States compiled by Rabbi Abie I. Ingber. These files include news clippings, synagogue directories, yearbooks, cemetery records, record surveys and inventories, maps, and histories of Jewish communities, organized by state. Not all states have the same depth of documentation, Ohio is particularly strong, while Alabama is somewhat limited. There is also extensive documentation of the history of Congregation Sherith Israel (Cincinnati, Ohio), including building plans, cemetery list, news clippings, correspondence, and photographs. These are of particular interest because they include Rabbi Ingber’s discovery of the dilapidated and abandoned Sherith Israel Temple in downtown Cincinnati, Ohio and his fight to have the site declared an historic landmark by the Historic Conservation Board.

Arrangement Note

This collection is arranged in two (2) series:

Restrictions

Terms of Access and Use

This collection is open to all users. The original manuscript collection is available in the Barrows-Loebelson Reading Room of the Jacob Rader Marcus Center of the American Jewish Archives.

Property and Literary Rights

Abie Ingber, by the act of donating the Abie I. Ingber Papers to the American Jewish Archives, assigned all property rights to the American Jewish Archives. Literary rights are retained by Abie Ingber and his heirs. Literary rights may also be retained by specific creators of materials.

Questions concerning rights should be addressed to the Executive Director of the American Jewish Archives. For more information see the American Jewish Archives copyright information webpage.

Administrative Information

Preferred Citation

Footnotes and bibliographic references should refer to the Abie I. Ingber Papers and the American Jewish Archives. A suggestion for at least the first citation is as follows:

[Description], [Date], Box #, Folder #. MS-792. Abie I. Ingber Papers. American Jewish Archives, Cincinnati, Ohio.

Provenance

The Abie I. Ingber Papers were received from Abie Ingber, Cincinnati, Ohio in May, 2010.

Processing Information

Processed by Michelle Wirth, August, 2011.

This collection was arranged and described according to minimal-processing standards. Processing was made possible through a grant from the National Historic Publications and Records Commission.

Accruals and Additions

No further accruals are expected to this collection.

Box Folder Listing

Search Terms

The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the American Jewish Archives's online catalog.

Institutions

Subjects

Places