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The article focuses on the Sinsheimer family of San Luis Obispo whose own archives reach back to pre-Civil War in the U.S. It offers a look at the establishment of the Sinsheimer Brothers store in 1878. Information is also presented on several members of the family, including Simcha, the first member of the family, who was born about 1650 in Sinsheim, Germany, and Aaron Z. who migrated to the U.S. in 1845.

A biography of Hattie Hecht Sloss, a Jewish cultural and civic learder in San Francisco, California, is presented. She was born on June 12, 1874 in Boston, Massachusetts. Her affiliations include the San Francisco Opera Association, the San Francisco Symphony Association, the Congregation Emanu-El, the American Red Cross and the San Francisco Section of the National Council of Jewish Women. Sloss died in 1958.

A biography of Bertha Spier Stodel, a Jewish community leader in Los Angeles, California, is presented. She was born on September 30, 1880 to Morris and Charlotte Spier. Her career as a community leader began during the World War I in which she became the president of the Parent-Teachers Association. Furthermore, she led various humanitarian organizations including the National Council of Jewish Women and the Junior Auxiliary of the Homes of the Aging. She died on April 22, 1970.

A biography of philanthropist Max Zimmer is presented. He was born on April 25, 1893 in Delatin at the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains. He was the second oldest with siblings including Tilly, Berel, Leah and Hodes, who died when she was little. He was 13 when his mother died leaving a baby sister who was six months old. Max went to Ohio to explore new business opportunities at the age of 22. He had his own business after working for the American Showcase and Fixture Company in New York.

A biography of Benjamin Dreyfus, a pioneer Jew of the west and co-founder of August Langenberger, a wine producer in Anaheim, California, is presented. He was born in Westheim, Bavaria on September 15, 1824. It was in the late 1840s when he first came to the U.S. and settled in Baltimore, Maryland. He was naturalized in 1854, which was also the year when he left for California. He became a viticulturist and wine merchant in California and even served the city council and became the mayor of Anaheim.

A biography of Daniel Cave, a dentist, civic leader and mason in Southern California, is presented. He was born on January 4, 1841 into a Jewish family in Strasbourg, France and started studying medical arts then dentistry under Parisian dentist Dr. Pretere, when he was eighteen. He practiced dentistry first in Europe, then in 1873, started in San Francisco, California, then later settled in San Diego. Cave married Rosa Meyer in 1878. His many honors include being the first president of the Dental Society of San Diego and founding West Gate Lodge.

A biography of businessman Achille Levy of Ventura County, California is presented. He was born to French Jewish parents on October 23, 1853. He attended a business college in San Francisco, California where he also acquired a fluency in the English language. The article relates how Levy became a crop broker and how he was forced into being a banker. It relates the contributions of Levy to the growth and diversity of agriculture in Ventura County, particularly his role in introducing the raising of lima beans.

A biography of Seixas Solomons, an accountant and journalist, is presented. He was born in 1828 and died in 1889. Named after his maternal grandfather, Rabbi Gershom Mendes Seixas, he established a career as an accountant upon his arrival in San Francisco, California in 1854. He served four terms as secretary of Congregation Emanu-El and became the secretary of the board of education in the congregation's school. As a journalist, Solomons wrote for the "Occident" and became co-editor of "The Voice of Israel" with Louis Kaplan.

A biography of Jessica Blanche Peixotto, a professor and women's activist, is presented. She was born on October 9, 1964 in New York and died in Berkeley, California in 1941. She graduated from the University of California (UC) in 1894 and became the first Jewish woman to attain the post of professor at the university in 1918. She taught sociology and economics at UC until 1935, was elected vice-president of the American Economic Association in 1928, and is the author of the book, "The French Revolution and Modern French Socialism."

A biography of Ernest Clifford Peixotto, a U.S. artist and writer, is presented. He was born in San Francisco, California on October 15, 1869 to the family of Raphael Peixotto. In 1915, he joined the Bohemian Club of San Francisco which included members like Jack London, Frank Norris, and Maynard Dixon. He exhibited his various paintings in New York in 1896 and made illustrations for various books including Theodore Roosevelt's "Life of Cromwell" and Henry CabotLodge's "Story of the Revolution."

A biography of Henry J. Labatt, a pioneer Jewish lawyer, is presented. He was born in New Orleans, Louisiana in 1832 and died on September 8, 1900 in Galveston, Texas. Labatt finished law studies at the University of Louisiana and graduated with a master's degree in Yale University. He practiced law as a Commissioner for Louisiana in 1850 and was elected Clerk of the Supreme Court in 1855. Labatt wrote many law books during his career, including a volume of "Reports of Cases Determined in the District Courts of the State of California" in 1858.

A biography of California Supreme Court judge, Solomon Heydenfeldt, is presented. He was born on September 14, 1816 in Charleston, South Carolina and died in San Francisco, California on September 15, 1890. Heydenfeldt was admitted to the bar at Montgomery, Alabama in 1837 where he began a successful law practice. He sought candidacy for the U.S. Senate in 1851 as a representative of California, and would establish his tenure at the state's Supreme Court from 1852-1857. Heydenfeldt wrote some 450 court opinions in the "California Reports."

A biography of David A. D'Ancona, B'Nai B'Rith leader, is presented. He was born in 1827 in London, England to a family of Sephardic Jews, and died on November 17, 1908. He received his education at the Bevis Marks Congregational School and arrived in New York in 1850 to work as a manager at Genin's Bazaar. In 1870, D'Ancona moved to San Francisco, California to resumed trade as a furrier, and became president of the B'Nai B'Rith District Grand Lodge No. 4 in 1876.

A biography of Joseph R. Brandon, a Jewish activist lawyer, is presented. Brandon was a Sephardic Jew who was born in Barbados on January 8, 1828 and died on April 22, 1916 in San Leandro, California. He was educated in London, England and traveled throughout Europe before arriving in San Francisco, California in 1855 where he studied and practiced law. Attorney Brandon worked for the separation of church and state in California, by opposing the Sunday closing law in 1861, and the recitation of the Lord's Prayer as a public school ritual in 1875.

A biography of David Belasco, a theater producer and playwright, is presented. Belasco was born in San Francisco, California on July 25, 1853 to a family descended from Portuguese Jews. He developed his interest in theater and drama when he attended the Lincoln Grammar School as a student of Bernhard Marks. As a stage manager, Belasco was known for being inventive and incorporating realism into scenes. He is remembered for his production of "Madame Butterfly" in 1900, and "The Girl of the Golden West" in 1905. Belasco died at the age of 76.

A biography of painter Arnold Belkin is presented. Belkin, who belongs to a family of Jewish immigrants from Russia, was born in 1930 in Calgary, Canada. He also lived in Mexico and went to the U.S. to teach, to paint and to conduct exhibitions. Belkin studied at the School of Art in Vancouver, Banff School of Fine Arts, and National Polytechnical Instituted in Mexico City. His first exhibit was in 1952 at the Anglo-Mexican Cultural Institute. His works include the "Kehila Mural," "Warsaw Uprising" and "Kaddish."

A biography of Kaspare Cohn, founder of the Kaspare Cohn Bank in Southern California, is presented. It notes Cohn's birth in Loebau, Prussia, Germany on June 14, 1839. It mentions his arrival with a little amount of money, ability, and character in Los Angeles, California in 1859. Furthermore, it also explores the business activities of Cohn and his partnership with his uncle Harris Newmarks and his brother Samuel Cohn.

A biography of Joseph Rodriguez Brandon, a Jewish activist lawyer in California, is presented. He was born on January 8, 1828 in Brandon Island, Barbados to Abraham Rodriguez Brandon, a wealthy planter. He was educated in London, England, entered the shipping business and studied law at the law office of Joseph Simpson, an early Sephardic, American-born attorney. He was noted as the leading defender of the civil rights of California Jewry in the nineteenth century.

A biography of Joseph Rodriguez Brandon, a Jewish activist lawyer in California is presented. It states that Brandon was born on January 8, 1828 on Brandon Islands of the Barbados, educated in London and had traveled extensively in Europe. It mentions that Brandon opposed the belief of John Hemphill, a pastor of the Calvary Presbyterian Church of San Francisco, that the Lord's Prayer must be recited in the classrooms. Eventually, Brandon charged Hemphill with purposely misquoting the Scriptures.

A biography of Rabbi Mayer May is presented. He was born in 1848 in Bavaria, Germany and eventually settled and became a religious school teacher in Vicksburg, Mississippi. May was elected as the rabbi of the Congregation Beth Israel to which he encouraged the adoption of Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise's prayer book called the "Minhag America." He became the first supervisor of the Jewish Education Socitey and died on May 23, 1913 at the age of 65.

A biography of Bertha "Birdie" Spier Stodel, one of the major leaders of the Jewish community in Los Angeles, California, is presented. She went to the Los Angeles High School and after she graduated, she became involved in humanitarian endeavors and helped in staging a civic benefit program to help the Galveston flood in 1900 in Texas. She married Jacob Andrew Stodel and they had three children but she continued to be involved in the community service. She died on April 22, 1970.

A biography of Anna Jacobson Myers, a rebbitzen and Jewish leader, is presented. Born in Vienna, Austria in 1866, Myers was married to the California's Zionist movement founder, Rabbi Isidore Myers. She founded the Jewish Women's Foreign Relief Association in 1905, and agreed to function as an interstate representative of the Jewish Consumptives' Relief Society of Denver. She was known for employing her intelligence, personality and background in pioneering modern fundraising in the Western U.S.

A biography of Jewish violinist Henry Heyman, who was born on January 13, 1855 in Oakland, California is presented. He began his training in violin under Philip Reiter and continued under Frederick Buch. He also studied at the Oakland College and in 1870, he was sent at the Royal Conservatory of Music at Leipzig to study violin. He died on March 28, 1924 at Hotel Paso Robles after suffering from a heart attack.

A biography of Rachel "Ray" Frank, referred to as the first woman rabbi of the U.S., is presented. She was born in 1861 in San Francisco, California to parents Bernard and Leah Frank. She finished her high school studies in 1879 and held adult education classes in a mining town in Ruby Hill, Nevada. She attended religious and cultural events in Eureka, which laid the groundwork for her future achievements. An event in Spokane, Washington which changed the position of women in the religious life of American Jewry, is described.

A biography of Isaac Lankershim, born a Jew in San Fernando Valley, California in 1818 and became a Christian religious devotee, is presented. Family ties remained close despite Lankershim's conversion from Judaism to the Baptist faith. He supported the Baptist College at Vacaville with endowments. The role that Lankershim played in the agricultural sector in California and the development of the area is explained. He died on April 10, 1882 of stomach cancer.

A biography of Rabbi Edgar Fogel Magnin is presented. The American Jewish religious leader was born on July 1, 1890 in San Francisco, California. He studied at John Swett Grammar School and then at Lowell High School in San Francisco. Magnin went to Hebrew Union College and finished the course incorporating the pre-rabbinic and rabbinic programs in only seven years instead of nine. The formal installation services for Magnin as a rabbi in Stockton, California were held at Temple Israel on September 11, 1914.

A biography of Michael G. Solomon, a lawyer and rabbi who served the Congregation B'nai B'rith in Los Angeles, California, is presented. Born in Poland on September 15, 1868 to Jacob B. and Myrna Burnett Solomon, he would enter City College and go on to the University of Cincinnati. The editor of "The American Israelite" expressed the hope that he would be instrumental in bringing the congregation into the Union of American Hebrew Congregations. His arrival to the city in the midst of controversy over the hiring of Rabbi Abraham Blum is also described.

A biography of Jewish child prodigy and chess grand master Samuel Reshevsky is presented. He was born in Ozorkow, Poland on November 26, 1911, became a chess player at the age of four, and made his first public appearance in a competition in Vienna, Austria after a year. Reshevsky played with the best chess players in the U.S. during his tour in 1920 and a reception was held for him at the Hotel Saint Francis in San Francisco, California. Also mentioned is his friendship with actor Charlie Chaplin.

A biography of Abraham Blum, a rabbi from Los Angeles, California is presented. Born in 1843 in Alsace, France, Blum's character was reportedly influenced by the environment of religious tolerance and high culture. After attending rabbinical school, Blum emigrated to the U.S., where he first became the rabbi of a congregation at Dayton, Ohio. The article particularly focuses on Blum's ministry in Galveston, Texas.

A biography of Jewish businessman Michael Reese is presented. He was born on August 15, 1817 in Hainsfurth, Bavaria and left for Baltimore, Maryland in 1836. Reese settled in San Francisco, California on June 24, 1850 with a capital of $120,000. It provides anecdotes about Reese's alleged stinginess. The businessman is said to have favored the University of California briefly when he was alive and more generously in death.

A biography of Los Angeles, California Rabbi Abraham Wolf Edelman is presented. Edelman was born on August 17, 1832 in Kutno, Poland. He received his Jewish education in Warsaw. Edelman and his wife, Hannah Pessah Cohn, came to the U.S. shortly after their marriage in 1851. In his first decade in the country, he became a Hebrew teacher and a salesman for a wholesale dry goods firm. Joseph Newmark, the patriarch of Jewry in Los Angeles, California, together with Moritz Morris, invited Edelman to officiate as the first professional rabbi in Los Angeles.

A biography of Abraham Cohen Labatt, pioneer of the first Reform Jewish congregation in the U.S., is presented. He was born in Charleston, South Carolina in 1802, and died in Galveston, Texas in 1899. Labatt was the first Sephardic Reform Jew and first master of the first Masonic Lodge in the West Coast. He migrated to San Francisco, California in 1849 where he worked as an appraiser for the Federal Customs House of the city port. In 1851, Labatt became the first president of the Emanu-El Congregation of San Francisco.

A biography of J. Mendes de Solla, a rabbi of Congregation Emanu-El, is presented. He was born in Amsterdam in 1818 and died at the age of 83. De Solla arrived in the U.S. in 1854 and settled in San Francisco, California in 1865 where he began writing for "The Hebrew" journal with Manuel Mordecai Noah. He was known in the Jewish community for taking a special interest in the Hebrew education of Jewish boys.