Aleph Zadik Aleph. Rauch Chapter 107. Records, 1951-1975, 2002
Held by The Filson Historical Society
Creator: Aleph Zadik Aleph. Rauch Chapter 107 (Louisville, Ky.)
Title: Aleph Zadik Aleph. Rauch Chapter 107. Records, 1951-1975, 2002
Rights: For information regarding literary and copyright interest for these papers, contact the Collections Department.
Size of Collection: 0.66 cu. ft (in 1 cu. ft. box) and 1 ovsz. Box
Location Number: Mss. BD A369
Historical Note
Louisville’s Aleph Zadik Aleph (AZA) Chapter 107 was a Jewish high school fraternity founded in November 1929 and affiliated with the international Jewish service organization, B’nai B’rith, and with the B’nai B’rith Youth Organization (BBYO) after BBYO’s formation in 1944. In April 1957, Chapter 107 became the Rabbi Joseph Rauch Memorial Chapter of the Aleph Zadik Aleph, named in honor of Joseph Rauch (1880-1957), who served as rabbi of Louisville’s Temple Adath Israel from 1912-1957.
During the 20th century, Louisville’s Jewish high school fraternities and sororities met at the Young Men’s Hebrew Association (YMHA) downtown and then at the Jewish Community Center (JCC) after its opening on Dutchmans Lane in 1955. The Rauch Chapter of AZA was disbanded in 1977.
Scope and Content Note
The collection consists of records of Aleph Zadik Aleph (AZA) Chapter 107, a Jewish high school fraternity in Louisville, Kentucky, affiliated with the B’nai B’rith Youth Organization (BBYO) and renamed the Rabbi Joseph Rauch Memorial Chapter in 1957. Included in the collection are newsletters, member information, and scrapbooks from 1951-1975, as well as correspondence and notes from a 2002 reunion. Materials document Rauch AZA’s activities and Jewish youth culture in the post-World War II decades, when Louisville’s Jewish youth groups were filled with teenage members of the baby boom generation.
Folders 1-4 hold newsletters from 1951, 1962, and 1967-1971 and member rosters from 1957-1963 and 1967. The 1951 Beacon newsletter provides information about dances, updates about the basketball team, social tidbits about AZA Chapter 107 members, and jokes. A newsletter from 1962 and Rauch Ragweed issues from 1967-1971 document activities such as Skit Nite, fundraising, songfest, sports league play, quiz bowl, BBYO district conventions, and Oneg Shabbat on Friday nights. There are editorials about Israel, Soviet Jewry, the Vietnam War, and environmental issues. Newsletters mention other local Jewish youth groups such as Amitie, Resnick AZA, Vinson AZA, Brandeis BBG (B’nai B’rith Girls), Modern Femmes, and Mu Sigma. Information about members includes a short write-up in the August 1962 newsletter about new member Hector Gonzalez, who came to the United States from Cuba with his family in 1961. There are officer updates and notes from the chapter’s “Sweetheart”—an individual chosen each year from one of the Jewish high school sororities. In the late 1960s-early 1970s, officers comment in newsletters about lackluster member participation in Rauch AZA social activities and fundraisers.
Folders 5-9 and oversize volumes 13-14 consist of disassembled and intact scrapbooks from 1957-1975. The scrapbooks include telegrams and other correspondence, event programs, awards and certificates, newspaper clippings, and photographs of members and activities. These materials document Rauch AZA’s social events, sports teams, service work, BBYO activities, and relations with other local Jewish youth groups.
Folders 10-12 consist of miscellaneous records from 1963-1972 and 2002. There is a ledger account book from 1963-1967. Materials from 1967-1971 include Louisville Council BBYO information, a July 1969 Kentucky Jewish Post and Opinion article about Rauch AZA burying a time capsule at the Rauch Planetarium, and a 1972 membership roster. Also of note are emails and notes relating to a Rauch AZA Chapter 107 reunion at the new Rauch Planetarium in 2002.
Related collections:
Aleph Zadik Aleph. Rauch Chapter 107 (Louisville, Ky.) museum items [2022.23.1-3].
Aleph Zadik Aleph. Rauch Chapter 107 (Louisville, Ky.) photograph collection [022PC25].
Folder List
Box 1
Folder 1: Beacon and Rauch Ragweed newsletters and AZA rosters, 1951, 1957-1967
Folder 2: Rauch Ragweed newsletters, 1968
Folder 3: Rauch Ragweed newsletters, 1969
Folder 4: Rauch Ragweed newsletters, 1970-1971
Folder 5: Scrapbook, 1957-1960
Folder 6: Scrapbook, 1961-1966
Folder 7: Scrapbook, 1966-1967
Folder 8: Scrapbook, 1968-1969
Folder 9: Scrapbook, 1970-1971
Folder 10: Ledger book, 1963-1967
Folder 11: Miscellaneous materials, 1967-1972
Folder 12: Correspondence and notes for reunion, 2002
Box 2 [oversize]
Volume 13: Scrapbook, 1972
Volume 14: Scrapbook, 1973-1975
Subject Headings
Baby boom generation.
Blacks – Relations with Jews – Kentucky – Louisville.
B’nai B’rith Girls.
B’nai B’rith Youth Organization.
Cuban Americans.
Environmentalism – Kentucky – Louisville.
Fasts and feasts – Judaism.
Fort Knox (Ky.)
Greek letter societies – United States.
Hadassah, the Women’s Zionist Organization of America. Louisville Chapter.
Jewish American newspapers – Kentucky.
Jewish Community Center (Louisville, Ky.)
Jewish youth – Societies and clubs – Kentucky – Louisville.
Jews – Identity.
Jews – Kentucky – Louisville.
Jews, Soviet.
Jews – United States – Attitudes toward Israel.
Judaism – Customs and practices.
Rauch, Joseph, 1880-1957.
Smoking.
Team sports – Kentucky – Louisville.
Time capsules – Kentucky – Louisville.
Vietnam War, 1961-1975.
Young Men’s Hebrew Association (Louisville, Ky.)
