Dorothy Straus
Geneviève Straus
Geneviève Straus-“an incomparable woman, unique, with infinite grace, and a supreme spirit”- was a muse to Marcel Proust and hosted influential salons attended by artists, politicians, and nobility.
Rahel Straus
Rahel Goitein Straus, a pioneering woman medical doctor trained in Germany, was a model “New Jewish Woman” of the early-20th century. Successfully combining a career as a physician with marriage and motherhood, she committed herself to Jewish and feminist causes and organizations throughout her life, while also embracing Zionist ideals.
Sarah Lavanburg Straus
With the support of philanthropist Baroness Clara de Hirsch, Sarah Lavanburg Straus helped to establish two homes for immigrant girls in New York City early in the twentieth century.
Annette Greenfield Strauss
Lillian Laser Strauss
Lillian Laser Strauss performed pioneering work in public health and child welfare in Pennsylvania, became a lawyer at age fifty, and, in the midst of active legal advocacy for public health, died suddenly of a heart attack at age fifty-six.
Barbra Streisand
Hilda Weil Stroock
Hilda Weil Stroock was a sponsor of the first Women’s Conference on Jewish Affairs held in 1938 at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. This pioneering event reflected her lifelong interest in the welfare of women and children and the condition of the Jewish community.
Regina D. Stroock
Born in New York City in 1875 to a life of privilege, Regina Stroock parlayed her talents and wealth into a career of philanthropy and civic leadership. Active in both Jewish and New York City philanthropy, Stroock involved herself with many charitable organizations related to child welfare and other social issues of the time.
Manya Gordon Strunsky
Manya Gordon Strunsky was a socialist activist and a respected writer on political and social issues. Strunsky was also instrumental in bringing Jewish immigrants from czarist Russia to America and helping them to become settled.
Rivka Sturman
Shira Stutman
Suburbanization in the United States
Jews migrated in large numbers to newly constructed suburbs after World War II and the end of restrictive covenants that had excluded them. During the day, suburbs were largely female spaces where married Jewish women cared for their children and private homes, while volunteering for Jewish and civic activities. Jewish daughters raised in suburbs enjoyed middle-class comforts but also experienced pressures to conform to American gentile ideals of beauty.
Suffrage in Palestine
Suffrage in the United States
American Jewish women were heavily involved in the suffrage movement from its earliest days, though mostly as individuals rather than through organizations. Middle-class Jewish women believed the vote was necessary to achieve their broader reform goals, while working-class women hoped enfranchisement would improve their working conditions and economic opportunities. By the time the Nineteenth Amendment finally passed in 1919 the American Jewish community overwhelmingly supported it.
Sara Sugarman
Sara Sugarman is a Welsh-born movie director and actor, who made her mark as a small-screen performer before stepping behind the camera to direct international award-winning movies with a Welsh twist.
Hasya Sukenik-Feinsod
Hasya Sukenik Feinsod served as director of the Hebrew Kindergarten Teachers College. In 1919 Feinsod was appointed by the Education Committee to serve as superintendent of kindergartens in Jerusalem. She headed the Association of Kindergarten Teachers, and she was the first and only female representative on the Education Committee.
Sarra Copia Sullam
The best-known and least typical Jewish woman of early-modern Italy, Sarra Copia Sullam engaged publicly with leading intellectuals and produced poetry, letters, and polemics, particularly about the belief in immortality of the soul. The context of her literary activity was the academies (accademia) of Venice, including one that she held in her own house, which attracted a stream of distinguished visitors from the city states of northern Italy who discussed philosophy, theology, art, and literature and who engaged in domestic intrigue.
Elsie K. Sulzberger
Elsie K. Sulzberger had an important public career through her leadership in the National Council of Jewish Women and in the early twentieth-century birth control movement.
Iphigene Ochs Sulzberger
Rachel Hays Sulzberger
Rachel Hays Sulzberger maintained an active volunteer career in public service, in both Jewish and secular organizations. She is best remembered as the second president of the New York section of the National Council of Jewish Women.
Rachel Sumekh
Summer Camping in the United States
The Jewish summer camp movement shaped ethnic-American identity and Jewish childhood throughout the twentieth and into the twenty-first century. A means to fight anti-Semitism by showcasing patriotism and developing the camper’s physical fitness, it was also a safe space to explore, question and craft religious traditions and rituals, novel ideas about girlhood, and the possibilities of womanhood.
Jacqueline Susann
Author and actress Jacqueline Susann made history as the first author to have three consecutive New York Times bestsellers, starting with her famous 1966 novel, Valley of the Dolls. She is credited with drastically changing book promotion and marketing, using television and print advertising to promote her novels rather than relying on reviews.
Susanna: Apocrypha
Susanna’s story comes from Greek manuscripts of the Book of Daniel and is included in the Christian but not Jewish canon. She was a Babylonian Jewish woman who was falsely accused of adultery by two judges, but was saved by God through Daniel.
