Tag Archives: Chicago

Jew of the Week: Lynn Margulis

The Rebel Evolutionist

Lynn Petra Alexander (1938-2011) was born in Chicago to a prominent Jewish (and passionately-Zionist) family. She got accepted to the University of Chicago when she was just 15 years old, and graduated with a BA four years later. That same year, she married (former Jew of the Week) Carl Sagan, then on his way to becoming a world-renowned scientist himself. She then went to the University of Wisconsin and earned her Master’s in genetics and zoology, followed by a PhD from UC Berkeley. Around that time, she divorced Carl Sagan and later married another scientist, Thomas Margulis. Although she divorced him as well, she kept the last name and is best known today as Lynn Margulis. In 1966, she became a biology professor at the University of Boston and remained there until 1988, when she became Distinguished Professor of Biology and Geosciences at the University of Massachusetts. Her 1967 paper “On the Origin of Mitosing Cells” was initially rejected by fifteen journals and stirred a great deal of controversy before being confirmed experimentally in 1978. Much of her research (and the opposition to it) was based on demonstrating major flaws within Darwin’s evolutionary theory. She would say that “Natural selection eliminates and maybe maintains, but it doesn’t create.” Margulis offered one hypothesis of her own, endosymbiosis, now a widely-accepted theory in biology and a key mechanism of evolution. Margulis also co-authored the first paper on the now-famous Gaia hypothesis regarding the intricate interactions between living things and the planet. Margulis worked tirelessly to the last days of her life. She co-authored another big (and controversial) paper in 2009—at the age of 71! Margulis has been called a “scientific rebel” and won countless awards, including a National Medal of Science from President Bill Clinton and a NASA Public Service Award for Astrobiology. She also has 15 honourary doctorates and was elected to the National Academy of Sciences. In 2002, she was ranked among the 50 most important women in science.

Words of the Week

We never judge a statement by its author, but only on its own merit.
– Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzatto (1707-1746), Derekh Tevunot 

Jew of the Week: Genndy Tartakovsky

Hotel Transylvania and Dexter’s Lab

Genndy Tartakovsky (Credit: Sony Animation)

Gennady “Genndy” Borisovich Tartakovsky (b. 1970) was born in Moscow. His family escaped the Soviet Union to Italy when he was still a child, and were soon forced to move again after experiencing tremendous anti-Semitism. They ended up in Chicago, where Tartakovsky grew up, enjoying his new-found comic books, American cartoons, Japanese anime, and comedy shows. Tartakovsky had a difficult youth. He was made fun of for being an immigrant, and always felt like an outsider. His father passed away when he was a teenager, and the family barely scraped by living in subsidized housing. Although he wanted to be a businessman and get his family out of the gutter, Tartakovsky was placed in an animation class and decided this was his life’s work. He would go on to study at the prestigious California Institute of the Arts in Los Angeles. After finishing his studies, Tartakovsky got a job in Spain working on a Batman cartoon. His big break came when he was hired by Hanna-Barbera and given the chance to come up with a show. Tartakovsky brushed off an old student project, Dexter’s Laboratory,which ended up on television and became hugely popular. It won three Annie Awards and was nominated for four Emmys. It would later be ranked among the 100 best cartoons and credited with launching ” a new generation of animated series that played on two levels, simultaneously fun for both kids and adults.” Tartakovsky then co-produced The Powerpuff Girls, followed by the hit Samurai Jack, which won him an Emmy and was also ranked among the 100 best cartoons. Tartakovsky’s shows boosted the Cartoon Network’s viewership from 12 million to 72 million. In 2005, Tartakovsky was hired by George Lucas to direct Star Wars: Clone Wars. The show won three Emmy Awards. In 2012, Tartakovsky made his film debut with Hotel Transylvania (originally created by Todd Durham), which was nominated for Best Animated Feature at the Golden Globes. Hotel Transylvania spawned two sequels, earning the trilogy nearly a billion dollars at the box office. Tartakovsky has worked on many other films and shows, including The Flintstones and Iron Man 2, and even wrote and illustrated for Marvel Comics. The key to a good comedy cartoon, he says, is writing with parents in mind and remembering that kids are really smart, too.

Words of the Week

I see Star Wars as taking all the issues that religion represents and trying to distill them down into a more modern and easily accessible construct… I put the Force into the movie in order to try to awaken a certain kind of spirituality in young people – more a belief in God than a belief in any particular religious system.
– George Lucas

Jew of the Week: Shelley Berman

Sheldon Leonard Berman (1925-2017) was born in Chicago. After serving in the navy during the Second World War, he went to study drama and theatre. Berman soon moved to New York in search of his big break, and in the mean time made a living as a taxi driver, dance instructor, speech therapist, and drug store worker. Failing to find success, Berman returned to Chicago and joined the Compass Players actors group. This group would transform into The Second City, an improv troupe that became one of the most influential in the world, eventually spawning Saturday Night Live, and many other hit shows and comedy clubs. In 1957, Berman started doing stand-up comedy and was soon signed to a record deal. His first three albums all went gold, and Berman won the first-ever Grammy for a comedy recording. With this, Berman launched an industry, making comedy albums popular and paving the way for countless future comedians. Berman starred on Broadway, and appeared on multiple TV shows, including The Ed Sullivan Show, The Twilight Zone, and MacGyver; as well as Friends, The King of Queens, Curb Your Enthusiasm, and Grey’s Anatomy later in his career. Berman also appeared in 11 films, wrote three books, two plays, and numerous poems and TV scripts. For twenty years, he taught humour writing at the University of Southern California. Berman was famous for his clean, innocent jokes; for making the annoyances of everyday life hilarious. Great comedians like Steve Martin, Woody Allen, and Jerry Seinfeld followed in his footsteps, and credited him with both being an inspiration, and “changing modern stand-up”. Sadly, Berman passed away last month from complications related to Alzheimer’s. Berman left behind a daughter, and a wife to whom he was happily married for an incredible seventy years. This was the achievement he was most proud of, and said: “The love we have and the way it has grown, that’s what I’d like to be remembered for.”

Words of the Week

Humour uplifts the mind from a state of constricted consciousness to a state of expanded consciousness.
– Rabbi Israel Baal Shem Tov