Judaic Lapel Buttons

I col­lect (Amer­i­can) Juda­ic lapel buttons.

I have over 3,500 unique items. Each one rep­re­sents a dif­fer­ent moment in Amer­i­can Jew­ish life and offers a way to learn about the Jew­ish experience.

polit­i­cal but­tons as history

instant history

Jews have pro­duced and dis­trib­uted lapel but­tons (or pins) since the begin­ning of the 20th cen­tu­ry. Some of these were pro­duced to com­mem­o­rate cel­e­bra­tions, oth­ers to make a point at demon­stra­tions. Some were pro­duced for com­mer­cial gain, and oth­ers for a polit­i­cal cam­paign. Their pur­pos­es are legion and diverse. Some are humor­ous, some seri­ous. Each one tells of a moment in the recent Jew­ish experience.

In the Spring of 1979, Present Tense mag­a­zine (pub­lished by the Amer­i­can Jew­ish Con­gress until the ear­ly 1990s) print­ed a brief descrip­tion of my col­lec­tion [Vol 6 #3 pp. 30–31, it was actu­al­ly the cov­er sto­ry]. At the time, the col­lec­tion num­bered only a few hun­dred items.


your lapel buttons

Many peo­ple have lapel but­tons. They may be attached to a favorite hat or jack­et you no longer wear, or poked into a cork-board on your wall. If you have any lay­ing around that you do not feel emo­tion­al­ly attached to, please let me know. I am pre­serv­ing these for the Jew­ish peo­ple. At some point they will all go to an appro­pri­ate museum.

things are not always as they seem

Some­times I find a but­ton that looks like it should belong in my col­lec­tion. To be on the “safe side” I’ll buy it… only to learn lat­er that…

Image on century-old lapel button is priest, not rabbi

[The Catholic Mes­sen­ger had moved the page, but I was able to find it in their archive and recon­nect the link on 2020.08.24.]

http://www.davka.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/neirman1301.png
Rt. Rev. Anton Nier­mann, who served at St. Joseph Parish in Dav­en­port, appears on a 1909 lapel but­ton that Rab­bi Mark Hurvitz of New York bought.

other buttons shared

  1. women fight­ers and sho’a nightmares
  2. count­ing the omer to climb over the rain­bow from slav­ery to roy­al­ty at Sinai
  3. learn­ing the cheers
  4. on being a bridge, a “com­pro­mise selec­tion” in a “gor­geous mosaic”
  5. jew­ish texts on fair vot­ing and just elections
  6. rejoice in your fes­ti­vals — a sukkot meditation
  7. how many dif­fer­ent ways can you say the al chet (על חטא)?
  8. Pass the Anti-Lynch­ing Bill!
  9. breath­ing and the א of revelation
  10. Plagues Suck (or: Passover in a time of plague)
  11. Queen Esther Helped Me Beat the Draft
  12. To big­otry no sanction
  13. A Grow­ing Hag­gadah (2019)
  14. Did you go to the Purim Concert?
  15. Be Hap­py, It’s Adar! (again)
  16. Fake News vs. Truth a case of Goliath vs. David

  17. Jews and Cam­paign But­tons: A Time-Hon­ored Tradition
  18. crossover
  19. let’s exper­i­ment
  20. #blo­gelul — hear
  21. #blo­gelul — believe
  22. #blo­gelul — be
  23. #blo­gelul — do
  24. #blo­gelul — know
  25. #blo­gelul — bless
  26. #blo­gelul — act
  27. pre­pare
  28. face to face
  29. (ac)counting
  30. jew­ish envi­ron­men­tal­ism and tu b’sh’vat
  31. faith mccain 2008 faith obama 2008 #blo­gelul : faith 
  32. a shonda!
    trust me, i'm a rabbi
    #blo­gelul : trust 
  33. love
    40 israel
    david's bar mitzvah
    a great day on eldridge street
    remember plo massacre
    10 commandments
    quad temple 9th grade convention
    brith sholom
    remember the sabbath
    six million
    brought five
    sarah rebecca rachel & leah
    mazon
    moses and the tablets
    we are all one people #blo­gelul : counting 
  34. celebrating 150 years
    Union of American Hebrew Congregations
    given for good behavior
    willkie
    let my people go

    Freedom for Soviet Jewry СБОВДА
    I am a maccabee
    dress british think yiddish #blo­gelul : inventory 
  35. arise return #blo­gelul : return 
  36. hashachar promise of dawn 
  37. aipac can an aipac sup­port­er explain this one? 
  38. time for pruning 
  39. אחוה 6 on a scale of 1 to 10? 
  40. SelfDeterminationForPalestine-300x300.png what’s the dif­fer­ence between 48 and 11? 
  41. begin sadat button a cold peace 
  42. breira now is the time for change 
  43. א שענערע און בעשׂערע וועלט what would dad think? 
  44. the real thing …the real thing? 
  45. smiling hillel love human­i­ty, & bring them close 2 #Torah
  46. beyond the straits and narrow 
  47. remem­ber­ing pearls of music 
  48. the new year; trav­el­ing for chocolate…
  49. let us make light
  50. It’s very clear
  51. pirke ima­hot .01
  52. when?
  53. אלול comes every year
  54. Hiroshi­ma 広島市 Day Again (may we have many)
  55. i love my gay rabbis
  56. which jews…?
  57. the elec­tron­ic leaflet
  58. מזל טוב
  59. be תורה
  60. the boy and I
  61. giv­ing and taking
  62. fol­low­ing orders
  63. let my peo­ple go (2)
  64. do can­dles have feelings?
  65. how much is any life worth?
  66. esther’s song
  67. steve’s song
  68. Swann Song
  69. Shake a Bib­li­cal Bouquet
  70. The Peo­ple of the…
  71. Elul Home­work 2 (I’ve done that too!)
  72. How did the על חטא (al ḥet) begin?
  73. Elul Home­work 1
  74. Uni­fy­ing my life as I trim my garden
  75. I am my ♥’s and my ♥ is mine אלול
  76. for mul­ti­ple trans­gres­sions of…
  77. Hiroshi­ma 広島市 Day ☮
  78. Help Save Raoul Wal­len­berg; Sav­ior of 100,000 Jews
  79. Rab­bis for Human Rights
  80. Anne Frank
  81. I. L. Peretz
  82. Theodor Her­zl
  83. Yom haShoa 5769
  84. Let My Peo­ple Go
  85. Be Hap­py, It’s Adar

images of lapel buttons found around the Web


This page was originally Posted 26 March, 2009 (Rosh Ḥosdesh Nisan, 5769)

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.