Donald H. Harrison

Donald H. Harrison

Donald H. Harrison is the publisher and editor of San Diego Jewish World. 

Harrison began his journalism career in 1962 on the UCLA Daily Bruin.  Following graduation he joined the staff of the Associated Press, and later became politics writer for The San Diego Union.  Afterwards he pursued a career in tourism, helping to establish San Diego’s Cruise Ship Program as well as Old Town Trolley Tours of San Diego.  He also wrote for such Jewish publications as the San Diego Jewish Press Heritage and San Diego Jewish Times before starting San Diego Jewish World in 2007.

Don’s  latest work is the three-volume Schlepping and Schmoozing Along the Interstate 5.  

He is the author of six previous books.  Those with links may be obtained on Amazon.

Young Readers Get a Taste of the Holocaust in ‘One Day’

“One day at a time. One day after another” was the motto of Holocaust escapees Eugene Handschuh and his father Oscar. Accordingly, father and son submitted to the brutal schedule the Nazis forced on them until they perceived an opportunity to escape — not once, but twice. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Holocaust, International, Jewish History, Staff and Bylined Contributors

Gymnast Survived Nazis; Went on to Become Gold Medalist in Olympics

This book, written in simple language for children between the ages of 5 and 9, tells of Ágnes being banned from the national gymnasium because she was Jewish.  In response, she secretly practiced early in the morning at an unlit, unheated high school gym with her friend Istvan Sarkany. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Holocaust, International, Israel, Jewish History, Sports & Competitions, Staff and Bylined Contributors

Biography Explains the Holocaust to Children Ages 8 to 12

It augments the narrative with supplemental pages explaining such terms and concepts as World War II, antisemitism, ghettos, partisans, the Holocaust, collaborators, the righteous among the nations, the camps, and resistance. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Holocaust, International, Jewish History, Staff and Bylined Contributors

Book Traces History of the Anne Frank House from Its Construction in 1635

The house at 263 Prinsengracht (Prince’s Canal) in Amsterdam was built in 1635, more than three centuries before its most famous resident—Anne Frank–lived and hid there from the Nazi occupiers. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Holocaust, International, Jewish History, Staff and Bylined Contributors

Rabbi Drazin’s Speculations Generate an Eclectic Book

Our regular readers will not be surprised that in this book he poses answerless questions intended to make us think. He speculates about the sacred and the mundane, inquiring in chapter 30 “What do we know about God?” and in chapter 26 about “Ethical behaviors concerning shoes.” [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Israel Drazin-Rabbi Dr., Jewish Religion, Staff and Bylined Contributors, Trivia, Humor & Satire

Novel Explores an Immigrant Jewish Family’s Life in Louisville Before World War II

This novel is a collection of sequential short stories about the Toplansky family, whose patriarch Shlomo immigrated in 1920 from Bialystok, Poland, to Louisville, Kentucky. He changed his first name to Sol and eked a living from his tailoring shop supplemented by singing and gambling.  He served as the chazzan at the Orthodox synagogue. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Jewish Fiction, Staff and Bylined Contributors, USA

Biblical Imagery Brightens Poet’s Bleak Account of Life in the Arizona Desert

Poet Allisa Cherry is entranced by Hebrew Scriptures, turning to them to express her anguish over the tragic lives of the members of a Mormon family. A grandmother had a double mastectomy; a father died of radiation poisoning caused by nuclear testing in the desert; a brother died in a car accident before he was 20; and a wife, caught in a loveless marriage, divorces her ne’er-do-well husband. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Jewish Religion, Staff and Bylined Contributors, USA

Kol Tefillah Band Specializes in Music for Praying and Reflecting

Something ignited when Debbie Mishek, M.D., traveled to Congregation Beth Am in Los Angeles to attend a presentation about Kol Tefillah (The Voice of Prayer) a few years ago.  The program was about “reimagining Jewish prayer and making it more relevant and more inspiring,” the developmental pediatrician recalled.  “There is something about music and prayer that is so spiritual.  I access my spirituality through music.” [Donald H. Harrison]

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California, Donald H. Harrison, Jewish Religion, Music, Dance, and Visual Arts, Staff and Bylined Contributors

Frances Perkins, Nation’s First ‘Madam Secretary’ Tried to Help European Jewish Refugees

Struggling against American xenophobia, racism, and antisemitism in the 1930s, Labor Secretary Frances Perkins—the first woman to serve in a President’s Cabinet – sought in several ways to spare German Jewish refugees from annihilation by Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Antisemitism, Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, International, Jewish History, Staff and Bylined Contributors, USA

Good Deeds, Even Little Ones, Change the World for the Better

In a big city, a little girl notices that a swing has become unhooked on one side so that it hangs limply.  Another swing has some off both hooks and is lying on the ground. She wants to fix them. With the help of her grandmother, she rehooks the swings. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Lifestyles, Philanthropy & Volunteerism, Staff and Bylined Contributors

Nazi Hunter Lewkowicz Identified Amon Göth, Infamous Commandant of Plaszow Concentration Camp

He identified Amon Göth, the commandant of Plaszow, whose brutality was graphically depicted in the movie Schindler’s List.  Göth used to shoot inmates for target practice from a vantage point overlooking the concentration camp.  Touring the camp, Göth would abruptly murder inmates on a whim.  He reveled in making Jews quake. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Holocaust, International, Israel, Jewish History, Staff and Bylined Contributors

Novel Depicts a Man’s Metamorphosis from a Hare to a Tortoise

The title of this book, referencing “tortoise” and “hair,” immediately brings to mind Aesop’s Fable about the race between the tortoise and the hare in which the slow and steady tortoise defeats the brilliantly fast but overly distracted hare. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Staff and Bylined Contributors

How a Neighborhood Rallied to Save a Library’s Collection Unavoidably Soaked by Firefighters

In 1966, a fire that started on a top floor of the 10-story Jewish Theological Seminary building in New York City destroyed 70,000 books and other written items.  Many were extra copies of the books stored below; others were irreplaceable items such as the Torah scrolls sent for safekeeping from Danzig during the Holocaust. [Donald H. Harrison]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Jewish History, Jewish Religion, Philanthropy & Volunteerism, San Diego County, Staff and Bylined Contributors, USA