Gatecrashers

Dreyfus: A Very Modern Affair is an October 7th story, but one that begins not in 2023, but in October of 1894 with the arrest of French military officer Alfred Dreyfus, who also happened to be a Jew. The implications of his framing, arrest, incarceration and the fallout of his eventual exoneration reverberate today. Over this five-episode series, we examine how these events unfolded, and how they...

Covering Their Tracks is the extraordinary story of a young man’s escape from a moving train bound for the Auschwitz concentration camp during the Holocaust, and his fight to hold the French national rail company, the SNCF, accountable for their actions as they later bid for lucrative high-speed rail contracts in the United States. For more information visit http://tabletmag.com/coveringtheirtrack...

In the 1990s, Harvard’s student body was said to be nearly a quarter Jewish. According to the Harvard Crimson’s 2020 survey of the freshman class, 6.7 percent of respondents identified as Jewish. On the final episode of this series, we explore the declining numbers of Jewish students across the Ivy League, and try to understand why, at places like Harvard, there may be fewer Jewish students today...

By the late 1980s, most Ivy League schools were a fifth or a quarter Jewish—and the University of Pennsylvania was more Jewish than most. For starters, unlike several other Ivies, Penn was never a Christian divinity school. It’s located in the heart of a big city that has had a large Jewish population going back to colonial times. Plus, it offered a plethora of professional schools, which, as we’v...

In the fall of 1970, a group of Jewish Cornell students did something radical. Energized by a Freedom Seder on campus led by Arthur Waskow and the countercultural movement sweeping a country, they created a Jewish communal house. The Cornell Havurah was an “an anti-establishment establishment,” completely independent with no deans, resident advisors, or national organizations overseeing it.  The h...

While today most American universities offer all sorts of dining accommodations, the on-campus dining scene in the 1950s was far less welcoming for students with specific dietary needs. For students who observed the Jewish dietary laws known as kashrut, and therefore didn’t mix milk with meat or eat pork or shellfish (among other restrictions), their options for elite colleges were narrowed even f...

It’s accepted as gospel—or at least reliable urban legend—that at nearly every Ivy League school in the mid-20th century, there were limits on the number of Jews admitted each year. The Jewish population, it was said, was capped at 10 percent of the student body. But was that true? Episode 4 of Gatecrashers investigates the real story of Jewish quotas, examining the practice at Yale University. Yo...

On the surface, all-male Dartmouth in the 1940s and 1950s seems like it would be deeply unappealing to Jews: rural New Hampshire campus, no Jewish girls within miles, a history of antisemitic fraternities. But Jewish alumni from that era seemed to love Dartmouth. Why? Something about Dartmouth—maybe it was the bucolic campus, the mountains, all that fresh air—made for a more laid-back environment...

Back in the 1950s, the Princeton eating clubs were essential. The dining hall was only meant for freshmen and sophomores. The club you joined as a sophomore became not just a place to eat but the center of your Princeton social life, a place to hang out, nurture friendships, and make connections.  According to one estimate, by the late 1950s, the school was about one seventh Jewish. But the Jewish...

Isaac Asimov was one of the most prolific authors in history. He was best known as a pathbreaking sci-fi writer, but his more than 500 books also included volumes on the Greeks, the Romans, Shakespeare, the Bible, and much more. He was one of the most learned men in history.  But in 1935, 15-year-old Asimov was rejected by Columbia University. Admissions officials instead directed him to Seth Low...

What topic is more controversial, sensational, and endlessly captivating than college admissions? It’s a billion-dollar industry. It sends celebrities to jail. The Supreme Court is weighing in on who gets in and why. We might think we have read all there is to read on the issue, and heard all there is to hear. But if you want to understand everything that’s going on with college admissions today—n...