In Jewish hall of fame: Streisand, no Stooges

Albert Einstein made the cut.

So did Irving Berlin, Leonard Bernstein, Golda Meir, and Sandy Koufax.

But the National Museum of American Jewish History, whose new home is under construction on Independence Mall, will also honor some little-known Jewish Americans among the 18 selected for its "Only in America" hall of fame.

Does the name Rose Schneiderman ring a bell? Isaac Leeser?

In July, the museum invited the public to vote on (and learn about) 218 candidates for possible admission to its gallery. Over four weeks, it received more than 209,000 votes from 56 countries, according to president Michael Rosenzweig.

"I was amazed," he said yesterday. "We didn't know what to expect."

Still, the popular vote alone did not decide who would be featured in the ground-floor gallery when the doors to the modernistic, five-story, $150 million building open in the fall of 2010.

The museum's panel of historians and consultants were asked to balance the superstars of American Jewry with Jews whose achievements have been underrecognized, particularly women. Hence, the list comprises the iconic Einstein as well as Schneiderman, an early labor leader.

Admission to the gallery "was never a popularity contest," Rosenzweig explained.

The museum is refusing to reveal the poll standing of the 200 who will not be featured in the gallery. And so the burning question is left unanswered: Who got more votes, nominees Larry or Moe of the Three Stooges?

Nevertheless, Rosenzweig said, popular opinion played an essential role in the selections. The top vote-getter in each of eight categories, such as science, sports, philanthropy, and literature, will be featured in the gallery.

Barbra Streisand was traveling out of the country when her inclusion in the hall of fame was announced. But yesterday her publicist, Dick Guttman, called it "one of the most honorable lists I've ever seen. I'm sure she'll be thrilled."

Each honoree will be the subject of an exhibit and short video. The museum, which has raised $120 million of its $150 million construction budget, also plans to add new faces to the gallery over time. The museum's Web site, with a link to biographies of its 218 original nominees, is www.nmajh.org.

Broad agreement on a short list of America's most important Jews is nearly impossible, said Mel Wacks, founder in 1969 of another Jewish hall of fame, at the Judah L. Magnes Museum in Berkeley, Calif.

"I was surprised they didn't include Haym Salomon," said Wacks, a retired electrical engineer and numismatist. Salomon, who lived in Philadelphia, was a leading financier of the American Revolution.

Wack's hall of fame features 39 individuals and one synagogue. Among those missing from the Philadelphia museum's list: songwriter George Gershwin, Philadelphia educator Rebecca Gratz, historian Elie Wiesel, magician Harry Houdini, playwright Arthur Miller, clothier Levi Strauss, comedian Milton Berle.

His exhibit of about 40 plaques is currently on display at the B'nai B'rith headquarters in Washington. The Jewish American Hall of Fame's Web site is at www.amuseum.org/jahf

The Jewish Americans who will be honored when the National Museum of American Jewish History's "Only in America" gallery opens next year are:

Irving Berlin: composer and lyricist; wrote "God Bless America" and "White Christmas," among other songs.

Leonard Bernstein: composer and conductor of New York Philharmonic.

Louis D. Brandeis: first Jewish justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Albert Einstein: mathematician and physicist, Nobel Prize winner; made landmark discoveries into the nature of time and space, including the special and general theories of relativity

Mordecai Kaplan: founder of Reconstructionist Judaism.

Sandy Koufax: record-setting pitcher for the Brooklyn and Los Angeles Dodgers; refused to play a World Series game on Yom Kippur.

Estée Lauder: businesswoman, founder of the fragrance and cosmetic firm that bears her name.

Emma Lazarus: poet and Zionist, author of sonnet "The New Colossus," whose famous lines - "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free" - adorn the Statue of Liberty.

Isaac Leeser: rabbi, author, prayer leader of Congregation Mikveh Israel in Philadelphia, translator and publisher of the first English-language Torah in the United States.

Golda Meir: first prime minister of Israel. Born in Ukraine, she lived from 1906 to 1921 in the United States before emigrating.

Jonas Salk: physician who developed a successful polio vaccine.

Menachem Mendel Schneerson: "the Rebbe," leader of the worldwide Chabad-Lubavitch Hasidic movement based in Brooklyn.

Rose Schneiderman: labor leader, especially of garment workers, and a founder of the American Civil Liberties Union.

Isaac Bashevis Singer: short-story author who wrote in Yiddish; won 1978 Nobel Prize for literature.

Steven Spielberg: Oscar-winning film director and producer of such hits as Jaws, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and Schindler's List.

Barbra Streisand: singer, actress, songwriter, film director, political activist.

Henrietta Szold: early Zionist and feminist, founder of Hadassah, the women's Zionist and service organization, in 1909.

Isaac Mayer Wise: rabbi and religious reformer, founder of Reform Judaism and Hebrew Union College, the movement's rabbinic seminary.