Our KI Library is as old as KI. The founding members began the collection over 50 years ago, and it has expanded over the years. The library is maintained by a dedicated group of KI congregants.
We have a children’s collection located in the Early Childhood Center which is supported completely by donations to the Donald Goldberg Memorial Fund and the community.
Our Adult collection is located next to the sanctuary and contains an extensive range of Judaica. It is supported by the Library Fund. Donations to these two funds are greatly appreciated and well used. We encourage you to make a donation today.
The library works on the honor system so you don’t have to worry about whether we’re open when you come. Just pull the card out of the book you’re checking out, fill out the card with the date and your name and phone number and leave the card in the front of the box on the library “book truck” (the book truck is on your left as you leave the library). Please return the book within a month by placing it on the same book truck (the library committee volunteers will take care of checking the book in and reshelving it.)
our ki collections
- The Adult Collection is based on the Elaza Classification system for Judaica libraries. The complete card catalog is located on the computer in the middle carrel (on your left as you enter the library).
– Reference books are noted by the letter R before the call number and on the spine of the books. Reference books are at the back of the library. Please do NOT remove a reference book from the library.
– The Fiction collection is listed by initials of author’s last name and is found by the door to the patio toward the back of the library.
– The Non-Fiction collection is organized as follows:
001-099 Bible and Biblical Studies
100-199 Classical Judaica: Halakhah & Midrash
200-299 Jewish Observances & Practices (includes holidays, baby naming, weddings, B’nai Mitzvah)
300-399 Jewish Education
400-499 Hebrew, Jewish Languages & Sciences (includes Yiddish)
500-599 Jewish Literature
600-699 The Jewish Community: Society & Arts (including Women Studies)
700-799 Jewish History, Geography & Biography
800-899 Israel & Zionism
A complete listing of the library catalog is on the computer in the middle carrel on the left as you enter the library. Instructions for the use of the catalog are on the bulletin board above the computer. There are guides on the shelves directing you to the numbers/subjects as indicated in the catalog.
HThThe Rest of Us by Stephen Birmingham. Birmingham, better known for Our Crowd about the arrival of German Jews in New York, writes now about the wave of Eastern European Jewish immigrants who swept into New York in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries by way of Ellis Island. Not welcomed by the settled German Jews, the new arrivals were tough, passionate, and determined, and in no time they were moving up from the ghetto tenements of New York’s Lower East Side to make their marks and their fortunes across the country in a variety of fields, from media and popular music to fashion, motion pictures, and even organized crime. (771.5 BIR)
The Downtown Jews by Ronald Sanders. A history of the 1880s through World War II told mostly from the standpoint of the Jewish Forward. (771.5 SAN)
Tough Jews by Rich Cohen. Tough Jews traces a generation of Jewish gangsters from New York City’s Lower East Side to its Upper East Side. This is a (sometimes) gruesome but funny history of the Jewish gangster. You can almost hear the squeal of tires and the rattle of gunfire as you read. (770.9 COH)
The Deadliest Lies by Abraham H. Foxman. The former head of the Anti-Defamation League shows how old stereotypes associated with the most virulent forms of bigotry have been resurfacing and taking subtle new forms, particularly around Israel and the so-called “Jewish Lobby.” (770.9 FOX)
HTJews and the New American Scene by Seymour Martin Lipset and Earl Raab. The authors discuss the Jewish success and acceptance in the United States, as well as the problems of assimilation and the erosion of Jewish identity. (770.9 LIP)
The New Country: Jewish Immigrants in America by Abraham Shulman. Over a period of 20 years around the turn of the century, over 2 million Jews left Eastern Europe to come to the United States. This book gives a picture of what they did when they got here and how they adapted to their new country. (771.5 SH)
Number Our Days by Barbara Myerhoff. When noted anthropologist Myerhoff received a grant to explore the process of aging, she decided to study some elderly Jews from Venice, California, rather than to report on a more exotic people. The story of the rituals and lives of these remarkable old people will enthrall you. (777.1 Myerhoff)
Profiles in American Judaism by Marc Lee Raphael. This book provides perspective on the historical development of the different branches of American Judaism. (770 RA)