Rabbi David Einhorn and Sanding a Caboose

 

Thomas Pate

Rabbi David Einhorn

            My addition to President Street station that stands in the lobby is a banner depicting the life of Rabbi David Einhorn. Einhorn was an immigrant to Baltimore from Germany, and he was the writer of the abolitionist newspaper Sinai. His anti slavery views, backed up by holy text, inflamed hatred towards him from not only pro slavery Baltimoreans but from members of the Jewish community. Some Rabbis, such as Rabbi Raphall, disagreed on the interpretation of the Torah, stating that enslaving African Americans was not sinful. After the Pratt Street Riots, Einhorn’s newspaper building was burned to the ground, and he received death threats for himself and his family, forcing him to flee Baltimore to Philadelphia.

Researching this banner required a visit to the UMBC library, and I also inquired from local Rabbis about Einhorn’s history. When writing the banner, I had to restart during the internship since I was not satisfied with the work I completed. Eventually, I finished writing the banner and Robert Reyes was able to transfer it to an editor, who finished the banner. There were not really too many interesting things to say about this, as it was a cut and dry research project, but there is another project I did at the internship which went without as much notice as the banner.

As I mentioned in the first blog post, I sanded down a caboose and this had numerous challenges. First, I applied Bondo to the holes on the sides of the caboose, and waited for the putty to dry. Then, I belt sanded the exposed portions to be flush with the rest of the surface. This kicked up many fine particles that wafted all over my clothes and the sidewalk. Eventually, I stopped any more work since particulates were starting to enter the adjacent James Joyce restaurant. I finished the job well enough, and that was another contribution I made to the museum. These two contributions to President Street Station were small, but they were quite memorable since I learned new skills such as networking and belt sanding.