Shana Tova Tel Aviv, 1930

This is a Shana Tova card from the year 5691 which corresponds to the autumn of 1930. The card is a photograph of a family standing behind a large placard intended to be sent as a Shana Tova card on which is written the place and date of the photograph: “Tel Aviv, Eretz Israel, 5691, 1930.” The parents and the child have dressed for the occasion: the father is wearing a suit jacket, the mother a dress, and the son a white shirt with a large, dark bowtie. Underneath the family is the phrase, “To build the Galilee,” the first line of a popular song at the time, and an image of four chalutzim (pioneers) dancing in front of a tent. Around the placard are four photographs depicting pioneer life in the Galilee: (from the top right), two people ploughing a field with horses, a group of farmers ploughing with a tractor at Nahalal, people hoeing the fields with white tents visible in the background, and a view of a kibbutz with mountains in the background.

Discussion Questions

Observation

• What is this card?
• What is written on the card?
• Describe the design on the card: the family, the texts, the photographs, and the images.

Reading Between the Lines

• This family from Tel Aviv chose to be photographed for a Shana Tova card with images of pioneers from the Galilee.
  What message do you the card was looking to convey?
• What does this card tell us about life in Israel in the 1930s?

Connections

• The photographs on the Shana Tova card show pioneers working the land and building the Galilee.
  Do you think you would have enjoyed being a pioneer?
  What do you think the pros and cons would have been of living in one of the communities pictured on the card?
• If you were sending a Shana Tova card which depicted your community, what pictures would you include? What message would you want to send about your community?

Creative Ideas

• Create an updated version of the Shana Tova card featuring pictures from the Galilee region today.
• Write the message that the family on the card might have written to the recipient of the card.