Molly Lyons Bar-David Collection

Collection

Identifier: P-1057

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

The Molly Lyons Bar-David Collection consists of magazine articles, newspaper clippings, ephemera, photographs and personal correspondence, spanning the years 1930 to 1970. Most materials relate directly to Bar-David's career as a cookbook author and authority on Israeli cuisine. Also prominent within the collection are materials documenting Bar-David's columns and lecture series for Hadassah, both in the U.S. and her homeplace of Israel. Additional material includes published writings by family members and a small collection of untranslated documents in Hebrew and Yiddish (as of June, 2023). Many of the original newspaper articles have been replaced with archival facsimiles for conservation purposes.

Dates

Creation: undated, 1930-1970

Access Restrictions

The collection is open to all researchers, except items that may be restricted due to their fragility, or privacy.

Use Restrictions

No permission is required to quote, reproduce or otherwise publish manuscript materials found in this collection, as long as the usage is scholarly, educational, and non-commercial. For inquiries about other usage, please contact the Director of Collections and Engagement at mmeyers@ajhs.org.

For reference questions, please email: inquiries@cjh.org

Biographical / Historical

Molly Lyons Bar-David was born on July 3, 1910, in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. Raised by Zionist parents, she shared her family’s dream of one day relocating to Israel. In 1936, at the age of 25, Bar-David and her sisters met their parents in the village of Gan Hasharon, where they quickly joined the Haganah and learned to protect their new home from the Arab Revolt. Bar-David put her literary skills to use by recording her wartime experiences for publication in newspapers across Canada. After moving to Jerusalem, she became a staff member at the Palestine Post and contributed to several Israeli and Anglo-Jewish news sources. When the Arab Israeli War erupted in 1948, Bar-David once again dedicated herself to the war effort by aiding and caring for refugee children alongside her own family with husband Jaap Bar-David – a literary agent and war veteran. Her long running column “Diary of a Jerusalem Housewife” for Hadassah Newsletter made Bar-David a household name among American-Jewish readers and would lead to a lifelong partnership with the organization. She traveled to the United States for the first time in 1951 to appear in a series of lectures about life in Israel – one of many speaking engagements arranged by Hadassah – and would go on to attend a host of stateside events as both a connoisseur of Jewish cuisine and a representative of the Israeli people. The publication of her autobiography titled My Promised Land in 1953 was followed by two internationally acclaimed cookbooks; Jewish Cooking for Pleasure and The Israeli Cookbook.

Molly Lyons Bar-David (AKA Malka Bar-David) died on October 21, 1987. She was buried Savyon, Israel - the place she proudly called "home".

Extent

2 Manuscript Boxes (1 standard manuscript box; 1 half-size manuscript box)

Language of Materials

English

Hebrew

Yiddish

Additional Description

Abstract

The Molly Lyons Bar-David Collection consists of magazine articles, newspaper clippings, ephemera, photographs and correspondence relating to Bar-David's career as a cookbook author and authority on Israeli cuisine. Also prominent within the collection are materials documenting Bar-David's columns and lecture series for Hadassah, both in the U.S. and her homeplace of Israel.

Arrangement

This collection is arranged alphabetically by subject matter. Selected materials were grouped and labeled prior to delivery to AJHS, while the remainder were in no particular order.