Hello and welcome to this day in esoteric political history from Radiotopia.

My name is Jody Avrogan.

This day June 13, 1877, a Jewish banker by the name of Joseph Seligman, was traveling home to New York City with his family, and he was delayed near the resort town of Saratoga Springs, New York.

He went to a local hotel, the Grand Union, a hotel that he'd stayed at many times before,

but this time he was denied entry because he was, quote,ite soon thereafter the New York Times reported

on the incident with a headline it read a sensation at Saratoga no Jews to be admitted.

This caused a stir but also emboldened other hotels to stop

admitting Jews even taking out advertisements sort of proclaiming their no-Jew policy.

So let's talk about what came to be known as the Seligman affair of

1877 probably the most high profile story of anti-Semitism in the United

States maybe up to that point here as always as usual

Nicole Hammer of Vanderbilt and Kelly Carter Jackson of Wellesley hello there

hello Jody hey there and our special guest for this episode is

Zev Ella who recently wrote about the Seligman affair in the journal Sources,

which is a journal of Jewish ideas by the Shalom Hartman Institute.

Zev, welcome to the show.

Thanks for doing this.

Thanks for having me.

So we've had lots of academics on the show no surprise

you are our first college president

i buried the me you are the president of grats college in

Pennsylvania uh we are an esteemed company here President of Gratz College in Pennsylvania.

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