Ackerman Breaks Ranks: First U.S. Female Rabbi Leads Service
Paula Ackerman led her first rabbinical services at Beth Israel synagogue in Meridian, Mississippi, becoming the first woman to perform such functions in the United States. Her appointment broke a centuries-old gender barrier in American Judaism and preceded the formal ordination of women rabbis by more than two decades.
December 12, 1950
76 years ago
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