Julius Rosenwald with students from a Rosenwald School (Courtesy of Fisk University, John Hope and Aurelia E. Franklin Library)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — The White House screened the documentary, “Rosenwald,” about the philanthropist who worked with blacks to build schools across the country, to mark Jewish American Heritage Month.

The screening Monday of the documentary about Julius Rosenwald, directed by Washington D.C. documentarian Aviva Kempner, took place in the Old Executive Office Building, adjacent to the White House.

Speaking at the event was Valerie Jarrett, a top aide to President Barack Obama whose great grandfather, Robert Robinson Taylor, designed the schools.

“My goodness, how much did he give back to our country!” Jarrett, who is African American, said.

Rosenwald, the CEO of Sears Roebuck, joined with black educators and community leaders to build more than 5,000 schools across the South during the first part of the 20th century, when blacks were kept from attending local schools and were often consigned to run-down, one-room schools, if they were availed of any schooling at all.

It is estimated that more than 600,000 people graduated from the schools, forming the core of the African-American middle class that led the struggle for civil rights. Rosenwald also established a fund that dispensed grants to young artists, including names that came to dominate American arts in the latter half of the century, such as authors James Baldwin, Langston Hughes and Ralph Ellison, contralto Marian Anderson, and photographer and film maker Gordon Parks.

Obama, marking Jewish American Heritage Month each May, has consistently heralded the black-Jewish alliance that spurred forward civil rights reforms.

The event drew several dozen invitees. Obama threw major parties marking Jewish American Heritage Month in his first term, but rolled these and other celebrations back after Congress limited government funding.

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