When she visits Berkeley’s Judah L. Magnes Museum, Frances Dinkelspiel doesn’t hang back and admire the art from afar. She likes to put her hands on an item, be it an antique book from the Jews of India or a rare 78-rpm klezmer recording.
Her love of the museum and its research library, the Western Jewish History Center, led Dinkelspiel to join the Magnes board in 2001. Now the Berkeley resident is the museum’s new board president.
“It has always been a wonderful place to explore your Jewish side,” Dinkelspiel said of the Magnes, “a place that celebrates the history, culture and art of Judaism in a dynamic way.”
Dinkelspiel brings a unique perspective to the top job at the Magnes. A graduate of Stanford University and Columbia University’s prestigious journalism program, she was a reporter for many years, writing for the San Jose Mercury News, the San Francisco Chronicle and the New York Times, among others.
A fifth-generation Californian, Dinkelspiel most recently wrote a book, “Tower of Gold,” which tells the story of 19th century Jewish banking pioneer Isaias Hellman, Dinkelspiel’s great-great-grandfather.
That might help explain her love of the Western Jewish History Center and its extensive collection of documents, artifacts and Judaica related to the Jewish experience in California.
“I straddle a couple of worlds,” she said. “I’m a journalist and did all this research for my book [at the WJHC], so I have an appreciation for the collections.”
Those collections are now almost completely digitized and available to view online, something that thrills Dinkelspiel. “The Magnes is now embarking on this very 21st century approach to its collections,” she said. “For the first time in its 45-year history, we actually have our holdings online. This is significant.”
That good news has been offset by the impact the recession has had on the Magnes. The museum has had to trim its staff and operating budget, and the move to a new building in downtown Berkeley has been postponed.
But Dinkelspiel believes in the museum’s mission as well as the community’s determination to support it, through good times and bad.
“I feel the Magnes has such amazing holdings,” she said. “I get excited every time I go there.”