Local

Jews were among the settlers heeding the proverbial call of the mid-1800s to "Go West." Following the lure of the Gold Rush, they came to California and helped establish the community that eventually would grow to be San Francisco. Because of the hardships endured during that westward migration, however, these early pioneers established a communal fund — eventually called the Eureka Benevolent Society — to help provide widows and children with food and shelter and pay burial costs when their husbands and fathers succumbed to the hardships of dangerous work and difficult living conditions.

With the Society as a starting point, San Francisco's growing Jewish community had established a large number of social service agencies by 1910. Eventually, the leaders of these agencies decided to centralize fundraising by combining agencies under one roof, and the Jewish Welfare Fund (JWF) was born.

By 1980, the JWF was no longer dedicated to helping just the needy, eventually broadening and deepening its mission to fund Jewish education and culture and other Jewish identity-building programs.

The Jewish Community Federation was founded from these roots.

In 1981, the JWF changed its name to the Jewish Community Federation of San Francisco, the Peninsula, Marin and Sonoma Counties (JCF) to better reflect its mission and the geographic area that it served. Its objective included future planning and leadership development for the area, reaching as far south as Sunnyvale and as far north as Sonoma County.

Today, JCF continues to ensure a viable Jewish community in the Bay Area, in Israel, and wherever Jews are in need.

National

United Jewish Communities, and the umbrella organization of The Federations of North America, created a flash program on the history of the Jewish people and philanthropic organizations in the United States. The presentation can be viewed at http://www.ujc.org/onlinelearning/flash/interface.html