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The
University of Cape Town's holdings of Judaica and
Hebraica long pre-date the establishment of the
Jewish Studies Library as a special library in
the the U.C.T. Library system. In 1895 the
Reverend Alfred Philip Bender, an M.A. graduate
of St John's College, Cambridge, was appointed as
the first Professor of Hebrew at the South
African College, which in 1918 became the
University of Cape Town.
As
early as 1921 a donation of 520 pounds was
received by the University of Cape Town, raised
by the Students' Jewish Association from local
Jewish businessmen, for the purchase of Jewish
books (Immelman, 1956, p. 35). Many years later
in December 1962 a collection of 900 basic modern
Hebrew texts was presented to the University of
Cape Town by Bertha and Ellis Silverman. From
1978 a two year undergraduate program in Hebrew
Culture was offered at the University of Cape
Town.
 In
1980 the Isaac and Jessie Kaplan Centre for
Jewish Studies and Research was established at
the University of Cape Town through a donation by
the Kaplan-Kushlick Foundation. The Centre set
out to sponsor post-graduate research on Jewish
related topics, to bring out international Jewish
scholars, to organise public lecture series, and to provide
in-service programs for teachers in Jewish Day Schools. In 1986
a two year undergraduate program in Jewish Civilization replaced
the courses in Hebrew Culture. In 1993 this was expanded to
three years.
In
1981 the Kaplan Centre for Jewish Studies and
Research bought a Jewish Studies collection of
approximately 11,000 volumes of books and bound
periodicals, from Professor Abraham Duker, of New
York. An innovation was that by the conditions of
the donation this core collection, which would be
supplemented by ongoing acquisitions from the
funds of the Kaplan Kushlick Foundation, would be
maintained separately as a special collection,
part of what was then known as the Special
Collections Department. In February 1989 the
Jewish Studies collection moved out of the
Special Collections Department into its own library in the
Rachel Bloch House, the new Kaplan Centre building.
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