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Moses Rischin is an American Jewish historian, author, lecturer, editor, and emeritus professor of history at San Francisco State University. He coined the phrase new Mormon history in a 1969 article of the same name. Rischin is from New York City. His undergraduate studies were at Brooklyn College. Harvard University awarded him a PhD in 1957. In addition to his professorship, he sits on the board for the Journal of American Ethnic History and on the council of the American Jewish History Society. There is an annual lecture given in his honor at the Western Jewish History Center, where he is director. There is a collection of historical essays published in Rischin's honor, and a supporting character, Meyer Meyer in the 87th Precinct series, may have been partly modeled after him.
Rischin is considered an authority on American ethnic and immigration history and a pioneer in the field of American Jewish history. Historian Selma Berrol, however, has challenged the minimal treatment Rischin has given to the tensions between earlier German Jews and later Russian Jews in America.
During the Monica Lewinsky scandal, Rischin was a signatory of "Historians in Defense of the Constitution" wherein 400 historians criticized efforts to impeach President Bill Clinton.
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