Judah Monis (M / Italy, United States, 1683-1764), scholar
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Judah Monis
Judah Monis (1683-1764) was a Jewish Italian Americam scholar. He was the first Jew and the first Italian to graduate at Harvard (in 1720) and the first Italian and the first Jew to teach in an American university (from 1722 to 1760). Born in 1683 and raised in Livorno, Italy, Monis came to America around 1715. In 1720 he authored "A Grammar of the Hebrew Tongue," which, printed in 1735, was the first Hebrew textbook published in North America. He was required to receive baptism in 1722 in order to have his appointment confirmed at Harvard as first college instructor of the Hebrew language. Died in Cambridge, MA in 1764.