August (1950- ) is a Milwaukee-area educator and scholar. He received his doctorate from
the University of Wisconsin (Madison) in 1978, and published the book, The Selling of the Empire: British and French Imperialist Propaganda,
1890-1940, in 1985.
Rabbi Baron was an influential rabbi and community leader in the Milwaukee area. After
serving the Jewish community of Davenport, Iowa, at the Tri-Cities Temple Emanuel, Baron
came to Milwaukee in 1926, where he soon become a fixture at the Temple Emanu-El B'ne
Jeshurun, where he served until his death in 1960.
During Baron's thirty-five years in Milwaukee, he was extremely active in temple,
community, and state activities. At the Temple, he established a temple office, a library,
a museum, and the Temple Bulletin. He also modernized the
religious school, designed the pattern for the stained-glass windows in the temple's
sanctuary, and organized the Temple Brotherhood.
For the Milwaukee community, he taught philosophy at the local State Teachers' College
and later the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee; he helped establish the Milwaukee Round
Table of the National Conference of Christians and Jews, the Milwaukee Jewish Council, the
Milwaukee Chapter of the American Jewish Committee, and the Yavneh School for Unaffiliated
Jewish Children; and he served on various boards and committees including the Social
Planning Committee of the Milwaukee County Council of Social Agencies, the Religious
Committee of Centurama, Abraham Lincoln House (later the Milwaukee Jewish Community
Center), Federated Jewish Charities, the Jewish Welfare Fund, Boy Scouts, YMCA, and
YWCA.
On the state level, Baron helped establish a number of synagogues and organizations
including Temple Beth El in Madison, Temple Emanu-El in Waukesha, the Wisconsin Rabbinical
Association, the Wisconsin Conference of Liberal Synagogues, the Wisconsin Society for
Jewish Learning, the Wisconsin Jewish Archives, and the Department of Hebrew Studies at
the University of Wisconsin. He also served on the Governor's Commission on Human
Rights
