COLEMAN, EDWARD DAVIDSON

COLEMAN, EDWARD DAVIDSON (1891–1939), writer and bibliographer. A native of Suwalki, Poland, Coleman emigrated to the United States at a young age and studied at Harvard University. In 1931 he became the librarian of the American Jewish Historical Society and later its secretary and assistant to the president. He helped organize the Herzl Zion Club, the first Hebrew Zionist youth organization in the United States. Coleman's main scholarly interest was the Jew in English literature and American Jewish bibliography. Among his main works are The Bible in English Drama (1931), and Plays of Jewish Interest on the American Stage, 1752–1821 (1934). He prepared the second volume to A.S.W. Rosenbach's American Jewish Bibliography, which, like most of his literary estate, has remained unpublished. Coleman's private library is now part of the Jewish National and University Library in Jerusalem. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Rivkind, in: AJHSP, 37 (1947), 458–60.