Starry night for museum's debut

Saturday night at the National Museum of American Jewish History - filled, really filled in the fifth-floor party area - was for celebrity, celebration, and superlatives.

Fantastic. Terrific. Better than anyone could have expected. Those were the sentiments, repeated through the evening, by many of the 1,000-plus revelers at the museum's opening gala, which moved from a cocktail reception in the museum to dinner and entertainment under a huge tent stretching along Fifth Street on Independence Mall.

They dined at row after row of tables for 10, on beet salad with salmon and rack of lamb, prepared by Betty the Caterer - a local kosher kitchen, of course. The interior was lit softly in violet and rose, and chandeliers hung from the center of a skylight. The chandeliers were rung with pictures of the 18 honorees. (In Judaism, the number 18 has a special significance: Its representation in Hebrew letters forms the word chai, meaning life.)

It was a night for special moments: Barbra Streisand, journeying to the lower level to check out a dress she wore in the 1983 movie Yentl, part of the museum collection; Jerry Seinfeld, taking the stage under the tent to host the evening; Bette Midler, taking the same stage later for an after-dinner concert.

Streisand - who dined at a table in the middle of the room by the stage with her husband, James Brolin; Sidney Kimmel and his wife, Caroline; and others said to be mutual friends - stood for a moment in the spotlight as Comcast-Spectacor chief Ed Snider introduced her. The moment was part of a presentation about a hall at the museum.

In that hall, 18 Jewish Americans are honored in an "Only in America" display. They were chosen through an international Internet vote, then vetted by curators. Only three of those honored are alive, and Streisand was the only one of them present Saturday night.

"This is a great addition to Independence Mall for many reasons," said U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter (D., Pa.), who, attending with his wife, Joan, was among a number of politicians present. "It will tell thousands of visitors of the great contributions of the Jewish people to civilization - and it symbolizes here on this mall the First Amendment promise of the freedom of religion."