An Attempt to Open a School for Jewish Girls in Ottoman Istanbul

A graduate of the Alliance Israélite Universelle school system, Victoria Danon taught Ottoman Turkish to Jewish girls at Alliance schools in Istanbul throughout much of the 1880s. By the mid-1890s, she wrote to Ottoman officials requesting permission to found her own Jewish girls’ school in the imperial capital. Although Danon appealed to the authorities by arguing that she sought to combat foreign influences and foster a sense of imperial patriotism in her students, her plan was rejected after non-Jewish residents of the Sirkeci district—where she hoped to open her school—complained that the proposed site was too close to a mosque. Undeterred, Danon soon proposed to open a girls’ school for needlework, a project that was approved in 1896.