viva Kempner’s Rosenwald tells the inspiring true story of Julius Rosenwald, the President of Sears, who was a Jewish hero of African-American history. Rosenwald, imbued with the value of tikkun olam, saw parallels between the brutal persecutions of Jews in Eastern Europe and African-Americans in the Jim Crow South, and he could not stand idly by. His grandest project was to build more than 5,300 rural schools to educate black children in partnership with Booker T. Washington. Several generations of leaders, thinkers and scholars were Rosenwald school graduates, including such luminaries as the late Maya Angelou, the late Rep. John Lewis, and Eugene Robinson — all of whom appear in the film.