The U.S. Postal Service has a term for when the independent federal agency cannot sort or deliver a piece of mail due to an incorrect, illegible or insufficient address: a “nixie.” The same term could apply to Albert Goldman, the Jewish New York postmaster in the 1930s and 1940s, who in many ways foreshadowed social-media “influencers” of today and in other ways, particularly his personal faith and motivations, proved to be ANK, “address not known.”

The day after Goldman died on May 5, 1967, The New York Times reminded readers that it called the late postmaster “most friendly, helpful and accommodating” when he retired in 1952, after more than 25 years in public office. “No worthy cause in this city has ever had to ring twice to enlist the enthusiastic support of Albert Goldman,” it a

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