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Rabbis did not like secular Jewish communal institutions’ proliferation from the middle of the 19th century into the early 20th century. Clubs, fraternal organizations, societies, lodges, women’s organizations, Zionist associations, and athletic organizations did not monitor members’ behavior or admonish members to fulfill their specific religious responsibilities. In America, a “decoupling of previously fused ethnic and religious components of Jewish group life and self-identification developed.” Yiddishkeit---“as a folk or people with a common history---became separable from Judaism” and produced “a rapid proliferation of religion unrelated social and cultural institutions.”
“The rabbis complained that lodges, clubs, societies, and other ‘community’ institutions undermined their authority and drained membership from their congregations. and encouraged American indifference to religion,” according to historian Hasia Diner. For example, Rabbi Solomon Schindler, a leading Reform rabbi in Boston, bemoaned the low attendance at synagogues because Jewish immigrants considered “their lodge meetings” equivalent to attending religious services. Historians agreed with Schindler’s analysis and considered it a product of the American separation of church and state and widespread voluntarism. American Jews, whether in Albany, New York, or Chicago, voluntarily joined together in associations that served their social, educational, philanthropic, mutual aid, political, and communal needs. Fraternal organizations served the needs of an immigrant generation and their American-born sons searching for a sense of belonging and social fellowship. Max Schlesinger and Simon Rosendale believed in 1910 that immigrants “stood alone in a strange land” and lodges supplied “ties of friendship,” a deep-felt need of new immigrants. For Jewish immigrants seeking to adjust to a strange new environment creating voluntary associations helped in adapting to America. Fraternal orders and other voluntary societies developed in every Jewish community. As the Utica Jewish community historian concluded, the associations filled “the need for social integration and cultural adjustment to the American environment.” Some Jewish immigrants viewed these groups as a way to maintain their identity as Jews outside of attendance at synagogues, while others used them as halfway stations for Americanization and assimilation. For Jews who did not frequent taverns, the fraternal societies allowed men to socialize in a safe, reassuring, and positive atmosphere creating an alternative to their often drab and exploitive occupations.
Albany’s Jews organized their own institutions for social, fraternal, and philanthropic purposes. Between 1843 and 1859, each of the synagogues, Orthodox Beth El (German). Reform Anshe Emeth and Orthodox Beth El Jacob (Polish) organized burial societies and mutual aid societies for the ill. Modeled after the Chevra Kadisha (holy society) of European communities, these societies “ performed the prescribed rituals surrounding the death” from purification of the body to burial. Jewish religious tradition required that Jews must be buried in separate cemeteries for Jews. Every synagogue purchased land for a cemetery, and every Jewish organization formed in the 19th or early 20th centuries made provisions for the burial of their members. Gentiles could not be buried in a Jewish cemetery. Jewish immigrants maintained this tradition, whether Reform or Orthodox, whether in Albany, New York, or in Albany, Georgia.
In 1843, the Society for Brotherly Love became the first society in Albany to provide mutual aid for the ill, assist with burials if needed, assist the poor, and help recent Jewish immigrants and Jewish travelers passing through the city. Brotherly Love emerged as the first association independent of the synagogues. By 1847, a Ladies' Benevolent Society started with a separate School Fund Society “to pay for the schooling of poor Hebrew children.” In 1855, the synagogues united their societies to aid the poor and sick, creating, on September 20, 1855, the Hebrew Benevolent Society of Albany. This occurred not without dispute. Initially, all were in agreement, and” this union was saluted by every candid mind as a step to reunite our Israelites in sentiments and in pursuit of a noble purpose.” A dispute quickly emerged, however, with another philanthropic association that had just been established, Shiloh Lodge of B’nai B’rith, over conflicting fundraising efforts in 1854. In spite of the rocky start, both organizations quickly became well-respected philanthropies winning recognition from local political leaders and the general public for their good works. As one newspaper pointed out in 1885: “The society is doing noble work among the poor, sick, and distressed, and its efforts should be encouraged in every way possible.” As an example of its activities in 1897, the Hebrew Benevolent Society spent over $2,000 for “the relief of the poor and needy.” While a secular organization, the Hebrew Benevolent Society upheld Jewish traditions and Yiddishkeit, like supporting Succoth, the feast of booths, and encouraging members to attend holiday services at Temple Beth Emeth in 1918.
[4]B’nai B’rith, the first national Jewish secular organization, was started in New York City in 1843 by German Jews. A uniquely American institution, it encouraged social interaction to help new immigrants learn how to adapt to America from more seasoned immigrants. The organization walked the tightrope of the American Jewish experience, encouraging members to become real Americans and preserving Jewish identity by sponsoring talks on Jewish subjects. It provided mutual assistance and supported education and moral uplift. aid to widows and children, philanthropy, and patriotism. B’nai B’rith and other mutual aid societies offered death benefits, limited health insurance, brotherhood, and a sense of Jewish identity for immigrants attempting to adjust to an alien environment. Historian Howard Sacher viewed B’nai B’rith as a halfway house to acculturation, but Hasia Diner noted that “B’nai B’rith articulated a conception of Jewishness that existed outside of the synagogues and rabbinic authority, proclaiming according to historian Deborah Dash Moore, a bold new vision of the nature of Jewish identity.’”
[5]Albany boasted two chapters of B’nai B’rith, Shiloh Lodge, founded in December 1853, carried out most transactions in German. The Shiloh Lodge established the day school, B’nai B’rith Academy, in 1866, combining Hebrew and secular subjects. It fulfilled “a uniquely Jewish function,” providing Jewish education, as did other lodges of B’nai B’rith. However, insufficient funding forced the academy to close in 1870. Many of its members came from the German synagogues Orthodox Beth El and Reform Anshe Emeth. It became one of the most well-respected secular Jewish organizations in the city. Members of the Shiloh Lodge joined with other Jewish lodges in 1886 to contribute to the Albany bi-centennial fund, earning the press's commendation for patriotism. As another indication of the lodge’s civic responsibility, members donated to a city-sponsored concert in December 1887. Also, Shiloh Lodge contributed to the construction of a new Albany hospital in 1910. In addition, members participated in recreational activities. In July 1897, for example, “both the old and new went down the river” in a moonlight excursion down the Hudson River to New Baltimore. Members frequently joined the Gideon Lodge on excursions in the summer. Many of Shiloh’s members belonged to other German language societies. Jacob Newburg, who immigrated from Württemberg and ran a hat store on South Pearl Street, belonged to the German Oak Lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. Julius Levanthal, born in Hanover, became “one of Albany’s foremost businessmen and prominent Jewish resident who served as congregation president of Anshe Emeth and Beth Emeth from 1884 to 1903 ” and belonged to the German language chapter of Free Sons of Israel.
[6]Albany’s German Jews founded or participated in a number of German language societies until World War I. German Jews from congregations Beth El and Anshe Emeth self-identified with the German language and culture. German Jewish synagogues continued to hold separate services in German and English. In Albany, German Jews often assumed leadership roles in German cultural associations. The retention of language became an essential part of the retention of identity for immigrants and their descendants in American society and a barrier to assimilation. German-speaking Jews could easily reinforce their German since there were over fifty German lodges, societies, clubs, athletic associations, and ladies’ societies in Albany in 1910. In fact, when Beth El and Anshe Emeth merged and built a new building Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise, the leader of Reform Judaism and former rabbi at Beth El and Anshe Emeth, returned to Albany. On May 23, 1889, Wise delivered a speech in German, dedicating the new synagogue of the combined congregation of synagogue Beth Emeth.
[7]Members of the two German Jewish congregations belonged to numerous German language societies. The German Literacy Society, Deutsche Gesellschaft, organized in 1848, remained heavily Jewish. The Literacy Society spawned a German singing society, Albany Liederkranz, in 1849. Rabbi Wise played an important role in both associations. The purpose of the German Literary Society was “to study and spread German literature as well as to extend assistance to newly-arrived German immigrants.” German Jews belonged to half-dozen other societies that included a larger number of non-Jewish Germans, including the Albany Turin Verein, German Harmonia Lodge, and German Oak Lodge of Odd Fellows. This paralleled the larger national trend of Jews of German origin subscribing to German language newspapers and becoming “patrons of German clubs.’ For many Jews, “German culture was an important unifying force.” Prior to the 1890s, many German Jews, especially members of Reform congregations, appeared to identify more closely with non-Jewish Germans than with their brethren from Poznan, Galicia, Poland, Russia, Hungary, or Lithuania.
The continued use of German did not please many of the grown children of the German-speaking immigrants. Younger members of the Shiloh lodge of B’nai B’rith revolted in 1870 and established the English language, Gideon Lodge, on March 17, 1870. Members noted: “while Shiloh Lodge retains our Mother Tongue in its proceedings, we cling to that of the Country we reside in,” reflecting the impact of Americanization. The behavior of the grown sons of German congregations would be repeated by the sons of Yiddish-speaking East European Jews who would spawn the Conservative branch of Judaism, another example of American-born Jews retaining their Jewish identity and seeking acceptance as English-speaking Americans, not as foreigners, not as the “other.”
[8] Members of the Gideon Lodge, led by Simon Rosendale, played an important role in reaching out to other chapters of B’nai B’rith in 1870 to support the mission of Benjamin Peixotto to Bucharest to help alleviate the suffering of Romanian Jews. Jewish political activist Simon Wolf of Washington requested help from Albany’s B’nai B’rith. The Gideon Lodge pressured President Ulysses S. Grant to appoint Peixotto, president of B’nai B’rith, to the post and raise funds for the mission. Simon Rosendale wrote a condemnation of Romania’s behavior and appealed to the brothers of the organization, Jews and Americans, to donate to Peixotto’s mission. Two years later, in June 1872, the lodge established a committee headed by Simon Rosendale to raise additional funds to support Peixotto’s mission. In June 1903, Gideon Lodge donated funds “for the relief of the Kishineff sufferers,” victims of Russian pogroms against Jews. According to historian Mark Raider, “Kishinev marked a turning point in American Jewish history,” as Jews of whatever religious affiliation, ethnicity, or political beliefs “reacted with horror” at the barbaric actions of the Russian government. Jews rallied to denounce the Russian government, even in Fort Worth, Texas. Over 300 pogroms initiated by the Russian government took place between 1903-1906. The continued pogroms in Russia led the Gideon Lodge to organize a special meeting in November 1905 at Beth Emeth “for the purpose of appropriating means for the relief of the stricken Jews of the Russian Empire.” money was donated to help the survivors of the pogroms. As an expression of their identity as Jews, the Gideon Lodge and other Jewish organizations sought to assist Jews abroad and identified with the plight of Jews in Europe. Although Albany’s Jews had tried to assist Jews in Europe since 1853, the pogroms in Russia created a new determination and feeling of responsibility to help alleviate the plight of Jews abroad. As Mark Raider concluded, events in Russia created a national consensus among American Jews about the role of American Jewish philanthropy.
[9] The plight of Jews in Eastern Europe once again became a subject of concern during World War I. Hundreds of thousands of Jews uprooted by the war in Eastern Europe fled for safety. Roving armies decimated scores of Jewish communities and impoverished hundreds of thousands of people. From 1914-17, the Russian government forced 600,000 Jews from their homes. American Jews created the Joint Distribution Committee to distribute aid to Jews displaced by the war and help Jews in Palestine. As historian Daniel Soyer concluded, American Jewish assistance overseas became “a defining characteristic of American Jewry.” Albany’s Jews had a personal stake in helping because, as historian S. Joshua Korn noted about the Jewish community of Utica: “there as hardly a person who was not related to a war-stricken family in war-torn Europe and Palestine, for the vast majority of Jews were immigrants of…1890-1914 and their children.” Most of the Jews living in Albany and neighboring communities of Schenectady, Cohoes, and Troy immigrated to the Capital District at the same time as the Jewish residents of Utica. Albany’s synagogues and Jewish organizations, including the Gideon Lodge, felt obligated to assist displaced and hungry Jews in Europe. B’nai B’rith lodges expressed concerns for their brethren in Eastern Europe ever since the plight of Romanian Jews emerged in the late 1860s and early 1870s. By the 1890s, German Jews felt a sense of solidarity with Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe and identified with their deteriorating status in Europe.
[10] Local relief efforts by Jewish organizations started with the outbreak of the war, but a major drive coincided with President Woodrow Wilson declaring January 27, 1916, Jewish Relief Day. Members of the New York state legislature passed resolutions endorsing Jewish Relief Day. New York Governor Republican Charles Whitman issued his own proclamation asking the people of New York to donate to reduce “the sufferings with which the Jewish people are confronted.” Prominent members of Beth Emeth, who also belonged to the Gideon Lodge, like Simon Rosendale, Albert Hessberg, and Rabbi Max Schlesinger, led the campaign in Albany. All the synagogues and associations, such as Yiddish language and Socialist Local 320 of Workmen’s Circle, socialist labor Zionist Poale Zion, working-class Hebrew Tailor’s Association, middle class and predominately Jewish Washington Lodge of Masons, Ladies’ Auxiliary of Beth El Jacob (Orthodox-Polish), and Ladies’ Radical Society, donated to Jewish relief. The misfortune facing Jews in Eastern Europe created unity in the United States for Jewish groups, regardless of denominational, ethnic, political, or language differences. Helping the Jews of Europe and Palestine united secular and religious groups and reinforced a sense of Yiddishkeit within the Jewish community of Albany and the Capital District. A number of non-Jews donated and or endorsed the campaign, including Republican Mayor Joseph W. Stevens and former governor Irish Catholic Martin Glynn, a Democrat and first Irish Catholic governor of the state. Funds raised went to the Joint Distribution Committee.
[11] In an article appearing in the
American Hebrew on October 31, 1919, entitled “The Crucifixion of Jews Must Stop,” former governor Martin Glynn condemned the “threatened holocaust of human life” [and] “bigoted lust for Jewish blood,” in Eastern Europe. Polish troops killed 40,000 Jews in eastern Galicia between 1919-21, and a mix of Ukrainian nationalists, White Army, and elements of Red forces killed 100,000 Jews in Ukraine, Belarus, Russia, and Lithuania, and 150,000 died of starvation, disease, and exposure as these roving armies devastated at least 150 Jewish communities between 1917-21. Romanian troops killed another 5,000 Jews in Hungary. “Tragedy of Jews Stirs Albanian Hearts,” proclaimed the Albany Argus in October 1919 as the second round of fundraising for the Jews of Eastern Europe began. Gideon Lodge joined with all Jewish organizations, synagogues, and many non-Jews to contribute to the injured and starving. On October 5,1919, members of B’nai B’rith’s lodge donated $150 “for the Jewish War Sufferers…unanimously carried.” Governor Al Smith and Catholic and Episcopalian bishops of Albany endorsed the fundraising and condemned the atrocities. Jews of Albany, including members of the Gideon Lodge, joined with Jews from Troy, Cohoes, and Schenectady on December 7, 1919, at the Palace Theater in Schenectady in a mass meeting to denounce the atrocities in Eastern Europe.
[12] In the interwar years, B’nai B’rith reached out to the sons of East European Jews, expanding the membership at the local and national levels. It created a youth wing, and young men joined Aleph Zadik Aleph Fraternity. At local colleges, chapters of Hillel attracted younger Jews. By 1940, B’nai B’rith had 150,000 members and became the largest secular Jewish organization. In Albany, the Gideon Lodge supported aid for Jewish survivors of the Holocaust, the relocation of some survivors to Albany, and successfully built B’nai B’rith Parkview Apartments in Albany in 1973 for Jewish senior citizens. Albany’s Jewish Community Council worked with B’nai B’rith to make Parkview a reality. The Gideon Lodge and Gideon chapter of B’nai B’rith women assisted in providing support services for the seniors at Parkview. In the 1990s, the Gideon Lodge welcomed Soviet Jews who settled in Albany and Schenectady and assisted in finding housing for the latest Jewish immigrants to the Capital District. From 1974-1981 at least eighty-one Jews from the U.S.S.R. arrived in Albany. Since 1988 about 1,300 Soviet Jews have moved to Albany.
[13] While the Gideon Lodge was the longest-lasting fraternal organization in Albany, a number of other associations and branches of national organizations developed between the 1870s and the early 1900s. These organizations suggested the richness of Jewish communal life that” combined ideas of “mutual benefit with social and recreational functions.” On September 15, 1872, the B’nai Mordecai Lodge of Kesher Shel Barzel (Chain of Iron) opened a chapter. While B’nai B’rith initially attracted German Jews and their descendants, KBB, established in 1860, became a primarily Polish fraternal organization. A second chapter, the Capital City Lodge, was also formed, but both agreed to merge in 1894. Free Sons of Israel, started in New York City in 1849, chartered a local chapter on April 5, 1872, Arnon Lodge appealed to German Jews and their descendants. Most of the members of Free Sons belonged to Anshe Emeth and Beth El, and later Beth Emeth. It had a glorious celebration in April 1899 on its Silver Anniversary, with 250 in attendance for dinner, and several hundred more came for the dance. One of the speakers, Simon Rosendale, stressed the charitable purposes of the lodge. Prominent non-Jews recognized the good works of the Arnon Lodge, including Mayor Van Alstyne and Governor Theodore Roosevelt. The Governor praised the members and denounced anti-Semitism. B’rith Abraham, founded in 1844, was one of the first Jewish fraternal societies to offer death benefits to members and their wives. It started as a German and Hungarian Jewish association, although it later accepted Russian and Polish Jews. It also had a strong connection to Beth El and Anshe Emeth. Morris Coplon, its local chairman, led the association when it held its national convention in Albany on August 23, 1896, as 250 members attended the convention. Not surprisingly, Rabbi Max Schlesinger of Reform Beth Emeth delivered the opening prayer and blessing.
The arrival of Polish and Russian Jews after 1870 fostered a new group of fraternal orders. Independent Order of B’rith Abraham, organized nationally in the 1880s, emerged as a Russian Jewish association, and a local chapter was chartered in 1893. It started as an organization of Hungarian Jews but quickly expanded to include Jews from the Russian Empire. By expanding membership, it soon rose to 200,000 members and, for “a brief period in the early 1900s, constituted the largest Jewish organization of any kind in the United States.” Chapters of Sons of Benjamin (1897-1901), Albanian and Capital City lodges of Assembly of Israel ( November 27, 1894, and December 8, 1895), and Young Men’s Montefiore Association (December 26, 1896) were established. Public officials recognized these Jewish societies and invited them to public functions, like having members of B’rith Abraham, Young Men’s Montefiore Association, and Independent Order of B'rith Abraham march in the October 1909 Hudson-Champlain Commemoration.
[14] East European immigrants voluntarily formed chapters to meet their emotional, social, burial, sickness, and recreational needs. These lodges fostered responsibility, fellowship, and Yiddishkeit. Branches of the fraternal organizations developed in each upstate New York community where enough Jewish men lived to support a lodge---Albany, Schenectady, Troy, Syracuse, Rochester, Binghamton, Utica, Gloversville, Amsterdam, and Poughkeepsie. The most popular was B’nai B’rith, Free Sons of Israel, and B’rith Abraham. Upstate Jewish communities, like Albany, did not support a secular Jewish organization popular in New York City and other large cities---landsmanshaftn, associations of Jewish men from the same city, town, or village in the old country, like the Bialystok Mutual Aid Society. Their functions were similar to fraternal orders but rooted in men, landsmen, from the same community in Eastern Europe. By the 1930s, New York City hosted over 3,000 landsmanshaftn, but this local connection to hometowns did not flourish in upstate Jewish communities, primarily due to the lack of numbers and the anti-Jewish and restrictive immigration laws of 1921 and 1924 that cutoff most Jewish immigration from Eastern Europe.
[15] One politically motivated fraternal order that originated in New York City found a home in Albany and other upstate Jewish communities---Arbeiter Ring (Workmen’s Circle), a nationwide fraternal and mutual aid society with a Yiddish and Socialist agenda. Founded in 1892, combining socialism, Yiddish culture, and the fraternal organizational structure, Workmen’s Circle became popular with Jews from Poland, Russia, and Lithuania. The organization expressed a secular sense of Jewish solidarity and identified with workers’ rights and the Yiddish language. While usually linked to Jewish communities in larger cities like Boston and New York, Workmen’s Circle found a responsive audience in upstate Jewish communities of working-class Jewish immigrants. It represented an expression of first-generation Jewish identity among immigrants from Eastern Europe through the socialist revolutionary movement in the Russian Empire, the General Jewish Workers’ Union, known as the Bund. The Bund combined class struggle “with loyalty to the Jewish people---indeed, to Jewish peoplehood.” In the United States, Workmen’s Circle expressed the ideas of the Bund but widened its appeal by stressing a Yiddish-based socialist and cultural movement. By combining Yiddish culture, socialism, mutual aid society benefits, and brotherhood, it created an attractive mix “making it the longest-lived and most effective of all East European fraternal orders”
[16] Member of Workmen’s Circle discussed Yiddish literature, listened to Yiddish language speakers, and invited Yiddish theater groups from New York City to give performances at local theaters. As the historian of the Utica Jewish community concluded: “The Arbeiter Ring…had a profound influence on a large section of the Jewish population in Utica during the first quarter of the twentieth century.” For the immigrant generation, it played an important role in the lives of Jews in Albany, Schenectady, and Troy. Workmen’s Circle appealed to industrial workers, peddlers, tailors, and small merchants attracted to the secular Yiddish culture it promoted. Some came to discuss contemporary political and economic issues like the arrest of four Socialists in Albany on August 26, 1917, for handing out a four-page pamphlet that the courts decided violated the Espionage Act. Others came for a general discussion of socialism in Yiddish or for a non-political discussion of Yiddish writers, like Sholem Aleichem. Wherever there was an immigrant Jewish community from Eastern Europe---Poughkeepsie, Albany, Troy, Schenectady, Utica, Syracuse, Rochester, and Buffalo, there was a branch of the Arbeiter Ring in the first quarter of the twentieth century. Jewish radicals of whatever political orientation could mingle in the fraternal order of Workmen’s Circle.
[17]Some communities, like Albany, Schenectady, Utica, Rochester, and Buffalo, organized Yiddish language Folk Shules in the 1920s and 1930s. The afternoon schools taught Yiddish, Jewish history, and socialism. Sadie Flax, for example, remembered learning Yiddish and socialism at the Workmen’s Circle school in nearby Schenectady. The schools passed on the passion for Yiddish and socialism to another generation, this time to American-born children of Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe. Workmen’s Circle ran their school out of their building on Ash Grove Place. The Albany school ran into the 1940s. The Albany branch of Workmen’s Circle was founded in semi-secret on May 14, 1904, in the home of N. Rosenberg. Orthodox Jews distrusted the organization and discouraged renting space for the organization’s meetings. Members of the Orthodox community destroyed flyers for Workmen’s Circle's meetings forcing it to meet initially quietly and finally meet outside the Jewish neighborhoods in the South End of Albany.
However, the arrival of Jews fleeing the Russian pogroms brought Jews with experience in the Russian radical movement that quickly embraced Workmen’s Circle leading to a second branch, Number 122, in 1907. It became popular with new immigrants, and its meeting place on 67 South Pearl Street became “the modern Yiddish culture center of the city.” Residents flocked to the concerts and the speakers. Members of the Albany local worked with the Jewish-dominated unions, bakers, and tailors, founding the Bread and Meat Cooperative. Workmen’s Circle worked closely with Jewish bakers to support unionization and the purchase of union-made baked goods. Workmen's Circle assisted the garment workers by raising money for their organizing efforts in February 1920 and joining in the campaign to persuade consumers to only patronize stores that sold unionized goods. In 1914, the two locals merged into Branch 320. Workmen’s Circle started fundraising for Jewish relief to help Jews in Europe in 1914 and participated in drives in 1916, 1918, and 1919 for Jews displaced by the war. The Albany chapter contributed $100,000 for the defense of the four Socialists arrested in August 1917 for violating the Espionage Act. According to the local press, the Albany local’s reach extended to Jewish communities in Troy, Hudson, Gloversville, and Glens Falls.
[18] In 1909, the organization purchased land for a cemetery. Although Workmen’s Circle was secular, it agreed with the Orthodox that only Jews, and not Gentiles, could be buried in a Jewish cemetery. It took “a heated discussion, lasting several weeks,” before the majority of members rejected burying non-Jews. Two of the most interesting monuments in the cemetery are written in Yiddish. One, to Harriet Thuroff, “Thy memory shall be the guiding star in our struggle.” Rose Halpert’s includes a commemoration of her activism in the revolutionary workers' movement. Children and grandchildren of the original members of the Workmen’s Circle are still being buried in the Albany Cemetery.
A faction of Workmen’s Circle broke off in 1929 to form International Worker’s Order, affiliated with the Communist Party. An Albany branch, Jewish Peoples’ Fraternal Order, seceded from the local Workmen’s Circle, and in retaliation, Workmen’s Circle refused to bury the Communists in their cemetery. During the McCarthyite period, the federal government dissolved the political movement as a Communist front in the early 1950s and seized the cemetery but eventually returned it to the JPFO. Historian Maurice Isserman argued: “regardless of its political affiliation, JPFO played a significant and largely positive role in the lives of tens of thousands of American Jews.” Isserman appears correct since the JPFO and its broader organization, International Workers Order, sponsored Yiddish language schools and Yiddish cultural activities, a more radical version of Yiddishkeit.
[19] Another national fraternal organization founded a chapter in Albany, Farband. Founded in Rochester in 1910, the Farband, also known as the Jewish National Workers’ Alliance, appealed to the same East European working-class immigrant population of the Workmen’s Circle but combined socialism with active support for Zionism, while Workmen’s Circle remained non-Zionist as did JPFO. Farband supported folkshulen (Folk Shuls) but promoted both Yiddish and Hebrew, Jewish cultural activities, and the same benefits as other fraternal orders. A chapter of Farband was established in Albany in 1912. Farband established the city's first secular Yiddish school, one of the earliest in the country.
In December 1912 and January 1913, Farband held its national convention in Albany. Opening on December 28, 1912, the conference discussed improving the conditions of Jewish workers, modern Yiddish education, and improving insurance coverage. It met at another recently created Jewish cultural institution, Hebrew Educational Institute, on Franklin and South Ferry Streets, in the heart of Albany’s Jewish neighborhood. Farband advocated for Jewish workers’ rights, socialism, and Zionism and later became linked to socialist labor Zionism in Palestine. At the founding, Farband included Socialists-Territorialists Zionists who believed in a Jewish homeland, including areas outside of Palestine. Albany’s chapter also organized Farband chapters in other communities like Schenectady. As historian Moses Rischin concluded: “socialism was Judaism secularized” Combining an emphasis on Yiddish and Hebrew along with socialism provided another vision of Yiddishkeit for Jewish immigrants.
[20] Several occupational groups unique to the Capital District acted as mutual aid societies. The two most common occupations of recent immigrants from Eastern Europe were tailors and peddlers. This had been true for German immigrants earlier since the membership of Beth El, Beth El Jacob, and Anshe Emeth in the 1850s were primarily peddlers. Recent immigrants formed the Jewish Peddlers Association in Schenectady in 1916 “for the promotion of intellectual, social, and recreational activities for the families of its members.” Members listened to Yiddish language speakers, and the talks attracted larger audiences, becoming community events.
Earlier, a group of eight tailors in Albany on August 31, 1891, organized the Hebrew Tailors Association “for mutual benefit and benevolent purposes.” Apparently, an Albany Jewish tailor fell ill and had no means to take care of himself, and this motivated the creation of a society to help fellow workers. It would take care of the sick, help those in distress, and provide for the burials of members. It became a well-respected local Jewish organization and even marched in the Hudson-Champlain Commemoration in October 1909. Hebrew Tailors joined in fundraising for all the Jewish causes, like Jewish Relief Day in January 1916 and a second round of fundraising in March 1916. Tailors also held recreational activities for its members. For example, one hundred couples participated in a ball on February 24, 1902, “and it was the early hours of the morning before the dance broke up.” The association sponsored annual dinners and annual balls. At the ball on January 3, 1910, “there was a good crowd present and most enjoyable time was had.”
[21] Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe brought radical traditions, and as Moses Rischin noted, socialism became secularized Judaism. Both the Socialist parties in Albany and Schenectady had Jewish sections. There was no coincidence that the Albany Socialist Party had its headquarters on South Pearl Street, in the heart of the Jewish neighborhood. For the immigrant generation struggling to find their place in American society and primarily working class, socialism appealed to their sense of solidarity, Jewish ethics, and the Jewish quest for justice. In Albany, Jews were peddlers, bakers, tailors, garment workers, and cap workers. There were a number of cap factories in Albany, and “almost all of whose workers were Jewish.” Failed efforts to unionize further inflamed their resentment of economic inequality. Jews from the Russian Empire identified with the Jewish branch of the Russian Social Democratic Party---Bund, a Yiddish language workers movement among Jews in Poland, Belarus, Lithuania, Ukraine, and Russia. Working-class Jews felt exploited in America and brought their loyalty to socialism to the United States. A small number later split off to endorse the more radical Communist Party.
[22] However, there was another radical alternative,
Jerminal, the Albany Jewish anarchist group active between 1900 and 1920s. Jewish anarchists would sometimes meet with their Italian immigrant comrades from Schenectady over tea and pastry to discuss the revolution. Leon Malmed, a local deli owner, played an active role and developed a close relationship with Emma Goldman. “Red Emma” spoke several times in Schenectady and Albany between 1906-1917, with the help of Leon Malmed, her sometime lover. Emma would deliver talks in Yiddish, English, and Russian. A handbill in Yiddish, for example, advertised, “Emma Goldman, the very popular speaker…will speak in Albany…first of April 1906.” Albany’s police interfered on April 1, 1906, breaking up the talk by Goldman. Leon Malmed introduced Goldman, but her critique of the American government angered a police sergeant who ordered the meeting stopped. The “audience was composed entirely of foreigners,” meaning Jewish immigrants from Russia. For a small number of Jews from the Russian Empire, anarchism seemed another way to express secular Jewish values in Yiddish. Jewish anarchists based their positions on Jewish ethical norms, but they rejected Judaic religious rituals. One of the problems for Jewish anarchists, whether in Albany or New York City, was working-class Jews agreed with their critique of inequality that stemmed from Jewish values but opposed the anarchist attack on Jewish religious rituals, severely limiting the growth of
Jerminal and other Jewish anarchist groups.
[23] Zionism became another way for Jews in Albany to preserve their identity as Jews. In 1898, Jews in Albany, Troy, and Schenectady formed chapters that sent delegates to the 1898 Federation of American Zionists convention. Representatives from the Albany, Troy, and Glens Falls chapters attended the 1900 convention. A chapter of Choveve Zion (Lovers of Zion) began at the same time. A Zionist fraternal order, Max Nordau Lodge, opened on September 16, 1900, and associated with the Federation of American Zionists. Albany Zionists actively purchased Jewish National Fund stamps. Another Zionist group, also affiliated with FAZ, Sons, and Daughters of Zion, expanded “ intensive and widespread Zionist activities.” They became active in fundraising for displaced Jews in Europe during World War I. and sponsored lectures and concerts to raise money for Palestine and promote Zionism. Religious Zionists established a chapter of Mizrachi in 1914 after Mizrachi leader Meyer Berlin visited Albany. Socialist Zionists had several options, like supporting Zionism while enrolled in the Jewish branch of the Socialist Party or Workmen’s Circle. They could join the group of Socialist Territorialists Zionists or the chapter of Poale Zion (Workers of Zion) that started a chapter in Albany in 1906 and supported their fraternal association, the Farband Labor Zionist Order. Zionists held regular memorial services to honor the death of Theodore Herzl. In 1916, for example, Sons and Daughters of Zion sponsored an event at the Orthodox (Polish) Beth El Jacob synagogue with speakers in English and Yiddish. All the Zionist groups joined in the campaign for Jewish war relief for the Jews of Europe and Palestine in 1916, 1918, and 1919.
[24] On June 3, 1920, 4,000 Jews from Albany, Schenectady, Troy, Amsterdam, Gloversville, Hudson, Glens Falls, and Cohoes marched down South Pearl Street in Albany’s Jewish neighborhood in support of the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine. Carrying banners in English and Hebrew with the Zionist flag, six-pointed blue star, and stripes on a white background, the Stars and Stripe's marchers walked past “shops and residences along the route” decorated with the Zionist flag as Jews celebrated the end of Ottoman rule in Palestine, Balfour Declaration, and “the restoration of Israel.” Marchers represented all of the Jewish societies “and congregations of virtually every city near Albany.” A band played Hatikvah. This became the largest Jewish parade in the history of the city. Speakers included Governor Al Smith (Democrat), Mayor James Watt (Republican), and former governor Martin Glynn as Albany’s Catholics and Protestants endorsed the creation of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. The massive parade for Zionism and a Jewish homeland in Palestine showed that Zionism and Americanism were not in conflict. American political leaders, Democrats, and Republicans supported Jewish nationalism. Zionism became another manifestation of how Jewish immigrants and American-born Jews maintained their identity as Jews in Albany and America.
[25] Jews also joined national fraternal orders. There were Jews in the Masons, Knights of Pythias, and Odd Fellows, often in predominately Jewish chapters in Albany and Schenectady. This got repeated as middle-class Jews formed their own chapters of the Odd Fellows and Masons in Syracuse or the Jewish lodges of the Masons and Odd Fellows in Utica or Knights of Pythias, Odd Fellows, and Masons in Buffalo. By joining these societies, “Jews sought equality and integration into America, and at the same time continued to behave as Jews.” These secular lodges enabled Jews to socialize with fellow Jews “without the tumult of synagogue politics and congregational bickering.” Predominately Jewish lodges contributed to Jewish causes, like Jewish war relief in World War I or support for creating Jewish community centers. This became another outlet for Jews wanting to preserve their identity as Jews but outside the context of synagogues and denominational differences within Judaism.
[26] Women’s associations performed the same functions and provided the same communal responsibilities to preserve Jewish identity. As Hasia Diner noted, women’s associations “served the same religious and communal needs, and most members came from the same families.” Furthermore, “these societies saw themselves as agencies for the preservation of Judaism in its full sense.” They took care of the sick and acted as burial societies for women. The Ladies or Women’s Benevolent Society took on charitable functions. By the late 1860s, Purim balls became a vehicle for fundraising for charity, and Albany’s women sponsored one in 1869. Women played a major role in fundraising fairs for the Jewish Home for the Aged in 1880, primarily members of the German Beth El and Anshe Emeth congregations. In the 1880s, the Ladies Sewing Society sponsored entertainments to raise funds to help the poor in the Jewish community, such as for example, the one organized in 1883. The actions of German Jewish women in Albany fit the pattern of “German Jewish volunteer women being particularly active in organizing and raising funds for social welfare programs” to help poor members of the Jewish community.
[27] Reacting to the male B’nai B’rith, a group of Jewish women created a women’s equivalent in 1845 in New York called the United Order of True Sisters (Unabhangiger Orden Trueue Schwestern) that emphasized social, educational, and philanthropic activities. A predominately German-Jewish organization, Anshe Emeth and Beth El members established an Albany chapter, Abigail Lodge, on August 4, 1857. German remained the language of meetings until 1905. Women organized the Clara de Hirsch Society in 1890 “for the purpose of giving aid to the poor and needy” within the Jewish community. In 1893, a national women’s organization, the National Council of Jewish Women, was established for educational, social, and philanthropic purposes. Local women established a chapter on December 8, 1895, and by 1903 it had 125 members. In Albany, the chapter concentrated on religious education for the children of East European immigrants, and after World War I, on settling displaced East European Jews on farms in southern Rensselaer County. Young Jewish women in Albany founded a chapter of the YWHA in December 1915, sponsoring athletic and educational activities and dances at the Albany Yacht Club, where young people socialized. Merging with the YMHA in 1925, they formed the Jewish Community Center. According to historian Howard Sachar the Jewish community center movement “translated Judaism and Jewish identity into the widest ambit of Jewish civilization.”
[28] A national women’s Zionist organization founded in the 1920s as an arm of the Zionist Organization of America, known as Hadassah, established an Albany chapter in 1923 to support medical, vocational, and land reclamation projects in Palestine. Linked to labor Zionism, Pioneer Women, founded in 1921, established an Albany chapter in the 1920s. These women’s organizations acted to reinforce Jewish identity in Albany and provided different options for women to contribute to the community. They bridged the gap between becoming American and remaining Jewish. Zionism became an integral part of Jewish identity in Albany by 1920 for Jews of East European origin and by 1929 for Jews of German origin.
[29] These organizations helped Jews preserve their identity and provided mutual aid, social support, and ”camaraderie in times of joy and comfort in times of trouble, illness, and death.” Jewish organizations raised funds for philanthropy, social services, education, and maintaining Jewish institutions. As a small religious and ethnic minority in American society, Jewish organizations allowed Jews to retreat into an “exclusive social and cultural space.” Ever since Jews arrived in America in 1654, Jews have faced the same question---how to maintain Jewish identity in an overwhelmingly Christian society and cling to separate ethnic, religious, cultural, and social values as they navigated between Americanization and remaining Jewish. Jewish associations were bottom-up institutions created to serve the needs of immigrants and their children, searching for options to preserve Yiddishkeit while becoming American. Each individual Jew decided on their commitment to Judaism or to a Jewish identity outside of synagogue membership. Every commitment to religion and ethnic identity was voluntary for Jewish immigrants and their descendants. Howard Sachar’s comments on the Jewish Center movement suggested one of the several ways Jewish immigrants and their descendants found creative methods to reinvent their Jewish identity in secular mediums. Jewish organizations expanded Jewish civilization and constantly reinterpreted the meaning of Yiddishkeit for Jewish immigrants and their descendants. These institutions allowed Jews to maintain their identity as Jews outside of the communal politics of synagogues and the conflicting interpretations of Judaism.
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