The Jewish Community of West Philadelphia

The Jewish Community of West Philadelphia
Author: Allen Meyers
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
Total Pages: 132
Release: 2001
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780738508542

The Jewish community of Philadelphia west of the Schuylkill River is a composite of seven distinct neighborhoods surrounding West Philadelphia proper. These include Fortieth and Girard, Parkside, Wynnefield, Overbrook Park, Wynnefield Heights, Southwest Philly, and Island Road. A gathering of seventy-five thousand Jewish people in West Philadelphia during the twentieth century qualified the area known as "a city within a city" as a second settlement area. Excellent public transportation included the famed Market Street Elevated. The West Philadelphia Jews flourished and supported dozens of synagogues and bakeries, and more than one hundred kosher butcher shops at the neighborhood's height from the 1930s through the 1950s. Newly arrived immigrants embraced traditional Jewish values, which led them to encourage their offspring to acquire a secondary education in their own neighborhoods as a way of achieving assimilation into the community at large. The Jewish Community of West Philadelphia portrays Jewish life throughout West Philadelphia in the mid-twentieth century. The book captures rare, nearly forgotten images with photographs gleaned from the community at large.

Oxford Circle

Oxford Circle
Author: Allen Meyers
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
Total Pages: 132
Release: 2004
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780738536217

The Jewish community of Northeast Philadelphia was created by the relocation of secondgeneration eastern European Jews from the neighborhoods of Strawberry Mansion and South, North, and West Philadelphia. Serving more than one hundred thousand Jewish residents at its height, Northeast Philadelphia consisted of ten distinctive neighborhoods, including Feltonville, Oxford Circle, Tacony, and Mayfair. During the twentieth century, thousands of Jewish families were attracted to the area by the houses built along Roosevelt Boulevard for soldiers returning home from World War II. Welsh Road catered to younger families, and wealthier families resided along Bustleton Avenue and Fox Chase and Verree Roads. Today, the influx of strictly orthodox Jewish residents has given rise to a third generation of Jewish life in Northeast Philadelphia.

The Jewish Community of South Philadelphia

The Jewish Community of South Philadelphia
Author: Allen Meyers
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
Total Pages: 132
Release: 1998
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780738549552

For many Jewish immigrants to America, Philadelphia's row houses provided an instant community of neighbors where they were able to combine the traditions of the Old World with new American ideals. In their flight to a new land and a new life, Jewish immigrants found a place to call home in South Philadelphia. This unprecedented collection of images celebrates the people and places of this community, from their struggles to their triumphs and the family bonds that provided their strength along the way. The Jewish Community of South Philadelphia is a tribute to tradition and pride that will serve as a valuable tool in teaching the history of Jewish immigrants in America. Join Allen Meyers in this exploration of the past that will be enjoyed for generations to come.

The Jewish Community Around North Broad Street

The Jewish Community Around North Broad Street
Author: Allen Meyers
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
Total Pages: 134
Release: 2002
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780738510170

The cradle of Jewish life in Philadelphia began with the establishment of the first synagogue, Mikveh Israel, in 1740. With the influx of many German Jews in the 1840s, the community expanded above Spring Garden Street into the Northern Liberties neighborhood. Urban settlement of Philadelphia's Jewish population during the last quarter of the nineteenth century shifted to North Broad Street when the economy improved for the city's residents after the Civil War. North Broad Street soon boasted two elegantly designed synagogues and the newly relocated Jewish Hospital from West Philadelphia.The Jewish Community around North Broad Street weaves the tale of the Jewish community in this part of Philadelphia through a collection of rare and stunning images. The construction of the North Broad Street subway in the 1920s and the row house Jewish community known as Logan are parts of this story. The development of business districts led to a more cohesive north and northwest Jewish community that allowed for satellite Jewish enclaves to flourish, complete with their own synagogues, bakeries, kosher meat markets, and hundreds of other shops that served the general population. In the 1950s, new neighborhoods, such as Mount Airy and West Oak Lane, alleviated an acute housing shortage at a time when 110,000 Jews lived in north-central and northwest Philadelphia.

West Philadelphia

West Philadelphia
Author: Robert Morris Skaler
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
Total Pages: 132
Release: 2002-03-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780738509709

The many neighborhoods west of the Schuylkill River across from William Penn's "Quaker City" were distinctly rural until 1860, when horsecar lines first crossed the river. The area soon became home to wealthy businessmen who built elegant mansions and villas in University City and Powelton Village. West Philadelphia's growth accelerated northward into Belmont and Parkside-Girard after the 1876 Centennial Exposition and westward into Cedar Park, Spruce Hill, and Walnut Hill in the 1890s with the introduction of electric trolley lines. West Philadelphia: University City to 52nd Street is the first photographic history of the area in the last one hundred years. Images of the typical, modest West Philadelphia row houses, which slowly took over the open farmland after the Market Street Elevated opened in 1907, tell the story of how Philadelphia became known as the "City of Homes." Countless, rarely seen photographs of the streets where people lived and worked fill this extraordinary history.

Klezmer

Klezmer
Author: Hankus Netsky
Publisher: Temple University Press
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2015-06-12
Genre: Music
ISBN: 9781439909034

Klezmer presents a lively and detailed overview of the folk musical tradition as practiced in Philadelphia's twentieth-century Jewish community. Through interviews, archival research, and recordings, Hankus Netsky constructs an ethnographic portrait of Philadelphia’s Jewish musicians, the environment they worked in, and the repertoire they performed at local Jewish lifestyle and communal celebrations. Netsky defines what klezmer music is, how it helped define Jewish immigrant culture in Philadelphia, and how its current revival has changed klezmer’s meaning historically. Klezmer also addresses the place of musicians and celebratory music in Jewish society, the nature of klezmer culture, the tensions between sacred and secular in Jewish music, and the development of Philadelphia's distinctive “Russian Sher” medley, a unique and masterfully crafted composition. Including a significant amount of musical transcriptions, Klezmer chronicles this special musical genre from its heyday in the immigrant era, through the mid-century period of its decline through its revitalization from the 1980s to today.

Jewish Community of West Philadelphia

Jewish Community of West Philadelphia
Author: Allen Meyers
Publisher: Arcadia Library Editions
Total Pages: 130
Release: 2001-07
Genre: History
ISBN: 9781531605261

The Jewish community of Philadelphia west of the Schuylkill River is a composite of seven distinct neighborhoods surrounding West Philadelphia proper. These include Fortieth and Girard, Parkside, Wynnefield, Overbrook Park, Wynnefield Heights, Southwest Philly, and Island Road. A gathering of seventy-five thousand Jewish people in West Philadelphia during the twentieth century qualified the area known as "a city within a city" as a second settlement area. Excellent public transportation included the famed Market Street Elevated. The West Philadelphia Jews flourished and supported dozens of synagogues and bakeries, and more than one hundred kosher butcher shops at the neighborhood's height from the 1930s through the 1950s. Newly arrived immigrants embraced traditional Jewish values, which led them to encourage their offspring to acquire a secondary education in their own neighborhoods as a way of achieving assimilation into the community at large. The Jewish Community of West Philadelphia portrays Jewish life throughout West Philadelphia in the mid-twentieth century. The book captures rare, nearly forgotten images with photographs gleaned from the community at large.

The Jews of Boston

The Jews of Boston
Author: Combined Jewish Philanthropies
Publisher: Yale University Press
Total Pages: 390
Release: 2005-01-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780300107876

Published on the 350th anniversary of the first Jews to arrive in America, this comprehensive history of the Jews of Boston is now available in a revised and updated paperback edition. The stunning work combines illuminating essays by distinguished Jewish historians with 110 rare photographs to trace the community from its tentative beginnings in colonial Boston through its emergence in the twentieth century as one of the most influential and successful Jewish communities in America. The volume also presents fascinating information about Boston’s synagogues and Jewish neighborhoods as well as the evolution of Jewish culture in Boston and the United States.Praise for the previous edition:“The writing is engaging and lucid, and the superb, profuse illustrations enhance the text. While numerous community histories have been published, this volume is in a class by itself--and will set the standard for all future works of this kind.”—Library Journal“For those of us who grew up with anecdotes of what being a Jew was like in, say, the South End in 1910, or in Roxbury or Chelsea in 1920, this history, collected in one place for the first time, fills in the blanks. It gives us the context for our inherited folk tales.”—Alan Lupo, Boston Globe

Philadelphia Trolleys

Philadelphia Trolleys
Author: Allen Meyers
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
Total Pages: 132
Release: 2003
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780738512266

Streetcar service arrived in Philadelphia in the 1850s, shortly after the consolidation of the city. After the Civil War, the horse-drawn omnibus gave way to a comprehensive network of streetcar lines with some routes measuring nineteen miles in length. By 1915, the electrification of the streetcar increased the number of routes in Philadelphia to a total of eighty-six. During the trolley's heyday, the city provided a vast test track for such companies as J.G. Brill, Kimball and Gorton Car Manufacturers, and the Budd Wheel Company. The Wharton Railroad Switch Company revolutionized the manufacture of switches and tracks. Of the lines that once operated in Philadelphia, five are still running today. Philadelphia Trolleys contains a variety of rare images, including a postcard of the Point Breeze Amusement Park, photographs of motormen's uniform badges and buttons, architectural drawings, early stock certificates, and a photograph of the Toonerville Trolley used in the silent movies produced by Lubin Studios in the 1920s.