Eastern European Jews
Eastern European Jews, primarily from regions such as Russia, Austria-Hungary, and Poland, began a significant emigration to the United States in the 1880s. This migration was largely driven by modernization that rendered their traditional roles as small merchants and artisans less viable, combined with violent state-sponsored anti-Semitic riots following the assassination of Czar Alexander II in 1881. By 1920, over two million Eastern European Jews had settled in the U.S., dramatically increasing the Jewish population and prompting concern among the established American Jewish community about rising anti-Semitism.
Upon arrival, many Eastern European Jews gravitated towards urban centers, particularly New York City, where they formed tight-knit communities and often faced challenges integrating with other ethnic groups. They typically found employment in burgeoning industries, such as garment manufacturing, while establishing their own cultural and religious institutions. However, internal divisions existed within the Jewish community, with distinctions based on region and economic status affecting social interactions and marriage choices.
Over the decades, as the descendants of these immigrants achieved economic success and assimilated into American society, they gradually moved to suburban areas, resulting in improved relations with other ethnicities. By navigating their complex identity as both Jews and Americans, Eastern European Jews contributed significantly to the cultural and professional landscape of the United States.
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Eastern European Jews
The major emigration of Eastern European Jews to the United States did not begin until the 1880s. Jews began to emigrate when the services they performed as small-scale merchants and artisans were rendered obsolete by the modernization of agriculture and the early impact of industrialization on the peasant economy of Russia, Austria-Hungary, and the Polish territory held by Germany. The migration became a mass movement, however, when deadly state-sponsored riots left hundreds dead and thousands homeless in Russia and Russian Poland following the assassination of Czar Alexander II in 1881. By 1920, more than one-third of the Jewish population in Russia had immigrated. About 250,000 Jews lived in the United States in 1880; by 1920, more than 2 million Eastern European Jews had joined them.
They were not given a warm welcome. The American Jewish community reacted with alarm, fearful that the upsurge in immigration would stimulate anti-Semitism and undermine the relatively comfortable position that Jews had attained in the country. Only as the magnitude of the problem became clear did the established Jewish community begin to organize an array of philanthropic institutions and establish defense organizations to combat anti-Semitism. The migration’s size and the tendency of the new arrivals to cluster within the nation’s largest cities, especially New York, made them particularly conspicuous. Crowded into slum areas where they transformed whole neighborhoods into regions where no English could be heard, they seemed particularly threatening to native-born Americans.
Many of the men, possessing few skills valuable to an industrial economy, became peddlers pushing carts or carrying packs filled with merchandise until they accumulated enough cash to open small retail stores. Many of the women and a significant proportion of the men found work in the garment industry. A few had previous experience in the needle trades, but of more importance was the willingness of owners to hire them. Manufacturing ready-to-wear clothing was a relatively new and risky industry that attracted Jewish entrepreneurs who were open to hiring and training Jewish workers.
Eastern European Jews settled in dense concentrations in their own neighborhoods and rarely interacted with other ethnic groups. Those whom they displaced, especially the New York City Irish, often responded with small-scale street violence. In addition, the Jewish community experienced sharp internal divisions. Jews from a given area of Europe tended to settle near each other, build separate synagogues, and create self-help and burial societies designed to serve migrants from the specific city or region from which they had come. A hierarchy of prejudice separated Jewish groups and influenced the choice of marriage partners. German Jews looked down on Polish and Russian Jews. Russian Jews were reputed to view marriage with Galician Jews, who came from the most poverty-stricken region of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, as equivalent to marrying a Gentile, which was taboo.
Economic success increased the interaction of the Eastern European Jews with the larger American society. In the affluent post-World War II years, they moved into the suburbs. Their children, fluent in English and increasingly college-educated, entered the professions as teachers, doctors, and lawyers. As the descendants of the Eastern European Jews merged with the American middle class, relations with other ethnic and religious groups became easier and less antagonistic.
Bibliography
“A People at Risk.” The Library of Congress, www.loc.gov/classroom-materials/immigration/polish-russian/a-people-at-risk/#:~:text=In%20the%201880s%2C%20more%20than,processing%20center%20at%20Ellis%20Island. Accessed 4 Nov. 2024.
Berrol, Selma Cantor. East Side/East End: Eastern European Jews in London and New York, 1870–1920. Westport: Praeger, 1994. Print.
Birmingham, Stephen. “The Rest of Us”: The Rise of America's Eastern European Jews. Boston: Little, 1984. Print.
Cowan, Neil M., and Ruth Schwartz Cowan. Our Parents' Lives: The Americanization of Eastern European Jews. New York: Basic, 1989. Print.
Garland, Libby. After They Closed the Gates: Jewish Illegal Immigration to the United States, 1921–1965. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 2014. Print.
Gay, Ruth. Unfinished People: Eastern European Jews Encounter America. New York: Norton, 1996. Print.