Memoirs: Israel Oseroff
Beth Shalom, 1939
The Cremieux Society
Calendar
Community News
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Esther Levitt presenting a new ambulance to Abraham Oseroff, acting director of Montefiore Hospital, on behalf of the Montefiore Aid Society. The Society had purchased the ambulance for $4,000. Seated in the vehicle is Dr. Harry Miller. Also pictured are (from left) Ida Skolsky, Mrs. Harry Feinstein, Marian Davis, Ruth Perlman, and Mrs. Ben Amdur, 1930.
—Montefiore Hospital Photographs [MSP 286]
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Nostalgia lurks in virtually everyone’s past. Yet it is not easy to distill it out of those bygones and bottle it for those who care to share it. There has to be a sense of recall, the patience of a panner for gold and the candor of a sage.
All three virtues are reflected in the just-published memoirs of Israel Oseroff…
—Milt Sussman, Jewish Chronicle, April 7, 1977
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Israel Oseroff titled his memoir “I Was There.” He uses the phrase to mark the many times he found himself “on the scene when historical events happened.”
Oseroff describes his experiences growing up in Pittsburgh—and particularly the Hill District and Soho neighborhoods—in the early 20th century. His parents immigrated to Pittsburgh in 1891 and started a grocery store on Clark Street. The business evolved over time into a successful garment factory called the Penn Trouser Company, located at 1322 Fifth Avenue in Uptown.
In telling the story of his childhood, Oseroff shares useful details about the religious, cultural, economic, and social life of the Hill District at that time— not only the Jewish experience, but also the dynamic between people of different races, different ethnicities, different genders, and different economic outlooks. It is a rare surviving first-person account of the world of Fifth Avenue before World War II. And in places it is, as Sussman noted, sagely candid.
Oseroff describes his pivotal role founding the Y Music Society and his leadership of the Hebrew Free Loan Association through the 1936 flood. But his perspective is bigger than his own experiences. He “took some small part in the happenings of the live around me,” and therefore he feels obliged to describe the lives of those who made the happenings happen. Of particular interest are his descriptions of his brother Abraham and his wife Pauline, each of whom was much more prominent in Jewish communal affairs than he was.
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Next week: Your memoirs
All year, the Rauh Jewish Archives is highlighting memoirs of Jewish life in Western Pennsylvania. If you would like to donate a memoir, or just chat about the stories you've read, contact the archive or call 412-454-6406.
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New Collection:
Beth Shalom confirmation class photograph [2021.0065]
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"Thirteenth Graduating Class, Beth Shalom Religious School, May 21, 1939, Pittsburgh, Pa."
—Beth Shalom confirmation class photograph [2021.0065].
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Beth Shalom confirmation class list
—Jewish Criterion, May 5, 1939
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Barb Siegel donated this group portrait of the 1939 confirmation class of Congregation Beth Shalom. Her mother Elaine Greenberg Kelsky is first on the left in the second row.
Thanks to the Jewish Criterion, we have a complete list of Beth Shalom's confirmands from that year, (although, unfortunately, the list does not provide a key telling us which name belongs to which face).
The list includes “Jerry Louis Caplan,” who would become one of the great artists working in Pittsburgh in the middle decades of the 20th century.
The list also includes many surnames still present in the local Jewish community today. Do you recognize anyone? Can you identify where in the Beth Shalom synagogue this photograph would have been taken?
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Jewish Encyclopedia of Western Pennsylvania:
The Cremieux Society
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Cremieux Society listing.
—American Jewish Yearbook, Vol. 1 (1899-1900)
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The Cremieux Society was the Pittsburgh branch of the Paris-based Alliance Israelite Universelle. Dr. Lippman Mayer of Rodef Shalom Congregation founded the local branch around 1875 to raise funds in support of Jewish refugees fleeing Russia and Eastern Europe. In 1881 and 1882, the Cremieux Society oversaw a major resettlement effort in the Pittsburgh region.
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The Jewish Encyclopedia of Western Pennsylvania brings together numerous online resources into a clearinghouse for conducting research about Jewish history in this region. As we migrate information to this new website, we’ll be announcing new entries and resources in this section of the newsletter. |
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Calendar—Past and Present |
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Purim play at the Hebrew Institute, March 1965.
—Hebrew Institute Purim Play photographs (2020.0058)
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Purim begins at sundown on March 16 and continues through sundown on March 17. The holiday commemorates the victory of the Jewish people over a genocidal plot in ancient Persia, in the era between the two Temples.
One of the most beloved traditions of Purim is retelling the story of the holiday through a spiel, or play. Seen here is a Purim spiel put on by the children of the Hebrew Institute nursery school in March 1965. The teacher is Freda Clark.
This photograph comes from a series of four images given to the archive by Dr. Bernard Newman, who played King Ahashuarus in the play that year.
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March 19-20
The Bat Mitzvah Centennial Celebration
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Dress worn by Nancy Moidel Ciccone at her bat mitzvah ceremony on May 24, 1963, at the Aliquippa Jewish Community Center.
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In March 1922, Judith Kaplan celebrated what is widely considered to be the first modern bat mitzvah.
Today, bat mitzvah ceremonies are commonly celebrated across the Jewish world. In honor of the centennial of this milestone, Congregation Dor Hadash is hosting a celebration and symposium, co-sponsored by Jewish Studies Program at the University of Pittsburgh, Rodef Shalom Congregation, and the national Reconstructing Judaism.
The March 20 symposium features a keynote address by Rabbi Dr. Deborah Waxman of Reconstructing Judaism, and three local workshops looking at various aspects of the bat mitzvah: the history of bat mitzvah ceremonies in Western Pennsylvania from the Rauh Jewish Archives, an overview of the experience of adult bat mitzvah ceremonies, and the emerging "b'mitzvah" as a non-binary approach to this rite of passage.
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March 27
JGS Pittsburgh Presents: Mona Freedman Morris
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The release of the 1950 Census this year will provide genealogists with an important tool for researching ancestors. In her talk “Getting Ready for the 1950 Census," Morris will provide a hands-on, step-by-step introduction to the 1950 Census. She will include stories about the social and economic changes documented in the decade after the 1940 Census. She will also provide detailed instructions on how to use SteveMorse.org “One-Step” website to find Enumeration Districts and how to use City Directories to find where people lived at the time the census was taken.
This is a virtual program. It will be recorded, and the recording will be made available for JGS-Pittsburgh members who are current on their dues.
This program is possible through the support of the William M. Lowenstein Genealogical Research Endowment Fund of the Jewish Community Foundation.
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Mona Freedman Morris is an energetic, informative, and inspirational speaker with more than 40 years experience. She is a professional genealogist with memberships in the Association of Professional Genealogists, Jewish Genealogical Society of Palm Beach County, and Jewish Genealogical Society-NYC. She is the founder and President Emerita of the JGS Palm Beach County, Fl. She has spoken on many genealogical subjects relating, and her reviews have always been outstanding whatever subject she is chosen to speak about. She has appeared in many newspapers and is well known in her field. She is the author of Scattered Seeds: A Guide to Jewish Genealogy.
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March 29
Jewish Exodus from the Hill
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RESCHEDULED FROM MARCH 15
As part of Rodef Shalom Congregation's popular Jewish Pittsburgh History series, Rich Brean will discuss the Jewish outmigration from the Hill District in the mid-20th Century. Brean previously presented a two-part talk on the Jewish history of the neighborhood, told through historic research and personal experience. You can view those presentations here and here.
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Pittsburgh Jewish Newspaper Project |
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The home page of the new Pittsburgh Jewish Newspaper Project website, hosted by Carnegie Mellon University Libraries. The redesigned website is launching this month. |
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By now, you're probably expertly zipping around the new Pittsburgh Jewish Newspaper Project platform. But if you still need a little help navigating the features and tools of the website, the Rauh Jewish Archives recently contributed a brief explanatory article to the Jewish Chronicle. It provides some basic tips and techniques for conducting research using the new site.
We plan to provide a live virtual training workshop in the near future to review the website and its functionalities. Until then, we are here to help you troubleshoot problems. You can contact the archive or call 412-454-6406.
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[IMAGE: Marian Schreiber and employees at the Schreiber Trucking Company, c.1943—from Schreiber Family Papers and Photographs, MSS 846.]
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The Rauh Jewish Archives was founded on November 1, 1988 to collect, preserve, and make accessible the documentary history of Jews and Jewish communities of Western Pennsylvania. You can help the RJHPA continue its work by making a donation that will directly support the work being done in Western Pa. |
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Plan a Visit
Senator John Heinz History Center
1212 Smallman Street
Pittsburgh, Pa. 15222
412-454-6000
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A proud affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution, the Senator John Heinz History Center is the largest history museum in Pennsylvania and presents American history with a Western Pennsylvania connection.
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