March 16, 2025

Vol. 6, No. 11

Jewish Artists:

Sara Wolk Hoechstetter

Jewish Encyclopedia:

Jewish Women's League

Article:

The Pittsburgh Dybbuk (Part 3)



A Patchwork Life:

Purim

Calendar:

March 19: Americans and the Holocaust

March 26: Barbara Trellis exhibit

April 10: "Teach Them to Your Children"

Jewish Genealogy Society:

Announcement

Mar. 19: Michael Moritz

April 6 and 20: Gil Bardige



Community:

URA photographs

SHHS archives

JCBA "Road-Trip"

Research Tools:

Newspapers, Cemeteries,

Memorial Plaques, Books,

Population Figures, Synagogues, Newsletter Archive,

Shul Records America

Jewish Artists:

Sara Wolk Hoechstetter

Black and white photograph of Sara Wolk Hoechstetter with her painting of Union Station.

Jewish Criterion (Oct. 20, 1933)

Pittsburgh Jewish Newspaper Project

One winter day in the early 1930s, Sara Wolk Hoechstetter (1896-1974) was dropping off a friend at Union Station downtown when she was overcome by sublime beauty. As the Pittsburgh Press later described it, “The wind was whirling madly around the gray building. A few pedestrians plowed through the drifts and wind.” Wolk Hoechstetter felt compelled to capture the visual intensity of this scene. She made a quick sketch while sitting in her car and later worked the sketch into a completed painting. It was her first.

Wolk Hoechstetter was part of a large musical family. She had previously expressed her creative interests as part of a singing duo called the Syncopating Sisters. A year before her epiphany at Union Station, she had attended a series of art lectures sponsored by the National Council of Jewish Women. She was particularly intrigued by a lecture from Dr. Max Schoen of the Department of Psychology and Education at the Carnegie Institute of Technology. “Dr. Schoen condemned the person who gives only one glance at a painting, and then expresses an opinion about it. He said true criticism partially depends on the critic getting the mood of a picture, as painted by the artist,” the Press noted. Wolk Hoechstetter felt that perhaps someone out there might understand what she wanted to say through her art.

“I kept reading in the papers that America is trying to develop native art,” Wolk Hoechstetter explained in an interview with the Pittsburgh Press. It gave her the confidence to explore her own artistic interests, rather than attempt to copy the style and technique of the Old Masters. She came to admire John Kane as an artist who she felt was working entirely in an American mode.

Her painting of Union Station was accepted into an outdoor exhibition of Pittsburgh painters on the lawn of the Schenley Hotel It attracted the attention of several local critics, who encouraged her to continue painting. She remained a fixture of the local art scene throughout the remainder of her life.

All year, the Rauh Jewish Archives is highlighting stories of Jewish artists in Western Pennsylvania before World War II. If you would like to donate a material from this time period, or any historic materials documenting Jewish life in this region, contact the archive or call 412-454-6406.

Jewish Encyclopedia of Western Pennsylvania:

Jewish Women's League

Color photograph of 258 Oakland Ave.

Google Street View (Nov. 2020)

The Jewish Women’s League for Taharath Hamishpocho was created to manage a community-wide mikvah (ritual bath) for Jewish women in Pittsburgh.

The Jewish community of Pittsburgh and Jewish communities in many of the neighboring small towns presumably maintained these mikvaot (ritual baths) in the 19th and early 20th centuries, although few details have emerged in the historic record. Efforts to expand and encourage the practice locally date to the mid-1920s, when Rabbi Sol B. Friedman of Congregation Poale Zedeck convened a community meeting to discuss the issue. Subsequent reports show that Rabbi Wolf Leiter was also involved in these initial efforts.

The movement grew in the early 1940s, when Mollie Butler, Ruth Milch, and Ethel Weiss established the Jewish Women’s League for Taharath Hamishpocho. It had a mission to build a new community mikvah in Oakland, which was centrally located for Jewish people living in the Hill District, the East End, and Squirrel Hill. The league opened a mikvah, described in newspaper reports at the time as a “ritualarium,” at 358 Oakland Ave. in November 1942 with Lena Speevack serving as the “matron” of the new institution.

Article:

The Dybbuk Returns

Color production still from the 2013 production of “The Dybbuk” by the Pittsburgh Jewish Music Festival, showing Leah watching the burial of Channon.

—Pittsburgh Jewish Music Festival Records

In the last of a three-part series, “The Dybbuk” is revived locally on stage through three community theatre productions in 1984, 1993, and 2013.

Louise Silk: A Patchwork Life

The Witness Quilt has completed its transformation to its white “kittel” underlayer, revealing the “positive vidui” as well as an assortment of new Bubbe Wisdoms. Visit during regular hours to see this new version.

In the next issue, we’ll have a report from the final Gut Yontif program.

March 19-April 27:

Americans and the Holocaust

March 21-April 21:

Barbara Trellis: The Story Behind Her Designs

A self-made textile designer and artist, Barbara Trellis (1930-2024) graduated from Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University), where she majored in Clothing and Design. Barbara's passion for needlepoint inspired her to launch a mid-life career teaching the craft to others. She ultimately became an ecclesiastical designer and was tapped to design and produce many large-scale installations for major Pittsburgh religious institutions. She carefully selected and led teams of volunteer stitchers from these organizations to execute her elaborate designs.

For Rodef Shalom, projects included Torah covers, altar chairs, banners depicting the Ten Commandments, and a wall hanging of the Torah portion from Leviticus. In addition, independently, she designed and constructed a silk appliqued chuppah. Her final contribution was a large, dramatic appliqued kidskin Menorah. In addition, Trellis designed Torah covers for Beth Shalom, Torah covers and a chuppah for Beth El, a curtain and valance for the ark and lectern coverings for Poale Zedek, and an ark covering for Beth Israel in McKeesport. She designed a series of communion kneelers for the United Methodist Church in Mt. Lebanon.

This free exhibit will be on display in the Rodef Shalom Congregation Jewish Museum (4905 Fifth Ave.) from March 21 through April 21, 2025 with an opening event on Wednesday, March 26 at 6 p.m.

April 10:

"Teach Them To Your Children"

Since the times of the Talmud, Jewish education has been a communal responsibility. How has Western Pennsylvania met this challenge? 

In a fast-paced and engaging monthly series “Teach Them To Your Children,” Rauh Jewish Archives Director Eric Lidji will cover 150 years of Jewish educational initiatives in Western Pennsylvania, showing how our community has perpetuated Jewish knowledge from generation to generation. 

This series will take place monthly in the Community Day School library (2743 Beechwood Blvd.) on Thursday evenings at 7 p.m.

Jan. 9—The 19th Century

Feb. 6—The 1900s

Mar. 6—The 1910s

The series continues April 10 with a review of local Jewish educational initiatives between 1920 and 1930 including the Southwestern District of Pennsylvania Jewish Religious Schools program, the Bureau of Jewish Education, and the first religious schools in Squirrel Hill.

The schedule for the rest of the year includes:



May 8—The 1930s

June 12—The 1940s

July 10—The 1950s

Aug. 14—The 1960s

Sept. 11—The 1970s

Oct. 9—The 1980s

Nov. 13—The 1990s

Dec. 11—The Future

"Teach Them To Your Children" is presented by Community Day School, Hillel

Academy of Pittsburgh, and Yeshiva Schools of Pittsburgh.

Jewish Genealogy Society

Jewish Genealogy Society of Pittsburgh

becomes fully independent

The Jewish Genealogy Society announces that it has become fully independent following a five-year partnership with the Rauh Jewish Archives (RJA).

Through a partnership launched in January 2020, the JGS organized an ambitious calendar of Jewish genealogical programming using administrative support from the RJA and financial backing from the William M. Lowenstein Genealogical Education Fund. The purpose of the partnership was to improve the genealogical resources for the local Jewish community by helping the JGS improve operations, increase membership, and become fiscally sustainable.

With the start of the pandemic, the JGS became one of the first Jewish genealogy societies in the country to adapt to online programming, hosting monthly programs on a diverse array of topics. Some of these topics included: Jewish genealogy from specific regions of Europe, Sephardic genealogy, using genealogy websites, understanding the role of DNA and other new technologies, understanding Jewish name changes, genealogical ethics, and of course, several programs on Western Pennsylvania Jewish history.

Through the partnership, the JGS has:

• hosted 55 programs with more than 4,400 registrants from around the world,
• published more than 50 issues of its monthly newsletter Z’chor,
• started holding regular in-person membership meetings in Squirrel Hill, 
• increased membership from 22 people in 2019 to 318 people today,
• became financially and administratively self-sufficient.

The JGSP/RJA partnership showed how organizations can leverage their respective strengths to provide services greater than either one could alone.

Now that the JGS has attained a solid footing, it is sufficiently strong to move ahead independent of support from the RJA and its administration. Going forward, the JGS and RJA will continue to partner by cross-promoting programming and providing in-person events at the Heinz History Center.

Julian Falk started the JGSP in 1981, publishing a newsletter Z’chor, and hosting programming in the community. Activities dwindled through the 2010s. Enormous changes have happened in the genealogy world since 1981. Steve Jaron revived the organization in 2017. With the introduction of at-home DNA testing, digital records, and the resources of the internet, it is now easier than ever to trace one's family history and gain insight into our personal origins. 

“We restarted JGS Pittsburgh in 2017 to improve the resources available to Jewish genealogists in our region. We are now stronger and more sustainable than at any point in our history, and we’re excited to enter our next phase of growth in the years to come,” said JGSP President Steve Jaron. 

Upcoming programs on the schedule are:

• Michael Moritz: Romanian Records Go Online. Michael is Director of JewishGen's Romania Research Division. 
• Gil Bardige: Help, I got my DNA Results and I’m Confused. Understanding your DNA matches and ethnicity estimates, and prioritizing your DNA matches to increase chances of finding common relatives. (2 parts)
• Dan Rottenberg, journalist and author of Finding Our Fathers (1977), the first English-language book on tracing Jewish ancestors that launched the modern Jewish genealogy movement.

Our national and international membership shows that you need not be present in Southwestern Pennsylvania to pursue your genealogical interests. Having said that, the group still would like to engage the "local" Southwestern Pennsylvania membership at meetups and with personal interactions to utilize the collective wealth of information about Jewish history in the area. 

Anyone interested in attending JGS Pittsburgh programs or starting their family research can contact the organization or visit pghjgs.org.

March 19:

Romanian Records Go Live

with Michael Moritz

This session will cover the availability of records from throughout Romania in many different online sources. We will cover all the various regions of the modern-day country, as well as regions that were formerly part of Romania but no longer are. This session also will delve into the specifics of the new developments on Romanian Jewish genealogical research, which will serve to benefit all those researching Romanian ancestors!

For more information, contact the Jewish Genealogy Society at president@pghjgs.org.

Michael Moritz is a seasoned genealogist with two decades of family research experience, having performed research for hundreds of individuals, with ancestry in over 35 countries and records written in over 10 languages. He has also taught workshops on a wide variety of topics regarding United States and international research.

April 6:

"Help! I got my DNA Results, and I’m Confused!" PART 1

with Gil Bardige

Did you get your autosomal DNA results from any or all of the 4 testing companies? Do you, have tens of thousands of matches that they tell you are close relatives, only to find that they don’t share a surname or town in common? Confused? Frustrated? You are not alone.

So, take a deep breath and join us in understanding your results; how to prioritize them, and reduce the thousands of matches to numbers you can research and find keys to expanding your family tree.

This presentation is for beginners and others who are just stuck or don’t know what to do next. Maybe you need a restart? Learn about the effects of endogamy and how to compensate for them.

Join the thousands of genealogists who have been successful with Gil’s methodologies. He will share an expanded version of his processes and techniques to prioritize matches, to get organized and feel like you can accomplish something and know what to do next. His speaking style is high energy (you won’t be bored) and he loves to take questions at the conclusion. In the end, you will be able to say, “Now I understand, I get it, I know what to do.”

For more information, contact the Jewish Genealogy Society at president@pghjgs.org.

April 20:

"Help! I got my DNA Results, and I’m Confused!" PART 2

with Gil Bardige

Did you enjoy Gil Bardige’s previous talk…Part 1? We hope that you tried his methodologies and techniques. Well, it is now time for the Next Steps. This intermediate to advanced level presentation is primarily for people working with Jewish ancestry who have completed Gil’s Part 1 and have run into

new brick walls or want to expand their search parameters productively.

Gil will provide you with actionable processes that you can use in your genealogy research, including new criteria and dealing with the exceptions. Through case studies and examples, he explains Pileup Areas, Segment Triangulation and for those of you who have tested at Ancestry, Gil has added, how he used Pro Tools (Shared matches & ThruLines) to find 7 DNA matches that he would have missed without these techniques and added nearly 4 dozen new documented relatives to his tree.

Tested at MyHeritage? Learn some key shortcuts to help you sort through the unknown matches in a quicker more productive process while making use of the key tools that only My Heritage provides.

He is a firm believer that you can use DNA results as a tool in your genealogical research as it generates clues that can help people confirm/deny relationships. His speaking style is high energy (you won’t be bored) and he loves to take questions at the conclusion. People have said of his presentations, “Thank you, Gil, I am no longer confused!”

Gil Bardige was born & raised in Chicago and currently lives in the Columbus Ohio area. A graduate of the New York Institute of Technology, Gil retired in 2019 after a long career in air conditioning and refrigerationmost recently as a National Business Development Leader for Trane Technologies. At the “instruction” of his mother, Gil began his genealogy adventure in 1979 with 54 people in his tree.

Today his family tree including Mishpocha, is over 3200 people tracing 4 branches back to his 5th great grandfathers born about 1740. His family arrived in Chicago in the early 20th century. For nearly 18 years Gil has expanded his knowledge base to Genetic Genealogy, testing at each of the four

major DNA companies, and currently manages three y-DNA projects at Family Tree DNA as a Volunteer Administrator. He loves to help people manage their expectations and begin to remove confusion from the DNA results whether it’s, Y-DNA, mtDNA, or Autosomal DNA. He had spoken at dozens of local events, international webinars and conferences, including at last 8 IAJGS Conferences. Gil has found nearly four dozen previously unknown cousins through DNA.

Gil is the Chair of the Genealogy Committee of the Columbus Jewish Historical Society (JGS). He co-hosts live Genetic Genealogy Q&A sessions at JGS Illinois and JGS Toronto. Gil developed and hosts the monthly Kvell & Kvetch genealogy Q&A in Columbus. Gil has managed the Mentoring Program for IAJGS and cohosts the Apple Users and Jewish Genealogy Facebook page and monthly virtual BOF (Birds of a Feather) meeting.

Community

Urban Redevelopment Authority Archives

The City of Pittsburgh Archives has launched a new digital archive containing thousands of photographs and documents spanning more than two centuries. Of particular interest to local Jewish history is a collection of more than 2,000 photographs of properties in the lower Hill District taken by the Urban Redevelopment Authority in the late 1950s prior to demolitions in the area. 

Squirrel Hill Historical Society Archives

Squirrel Hill Historical Society has added a collection of 60 historic images of Squirrel Hill to the Historic Pittsburgh website. The collection contains selected images from three organizations: the Squirrel Hill Historical Society, Squirrel Hill Urban  Coalition, and Mary S. Brown Memorial-Ames United Methodist Church. The photographs document many aspects of life in Squirrel Hill, including many beloved businesses from the 1990s that no longer exist.

From the Jewish Cemetery & Burial Association

"Road Trip: The Jewish Cemeteries of Western Pennsylvania"

The Jewish Cemetery and Burial Association of Greater Pittsburgh has released a new documentary showcasing Jewish cemeteries in Western Pennsylvania.

“Road Trip: The Jewish Cemeteries of Western Pennsylvania” is a one-hour tour of the many cemetery properties overseen by the JCBA, as well as an overview of the organization’s ongoing work to care for these sacred burial grounds. The video is a wonderful opportunity to celebrate these special Jewish cultural sites in our region. The video includes many historic photographs and documents from the collections of the Rauh Jewish Archives. 

Research Tools

The Pittsburgh Jewish Newspaper Project contains digitized, searchable copies of four local English-language Jewish newspapers between 1895 and 2010. It is a valuable tool for researching almost any topic about Jewish history in Western Pennsylvania. For a primer on using the website, watch our video.

Western Pennsylvania Jewish Cemetery Project

The Rauh Jewish Archives launched the Western Pennsylvania Jewish Cemetery Project in 1998 to preserve burial records from Jewish cemeteries across the region. Over a period of fifteen years, the information was compiled into a searchable, online database containing approximately 50,000 burial records from 78 Jewish cemeteries throughout the region.

Western Pennsylvania Yahrzeit Plaques Project

The Rauh Jewish Archives launched the Western Pennsylvania Yahrzeit Plaques Project in 2020. The goal was to create a comprehensive collection of burial records from memorial boards at synagogues across the region. Volunteers are currently transcribing these boards and records are being added monthly to our online database. The database currently contains more than 2,700 listings.

Rauh Jewish Archives Bibliography

University of Pittsburgh librarian and Rauh Jewish Archives volunteer Laurie Cohen created this comprehensive bibliography of the Rauh Jewish Archives library holdings from 1988 through 2018. It lists nearly 350 volumes arranged by type and then by subject. This a great tool to use early in your research process, as you’re surveying available resources on a given subject.

Jewish Population Estimates

Looking to figure out how many Jews lived in a certain part of Western Pennsylvania at a certain moment in time? This bibliography includes more than 30 estimates of the Jewish population of Pittsburgh and small-towns throughout the region, conducted between 1852 and 2017.

Synagogues

A database of buildings throughout Western Pennsylvania known to have hosted Jewish worship services. Includes links to photographs and citations with original source material. Database currently includes 90 locations from 2 institutions

Rauh Jewish Archives Newsletter

The Rauh Jewish Archives has been publishing a weekly newsletter since 2020. The newsletter contains a variety of articles about local Jewish history, including much original research not found anywhere else. You can find and read every issue—more than 150!— in our new index.

Shul Records America

Online finding aid from JewishGen listing congregational archival collections held at publicly accessible repositories across the United States. Includes 63 listings from the Rauh Jewish Archives, as well as other repositories with Western Pennsylvania congregational records.

The Rauh Jewish Archives was founded on November 1, 1988 to collect and preserve the documentary history of Jewish life in Western Pennsylvania and to make it available to the world through research assistance, programing, exhibits, publications, and partnerships.

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