Little Jerusalem (Burlington, Vermont)

Last updated

Little Jerusalem is the historic Jewish quarter in Burlington, Vermont. The neighborhood was located in Burlington's North End, particularly along North Street. The community was vibrant between the 1880s and the 1930s. The religious and secular practices in Little Jerusalem resembled the shtetl life of Eastern Europe, due to the Eastern European origins of the community. As the North End was rural at the time, Little Jerusalem's Yiddishkeit strongly paralleled the characteristics of rural Eastern European village life. Due to assimilation, intermarriage, secularization, and other developments, Little Jerusalem had largely faded as a distinct community by the time of the Second World War. [1]

History

The neighborhood was once home to a vibrant Jewish community including kosher bakeries, synagogues, and a mikveh. [2] The community was developed by Ashkenazi Jewish immigrants from Lithuania, Russia, Poland, Germany, Ottoman Palestine, and elsewhere. Litvaks (Lithuanian Jews) were the largest group of Jewish immigrants living in Burlington. [3] The earliest Jewish immigrants to burlington were a group of Livtak families from Kovno. These Lithuanian immigrants preserved the Yiddish language for decades and largely practiced Orthodox Judaism. [4]

In 2012, [[Vermont Public Television] produced a documentary about the community titled "Little Jerusalem". [5] The documentary features an archivist from Burlington's Ohavi Zedek Synagogue. The documentary won the Vermont Historical Society’s Richard O. Hathaway Award. [6]

Over time, many Orthodox Jews left Burlington. There was no yeshiva or Jewish day school in Burlington, with the nearest yeshivas and day schools being in New York State. [7]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Haredi Judaism</span> Ultra-orthodox branch of Judaism

Haredi Judaism consists of groups within Orthodox Judaism that are characterized by their strict adherence to halakha and traditions, in opposition to modern values and practices. Its members are usually referred to as ultra-Orthodox in English; however, the term "ultra-Orthodox" is considered pejorative by many of its adherents, who prefer terms like strictly Orthodox or Haredi. Haredi Jews regard themselves as the most religiously authentic group of Jews, although other movements of Judaism disagree.

Ger is a Polish Hasidic dynasty originating from the town of Góra Kalwaria, Poland, where it was founded by Yitzchak Meir Alter (1798–1866), known as the "Chiddushei HaRim". Ger is a branch of Peshischa Hasidism, as Yitzchak Meir Alter was a leading disciple of Simcha Bunim of Peshischa (1765–1827). Before the Holocaust, followers of Ger were estimated to number in excess of 100,000, making it the largest and most influential Hasidic group in Poland. Today, the movement is based in Jerusalem, and its membership is estimated at 11,859 families, as of 2016, most of whom live in Israel, making Ger the largest Hasidic dynasty in Israel. However, there are also well-established Ger communities in the United States and in Europe. In 2019, some 300 families of followers led by Shaul Alter, split off from the dynasty led by his cousin Yaakov Aryeh Alter.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Abayudaya</span> Community in eastern Uganda that practices Judaism.

The Abayudaya are a community in eastern Uganda, near the town of Mbale, who practice Judaism. They are devout in their practice, keeping kashrut and observing Shabbat. There are several different villages where the Abayudaya live. Most of these are recognized by the Reform and Conservative movements of Judaism. In June 2016, Rabbi Shlomo Riskin led a Beit Din that performed an Orthodox conversion for the Putti community of Abayudaya.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lithuanian Jews</span> Ethnic group of Europe

Lithuanian Jews or Litvaks are Jews with roots in the territory of the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The term is sometimes used to cover all Haredi Jews who follow an Ashkenazi, non-Hasidic style of life and learning, whatever their ethnic background. The area where Lithuanian Jews lived is referred to in Yiddish as ליטע Lite, hence the Hebrew term Lita'im (לִיטָאִים).

The Union of Orthodox Rabbis of the United States and Canada (UOR), often called by its Hebrew name, Agudath Harabonim or Agudas Harrabonim ("union of rabbis"), was established in 1901 in the United States and is the oldest organization of Orthodox rabbis in the United States. It had been for many years the principal group for such rabbis, though in recent years it has lost much of its former membership and influence.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Har Nof</span> Neighborhood in Jerusalem, Israel

Har Nof is a neighborhood on a hillside on the western boundary of Jerusalem with a population of 20,000 residents, primarily Orthodox Jews.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Haredim and Zionism</span> Overview of the relationship between Haredim and Zionism

From the founding of political Zionism in the 1890s, Haredi Jewish leaders voiced objections to its secular orientation, and before the establishment of the State of Israel, the vast majority of Haredi Jews were opposed to Zionism. This was chiefly due to the concern that secular nationalism would redefine the Jewish nation from a religious community based in their alliance to God for whom adherence to religious laws were “the essence of the nation’s task, purpose, and right to exists,” to an ethnic group like any other as well as the view that it was forbidden for the Jews to re-constitute Jewish rule in the Land of Israel before the arrival of the Messiah. Those rabbis who did support Jewish resettlement in Palestine in the late 19th century had no intention to conquer Palestine and declare its independence from the rule of the Ottoman Turks, and some preferred that only observant Jews be allowed to settle there.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kehila Kedosha Janina</span> Synagogue in New York

Kehila Kedosha Janina is a synagogue on 280 Broome Street between Allen and Eldridge Streets in the Lower East Side neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. It was built in 1925-27 and was designed by Sydney Daub and is now the only Romaniote rite synagogue in the Western Hemisphere. Romaniote traditions are separate from those of both Sephardic and Ashkenazi Judaism, deriving their lineage in the Eastern Mediterranean for nearly 2000 years, long before the Spanish Inquisition.

Beth Israel Synagogue is a historic Carpenter Gothic style Orthodox synagogue located in Edenbridge in the rural municipality of Willow Creek, near Melfort, Saskatchewan, Canada. The Edenbridge Hebrew Colony was founded in 1906 by Jewish immigrants who came from Lithuania via South Africa. Completed in 1908, the synagogue's wooden frame exterior, steep pitched roof and end lancet windows are typical of the plain Carpenter Gothic style buildings built by other religious groups in Saskatchewan and the rest of rural North America during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The elegant interior, however, reflects the Eastern European roots of the Orthodox congregation. Today Beth Israel is the "oldest surviving synagogue in Saskatchewan."

Ahron Dovid Burack was a Lithuanian-American rabbi and rosh yeshivah.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ohavi Zedek</span>

Ohavi Zedek is a Conservative synagogue in Burlington, Vermont, United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Old Ohavi Zedek Synagogue</span> United States historic place

Old Ohavi Zedek Synagogue is a historic synagogue building at Archibald and Hyde Streets in Burlington, Vermont. It was built in 1885 for Ohavi Zedek, Vermont's oldest Jewish congregation, and is currently occupied by Congregation Ahavath Gerim. The building, a distinctive vernacular interpretation of the Gothic Revival, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1978.

The history of the Jews in Curaçao can be traced back to the mid-17th century, when the first Jewish immigrants began to arrive. The first Jews in Curaçao were Sephardi Jewish immigrants from the Netherlands, Portugal, and Spain. These immigrants founded Congregation Mikvé Israel-Emanuel, the oldest continuously used synagogue in the Americas. The first Jew to settle in Curaçao was a Dutch-Jewish interpreter named Samuel Cohen, who arrived on board a Dutch fleet in 1634. By the mid-1700s, the community was the most prosperous in the Americas and many of the Jewish communities in Latin America, primarily in Colombia and Venezuela, resulted from the influx of Curaçaoan Jews.

The history of Lithuanians in Baltimore dates back to the mid-19th century. Thousands of Lithuanians immigrated to Baltimore between the 1880s and 1920s. The Lithuanian American community was mainly centered in what is now the Hollins–Roundhouse Historic District. Baltimore's Lithuanian community has founded several institutions to preserve the Lithuanian heritage of the city, including a Roman Catholic parish, a cultural festival, a dance hall, and a yeshiva.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of the Jews in Greater Cleveland</span>

The Jewish community of the Greater Cleveland area comprises a significant ethnoreligious population of the U.S. State of Ohio. It began in 1839 by immigrants from Bavaria and its size has significantly grown in the decades since then. In the early 21st century, Ohio's census data reported over 150,000 Jews, with the Cleveland area being home to more than 50% of this population. As of 2018, Greater Cleveland is the 23rd largest Jewish community in the United States. As of 2022, the Cleveland Jewish Community is estimated to be about 100,000 people.

The history of the Jews in Denver, Colorado extends from the discovery of gold in 1858 to the present day. Early Jewish pioneers were largely of German backgrounds and were deeply involved in politics and local affairs, and some were among the most prominent citizens of the time. Beginning in the 1880s, the influx of Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe to the U.S. expanded the Denver Jewish community and exposed cultural rifts between Jews from German versus Yiddish speaking backgrounds. As Denver became a center for those seeking tuberculosis treatment, Jews were among those who came seeking healing, and the Jewish community set up two important organizations that aided not only sick Jews, but the sick poor of all backgrounds. In the early 20th century, the Orthodox community in the city's West Side attracted religious new immigrants and built up a number of communal institutions. The community, especially the poor in the West Side, had to deal with anti-Semitism, sometimes violent, and the rise of the Ku Klux Klan in Colorado. Beginning in the 1950s and continuing through the 1970s, the community began to spread out of the West Side to the East Side, and then the suburbs. The community remains vibrant today, and as it has rapidly grown in the past decades so have the number of educational, recreational, and religious organizations and institutions that serve it.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Belarusian Americans in New York City</span>

New York City includes a sizeable Belarusian American population. The New York metropolitan area has one of the largest concentrations of Belarusians in the United States. Many Belarusians live in Brighton Beach and elsewhere in South Brooklyn, along with other ex-Soviet immigrants including Russians and Ukrainians. Around 55,000 people of Belarusian descent live in the New York City metropolitan area, with estimates ranging from 50,000 to 75,000.

References

  1. "North Street Historic District Burlington, Vermont". University of Vermont . Retrieved 2019-10-05.
  2. "After 100 Years, Vermont's 'Little Jerusalem' Comes Full-Circle". Chabad.org . Retrieved 2019-10-05.
  3. "The Colorful, Historic 'Lost Shul Mural' of Burlington, Vermont". Jewish Telegraphic Agency . Retrieved 2019-10-05.
  4. ""Little Jerusalem" - Burlington's Jewish History". Vermont Public Radio . Retrieved 2019-10-05.
  5. From The Archives | Little Jerusalem | Season 2014 | PBS , retrieved 2023-01-16
  6. "Vermont Public Television wins award for 'Little Jerusalem' documentary". VTDigger. Retrieved 2019-10-05.
  7. "The Wondering Jew". Seven Days . Retrieved 2019-10-05.

Coordinates: 44°29′06″N73°12′04″W / 44.485°N 73.201°W / 44.485; -73.201