COMMUNITY INSTITUTIONS

  
 

Though synagogues have been the most numerous Jewish community buildings (we have treated them extensively on these pages (more ...), other buildings housed agencies that were also an important part of our community structure. This new section of the CJH website will organize our content on community institutions other than synagogues.

We show these buildings in the order of their opening, which, given the Jewish community's (and much of Cleveland's) continual eastward movement, is roughly near downtown then east.

Pages include:

June 2010 -     The three oldest cemeteries.
January 2011 - A view of the Jewish Orphan Asylum by Gary Polster.
March 2011     The Jewish Scene radio broadcasts
May 2011        Cleveland's Holocaust Memorial
October 2o14   Hebrew Free Loan Association  
October 2o14   Jewish Carpenters Union and Carpenters Hall 
 

Jewish Orphans Home

In 1868 B'nai B'rith founded an orphanage for children of Jewish veterans of the Civil War. They bought a building on Sawtell Avenue (East 51st) that had been built as a "water cure" spa. In 1926 it would move to Shaker Heights and become known as Bellefaire.

See Bellefaire and Gary Polster's Inside Looking Out
 

 

B'nai B'rith


See our B'nai B'rith page
 
 

Educational Alliance
 

 

Cleveland Hebrew Schools Building

Originally built in 1900
Known as the Margolis Memorial Building
Located at 2491 East 55th Street.
Building acquired in 1921 from the German Singing Society (Cleveland Gesang Verein).
Sold to a black Baptist church in 1932.
Now owned by The House of Wills Funeral Home.

 

Workmens Circle
 

 

Holocaust Memorial

Possibly the nation's first free-standing community holocaust memorial, our memorial in Zion Memorial Park in Bedford Heights was built by the Kol Israel Foundation and dedicated on May 25, 1961.

The Schvitz

Opened in 1927, this bathhouse near East 116th and Kinsman is still open on a limited scale. Fred Gold, the "driving force" in this family business died in 2010 (obituary), but it is still family owned. 

For a description, see an essay on this website and a CJN story Sweatin' with the oldies.

Photo: Allen Miller
   

Jewish Federation of Cleveland
25701 Science Park Drive, Beachwood

In 2008, after much debate, Federation decided to move with its 100 employees to the center of the Jewish population, See our chronology of events. The move to what had been the headquarters of Lamson & Sessions took place in August 2010 and was facilitated by a gift from the Mandel brothers.

It had been downtown since 1965 at 1750 Euclid Avenue in building designed by Edward Durell Stone, when 50 employees served a community of about 80,000 persons. See our pages on Federation, its homes from 1903-1965, and the 1963 decision to build downtown.
 

 

Jewish Community Center

Mayfield Road in Cleveland Heights
now Mandel JCC in Beachwood

 
 

Mount Sinai Hospital
 

 

 

Aaron Garber Library   

Founded in 1924 and regarded as the central library of our Jewish community, since 1976 it served the College of Jewish Studies and was located in the Siegal-Agnon Building on Shaker Boulevard. The library closed in August 2014.

 

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