INTRODUCTION
Home page
About This Website
Meet the Editor - Arnold Berger
What's New
What's Not So New
Site Map (this page)
How This Website Evolved  
Contributors
Privacy Policy
Fair Use Notice
Help Page
Contact Us

HISTORY RESOURCES
Resources main page

Jewish History Links
Cleveland Jewish History Resources
WOMEN: a resource guide 
 "This Tempting Freedom" by Allan Peskin
Cleveland (2006 Encyclopaedia Judaica)
Jeffrey Morris synagogue history collection
Paul Klein's index of Jewish biographies 
The Jewish Society Books 1915-25    
The 1924-25 Blue Book   
Cleveland Jewish History Sources (index cards)
Virtual History of Cleveland Jewish Organizations
American Jewish History Resources
Virtual Treasures
     • Trefa Dinner menu
1920 American Jewish Year Book: Cleveland
The Cleveland Jewish News Digital Archive
A Stitch in Time: the Cleveland garment industry
Facebook Group: Northeast Ohio Jewish History
Jewish History Hub Facebook Group (old group name)
Council of Jewish Women Holocaust Oral Histories  

General History Links
Other Cleveland History Websites
Virtual History of Cleveland Cultural Organizations

SYNAGOGUES
Synagogues main page

Old still-standing Synagogues

Leonard Case's great gift to Cleveland's Jews
  • CJN Clipping
  • Deed to Israelitic Society
The Great Defection of 1866   new
Yom Kippur 1887 - a synagogue tour

Anshe Chesed Fairmount Temple
Early Years of Anshe Chesed  
Dedication of the Eagle Street Synagogue,1846  
1886 Laying cornerstone Scovill Avenue Temple
Eagle Street Synagogue building around 1928
In Pursuit of the Eagle Street Synagogue Plaque
The Central Market Planter
Seat license documents: 1842, 1888 and 1914 
Anshe Chesed Becomes Reform   
Euclid Avenue Temple
Euclid Avenue Temple Tiffany Mosaic
Euclid Avenue Temple's Tiffany Windows
    ● Patriarchs
    ● Moses
    ● Kings
    ● Prophets
    ● Psalmists
    ● Sages
    ● Talmudists
    ● Middle Ages

The Temple - Tifereth Israel
Tifereth Israel
The Willson Avenue Temple (1894)
Building The Temple in University Circle  new
Photo Gallery: The Temple in University Circle 
What inspired the design of the Temple in University Circle?
The Temple at University Circle
The Temple at University Circle large image
The Temple at University Circle starts a new life
The Yizkor plaque at the Maltz Center

B'nai Jeshurun Congregation
B'nai Jeshurun congregation 150 years 
B'nai Jeshurun 150 year timeline 
B'nai Jeshurun congregation 140 years 
  ● Banner 1  1866 to 1920
  ● Banner 2  1920 to 1966
  ● Banner 3  1966 to 1996
  ● Banner 4  1996 to present
The CJN B'nai Jeshurun Timeline 

Congregation Brith Emeth 
and Rabbi Philip Horowitz by Alan Levenson

Park Synagogue
Cleveland Jewish Center
Mixed Seating dispute 

Chibas Jerusalem Synagogue

The West Side Synagogues   

GENERATIONS
Main page

Simson Thorman - first Jewish settler and community leader
Time Line   
Simson Thorman
His daughter Lizzie Thorman Hays
Her daughter Rolinda Hays Joseph
Her son Ralph S Joseph
His daughter Martha J Joseph

The Alsbacher Document, May 1839 
 Moses Alsbacher and his descendants
 Graves of Moses Alsbacher and descendants 
 Larger images of the three moved headstones 
 Abe Nebel, who found the document

Jewish Cemetery in Unsleben Bavaria
Connecting with The Lost Jews of Unsleben

Jewish Cleveland before the Civil War
by Schwartz and Lasky
Pages 1 - 15    
Pages 16 - end 
Appendix introduction 
Appendix - list of 850 antebellum Jews 
   A-C
  D-F
  G-I
  J-L
  M-R
  S-U
  V-Z

Aaron J Marx - First Jewish Policeman 

Sam and Minnie Klausner, from Tetiev, Ukraine
Introduction
The Pale of Settlement
From Russia to Cleveland
Tetiev Today by Fred Livingstone 
Sam and Minnie's Life in Cleveland
Sam and Minnie's Family in 1926
Klausner Cooperage
Sam and Minnie's Children
Mary Klausner and Issie Klotzman
Fred Klotzman: Mary and Issie's Son
A Family Scrapbook
Family Reunions
Epilogue
Postscript: Lisa Klausner Moves Home
Passenger Lists (Ship Manifests)
    • 1910 Minnie and children 
    • 1910 Minnie and children page 2
    • 1907 Issie Klotzman
US Census Forms
    • 1910 Issie Klotzman
    • 1920 Sam and Minnie 
    • 1920 Sam and Minnie's children
    • 1930 Sam and Minnie
Mary Klausner and Issie Klotzman Marriage
Mary Klausner Klotzman's Letter
Klausner Cooperage Newspaper Story
Klausner Family Tree

INSTITUTIONS
Institutions main page

Cemeteries
1840 Petition for a Jewish Section in the City Cemetery 
Discovery of the 1840 Petition  
Signers of the 1840 Petition   new
A Tale of Two Documents       new
Willet Street Cemetery 
Willet Street Cemetery Deed  
Willet Street Cemetery Graves  
Cleveland's First Jewish burial - Alexander Kahnweiler
First Burial Headstone   new
Alexander Kahnweiler Documents  
Fir Street Cemetery
Mayfield Cemetery
  • Mayfield Cemetery Deeds
  • United Jewish Cemeteries
  • Corrigan Gate - and Pat Corrigan  
 

Bellefaire - Jewish Children's Bureau
Bellefaire
Memorial Tablets at the Orphan Asylum  
The Jewish Orphan Asylum by Gary Polster

B'nai B'rith
  • East 55th Street building and its loss in 2010

Cleveland's Holocaust Memorial
  • Large image of the memorial
  • 2017 program with history and names memorialized

Jewish Federation of Cleveland
Introduction
Founding in 1903 as Federation of Jewish Charities
Jewish Community Council 
Names and Logos over the years 
New logo and its 2017 improvement 
Locations over the years
First eight homes, starting in 1903
The ninth decision, made in 1963
Moving east: a chronology 2007 - 2010
The tenth decision, in September 2008  
Old building demolished, December 2015 

Jewish Scene broadcasts (1978-2000)

Aaron Garber Library 
Virtual Tour
History
Aaron Garber Obituary
Website

Hebrew Free Loan Association 

Israelitic Society  - our first Federation   new

Jewish Carpenters Union and Carpenters Hall

Fashioning Cleveland's Union-Made Clothing  

Workmen's Circle Photo Gallery  
1027 Workmen's Circle Convention 

PEOPLE
People index page

"Czar" Harry Bernstein
1899 - Jewish Leaders fight for political reform
Bernstein's Elbow
Rise and Fall of Czar Bernstein (1907)

Cleveland's CCAR presidents

Max Kalish (1891-1945) sculptor by Gail Greenberg  new

Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver by Arnold Berger
Welcome page
Home page
About this Site
  • Introduction — how this site started
  • Site Guide — how we present information
  • Permissions - Privacy statement
  • Recollections — webkeeper's recollections
Youth
  • Maps
  • 1910 census record
Wheeling West Virginia years
  • From HUC to Wheeling
  • Wheeling 1915-17
  • From Wheeling to Cleveland
  • Resignation Letter
The Temple - Tifereth Israel in Cleveland
Zionism Ascent to leadership, success and later
  • Photos
  • Tannersville photo 1906
  • Zionism - notes
Publications
  • Books
  • Poem - America  new
  • In The Time of Harvest (1963)    new
Biography
  • On the internet
  • In-print
  • The work of Ofer Shiff
Recognition
Abba Hillel Silver archives
Chair in Jewish Studies   new 
Photos
LP record made in 1954: What is Judaism  
Death    
Funeral Service
  • El Maley Rachamin
Obituary (N Y Times)
Death Notices (N Y Times) 
Gravesite
 
Zvi Hirsch Masliansky - Silver's inspiration
Biography
Photos
60th Birthday Celebration
Memoirs 
Silver's Eulogy for Masliansky
Silver's Handwritten Notes for the Eulogy
Endnotes
Abba Hillel Silver Archives

Rabbi Michaelis Machol by Nathan Arnold
  • Rabbi Louis Wolsey's tribute to Rabbi Machol

Jewish Members of Cleveland's City Council

Rabbi Israel Porath by his family
Encyclopedia entries
Early years
With President Coolidge
Porath family in 1929
50th wedding anniversary
US Congress
Soviet Jewry
Trip to Israel
Biography
Three synagogues
Retirement
Obituary
Appreciations
Messages to the community
Final resting place
Porath and Silver
A granddaughter remembers
The Stranger" by Shoney Long
Porath Street
Window in Oheb Zedek Cedar Sinai Synagogue
Porath Family Tree
Destruction of Orthodox Synagogues by Ira Robinson

Siegel, Shuster and Superman by Gail Greenberg 

Warner Brothers by Gail Greenberg

Leon Wiesenfeld  
Memoir: Jewish Life in Cleveland
Adopted Grandchildren 

Alta Weiss - Play Ball, Alta Weiss by Gail Greenberg new

VIRTUAL TOUR OF OLD JEWISH CLEVELAND
by Nate Arnold
Home
Introduction
Tour Route
  • Map
  • Central Market Area  1840-1860    
  • East 38th and Community College Ave  1906
  • East 55th Street    1890-1920
  • Euclid Avenue and East 82nd  (1912)
  • East 105th and Ansel Road  (1924)
  • Hebrew Cultural Garden on East Blvd. (1926)
  • Parkwood Drive, Morison Avenue
  • East 105th Corey Methodist Church (1921)
  • Union Avenue and Kinsman Avenue
Itinerary (pdf)
End page

EVENTS AND TRADITIONS

Cleveland's Jews mourn Abraham Lincoln   
Invocations at Republican conventions   
1904 American Zionist Convention   

Confirmations in Cleveland
Is Confirmation a Disappearing Rite of Passage?
Four generations of confirmations at
The Temple - Tifereth Israel
  • 1905 father William Weidenthal
  • 1941 Maurice (Bud) Weidenthal
  • 1976 daughter Susan Weidenthal Saltzman
  • 2006 granddaughters Hayley and Stephanie

Two confirmations in the 1860s

Confirmations in 1923   

Bat Mitzvah
1922 America's First Bat Mitzvah Ceremony   
1949 Cleveland's First Bat Mitzvah- Park Synagogue  

Going to the Schvitz by Irv (Earl) Seidman

U N Resolution 181 70th Anniversary 

The morning of 9/11 we said Kaddish twice

Hanukkah in Cleveland    

PLACES and NEIGHBORHOODS

Wharf on Merwin Street  

Woodland Avenue
   • Maps
   • Central Market - where we started

Glenville
Information Sheet
Last Jewish-owned business in Glenville
Morison Avenue Bath House    new

Geneva Ohio Jewish Farmers  
The picnics of 1928 and 1929  
Abba Hillel Silver's $1,000 gift  
1928 picnic photo, with names   
Naming who was in the 1928 photo  
The Flock farm and its owners  
Learn more about the farmers

FREE SOVIET JEWRY MOVEMENT

Cleveland and the Freeing of Soviet Jewry
by Dr Louis Rosenblum
Introduction
Table of Contents
Preface, From These Beginnings
First Contact with the Jewish Federation of Cleveland
Launching the Cleveland Committee
On the National Scene
An American Jewish Conference on Soviet Jewry
Transforming the Cleveland Committee
Face-to-Face with Visiting Soviet Cultural Groups
Agreement Between the JCFC and the CCSA
CCSA Projects
   •  Spotlight Newsletter
   •  Handbook for Community Action
   •  Students and Housewives 
   •  Protest Stamps (Seals)
   •  Movie - "Before Our Eyes"
   •  Leadership Conferences
   •  Greeting Cards to Soviet Jews
   •  Freedom Caravan
   •  Project Sefer
Union of Councils for Soviet Jews
Political Action
Government of Israel — Elephant in the Room 
   •  Backstory
   •  The Office Finds Us
   •  Blush Off the Rose
   •  Enforcer or Loose Cannon?
   •  Office Overtures: Played Dolce
   •  Office Control Crumbles
   •  The Why and Wherefore and the Woe
   •  In Contrast: An American Strategy
   •  Notes
Coda
Endnote
Biographies:
   •  Abe Silverstein
   •  Louis Rosenblum
   •  Ann Shenkar
Archives
Learn More (links to other resources)
Interview by Daniel Rosenblum  new
   • Text of Interview (pdf)  new

Pages by others
25th anniversary of Summit Sunday 
Natan Sharansky:
How the movement helped end the Cold War
Proclamation of a Sabbath for Soviet Jewry
Herb Caron: how the movement began (1963)
Oral History Project   new
May 15, 2016 presentation 
Federation Report on Resettlement by R Davidson
Ohio Historical Marker at The West Temple
A Charles Eisenman Award for the CCSA  
Celebrating the Modern Exodus    new

PHOTO GALLERY 
Willson Avenue Temple 1906 
Aaron Garber Library   
Jewish Carpenters Union  
Corky and Lenny's Delicatessen 
The Tannersville Photo of Abba Hillel Silver
Unsleben Bavaria Today
Tetiev, Ukraine Today
Dedication of Silver Hall 2015
1877 Birds eye View of Cleveland  
Brethren Coming Together new
Glowing Treasures by Arthur Szyk  new
 

Herb Ascherman's Rabbis (2008)
Moshe Adler
Moshe Berger
Eric Bram
Richard A Block
Frederick A Eisenberg
Matthew J Eisenberg
Estelle Gottman-Mills
Stephen Grundfest
Michael Hecht
Michael A Oppenheimer
David Lipper
Daniel A Roberts
Steve Segar
Rona Shapiro
Joshua Hoffer Skoff
Susan B Stone
Yakov Travis
David S Zlatin
Rabbi Daniel Jeremy Silver (added 2021)