The Bearmans were a North Side family with a successful produce business. They sponsored a baseball team that played in the municipal league. Of note is the unidentified African-American player at the far left.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Queens from three Beth El fundraisers posed for this photograph, including Mrs. Louis Rubenstein on the left. The woman selling the greatest number of tickets to the event was named Queen.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Confirmants dressed in white and arranged in two rows sit and stand with Rabbi Aronson seated in the middle. Rabbi Aronson came to Beth El in 1924, and served the congregation for 35 years. Beth El, at the time the photo was taken, was on the North Side of Minneapolis. The congregation is now in St. Louis Park .
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Portrait photograph of a boy wearing a Husch Brothers uniform for the Saint Paul Winter Carnival. Husch Brothers was a Jewish-owned clothing manufacturer.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
George Gordon began his life-long career as a Jewish educator at the first Hebrew Free School on Minneapolis's North Side, where as a twenty-year old, he helped teach the Hebrew alphabet to young students. He earned an M. D. degree in 1900, then devoted the rest of his professional life to promoting all aspects of Jewish education. Dr. Gordon taught at Hamline University, and created and oversaw adult, collegiate, high school and Hebrew education classes at the Minneapolis Talmud Torah.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
By 1924, when this photograph was taken, the Talmud Torah had moved to a new building space. The old building remained a community center, but the Hebrew school moved to the Emanuel Cohen Center. The school was also gaining national recognition at that time as a place of innovative teaching methods and rigorous curriculum. The Elementary Level lasted for 5 years and was the first level of Hebrew instruction.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
A photograph showing members of the graduating class in caps and gowns. St. Paul differed from Minneapolis in that it supported two Hebrew schools rather than one centralized school. The Hebrew Institute and the Capitol City Hebrew School maintained their affiliations with founding synagogues: consequently, enrollments for the schools was smaller and funding for the schools was less robust than in Minneapolis. In 1956, Capitol City Hebrew School and the Hebrew Institute merged to become the St. Paul Talmud Torah.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Joe Numero and his business partner, Fred Jones, were responsible for the creation of the first refrigerated truck. Their invention, financed by Numero and engineered by Jones, revolutionized interstate commerce. A trucking company could deliver perishable products to far-flung markets without fear of spoilage en route. The invention happened at a fortuitous moment--the beginning of WWII, when the country had need of moving large quantities of produce and meat across long distances to feed hungry troops.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Joseph Schanfield was born in Romania, and became successful in Minneapolis' booming turn of the century real estate and insurance markets. At 23, he became the head of the Adath Jeshurun congregation on Minneapolis's South Side. During his years of service to the community, there were few leadership positions he did not hold, including president of the Jewish Sheltering Home and the Jewish Home for the Aged, as well as the Adath Cemetery Association.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
This portrait of Hiram Mendow was taken after his graduation from the University of Minnesota Law School in 1915. Mendow had a extraordinary career as a practicing attorney in Minneapolis, where he represented "Kid Cann" Blumenfeld, head of Minneapolis's bootleg syndicate, among others. The family immigrated from Lithuania, and Mendow began work at the age of six, delivering newspapers and shining shoes. Mendow litigated a number of famous cases, and continued practicing law well beyond his 100th birthday.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Leonard Levy, better known as "Butch", was a football and wrestling standout at the University of Minnesota. He served in the Navy during World War II, and afterwards played football for the Los Angeles Rams. His athletic versatility enabled him to wrestle professionally during the off-season. When his athletic career ended, he went on to be a successful insurance agent and securities salesman.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Portrait photograph showing members of the Minneapolis Workmen's Circle. Workman's Circle members were non-religious, politically active Jews, many of whom were Socialists. They espoused a classless society, favored the use of Yiddish for cultural expression, and created a variety of services for members, including medical and insurance benefits.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Portrait photograph of members of the Workmen's Circle, which was created in the late 1800s by Jewish immigrants as a mutual aid society. The Circle was secular, practical and leftist, and many members were involved in support for Palestine.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Portrait photograph of some men affiliated with Central Community House. Central Community House and its West Side counterpart, Neighborhood House, were created to assist immigrants newly arrived to the community. Although the settlement house roots were in the Jewish community, the curriculum and activities offered emphasized Americanization and secularization. The group of young Jewish men in the photo may be members of Coming Men of America, a fraternal order with Masonic roots who met at the House.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Portrait photograph showing men associated with the Mercury Athletic Club. The Mercury Club was founded in 1930 as the Wells Mercurys, a boy's and girl's athletic club affiliated with the North Side Well Settlement House.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Portrait photograph of the Mercury basketball team in uniform. The Mercurys were the city and state basketball champs in the settlement house league in 1923. Max Winter is in the back row on the far left.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Portrait photograph of the Minneapolis, Mars basketball team with Max Winter as coach. Max Winter coached a variety of Minnesota sports teams, and later in his career co-owned the Minnesota Vikings and the Minneapolis Lakers. Winter was born in Austria: his family immigrated in 1913 and settled on the North Side of Minneapolis. Winter is on the left in the back row.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Portrait photograph of the North High men's basketball team. North High had a large Jewish population from the turn of the century through the early 1960s.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Photograph showing the young men of the Minneapolis Talmud Torah Bar Mitzvah class. Bar Mitzvahs celebrate the coming of age at 13 of Jewish boys. At this age, young men become obligated to observe scripture. They may also lead prayer services and count towards a minyan. No service is required: however, it is customary to mark the occasion with a service and celebration. In the 20th century, young women were also welcomed into the adult community with a bat mitzvah. Both bar and bat mitzvahs participate in several years of Hebrew and religious study before the public occasion.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
A portrait photograph of the Minneapolis Talmud Torah football team. When plans for the new Talmud Torah building were being formulated in the mid 1910s, there was a groundswell of support for a facility that would include not only classrooms, but social and recreational space for young people in the community. There was a plea for funding for a Talmud Torah gymnasium. Public pressure resulted in several community organizations pledging to fund activities for teenaged boys and girls. The sports programs were overseen by a new administrative unit, the Talmud Torah Social Service department.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
A portrait photograph of the Minneapolis Talmud Torah football team. The Talmud Torah attempted to engage young people not only through studies, but through social activities including sports. This stems in part from the early affiliation of the school with the Jewish Family Welfare Association.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Photograph of a woman using a measuring tape to measure the length of a skirt on Ida Blehart. Neighborhood House was founded by the Hebrew Ladies Benevolent Society. Neighborhood House was founded primarily to provide recreational, educational and social activities to residents of the West Side neighborhood. It maintained an active recreational program for girls in the neighborhood, teaching sewing, cooking and other domestic arts.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
A duplicate portrait photograph of Nellie Weiss Bondy in her wedding dress. Nellie Weiss married Louis Bondy in 1886: the event is reputed to have been the first Jewish wedding in Duluth.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Portrait photograph of men and women members of Poale Zion, which was a Zionist-Socialist-Laborite group founded in Russia. The St. Paul chapter in the picture is promoting "Tag Day" a fundraising activity supporting Jewish emigration to Palestine. The future first Prime Minister of Israel, David Ben-Gurion, is pictured standing fourth from the left in the third row. Ben-Gurion was a member of Poalie Zion and traveled worldwide to fundraise and to recruit young American Jews to the Jewish Legion serving in World War I.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Dr. Moses Barron was instrumental in the creation of Mt. Sinai Hospital in Minneapolis. Prior to hospital construction in 1949, Jewish doctors were denied admitting privileges to local hospitals. Determined to address this discrimination, the Jewish community raised the capital to build Mt. Sinai hospital in South Minneapolis. Initially, Dr. Barron pushed for a Jewish-sponsored hospital out of concern that Jewish doctors serving on the war-front and had full permitting privileges would be frustrated in their practices upon returning home. Dr. Barron served as Mt. Sinai's first Chief of Staff.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Etta Zrive and Abraham Bearman were born in different Lithuanian shtetls in the 1870s. Their clothes and home furnishings suggest they were economically comfortable by the time that this photo was taken in the early 1900s.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Harry Goldie had an interesting career, which included amateur boxing, coaching, and real estate development. He spearheaded the creation of the Calhoun Beach Club. While the club was chartered in 1928 and building began in 1929, financing for it foundered during the Depression, and it didn't officially open until 1946. Goldie's dream for the club entailed an egalitarian social and athletic space that would welcome members regardless of race, religion or sex.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Harry Goldie posed in fighting stance wearing boxing uniform. He was an exceptional boxer; the first boxing coach for the University of Minnesota; and the developer for the Calhoun Beach Club, a Minneapolis architectural landmark.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Portrait of Harry Goldie He was an exceptional boxer; the first boxing coach for the University of Minnesota; and the developer for the Calhoun Beach Club, a Minneapolis architectural landmark.who was the first boxing coach at the University of Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Portrait of Rabbi Albert G. Minda, rabbi of Temple Israel Synagogue in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He was a president of the Central Conference of American Rabbis and a spiritual leader of Minneapolis Jews from 1922-1963. Additionally, he was co-founder of the Minneapolis Urban League and Round Table Conference of Christians and Jews.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Rabbi Wechsler (pronounced Wexler) lead the congregation's sponsoring a Jewish farming settlement in the Dakota Territories. The settlement attempted to help Russian Jewish immigrants find livelihoods working the land in the American West. Though the farm colony ultimately failed, he was considered an innovator and modernizer. Late in his career, after leaving Minnesota, he worked to improve educational opportunities in Mississippi for blacks. He served at Temple Mount Zion from 1878-1886.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
A portrait of Robert Lazarus, who played violin with both the Chicago and Oakland (CA) Symphony Orchestras during the 1920s. After his professional playing career ended, he opened a violin repair shop in downtown St. Paul.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
A portrait photograph of Rabbi Albert Minda. Rabbi Minda succeeded Rabbi Samuel Deinard at Temple Israel after Deinard's death in 1921. Minda was a graduate of Hebrew Union Collage, and served Temple Israel until his retirement in 1963. Minda was an exceptional leader, presiding over the construction of a new synagogue in 1929, the founding of the Minneapolis Jewish Federation in 1949, the Minneapolis Urban League and The Minneapolis Roundtable of Christians and Jews. In Minnesota's Centennial year--1949--he was designated as one of the "Hundred Living Great [sic] of Minnesota."
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
A portrait photograph of Rabbi Samuel Deinard. Deinard was Rabbi at Shaari Tov, later known as Temple Israel, and a committed Zionist. He also served as the editor-in chief of the American Jewish World, the Twin's Cities foremost English-language Jewish newspaper; and in the Department of Semitics at the University of Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
A portrait photograph of Rabbi Solomon Silber. Rabbi Silber served as Kenesseth Israel's rabbi from 1902 to 1925. He, and members of his congregation, were instrumental in funding and building the Jewish Family Welfare Board and the Jewish Sheltering Home.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Photograph of Rachel Calog sitting in a chair. Rachel Bella Calof is the author of "My Story", an autobiographical account to her marriage to Abraham Calof and their efforts to homestead and raise a family on the plains of North Dakota at the turn of the century. Despite desperate hardships, the Calof's raised nine children, and Rachel was a driving force in the establishment of the regional school district. After 23 years outside Devil's Lake, the Calofs moved to St. Paul in 1917. Rachel begin her autobiography in 1936, which she wrote in longhand. The manuscript was "discovered" in the American Jewish Archives in the early 1990s, and published in 1995 as "Rachel Calof's Story".
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Members of the Sigma Alpha Mu basketball team are posed in uniform. Sigma Alpha Mu was founded in 1909 at City College in New York as a Jewish fraternity. The University of Minnesota had an active chapter.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
A group of members of the Sigma Delta Tau Sorority in caps and gowns. Sigma Delta Tau sorority was founded by seven young women at Cornell University in 1917. The seven had had been denied membership into other Greek organizations because they were Jewish.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Many graduates of the Minneapolis Talmud Torah stayed together socially after their Hebrew instruction was complete. Through participation in sports, men built social networks that served them in business and community activities. Activities were paid for jointly by individuals and community organizations, which encouraged people to join by relieving financial constraints.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Dr. George Gordon, founder and driving force behind the Minneapolis Talmud Torah is in the center, front row. Dr. Gordon introduced modern teaching methods, grades, and a rigorous curriculum to Hebrew instruction, and remained administratively independent of any religious congregation. High school classes were the second level of instruction: students graduated after 3 years.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
Rabbi Alfred H. Khan, a graduate of the Jewish Theological Seminary, is shown here with his students. Confirmation is a coming-of-age practice for post Bar- and Bat Mitzvahs. between age 15 and 18. It was originally developed by the Reform Movement to follow bar- and bat mitzvahs in the belief that thirteen year olds were not yet ready to be considered adult and should continue on in their religious education. Temple of Aaron was founded as an orthodox congregation but switched affiliation to Conservative several years after founding.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
An unidentified woman sits in her backyard surrounded by chickens. An unidentified man stands on a ramp next to large crates in the background. The boxes are likely for salvage. Chickens were kept in the yard to help feed the family.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Libraries, Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives