Timeline of the Jewish Community of Northern New Jersey

A Young Men’s Hebrew Association (YMHA) was founded in Jersey City, followed by Paterson (1906) and Passaic (1907). 

Esther and Ruben Pinck arrived in Passaic from Russia. Mr. Pinck started as a carpenter, and later built some of Passaic’s first residential apartment houses. Esther Pinck, known as the “Mother of the Poor,” spent her days collecting and dispensing tzedakah (charity). It was her desire to establish a Jewish hospital in Passaic, and her dogged determination as a fundraiser allowed this dream to come to fruition in 1926 when the Passaic Beth Israel Hospital opened. PBI has since merged into Passaic General Hospital and the building was demolished in 2005. 

Hebrew Free Loan Association founded in Paterson, established a fund to make interest free loans to people with financial difficulty. Loans were made available to Jewish people for educational, medical and business expenses, and to help maintain families in their households.

Miriam Barnert died and a grief-stricken Nathan Barnert devoted his remaining years to charitable endeavors, including the purchase or construction of the following facilities in Paterson: the Miriam Barnert Memorial Hebrew Free School (1904), the Miriam Barnert Dispensary (1908), and the Daughters of Miriam Home for the Aged and Orphans (1921).

The Great Fire of Paterson destroyed the entire downtown area.  Merchants quickly rebuilt which included a new, expanded Meyer Brothers. At its peak, the store employed nearly 1,000 people and was the landmark department store for all of Northern New Jersey.

The Star of Israel in Hoboken was organized as an Orthodox congregation.  The building, designed by local architect Max Beyer, was modeled after the famous synagogue in Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany. In 1946 they merged with the Hoboken Jewish Center to form United Synagogue of Hoboken.

Congregation Mount Sinai was founded in Jersey City by merchants who anchored the Central Avenue retail district, and holds historic landmark status today. Congregation Mount Sinai flourished in mid 20th century. The distinctive copper cupolas characterize the structure's historic landmark status. It continues to serve as the city's oldest synagogue.

Congregation Tifereth Israel (the Galitzianer Shul) was established in Passaic. At it's inception, the congregation held services in the Richmond home on Second Street where they had limited accommodations and sat on store boxes instead of chairs. A new synagogue was built in 1914 and their first Rabbi was Jacob Mendel Chapler.

Congregation Anshei Lubavitch, popularly called “The Polish Shul,” was built on Fair Street, Paterson.  It was also known as the United Brotherhood Anshai Lodz, and served the growing Polish-Jewish immigrant population.

The Hackensack Hebrew Institute, predecessor to today’s Congregation Beth-El, was established by Reform Jews who had moved from Paterson, Passaic and Newark. They moved into a new facility on Main and Warren Streets in 1921; It is currently located on Summit Avenue.

S. J. Aronsohn built his silk mill complex at 10th Avenue and East 18th Street. The four-story, 400-foot-long mill was the first large mill in Paterson powered by electricity. 

The Miriam Barnert Dispensary opened at 58 Hamilton Avenue, Paterson as a facility “for the medical and surgical care of the sick, regardless of their financial ability to pay, regardless of their race, creed, or nationality.”

Thirteen-year-old Samuel Irving Newhouse, raised in Bayonne, quit school and found work as an office boy with a local lawyer, Hyman Lazarus. By age 16, he was named office manager and a few years later was asked to manage The Bayonne Times, owned by Lazarus.  In 1922, partnering with Lazarus, S. I. Newhouse purchased The Staten Island Advance and began building the second-largest publishing company in the United States.

Passaic's immigrant population centered on the Dundee section. The heart of Dundee was Second Street (now Market Street) where the stores owned by Jewish merchants were located.  These Jewish families and their descendants played and important part in the life and development of the city.

Temple Emanuel Association was organized in Bayonne.  Hyman Lazarus was elected as the first President. A permanent building was constructed in 1913 on the corner of Boulevard and 29th Street. The first regularly engaged spiritual leader was Rabbi M. Berman.

The Paterson Silk Strike began in February, caused by poor working conditions, declining wages, long work hours and an increase in the number of looms each weaver had to manage. Five thousand Jewish weavers were part of the 23,000 who went on strike. Responding to the turmoil, a militant faction of the IWW (Industrial Workers of the World) came into Paterson to organize the strike. Paterson’s mills were not unionized, but Jewish immigrants had a strong labor orientation -- for instance, the city had several chapters of the socialist-oriented Workmen’s Circle. The strike was acrimonious, with Jewish laborers pitted against Jewish mill owners.  

Hannah Silverman, 18 years old, translated the workers’ grievances from Yiddish to English.  Hannah’s fiery speeches resulted in her arrest several times during the course of the acrimonious strike. Jewish families without wages during the strike often sent their children to board with families in New York. During this time, a cooperative bakery in Paterson was started, as well as the Hebrew Free Sheltering Home, an orphanage on 168 Quincy Street in Passaic.

Although it was commonly dubbed “Fabian’s Folly” in the belief it would fail financially, Fabian went on to assemble a strong film distribution network of theaters throughout northern New Jersey. In 1926, he merged with the Stanley Group of Philadelphia, forming the firm Stanley-Fabian. By 1928, he was part of a group that operated 247 theaters throughout the northeast and the company merged with Warner Brothers Studios.

On October 19, a grand ceremony was held, including a parade through Paterson, celebrating the opening of Barnert Hospital, fulfilling Nathan and Miriam Barnert’s lifelong dreams. The entire cost of the new hospital was borne by their family, and it was designed by Wentworth. The building was replaced in the 1960s and the hospital closed in 2008.

A small cottage was purchased on Stevens Avenue, Jersey City, to care for Jewish orphans.   With a growing need to house the elderly by the 1930s, the institution changed its name to the Hebrew Home for Orphans and Aged of Hudson County.  In the 1950s, the name became the Hebrew Home and Hospital, serving the needs of the chronically ill from Hudson and Bergen counties.  It became New Jersey’s largest specialized hospital.

Morris Blander, from Hrubiezer, Poland, became the first Jewish resident of Fair Lawn when he bought a dairy farm on Prospect Street in 1915. Within a short time, Morris was asked to sponsor another immigrant, Morris Goldman, who was also a dairy farmer in Poland.  Eventually, Morris Goldman founded Fair Lawn Dairies, now known as Farmland Dairies and still a major milk supplier in New Jersey.

Purity Cooperation opened after 1913 Silk Strike on Tyler Street in Paterson. The Co-op made bread and dairy products available at affordable prices.

Reuben Kaufman was the first Jewish soldier from Paterson killed in action during WW1. The Reuben Kaufman Post of the Jewish War Veterans of the United States was established in 1932.  After WWII, the name was changed to the Kaufman-Harris Post, honoring Sidney Harris, the first Paterson Jew killed during that war.