USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Boston > The early Jewish community of Boston's North End; a sociologically oriented study of an Eastern European Jewish immigrant community in an American big-city neighborhood between 1870 and 1900 > Part 2
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3
making a living
WHAT WERE THE OCCUPATIONS of the North End Jews at the end of the nineteenth century?17 As in the case of many other aspects of immigrant life, the economic activities of the first generation Jews were determined by two sets of factors: on the one hand by the back- ground the immigrants brought with them from the old world, and on the other hand by the particular conditions under which they were to begin their money- earning career in the new land. The Jewish immigrants started on their westward journey from the same place as that in which other immigrant groups had their origin: from the European village or small town.18 The role of the Jew in the economic life of the village had, however, differed from the role of the peasant. This had an effect on the choice of occupations by the Jews in the new world. They did not become farming colonists because even in Europe most of them did not engage in agricul- ture. The few attempts to settle Jews on the soil in the new world met with limited success.19 Despite an avidity for learning inspired by their faith, the educated profes- sions remained closed to them until their descendants,
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reared in the culture of the new land, would attain a place in those fields. The economic area to which the Jews were accustomed from home and which fit the needs of the Jewish immigrants was, in the main, small trade. At the time of their arrival, small trade was prac- ticed in America by Jewish immigrants in the form of peddling,20 although many became small storekeepers. One interview contains the following discussion :
Q. What occupations did the North End Jews have out- side of peddling?
A. Well, they had stores; my father never peddled.
Q. I know. But would you say that a large percentage of the people had stores or a small percentage?
A. No, I would say a small percentage. A large percent- age were peddlers. Everybody who came to America, who came to Boston, would take a basket.
Q. Would you say that 80% of the people peddled or more or less?
A. Well, it would be only a guess on my part. All I can remember is . . . about a handful of store-keepers and everybody else ... coming and filling the baskets.
Without the knowledge of the language, without any capital, a young immigrant would still be able to "fill up a basket" of merchandise on credit, set out on the road and sell his wares.21 In the beginning he was not able even to name in English the needles, ribbons, shoelaces and yarns he had to offer. One interviewee recalls that one of the first sentences of English a new arrival would be taught in the North End was "Look in the basket." Jewish peddler and Yankee or Irish customer were so- cially and culturally worlds apart, yet commercial talent,
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good merchandise and a desire to please created a bridge of successful trading between the former kremer of the Russian village and the New England farmer or factory worker who was to become in a short time a trusting customer.
The basket-peddler carried small inexpensive articles. More valuable merchandise would be sold by the ped- dler who carried a "pack on the back." The pack would contain pillow cases, sheets, aprons, towels, dresses and other similar articles. One interviewee remembers that his father would walk with pack on his back from the North End to Hyde Park. His burden would be in- creased by the kosher food he had to take along from home. He would not buy even bread on the road. The wares were acquired from one of the few peddlers' sup- ply stores in the North End. A son of the owner of one of the largest among these establishments describes the credit arrangements of the typical newcomer in the fol- lowing excerpt :
Q. You said that many North Enders peddled after land- ing in America. Was there no need for a certain amount of capital even for that small business activity?
A. I can tell you how it worked in my father's store. I told you that he had a peddlers' supply store. When an immigrant arrived and wanted merchandise for peddling, they would talk to him and if he appeared honest they would give him fifty dollars credit. When he paid the amount, he would get more credit.
Q. How would he know where to peddle?
A. Other peddlers would tell him of some "uncharted" neighborhood which was not visited yet by many peddlers and where prospects were good. It was not
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easy to acquire customers. But once they knew you, you could make money.
Q. Was that because of a considerable margin of profit?
A. It was mainly because the peddler sold on an install- ment plan. The Irish woman would buy an item and the peddler would collect every week a small amount for it. Over a considerable stretch of time he col- lected a profit above the original fifty dollars which he received in merchandise for credit.
In addition to the basket peddler and the "pack-on- back" peddler there was the "tin-peddler" who sold kitchen utensils. Moreover, even groceries were some- times sold by North End peddlers. The great advance- ment in the lot of a peddler was when he was able to acquire a "horse and buggy" and carry with greater ease a much larger assortment of wares.
An experienced peddler sometimes employed other newcomers - beginners in the trade - to sell his wares. This could grow into big business. One resident speaks of a relative who had twenty peddlers distributing his merchandise. The wave of immigration toward the end of the century resulted in the establishment of many boarding and lodging houses. The landladies of these houses were in constant need of linens, soaps and even groceries. To enlist some of these landladies as one's customers would be particularly lucrative. Later, the "customer-peddler" came. His clients were mainly city dwellers or farmers from nearby locations. He carried only samples. When the Irish woman chose a dress from among these samples, she was given a written order to a store in town. She received her dress there, for which the peddler was billed at a wholesale price. She then paid for
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the dress in installments to the peddler, who thus made his profit.
Peddling was, of course, a strenuous occupation. Residents recall the long line of peddlers gathered on Saturday nights at peddlers' supply stores to have their baskets filled. The journey would start early on Sunday mornings and sometimes last an entire week. On Fridays they would return exhausted, hungry for a warm meal but with a few dollars of profit. The latter would be di- vided into three parts. Some of it would be used for living expenses ; some would be re-invested in new mer- chandise; a third part would almost invariably be de- posited with the steamship ticket agent toward the ex- pense of bringing over some loved one from the other side.22 There is no wonder that they were eager to ex- change this type of life for a more settled one. When the peddler accumulated sufficient funds, he opened a small store on Salem Street, usually in a basement made fit by one of the landlords. Frequently, the store had two counters, in which case it was shared by two "business- men" for the sale of non-competing products. Their customers were by no means only Jewish. In their ped- dling days they learned well the art of small trading with the Irish and the Italians. They continued to use that ability to advantage in the new store.
At other times, a number of peddlers pooled their funds to establish a peddlers' supply store. From their own experience they knew what their peddler friends needed. The increase in immigration - which meant an increase in the number of peddlers - thus resulted in excellent opportunities for the former immigrants to be- come wholesalers of all kinds. In addition to the rather large firm of the Freedman Brothers, interviewees men-
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tion the store of Louis Berenson, the one owned by Harris Gorfinkle and Company (established in 1888 by eight former peddlers) which distributed women's cloth- ing, that of Richmond, Cohen, and Reinherz, which spe- cialized in men's clothing, as well as the store owned by Michael Slutsky.
The owners of the peddlers' supply stores constituted a financially and socially leading group among the North End Jews. Next to them on the social ladder were the owners of the retail stores. As one North Ender puts it:" ... Of course, there were strata within the Jewish population : men who had the stores, men who worked manually and the poor people who were unable to do anything."
Q. Where did the peddlers belong?
A. One step below the storekeepers.
Q. What kind of manual work did the second group do?
A. They were tailors, shoemakers and some who began to get work outside the locale.
Trade was thus by no means the only occupation North End Jews were engaged in. Immigrants some- times tried their luck in many different fields of en- deavor until they found a fitting occupation for them- selves. The recollection of the son of one of them is characteristic: "Father worked in an iron foundry at Charlestown. Later, he became a street-car conductor. Finally, he had a horse-drawn taxicab, a "herdicle." After these jobs he became a shames at a Lithuanian synagogue."
In contrast to this immigrant, I. B. Reinherz, one of the leading figures in that community, started in the
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new world with an occupation related to religious life, that of shoichet, and only later did he transfer to the secu- lar calling of steamship ticket agent and banker. Other immigrants remembered by interviewees were engaged in the real estate business, which promised good oppor- tunities for earning in view of the expected large-scale immigration. "I went into architecture because my father not only bought real estate but also built and remodeled. I was interested in art and that sort of thing."
Soon after their arrival, some early immigrants opened small tailor shops, some of which later grew into large establishments with the emergence of the Jewish needle industry.
The Eastern European balagole had his American coun- terpart in the Jewish driver of the horse-drawn cabs of the time. There was a stand of these cabs on Postoffice Square and many North End Jews could be found among the drivers.
Business morality-as viewed, perhaps a bit benevo- lently, by former residents - was generally on a high level. "The Jews in those days who used to live down there were very honorable. In those days my father couldn't believe in a second mortgage. That was swin- dling, he thought." Yet even this society had its share of those who liked to earn easy money. One interviewee relates: "There were, however, other occupations. There were some money lenders, not too well liked or re- spected. There was a certain [name omitted], known as the 'old clothes man' among Harvard students. He would buy the used clothes of wealthy students who had come to the end of their money allowances. It was easier for these students to convince their parents to buy them a new suit than to get them to send extra pocket money.
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He would also make loans to students to be paid after the next visit home or even after graduation."
In conclusion: The manner in which the first genera- tion immigrant earned his living was determined by the conditions and opportunities of America's contemporary economy and by the abilities, experiences and goals which the immigrants brought over with them. They embarked on careers in which the use of their "im- ported" resources promised greatest success in view of American economic reality. Small trade in the earlier periods, certain forms of industrial employment in the later years seemed to be the forms of earning that suited them best.
Peddling - the prevalent form of small trade - had a double advantage. On the one hand it was in many ways a continuation of small-town trading Jews had practiced in Europe. On the other hand it helped in the limited and gradual acculturation the immigrants desired. As pointed out in another section of this study, there are many indications that the attitude of immigrants to ac- culturation was much more favorable than is commonly recognized. They adhered to forms brought over with them from the old country but they prepared them- selves for changes in their way of life, or in the way of life of their children, which appeared to them inevitable in the new world. Peddling, which helped them get ac- quainted with America better than anything else, be- came in their lives not only an important economic but also a welcome Americanizing factor. It provided an op- portunity to keep daily contact with non-Jewish Ameri- cans, to learn their language and their ways. Yet, this contact would be limited to the field of business and would not interfere with the separateness which the im-
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migrant desired to maintain at this time in the religious and social spheres. He observed the vast new world of America, he spoke to the farmer, his wife and his daughter, yet he was only a visitor, a trader perhaps wel- come and liked, but always distant.
The ambition and aggressiveness with which the im- migrants seem to have set out on their new careers indi- cates the profound trust they had in their own future in the new land. They spent weeks on the road or stood all hours behind the counter because they knew that their toil would bring financial rewards they could never at- tain in the old country. It must not be forgotten that the prospect of such financial success had been one of the most tempting aspects of America and had provided many an immigrant with the motive to migrate. One may contrast the apathy, the lack of productivity in the economic life of the shtetl with the busy liveliness dis- played by the former Jews of the shtetl once they con- fronted the challenge and the promise of the demand- ing, yet free, economy of America. The economic ag- gressiveness of first generation North End Jews was later transmitted to the second. This process probably contributed to the great advances in the commercial and industrial life of the city of Boston made by the children of many North Enders.
The preoccupation of the immigrant with establishing a livelihood had, however, negative results as well. It was responsible for a rising materialism in a Jewish so- ciety in which religion, education and other idealistic pursuits formerly had a much more significant role. The talmid chochom, the learned man, was still greatly re- spected; yet the amhoretz, the unlearned Jew, who had been treated with light contempt in the shtetl, could
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much more frequently become an important man in the community if he proved to be a successful peddler.23
The strenuous working patterns of the times brought about certain changes in family and community life as well as in leisure-time practices. Fathers saw their chil- dren only on the Sabbath. Matters pertaining to the edu- cation of the young, to charity and to synagogue activi- ties passed little by little from the hands of the busy menfolk to the hands of the women. One North End rabbi writes in 1908: "Since men are generally engrossed in their business and in their craft, women have a major part in all institutions and charitable activities. [Men] seek rest and repose and habitually say [to one who at- tempts to involve them in community projects] 'Here is a dollar and leave me alone'."24
These other aspects of North End Jewish life will be discussed in the following chapters.
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4 homes and family life
THE HOUSES which the North End Jewish immigrants occupied were in the beginning rather small, insuffi- ciently equipped dwellings.25 They were not very well suited to give comfort to the immigrant's family, his boarders and his relatives who followed him to America and stayed with him until they had their own homes. Most houses in the area had been built by the earlier Yankee inhabitants who were later displaced by the Irish and the Italians. They were dilapidated but sturdy in basic structure, so that Jewish home owners and real estate dealers found it possible to rebuild them more than once to provide more apartments per house and to make them more livable. 26
One of the aged interviewees recalls: "Life was very primitive. Toilet was out in the yard. There was running water in the homes but no bath tubs. We would go to [the] American House [on Hanover Street] and take a hot bath [for a small fee]."
In another interview:
Q. How were housing conditions in the North End?
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A. Very modest. We lived on an upper floor apartment. People lived even in the attic.
Some real estate men began building "apartment houses," which were distinguished from "tenement houses" mainly by the comforts found in them. Ac- cording to one interviewee - the son of a North End real estate man - the first apartment house in the area was built in 1885 on the corner of Hanover and Cross Streets.
In these homes the immigrant women went about solving the initial problems of housekeeping with the same determination with which their husbands ap- proached the hardships of earning a livelihood. The de- sire to make their household Jewish did not make their task easier. For kosher meat they had to walk long dis- tances. At a rather early date, however, a kosher butcher store was established by one of the Wyzanski brothers. Many other products could be purchased on the market place just as in Europe. This is what a lady interviewee has to say about the very early years : "Someone sold chickens on Salem Street, in the backyards. The women would go there and look at them and feel them and they would pick one and the woman would bring the chicken to the [shoichet's] house [to be ritually slaughtered]."
Q. Did they buy chicken only for the Sabbath or for week-days as well?
A. Mainly for shabes. Everyone would have chicken and tsholent for shabes.
Q. Was food expensive?
A. Chicken cost ten to twelve cents a pound. I remem- ber how everyone complained about an inflation when a dozen of eggs went up to twenty cents.
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Note both English and Yiddish window inscriptions. meeting places for early immigrants. Kosher restaurants served as important
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A DEUTSCH
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Peddling was an important economic activity in the North End.
Q. How about other food?
A. Fruits were sold in front of the stores. They would sometimes sell you half an orange, if you did not want to buy a whole one.
Most interviewees give the impression that food was adequately available. However, some items which are today within reach even for the poorest were then re- garded as luxuries.
Q. What standard of living resulted from these peddling activities? Was there, for example, meat available every day?
A. I do not remember; I know there was chicken for the Sabbath.
Q. Did children buy ice cream as easily as they do now- adays?
A. Ice cream was a rarity. I do not think I had it more frequently than once a month. You offered it to visitors as a refreshment.
These standards of living, regarded as humble by former residents looking back on the past, must have represented to the immigrants themselves a degree of plenty rarely experienced before. Dos Goldene Land de- manded hard work but promised an opportunity to overcome poverty - the greatest of the social ailments of the shtetl.
While the material conditions of home life were to most immigrants better than in Eastern Europe, it was not easy for them to re-create in the new land the char- acteristic atmosphere of the Jewish home which was present in the tiny dwellings of the old country. Family life was exposed to many trials and changes in the first years after immigration.27
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For one thing, a large percentage of the immigrants spent years in America without their families. Men alone came "to look around" or to gather the funds necessary for the purchase of steamship tickets for the rest of the family. Some immigrants originally viewed their coming here only as a money-earning venture at the completion of which they planned to return and not bring over their families at all. After these long interruptions, readjust- ment to affectionate, orderly family life was not always easy. The boarding house was a poor substitute for home and did not make better fathers of the lonely men. Even those who came with wife and children were frequently away on week-long peddling trips. Store-keepers spent their evenings at business and saw their children only on the Sabbath.
The charitable organizations were burdened by the care of many families deserted by the husband and father. "Although Jews had shown a lower rate of desertion than some immigrant groups, it was one of the major problems confronting the Benevolent Association."28 The occurrence of these cases among Jews was a symp- tom of the general crisis to which Jewish family life was exposed at this time.
Religious life must have exercised a steadying influ- ence under these conditions. The Sabbath and the holi- days, which forced a much needed rest upon everyone, brought the members of the families together for holi- day meals and for prayer.29 Former residents still recall the festivity and the warmth of the home atmosphere which they experienced on these occasions. One elderly lady still sings the Sabbath table songs that she heard at her father's house every Friday evening. Another inter- viewee recalls his father's Yom Kippur Eve blessing.
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When the candles were lit and everyone was ready for shul, his father came in dressed in white (apparently in a kitl, a special white gown for High Holidays worn by laymen and rabbis alike) and blessed each child sepa- rately. (Experiences of this kind may have helped shape the nostalgic type of religiosity which later characterized the otherwise radically unobservant second generation.)
The relationship between the members of the family at first differed little from what it used to be in East European society. Parental authority was high; the American born generation was not yet grown to label its elders old fashioned and foreign. As one interviewee de- scribes her, the mother was usually "the old fashioned type. She was an indefatigable worker. But she accepted at all times the decisions of the father." Frequently, how- ever, interviewees speak of North End women who earned a living for their families, especially by occupa- tions in which Jewish women had been often engaged in Europe as well. Energetic Yente Rabinowitz opened a small grocery store soon after her family arrived in this country. Bernard Berenson, the noted art critic, used to bring his friends to the luncheonette run by his mother.
In most cases, however, the role of the woman was confined to the task of creating a warm home environ- ment for her husband and children who were daily ex- posed to the bewildering strangeness of the new world. The relationships within the typical North End Jewish home are well characterized in this excerpt: "They had a home life far different than they have now."
Q. In what way?
A. Well, the man, when he came home - that was din- nertime for all. If he came at eight o'clock at night
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that was all right too. Children had a lot of respect for their parents. What their father said was just so. Mothers, in most cases, were easy- going, always protecting their children in every way.
Q. [In those days] was there any greater significance in the role of the mother?
A. Oh, definitely. As I see it today. Well, I think that the love for the family was greater in those days than to- day. But the general habits of the women of those days were different ... they were not going out. I don't remember my mother going out. Never ; always at home.
The process of Americanization was bound to force a change upon the position of father, mother, and Ameri- can born (or at least American-educated) children within the Jewish family. Husbands Americanized faster than their wives. Immigrant men had more contact with the "outside" world than women. On their peddling trips, they were more likely to be influenced by the ways and ideas of the great new world in which they labored for a living. Thus, until the children grew up, the father was the most "modern" member of the family, the recog- nized expert on all things progressive, American and worldly. The mother, on the other hand, tended to be- come the guardian of the more familial, more permanent values. She was anxious to secure the continuity of the traditional family atmosphere - thus, she became the conservative force in the family. As a result, we find the mother in the North End in charge of the Jewish educa- tion of her children and of many religious and charitable activities in the community. This was in complete con- trast with the usual situation back home in the shtetl,
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where all matters pertaining to religious and educational life were the domain of men. The fact that the extreme burden of earning a living left the men little time to oc- cupy themselves with spiritual and cultural matters is only part of the explanation. The resulting general pro- gressive worldliness of men against the traditionalism of women is, I believe, an aspect of the situation to be recognized.30
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