The mass migration from the shtetls of Eastern Europe to the slums of New York uprooted centuries-old patterns of Jewish life, so it's only natural that Jewish culture also underwent a massive shift. As young Jews left the tight-knit communities of the shtetls behind for the great big world of the cities, Orthodox Judaism faded away and secular Yiddish culture blossomed. As Jews confronted the harsh realities of industrial capitalism in New York, socialism replaced religion as the great hope to end the suffering of the Jewish people. In this episode, I'll explore the vibrant cultural, politica ..read more

For centuries, the majority of the world's Jews had lived in small towns called shtetls in the countryside of Eastern Europe. These were isolated, tight-knit communities where the Torah reigned supreme. By the late 19th century, dissatisfaction had been growing among younger Jews about the poverty, the antisemitism, the lack of opporunity, and the narrow-mindedness of the shtetls. Then, in 1881, a series of violent pogroms broke out in Ukraine, forcing thousands of Jews to flee first to major cities nearby and then to America. This exodus only picked up steam in the coming decades as the long ..read more

The mass migration from the shtetls of Eastern Europe to the slums of New York uprooted centuries-old patterns of Jewish life, so it's only natural that Jewish culture also underwent a massive shift. As young Jews left the tight-knit communities of the shtetls behind for the great big world of the cities, Orthodox Judaism faded away and secular Yiddish culture blossomed. As Jews confronted the harsh realities of industrial capitalism in New York, socialism replaced religion as the great hope to end the suffering of the Jewish people. In this episode, I'll explore the vibrant cultural, politica ..read more

For centuries, the majority of the world's Jews had lived in small towns called shtetls in the villages of Eastern Europe. These were isolated, tight-knit communities where the Torah reigned supreme. By the late 19th century, dissatisfaction had been growing among younger Jews about the poverty, the antisemitism, the lack of opporunity, and the narrow-mindedness of the shtetls. When a series of violent attacks broke out in 1881 and continued in the coming years, the desire to leave boiled over. By choice or by force, over two million Jews were thrust out into the great gentile world of the big ..read more

Point Dark is yet another useless browser add-on that inserts ads into your searches Point Dark is advertised as an extension that can provide a dark mode for all visited pages. While it may seem like your average app for Google Chrome or other compatible browsers, there have been reports about bad experiences from users ..read more

For centuries, the majority of the world's Jews had lived in small towns called shtetls in the villages of Eastern Europe. These were isolated, tight-knit communities where the Torah reigned supreme. By the late 19th century, dissatisfaction had been growing among younger Jews about the poverty, the antisemitism, the lack of opporunity, and the narrow-mindedness of the shtetls. When a series of violent attacks broke out in 1881 and continued in the coming years, the desire to leave boiled over. By choice or by force, over two million Jews were thrust out into the great gentile world of the big ..read more

This is part one of a series about the incredibly multifacted history of Jewish immigration to NYC, each episode focusing on a different facet. In this episode, I talk about the oldest and most successful part of America's Jewish population: German Jews who immigrated in the mid-19th century. Join me as I follow these immigrants from the ghettos of Germany to the tenements of Little Germany to the luxurious apartments of the Upper West Side ..read more

By the turn of the 20th century, the New York Irish still formed a clear underclass, but they started to have a few things going for them: their power in Tammany Hall, their dominance of the skilled building trades, and their social advantage over the Italian, Jewish, and especially African-American migrants who had began pouring into the city. In the final episode of this four-part series, I talk about how they used these advantages to climb out of poverty and escape the slums. I'll also talk about the underappreciated later waves of Irish immigration and the cultural life of working-class Ir ..read more

In this episode, I discuss the impact the Irish had on the politics of NYC, their role in the Civil War, and why, in 1863, they carried out the worst race riot in our country's history ..read more

In part two of my four-part series on the history of Irish New York, I talk in detail about the Great Hunger, the journey of the million people who fled it, and the lives they then established in New York City ..read more