While the first Jews to arrive in America came to New Amsterdam in 1654, in the early decades of the United States, the largest Jewish community was in Charleston, SC. This lecture will study the history and the culture of this early American Jewish community. Charleston was also the home of the first Reform congregation in America. We will explore how that congregation came to be and why American Reform began in Charleston.
 

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Cincinnati was one of the most important American cities in the second half of the nineteenth century. Its Jewish community evolved around the opportunities that the city provided. Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise founded Hebrew Union College which began as the first rabbinical school in America and soon developed as the center of American Reform. The Eastern European Jews also created a vibrant Orthodox community in Cincinnati
 

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The Jews arrived in Boston in the middle of the nineteenth century. This community consisted of mainly Polish Jews and grew significantly in the last decades of the century. The Jews experienced both the anti-Semitism of Boston as well as the intellectual openness of the city. This lecture will highlight the roles of Louis Brandies and Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik in the creation of an American Judaism that reflected the unique place of Boston in the American Jewish experience.
 

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Jews arrived in Brooklyn at the end of the of the nineteenth century with the completion of the Brooklyn and Williamsburg Bridges. The community quickly grew and developed and eventually spread to other neighborhoods in Brooklyn. This lecture will explore the development of both the Eastern European and Syrian communities in Brooklyn with an emphasis on the unique nature of each of these communities and their attitudes towards assimilating into American society and culture.
 

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