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Jewish Life in Kentucky
By Carol Ely
Blintzes and Grits.Bagels and Bluegrass. "Shalom, Y'all." The jokes
come from the obvious contrasts between what we think of as Jewish culture
and what we think of as Southern. But the reality is a much more complex blending
of cultures and identities, creating a unique kind of Jew—the Kentucky
Jew.
Jews were present for the very creation of Kentucky. The Virginia mercantile
firm of Cohen and Isaacs hired Daniel Boone to scout out their Kentucky lands;
and another merchant family, the Gratz family of Philadelphia, set up trading
posts on the Ohio (including the river landing at Gratz, Kentucky) and joined
the founders of Lexington. These early Jews were Sephardic Jews, with roots
in the dispersion of Jews from Spain to the rest of Europe and the New World.
They followed Sephardic traditions of worship and law and were part of an
educated and entrepreneurial transatlantic elite. By the 1840s Jewish traders
and peddlers appeared in greater numbers in Kentucky settlements, emigrating
from political unrest, poverty, and restrictive laws in Germany. In most of
Europe, Jews were not permitted to own land, so most Jewish immigrants did
not expect to become farmers. Instead, small-scale retailing, either through
door-to-door, town-to-town peddling, or in a small storefront, was the best
opportunity open to them. When enough Jews gathered in one place, it was natural
to think of formalizing their community as a congregation.
In mid-nineteenth century Louisville, then in Owensboro, Lexington, and Paducah, German Jews began creating synagogues for worship and establishing cemeteries. But there were some differences to sort out. Some of the settlers were traditional—they worshipped in Hebrew, wanted to eat kosher food, and believed in traditional practices. Others were influenced by the Reform movement that was underway in Germany—they wanted services in German, and they wanted to modernize Jewish law. The first congregations in Kentucky began traditionally, but most soon adopted reform practices. In urban areas, cultural differences more than differences in doctrine split the community. When "Polish" Jews arrived in mid-century from Eastern Europe, speaking Yiddish and objecting to the Americanization of services, new houses of worship were necessary. Louisville had several congregations; small Kentucky towns that had barely enough Jews to form a minyan of ten worshippers had to negotiate compromises to satisfy members of divergent backgrounds. Smaller Kentucky cities that have had Jewish congregations include Covington, Ashland, Henderson, Hopkinsville, and Newport. Between 1890 and 1914, terrible persecutions drove million of Jews out of Russia and Poland to America. Most settled in the larger cities of the East, but some found Kentucky, where they joined their "landsmen," their fellow Jews.
Some settlers made an effort to move old world communities intact to the New World, such as the group from the shtetl (village) of Pushelot in Lithuania who built Lexington's first synagogue.In Kentucky towns and cities, these Jews of German or Russian background tried to fit in to the general culture without giving up a Jewish identity. In Louisville, the Jewish neighborhood was centered east of downtown, in what is now the hospital district. This urban neighborhood of Jewish-owned shops, synagogues, bakeries fragrant with challah, crowded apartments, fine townhouses, kosher butchers, the Talmud Torah (Hebrew school), and Jewish Hospital, created a Jewish world where families could feel comfortable among their own people. The larger community was usually accepting; but, when it was not, Jews established their own institutions. When hospitals limited their quota of Jewish doctors, Jewish Hospital was created. If the Cotillion did not accept Jewish debutants, a Jewish Cotillion was formed to teach teenagers the social graces for Bar Mitzvah dances. When Jewish sportsmen were not admitted to local country clubs, the Standard Club was formed.
The community also organized charitable societies to help the poor and support
new immigrants, and a wide variety of social clubs and organizations. The
world of the old downtown neighborhood, however, was broken apart during the
1950s, with affluence and suburbanization. In Louisville, pressure from the
growing hospital district and the construction of I-65 through the heart of
the Jewish neighborhood hastened the process. The Jewish Community Center,
for instance, began downtown as the YMHA (Young Men's Hebrew Association)
as a place for sports, acculturation, education, and community. It grew and
relocated, and finally in the 1950s joined the exodus to what was then the
outermost fringes of the city.In the years before World War II, Kentucky Jews
worked to save their European co-religionists from annihilation and brought
over a few German immigrants; and after the war other Holocaust survivors
joined the community. During the 1970s and 1980s, American Jews lobbied for
the release of Soviet Jews and during this period succeeded in resettling
many Russian Jewish families here. A few Israeli Jews have also settled in
Kentucky, adding authentic Middle Eastern culture, foods, and music to the
multi-ethnic Jewish mix.
Today, Kentucky Jews combine their varieties of Judaism (Reform, Conservative, Orthodox) and their Jewish cultures (German, Russian, Israeli) with their Kentucky heritage and the customs that they can comfortably absorb from the wider culture. Judaism as a whole during the past twenty-five years has begun a re-examination and a creative new use of tradition. Jewish practices and arts that had been dormant for a generation have been revived, such as klezmer music (Eastern European jazz-fusion), textile arts (such as creating tallitot, prayer shawls), and religious customs (such as the building and decorating of a sukkah, described below). Jewish foods, like bagels, have entered the Kentucky food vocabulary as well. Most Jewish folklife today centers around holidays, with their foods, songs, and rituals both at home and at shul (Yiddish for synagogue or temple). People are returning to the observance of these traditional holidays, such as the weekly Shabbat (Sabbath) which lasts from sundown on Friday (ushered in with candles, wine, and braided challah bread) to sundown on Saturday (ushered out with a havdalah service with a special braided candle, spices, and wine).
The yearly cycle of holidays begins with the fall High Holidays: Rosh Hashanah,
the New Year, featuring apples and honey, and often new clothes for family
worship in synagogue or temple; and Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, a day
of fasting and prayer. Sukkot, featured at the Folklife Festival this year,
follows closely after. Sukkot is a harvest festival, when families build a
temporary booth called a sukkah in their backyards, decorate it, and eat there
for the eight days of the festival.
Alternatively, most synagogues and temples also build a public sukkah on their
grounds where Sukkot is observed as a community event. Simchat Torah immediately
follows the end of Sukkot and is observed with rejoicing and dancing in the
gift of the Torah, the five books of Moses. Hanukah is celebrated in early
winter with eight days of lighting candles in a branched hanukiah (or menorah)
to commemorate the historical miracle of the victory of the Maccabees and
the survival of the Jewish people. The game of dreidl (a 4-sided top), a legacy
of Eastern Europe, is played; foods fried in oil are eaten in vast quantities,
such as potato latkes (pancakes), for those of Eastern European origin, or
sufganiot (jelly doughnuts), for those from Israel or the Middle East. Most
Jews just eat both. Midwinter brings Purim, in memory of another miraculous
rescue of the Jews, a lively holiday of costumes and the Purimspeil (a play
or parody). Children dress up as the beautiful Queen Esther or the wicked
Haman. A revived holiday, Tu B'Shevat, is about caring for trees and the earth,
with roots in Biblical agricultural customs.
Pesach, or Passover, marks the beginning of spring. A huge housecleaning in preparation for the festive Seder meal (one Seder night for Reform Jews, two for traditional Jews) and eight days when matzoh replaces bread, commemorates the central event of Jewish history and lore—the Exodus from Egypt. The Seder meal is a stylized retelling of the story, in text (Hebrew, English, or even Yiddish, German, or Russian), dialogue, questions, and song, with symbolic foods and other family traditional dishes (guarded and argued over and passed down through the generations). Seders bring together close and far-flung family members, friends, and strangers alike, for no one should be without a place to be on Pesach. Early summer brings Shavuot, a holiday of study and learning.
The newer holidays of Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Remembrance) and the festive
Yom Ha'atzmaut (Israel Independence Day) are both observed as community-wide
events in Louisville. The only summer holiday is the solemn fast of Tisha
B'Av, a time of mourning for the destruction of the Temple in ancient Jerusalem.
Then the cycle of seasons begins again with Rosh Hashanah—this coming
new year, known as 2000 to the secular world, is year 5760 in the Jewish calendar.
In this new year of 5760, organized Jewish communities remain in Louisville
(with five congregations and numerous community organizations), Lexington
(two congregations), Owensboro, and Paducah. The active and committed Jews
of these communities not only have kept their traditions alive, in recent
years they have enhanced and expanded their Jewishness, reinvigorating and
rediscovering old practices and customs for a modern world.
