A Century of Jewish Detroit
1900-1910
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• 1900-1910: The "reluctant melting
pot" characterized these years. As the
Great Migration of eastern European
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immigrants continued, the question of
Americanization, with the threat of
losing Jewish identity, loomed large. It
was a decade of organization and
reorganization as the United Jewish
Charities spoke on behalf of the Jews
of Detroit, yet without appreciation of
the difficulties of merging immigrant
Jews into a "melting pot" with earlier
Temple Beth El on Woodward Avenue and Eliot
Street, where it remained from 1903-1922.
arrivals. As the UJC cooperated with
the Industrial Removal Office, the
Jews of Detroit subtly seemed to
acknowledge the potential anti-
semitism of middle America — even
as the automobile companies respond-
ed positively by providing jobs to the
new immigrants.
Rabbi Abraham Hershman and his
wife on their honeymoon in 1909. A
graduate of the Jewish Theological
Seminary of America, he was Detroit's
first Conservative rabbi.
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