A HIDDEN JEWEL OF DETROIT JEWISH HISTORY, BETH OLEM CEMETER
BILL CARROLL, special writer
KRISTA HUSA, staff photographer
iv
orkers, carrying lunch pails, trudge past the
nearby automotive plant. Shiny new Cadillacs
roll off the assembly line, then are taken for a
brief test drive around a track in the area. Heavy
traffic roars up and down Interstate 75, a short distance
away.
This hubbub.in Hamtramck is the unlikely setting for
Beth Olem Cemetery, dating back to 1862. It is one of the
oldest Jewish cemeteries in Michigan and, undoubtedly, the
only one in the world on the grounds of a car factory.
Surrounded by a wall and lined with trees, the 2.5-acre
Beth Olem Cemetery — formerly known as the Smith Street
Cemetery — is the resting place of 1,400 Jews. Burials took
place here between 1868 and 1948, with the service usually
held in a long-gone chapel. Today, the cemetery is open only
twice a year, on the Sunday before Rosh Hashanah and
Passover. It will be open this Sunday, Sept. 24, when Beth
Olem joins with the Jewish Genealogical Society- of
Michigan for a community-wide memorial service (see related
story).
"Yontiff[holiday] is coming . . . it's our busy season," said
the man in charge of maintaining the historic burial ground
— and he isn't even Jewish. Andy Phythian has been super-
intendent of Congregation Shaarey Zedek's Clover Hill Park
Cemetery in Birmingham for 24 years, a job that includes
the upkeep of Beth Olem.
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2000
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Before that, Phythian spent five years at another Jewish burial
place, Machpelah Cemetery on Woodward Avenue in Ferndale.
Supervising Jewish cemeteries has given him some basic
knowledge of Yiddish and Jewish customs. "People always ask
me for information about the Jewish holidays and cemetery
customs, and I'm happy to help them," he said.
Phythian said usually only six to 10 people show up for
the two days each year that Beth Olem is open, but as many
as 300 are expected for this Sunday's service, which would
make it one of the busiest times in the cemetery's history.
Different Caretakers
Through the years, Beth Olem (meaning, "house of the
world") has been like an orphan with several surrogate parents.
Shaarey Zedek is the main caretaker of the cemetery because
its members' graves comprise the largest area, although several
synagogues and organizations had plots there at one time or
another. Bnai Israel (known as the Mullet Street Synagogue)
follows Shaarey Zedek in the number of burials at Beth Olem.
General Motors Corp., the Jewish Genealogical Society of
Michigan, the Jewish Historical Society of Michigan and the
Jewish Community Center's Institute for Retired Professionals
also have helped preserve the cemetery over the years.
"We're proud of our little cemetery," proclaimed an
unnamed GM official.