Historical footnote

[richard_wolpoe <richard_wolpoe...>]

In the 1880's and 1890's when Eastern European Jews were coming to the USA in 
droves, there were Jews and Non-Jews who distinguished the old-timers (i.e. 
Sephardic and German Jews) by using Hebrew as opposed to the newcomers who were 
referred to as Jews.

Restricted Hotels in the Catskills (yes the Catskills was most unJewish about 
100-120 years ago!) would allow "Hebrews", but not "Jews".

Both the Spanish Portuguese and the German Jews did NOT speak Yiddish.  Yiddish 
speaking Jews were not accepted for a long time.


My souce is the late Professor Hyman Grinstein OBM.

Regards,
Rich Wolpoe


______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________
Subject: Re: Film, "The Governess" 
Author:  <jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org> at Tcpgate
Date:    11/30/98 10:35 AM




        5. In Britain, Sephardic Jews were very in the dominant position 
vis a vis Ashkenazim and this was a major factor, in the early years of 
this century, for the rapid weekening of Yiddish culture here. The 
Jewish community's cultural elite were very worried about the bad name 
their newly arrived Yiddish-speaking cousins gave them - I have read of 
instances where Yiddish theatre troups were bribed to go to New York and 
printers of Yiddish newpapers like Polisher Yidl and Arbeiter Fraint 
were bribed to sabotage their products!

Benjamin