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Dr. Leslie Fishbein spoke about the Jewish American immigrants of the Lower East Side, at Highland Park Conservative Temple-Congregation Anshe Emeth on Feb. 10.

Fishbein is an associate professor of American studies and one of the founding faculty members of the cinema studies program at Rutgers University.

Fishbein said the Jews of the Lower East Side helped shape the society to what it is today, because they were active in the unions and fought for social equality. Also, they were major players in politics, literature, and entertainment.

The Lower East Side offered many more opportunities for the Jews from Eastern Europe, she said. However, the Lower East Side became a melting pot for immigrants from Eastern Europe, she said.

"The notion of the melting pot is that you take whoever you get from the old world, put them in the spiraling cold, mix them around, and you will melt them all down, and you will come into true American life," she said. "Jews were encouraged to embrace the melting pot."

Jewish American immigrants typically migrated to urban areas such as New York, Boston, and Chicago, she said. When the Jews arrived in the Lower East Side, they came to a place that was completely different from their shtetls of Eastern Europe.

"Jews were 9.4 percent of immigrants in the United States between 1881 and 1914," Fishbein said.

However, the Italians and Greeks heavily migrated to the Lower East Side as well, she said. But, the major difference between them and the Jews is the Jewish immigrants more often set down roots in the U.S.

"Jews are not like everybody else, they tend to come and stay," she said. "As of 1908 when the United States government began keeping statistics, the percentage of immigrants that departed was 32.2 percent, while that of Jews was only 7.1 percent."

As more Jews settled in the Lower East Side, it became a thriving area of hard-working Jewish immigrants.

"By the first decade of the 20th century, the Lower East Side developed into an immigrant Jewish cosmopolis with many different communities of Jews, such as those from Russia and Poland," Fishbein said.

However, life in the Lower East Side wasn't a walk in the park for the Jews, Fishbein said. There was very little job security, the economy was difficult, and living conditions weren't the best.

"The Lower East Side was a place of crowding and turmoil," she said. "There was great hustle and bustle in an urban environment and virtually no privacy."

The Jews were heavily involved in the garment industry, she said. Also, due to their permanent migration to the Lower East Side, they were very active in the union, she said.

"They were much more willing to take risks for future benefits," Fishbein said.

Jews of the Lower East Side faced jobs with low wages, long hours, and overall very little job security she said. But, they fought back against the harsh economic conditions, she said.

"There were meat boycotts by Jewish women on the Lower East Side; they felt the kosher butchers were elevating the prices unfairly," she said." Jews were heavily involved in the strike waves in the garment industry."

Religion, making money, and survival were the main concerns of Jewish life in the Lower East Side, she said. However, all three of them caused many problems.

"People did try to study; there was a real attempt to do that, but you were living in a world where people had to make a living," she said. "Some of them obviously violated the Sabbath, and others took lesser wages in order to maintain religious observance."

Living conditions were overcrowded and hazardous, therefore the Jews of the Lower East Side did not have privacy, Fishbein said. Families were forced to live in extremely small apartments that that just had three rooms: a kitchen, a parlor, and a bedroom. Additionally, the apartments were extremely hot because there was no ventilation.

"Fire escapes were non-existent," Fishbein said. "Even if they did exist, so often families used them for storage."

Bathhouses were prevalent throughout the Lower East Side; therefore, Jews were relatively healthy and clean compared to other groups of immigrants she said.

Both the children and the adults assimilated to life on the Lower East Side, however many children clashed with their parents over religion and education, Fishbein said. Children began to embrace sports, secular school, became agnostics and atheists, and many married non-Jews creating rifts between parents and their kids.

Jews were extremely active in entertainment, politics, and literature, she said. Many Jews helped create Nickelodeon on the Lower East Side which primarily was produced in New York City and eventually moved to Hollywood. Also, Yiddish was one of the primary languages spoken by many of the Jews, she said.

"Abraham Cahan edited The Jewish Daily Forward, the largest Yiddish language newspaper in the world, and his advice column helped to acculturate many Jewish immigrants to American customs," she said. "Abraham Cahan's 1917 novel of immigrant life, ‘The Rise of David Levinsky,' won the praise of American novelist and literary critic William Dean Howells and reached an American audience interested in Jewish life and customs."

Fishbein said one of the most renowned advocates for the legalization of birth control was Emma Goldman of the Lower East Side. Jews were also very active in the settlement house movement, whereas Lillian Wald founded the Henry Street Settlement.

Rabbi Yakov Hilsenrath, rabbi emeritus of Highland Park Conservative Temple-Congregation Anshe Emeth, said Fishbein depicted an eloquent and excellent presentation of what it was like to be a Jewish immigrant on the Lower East Side.

"I thought the presentation was quite comprehensive and it was very good," Hillsenrath said.