Rediscovering the Jewish Past

It has been almost two months since Christmas passed but on the 2800 block of Poplar St. in Brewerytown, there is a a window decorated in Christmas bows and garlands. Despite this outdated display, the Christmas decorations were not the objects that caught our attention. Instead, the two Menorahs sitting adjacent from each other sparked our interest. A couple of blocks from this house is Strawberry Mansion, which was the largest secondary Jewish immigrant district.  Eastern Europeans flocked to Strawberry Mansion to separate themselves from South Philadelphia in the early 1910s, but as the African-American population moved in during the 1950s, the Jewish population moved out.

Seeing the two Menorahs gives our group confidence that there is indeed Jewish life within this community and we will be following up on this. 

By Ibtisam Abdul-Barr, Shannon McDonald and Stephanie Ramirez