J.D.B. News Letter

Many New Activities Mark Growth of Los Angeles Jewish Community (By Our Los Angeles Correspondent)

The closing months of 1927 are attended by a number of significant events in various walks of the Jewish community life in Los Angeles. There is the intensive participation of the Jewish leaders and population of this city in the huge $2,750,000 Community Chest drive of Los Angeles, out of which amount $426,000 will be allotted to the local Jewish agencies of welfare. There is the much prepared-for conversion of the “California Jewish Voice,” an Anglo-Yiddsh weekly, into a daily. There is the corner-stone laying of the new $200,000 Jewish Alliance Club House donated by the Hamburger family. Preparations for the building of a new $1.000,000 B’nai B’rith Temple; the purchase of a 100 acre camp by the local Workmen’s Circle and many other recent events testify to the growth and progress of the Jewish community of this city.

There are five Reform temples and sixteen Orthodox and Conservative congregations in Los Angeles. Of the congregations, E’nai B’rith, Edgar F. Magnin, Rabbi, is the largest and oldest, dating back to 1862. Of the institutions of religious learning the Hebrew Talmudic Academy Yeshivah Torah is outstanding.

A partial list of the local Jewish institutions of welfare may give the due impression as to the scope of community activities of the Los Angeles Jewry. The list is topped by the Federation of Jewish Welfare Organizations, I. Irving Lipsitch executive director, some of whose important constituent societies are: Jewish Big Brothers’ Association; Hebrew Consumptive Relief Association; Jewish Aid Society of Los Angeles; Jewish Alliance of Los Angeles; Jewish Orphans’ Home of So. California; League for the Assistance of Jewish Students; Jewish Loan and Housing Association; Jewish Committee for Personal Service in State Institutions; Los Angeles Jewish Dispensary; Kaspare Cohn Hospital; Modern Social Centre; Jewish Mothers’ Alliance Day Nursery.

George Mossbacher is president of the Federation. Ben R. Meyer, Irving H Hellman, Louis B. Mayer, I Eisner, and Henry W. Louis arc some of the local Jewish leaders.

Other Jewish organizations of welfare outside of the Federation are: Hebrew Sheltering Home for the Aged; Los Angeles Home for Inclurables; Council of Jewish Women; Jewish Consumptive Relief Association, the national organization maintaing the Sanatorium at Duarte and Ex-Patients’ Home in the city. The Sanatorium and the Ex-Patiens’ Home are actively supported by the local Jewish labor organizations, including the “Arbeiter Ring” with seven branches.

The Jewish company playing permanently at the Capitol Theatre and the literary society of the Los Angeles Yiddish Club headed by the wellknown Jewish stage and screen actor Teneu Holtz complete the list of the cultural institutions of the community.

In the local political and civic life the Jews have lost much of their whilom weight. There arc however: Judge Harry A. Hollzer, Superior Court, who is also the secretary of the State Judicial Council, and Judge Elias Rosencranz, Municipal Court, both of whom are very active in the Jewish community life. J. M. Fricdiander, is the State Corporation Commissioner. Dr. David William Edelman, the son of the first rabbi of Los Angeles, is noted for the high positions he has been for many years occupying in the local Democratic party councils. His management of city campaigns resulted in the election of several Democratic mayors in a city predominantly Republican. Myer Lissner is a Republican, known in the past as Senator Hiram Johnson’s aide; he was also a member of the U. S. Shipping Board. Attorney Harry Lyons is one of the Los Angeles men now serving in the California State Assembly.

In the realm of medicine the names of the following Los Angeles Jews are well known nationally; Dr. Aaron Rosanoff, author of the “Manual of Psychiatry” state commissioner for lunacy and lecturer of the University of California, Southern Branch, and University of Southern California; Dr. Edmund Lazard, author of many works, Dr. Henry Herbert, Dr. Leon Meyers, Dr. Adolph Tyroler and Dr. Maurice Kahn, both noted surgeons; Dr. Leon Shulman, Dr. Herman Sugarman and Dr. Geo. Piness. There is the Maimonides Medical Club with a membership of 100 Jewish physicians of the city.

The first efficient banking facilities in Los Angeles were provided by the Hellman family, which to this day controls the Merchants National Trust and Savings Bank. Ben R. Meyer and Milton Getz are the president and vice-president respectively of the Union. Bank and Trust Company. In the field of real estate and investments Joe Toplitzky. the Newmark and the Hamburger families. I. Eisner, Isaacs Brothers and Louis M. Cole are known for their wide operations. The departmerit store field now has the May family’s establishment and Jacoby Brothers. Haas, Baruch and Co. and M. A. Newmark Co. are at the helm of the wholesale grocery business of the Southwest, Newmark Brothers are noted for their large coffee interests. The wholesale fruit and vegetable growing and shipping business of Southern California has Peter Kahn, J. Friedheim. J. Klein and Kingsbaker Brothers at its head. Simon Levy Co. is a large produce and grocery concern.

The part played hy the Jews in the upbuilding of the motion picture industry of America is universally recognized. The names of Louis B. Mayer, Carl Laemmle, Joseph Schenck, Jesse I Lasky, Jack Warner and other motion picture magnates of Hollywood are internationally known. We also find Jews among celebrated actors, directers and writers of moviedom.

The Jewish community of Los Angeles traces its foundation to the earliest days of the American rule in California. Jews were known to settle in the then little and sleepy pueblo as early as in 1849. The census of 1850 lists several Jews, according to the latest findings of M. H. Newmark. Religious services were first conducted in 1852. while two years later one Carvalho, a Sephardic Jew, a member of General Fremont’s expedition, settled in Los Angeles and proposed the organization of a Hebrew benevolent society. Must of the earliest Jews of Los Angeles were of German origin and came here in the wake of the Gold Rush of ’49. having drifted from San Francisco and the Sierras southward in quest of quieter vistas and more stable pursuits. The Newmark, Hellman and Hamburger families, to this day active in the local affairs. Jewish and general, were some of the earliest settlers. The rolls of the first Vigilance Committees of Los Angeles contain the names of Xewmarks and other Jews.

The Jewish contingent grew and prospered keeping pace with the city. In the year of 1904, 3,000 Jews were counted in Los Angeles. This was the beginning of the large Jewish immigration. At the present time, the total population of 1,300,000. contains about 75.000 Jews. This is the nearest guess as to the ever-fluctuating figure of the local Jewry. New York. Chicago, Canadian cities, Detroit and Ohio cities are said to contribute largely to the recent Jewish migration to Los Angeles now still in process. Many come here to seek health in the balmy climes; others come to retire; still many more come to establish here their stores, shops and offices. There is a considerable colony of Sepharrlic Jews, mostly hailing from Turkey, and a group of “Subbotniki,” or “Sabbath”-people, the Russian peasants who embraced orthodox Judaism and fled to America from the wrath and persecutions of the Czar. Los Angeles is the only American city where these “Sabbath”-men and women, still dressed in their Russian national costumes, can be found.