Yeshiva

The First American Yeshivot

The large influx of Jews from eastern Europe who immigrated to the United States in the late 19th century initially had little interest in sending their children to a yeshiva. Wanting their children to assimilate into American culture, these parents chose to educate their children in public schools while enrolling them in after-school programs that taught them about Judaism. Although many of these after-school institutions were called yeshivot, they did not provide the Talmudic instruction that was central to the eastern European tradition. This development disturbed many Orthodox rabbis, who wanted boys to have a Jewish education that would protect them from acculturation into the American mainstream. In 1886, Etz Chaim, the first elementary school providing advanced study of the Jewish religious texts, opened in a storefront on the Lower East Side of Manhattan in New York City. Study of the Torah and Talmud was the core of Etz Chaim's instruction and was provided during most of the day, while secular subjects were taught after 4 p.m.

In 1898, the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations was established, and this organization founded many other yeshivot. By 1906, there were 21 yeshivot in the United States that were modeled after the Lithuanian yeshivot that ordained rabbis. Talmudical Academy in New York City, established in 1916, was the first Orthodox Jewish high school in the country to offer traditional studies as well as a state-approved general education curriculum.

At the same time that these schools opened for boys, the Beth Yaakav movement provided education to Jewish girls. The Beth Yaakav schools, which originated in Poland in the early 20th century, did not feature Talmudic study but offered girls instruction in the Torah, prayers, and Jewish laws and customs. The first movement-affiliated school in the United States opened in the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn, and similar yeshivot were founded in Brooklyn's East New York and Brownsville neighborhoods.

In 1921, Yeshiva Torah Vodaath, the fifth Jewish all-day elementary school in the United States, was founded in Williamsburg by Orthodox Jews from Poland. Five years later, the curriculum was expanded to include high school courses, and the school later opened a separate Talmudic academy for post–high school instruction.

“Black Hat” and Day Schools

In the 1930s and 1940s, a new wave of eastern European immigrants, feeing Nazi persecution, settled in the United States. Among these immigrants were thousands of Orthodox Jews, trained in Lithuanian Talmudic academies, who opened up similar schools in their adopted country. These yeshivot were dubbed “black-hat schools,” in reference to the black hats worn by the Orthodox. These institutions included Ner Israel Yeshiva in Baltimore (founded 1933), Choftez Chaim Yeshiva in Brooklyn (1933), Mesivta Tifereth Jerusalem in Manhattan (1937), and Yeshiva Chaim Berlin in [Page 2211]Brooklyn (1939). Telz Yeshiva was transplanted from Lithuania to Cleveland in 1941, and two years later, Beth Midrash Govaha, which would become the largest and most prestigious school for advanced Talmudic studies in the United States, was founded in Lakewood, New Jersey.

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