Mapping Work in Early Twentieth-Century Montreal: A Rabbi, a Neighbourhood, and a Community-Reference-Cited by-同舟云学术

Mapping Work in Early Twentieth-Century Montreal: A Rabbi, a Neighbourhood, and a Community

Published:2017-03 Issue:2 Volume:45 Page:7-24
ISSN:0703-0428
Container-title:Urban History Review
language:en
Short-container-title:Urban History Review

Author:

Poutanen Mary Anne,Gilliland Jason

Abstract

Rabbi Simon Glazer’s 1909 daily journal provides a window onto his role as an orthodox rabbi of a largely Yiddish-speaking immigrant community, his interactions with Jewish newcomers, the range of tasks he performed to augment the inadequate stipends he received from a consortium of five city synagogues where he was chief rabbi, and the ways in which Jewish newcomers sought to become economically independent. Using a multidisciplinary methodology, including Historical Geographic Information Systems (HGIS), Glazer’s journal offers a new lens through which to view and map the social geography of this community. Our study contributes to a growing body of literature on immigrant settlement, which has shown that such clustering encouraged economic independence and social mobility. Characterized by a high degree of diversity in ethnicity and commerce, the St. Lawrence Boulevard corridor was an ideal location for Jewish newcomers to set down roots. We argue that the community served as a springboard for social mobility and that Simon Glazer played an important role at a critical moment in its early development. It was on its way to becoming one of Canada’s most significant Jewish communities. Over the eleven years that he worked in Montreal (1907–18), Glazer carved out a vital place for himself in the city’s Jewish immigrant community and honed skills that would serve him well when he returned to the United States.

Publisher

University of Toronto Press Inc. (UTPress)

Subject

Urban Studies,History

Link

https://utpjournals.press/doi/pdf/10.3138/uhr.45.02.01

Reference145 articles.

1. A photocopy of the original journal (housed at the American Jewish Archives in Cincinnati, Ohio) is available at the Alex Dworkin Canadian Jewish Archives in Montreal (hereafter ADCJA). P0076, Rabbi Simon Glazer Fond, 1903–1927.

2. In 1909 these included the Galician, Chevra Kadisha, Austrian Hungarian, Rumanian, and Beth Judah congregations. He was also the chief rabbi of the Beth Israel Synagogue in Quebec City. See Ira Robinson, “Rabbi Simon Glazer: A Rival for the Chief Rabbinate,” in his book Rabbis & Their Community: Studies in the Eastern European Orthodox Rabbinate in Montreal, 1896–1930 (Calgary: University of Calgary Press, 2007), 47–8.

3. In Quebec, see, for example, Henriette Dessaulles, Hopes and Dreams: The Diary of Henriette Dessaulles, 1874–1881 (Willowdale, ON: Hounslow, 1986); diaries of Abraham Joseph and Fanny David Joseph (LAC, Fonds Abraham Joseph, R5374-0-4-E); diaries of Amy Redpath Roddick (McGill University, Rare Books & Special Collections division, MS 659, Sir Thomas Roddick, Amy Redpath Roddick); and diaries of Clarence de Sola (ADCJA, De Sola, Clarence and Mendola, P0164, Diaries of Clarence de Sola, 1873–1875, 1879, 1880, 1904, 1919); and Annmarie Adams and Peter Gossage, “Girlhood, Family, and Private Space in Late Nineteenth Century Saint-Hyacinthe,” Urban History Review/ Review d’histoire urbaine 26, no. 4 (1998): 56–68.

4. Exceptions include Don Lafreniere, “Reconstructing the Spatial and Temporal Patterns of Daily Life in the 19th-Century City: A Historical GIS Approach” (PhD diss., University of Western Ontario, 2014). There has also been some effort to create pedagogical tools through a story map. See, for example, Story Map Journal at https://storymaps.arcgis.com/fr/app-list/map-journal/; and Esri Story Map at www.esri.com/esri-news/arcwatch/1114/tell-an-in-depth-story-using-the-new-esri-story-map-journal-app.

5. Rabbi Glazer pursued similar goals in the United States. His finely attuned antennae for social injustice resulted in a very public struggle against the Ku Klux Klan—he offered to publically debate the grand wizard—and in efforts to stop the Johnston-Dillingham Bill, which would have limited the number of immigrants to the United States. As a Zionist, Glazer supported the Balfour Declaration and played a key role in the 1922 congressional resolution, which approved the establishment of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. President Harding invited him to the White House to discuss the Palestine question and the plight of Ukrainian Jews. See Joseph P. Schultz and Carla L. Klausner, “Rabbi Simon Glazer and the Quest for Jewish Community in Kansas City, 1920–1923,” American Jewish Archives 25, no. 1 (April 1983): 13–25.