Jewish Cemetery Site

Location: 500 block on west side of N. Niles Avenue, South Bend. (St. Joseph County, Indiana)

Installed: 2002 Indiana Historical Bureau and Michiana Jewish Historical Society

ID# : 71.2002.1

Text

Side one:

Hebrew Society of Brotherly Love of South Bend established Jewish cemetery on this site 1859. First Jewish families settling in a new community typically organized a burial society before establishing a formal congregation. Before Civil War era, such organizations helped widely scattered Jews in Indiana maintain Jewish identity and traditions.

Side two:

Hebrew Society purchased larger tract of land 1883; bodies from original cemetery reinterred at new site 1884; later named Rose Hill Cemetery. Many society members were part of migration starting in 1820s of German-speaking Jews seeking civil liberties. During twentieth century, Jewish population in area was second or third largest in state.

Keywords

Cemetery, Immigration and Ethnic Groups

Annotated Text

Jewish Cemetery Site

Hebrew Society of Brotherly Love of South Bend established Jewish cemetery on this site 1859.(1) First Jewish families settling in a new community typically organized a burial society before establishing a formal congregation. Before Civil War era, such organizations helped widely scattered Jews in Indiana maintain Jewish identity and traditions.(2)

Hebrew Society purchased larger tract of land 1883;(3) bodies from original cemetery reinterred at new site 1884;(4) later named Rose Hill Cemetery.(5) Many society members were part of migration starting in 1820s of German-speaking Jews seeking civil liberties.(6) During twentieth century, Jewish population in area was second or third largest in state.(7)

Notes:

(1) Hebrew Society of Brotherly Love, Minute Book #1 1 (Temple Beth-El Archives, South bend), May 22, 1859, pp. 1-2

(2) ) Robert M. Taylor, Jr. and Connie A. McBirney, Peopling Indiana: the Ethnic Experience (Indianapolis, 1996), 324-25.

(3) Minute Book # 1, p. 24 and Minute Book #2, July 8, 1883

(4) Minute Book #2, 1883-1884, November 30, 1884

(5) Jewish Historical Sites in South Bend . . . Indiana, Michiana Jewish Historical Society, Inc., 1998

(6) Taylor and McBirney, 315-16; ; L. C. Rudolph, Hoosier Faiths (Bloomington & Indianapolis, 1995), 346.

(7) Taylor and McBirney, 322; David Singer and Lawrence Grossman, eds., American Jewish Year Book 2000 (New York, 2000), 251-52