by Miloslav Rechcigl, Jr.
.....(meet the author)

     Prior to the publication of Guido Kisch's book, In Search of Freedom¹,  the subject of the Czech and Slovak migration to the New World was entirely unexplored both from the factual angle and with regard to its political and social origins. Despite the generally-held notion that Jews from areas that later became part of Czechoslovakia "appear to have left only faint traces of their presence in America," Kisch's penetrating analysis clearly established that “the Jewish immigrants from Bohemia, Moravia and Slovakia not only made important and original contributions to American civilization, but left remarkable and lasting imprints on American life and culture."²  Professor Kisch focused his inquiry primarily on the immigrants who came to America around and after the revolutionary year of 1848, which gave the impetus to the mass "Auf nach Amerika" (On to America) movement. 
   The present study explores and documents the arrival of Jews in America from the territory of the former Bohemian Crown (Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia) and Upper Hungary (Slovakia) prior to 1848.

    Joachim Gans. The first documented entry of a Bohemian Jew³, or for that matter, of any Jew⁴ on the shores of America, is that of Joachim Gans of Prague, who came to Roanoke, NC in 1585 with an expedition of explorers commanded by Admiral Sir Richard Grenville (1542-91). This expedition originated in Plymouth, England, 35 years before the Pilgrims set sail from the same port on their historic voyage.  Joachim Gans, who probably was  related to the famed Prague Jewish scientist and scholar David* ben Solomon Gans (1541-1613), was a metallurgist of note who mastered the skills of dressing and smelting copper. Unfortunately, due to various logistical problems, and particularly due to the lack of provisions for the colonists and the inherent dangers from the Spaniards and Indians, the expedition was abruptly brought to an end on June19, 1586, when Sir Francis Drake (1546-96) was ordered to take the whole company of colonists back to England.
   Gans must have been a man of strong religious convictions, for upon his return to England, he was arrested at the seaport of Bristol for professing his Jewish faith. No record has been found indicating the manner in which this incident was resolved. In any event, Gans left England.

     * David Gans worked with Johannes Kepler and Tycho Brahe at the Prague observatory, and translated mathematical tables for Brahe from Hebrew into German. 
 

    Uriah Hyam. The second recorded presence of a Bohemian Jew in America is found in a Last Will and Testament filed with the Surrogate's Office of the County of New York in 1740: 

In the Name of God, Amen, the first Day of November, 1740, 1 Uriah Hyam, now resident of the City of New York Chandler, I give and bequeath unto my brother Enoch, living in Bohemia, the sum of twenty pounds ...⁵

    Elias Wollin. The next documented reference to an individual of Bohemian Jewish background can be found in an advertisement posted in Zenger's New York Weekly Journal⁶ in 1741: 

Elias Wollin of Bohemia, who had served in His Imperial Majesty's Army as Chirurgeon four years, infallibly and instantly Cures the Tooth Ach to Admiration, also Bleeds without any Manner of Pain, Cups in the Like Manner; Wounds, Swellings and Sores are lso cured wonderfully by him in a Short Time, he has made sundry Cures of the Tooth Achs in Presence of Many ...

    The Phillips Family. There was yet another Phillips family of Bohemian descent, not related to the above, living in Pennsylvania at that time. The progenitor of this family, Jonas Phillips (?- 1794),¹⁵ a son of Phineas Phillips, emigrated from Bohemia to London, England, in the middle of the eighteenth century; several members of his family subsequently moved to the United States.
    One of the sons of this Jonas, Isaac Phillips (1794-1851), who came to America in 1800 as a member of the foreign commission and exchange firm of R.I. Phillips, became a prominent figure in the Philadelphia business world. His firm was the first American representative of the House of Rothschild. Isaac's son Barnet Phillips (l826-85),¹⁶ a founder of the American Jewish Historical Society, achieved distinction as a scholar, soldier and journalist. In 1872 he joined the staff of The New York Times, and at the time of his death, on April 8, 1905, was in charge of the book review department.  The branches of the family that remained in England intermarried with the leading families of the British aristocracy. Among their descendants who gained particular distinction one ought to at least mention Sir Benjamin Samuel Phillips (l8l1-89),¹⁷ who was elected Lord Mayor of London in 1865.

    The Gratz Brothers. Very few individuals attained a greater influence on the growth of business life in eighteenth-century America than the two brothers, Barnard (1734-1801) and Michael Gratz(1735-1811).¹⁸  Natives of Langendorf, Upper Silesia, they emigrated at an early age to London and in 1754 and 1759, respectively, came to America and settled in Philadelphia. At the time of their birth, Silesia was an integral part of the Lands of the Bohemian Crown. It is thus appropriate to include the two Gratz brothers in our survey. It. is noteworthy that the grandfather of the Gratz brothers, Rabbi Jonathan Bloch (d. 1722), resided in his youth in Prague, the Bohemian capital, from where he moved to Langendorf in 1664.¹⁹
    The Gratz brothers were described as promoters and merchants who, as pioneers, opened up vast territories to trade and exploration.  Their specialty was the fur trade. Their trade routes extended from the Pennsylvania frontier town of Lancaster, to the forks of the Ohio River and the present city of Pittsburgh. From these forks their steamboats plied the river into what was then Indian territory, and which today constitutes the states of West Virginia, Ohio and Kentucky.  Their routes branched out further into what is now Indiana and Illinois.
    The Gratz brothers were among the signers of the non?importation resolutions adopted on October 2, 1765, by the merchants of Philadelphia as a protest against the British Stamp Act, prior to the Revolution. When the final break with England came, the Gratz brothers cast their lot with the revolutionaries. Barnard took the oath of allegiance to the commonwealth of Pennsylvania and to the United States as a free nation on November 5, 1777. Michael Gratz had moved to Virginia during the Revolution, and he took the oath of allegiance to that state in 1783. Barnard is known to have laid the cornerstone of the first synagogue in Philadelphia, which became Congregation Mikveh Israel in 1773. He was the first recorded president or "parnas" of this congregation, the third to be organized in the U.S. In June, 1782, Barnard's daughter Rachel (1764-1831) married Solomon Ettinger of Baltimore (1764-1847), who became a champion of Jewish civic rights, and was elected to the Baltimore City Council, the first Jew to hold public office in the state of Maryland.
   Michael Gratz left an extensive family, including the well-known communal worker Rebecca Gratz (1781-1869), who helped found the Philadelphia Orphan Society in 1815 and served as its secretary for 40 years. In 1838 she founded the Hebrew Sunday School Society, the first institution of its kind in the United States, serving as its president until 1864. She is reputed to have been the model for Rebecca in Sir Walter Scott's novel Ivanhoe.
    The Gratz family business was continued by two of Michael's sons, Simon(1773-l839) and Hyman (1776-1857). Of the two, Hyman gained the greatest prominence. He participated in large commercial enterprises over and beyond the business he conducted with his brother. He became a director of the Pennsylvania Company for Insurance on Lives and Granting Annuities in 1818, and in 1837 was elected president of this corporation, an office he held until his death. A man of culture, he was keenly interested in art and was one of the directors and later president of the Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts. He was prominently identified with the administration of the affairs of Congregation Mikveh Israel and was one of the leading spirits in the organization of the first Jewish publication society in the United States in the year 1845. Shortly before his death, he executed a deed of trust "to establish and maintain a college for the education of Jews residing in the city and county of Philadelphia." This led to the founding of Gratz College, the first Jewish teachers' training institution in the United States.

    Joseph Karpeles. There is a record of a Bohemian Jew who came to America around 1783/84 and who lived in Philadelphia during 1784/85. He was Joseph Karpeles,²⁰ a son of Wolf Karpeles of Prague. According to a letter that has survived,²¹ Haym Salomon (l740-85), the famous financier of the American Revolution, engaged Karpeles as his arbiter to represent him in a legal dispute, which was supposed to be decided by a court of arbitration, concerning an inheritance worth 800 ducats. Both parties to the litigation were required to deposit a personal check in the amount of 4,000 ducats to guarantee that they would accept the decision of the court.  This event shows the responsibility entrusted to Karpeles and the esteem in which he was patently held.

    The Block Family Dynasty. At the turn of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, many members of the Block family from Svihov, Bohemia, settled in America. This is the first known instance of an entire Jewish family emigrating from Bohemia to the New World.  The original surname of the family was Bloch.²² The family was so large²³ that it was considered the first and most numerous Jewish family to settle west of the Mississippi River.²⁴  It has sometimes been compared to the Sheftall family, whose members played a significant role in the founding of the Georgia colony at Savannah.
    One of the first Blocks to land in America was Jacob Block, who briefly lived in Baltimore, Maryland, and Williamsburg, Virginia, before settling permanently in Richmond, Virginia. In Baltimore he had been a grocer; in Richmond he became a merchant. He was very active in Jewish affairs and, before his death in 1835, he had served as president of Beth Shalome, the only Jewish congregation in Richmond at the time.²⁵
    Jacob's son, Eleazer Block (1797-?)²⁶, after completing his studies at the College of William and Mary, moved to St. Louis, Missouri, becoming the "first Hebrew lawyer" in that city. 
    About the time Jacob Bloch lived in Baltimore, Williamsburg and Richmond, a close relative of his, Simon Block, resided in the same places. His name appears on the Baltimore list of retailers who were granted licenses in 1797. In 1804, he was among the signers of a petition in Richmond. In 1810, according to court records, he was a resident of Williamsburg. He later moved to Missouri and eventually to Cincinnati, where he died. The Jewish Congregation of Cincinnati mourned his loss, as "this venerable gentleman being the oldest amongst us, we considered him the father of this congregation."
    There was another Simon Block, called "Jr." to distinguish him from "old" Simon Block, living in Richmond at the time. Like his namesake, he moved to Missouri, establishing himself as a merchant in Cape Girardeau. Following his early death in 1826, the court appointed Eleazer Block (probably his brother) as the guardian of his ten minor children.
    Eleazer's brother, Capt. Abraham Block (?1857), is considered to have been one of the original pioneer settlers of Arkansas. According to his obituary:

Capt. Block was born in Bohemia, but emigrated to this country more than fifty-five years ago. He married in Virginia, removed from Virginia to Arkansas in 1823, and was one of the pioneers or the Upper Red River country, then almost a wilderness. Resettled in the village of Washington, where he has since resided loved and esteemed by all who knew him, and among the commercial community of New Orleans and the planters of Red River and southern Arkansas he was almost universally known. He sleeps according to his cherished wish among his people, in the Portuguese cemetery, on the Metairie Ridge in the city.²⁷

     The Kohns. Thanks to the personal memoir of the British Jewish historian Lucien Wolf,²⁹  we have a charming account of the circumstances that led one Samuel Kohn to leave his native Bohemia at the beginning of the nineteenth century to emigrate to America. As Wolf put it:

Samuel Kohn was known all over the countryside as a good-hearted, hare-brained ne'er-do-well, fond of the tavern and the lassies; and fonder still of a game of cards....One day the news ran through Hareth [Horany, Bohemia] that Samuel Kohn had disappeared. He had last been seen drinking and gambling with strangers in the Gast-haus. and, after some high words, had tramped off in the direction of Saaz, a picture of abject misery . . . It seems that Samuel Kohn, on the day on which be disappeared from Hareth, had been cheated of everything he had in the world by a gang of card-sharpers. When he left the tavern with empty pockets, he felt he could not again go home to the poverty-stricken cottage in the wood and confess his follies to his long-suffering mother. So he turned his steps in the direction of the country town and thence tramped northward all the way to Hamburg. He worked his way on a sailing vessel to New Orleans.

    Levi Collmus. About the time Samuel Kohn's name was first noted in New Orleans, another Bohemian named Levi Collmus made his entry into Baltimore, Maryland.³⁴ Although some sources state that he arrived in 1798, as a lad of 15, or in 1800, a declaration of naturalization he made in 1822 states that he arrived at the port of Baltimore in September 1806. He gave Prague as his birthplace and his age as 40 years.
    The earliest known public record of his life in Baltimore is that of his marriage to Frances Williams, a Quaker, on May 19, 1812. He was inconsistent about the way he spelled his surname. He is listed in various city directories as Collmus, Calimons, Colmas, Colmes, or Callimus. He was a dry goods dealer. 
    Levi Collmus participated in the War of 1812. According to his application to the U.S House of Representatives for a pension, he "was engaged in the battle near Baltimore which took place on the 12th day of September, 1814... in defense of the city of Baltimore against the British army, which had advanced within a very short distance of the city. During said engagement, the exertions of the said Colmas, in the discharge of his duty as an artillerist, were extremely arduous and violent . . . within three or four days thereafter, the disability, which has continued upon him ever since, made its appearance...”
    Although he had intermarried, Collmus was one of the electors of the Baltimore Hebrew Congregation in 1831, and he became treasurer of the United Hebrew Benevolent Society when it was formed in 1834. He died in Baltimore on March 30, 1856. Though buried in a Christian cemetery (Greenmount Cemetery), he was given a burial according to the full Orthodox Jewish ritual.³⁵

    Moritz Fuerst. A year after the arrival of Collmus in Baltimore, an immigrant from Slovakia by the name of Moritz Fuerst (1782-1840) reached the American shore.³⁶ He was born in Pezinok, near Bratislava, in March, 1782. Having mastered the art of die-sinking, he was enlisted by the American consul at Leghorn, Italy, in 1807; and came to the United States to work as an engraver. In 1808 he settled in Philadelphia, where he set up business as a seal and steel engraver, and a die-sinker. He was subsequently employed by the United States Mint in Philadelphia and soon received recognition as an early American medalist. Thirty-three of his patriotic commemoratives and portraits, including his best-known work honoring heroes of the War of 1812, are still issued by the U.S. Mint. He struck the official portraits of Presidents James Monroe, John Quincy Adams, Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren. He also executed the first recorded American Jewish medal, to commemorate the death in 1816 of the patriot and religious leader Gershom Mendes Seixas.

    Francis Joseph Grund. In contrast to the humble background of most of the early immigrants from Bohemia, Francis J. Grund (1805-63) was an educated man, when he came to America,³⁷ with a degree from the Vienna Polytechnic. He was a mathematician of note who wrote textbooks on arithmetic, algebra and geometry, in addition to texts on chemistry, astronomy and natural philosophy. In 1827, after a year of teaching mathematics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, he settled in the United States. He continued teaching mathematics in Boston until 1833, subsequently engaging in journalistic work. In 1837 he settled in Philadelphia, where he served as an editor of the Whig newspaper, Standard and Grund's Pennsylvanischer Deutscher. For a short time in 1837, he was American consul at Antwerp, Belgium; in 1841 and 1842 Grund occupied the post of consul at Bremen, Germany, and from 1859 to 1861, a similar position at Havre, France. In the intervals between his visits abroad, he was Washington correspondent for several newspapers. He died on September 29,1863. Grund was the author of an important historical classic, The Americans in their Moral, Social and Political Relations (1837), followed by Aristocracy in America (1839) and Thoughts and Reflections on the Present Position of Europe and its Probable Consequences to the U.S. (l860).³⁸

    Dr. Simon Pollak. In 1838 Dr. Simon Pollak (1814-1903), a young, brilliant, highly educated and widely traveled physician from Domazlice, Bohemia,³⁹  arrived in New York. In his colorful autobiography,⁴⁰  he discusses at length his plans for emigration to America:

I had read and knew by heart the history of the U.S. I longed for it, and I determined to get there some time. I never could brook the idea that I am not quite as good politically as anybody else. The United States of America, where the fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man, and the entire quality of political rights prevail, was my land of choice. 

    Henry Horner. Henry Horner (1817-78) was the first Bohemian Jew, and one of the first four Jews altogether to settle in Chicago.⁴¹  He came to America in 1840, and after settling in Chicago, was hired as a clerk for a clothing house, where he remained until he opened his own house, Henry Horner and Co. 
    Henry Horner and Co. started as a wholesale and retail house at Randolph and Canal Streets. In 1859 Horner built a large store at Nos. 78, 80 and 82 West Randolph Street, and in 1864 he moved his business to South Water Street. He was very active in the Chicago real estate market, and in 1869 he engaged in the banking business, in partnership with Lazarus Silverman. During the great fire of 1871, both of his business houses, as well as his residence at Jackson Boulevard and Wabash Avenue were burned to the ground. Horner quickly reestablished his business at his old store at West Randolph Street, which subsequently grew to gigantic proportions. Apart from his own business, "Uncle Henry,".as he was affectionately called by his associates, was also a charter member of the Chicago Board of Trade.
    After his death in 1878, the business was continued by his widow and his son Isaac H. Horner. Subsequently three other sons joined in the partnership. The enterprise continued its rapid growth until it eventually occupied the entire half?block on Randolph Street between Clinton and Jefferson.
    Henry Horner (1878-1940),⁴²  namesake and grandson of the founder of the family, grew to prominence as a lawyer and politician. His political career began in 1914 when he was elected probate judge of Cook County, a post to which he was reelected four times. The younger Horner's ability and impeccable reputation led the Democratic organization to nominate him for governor of Illinois in 1932. In the election he defeated the Republican nominee by a vote of 1,930,330 to 1,364,043, and became the first Democratic chief executive of the state in 17 years. During his tenure as governor(1933-40) he made many notable contributions to the welfare of the state of Illinois. His interest in Lincoln resulted in the gathering of one of the finest collections of Lincolniana in the U.S., which he donated to the Illinois State Historical Library.

    Colonel Louis Fleischner. Louis Fleischner (l827-96) came to New York in the early 1840's as a lad of fifteen, from the village of Vogelsang, Bohemia. He soon moved to Philadelphia, where he was employed by a horse and cattle dealer for five years. From there he went to Drakeville, David County, Iowa, where he ran a store. In 1852, heeding the call of the West, he crossed the plains with an ox team, heading for Oregon. Eventually, he settled in Portland, where he purchased a wholesale dry?goods house. In addition to his eminently successful business career, he was very active in Portland's political and civic affairs. In 1870 his personal popularity and the confidence he inspired among the people led to his nomination and election to the post of State Treasurer, which he held for five years. He was also president of the First Hebrew Benevolent Association of Portland and one of the most active members of Congregation Beth Israel.⁴³

    The Eidlitzes. Leopold Eidlitz (1823-1908),⁴⁴ a native of Prague, came to New York early in 1843. Trained at the Polytechnic in Vienna; he was destined to become a famed architect of the Gothic revival; he was purported to be the first Jewish architect to practice in the United States. His church designs include St. Peter's at Westchester, N.Y.; the Church of the Holy Trinity on Madison Avenue in New York City, and the Congregational Church in Greenwich, Conn. His most successful church was the Christ Church Cathedral of St. Louis, MO. The most original ecclesiastical building which he planned was the synagogue Emanu-EI on lower Fifth Avenue, New York City (1868), which was demolished at a later date to make way for a business skyscraper. Among Eidlitz's other buildings in New York deserving mention are the Continental Bank, the American Exchange Bank, the old Produce Exchange, the Brooklyn Academy of Music and the Dry Dock Savings Bank. His most spectacular work was the redesigning of the New York State Capitol at Albany. Leopold Eidlitz was the author of an important book, The Nature and Function of Art, published in 1881.
    Leopold Eidlitz's brother, Mark Eidlitz (1826-92),⁴⁵ who arrived in New York City in 1847, was the foremost building contractor in New York City for many years. Among the buildings that document his skill, some of which are still standing, are the old Metropolitan Opera House, the Steinway Hall of the Astor Library, the Presbyterian  and St. Vincent's Hospitals and the private residence of J. Pierpont Morgan.
    After Mark's death, his building operations were continued by his sons, Otto Mark Eidlitz and Robert J. Eidlitz. The firm of Mark Fidlitz and Son adorned New York with such notable buildings as the Rockefeller Institute, the New York Stock Exchange, the Western Union Building, the Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center, the J.P. Morgan Library, the Federal Reserve Bank, the New York Academy of Medicine and the Frick Art Gallery. 
    Leopold  Eidlitz'  son,  Cyrus  Lasalle  Warner  Eidlitz (1853-1921),⁴⁶ was also a well-known architect whose most noteworthy achievement was the design of The New York Times building, constructed in the narrow triangle between Broadway and Seventh Avenue and 42nd and 43rd Streets in New York City.

    Charles S. Kuh. One member of a well-known Prague family, Charles S. Kuh (d. 1871),⁴⁷ arrived in New York in 1844. While residing there he became a member of the Board of the "Bohemian Synagogue," Ahavat Hesed, organized by the Bohemian Jews in 1848, which had its own cemetery in Cypress Hills. The services of the congregation were initially held in rented rooms, first at 69 Ludlow Street, then (in 1849) at 33 Ridge Street and (in 1853) at 127 Columbia Street. Kuh was also one of founders and vice presidents of a Bohemian-Jewish mutual aid society, Die B6hmischen Brueder of New York.
    Little is known about his life or whereabouts in the United States, except that he later moved to Beaufort, South Carolina. In 1869 he was elected to the legislature of South Carolina from Beaufort County, where he was known as a "most honest man" who favored the emancipation of the slaves. He died of yellow fever at the home of his brother-in-law, M. Politzer, then mayor of Beaufort.

    Isaac Netstadtl. Among the earliest Jewish immigrants to settle in Milwaukee in 1844 were two Bohemians, Isaac Neustadtl and Solomon Adler. Isaac Neustadtl (d. l877)⁴⁸ started out as a retail grocer on Third Street but soon involved himself in the insurance business. Apart from his successful business, he was very active in the political and civic affairs of the city. In 1852/53 he was elected city alderman in the Second Ward, which contained the largest segment of Milwaukee's Jewish population. However, he was defeated in his campaign as Republican candidate for county treasurer in 1834. In 1860 he served on a nominating committee for the Republican city convention and was a delegate for the Union census of 1861. 
    Neustadtl sympathized with the European revolutionary movement of 1848 and headed an association in Milwaukee for aiding political refugees from Europe. Neustadtl was one of the founders of the renowned German-English Academy, where his son-in-law, Henry Katz, served as financial secretary for a long time. Neustadtl's daughter, Elizabeth Katz, was a founder of the Academy's kindergarten. Neustadtl was also one of the managers of the Milwaukee Musical Society during its first decade.
    It is also of interest that on Yom Kippur in 1847, 12 Jewish pioneers held their first services at the home of Isaac Neustadtl at Chestnut and Fourth Streets, leading to the establishment of Emanu-El, the first Jewish congregation in Milwaukee.

    The Adler Brothers.⁴⁹ Solomon Adler (1816-?) was the second Bohemian Jew to settle in Milwaukee, where he arrived in 1844. In 1847 he entered the clothing trade with Jacob Steinhart, a partnership which continued until 1851. 
    Following the arrival (in 1852) of Solomon's brother David Adler (1821-1905), who had previously resided for five years in New York, the two brothers jointly operated a retail clothing store. In 1857 David Adler bought out his brother Solomon, whose business volume had reached between $15,000 and $30,000 per year, and entered into a partnership with another brother, Jacob, as D. & I. Adler, shifting to the wholesale trade. In 1860 Solomon repurchased Jacob's interest and the firm continued as S. Adler and Bro.  The enterprise prospered greatly during the Civil War, with sales reaching as high as $600,000 in one year.
    When Solomon Adler retired from the firm, the company was reorganized as the David Adler and Sons Clothing Co., which grew to be one of the largest wholesale clothing houses in the United States.
    David Adler was one of the organizers and directors of the Wisconsin National Bank and one of the founders of the National Straw Works. He was vice?president of the Jewish Orphan Asylum of Cleveland, Ohio, and a member of the Emanuel and other Jewish benevolent societies. He was also an active member of the Odd Fellows of Wisconsin, serving as Grand Treasurer of the Grand Lodge of the State.

    Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise. Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise, whose life spanned most of the nineteenth century was an important personality in the religious history of American Jewry. Perhaps more than any other person, he was responsible. for the development of Reform Judaism in the United States He was born in Lomnicka (Steingrub), not far from Cheb (Eger), Bohemia, on March 20, 1819. The Jews living in the Habsburg monarchy at the time were still subjected to medieval restrictions; they had to pay a special "Jew Tax," were forced to live in ghettos, and their marriages were subject to the Familiantengesetz to keep the Jewish population from becoming too large. It may be assumed that these conditions impelled Wise to emigrate to the United States with his wife and child on July 23, 1846. 
    Shortly after his arrival in the New World, Wise was appointed to a rabbinical post in Albany, New York. In Bohemia, he had already become acquainted with the religious reforms instituted by West European Jewish leaders such as Abraham Geiger (1810-74) and others, Wise felt that the atmosphere in America would allow more. freedom for the development of Reform Judaism than the reactionary climate which prevailed in Europe at the time. However, his Reform ideas were not appreciated in Albany, and he consequently lost his position. In 1854 he was elected rabbi of Congregation B'nai Jeshurun in Cincinnati, Ohio. There his reforms were well received, and he held this pulpit for the rest of his life. Also in Cincinnati he founded two Jewish newspapers, The Israelite, later known as The American Israelite (in English) and Die Deborah (in German).
    In 1875 Rabbi Wise helped found the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, which is the national organization of American Reform Jews today. He subsequently established a training school for Reform rabbis, the Hebrew Union College (now Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion), which today has campuses in Cincinnati, New York, California and Jerusalem. One of his daughters, Iphigenie, married Adolph S. Ochs, the editor and owner of The New York Times. A son from his second marriage, Jonah B. Wise (1881-1959) was active as a Reform rabbi and communal leader in New York City.
    Isaac M. Wise died on March 26, 1900.

    On the basis of current information, we have assembled in Table 1 the names of Jews who had emigrated and settled in America prior to the revolutionary year of 1848 from the Czech Lands and Slovakia, in the order of their arrival. The identification of the listed individuals was not an easy task. Prior to the establishment of the Czechoslovak Republic in 1918, the immigrants from Bohemia, Moravia or Slovakia were hardly ever identified as Czechs, Bohemians, Moravians or Slovaks, but rather as Austrians, Germans or Hungarians. There is no doubt that future research will uncover additional names of Jewish immigrants in America with Czechoslovak roots. In viewing the mosaic of individual portraits presented here, one is struck by certain characteristics shared by most of the Jewish immigrants from the Czech Historic Lands and Slovakia, They were all energetic, enterprising, resourceful, self?made people, with a sense of purpose and accomplishment, highly patriotic towards their newly adopted country, yet mindful of their roots and their cultural and religious upbringing. It is therefore fitting that we conclude this survey with a quotation from Thomas Capek, the historian of Czechs in America (Moje Amerika. Prague: Fr. Borovy, 1935, p.41) :

     Anybody browsing through Who's Who in American Jewry or The Jewish Encyclopedia must be surprised by the number of the famed names  -  physicians, jurists, industrialists, financiers and wholesalers who have originated on the territory of today's Czechoslovakia. 
     They have attained both high economic and social status. You don't find them in the ghettos among the immigrants from Russia, Poland or Rumania. In learned professions they have overtaken us by far. Their pioneering spirit is well known.

 Notes

1. -Guido Kisch, In Search of Freedom. A History of American Jews from Czechoslovakia 1592-1948 (London: Edward Goldston, 1948).
2. -Op. cit. p.5. David B. Quinn, Set Fair for Roanoke Voyages and Colonies, 1584?1606 (Chapel Hill-London: University of North Carolina Press, 1985).
3. -David B. Quinn, Set Fair for Roanoke Voyages and Colonies, 1584-1606 (Chapel Hill-London: University of North Carolina Press, 1985).
4. -Gary S. Grassl, "Joachirn Gans of Prague: America's First Jewish Visitor," in Review of the Society for the History of Czechoslovak Jews, Vol, I, (1987) pp. 53-90.
5. -Leo Hershkowitz, Wills of Early New York Jews (1704-1799) (New York:American Jewish Historical Society, 967), pp. 55-56.
6. -Zenger's New York Weekly Journal. No. 390, May 25, 1741.
7. -The Universal Jewish Encyclopedia (New York, 1940), Vol.2, pp. 607-8.
8. -Samuel Oppenheim, "The Jewish Signers of the Non-Importation Agreement of 1765,'' Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society. No. 26 (1918), pp.236-237.
9. -For a genealogy of Bush's family, see Malcolm H. Stern, First American Jewish Families (New York: KTAV Publishing House, 1978), p.28.
10. -Henry Samuel Morais, The Jews of Philadelphia (Philadelphia: The Levy Type Co., 1894), pp.455-57.
11. -Harry Simonhoff "Colonel Solomon Bush," in Jewish Notables in America 1776-1365, (New York Greenberg Publisher, 1956), pp.79-82; Samuel Reznick, Unrecognized Patriots: The Jews in the American Revolution (Westport, CT:Greenwood Press, 1975, pp.25-27, 171-72.
12.  -Morais, op. cii.. pp.401-2.
13.  -Dictionary of American Biography (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1934). Vol. 14, pp.54l-2
14.  -Morais, op. cit., pp. 402; U.S. Congress, Biographical Directory of the American Congress 1774-1971 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1971), p. 1540;
15.  -For a genealogy of the Phillips family, Stern, op. cit., p. 245; Stanford A. Moss, Phillips Family Tree (Lynn, Mass., 1942); Neil Rosenstein, "Phillips Family of London,” in Unbroken Chain (New York: Shengold Publishers, 1976), pp. 44-9.
16.  -Universal Jewish Encyclopedia, Vol.8, pp.490-91; Isidor Levi, “Barnet Phillips;” Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society 6 (1907), pp. 195-97.
17.  -Universal Jewish Encyclopedia. Vol.8. p.491; Sir Bernard Burke, "Faudel-Phillips” in Burke's Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Peerage. Baronetage and Knighthood (London: Shaw Publishing Co., 1938) pp. 1967-68.
18.  -B. and M. Gratz, Merchants in Philadelphia. Edited by W.W. Byars (Jefferson City, 1916); Dictionary of American Biography. op. cit Vol.7, pp, 504-6; Universa/Jewish Encyclopedia. Vol.5, pp. 85-87; Letters of Rebecca Gratz:, edited by David Philipson (Philadelphia, 1929; reprinted in New York by Arno Press, 1975), pp. ix-xix.
19.  -Sidney M. Fisk, "The Ancestral Heritage of the Gratz: Family" in Oral:College Anniversary Volume, 1895-1070 (Philadelphia: Gratz College, 1971), pp. 47-62.
20.  -Kisch, op. cit, pp. 16-17.
21.  -Hyman B. Grinstein, "A Haym Salomon Letter to Rabbi David Tevele Schiff, London, 1784," Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society, no.34 (1937), pp.107-16; Grinstein considers Carpeles, as the name is spelled in American documents, as one of the most learned men among the Jews of America at the end of the eighteenth century.
22.  -Kisch, op. cit., p. 22.
23.  -A partial genealogy of one branch of the Block family is given in Stern, op. cit. p.25.
24.  -Isidor Bush, "The Jews in St. Louis," Bull. Missouri Historical Society Vol. 8 (1951), pp. 60-70.
25.  -Ira Rosenwaike, "The Jews of Baltimore to1810," American Jewish Historical Quarterly 64 (1975), pp. 291-320; Herbert T. Ezekiel and Gaston Lichtenstein,  The History of the Jews of Richmond from 1769-1917 (Richmond: Herbert T. Ezekiel, 1917).
26.  -Ira Rosenwaike, "Eleazer Block-His Family and Career," American Jewish Archives no. 31(1979),  pp. l42-49.
27.  -Kisch, op. cit.,  pp.22, 294-95.
28.  -Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Louisiana (Chicago: The Goodspeed Publishing Co., 1892) Vol.1, pp. 495-98; U.S. Congress, Biographical Directory of the American Congress 1774-1971 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1971), p. 1201.
29.  -Lucien Wolf ''The Romance of a Bohemian Village," in Essays in Jewish History (London: The Jewish Historical Society of England, 1934), pp.55-59.
30.  -Information of Kohn's stay in New Orleans is based on the extensive research of Bertram Wallace Korn, published in his The Early Jews of New Orleans (Waltham, MA.: American Jewish Historical Society, 1969), pp. 119-27.
31.  -Wolf, op. cit.. pp. 55-59.
32.  -Korn, op. cit.. pp. 122-23.
33.  -Ibid., pp. 125-26.
34.  -Ira Rosenwaike, "The Jews of Baltimore to 1810," American Jewish Historical Quarterly, no.64 (1975), pp. 291-320.
35.  -B.H. Hartogensis, “Notes on Early Jewish Settlers of Baltimore,” Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society, no.22, 1914, pp. 191-195.
36.  -Encyclopedia Judaica (Jerusalem: Keter Publishing House, 1971), Vol.7, p.222.
37.  -"Francis Joseph Grund," Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society, No.26 (1918), pp.234-35; Harry L. Golden and Martin Rywell, Jews in American History. Their Contribution to the United States of America (Charlotte, NC: M.A. Stalls Printing Co., 1950), pp. 378-79.
38.  -His penetrating essay about America is sometimes compared to Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America (1835-1840).
39.  -For a brief biography of Pollak, see Kisch, op. cit., pp.136-38.
40.  -S. Pollak, M.D., "My Autobiography and Reminiscences," St. Louis Medical Review, Vol.49 (1904), pp.113-16 and ff.; also published in book form under the same title (St. Louis, 1904) 331 pp.
41.  -A.T. Andreas, History of Chicago (Chicago, 1885), Vol.2, p.698; Paul Gilbert and Charles Lee Bryson, Chicago and Its Makers (Chicago: Felix Mendelsohn Publisher, 1929), p.724.
42.  -Dictionary of American Biography, Suppl. 2, pp.318-19; Herbert M. Lautmann, "Henry Horner 1878-1940," American Jewish Year Book, Vol. 43 (1941-1942), pp. 399-406.
43.  -Joseph Gaston, Portland, Oregon. Its History and Builders (Chicago-Portland: S.J. Clarke Publishing Co., 1911), Vol.3, pp. 258-62.
44.  -Kisch, op. cit., pp.157-158; Dictionary of American Biography. Vol.6, p.61.
45.  -Kisch, op. cit., pp. 158-59.
46.  -Dictionary of American Biography, op. cit., Vol.6, p.60.
47.  -Kisch, op. cit., pp. 126-27.
48.  -Louis I. Swichkow and Lloyd P. Gartner, The History of the Jews of Milwaukee (Philadelphia:The Jewish Publication Society of America, 1963), pp.11, 16, 19, 20, 33, 52, 59.
49.  -Jerome A. Watrous. Memories of Milwaukee County, Wisconsin (Madison Western Historical Association, 1909), Vol.2, pp. 734-36, History of Milwaukee. Wisconsin (Chicago: Western Historical Co., 1880), p.1241; Andrew K. Aikens and Lewis A. Proctor, Men of Progress. Wisconsin (Milwaukee: The Evening Wisconsin Co., 1897); Howard Louis Conrad. History of Milwaukee (Chicago-New York:American Biographical Publishing Co., 1889), pp. 430-32, 438-39.
50.  -National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, Vol.92 (1958), p.46.
51.  -National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, Vol.24, pp.25-26.
52.  -Lehgh H. Irvine, A History of New California (New York-Chicago: Lewis Publishing Co, 1905), pp.721-22.
53.  -Conrad, op. cit.. pp. 432-33; History of Milwaukee, p.665; Watrous, op. cit-.pp. 553-54
54.  -National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, vol. 43, p. 192.
55.  -The Biographical Cyclopaedia of Representative Men of Maryland and District of Columbia (Baltimore, Biographical Publishing Cc., 1879), p. 192.
56.  -Conrad, op. cit.. pp. 438-39.
57.  -Watrous, op. cit., pp. 273-75.
58.  -History of Milwaukee, Vol.2, p. 1243.
59.  -Encyclopedia of the History of St. Louis, edited by William Hyde and Howard L. Conrad (New York. The Southern History Co., 1899), Vol.4, pp 2217-18.
60.  -National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, Vol. 10, p.  16; Universal Jewish Encyclopedia, Vol. 10, pp. 539-41.
61.  -Dictionary of American Biography. Vol. 18, pp.31l-12; National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, Vol.42, pp, 654-55.
62.  -Encyclopedia of the History of St. Louis, Vol.4, pp.2215-16.
63.  -Ibid.
64.  -Swichkow and Gartner, op. cit., pp. 466-67.
65.  -Ibid.
66.  -National Cyclopaedia of American Biography. Vol.26, pp. 364-65.
67.  -Guido Kisch, "A Voyage to America Ninety Years Ago. The Diary of a Bohemian Jew of this Voyage from Hamburg to New York, 847," Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society no.35 (1939). pp. 65-78.
68.  -The Encyclopedia of the New West (Marshall, Texas: U.S. Biographical Publishing Co., 1881) pp. 274-75.  This study was originally published in Review of the Society for the History of Czechoslovak Jews Vol. 3 (1990-91),  pp. 157-179.

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