At the beginning of the 20th century, Manhattan’s Lower East Side was densely populated by immigrant Jews and their children. The stretch of East Broadway between Clinton and Montgomery Street at one point had over 50 small synagogues, known as shtiblekh. Now one of the few that survive on this erstwhile Shtibl Row is Agudath Israel Youth of Manhattan, which stands on the brink of dissolution with the anticipated loss of one of its members and, with him, its ability to get a quorum of adult males on Saturday morning. Jon Kalish reports:
Now in its 94th year, the congregation was incorporated in 1930 as Zeirei Agudath Israel. The shtibl was previously located on Avenue C in what is now known as Alphabet City; it then moved to a building on East Broadway that was subsequently torn down and replaced by a church. The Aguda moved into its current location in 1968 when it leased the second floor from the congregation that owned the four-story structure, Beth Hachasidim DePolen. A sign over the entrance to the building says, “Congregation Beth Hachasidim DePolen, Inc.” and to the right of that an old, sun-bleached sign reads “Agudath Israel Youth of Manhattan, one flight up.”
Today there are ten or so shuls still functioning in the greater Lower East Side. In 1900, . . . there were more than 500 shuls in the area between Bowery and the FDR Drive, and between Division Street and 14th Street.
But this story is not an entirely sad one: the departing member isn’t defecting from religion or dying, but getting married and moving to a different neighborhood.
Read more on New York Jewish Week: https://www.jta.org/2024/02/01/ny/a-tiny-orthodox-synagogue-a-relic-of-the-old-jewish-lower-east-side-struggles-to-survive