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Febuary 17, 2006                                       WWW.KANESTREET.ORG                                                     Yitro  
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Issue 7
Harrison Street Synagogue    

New facts come to light about the origins of the historic Kane Street Synagogue buildings.  The recent discovery of Brooklyn Eagle articles from the nineteenth century tell us about the prior owners of the building and the social history of the community in the vicinity of Harrison Street, the street’s original name.  

Readers who are familiar with the Sanctuary interior can readily imagine the scenes described in the articles on the strange events of 1887. Those who were present at the 2003 Groundbreaking Ceremony for the Goldman Educational Center will recall a similar commemorative box to the corner stone that was placed in the walls of the church in 1855.

The visual details about the family pew from a childhood memory, the architectural features of the organ loft, the primitive state of toilet facilities enhance our sense of what life was like for the members in earlier times, and of the enduring qualities of the synagogue.   

Next week’s Journal is devoted to Rabbi Israel Goldfarb who was the soul of this Congregation for fifty-one years.

Carol Levin, Editor
historicaljournal@kanestreet.org

Contents ...

Prior Use of the Synagogue Site and Structure
By Carol Levin

Kane Street Synagogue’s two buildings were built in 1855 as a Middle Reformed Protestant Dutch Church. The “Lecture Room” (the site of the Goldman Educational Center today) was constructed first and used for church services until the Sanctuary on the corner of Harrison and Tompkins was ready. Harrison Street was the name of the street until 1928. Much of what we know about the buildings and their uses comes from nineteenth century news accounts in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle.

On July 31, 1855, the paper reported on the cornerstone ceremony held at 5pm the prior day, describing the proposed edifice. “The building is to be of brick, in the Norman style of architecture, with two towers in front – the principal one to be 180 feet in height. The dimensions will be, 70 feet front on Harrison street, and extend 96 feet on Tompkins Place; the audience room to have a clear space of 64 feet in width. It is to be provided with galleries, and it is estimated that the building will seat about 1,500 persons. The exterior is to be trimmed with brown stone. – The cost will be $32,000. The lecture room adjoining is fronted with blue marble, and the new building is to be painted in imitation.” After a detailed description of the ceremony, the article concludes with, “The building is to be well ventilated, and will be heated with hot furnaces.” The Sanctuary’s opening date is unknown, but The Brooklyn Eagle reported on the June 19, 1856 organ exhibition and concert that “attracted a large audience”. “The organ, which is an excellent one, is from the manufactory of Messrs. Hall & Labagh, New York, and is one of the largest in Brooklyn.”

During the next thirty years, the Middle Reformed Church dwindled as many members relocated to fashionable Park Slope, and the congregation sold the buildings in April 1887. Kane Street Synagogue’s records have always maintained that the successor congregation was the German Evangelical Lutheran Trinity Church. It turns out not to be so. This issue of The Synagogue Journal identifies a series of historical Eagle articles written about the six month period when the Salvation Army owned the property. The nine articles include accounts of boisterous meetings, riots, angry neighborhood reactions, petitions and the eventual legal recourse that led the Salvation Army to sell the property in September. The next owners, the Lutheran Trinity Church, worshipped here for eighteen years, until 1905 when they built the small church on Degraw Street between Clinton Street and Tompkins Place, and transferred the property to Congregation Baith Israel.

The buildings were rededicated as Harrison Street Synagogue in February 1905. Baith Israel sold its small Boerum Place Shul with its many structural problems to take on the stewardship of a much larger facility in great need of repair. The new synagogue was fitted with the Congregation’s Ark from Boerum Place. The next order of business was to replace the primitive toilet facility with its dirt floor, and install tiling and ceramic fixtures. This critical project was the beginning of a century of improvements.

Significant changes have been made to the Synagogue and Community Building in our lifetime, and the Journal will address major renovations in future articles. Issue 7 of the Journal notes a few small details of early changes that I’ve observed from photographs, Trustee Minutes and Souvenir Journals. Examples of prior exterior features include: the original doors were in stained wood finish; an elaborate iron arch once led to the community building; the Synagogue exterior had a dark brownstone trim in contrast with pale walls (it is unclear if the brick walls were merely painted to imitate the Community Building stones, as the Eagle article suggests, or if actual stone blocks were used.) elaborate details adorned the cornice of the Community Building, Sanctuary and Towers. Early interior features included: two sets of painted wood Ten Commandment tablets that angled out from the top of the Aron Kodesh. Fortunately, during the 2001 renovation, one set was found and is now exhibited in the Synagogue.

Please see a related article in this Journal, “Recollections of the Early Synagogue” taken from a conversation with Joseph Goldfarb.

Download this Article PDF

Recollections of the Early Synagogue
Editor’s note: Joseph Goldfarb recalled childhood memories of the Synagogue buildings on May 2, 2002. They are reprinted here.

The Organ Loft
When the organ was up there, (in the organ loft) it was further forward because all they needed was enough room for a bench and the passageway for the organist, or an assistant or anybody else to pass between the bench and the low wall. All they did was, they removed the pipes and the mechanisms, and what was left was just like an empty box. They pushed it back further so there would be room for two lines of singers, or three lines of singers to stand in front of it. I remember hearing it, not really being played, but tones were being sounded on it. It had to be in the early 1920’s. I was five, six, seven years old. It was not played during services.

This area (the rear of the loft) was taken up by the whole body of the organ. There was a narrow passageway in the back, just enough to move around. Somebody was over here, the organist would have been sitting just in front of this wall. There was a wall in this space and there was a big vertical slot with a big handle, and you would stand here and pump it slowly, up and down. There was a bellows, and that produced the volume of air that produced enough sound. All the hand operated pipe organs worked like that until they were electrified.

All the inner workings were taken out of it, the keyboard removed, everything else, and it’s in a closet up there to this day, unless it’s been changed. They moved that whole thing away a little distance so there was enough room in front of the base of the organ, enough room for a choir to fit. And we had chairs up there. They were visible and everyone turned around to look at them.

The basses were there, and in front of us the altos were there, and the sopranos, there. And we sang.

This is really a beautiful, beautiful shul.

The wood carved lighting structures were always there as long as I can remember. There were probably globes on top. It looks like a religious candle. I don’t think it was Jewish, because that was part of the original church furniture.

Community Building
That was what we called the daily minyan. The daily chapel was here. [Where the Chapel extension is now] There was a minyan here. They started every morning, every weekday morning at seven and in the evening at mincha and maariv. There were chairs, folding seats bolted down to the ground, and there was a shulchan three-quarters of the way up. It was one big long room. Sometimes, we had a pretty good attendance in those days. They had a little raised platform at this end (south), one step up. There was the ark was against this wall (south). And there was a chair for my father. He had a table to lean on, and there was a little bit of a railing with a swinging gate.

The minyan room was later relocated to the rear room. Julius Kahn built the Aron Kodesh in this room.

There was a fire [in 1924] on the second floor of the community building when I was about six. The classroom partitions [with glass overhead] were there before the fire. I was of age to remember, and it happened during the school year. I remember when they were doing repairs here, we had classes in the shul building. In the shul, they had one corner downstairs, and the left corner front, and the right corner, each corner was a separate class. Some classes met in the balconies, one on the right side and one on the left side.

This used to be the main office. My father was principal and his desk was across here (west wall). The secretary sat in the corner (near the stairway) After a while, wanting more privacy, my father moved his office into the next room where the Rabbi now has his office.

Mail Delivery
The Shul didn’t have a mail slot. The mail used to go to the man next door, Harris Kohn was a custom tailor. I remember especially the Shabbes mail would be delivered next door, and Saturday nights my father would go there to pick up whatever mail had accumulated. And I used to hold his hand, and walk in with him. And he had a warm coat and I put my hand in his pocket, so I kept my hand warm.

Download this Article PDF

About the Journal …

The Synagogue Journal” is a one-year online publication at www.kanestreet.org/historical_journal.html, designed to highlight the Kane Street Synagogue congregation’s rich historical record. It will draw primarily on original source material: oral histories, minute books and financial ledgers, souvenir journals, newsletters, and stories of the nineteenth century from the Brooklyn Daily Eagle Online ™, Brooklyn Public Library.

Each week in 2006, the Journal will explore a specific theme, related to the Congregation’s experience. Articles will illustrate the three historic periods: the first fifty years as Congregation Baith Israel at both the Atlantic Street and Boerum Place sites; the middle years with Rabbi Israel Goldfarb as spiritual leader of the consolidated Congregation Baith Israel Anshei Emes at the present location, and the last fifty years, as the synagogue evolved to be the Congregation that we know today.

Journal readers who take in the entire series will view the panorama of our special synagogue’s experience in Brooklyn, the City of Churches: the constants, the changes and the cycles. Our intention is to foster greater understanding about synagogue customs and rituals and explore the development of the oldest Conservative congregation during its proud history.

Those of you who have watched the Congregation grow over the last decades and guided its course have a treasured perspective. We welcome your reminiscences, letters and photographs to help shape the BIAE story. Special thanks to Kane Street Synagogue webmaster Dugans for putting the Journal online. 

For further information, please contact us at: historicaljournal@kanestreet.org. 

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