Jewish New York by Deborah Dash Moore

Author:Deborah Dash Moore
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: NYU Press

Molly Goldberg on set. Gertrude Berg created the irrepressible character of Molly Goldberg, a Bronx Jewish mother and housewife who dispensed wisdom and humor in fractured and Yiddish-accented English. Starting in 1929, The Rise of the Goldbergs became one of the longest running radio serials in history. Molly Goldberg moved to television after World War II. She was most Americans’ image of a Jewish New Yorker. The Goldberg family acquainted listeners with some basic rituals of Judaism through discussions of major Jewish holidays. Berg’s business acumen and her use of gendered expectations drove much of the show’s humor. Courtesy of Getty Images.

Toward the end of the show’s run, the Goldbergs moved to suburbia, at the behest of apprehensive network executives who wanted the series to be more reflective of the emerging American scene. The newly arrived family in an aptly named Haverville addressed, in their own comedic way, some of the dilemmas of their decision to leave the city, most critically whether “it’s still possible to have good neighbors and be a cohesive family.” This question particularly concerned Jews, who worried what their Protestant and Catholic neighbors would think of them. Berg answered that Jewish food—a stand-in for abundant love—would win them over. Ever the successful businesswoman, Berg collaborated on the Molly Goldberg Jewish Cookbook, which presented eastern European Jewish recipes as accessible to all Americans through humorous stories accompanying each recipe. After all, if Molly’s Irish neighbor loved matzo brei, the distinctive Jewish egg and matzo pancake eaten on Passover, so could any American. Berg’s business acumen and her use of gendered expectations drove much of the show’s humor. Behind her “image of a simple housewife and mother stood one of the few women,” writes Jeffrey Shandler, “who maintained creative control over her work in American broadcasting for decades.”48

In music, art, literature, theater, and other cultural arenas, Jews worked alongside non-Jews. Together they established New York as an international center of the arts—so much so that scholars came to speak of a “New York school,” applying the phrase to abstract-expressionist art, documentary photography, public intellectuals, and even poets. Active in these fields, New York Jews infused American culture with a range of expressions influenced by their own experiences as immigrants or children of immigrants in the nation’s largest, most cosmopolitan, most multiethnic and multireligious city. Living and working in the cultural capital of the United States, New York Jews brought their creative sensibilities to bear on American culture.

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