At the start of the 20th century, New York’s Lower East Side was home to a growing Jewish immigrant community. The High Holidays—Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur—were times when the neighborhood came alive with prayer, tradition, and family gatherings.

The Tenement Museum is offering guided tours this September to help visitors experience what those holidays looked like more than 100 years ago. The tours feature recreated immigrant apartments, historic holiday postcards, vintage tickets for services, and traditional holiday foods. Guides also explain how synagogues often overflowed and how shops or community halls were turned into temporary prayer spaces.

Visitors can also see how holiday greetings were exchanged through postcards, learn about recipes from early Yiddish cookbooks, and take part in activities like card-making or cooking demonstrations. The goal is to give a sense of how Jewish families balanced their traditions while adjusting to life in a new country.

These tours connect present-day New Yorkers with the history of immigrant life, showing how holiday rituals shaped community bonds and cultural identity in the city.

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Read the full article from the original source:
JTA – This is how New Yorkers celebrated the High Holidays at the turn of the 20th century
Source: JTA, September 2025