BGuthrie Photos: DC -- Judiciary Square -- Lillian & Albert Small Jewish MuseumDC -- Judiciary Square -- Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum:
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Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
LASMAL_220703_01.JPG: The following pictures are from the page 2022_07_03D2_LA_Small DC -- Judiciary Square -- Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum (7 photos from 07/03/2022)
LASMAL_220508_02.JPG: The following pictures are from the page 2022_05_08F1_LA_Small DC -- Judiciary Square -- Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum (9 photos from 05/08/2022)
LASMAL_210313_01.JPG: The following pictures are from the page 2021_DC_LA_Small DC -- Judiciary Square -- Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum (21 photos from 2021)
LASMAL_210313_13.JPG: Lillian and Albert Small
Capital Jewish Museum
Coming 2022
LASMAL_210313_27.JPG: This building once was...
1876 -- 1st Synagogue Built in DC
1910s -- Bicycle Shop
1920s -- Greek Orthodox Church
1930s -- Soap Shop
1940s -- Barber Shop
1950s -- BBQ Restaurant
1960s -- Grocery Store
And soon will be the Capital Jewish Museum. Coming 2022.
LASMAL_200607_02.JPG: The following pictures are from the page 2020_DC_LA_Small DC -- Judiciary Square -- Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum (11 photos from 2020)
LASMAL_200607_19.JPG: Adas Israel
Synagogue
1876-1908
Rededicated as Jewish Museum of Washington
22 June 1975 / 13 Tamuz 5735
LASMAL_190701_02_STITCH.JPG: The following pictures are from the page 2019_DC_LA_Small DC -- Judiciary Square -- Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum (26 photos from 2019)
LASMAL_190701_29.JPG: Capital Jewish Museum
Opening 2021
LASMAL_180526_01.JPG: The following pictures are from the page 2018_DC_LA_Small DC -- Judiciary Square -- Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum (6 photos from 2018)
LASMAL_170502_01_STITCH.JPG: The following pictures are from the page 2017_DC_LA_Small DC -- Judiciary Square -- Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum (5 photos from 2017)
LASMA1_161103_002_STITCH.JPG: The following pictures are from the page 2016_DC_LA_Small_Move_161103 DC -- Judiciary Square -- Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum -- Event: The move! (204 photos from 2016)
LASMA1_161103_092.JPG: Construction workers at the next building watch
LASMA1_161103_200.JPG: Albert H. Small
LASMA1_161103_216.JPG: Ernie Marcus and Albert Small on the right
LASMA1_161103_225.JPG: Albert Small photographing the structure
LASMA1_161103_243.JPG: Spectators
LASMA1_161103_344.JPG: If you see the next three photos, you can see the wheels slowly turning
LASMA2_161103_008.JPG: 1960s
Veterans Market was operated by a Chinese immigrant family
6th and G Streets, NW
LASMA2_161103_010.JPG: December 1969
Scaffolding stabilized the second floor of the building during the move
6th and G Streets, NW
LASMA2_161103_012.JPG: December 18, 1969
Second floor of the synagogue moving down G Street
5th and G Streets, NW
LASMA2_161103_014.JPG: December 18, 1969
Passing the Government Accountability Office (GAO)
5th and G Streets, NW
LASMA2_161103_015.JPG: December 18, 1969
Synagogue on its new site
3rd and G Streets, NW
LASMA2_161103_019.JPG: 1970
Synagogue with restored first floor
3rd and G Streets, NW
LASMA2_161103_021.JPG: June 22, 1975
Rededication of the synagogue and opening to the public
3rd and G Srreets, NW
LASMA2_161103_023.JPG: 2010
Synagogue with fence donated by Gichner Iron Works
3rd and G Streets, NW
LASMA2_161103_026.JPG: Lobby
First Floor
LASMA2_161103_028.JPG: Entrance Plaza
This welcoming outdoor space facing Third Street, NW, leads to the museum's entrance. It encourages both passing pedestrians and those who planned a visit to come in and explore.
LASMA2_161103_031.JPG: "The new Small Jewish Museum will stand at the western gateway to Capitol Crossing -- as a historic embodiment of neighborhood heritage and a key cultural feature within this new 21st century development."
-- Robert H. Braunohler, Regional Vice President Property Group Partners, developers of Capitol Crossing
LASMA2_161103_033.JPG: Moving Forward, Learning from the Past
The Campaign for a New Museum of Washington Jewish History
Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum
Washington, DC
LASMA2_161103_039.JPG: Small Family, c 1910
Back row: Jack, Sarah, Isadore
Front row: Albert, Rose, Lillian
LASMA2_161103_040.JPG: Ernie Marcus, ???, and Bernard Glassman
LASMA2_161103_043.JPG: Rabbi Gil Steinlauf
LASMA2_161103_052.JPG: Alan Rubinson
LASMA2_161103_100.JPG: 1903
Earliest known photograph of Adas Israel synagogue
6th and G Streets, NW
LASMA2_161103_104.JPG: 1905
Synagogue and G Street neighborhood with Pension Building in the background
6th and G Streets, NW
LASMA2_161103_106.JPG: 1940s
Synagogue building used by Mission and Light Church and Purity Food Store
6th and G Streets, NW
LASMA2_161103_110.JPG: 1950s
Synagogue building used as a barbecue pork carryout
6th and G Streets, NW
LASMA2_161103_121.JPG: Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum
Third Street, NW
LASMA2_161103_130.JPG: Howard Morse
LASMA2_161103_177.JPG: Paula Goldman
LASMA2_161103_184.JPG: Rabbi Arnold Resnicoff
LASMA2_161103_197.JPG: Isadore Gimble inside Congress Food Market at 5th and E Capitol Street, NW, with Yiddish newspaper the Jewish Daily Forward.
LASMA2_161103_215.JPG: Lynn Zuckerman
LASMA2_161103_217.JPG: Stephanie Silverstein
LASMA2_161103_221.JPG: Jon Willen and Sandra Willen
LASMA2_161103_228.JPG: Paula Goldman
LASMA2_161103_235.JPG: Lynn Zuckerman
LASMA2_161103_246.JPG: Saadia Greenberg
LASMA3_161103_010.JPG: The move is over. Now they set up supports so the wheels can be removed.
LASMA3_161103_180.JPG: The little R2-D2 unit is a CSR Berger measuring device. Perhaps it's there to make sure things are moving in synch correctly.
LASMA3_161103_190.JPG: The saved some of the fence and then scrapped the rest
LASMA3_161103_279.JPG: Bernard Glassman
LASMA3_161103_328.JPG: Tom Sherwood, News 4
LASMA3_161103_535.JPG: Wendy Turman, deputy director of the Jewish Historical Society
LASMA3_161103_622.JPG: Zivan Cohen and the late Dick Tadjer established the firm of Tadjer-Cohen Associates, Inc. in 1962 to provide consulting structural engineering services. His firm is the one working on the new structures that are being built over I-395.
LASMAL_161022_02_STITCH.JPG: The following pictures are from the page 2016_DC_LA_Small DC -- Judiciary Square -- Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum (12 photos from 2016)
LASMAL_150618_01_STITCH.JPG: The following pictures are from the page 2015_DC_LA_Small DC -- Judiciary Square -- Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum (23 photos from 2015)
LASMAL_150618_10.JPG: On This Corner...
Imagine standing on this corner between the late 1800s and late 1960s. What would you see?
You would be surrounded by rowhouses, apartment buildings, small businesses, and streetcars rattling down G Street toward Union Station. The homes were occupied by a rich mix of families - Jewish, Irish, Chinese, Italian, Russian, Greek, African American, and German. Holy Rosary Church, completed by Italian immigrants in 1923, stood a half-block south at Third and F Streets.
The suburbanization, freeway and federal office construction, and the 1968 riots led to the relocation of many residents.
By 1969, this triangular lot was vacant. That year the Jewish Historical Society saved the city's oldest synagogue by moving it here from Sixth and G Streets. It now stands before you as the Lillian and Albert Small Jewish Museum.
LASMAL_150618_13.JPG: Neighborhood Businessmen:
Italian barber Pat Lignelli (left), Jewish tailor Simon Berman (center), and Chinese launderer Mr. Lee owned small shops along G Street in the 1930s. Other neighboring businesses included Sam Fabrizio's shoe repair store, Ramblin's grocery store, and Loesberg's Italian Store.
Sirota's Drug Store:
This 1943 photo shows Irving Sirota (center), an Eastern European Jewish immigrant, in front of the drug store he operated on this corner from 1921 to 1957. The pharmacy filled prescriptions, had a soda fountain, and sold candy, toiletries, and cigars. With Sirota are pharmacist Joe Snigowski (left) and cousin Jake Rothstein (right).
LASMAL_150618_16.JPG: Berman's Tailor Shop:
Gladys Berman stands in front of her father's tailor shop at 309 G Street. From 1910 to the 1940s, the shop pressed suits and cleaned and mended clothes. The family lived above the shop's original location at 313 G Street before moving to a house around the corner at 723 Third Street.
Neighborhood Scenes:
Selma Levine Musher Goldberg holds George Berman (left) and other Berman children pose in front of their home (right). The block wasn't purely residential, though. Across Third Street sat Shrier's family-owned grocery, and up the block was a Sanitary grocery store - part of a local chain later purchased by Safeway.
LASMAL_150618_19.JPG: The Harrison Apartments:
The Harrison apartment building opened in 1888 and, after serving as headquarters for the 1890 census, welcomed residents into its 79 apartments. The ground floor housed a restaurant, bar, barber shop, and pharmacy. The city's oldest example of rowhouse-style apartments, the Harrison was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1994.
LASMAL_150618_40.JPG: Original Adas Israel Synagogue
Dedicated 1876 -- Restored 1975
Listed on United States Register of Historic Places and an
officially designated landmark of the District of Columbia
Maintained by the Jewish Historical Society of
Greater Washington as the
Lillian and Albert Small
Jewish Museum of Washington
LASMAL_150618_43.JPG: This garden donated by William and Stella Robinowitz
October 1982
LASMAL_100907_009.JPG: "The neighborhood was our whole life." -- Albert Small, born in the neighborhood in 1902
This is the oldest surviving synagogue building in Washington. Constructed in 1876 by Adas Israel Congregation, and originally located at Sixth and G Streets, it served the German-Jewish immigrant shopkeepers in the neighborhood. Albert Small, a member of the congregation, grew up on Fifth Street and recalled that as a boy, "the neighborhood was our whole life [and] the synagogue was the focal point. We went to school at Seaton, and we took our music lessons in St. Mary's across the street from our house. We used to help in the family store two blocks away."
When the congregation outgrew this sanctuary in 1906, a Greek Orthodox church and later a carry-out restaurant occupied the building. Threatened with demolition in 1969, the building was moved to its present location and restored as a museum bearing the name of its benefactors, Lillian and Albert Small.
This historic synagogue symbolizes the rich immigrant history of the eastern section of Washington's downtown. Beginning with the Irish and German craftsmen who arrived in the early 19th century to work on the government buildings, the area has been a place for newcomers from around the world to establish an economic foothold in the federal city -- Jews, Germans, Greeks, Italians, Russians, Chinese, and others.
The legacy of the neighborhood's immigrant history surrounds you. Holy Rosary Catholic Church (founded about 1913 near its present site at Third and F Streets) served the surrounding Italian community. It still celebrates Mass in Italian, St. Mary's Catholic Church (established in 1846), at Fifth and H Streets, founded by Germans, today holds Mass in Latin and Cantonese. St. Patrick's Catholic Church (founded in 1794) and still located on its original site on Tenth Street between F and G, was established to serve Irish immigrants. And three former synagogues,on or near I Street, are now Baptist or African Methodist Episcopal churches serving African American congregations.
LASMAL_100907_107.JPG: Flashbacks by Patrick M. Reynolds
The Oldest Shul in the Capital
Shul in Yiddish for synagogue.
The Washington Hebrew Congregation, the oldest Jewish worship group in DC, was founded in 1852 by Ashkenazie (Germanic) Jews. Initially they held services in members' homes or in rented facilities.
They purchased an old church on 8th Street between H and I Streets NW and converted it into a synagogue in 1859. Men and women sat separately.
A rift occurred in 1869 when Reformed members installed an organ in the synagogue. A group of 38 Orthodox families broke away. The Washington Hebrew Congregation built their own synagogue on 8th St in the 1890s.
The Orthodox Jews formed the Adas Israel congregation and started to constrct a synagogue at 6th and G Streets NW in 1873. It was finished three years later.
The Adas Israel Synagogue was dedicated on June 9, 1876 with a three-hour Orthodox service. In attendence was President Ulysses S. Grant. The Adas Israel Shul still stands.
LASMAL_100907_114.JPG: Flashbacks by Patrick M. Reynolds
The Mobile Synagogue
The Adas Israel Synagogue stood at 6th and G Streets NW in Washington, DC from 1876 to 1969. The last Jewish service was held there in 1906.
The Gatti family, Washington realtors, purchased the property. Over the years, they rented it to the Greek Orthodox Church of St. Sophia and to an Evangelistic Congregation.
By 1946, the ground floor had been converted into several stores including a carry-out barbeque shop.
Then, Washington Metro executives planned to knock it down in order to build the subway. "We've had it declared a National Historic Site. Soon we'll move the building."
The ground floor was structurally weak, so workers proceeded to place the upper part of the synagogue on a 28-wheeled dolly.
The Adas Israel Synagogue was moved three blocks on December 18, 1969 at a cost of $150,000. Now standing at G and 3rd Streets, NW, the structure is the home of the Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington.
LASMAL_100316_03.JPG: The following pictures are from the page 2010_DC_LA_Small DC -- Judiciary Square -- Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum (28 photos from 2010)
LASMAL_100316_05.JPG: Original Adas Israel Synagogue
Dedicated 1876 -- Restored 1975
Listed on United States Register of Historic Places and an
officially designated landmark of the District of Columbia
Maintained by the Jewish Historical Society of
Greater Washington as the
Lillian and Albert Small
Jewish Museum of Washington
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Wikipedia Description: Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Lillian & Albert Small Jewish Museum, located in the Judiciary Square neighborhood of Washington, D.C., houses the oldest surviving synagogue building in the District. It was erected in 1876 by the Adas Israel Congregation. The museum is operated by the Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington. The museum's executive director is Laura Apelbaum.
The museum building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the D.C. Inventory of Historic Sites, and Historic American Buildings Survey. It is among the oldest synagogue buildings still standing in the United States. It is also an official project of the Save America's Treasures program.
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