Who we are at the Riverlands Jewish Archive

Questions that get asked a lot is "why here?", "why us?", or "we aren't historical."  Why preserve our local Jewish community history?  What is significant about the Jews of Vincennes, Indiana or the scattered Jews who lived in Barren County, Kentucky?  After all, the history surely is not as robust as that of the Lower-East Side or Los Angeles.  Why focus on the small towns of the Mississippi and Ohio River Valleys?

The short answer is "because no one has."  There is a basic human need for a sense of place and a natural curiosity to learn about one's home community.  In the 21st century, this is amplified by the ease of access to genealogical and historical records.  For much of our history, historians have placed an overwhelming emphasis on the Jewish histories along the coasts.  This makes sense, especially since the largest Jewish communities in the world are along the Atlantic coastline.  The New York experience came to typify how we view Jewish life in America.  But for the Jews who lived away from the population centers of the East Coast, their experience lived in shadow.  Jewish life in Carbondale, Illinois had as much in common as Jewish life in New York as it did Catholic life in Saskatoon.  To truly understand Jewish life in America, equal attention must be devoted to Flat River, Missouri as is dedicated to Baltimore, Maryland.  The experience of small town Jews also illuminates contestations and interactions between Jews and the wider American world in a way that studying the more sheltered hamlets on the east coast can't provide.