The old country

by Shulman, Abraham

In the 1920s, the New York Yiddish newspaper, The Forward, printed a weekly selection of photographs illustrating Jewish life in Eastern Europe over the previous half century. The aim of the pictures was to show immigrant Jews the life that they had left behind. From the archives of The Forward, Abraham Shulman, a native of Poland and a notable Yiddish writer of short stories and essays, selected hundreds of photographs to show what East European Jewish life was actually like. It was not all persecution, poverty, and heartbreak--there were many light and joyous aspects: pictures of children at play, adults at a village party, and family groups dressed in their Sabbath best to pose for a formal photograph all demonstrate that.--From publisher description.