Howard B. Rock

Runner-up for the Dixon Ryan Manuscript Award, New York Historical Association Haven of Liberty chronicles the arrival of the first Jews to New York in 1654 and highlights the role of republicanism in shaping their identity and institutions. Rock follows the Jews of NewYork through the Dutch and British colonial eras, the American Revolution and early republic, and the antebellum years, ending with a path-breaking account of their outlook and behavior during the Civil War. Overcoming significant barriers, these courageous men and women laid the foundations for one of the world’s foremost Jewish cities.

New York Jews in the New World, 1654-1865

Haven of Liberty

Annie Polland

Daniel Soyer

Jeffrey S. Gurock

Deborah Dash Moore

Part 2 of the three part series, Deborah Dash Moore, general editor.

New York Jews in the Age of Immigration, 1840-1920

Emerging Metropolis

Paul Gilje

They recreate the rhythms of daily life, clarify the impact of political and social changes on working people, and help us appreciate how these women and men-not just the country's founding fathers—were truly "keepers of the revolution." Paul A. Gilje and Howard B. Rock provide a general introduction to New York after independence and then devote sections of the book to apprentices, journeymen, master craftsmen, waterfront workers, blacks, and women. Most sections are anchored by several first-person accounts—autobiographies and reminiscences and include advertisements, courtcase testimony, newspaper reports, broadsides, appeals to Congress—all the colorful detail that can be used to illuminate the immediate, personal, lived experience of individuals of that particular time and place. A stunning group of illustrations adds to the reader's sense of the flavor and appearance of the rapidly growing city. Keepers of the Revolution will find appreciative readers among labor, social, urban, and early American historians, as well as antique collectors and antiquarians interested in early New York.

New Yorkers at Work in the Early Republic

Keepers of the Revolution

David Lobenstine

Black-and-white photographs and drawings from various eras depict the history, culture, and changes of New York City.

A History of New York in Images

Cityscapes

This is the first collection of primary sources by and about artisans in the early national era. In a number of ways it is as significant as the many volumes by the founding fathers that now grace library shelves because artisans were at the forefront of both the political and economic developments that would make this era so formative in American history. The documents illustrate the expectations spawned by the American Revolution within this sector of American society and the efforts of the artisans. It tells the colorful, dramatic, and hopeful, if ultimately disappointing story of their efforts, and the vital part they played in the shaping of American social and labor history.

A Documentary History

The New York City Artisan, 1789-1825

Winner of the 2012 National Jewish Book Award, presented by the National Jewish Book Council New York Jews, so visible and integral to the culture, economy and politics of America’s greatest city, has eluded the grasp of historians for decades. Surprisingly, no comprehensive history of New York Jews has ever been written. City of Promises: A History of the Jews of New York, a three volume set of original research, pioneers a path-breaking interpretation of a Jewish urban community at once the largest in Jewish history and most important in the modern world. Volume I, Haven of Liberty, by historian Howard B. Rock, chronicles the arrival of the first Jews to New York (then New Amsterdam) in 1654 and highlights their political and economic challenges. Overcoming significant barriers, colonial and republican Jews in New York laid the foundations for the development of a thriving community. Volume II, Emerging Metropolis, written by Annie Polland and Daniel Soyer, describes New York’s transformation into a Jewish city. Focusing on the urban Jewish built environment—its tenements and banks, synagogues and shops, department stores and settlement houses—it conveys the extraordinary complexity of Jewish immigrant society. Volume III, Jews in Gotham, by historian Jeffrey S. Gurock, highlights neighborhood life as the city’s distinctive feature. New York retained its preeminence as the capital of American Jews because of deep roots in local worlds that supported vigorous political, religious, and economic diversity. Each volume includes a “visual essay” by art historian Diana Linden interpreting aspects of life for New York’s Jews from their arrival until today. These illustrated sections, many in color, illuminate Jewish material culture and feature reproductions of early colonial portraits, art, architecture, as well as everyday culture and community. Overseen by noted scholar Deborah Dash Moore, City of Promises offers the largest Jewish city in the world, in the United States, and in Jewish history its first comprehensive account.

Howard B. Rock

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