Jewish Studies

Winner, 2017 National Jewish Book Award in American Jewish Studies from the Jewish Book Council Finalist, Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature An engaging history of how Jews forged their own religious culture on the American frontier Jews on the Frontier offers a religious history that begins in an unexpected place: on the road. Shari Rabin recounts the journey of Jewish people as they left Eastern cities and ventured into the American West and South during the nineteenth century. It brings to life the successes and obstacles of these travels, from the unprecedented economic opportunities to the anonymity and loneliness that complicated the many legal obligations of traditional Jewish life.

When people think of the Jewish immigrant experience, it's usually the Lower East Side of New York that comes to mind. But, in fact, thousands of Jews lived in western mining towns and on ranches and trading posts in the late nineteenth century. In this "colorful history of Jewish settlers in the West . . . that stereotype of the urban Jew is vigorously and even exuberantly rejected" (CHICAGO SUN-TIMES). PIONEER JEWS is a vivid and thorough chronicle of the lives, experiences, and contributions of the Jewish men and women who helped shape the American frontier.