Business
From The Peopling of NYC
First Stages of Business
In one room, Eastern European Jews would work with other pressers, finishers, buttonholers and pocket makers. Most immigrants were drawn to the garment industry –sewing, shoemaking. Exploitation was more intense in sweatshop tenement rooms. Soon, the Jews began opening their own businesses. In NY’s 8th Assembly District, there were: 144 groceries, 131 butcher shops, 62 candy stores, 36 bakeries, and 2,440 peddlers and cart pushers. Entrepreneurship shifted into first gear.
Business in Full Force
Many Jewish immigrants took to business. In Chicago, kosher meat markets, matzos bakeries, tailor shops, bathhouses, pushcarts, and peddler stalls began crowding the city. In Chicago, Jewish immigrants established Maimonides hospital. Soon, across the nation, there was integration in hospitals, orphanages, loan societies, and industrial training schools. This boom in the field of business isn’t surprising. After all, 35% Jews had previous entrepreneur experience when opening a small business in the U.S. After only several years in this new nation, Jews became highly mobile. They engaged in commerce, and enterprise. In NYC (1899-1914), 67% of Jews possessed industrial skills & had employment. Jews were more prosperous than any other ethnic inflow. The city later thrived with lawyers, doctors, pharmacists, and dentists.
