BETH HAKNESSETH ANSHE GRODNO congregation (1904-51), once also known as the Synagogue of the Province of Grodno, was founded in 1904 and incorporated that August by Morris Shapiro, Max Lifshitz, and Jacob Landy. Eleven Russian immigrant Jews from Grodno, Lithuania, founded the orthodox congregation. Religious services were held initially in the home of Benjamin Zelling. After 3 months, a hall was rented at Perry (E. 22nd) and Orange, where the congregation met until it purchased a frame house on Osborn near Woodland in 1907. In 1912 the congregation acquired a new building at E. 55th St. between Quincy and Central. In 1924 Anshe Grodno purchased a new synagogue at 105th and Columbia in GLENVILLE. For several years the congregation also maintained its Woodland branch. During the 1930s the congregation was served by Rabbi Judah Levenberg, the head of the short-lived Jewish Orthodox Rabbinical Seminary. In 1940, with a membership of 200 families, the congregation established a Hebrew school under the direction of Rabbi Milton Dalin. Like many small congregations, Anshe Grodno could not afford to relocate following World War II, when Jews left Glenville for the suburbs. In 1947 it proposed a merger with the HEIGHTS JEWISH CENTER. The controversial proposal was not consummated until Jan. 1951.
Finding aid for the Heights Jewish Center Records. WRHS.
See also RELIGION, JEWS AND JUDAISM, and LITHUANIANS.