Historical Society Hosts Authors' Discussion of Connecticut Jewish Farmers

“ALIEN INVASION OF CONNECTICUT FARMS,” screams the 1925 newspaper headline. “Every Third Farm in Connecticut Is Now in the Hands of a Man of Foreign Birth.”

The invading aliens were Italians, Poles, Germans, and others, and some of them - surprisingly to many both at the time and today - were Jews. Mary M. Donohue and Briann G. Greenfield, co-editors of the book A Life of the Land: Connecticut’s Jewish Farmers, spoke at the on Sunday and discussed how these Jews got here and how they made their mark on Connecticut between 1880 and 1945.

The book, published by the Jewish Historical Society of Greater Hartford, grew out of Donohue’s earlier work on a survey of local synagogues. She was surprised to find small shuls - “very New England on the outside and very Russian on the inside” - in places like Lisbon, Hebron, and Ellington. Their existence showed that there had once been enough Jews in these rural Connecticut towns to build and sustain communities substantial enough to require their own houses of worship.

Greenfield, an associate professor of public history at Central Connecticut State University, joined the project after already conducting previous research on Connecticut agriculture, a subject she calls “a long history of crisis.” The typical Connecticut farm was hilly, stony, and had poor soil. It was unprofitable, especially when compared to large farms in the Western states, and it became increasingly unnecessary as time went by. Many Yankee farmers – they were initially all Yankees, of English descent, Greenfield said  – had given up agriculture by the late 19th century.

Around the same time, immigrants began to arrive, some of whom rented these abandoned properties. The Italians specialized in trucking produce into the cities to sell, and the Poles mostly farmed tobacco. The Jews found their niche in poultry and dairy, plus anything else they could think of. They were mostly refugees, not immigrants; unlike most others, if it didn’t work out here, they had nowhere else to go.

They came fleeing persecution in Eastern Europe, and immigrated primarily to large cities like New York. The relatively affluent German Jews in these cities wanted to aid the poor newcomers, but also feared they would reflect poorly on all Jews, leading to increased anti-Semitism. Their answer was to send the newly arrived Jews away from the cities to farm the countryside.

Many Jewish farmers, like many farmers in general, did not succeed. The success of those who did, Greenfield and Donohue found, was due to several factors.

The first was The Jewish Agricultural Society, which administered the Baron de Hirsch Fund, created  by philanthropist Maurice de Hirsch in Germany in 1891 to help Jewish immigrants from Russia. The JAS provided Jewish Farm Agents, assisted with mortgages and scholarships, and published a magazine, The Jewish Farmer, which imparted such elementary information as how to stack hay.

Jewish farmers in Connecticut were quick to adapt any agricultural innovation, like new chicken coops, that could help them  make the most of difficult land. Additionally, they were willing to open side businesses, and fortunate in their proximity to existing Jewish communities.

Donohue, architectural historian with the Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism, spoke of the New London connection, noting that ethnic history cuts across regional and local histories.

She cited an 1891 article in the about a Chesterfield farm where workers sewed coats, suspenders, and pants in separate rooms of the farmhouse. This “piece work” was shipped from New York to New London to Chesterfield, then back via the same route. Men in farm families often worked part of the year in New York and returned to, say, Colchester, stopping in New London along the way.

The farmers, who were mostly Orthodox, began renting rooms in the summers to Jewish city dwellers. Seeking fresh air, hearty Kosher food - advertisements promised it would make them fat! - and affordable accommodations, they would take the train from Grand Central to places like Willimantic, where they’d be picked up by farm wagons. Some of these enterprises later grew into larger establishments with hotels, swimming pools, and entertainment. But unlike the Catskills, where resorts were the first priority and farming a distant second, in Connecticut the chickens and eggs came first.

A few Connecticut Jewish families remained in the farming business, but mostly, by the second or third generation, they moved on. Many came to nearby cities and opened dry-goods or clothing stores. The faded lettering of their names can still be seen on structures in many Connecticut downtowns, New London included.