Book Description

From the Jewish community of 1769 to that of 1917 is a far cry--the one resident of colonial times to the lawyers, doctors, bankers, artists, merchant princes and artisans of today. Success to a phenomenal degree has been theirs. What they accomplished has been by virtue of their own brain and good right arm. To penal and eleemosynary institutions they were practically strangers. They have, it is true, figured in the criminal courts--as the brightest of lawyers ; their escutcheons are often crossed with the bar sinister of a rope--it is not pendant from a tree, but a peddler's pack. Of all the successful Jews In Richmond today there is not one of whom it can be truthfully said that he owes aught of it to "pull." Theirs has been the conquest of "push." The remarkable part is all this has been achieved by stress of energy alone. They came to this country with only their good names, their indomitable wills, with the single purpose of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," and the right to practice their ancient faith as their consciences dictated. -- Pg. [11]