This is the little-known story of a challenging day in the first year of our Cleveland Jewish community. It’s an old tale, enriched by new information.

“Where can I find a Jew?” It was Aug. 6 or Aug. 7, 1840 in Cleveland, then a town with about 6,000 residents. The Christian driver of a horse-drawn wagon asked the question. In his wagon lay the body of a Jewish peddler. Good people in the rural area where the body had been found, knowing there were Jews here, brought his body here so he could be buried in the custom of his people.

There were Jews in Cleveland, about 60, organized as the Israelitic Society. As there had been an Israelitische Gemeinde back in Unsleben, Bavaria, it was their synagogue and their community federation.

Cleveland’s Jews knew whose body was in the wagon. It was

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