(1860-1951)
Biography Project by Ivan Lupov, Fall 2003
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Abraham Cahan was born on July 7th, 1860 in the historic for Jewish culture town of Vilna, shtetl of Podberezya, Lithuania. He was the son of Schachne and Sarah Goldarbeiter Cahan, both Hebrew teachers, and the grandson of Rabbi Jacob of Nementchin.
During his high school years, Abraham self-educated himself in various academic fields of study and enters the Vilna Teachers Institute. He graduated from the institute in 1881 with a teacher's diploma. As time went on he became affiliated with an anti-tsarist organization, which caused him strenuous tensions with the authorities. The tensions reached their peak when Abraham moved to a new school in the town of Velizh where he was suspected of illegal anti-tsarist activities. In an attempt to safe his life he decided to flee to Switzerland but circumstances lead him on his way to America.
Cahan arrived in New York on June 6th, 1881. Initially he worked at a tin factory but with his intellectual background that period of his life lasted for very short time. Quickly he began teaching English at the Young Men's Hebrew Association and also he wrote his first article, published on the front page of the New York World. Again his political focus was directed against tsarist Russia and he pleaded for the release of young Russian revolutionaries. It was in 1890 when he was sent as a delegate to the Second International Socialist Congress and met with Frederick Engles, which confirmed his socialist ideology.
Cahan's genius shines in the work he did for Arbeiter Zeitung newspaper where he wrote entire columns by himself. Under different pseudonyms he sometimes completed entire issues that dealt with various topics from politics to folklore myths.
In 1886 he married Anna Bronstein of Kiev. Their marriage lasted more than 60 years but never brought them any children. It was during this period of the 1980s, when Cahan began to gain popularity among other journalists and fellow immigrants. He was the first to deliver speeches in Yiddish to numerous Jewish immigrants in the ghettos of New York. He picked up another editor's position for the Tsunkuft newspaper as well as for the Arbeiter Zeitung. Parallel to working as an editor for two separate newspapers, in the same time period Cahan came out with his first novel entitled Yekl, a Tale of the New York Ghetto. This was the beginning of a series of novels that he wrote in the years from 1986 until 1917 and it was in 1917 when he wrote his most memorable novel called The Rise of David Levinsky.
In 1897 Cahan left the editorial board of the Jewish Daily Forward. He dedicated himself to his work at the other newspapers and joined the New York Commercial Advertiser where he was employed as a police reporter. This kept him very close to the dynamic life, full of hardship, of the young immigrants in the neighborhoods of New York. Not surprisingly the work he did there as a police reporter brought to life another novel entitled The Spirit of the Ghetto, which presented accounts of court rulings and offered various insights into the life of an immigrant. Also in 1897 he materialized his social teachings by establishing the Social Democratic Party, which he became affiliated with until 1902 when he joined the Socialist Party. At this time he voiced his support for unionization of East Side garment workers and stood firm behind their reasons for declaring strikes.
In 1903 Cahan returned again to the Jewish Forward and became the chief editor. When the World War I began he started writing every day columns covering the latest developments on the Eastern Front, which consequently turned the Forward into a nationwide newspaper with hundreds of thousands of subscribers. Cahan tried to take his own stand on the issues of war, declaring that Germany’s strive for military might was better than Russian authoritarianism but he eventually backed down from his ideology by allowing other members of the Forward to write in defense of the Allies. Around 1920s the Forward was transformed in the largest Jewish immigrant paper in the world with more than 250,000 thousand copies sold every day. Offices of the Forward were open in major cities like Los Angeles, Chicago, and Philadelphia. Since the newspaper was a non-profit institution, all profits were given in support for labor and social movements around the nation and the world, which is a contributing factor to Cahan becoming known as a radical trade unionist. Also in the 1920s Cahan reversed his earlier support for Communism and turned bitterly against it.
After the turbulent years during World War I, Cahan made a trip back to his hometown for the first time since 1882. That inspired him to begin working on his memoirs, which came out in 1931 entitled Blätter von mein Leben or “Leaves from my Life.” They portrayed him as the person all Jewish Immigrants looked up to until 1914.
In the interwar period Cahan traveled extensively in Europe and to the Middle East. He was present at the Versailles Peace Conference, at the opening of the first Labor Parliament in Britain in 1924, at the Socialist Congress at Marseilles and visited Palestine twice. His second time in Palestine was during the Arab Revolt, which had a transforming impact on him turning him into a firm defender of Zionism.
At the beginning of World War II Cahan revived his once own daily war column covering the latest on the Eastern Front. These were years of continual hard work covering not only the war but the issues that Jewish immigrants were faced with. Until 1946 when he suffered a stroke he never lost a bit of energy.If it wasn’t for the stroke there was nothing to hold him away from his office.
Unfortunately, on August 31st,at the age of 91, Abraham Cahan past away from congestive heart failure in the comfort of his house.
Timetable:
1860 Abraham Cahan was born in the town of Vilna, shtetl of Podberzeya, Lithuania.
1881 Graduated from Vilna Teachers Institute
1882 June 6th, Immigrated to New York City
1885 Married Anuita "Anna" Bronstein of Kiev.
1891 Began editing Arbeiter
Tzaitung
1891 Delegate of the United Hebrew Trades to the Second International Socialist Congress meeting with Frederick Engles.
1894-97 Edited Tsukunft newspaper.
1894-1901 Worked as a reporter for the New York Commercial Advertiser.
1895 “A Providential Match” – Cahan’s first attempt in writing fiction. It was published
1897 The Jewish Daily Forward was founded.
1896 Yekl, a Tale of the New York Ghetto was published.
1898 The Imported Bridegroom and Other Stories was published.
1902-03 Left The Forward only to return once more as an editor and chief in the following year.
1902 The Spirit of the Ghetto was published.
1905 The White Terror and the Red
1906 "Bintl briv" ("Bundle of Letters") came out in print.
1907 Rafael Naarizokh: An Erzaylung Vegin a Stolyer Vos Iz Gekommen Zum Saykhl was published.
1915 trip to Austria and Germany as a war correspondent for the Forward and the New York Globe
1917 The Rise of David Levinsky was published.
1923 The Forward was published in 11 major cities.
1926-31, Cahan wrote his an autobiography entitled Blätter von mein Leben
1951, On August 31st, Abraham Cahan died of congestive heart failure.
Significant Works:
Yekl, a Tale of the New York Ghetto – describes the different stages of adaptation an immigrant goes through once in United States. It deals with the Americanization of the new immigrants.
The Rise of David Levinsky – This book also dealt with the personal transformation of Russian Jewish immigrants in United States. It provides a description of the ways immigrants adapted to the American society in terms what they gained and what they gave up in the process. The book’s main character, Levinsky, is an example of an immigrant who made it to United States and accumulated incredible amount of wealth. But the book also describes how besides the wealth Levinsky gained no wisdom or deep and meaningful relationships with other people which is what he had dreamed for since childhood.
Sources:
- Columbia Encyclopedia, IXBCahan-Ab, www.search.ep net.com/direct.asp?an=IXBCahan-Ab&db=afh
- Abraham Cahan, The “Forward,” and Me, By: Lipsky, Seth, Commentary, 00102601, Jun97, Vol. 103, Issue 6
- Dictionary of American Biography, Supplement 5:1951-1955. American Council of Learned Societies, 1977
- Sanford E. Marovitz. "Cahan, Abraham"; http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-00243.html; American National Biography Online Feb. 2000. Published by Oxford University Press.
- Contemporary Authors Online, Gale, 2003. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: The Gale Group. 2003. http://www.galenet.com/servlet/BioRC
-
"Abraham
Cahan." Encyclopedia of World Biography, 2nd ed. 17 Vols. Gale
Research, 1998.
Reproduced in Biography Resource
Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: The Gale Group. 2003. http://www.galenet.com/servlet/BioRC