"Refuge in the Heights" Exhibition Opening with Rob Snyder

Rob Snyder, author of the book Crossing Broadway, Washington Heights and the Promise of New York City and Professor of Journalism and American Studies at Rutgers University-Newark, will help LBI celebrate its new exhibition on the German-Jewish refugees of Washington Heights with a talk on the northern Manhattan neighborhood once known as “Frankfurt on the Hudson” for its large population of German-Jewish refugees. Eight decades later, the neighborhood is still a vibrant home for new immigrant communities.

For German-speaking Jews fleeing the Nazis in the 1930s and early 40s, Washington Heights was symbolic and fertile ground from which to build new lives. There they could retain what they loved best about German and Jewish culture, while committing to the exercise of becoming American. Many who grew up in “Frankfurt on Hudson” remember it as a beloved community of family, neighbors, parks, synagogues, Jewish businesses, continuity, and also change.