Jewish Buffalo History Center: Sokolivka

Sokolivka: Once Home

BY CHANA REVELL KOTZIN, PH.D.

Sokolivkers in Buffalo and their descendants elsewhere can trace their roots back to two connected towns in the Russian Empire: Sokolivka and Yustingrad (Ustingrad). On a map today, Sokolivka appears in Ukraine, 98 miles south of Kiev and 179 miles north of Odessa, but historically it was located near the Romanian and Austro-Hungarian borders and before World War I, within the Russian Empire. The Jewish Buffalo History Center is creating an online exhibition about Sokolivka and Sokolivker descendants in Buffalo to launch in March 2023. This exhibition is dedicated in memory of a beloved volunteer leader, lost all too soon: Leslie Shuman Kramer (z”l), and is supported by the Kramer-Shuman family.

A small number of Sokolivkers left for America at the turn of the twentieth century, and settled in Philadelphia and New York as well as Buffalo. The greater number of Buffalo Sokolivkers came after a series of three pogroms in 1918. These terrible events were vividly recalled by survivor, Chaika Aliotz Shuman. Her testimony later informed part of a book entitled The Shuman Story. A memorial for those murdered during the pogroms is located at the entrance of the Holy Order of the Living cemetery on Pine Ridge and was erected by the Sokolifker landsleit in Buffalo, dedicated on August 30, 1964. As many as 200 families came to Buffalo including the family names of Ablove, Berkun, Carrel, Dozoretz, Gelman, Kaprove, Rekoon, Shuman and Wagner among many others.

Several organizations were connected directly and indirectly to the Sokolivker story in Buffalo and some of these already have short profiles on the Jewish Buffalo History Center website jewishbuffalohistory.org that we would like to expand. They include the congregation of Anshe Sokolivka formed around 1908, also known as the Spring Street Shul for their congregational home at 350 Spring Street, between William and Peckham. There was also a benevolent society, called the Ustingrader Unterstitzung Verein that was created in 1913 and closed in 1945. Sokolifkers were also members of several other synagogues, including Rabbi Joseph Rabinowitz who led Brith Sholem from 1908 to his death in 1910. His recently renovated ohel is located on Pine Ridge Road near the entranceway to B’nai Israel cemetery. Another rabbi’s family hail from Sokolivka: Rabbi Gedaliah Kaprow, who led Humboldt Orthodox Center also known as the Glenwood Avenue shul located in mid-Buffalo in the Humboldt area.

While a few studies of Sokolivkers have been undertaken (in part explaining

Ustingrader Verein, 25th Anniversary 1938, Ferne Mittleman Collection, The Benjamin and Dr. Edgar R. Cofeld Judaic Museum of Temple Beth Zion. Celebrating the acquisition of a Torah for Anshe Sokolivka Shul on Spring Street, ca. 1917. Collection of The Buffalo History Museum. Goldome-Nagle photograph collection.

why Sokolivka has so many different names in Polish, Yiddish, Russian and Ukrainian and its connection to Yustingrad), there is very limited widely accessible archival materials and we hope to change that by assembling further online resources.

Please contact Chana Kotzin at chana@ buffalojewishfederation.org if you have materials you would be willing to share for the exhibition that can be copied and returned.

Chana Revell Kotzin, Ph.D., is the coordinator of the Jewish Buffalo History Center website, which you can find at jewishbuffalohistory.org.

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