By Judah S. Harris

Since 1984, I had been participating in an early morning minyan a couple blocks away from the Washington Heights campus of Yeshiva University, where I was attending as an undergraduate. My photographic interests were steadily developing and I decided, late one summer, that this shul of older men who I’d come to know made for a poignant subject.

“Morning Prayers on 185th Street”, as I call the series, was photographed in August of 1990. It’s a photo essay that depicts the prayers, devotion and camaraderie of a group of men, most born in Europe, who for the last thirty or forty years had come each morning to this small shtieble in Northern Manhattan. Even as they aged and watched their neighborhood change around them, attending the Soloveichik Minyan remained a part of their regimen each day, before going off to their jobs as businessmen, shopkeepers,
teachers, and even artisans…

Shtiebles, as a gathering place for prayer and fellowship, are vestiges of an earlier generation, a more casual time, imbued with a discernable flavor of the Old Country. Indeed, many remain, and even new ones arrive from time to time when neighborhoods and local populations seek that which only they have to offer. But whether newer or (as is usually the case) older, shtiebles have traditionally stood in the shadows of the larger, more “established” synagogues that occupy greater prominence on the streets of our cities and suburbs. Often “hidden” from the majority of the local Jewish population, these small synagogues have remained non-descript, certainly non-palacious in the way they present themselves on the outside. And the insides are no different: simple, fluorescent-lit, replete with folding tables covered in white cloth, occasional wood benches of the older variety, and expanses of bookshelves lining the perimeter.

And yet this more modest experience has beckoned many, and still inspires fond memories for those who, perhaps many years back, discovered an actual shtieble just a few blocks away from where they lived, and if not there, then a few blocks further. Here they found a place where “everybody had a name.” For sure, there were the leaders, the organizers, the personalities everyone knew, but in the shtieble each individual could and did participate, contribute in some way. Leading the service, arriving early to arrange the chairs, roll the Torah scrolls; by purchasing fish and kugel, an assortment of cakes… to celebrate a simcha, to remember a yartzheit. Stopping off at the grocery to buy the paper plates, plastic forks and cups for the kiddush or Shabbos afternoon shalosh seudos… It wasn’t luxury, but it was personal. The shtieble experience quickly became familiar and provided many with a sense of belonging. On 185th Street, observers – and I was one of them – understood that for the men who attended the Soloveichik Minyan over the decades, the shtieble was indeed a second home, and maybe, as the years went on, and life changed, even a first.

For me, this was a personal project. I announced one morning after davening that I wanted to do a photo essay on the minyan, that I felt it was important, and I explained why, that there’s a story to tell and so on. I think they understood, but not like I did. I photographed on four different mornings over two weeks late that summer, 45 minutes each day, as davening lasted only that long. I remember: the first day I took pictures, but nothing exciting. Then from day two and on, I put the camera where it belonged. I was no longer hesitant to get in close to the people, to move around the shul – quietly, as the men were in the middle of prayers – but to get the pictures that I felt were important to capture.

Since 1990, some things have indeed changed on 185th Street. Until just a couple of years ago, the minyan continued to meet on Friday night and Shabbos morning, as well as on the various Yom Tovim. Sunday mornings also got a modest turnout, but there were no longer services weekday mornings at 6:35 AM, as the sign outside promised. There were no longer enough men for a minyan. People had passed away, others had moved away. For many still living in the neighborhood, the accumulated years made the early hours difficult, especially in the winter.

Some readers may find the scenes portrayed in this series of pictures familiar ones, even if distantly so. Certainly, there were members of a younger generation that participated in the Soloveichik Minyan. I was one of them. But the story is really about the older men. The cake and schnapps after morning davening, accompanied by friendly, teasing exchanges in varied amounts of English and Yiddish; the shabbos afternoon shalosh seudos, the third meal, with gefilte fish, herring, peanuts, a dvar Torah, and the traditional zemiros, different weeks, a different sponsor. The circling of the shul Sukkos-time, all of us marching with lulav and esrog in hand, led in prayer by one of the older men, a Rabbi born in Lithuania who had spent the war years in Shanghai… We, the younger set, who spoke less or no Yiddish and still studied for exams and finals, were guests; perhaps frequent ones. For these men, though, the minyan was an integral part of their lives, and if no longer on 185th Street, in other shtiebles elsewhere, these familiar scenes still remain.

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