After reading Christine Stansell’s “ American Moderns”, I now have a much better understanding of what made “The Village” what it is today. Previously, I had always viewed the start of Bohemian society in New York City as a group of people with radical ideas about sexual orientation, “free love,” anarchism, and many other things that pushed society’s limits. Although this idea was confirmed in Stansell’s work, it also showed that there was more to its beginnings than I had realized. From the beginning Stansell points out that one of the leaders in the early stages of the Bohemian society was Lincoln Steffens, the famous muckraker. Stansell goes on to explain how one of the major early objectives of the Bohemian society was to bring out and improve the rough edges of the cities. One area that was of extreme focus was the Lower East Side, known for being the ghetto of Jewish immigrants in New York City.

This is just the start of the influence that Jews would have on Bohemian society and Greenwich Village. As a Jew myself, (and one that has read a decent, though not extensive amount on Jewish History from the 20^th century on) this was quite a shock to me. I had known that many of the Jews that had come over from Eastern Europe and especially Russia towards the end of the 19^th century were socialists or anarchists. However, I did not comprehend how this would affect the tide of radicals blossoming in N.Y.C. at the time. As Stansell points out, many of these early Bohemian writers and thinkers would spend a lot of time in the Yiddish speaking restaurants and coffeehouses throughout the Lower East Side. Many of these Yiddish speaking Europeans had spent copious amounts of time in their home countries developing their ideas on socialism or anarchism. This made these shops the “go-to” place to hear more about these ideologies in early 20^th century America. The Jewish contribution didn’t stop there. As the Ferrer Center came onto the scene, there was now a way for immigrants to be welcomed and recognized in Bohemian society. The most prominent of these immigrant groups were the Jews. Nonetheless, possibly the greatest Jewish contribution to this culture was Emma Goldman. Taking up a whole chapter in Stansell’s book and appearing in many other places throughout the book, Goldman’s contributions are almost immeasurable. From being “ The face of Bohemian Greenwich Village” to the face of the “New Woman,” Goldman was at the forefront of this movement. Although she didn’t identify with the classical Jewish beliefs, she always stuck to her roots as being a secular, Americanized Jew. This alone was enough to break certain barriers of anti-Semitism that had held Jews out of the Bohemian society, until that time. This seemingly small point, really changed my understanding of the times, as it gave a new face to this movement that I had never seen before.