“Great Opportunities for the Many of Small Means”: New Jersey's Agricultural Colonies^*

* The author thanks Charles Geisler, Rachel Golden, Sarajane Milder, Frank Popper, Nicholas Popper, Michael Siegel, Lyn Slome, Peter Wacker, the Geographical Review editors, and anonymous reviewers for their comments, interest, and technical help.

Abstract

Pogroms in the Russian Pale in 1881 set off a wave of immigration of Russian Jews to the United States. Most went to the cities, but an important group, with the support of philanthropic organizations, became part of an experiment in Jewish agricultural colonies. South Jersey's Alliance and Woodbine were the most successful. Both were established on undeveloped land, and the landscape that emerged suggests the importance the funders placed on using landscape as a means of Americanization.

• Jewish agricultural colonies
• New Jersey
• Russian Jewish migration

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Notes on contributors

Deborah E. Popper

Dr. Popper is an associate professor of geography at the College of Staten Island, City University of New York, Staten Island, New York 10314, and a visiting associate professor at the Princeton Environmental Institute, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey 08540.