Jewish Suburban Pittsburgh (Indiana, Fox Chapel, Sharpsburg: closing, live in, zip codes)
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You guys have Koch's Deli on Locust Street. Mmmm...corned beef
Famous is where it's at.
Out in Lower Merion, where I grew up, Hymies was pretty good. The only two things I lament about Pittsburgh are the lack of a Jewish deli culture (is Smallman Street the only full-service Jewish deli that remains?), and the far distance from the Jersey Shore. Is there a (relatively) nearby lake where people have summer homes?
You guys have Koch's Deli on Locust Street. Mmmm...corned beef
Koch's has new owners ... it's still there ... but I miss Barry; may he rest in heavenly peace!
BTW, University City here in West Philly is seeing a revival of Jewish community after a long hiatus. Now we have Kol Tzedek congregation on Baltimore Ave. and not one but two Chabad houses near 40th Street.
Koch's has new owners ... it's still there ... but I miss Barry; may he rest in heavenly peace!
BTW, University City here in West Philly is seeing a revival of Jewish community after a long hiatus. Now we have Kol Tzedek congregation on Baltimore Ave. and not one but two Chabad houses near 40th Street.
Is that to accommodate Jewish university students and faculty, or are families starting to move in as well?
Out in Lower Merion, where I grew up, Hymies was pretty good. The only two things I lament about Pittsburgh are the lack of a Jewish deli culture (is Smallman Street the only full-service Jewish deli that remains?), and the far distance from the Jersey Shore. Is there a (relatively) nearby lake where people have summer homes?
Back in the '70s, I knew people who had a house at Conneaut Lake, but that's a long time ago. Squirrel Hill isn't as predominantly Jewish as it was then, at least not predominantly Reform.
The Smallman Street Deli is new, actually. It opened during the '00s. It promotes itself as "Deli the way it used to be," but it isn't. You stand on line, order, and someone brings out your food. It's good, but it's nothing like deli used to be, when there were two (at least) delis in Squirrel Hill, one in Oakland, and one in Shadyside. Of course, you don't have old Jewish waiters (anywhere) the way you used to. The food is essentially good, though they don't have poppy seed bagels.
I find the food at the Bagel Factory on Forbes near Shady acceptable, though I avoid eating there it because it's very noisy. All hard surfaces and speakers in weird places make for unpleasant acoustics. Add one crying child and I'm, like, "Wrap this to go, please."
Legitimate question (and I'd love to hear your answer).
According to the Pittsburgh Jewish population survey someone posted, there are an estimated 5,000 Jews in the North Hills/Fox Chapel. Obviously, they don't ALL live in and around the borough, but I don't think they're scattered all over either.
The North Allegheny area has a surprisingly low Jewish population, and I don't think greater Sewickley is known for its Jews either. You can pretty much count out Ross and Shaler, along with the river towns. I know a few Jews from Hampton, and there's a synagogue in Allison Park, so they probably at least have a modest population. I have no idea about Pine-Richland.
There are 28,727 people living in the Fox Chapel Area School District. I doubt many Jews live in Blawnox or Sharpsburg, so let's subtract them from our grand total. That leaves us with 23,849.
Let's say half of the North Hills Jews live in the Fox Chapel Area. That makes the "wealthy core" 10.5% Jewish, while the District as a whole is 8.7% Jewish. It's a far cry from my my hometown, which was about 1/3, but it's a big enough presence (and there is zero dispute that it's a growing presence) that it would be more than sufficient to meet my needs.
And answer me this: if there are so few Jews in Fox Chapel, why does the school district give off for the Jewish high holidays?
I'm genuinely interested as to what you think (along with anyone else who wants to chime in). I won't attack your integrity if you can answer this question without resorting to stereotypes and near-epithets.
"North Hills"? Um, that is huge and usually Fox Chapel is separate from that term, "North Hills". Lets say it is included in the study, just incase someone felt FC's area is North Hills. Does that include farther up the river, like Harmar, Cheswick, West Deer and beyond. On the other side there is Hampton, Shaler, North Hills, N.A., Quaker Valley, Pine and the list goes on. Lots of people live in the Sewickley area just because they need access to the airport, so I suspect there are all walks there including Jewish people.
If you look at the "North Hills", it is huge. To think 1/2 of the Jewish population lives in Fox Chapel sounds more than silly to me now than before. Why wouldn't someone Jews live in Blawnox or Sharpsburg? Sure seems odd that someone of any faith would not live in either of those areas. I suspect there is about every other religion present in those areas. If there are non, I have a feeling they would be the only religion not present there.
I won't attack your integrity if you can answer this question without resorting to stereotypes and near-epithets.
Seems to me all you have done is attack me. Shocking how aggressive some people can be, but I did give you my answer graciously. Fox Chapel revolves around protestants which is obvious by the largest churches present. The Presbyterian just put on some multimillion dollar addition/renovation, so I don't think they are losing congregation and the Episcopal is very impressive as well. There is another Presbyterian Church in Aspinwall as well as a little Catholic Church. There is a "Center for Jewish Life" in Blawnox, so maybe that is were many are indeed located? I am not sure, but they have a place there. There is a place in Cheswick as well.
Is that to accommodate Jewish university students and faculty, or are families starting to move in as well?
Families are moving into the gentrifying University City District (especially Spruce Hill). My, have I seen changes over the past decade! The university community is served by the on-campus Hillel center and an on-campus Chabad.
Let's not get off topic, this is about the 'Burg, not Philly.
I am acquainted with Rowna, the lady Cantor at Rodeph Shalom (you can hear her sing on YouTube!) ... I wonder were the members of that Shul all live? Squirrel Hill?
As far as I understand it, there are currently three major suburban Jewish epicenters in Allegheny County: Churchill/Wilkins (steadily decreasing since the post-Woodland Hills merger), Mt. Lebanon (stable), and the Fox Chapel Area (rapidly increasing in the past 10 years), with more modest-sized (but still noticeable) communities in Monroeville and Upper St. Clair. Comparatively few seem to hail from the North/West Hills.
Can any natives confirm/deny/supplement my understanding?
Sounds pretty accurate.
Even within the city proper, I think you'd see most of the Jewish population between the rivers and very few north or south.
I went to Langley many a moon ago, and I knew exactly zero Jews that went to my high school. There might have been some I didn't know, but certainly the number of Jewish teachers exceeded the number of Jewish students.
"North Hills"? Um, that is huge and usually Fox Chapel is separate from that term, "North Hills". Lets say it is included in the study, just incase someone felt FC's area is North Hills. Does that include farther up the river, like Harmar, Cheswick, West Deer and beyond. On the other side there is Hampton, Shaler, North Hills, N.A., Quaker Valley, Pine and the list goes on. Lots of people live in the Sewickley area just because they need access to the airport, so I suspect there are all walks there including Jewish people.
If you look at the "North Hills", it is huge. To think 1/2 of the Jewish population lives in Fox Chapel sounds more than silly to me now than before. Why wouldn't someone Jews live in Blawnox or Sharpsburg? Sure seems odd that someone of any faith would not live in either of those areas. I suspect there is about every other religion present in those areas. If there are non, I have a feeling they would be the only religion not present there.
As in most other metro areas, Pittsburgh's Jews are not "scattered." They're concentrated in clusters. The North Hills is huge, but you won't find many Jews in most North Hills municipalities.
By the "North Hills," the study meant everything North of the Allegheny River that was still within Allegheny County--IE, from Springdale to Leetsdale to Marshall to Harrison. I'm clarifying this, because I know individual 'Burghers definitions of the area can and do vary.
I'm going to do make an educated guess of an analysis involving the distribution of the North Hills' ~5,000 Jews. I'll start with the areas I'm fairly sure of (I think my analysis of Fox Chapel is pretty sound as well, but for the sake of argument, I'll save it for the very end).
Right off the bat, we can exclude West Deer, East Deer, Harrison, Fawn, Brackenridge, Springdale, Cheswick, Harmar, Blawnox, Sharpsburg, Etna, Millvale, Avalon, and Bellevue. Pittsburgh's Jews just don't live in towns like these anymore (if they ever did in the first place). These are by far the least Jewish towns in the North Hills. I would be greatly surprised if more than 150 Jews combined lived in these municipalities.
150.
Let's turn next to the North Allegheny area: Marshall, Bradford Woods, Franklin Park, and McCandless. For a higher-income, new money area, the Jewish population is quite spare. Out of the district's ~50,000 people I'm going to guess there's about 750 Jews (and that could very well be generous...).
150 + 750 = 900.
Ross/West View and Shaler proper are more Jewish than the lower-income river towns, but less Jewish than North Allegheny (I dated a girl from Ross, and I happened to be only the second Jew she met). I'll give another generous guess of ~600.
900 + 600 = 1,500.
I am the most sure of these three estimates.
This leaves us with Avonworth, Quaker Valley, Hampton, Pine-Richland, and the one and only Fox Chapel, among which we have 3,900 lucky remaining Jews to distribute.
Avonworth (Ben Avon, Ben Avon Heights, Emsworth, Kilbuck, and Ohio) is probably the least Jewish of the four. It's also very small, with only ~8,500 people, among which there can't be much more than ~100 of the chosen.
1,500 + 100 = 1,600.
Quaker Valley, Hampton, and Pine-Richland are admittedly trickier for me to determine. I haven't spent as much time there and/or have met as many people from there. I also can't just write these areas off as non-Jewish like the river towns.
Hampton is definitely the most Jewish of these three. Outside of the Fox Chapel area, it's the only North Hills municipality with a synagogue. Out of Hampton's ~18,000 people, I'll guess there are 500 Jews.
1,600 + 500 = 2,100.
Pine-Richland is not known for being a Jewish enclave, but like North Allegheny, it's a higher-income, new money area. Of Pine-Richland's ~21,000 people, I will guess that ~250 are Jewish.
2,100 + 250 = 2,350.
This leaves us with Quaker Valley, a small school district made up of a hodgepodge of microscopic municipalities, ranging from the ultra-rich to the working class.
For those who don't know the exact composition of Quaker Valley, it contains (wait for it): Sewickely, Leetsdale, Edgeworth, Glen Osborne, Sewickley Hills, Sewickley Heights, Bell Acres, Hayesville, Glenfield, Leet, and Aleppo. There are 14,000 people living in the district. With a generous estimate of 400 Jews...
2,350 + 400 = 2,750, leaving... you guessed it, 2,250 Jews living in the wealthy core of the Fox Chapel area. That's just a little bit off of the 2,500-person estimate I gave before (right about at 9.4% for the wealthy core, with 7.8% in the district as a whole).
This obviously isn't a scientific survey, but I trust my deductive reasoning enough to say it's a decent ballpark estimate of the Fox Chapel Area's Jewish population. Keep in mind that a population segment of 9% is plenty large enough that if you're looking for it, it'll stand out. It's also small enough that if you don't give it much thought, it'll blend into the woodwork (just some food for thought). You don't seem to interact with many Jews on a regular basis (your last post was refreshingly civil, so I'm trying to state this matter-of-factly, not insultingly) so it's possible that you just don't notice a lot of them.
Last edited by ElijahAstin; 10-20-2011 at 01:10 AM..
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