From: The Long Laker, Spring 2018, Ancramdale, NY.

Jewish Farmers?!
In Sharon and Amenia??!!
by Bobbie Slonevsky

Who’d a thunk it? Farming is not an Western Russia (which included Poland and
occupation generally associated with the Ukraine at the time) called the Pale of
Jewish people Settlement. They
(outside of Israel, lived in small
anyway)—with villages, or “shtetls,”
good reason. under notoriously
Throughout the harsh restrictions: in
medieval period, addition to not being
Jews in Russia allowed to own land
and Europe were in what was an
largely prohibited agrarian society,
from engaging in they could not leave
agriculture and the area without
owning land. permission; they
They were mostly could not go to big
consigned, cities; except for a
instead, to minuscule minority,
frowned-upon they were not
livelihoods such Anna and daughters Etta and Rose Marcus haying. Photo allowed a university
as money- credit: Marcus Family. education; and they
lending, tax were responsible for
collecting and peddling. At best they might conscripting a certain number of their boys
have been cobblers or tailors. 12 and over for a 25-year tour of duty in the
Czar’s army. As difficult as life was, it became
So how did they turn up milking cows and even more difficult when Czar Alexander II
tilling the land in our geographic backyard? was assassinated in 1881. Though the
That was the fascinating story told by Sharon culprits were a
resident and writer Carol Ascher during her trio of
Nathan and Rebecca Osofsky with
talk at the Pine Plains Free Library this past revolutionaries, Freda, Annie and Ida. Photo credit:
December. the era’s “fake Norman Osofsky.
news” blamed
Ascher first became interested in this little- the Jews, and
known piece of history when she heard a the
number of different neighbors claim that “This government
farm was owned by a Jew.” Consulting the unleashed a
Sharon Historical Society land records, she campaign of
found that between 1907 and 1925, some 30 murderous
Jewish families had bought property in the pogroms
Ellsworth hills, a high and stony area against them
between Sharon and Cornwall Bridge on both that lasted
sides of what is now Route 4. Next to the well into the
mortgage information for more than half the 20th century.
farms was the curious notation “JAIAS.”
Further research was in order. Somehow,
around two
Most Jews in Russia—our immigrant farmers’ million of the
country of origin, the speaker learned—were five million
confined to a legally defined district in residents of

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the Pale managed to flee—some to Palestine
and many more to the Americas. The latter
group made their way to such ports as
Bremen and Hamburg, where they booked
passage in steerage. Those headed for the
U.S. generally ended up on the Lower East
Side of New York living in airless,
overcrowded tenements, and working in
miserably oppressive sweat shops.
Two developments were instrumental in
advancing this story. First was the almost
ironic movement within the Pale of
Settlement that theorized a solution to
discrimination against Jews: they should
become farmers so that they would be like
everyone else. The second was the
sympathy of a Jewish-Belgian railroad
magnate, Baron Maurice de Hirsch.
Becoming aware of the Jews’ plight, de
Hirsch first tried to intercede with the Russian
government to secure more equitable
treatment for them. When this fell on deaf
ears, he dedicated a good portion of his
fortune toward helping the Pale’s refugees
make the journey from shtetl to New World.
Even more to the point, his Fund founded the
Jewish Agricultural and Industrial Aid Society
—note its abbreviation: JAIAS—that provided
mortgage assistance to Lower East Side
Jews so that they could buy their dreamed-of
farmland in the U.S. and Canada.
Farms and mortgage availability were
advertised in Der Forward (The Forward), the
iconic Yiddish daily read by Jewish
immigrants. Would-be Jewish farmers fanned
out over the entire country, most notably in
New York, New Jersey, Connecticut,
Massachusetts, Illinois, Michigan, and even
Woodbine Agricultural (Dairy) School. Photo
credit: Sam Azeez Museum of Woodbine Heritage.
the Far West. As it turns out, the Ellsworth/
Sharon area was served by the New York
Central Railroad, which made stops in
Amenia and Sharon Station—an easy
excursion from the Lower East Side to check
out the agricultural properties on offer.
Many of the newbie farmers ran dairy farms.
But, as speaker Ascher pointed out, what did
they know about selecting cattle or feed?
What did any of the farmers know about
buying machinery or planting seed? And
those weren’t the only problems. For the
most part, the soil in the Ellsworth hills, stony
and of poor quality, was unsuited to grazing.
What’s more, it was an era when big
commercial enterprises had already begun
competing with small subsistence farms.
JAIAS made every effort to respond. It set up
support bureaus, issued farm credit when
needed, provided on-site educational visits,
and established an agricultural school in
Woodbine, NJ, to teach career farming to the
immigrants’ children. It also founded the first
Yiddish agricultural publication in the world:
The Jewish Farmer monthly.
The families managed to eke out a living. But
it was a hardscrabble life. A number of them
supplemented their meager incomes by
taking on other work. Nathan Osofsky (see
sidebar, p. 3) bought a small farm about a
mile off what is now route 4 so that wife
Rebecca could offer rooms and kosher board
to New York City Jews wanting a vacation.
Barnet Shoifet, who had been a rabbi in
Russia, became a ritual (kosher) slaughterer,
while the Gorkofskys and the Temkins turned
to cattle-trading.
Educating their
children was of
great
importance to
these new
citizens.
Indeed, the
schooling leap
made by the
next
generation
was
astonishing.
While some
The first Yiddish agricultural !2
publication in the world. Photo
credit: Jewish Historical Society
of Greater Hartford.

remained farmers, many of them earned
advanced degrees, becoming dentists,
pharmacists, teachers, social workers,
accountants, etc. There was even a doctor
and veterinarian among them. However, it
was the simple desire for a secondary school
education that led to a dramatic shift in the
Ellsworth community—a wholesale migration
to Amenia.
Louis Temkin in center selling horses. Photo credit:
Temkin family.
Amenia Union school bus. A similar bus served
Ellsworth children. Photo credit: Sharon Historical
Society.
Little Freda Osofsky had been only four years
old when she came to the U.S. Some ten
years later, when she had graduated from her
one-room Ellsworth schoolhouse and was
ready to enter ninth grade, Sharon High
School wouldn’t allow her to enroll. So her
parents looked to Amenia. As the family was
already running a boarding house, and
Amenia was closer to the railroad, they
The Osofskys:
Ronnybrook Farm Dairy*
In 1907, brothers Mendel (Max) and Nathan
Ososka purchased 178 acres in Ellsworth with
the help of JAIAS. The two families, changing
their name to Osofsky, lived and farmed
together for about a year. Max then bought his
brother out, and eventually Nathan used the
proceeds to purchase 50 acres fairly close by.
Wife Rebecca was the one who launched a
boarding house, although they also kept cows
and chickens for eggs, and grew grain and
garden vegetables. By 1915, with two daughters
in Amenia High School, the family sold the
boarding house in Ellsworth to trade up to a
hotel in Amenia, sparking an eventual exodus of
their co-religionists along with them.
Rebecca continued to run the Hotel Grand
House, as it was known, until she was in her
seventies. Her goals were to provide her four
daughters with the training necessary to teach,
and to set up each of her four sons with a farm
—all of which she achieved. Today her
grandsons, brothers Ronny and Rick Osofsky,
run the extremely successful Ronnybrook Dairy
on Prospect Hill Road in Ancramdale. They
attribute their success to strategy: when
consolidation of the milk business threatened,
they decided to control the entire process.
Beginning in the 1990s, they have grown their
own feed, processed and distributed their own
milk, and have added another milk product
(yogurt, butter, crème fraîche, sour cream, ice
cream and drinkable yogurt) to their line every
couple of years.
The Paleys:
Paley’s Farm Market & Nursery*
Max and Ida Paley, already advanced in years,
came to Ellsworth in 1915, not to farm, but to
buy the boarding house that Rebecca Osofsky
had already developed. It was the following
three generations that took to farming. In fact,
the Paleys (along with the Osofskys) were
among the few Russian-Jewish families who
actually fell in love with farming.
Grandson Morris owned and farmed a 25-acre
parcel. Today, that land is occupied by his son
Charlie, who, with the help of his sister Sarah,
runs Paley’s Farm Market & Nursery located on
the Amenia Road (Route 343) in Sharon. There,
Charlie sells vegetables and plants that he
grows himself, as well as those supplied by
other regional growers. His greenhouses
provide a wide variety of annuals, perennials,
bushes and trees, and his garden center offers
tools, pots and fertilizers. Charlie’s and Sarah’s
children are also now involved in the operation.
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Old wooden Amenia High School that operated until
1928. Photo credit: Amenia Historical Society.
bought a hotel in that town. Pretty soon,
leaving behind the anti-Semitism that
characterized Sharon at the time, other
families followed. By 1929, almost all of the
Jewish farm families in Ellsworth had moved
to Amenia and were running boarding
houses, “kochaleins” (rooming houses with a
common kitchen where boarders did their
own cooking), hotels and resorts. In fact,
according to speaker Ascher, although
Paleys and Osofskys continued to farm in the
richer valleys around Pine Plains and
Amenia, most of the original settlers were no
longer farmers.
Unlike Sharon, the mostly Irish-Catholic
population of Amenia embraced their new
neighbors. In 1929, the Jews of Amenia were
able to raise enough money to build a
synagogue. Once Congregation Beth David
(still in operation) was a physical reality,
Jewish roots and enterprise seemed to gain
momentum. Members of the community
founded the local pharmacy, theater and
department store, all of which survived within
recent memory. While Long Lakers are
probably not familiar with most of the
Amenia-based names connected to these
The Arnoffs:
Arnoff Moving and Storage*
In 1918, Abraham and Molly Arnoff arrived in
Lakeville. Molly was actually the only Arnoff
ever to have farmed; she bought a cow and
earned money by selling cottage cheese.
Husband Abraham became a peddler, filling his
wagon with an assortment of goods that he
sold to local farmers. One day they found the
windows and doors of their house broken in,
with a sign that read: “Go Home Jews.”
Undeterred, they simply repaired the house and
persevered, making a life for themselves in the
Lakeville community.
In 1924, son Louis purchased a truck and
added transporting to his father’s peddling
business. He transported furniture, cattle or
anything else that needed to be moved. From
that humble beginning, Arnoff Moving and
Storage has become a household name. The
family business is now run by the fifth
generation of Arnoffs, boasting almost 100
trucks, 200 employees, and almost a million
square feet of warehouse space in Lakeville,
Millerton, Poughkeepsie, Saratoga Springs and
Fort Pierce, Florida.
*This information, supplemental to Carol Ascher’s
talk, is based on the book cited below.
enterprises, other names of the original farm
families do still resonate today (see
sidebars). They are the echoes of a faded,
but defining, chapter in the history of our
region.
Editor’s note: This story began as an exhibit at the
Sharon Historical Society (October, 2016–April,
2017). It has since become a permanent exhibit at
Congregation Beth David on Route 343 in Amenia
and the subject of a book: Ascher, Carol. A
Chance for Land and Fresh Air: Russian Jewish
Immigrants in Sharon and Amenia 1907–1940.
The Sharon Historical Society, 2017.
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