Unearthing the Past: How Torah Life Slowly Took Root in Monsey

By Y.M. Lowy

In the last article, we explored the roots that shaped Rabbi Yudel Weberman and the early “Malachim” movement in America. This week, we turn to the years before Monsey became a major Torah community, tracing how the quiet towns of Monsey and Spring Valley slowly transformed from summer vacation destinations into what it is today.

At the time of Monsey’s famous Bicentennial time capsule ceremony, there were still very few frum Yidden living in the area. In earlier decades, a small number of Jewish immigrants from Europe had settled throughout Ramapo, mainly concentrating in nearby Spring Valley, where several Jewish-owned factories and businesses began taking root.

Between the two World Wars, Spring Valley and Monsey became known among American Yidden mainly for their summer bungalow colonies and hotels.

The fresh mountain air and country atmosphere attracted families escaping the heat and congestion of New York City. Over time, dozens of hotels and bungalow colonies opened throughout the area. Some offered kosher food and even had small shuls right on the grounds.

“To give an example,” recalled Reb Shmuel Yitzchak Weberman, “the property where the Vizhnitz Talmud Torah building Vilchovitz stands today was once a bungalow colony owned by a man named Louis Schwartz. There was a large swimming pool there, and Friday afternoons were reserved only for men. The street Phyllis Terrace was named after his daughter. When the frum Yidden began arriving in Monsey, he gladly gave over one of the buildings from the colony to be used as a shul.”

Among the Yidden who spent summers in the area during those years was the famed Malach, Harav Hagaon Rav Chaim Avraham Dov Ber Levine zt”l, the rebbi of Rabbi Yudel Weberman.

Surrounded by the mountains, trees, and quiet countryside of Spring Valley, the Malach immersed himself in intense avodas Hashem. Those who witnessed his davening described an intense hisorerus that stirred many hearts and inspired many to do teshuvah.

Reb Shmuel Yitzchak shared another remarkable story from those early years.

When the first frum families settled in Spring Valley between the World Wars, they hired a respected talmid chacham named Rabbi Yoshe Ber Soloveitchik zt”l to serve as rav. His shul, Kehillas Yisroel on Old Nyack Turnpike, founded in 1930, still stands today.

Rabbi Yoshe Ber was the son of Rabbi Simcha Soloveitchik, the youngest son of the Beis Halevi of Brisk. Rabbi Simcha had fled the harsh persecutions of Czarist Russia and eventually settled in Williamsburg, where he became rav of the Keap Street shul. Despite the pressures of American life at the time, Rabbi Simcha remained unwavering in his standards of Torah and Yiddishkeit.

Rabbi Simcha also learned regularly with the Malach. The Malach once said about him, “He is a greater talmid chacham than I am. He could repeat entire pieces of Shas by heart as though he had learned them today.”

Rabbi Yoshe Ber brought that same seriousness and devotion to the fledgling Spring Valley kehilla. At a time when there were barely enough Jewish families in town to sustain mosdos, his rebbetzin founded the local Bais Yaakov high school, which continues operating through her descendants to this day.

Years later, when the gaon and tzaddik Rabbi Mordechai Schwab zt”l moved to Monsey, he once asked Rabbi Yoshe Ber why Monsey’s frum community had grown so successfully.

Rabbi Yoshe Ber answered with a striking response: “My father, Rabbi Simcha, learned together with the Malach. Every summer they came here to Spring Valley for rest. They prepared the ground.”

According to family recollections, when the Malach would leave the area at the end of the summer and see the many leaves covering the roads, he would remark: “As many leaves as there are here, that is how many Yiddishe families will one day live here.”

Today, as neighborhoods continue expanding in every direction, many residents see those words as a remarkable prophecy fulfilled before their eyes.

In the years that followed, other prominent tzaddikim and Torah leaders also passed through Monsey and Spring Valley, leaving their spiritual imprint on the growing community. Among them was the Ribnitzer Rebbe zy”a, known throughout the Yiddishe world as a poel yeshuos.

One story tells of the Ribnitzer attending a wedding at Singer’s Hotel, one of the last remaining Jewish hotels in Spring Valley. Upon entering the building, the Rebbe suddenly stopped, inhaled deeply, and declared: “One can smell Torah here.”

Those accompanying him were puzzled. The hotel at the time was not especially religious. 

Only years later did people understand the meaning behind his words, when the building was purchased for Yeshivas Noam Elimelech Lizhensk, where Torah learning continues to fill the halls today.

Another famous local hotel still standing today is the former Monsey Park Hotel. Its owner, Reb Yosef Rubinfeld, was himself an ehrlicher Yid and served for a period as president of Yeshiva of Spring Valley. A terrible tragedy struck the hotel on Erev Pesach 1965, when a fire broke out while many guests were staying there for Yom Tov. Two women tragically lost their lives in the blaze.

Today, however, the property has taken on a very different role. The complex now belongs to the Satmar Kehilla and houses both the central beis medrash of Kehillas Yitav Lev D’Satmar as well as the Talmud Torah Hachadash.

In the weeks and months ahead, Rockland Daily’s “Unearthing the Past” series will continue exploring the people, places, memories, and hidden stories connected to Monsey’s historic time capsule, preserving the history that helped shape Monsey into the town it is today.