Unearthing the Past: The Gadol Who Laid the Foundation for Frum Monsey

By Y.M. Lowy

Last week, we explored how Monsey and Spring Valley slowly became fertile ground for Yiddishkeit through the influence of rabbanim, roshei yeshiva, and some pioneer frum families. This week, we get introduced to the tzaddik whose arrival would change the town forever. Long before Monsey became what it is today, one visionary saw its potential and laid the foundation for the thriving community that exists today.

Monsey likely would never have become the place it is known as today without the influence of Harav Hagaon Rabbi Shraga Feivel Mendelowitz zt”l.

Rabbi Shraga Feivel arrived in America after World War I and quickly became one of the most influential builders of Torah life. As the menahel of Yeshiva Torah Vodaas, he helped establish some of the earliest serious yeshivos for bochurim in America, along with one of the first kollelim.

Perhaps most importantly, he founded Torah Umesorah, the organization that would eventually help establish thousands of Jewish schools across America and save generations of Yiddishe children from intermarriage.

The enormous responsibility he carried, however, took a toll on his health. In 1937, after becoming seriously ill, doctors advised him to leave the city and spend time in an area with cleaner mountain air.

Rabbi Shraga Feivel arrived in Spring Valley, then the center of Jewish life in Ramapo, and began searching for a suitable location to establish a yeshiva. His search eventually led him to neighboring Monsey, a quiet rural community where almost no Jews lived at the time.

Standing at the corner of Main Street and Maple Avenue was a beautiful building that Rabbi Shraga Feivel purchased for the sum of $15,000.

But a major obstacle soon emerged. The previous owner, a prominent local landowner known for his antisemitism, had inserted a restriction into the deed stating that the property could not be sold to a Jew.

With great wisdom and determination, Rabbi Shraga Feivel arranged for a friendly non-Jewish intermediary to purchase the building first and then immediately transfer ownership to him. The obstacle was overcome, and the building became the home of Bais Medrash Elyon, which still stands in Monsey today.

Suddenly, Monsey began attracting ehrliche Yidden who wanted to raise their children with the same kind of frum chinuch they remembered from Europe. Over time, Bais Medrash Elyon transformed not only Monsey itself, but the entire Jewish landscape of Ramapo.

Instead of Spring Valley remaining the main Jewish center, Monsey slowly became the new heart of Torah life in the area.

Bais Medrash Elyon produced outstanding talmidei chachamim across both the Litvishe and Chassidishe worlds. 

But Monsey was still a small and largely undeveloped village, and its first frum residents lived with genuine mesiras nefesh. There were no kosher supermarkets, no established infrastructure, and few conveniences. Anyone wanting chalav Yisroel would walk directly to one of the local farms and milk the cows themselves.

From those humble beginnings, the foundations of today’s Monsey were built.

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. As 2026 marks 50 years since the 1976 reopening, Monsey is once again drawing closer to revisiting that historic moment.