Erste Wielkie-Oczer Landsmanshaft

From wherever they came, Jewish immigrants to the United States established social organizations to help them get by the loneliness and difficult times that often greeted them in America. These associations, societies or landsmanshaftn evolved over time and served many purposes, not the least of which was to provide health and burial benefits.

What motivated these immigrants was perhaps best summed up by the American professor and author Irving Howe in his World of Our Fathers when he wrote:

"While the Jews seldom felt much loyalty to Russia or Poland as nations, they brought with them fierce affections for the little places they had lived in, the muddy streets, battered synagogues, remembered fields from which they had fled. The landsmanshaft, a lodge made up of persons coming from the same town or district in the old country, was their ambiguous testimony to a past they knew to be wretched yet often felt to be sweet."

[Howe, Irving: World of Our Fathers, Shocken Books, New York , 1989, pages 183-184]

On October 24, 1903 the Erste Wielkie-Oczer K.U.V. (Kranken Untershtitsn Varayn) was founded by landsleit from Wielkie Oczy to—among other things, we must assume—provide its members with the wherewithal to overcome illness and the means to have a proper Jewish burial. Thus, in February, 1904 the society purchased graves at the Mt. Zion Cemetery (Path 34 right, Gate 17) in Maspeth, NY. Later, more graves were purchased at the Mt. Hebron Cemetery (Section 36, Path 11) in Flushing, New York, and still later additional graves were purchased at Beth Israel Memorial Park (Block 10B) in Woodbridge, New Jersey

In 1998 and in 2001 separate surveys were completed of all headstones at Mt. Zion and at Mt. Hebron. Names, birth dates and death dates have been recorded.

In order to respect the privacy of families whose Wielkie Oczy forebears are buried at Mt. Zion and Mt. Hebron, we list here only family names. More detailed information from the aforementioned survey can be provided to family researchers on request.

According to the records of the New York State Department of Insurance, the Erste Wielkie-Oczer K.U.V. ceased to exist and was liquidated on August 29, 1984. At Mt. Zion an elaborate stone archway marks the entrance to the society's section (pictured above), and at Mt. Hebron stone gate-posts (one of which is pictured below) stand at the entrance to the section of the graves of Wielkie Oczy landsleit and their families along with the headstones of those buried there. Those names etched in the stone gate-posts, perhaps the names of officers at the time the posts were erected at Mt. Hebron, are reproduced below:

Erste Wielkie-Oczer K.U.V. Org. October 24, 1903
Moishe Hauben	Jacob Sanzberg
Meier Rosenblitt	Sime Bogen
Feivel Beer	Fishel Steinberg
Shmil Seiman	Feige Rauch
Moishe Simon	David Steinbruch
Moishe Dichtler	Serel Samberg
Moishe Bauer	Reise Hauben
Shimon Sambal	Eliezer Gottlieb
Meier Gottlieb	Leib Rauch
Hersh Mordechai Bleiberg	Hersh Wolf Meltzer
Mordechai Baruch Bogen	Bennie Goldman
Eidel Bleiberg	Leib Seltzer
Joseph Miller

The Erste Wielkie-Oczer K.U.V. Landsmanshaft