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6.

EDUCATION AND CULTURE

Education before 1914

For hundreds of years (prior to 1914) education in Drohitchin was based on the kheder. Generations of Drohitchin Jewish boys were educated and trained in the kheder. After finishing the kheder, a certain number of local children also traveled to study in nearby yeshivas. Others continued with their education privately at home. For an extended period of time there were a Jewish religious elementary school and a yeshiva in Drohitchin, and the yeshiva was filled with students from Drohitchin and other places in the surrounding region.

[Photo:] The yeshiva in the Street House of Study. The head of the yeshiva, Rabbi Aharon (seated), Rabbi Eliyahu Velvel Altvarg, Zvi Eisenstein, Shakhna Shamash.

        It should be noted that the percentage of Drohitchin yeshiva students who traveled to study in yeshivas was actually not that large, and was smaller than in neighboring towns. This fact is indicated by the small number of rabbis that Drohitchin produced. Before World War I, there were around a dozen yeshiva students, including some outstanding ones, from Drohitchin in the large yeshivas. However, except for 2 or 3, none of them remained a student, and this fact can probably be attributed to the war. In the inter-war period, the number of local yeshiva students decreased even further. There were only 6 students studying in the yeshivas. It is difficult to understand the reasons why parents in Drohitchin, who had great respect for scholars, didn't send their children to study in the yeshivas. Apparently, studying Torah is a very difficult undertaking. In general, I believe that the reason can be attributed to circumstances; the wealthy children didn't want to have to face eating their meals at the homes of strangers, as was once the usual custom. The poor children were forced to work with craftsmen to help support their families. We really don't have to

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speculate and try to give the benefit of the doubt. The fact is that Drohitchin didn't produce many rabbis in relation to the size of the town. Drohitchin did, however, have fine householders. In general, Drohitchin Jews were considered more advanced than those of nearby towns.

        There were also parents from among the wealthiest residents who sent their children to study in the gymnazia high schools and in university. These were very few, however. There was also an attempt by Russian-Jewish secularists to open a Russian school for Jewish children. The school didn't last long, however, and it closed rather quickly.

        Just before World War I a group of followers of the Enlightenment wanted to open a modern Hebrew school called Yavneh. Naturally, Russian was held in high esteem, and the school looked like it was going to succeed. Many children from town and surrounding towns started studying there. However, the war intervened, and the school was forced to close.

Rabbis, religious and secular teachers

         The well-known rabbis and teachers who educated generations of Jews in Drohitchin were: Chaim Kronstadt, Shimon Appelbaum, the Kaminitzer, and Shmuel Artshes and his son, Hershel Baum. The Talmud instructors were: R. Eliyahu Makhlis Zilbergleit, Mendel Moshe Isser's Kaminetsky, Avraham Shabtai Kapuller, Yosef Shakhat (Yossel Tchernas), Eliezer Adler, R. Moshe Velvel Shkolnick, and others.

        The secular teachers who taught the modernized elementary school classes were: Naftali Steinberg, Yehudah Leib Neiditch (the Reciter), Gedaliah Sacker, Yaakov Sidorov, Sender Shapiro (from Odrezshin), Bezalel Wolfson, Zvi Schwartz and Feigel Steinberg. These are deceased, and the following are still living: Yisrael Baruch Eisenstein, Yisrael Baruch Warshavsky, Todres Leib Milner, Yosef Wasserman, Aharon Kravitsky (from Lekhovitch), Chana Steinberg and others.

[Photo:] The Moriah School. Teachers from right: Moshe Bezdzhesky, R. Asher Weizel, Remz, Goldstein, Wolfson, Kolnick, Feldman et al. 1931.

         Education after World War I

        With the assistance of Drohitchin émigrés in America, a building was constructed in Drohitchin after the First World War to house the Hebrew school, Moriah, which took in almost all the children in town. The educational program was the same as in the government schools, but also offered classes in Yiddish and Hebrew subjects, as well as some Talmud.

        The more religious householders in town weren't entirely satisfied with the

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