Chinatown D.C. Can you imagine the Jewish neighborhood that used to be here? Creative commons licensed image by Flickr user shindohd.
On a recent rainy Sunday afternoon, the students in my "Jewish Geography" class and I traipsed around downtown Washington in pursuit of what had once been a thriving Jewish neighborhood.
Seventh Street, we were told by our knowledgeable and affable guide, David McKenzie of the Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington, the sponsor of our walking tour, had long ago been the hub, perhaps even the spine, of D.C.'s Jewish community. But between the looming presence of the Verizon Center and the clamoring presence of a Quiznos on the one hand and a striking array of Chinese signage on the other, our imaginations had to work overtime to visualize the modest storefronts and homes owned and lived in by the Behrends and the Cohens, the Dodeks and the Smalls.
Were it not for a number of synagogues on our tour – or, more precisely still, former synagogues turned churches, whose stained glass windows and exterior markings still bear the faintest traces of Jewish stars – I suspect that many in our merry band of walkers in the city would have been hard put to believe Mr. McKenzie. Essentially, we were asked to take it on faith that once upon a time, downtown had been a Jewish enclave.
As we made our way up one decidedly contemporary street and down another, what did my students, who hailed from California and Florida, Ohio and Tennessee, make of this exercise in conjuring up the past? Did it frustrate them? Awaken an appetite for historical sleuthing or extinguish it altogether? More pointedly still, were they saddened by the disappearance of what had once been a vibrant community or did they take it in stride, as an inevitable consequence of change?
They responded to these questions in different ways. Several students spoke of how the neighborhood's Jewish presence managed, somehow, to peek through the scrim of Chinatown. Others rued the fact that what had once been alive was now contained in a history museum. And still others embraced change as the one constant in modern life.
What united these disparate answers was a growing awareness that history lessons can be found on the street as well as in the classroom.
