The scene began to change when, in 1848, the Jews of Germany were oppressed to the point where tens of thousands were forced to flee their homeland, most of them coming to America--the New World--the world of great promise.
Then, between 1881 and 1900, the dire plight of the Jews of Eastern Europe--particularly those in Poland, Rumania, Hungary, and Lithuania--led to a stampede of emigration, the result being that some 600,000 newcomers settled in the United States.
With each major shift of population, the quality of Jewish life in America and the character of Jews living there began to change. But all these harried, persecuted, and plundered people, whose beginnings in the "Golden Land" were marked by the direst poverty, gave to American Jewish humor its warmth, its deep compassion, and its joyful optimism.
Featured between the pages of this volume by Henry D. Spalding, author of the renowned Encyclopedia of Jewish Humor (a classic in its own right), are the very best stories, anecdotes, and witticisms that have been told by and about Jews since they first set foot on American shores.
Here are the classics, the amusing tales and jokes that are guaranteed to delight not only because they are wonderfully funny and familiar, but because they recapture the spirit of a fun-loving people who struggled against all odds to make good in a new land.
Classic Jewish Humor in America sparkles with wit and drollery, qualities that have been the hallmark of Jewish humor throughout the centuries. Henry D. Spalding's extraordinary compilation is not only laugh-inducing, but it is a marvelous social document that vividly recaptures the flavor of the Jewish world of yesterday.
