Unlike some of their Russian counterparts, who greeted the Jewish influx into Kiev with suspicion and even hostility, Jewish newspapers reflected, with wonder and pride, the perception that Jews were settling in great numbers throughout Kiev. As early as 1863, an observer in the Hebrew press exulted that no Jew had entered the city for so long, and now "many Jews can be found throughout its neighborhoods and on all its hills."92 A historian of the Kiev Jewish community claimed that the authorities did not closely scrutinize the legality of all Jewish migrants in the early years because it was well-known that their economic activities were of benefit to the city.93 Nonetheless, Jews—especially maskilim concerned with Jews' image within Russian society—were sensitive to the accusations being made against them, and Alexander Tsederbaum, the editor of the Hebrew weekly Ha-melits and its Yiddish supplement Kol mevaser, warned those settling in Kiev "that they should strive to be good citizens [birger] and to find useful occupations."94
The exaggerations on both sides were, as is often the case, rooted in reality. Jewish merchants had done well in the city over a short period of time, and soon threatened the once-dominant Great Russian merchantry.95 As early as 1869, Jews made up three-quarters of all first-guild merchants, though less than 10 percent of the total of all merchants, both first and second guild. While it was clear that Jews were registering in the first guild in order to obtain greater privileges, in the eyes of many contemporaries the situation decreased the prestige of both the merchantry and the city as a whole. The proportion of Jewish first-guild merchants continued to rise, reaching 85 percent by the mid-1890s, when Jews made up over half of all Kiev merchants.96
It was sugar, refined from the sugar beets that grew in the soil around Kiev, that generated most of the city's wealth and created the wealthiest Jews in Kiev. Starting in the 1840s, a handful of enterprising Jews began moving from their traditional niche as middlemen for agricultural products; instead, they began to finance the growing sugar industry in the southwest region. Contracts between Jewish backers and the (usually Polish) nobles frequently gave the former a fixed percentage of the profits from the venture and granted them even some control over production. Jewish financiers could also acquire leases on sugar refineries, which in effect was but a short step from outright ownership.97 Men such as Israel Brodsky and lonna Zaitsev, two of the earliest Jewish entrepreneurs in the sugar industry, were pioneers in the burgeoning field, helping to develop markets for sugar and introducing new technologies into every step of the cultivation, refining, and marketing processes. By 1872, at least one-eighth of all sugar production in the Russian Empire was in Jewish hands. In order to get around the Temporary Laws of 1882, which placed heavy restrictions on Jewish ownership and leasing of land in the Pale of Settlement, the sugar industrialists simply converted their enterprises into joint-stock companies, which were not subject to the Temporary Laws. The Jewish sugar barons, chief among them Brodsky, played a central role in expanding the market for sugar in the empire; Brodsky pioneered the establishment of marketing agencies and storage warehouses throughout European Russia, the Caucasus, Siberia, and Central Asia, and made "Brodsky's Sugar" a household word from Tiflis to Bukhara to Vladivostok. Brodsky, Zaitsev, Moisei Gal’perin, and others also brought Russian sugar to Persia, Norway, and Western Europe. Christian sugar industrialists such as the Tereshchenkos and Bobrinskiis often operated on a much larger scale than their Jewish counterparts but were not as heavily involved in the marketing side of the business. This had important consequence for Kiev's economy—first in the annual Contract Fair, where both sugar and Jews played central roles, and after 1873 at the Kiev Exchange, which was dominated by the buying and selling of various sugar-related notes and securities, mostly by Jews. Genrikh Sliozberg claimed that Jewish entrepreneurs played a key role in forging a sense of solidarity and common purpose among the ethnically diverse provinces of the southwest; as members of a disinterested party, they were able to build bridges and create alliances (sglazhivat’) where others could not.98
Of all of Kiev's Jewish plutocrats, the Brodsky name was the most celebrated, known among Jews and non-Jews throughout the Russian Empire. The family, originally from Brody in Galicia, had settled in the small town of Zlatopol in Kiev province in the early nineteenth century. One of five sons, Israel Brodsky (1823-88) began to invest in the emerging sugar industry in the 1840s. He began by leasing and managing sugar refineries, and eventually owned an array of plants through the southwest, including a refinery in Demievka (near Lybed) that was one of the largest factories in Kiev. Brodsky himself moved to Kiev in 1876; at its height, his "sugar empire" would control a quarter of the sugar production in the Russian Empire.99 His sons Lazar’ and Lev (also known as Leon, he had started out in Odessa but, after experiencing business losses there, moved to his father's house in Kiev)100 extended the family's holdings into other areas such as milling; Kiev's Brodsky wheat mill was the largest in the city. Their cousin Alexander was also a leading figure in the economy of Kiev and its region. There were other Jewish sugar barons as well—Gal’perin, Zaks, and Lieberman—while other Kiev Jewish entrepreneurs such as David Margolin made fortunes from other sectors such as shipping on the Dnepr and milling.101
Like the Gintsburgs of St. Petersburg, with whom they would eventually be linked through marriage, the Brodskys donated huge sums to Jewish philanthropic causes, "were well-informed sponsors of Hebrew culture in the spirit of the Haskalah, and became active spokesmen on behalf of the empire's Jews. Prominent maskilim. . . were employed as tutors, secretaries, and librarians in their household."102 Lazar’ Brodsky, whom Genrikh Sliozberg called "a man of enormous initiative," was known as the "king of Kiev Jewry," and maintained close personal relationships with all the governors-general of the southwest region.103 "The Bible starts with the letter beys [B] — for 'Breyshis' [Genesis], and Yehupets, you should excuse the comparison, also starts with beys—for the Brodskys,” wrote Sholem aleichem of the city's most celebrated Jewish family in one of Kiev's short-lived yiddish newspapers (Yehupets was the yiddish writer's name for Kiev, probably a play on the Russian word for Egypt, Yegipet, or, in its south-Russian or Ukrainian pronunciation, Yehipet).104
These wealthy Jews maintained a high profile in the city. after the Senate ruled that Jewish first-guild merchants were permitted to purchase real estate anywhere in the city, they immediately began to do so, especially in the most elegant neighborhoods, building opulent mansions on the plots.105 Six members of the Brodsky family sat on the board of the Kiev Industrial Bank, leading Kievlianin to note dryly that the bank should be called the "Brodsky Family Bank.”106 A writer in a Jewish newspaper proudly noted that Jews were counted among the most honored citizens of Kiev, relating that two sons of Israel were among the invitees to a gala hosted by the Governor-General and were even provided with kosher food.107
While greater attention was often paid to the richest Jews, many more struggled to make a living in various small-scale commerce ventures. In 1874, almost as many Jews made their living from trade of some kind as did in industry and crafts, and one-third were petty traders. In that year, about one-fifth of Kiev's petty traders were Jews, and a good number of them were probably women, since three-quarters of all Kiev petty traders were female.108 Some Jewish women probably came to Kiev on their own; Kiev province had one of the highest rates of divorce among Jews in the Pale of Settlement, and "many Jewish divorcees migrated to the city because they had often been associated with their husband's occupation in their hometown, and divorce deprived them of both income and employment.”109
Apparently, many Jewish traders were officially registered as clerks to Jewish merchants, so as to avoid having to pay the expensive duties required for taking out a guild license and becoming a member of the merchantry.110 But many others were unable or unwilling to take even this step; when the police wanted to inspect a large number of Jews who were likely to be lacking any permit authorizing them to do business in Kiev, they checked papers at the city's markets.111 According to the 1874 census, even more Jews were engaged in retail trade than in petty trade: 42 percent of all Jews employed in some form of trade were owners or employees in Kiev stores; this group was equal to 25 percent of all Kievans in retail trade.112 The journalist Starozhil remembered that, in the 1880s, many of Kiev's Jewish-owned stores were concentrated on aleksandrovskaia Street in Podol, and they all sold readymade clothing; competition was such that "they practiced a form of forcible recruiting" of customers that made it difficult to walk down the street.113
In 1864, one year before Jewish artisans were permitted to settle outside the Pale and in cities like Kiev, there were 7,200 artisans in Kiev. Ten years later, that number had grown by two-thirds, to 12,000, much of it probably due to Jewish migration.114 Of Jews employed in crafts and industry in 1874, almost 70 percent were involved in some aspect of the garment trade; the 629 Jewish tailors and seamstresses made up one-fifth of all such artisans. Another 11 percent of Jews in handicrafts and manufacturing were in the tobacco and cigarettes industry, constituting 5 5 percent of laborers in that field; according to anecdotal reports, many were young women. Significant percentages of Jews also made livings from smithing and metalworking, tavernkeeping and distilling, and furniture-making and carpentering.115 Women formed a substantial portion of artisans (17 percent in 1874), working mostly in the ladies' garment and food industries.116 At times the police was apparently unsure how to handle cases in which a wife, working as an artisan, had the right to reside in Kiev while her husband, a lawyer or agent, did not.117
It seems that those Jews who entered the city on false premises most often did so to engage in petty commerce or the liquor trade—in retail sale of alcohol or tavern-keeping. Kiev had an inordinate number of liquor establishments (about 800, or one for every 112 adults, in 1874),118 and many were run by Jews. This was a natural way for Jews to make a living, since distilling and the keeping of public houses had been traditional Jewish occupations in the formerly Polish lands that constituted Russia's western provinces.119 Kiev's port area, also heavily Jewish, was especially overrun by pubs; Kiev-lianin's claim that, on some streets, almost all the liquor traders were Jews must be taken with a grain of salt, but nonetheless suggests the extent of the Jewish share of the alcohol trade.120 That taverns provided a steady source of income, for women as well as men, is demonstrated by a divorce case in 1865 in which the ex-husband declared that he had established a tavern in Kiev for his estranged wife to serve as a kind of alimony.121 Jews were the majority of owners of alcohol-trading businesses of one kind or another: 112 of 195, or 57 percent.122 The 1874 census probably did not count thegandel’shchiki, a Russian term that incorporated the Yiddish word for trade (handel) to refer, in all likelihood, to small-scale liquor dealers who, according to Kievlianin, were corrupting the simple people.123 An 1874 law attempted to limit Jewish participation in the liquor trade throughout the Russian Empire by permitting Jews to sell alcohol only "in their own homes" (the meaning of the phrase was ambiguous); two years later, however, Kievlianin complained that the trade in Kiev was, in actuality, still in the hands of Jews, despite nominal changes in the ownerships of taverns and other such establishments.124 Of those Jewish victims of the 1881 pogrom who declared an occupation on their applications for aid, 10 percent worked as tavern-keepers.125
Another visibly Jewish segment of the workforce were the cabmen and carters who transported passengers and cargo throughout the city; they served a particularly important role in Kiev, where the railway had never been extended to the port, necessitating a ground transportation link between the two depots.126 The 1874 census actually listed a separate category of drayman called balaguly, from the Yiddish word balagole, wagon-driver or coachman; this term was used in the Russian south and southwest to refer to the wagons driven by Jews that carried passengers and light cargo inexpensively within and especially between cities and towns. Though the balaguly were, of course, all Jewish, there were Jews among the other categories of carters as well. Their visibility made them particularly vulnerable to expulsion, since most did not have Kiev residence permits; they were among the Jewish groups expelled in 1886, and in 1891 they were singled out to be the only group expelled.127
Jews, who had only recently begun to attend institutions of higher learning, were represented in small but growing numbers in the professions. Of sixteen attorneys authorized to practice before the Justices of the Peace of Kiev Region in 1874, four (and possibly five) were Jews; Kievlianin, of course, complained about the increasing number of Jewish attorneys and their dishonest practices.128 The number of Jewish doctors was on the rise, and in 1874, a total of 28 of the city's 182 midwives, or 15 percent, were Jewish women.129
Kiev's most illustrious Jewish physician was the ophthalmologist Max Emmanuel Mandel’shtam (Mandelstamm) (1838-1912). Nephew of the maskilim Benjamin and Leon Mandel’shtam, Max attended Dorpat University and then received additional training in Germany. Settling in Kiev upon his return to Russia, Mandel’shtam served as docent at St. Vladimir University, which he left in 1880 when the university would not grant him a chair because of his Jewishness. He opened an ocular clinic in 1879, where he would often treat poor Jews at low cost or even for free; Yekhezkel Kotik remembered that "poor Jews streamed to him from all regions and corners."130 In the 1870s, Mandel’shtam played a leading role in the Kiev Jewish Student Fund, forerunner of the Kiev branch of the Society for the Dissemination of the Enlightenment Among the Jews of Russia (known by its Russian initials as the OPE). This was a natural role for him, and he became a prominent activist in the Higher Education Division of the OPE.131 Indeed, Mandel’shtam was known not only among Jews in the Russian Empire but also across Europe; the Jewish Chronicle described him in 1880 as "Dr. Mandelstamm, the eminent Jewish savant well known in London."132 Jonathan Frankel writes, "In the crisis of 1881-2 Mandel’shtam was to emerge as a highly articulate spokesman and effective organizer."133 In later years he would become a leading figure in the Zionist movement and then in the territorialist movement.
Work was available in Kiev, but life was not easy. In fact, between 1867 and 1886, prices went up by one-third to one-half, without a corresponding rise in wages.134 The cost of living was actually 20-35 percent higher than in the imperial capital, so that even members of the middle class felt the pressure on their pocketbooks.135 Jews might come to Kiev to earn a living or even to try to strike it rich, but they were more likely to remain poor. After only two decades of Jewish migration to Kiev, there was already a need for a free school for Jewish children, for which Israel Brodsky donated 40,000 rubles in 1880.136
World History
