² Briess, Ignatz, Schilderungen aus dem Prerauer Ghettoleben vom Jahre 1888 (sic: 1838)–1848 mit Streiflichtern bis an die Gegenwart und Jugenderinnerungen eines 78 jährigen, 2nd enlarged ed. (Brno, 1912), 41, 43, 45Google Scholar. Most places in the Bohemian Lands had both Czech and German names. To avoid anachronism, this article will use both the German and Czech names of all locations.

³ Franzos, Karl Emil, Aus Halb-Asien: Culturbilder aus Galizien, der Bukowina, Südrussland und Rumänie, 2nd ed. (Leipzig, 1878Google Scholar).

⁴ Briess, Schilderungen, 24–25, 47–49. For an equally nostalgic memory of the Jewish Trivialschule in Holleschau/Holešov in 1848/49, see Löw, Albert, “Unser Schulwesen nach den Befreiungskämpfen der Jahre 1848–1849 in Mähren,” Jüdische Volksstimme, 15 September 1927, 5Google Scholar.

⁵ Briess, Schilderungen, 80–81.

⁶ Kieval, Hillel J., “Caution's Progress: Enlightenment and Tradition in Jewish Prague, 1780–1830,” in Languages of Community: The Jewish Experience in the Czech Lands, ed. Kieval, Hillel J., 37–64 (Berkeley, CA, 2000)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Kestenberg-Gladstein, Ruth, Neuere Geschichte der Juden in den böhmischen Ländern, Erster Teil: Das Zeitalter der Aufklärung, 1780–1840 (Tübingen, 1969), 41–65Google Scholar.

⁷ Moravia was one of the Crownlands of Habsburg Austria. Interwar Czechoslovakia united it with Silesia into one province. Today, it is the eastern part of the Czech Republic.

⁸ K. k. Statistische Central-Commission, “Die Ergebnisse der Volkszählung vom 31. December 1900 in den im Reichsrathe vertretenen Königreichen und Ländern: Die summarischen Ergebnisse der Volkszählung,” Österreichische Statistik 63, no. 1 (1902): xxxiiGoogle Scholar; k. k. Statistische Central-Commission, “Die Ergebnisse der Volkszählung vom 31. December 1900 in den im Reichsrathe vertretenen Königreichen und Ländern. Die Umgangssprache in Verbindung … mit der Konfession,” Österreichische Statistik 63, no. 3 (1903): 178Google Scholar; k. k. Statistische Central-Commission, “Die Ergebnisse der Volkszählung vom 31. Dezember 1910 in den im Reichsrate vertretenen Königreichen und Ländern; Die summarischen Ergebnisse der Volkszählung,” Österreichische Statistik, N.F., 1, no. 1 (1912): 54,* 54–55Google Scholar. On Jews in Bohemia, see Kieval, Hillel J., The Making of Czech Jewry: National Conflict and Jewish Society in Bohemia, 1870–1918 (New York, 1988), 61Google Scholar; Cohen, Gary B., “Jews in German Society: Prague, 1860–1914,” Central European History 10 (1977): 28–54CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Historians debate why Bohemian Jews changed their allegiance so quickly. For a recent study that emphasizes its political dimension, as a way to accommodate political pressures and cope with Czech anti-Semitism, see Weiglová, Markéta, “Jews as a Barometer of the National Struggle in Bohemia and Moravia,” Judaica Bohemiae 43 (2007–2008): 93–119Google Scholar, at 114.

⁹ Österreichische Statistik 63, no. 3 (1903), xxxvii–xxxviii, 9. In Bohemia in 1900, 63 percent of all residents indicated Czech language and 37 percent German language.

¹⁰ There has been much productive scholarly discussion recently of this issue. See esp. Judson, Pieter M., Guardians of the Nation: Activists on the Language Frontiers of Imperial Austria (Cambridge, MA, 2006)Google Scholar; Zahra, Tara, Kidnapped Souls: National Indifference and the Battle for Children in the Bohemian Lands, 1900–1948 (Ithaca, NY, 2008)Google Scholar; King, Jeremy, Budweisers into Czechs and Germans: A Local History of Bohemian Politics, 1848–1948 (Princeton, NJ, 2002)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Luft, Robert, “Nationale Utraquisten in Böhmen: Zur Problematik ‘nationaler Zwischenstellungen’ am Ende des 19. Jahrhunderts,” in Allemands, Juifs et Tscheques à Prague/Deutsche, Juden und Tschechen in Prag 1890–1924, ed. Godé, Maurice, Rider, Jacques Le, and Mayer, Françoise, 37–51 (Montpellier, 1996)Google Scholar; and the articles on national indifference in Austrian History Yearbook 43 (2012)Google Scholar.

¹¹ Kestenberg-Gladstein, Ruth, “The Jews between Czechs and Germans in the Historic Lands, 1848–1918,” in The Jews of Czechoslovakia: Historical Studies and Surveys, vol. 1 (Philadelphia, 1968), 21–71Google Scholar, at 50.

¹² Sociologist Rogers Brubaker, one of the leading theoreticians of ethnicity and nationalism, has argued that parallel school systems provide “ecological niches,” institutional homes, and protected public spaces within which ethnicity can flourish. See Brubaker, Rogers, Ethnicity without Groups (Cambridge, MA, 2004), 26CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Brubaker's work, esp. 1–63, provides an important theoretical explanation for the fluidity of ethnic identities.

¹³ Haas, Theodor, Die Juden in Mähren: Darstellung der Rechtsgeschichte und Statistik unter besonderer Berücksichtigung des 19. Jahrhunderts (Brno, 1908), 13–17, 19, 22–26Google Scholar; Peter Urbanitsch, “Die politischen Judengemeinden in Mähren nach 1848,” XXVI. Mikulovské Sympozium/XXVI. Nikolsburger Symposium: Mährische Juden in der österreichisch-ungarischen Monarchie (1780–1918), 24–25 Oktober 2000 (Brno, 2003), 39–53; Miller, Michael Lawrence, Rabbis and Revolution: The Jews of Moravia in the Age of Emancipation (Stanford, CA, 2011), 274–86, 331Google Scholar.

¹⁴ Haas, Die Juden in Mähren, 26–28, 34–42; Miller, Rabbis and Revolution, 305–07.

¹⁵ Kieval, Making of Czech Jewry, 50–55. The number of private Jewish schools in Bohemia shrank from 114 in 1884/85 to 5 in 1910, and from 4,470 students to 154 in that period.

¹⁶ In 1873, there were 40 German-Jewish schools in Moravia, located either in political Jewish communities or in former Jewish towns that had not become political Jewish communities. Some of the schools closed due to declining Jewish population, but most of these schools continued to exist down to the end of the monarchy. By that time, 23 political Jewish communities still ran German (Jewish) schools. See Schimmer, Gustav, Statistik des Judenthums in den im Reichsrathe vertretenen Königreichen und Ländern (Vienna, 1873), 50–55Google Scholar; Haas, Die Juden in Mähren, 52–54.

¹⁷ On the dissolution of the political Jewish communities, Haas, Theodor, “Die Verteilung der jüdischen Bevölkerung in Mähren und Schlesien,” Jüdische Volksstimme, 23 April 1925, 3–4Google Scholar; Haas, Theodor, “Statistische Betrachtungen über die jüdische Bevölkerung Mährens in Vergangenheit und Gegenwart,” in Die Juden und Judengemeinden Mährens in Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, ed. Gold, Hugo, 591–97 (Brno, 1929), at 595–96Google Scholar. Czechoslovakia dissolved 25 of the 27 political Jewish communities in 1919/20, and the two remaining ones—Trebitsch/Třebíč and Misslitz/Míroslava—in 1925.

¹⁸ During World War II, the Nazis collected Jewish community records, including the records of Jewish schools, from all over Bohemia and Moravia. These records were carefully catalogued by Jews in Prague during the war. Since that time, they are located in the archives of the Jewish Museum in Prague. For a full description of holdings, see Heřmann, Jan, “Jewish Community Archives from Bohemia and Moravia: Analytical Registers to the Catalogues of Archive Materials from Jewish Communities with the Exception of that of Prague, drawn by K. Dolista and J. Šmolka,” Judaica Bohemiae 7, no. 1 (1971)Google Scholar.

¹⁹ On the Jewish school in Nikolsburg/Mikulov, see König, Robert, “Die jüdische Schulen in Nikolsburg,” in Juden und Judengemeinden Mährens, ed. Gold, Hugo, 444–50Google Scholar. Unfortunately, the articles on the Jewish communities of Trebitsch/Třebíč and Holleschau/Holešov in Gold contain no information on the Jewish schools. On anti-Semitic riots, see Helena Krejčová and Mišková, Alena, “Anmerkungen zur Frage des Antisemitismus in den Böhmischen Ländern des 19. Jahrhunderts,” in Judenemanzipation—Antisemitismus—Verfolgung in Deutschland, Österreich-Ungarn, den Böhmischen Ländern und der Slovakei, ed. Hoensch, Jörg K., Biman, Stanislav, and Lipák, L'udbomir, 55–84 (Essen, 1999)Google Scholar; on Holleschau/Holešov, 69.

²⁰ Sprengnagl, Gerald, “Nationale Kultur und Selbsterschaffung des Bürgertums am Beispiel der Stadt Prostějov in Mähren, 1848–1864,” Österreichische Zeitschrift für Geschichtswissenschaften 10, no. 2 (1999): 260–91Google Scholar; Heilig, Bernhard, Eine mährische Stadt und ihr Ghetto (Brno, 1932)Google Scholar; idem, Urkundliches zur Wirtschaftsgeschichte der Juden in Prossnitz (Brno, 1929)Google Scholar.

²¹ K. k. Statistische Central-Commission Allgemeines Ortschaften-Verzeichniss der im Reichsrathe vertretenen Königreiche und Länder nach den Ergebnissen der Volkszählung vom 31. December 1900 (Vienna, 1902), 338Google Scholar. k.k Statistische Central-Commission, Gemeinde-Lexikon der im Reichsrathe vertretenen Königreiche und Länder bearbeitet auf Grund der Ergebnisse der Volkszählung vom 31. December 1900 (Vienna, 1903–1908), vol. 10, “Mähren,” 194Google Scholar; Österreichische Statistik 63, no. 1, xl, lxxxii–lxxxiv, civ–cv, 98–105Google Scholar.

²² Antoinette Kahler, “Kinderjahre,” unpublished memoir, Leo Baeck Institute, New York, 58–59.

²³ Sprengnagl, esp. 288–91.

²⁴ Österreichische Statistik 63, no. 1, civ–cv, 98–105Google Scholar; Allgemeines Ortschaften-Verzeichniss…1900, 337; Gemeinde-Lexikon…1900, vol. 10, “Mähren,” 182–88Google Scholar.

²⁵ Allgemeines Ortschaften-Verzeichniss…1900, 331; Gemeinde-Lexikon…1900, vol. 10, “Mähren,” 144Google Scholar.

²⁶ Österreichische Statistik 63, no. 1, xl, civ–cv, 98–105Google Scholar; Gemeinde-Lexikon…1900, vol. 10, “Mähren,” 146Google Scholar.

²⁷ Wechsberg, Joseph, The Vienna I Knew: Memories of a European Childhood (Garden City, NY, 1979), 85Google Scholar; idem, Homecoming (New York, 1946), 58Google Scholar.

²⁸ Österreichische Statistik 63, no. 1, xl, cix–cv, 98–105Google Scholar; Allgemeines Ortschaften-Verzeichniss… 1900, 329; Gemeinde-Lexikon…1900, vol. 10, “Mähren,” 122Google Scholar.

²⁹ Wechsberg, The Vienna I Knew, 148.

³⁰ Státni úřad statisticky, Statistisches Gemeindelexikon der čechoslovakischen Republik auf Grund der Volkszählungsergebnisse vom 1. Dezember 1930 (Prague, 1935), 92.Google Scholar Only 491 people declared Polish nationality.

³¹ On these Zionist private schools, see Jüdische Volksstimme, 17 February 1921, 6; 9 June 1921, 1–2; 16 June 1921, 2–3; 7 June 1928, 3; and Tatjana Lichtenstein, “Making Jews at Home: Jewish Nationalism in the Bohemian Lands, 1918–1938” (PhD diss., University of Toronto, 2009). These schools had German-language instruction at first, but they switched to Czech at the end of the 1920s.

³² Jewish Museum Prague Archives (hereinafter JMP), “Prostějov,” File 63212, k.k. Kreisamt Olmütz to Israelitengemeinde Prossnitz, 29 October 1849 and k.k. Bezirkshauptmannschaft Olmütz to Israelitengemeinde Prossnitz, 30 September 1850 granting (and reconfirming) permission to the school to rename itself as a “Hauptschule,” and thus a four-class public school.

³³ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 62631, “Klassenbuch: Isr. Hauptschule 1864–65”; File 63212, “Schulerrichtungs-Urkunde,” 21 January 1866. On the Talmud-Thorahschule, see Miller, Rabbis and Revolution, 127–34.

³⁴ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 63212, “Schulerrichtungs-Urkunde,” 21 January 1866.

³⁵ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34904, Letter from Isr. Gemeindevorstand Prossnitz to k.k. Bezirksamt, 13 July 1865.

³⁶ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 75733, Letter of Volksschule of Israelitengemeinde to IKG Prossnitz, 23 February 1896. For evidence of official oversight, see the minutes of the “Teachers’ Conferences,” the monthly meetings of teachers to discuss classroom progress and problems, which were approved and stamped by the k.k. Bezirkshauptmannschaft in Prossnitz, the local branch of the central bureaucracy. See, for example, JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34887/c, “Protokolle der Lehrkörpers der Volksschule in der Israeliten Gemeinde Prossnitz, 1903/1904.” On liberal educational legislation, see Cohen, Gary B., Education and Middle-Class Society in Imperial Austria, 1848–1918 (West Lafayette, IN, 1996), ch. 1CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Engelbrecht, Helmut, Geschichte des österreichischen Bildungswesens: Erziehung und Unterricht auf dem Boden Österreichs, vol. 4, Von 1848 bis zum Ende der Monarchie (Vienna, 1986), 111–25Google Scholar.

³⁷ See list of subjects in JMP, “Prostějov,” File 64239, Katalog über den Fortgang und Schulbesuch der Schüler in der vierklassigen Volksschule in der Israelitengemeinde Prossnitz, Schuljahr 1874–75; and in all Klassenbücher cited below. For standard curriculum in Volksschulen after 1869, see Engelbrecht, Geschichte des österreichischen Bildungswesen, vol. 4, 115, 484–86Google Scholar.

³⁸ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 63218, statutes for “private Hebrew instruction” at the Volksschule of the Israelitengemeinde Prossnitz, 22 June 1888. Article 19 of the Austrian Fundamental Law of 1867 prohibited forcing a member of any Volksstamm from learning the “second” language of a province. Thus, Czech language could only be offered as a nonobligatory subject in German schools. See Stourzh, Gerald, Die Gleichberechtigung der nationalitäten in der Verfassung und Verwaltung Österreichs, 1848–1918 (Vienna, 1985), 166–67, 178–89Google Scholar; Engelbrecht, Geschichte des österreichischen Bildungswesen, vol. 4, 297–99.

³⁹ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 71524, “Schulrechnung pro 1904” for an example of the budget of the Prossnitz German-Jewish school. For examples of requests for Jewish schoolbooks for the poor, File 63196, Letters from Ober-Lehrer Weiner to Cultusvorstand, 24 September 1893, 8 March 1896, 20 September 1899, 18 January 1900.

⁴⁰ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 63212, Letter of Ob. Lehrer Weiner to Gemeindevorstand, 21 July 1878; 11 November 1878.

⁴¹ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34887/a, Protocoll, 14 July 1893, Teachers’ Conference.

⁴² See, for example, Jüdische Volksstimme, 1 December 1907, 4; 20 July 1908, 4.

⁴³ Miller, Michael L., “Voice and Vulnerability: The Vagaries of Jewish National Identity in Habsburg Moravia,” Jahrbuch des Simon-Dubnow-Instituts 5 (2006): 159–71Google Scholar, at 161; Miller, Rabbis and Revolution, 337. Miller thinks such a designation became increasingly symbolic, not real, but until 1918, it was both. On French-Jewish schools similarly announcing Jewish distinctiveness in Alsace, see Hyman, Paula E., The Jews of Modern France (Berkeley, CA, 1998), 66–69CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

⁴⁴ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 63218, Curriculum of private Hebrew instruction at Volksschule of Israelitengemeinde Prossnitz, 22 June 1888.

⁴⁵ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34887/a, Protocoll, Teachers’ Conference, 26 February 1893.

⁴⁶ School records indicate that boys and girls received the same Jewish education. For a specific example, see File 63198, Letter of Rabbi Gottlieb to IKG Prossnitz, 18 June 1900 and 15 January 1906.

⁴⁷ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 63198.

⁴⁸ Such was also the case in Kremsier/Kroměříž and elsewhere. See Frankl-Grün, Adolf, Geschichte der Juden in Kremsier. II. Theil (1848–1889) (Frankfurt, 1898), 54Google Scholar.

⁴⁹ Scholars have assumed that as the population of the political Jewish communities changed, the majority of children in their public schools were Catholic. Such was not the case in the schools studied here, and probably not elsewhere as well. See Haas, Juden in Mähren, 53; Kestenberg-Gladstein, “Jews between Czechs and Germans,” 49; Toury, Jacob, “Jewish Townships in the German-Speaking Parts of the Austrian Empire—Before and After the Revolution of 1848/1849,” Leo Baeck Institute Yearbook 26 (1981): 55–72, at 70–71CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Miller, Rabbis and Revolution, 336–37; Miller, “Voice and Vulnerability,” 160–61. Most of these scholars either make assumptions from population statistics or cite evidence from Nikolsburg/Mikulov, published in Vienna's Jewish newspaper, Österreichische Wochenschrift, in 1897. Without the records of the Nikolsburg/Mikulov Jewish school, however, it is impossible to know if the Viennese newspaper was correct. Even Robert König, writing in 1929, did not say that the school contained a Catholic majority in the late nineteenth century. He only said that it became like a regular public school, a rather vague statement. See his “Die jüdische Schulen in Nikolsburg,” in Gold, Juden und Judengemeinden Mährens, 448. Similarly Frankl-Grün, Geschichte der Juden in Kremsier, 56, provides no compelling evidence for his assertion that a third of the students in the school of the former “Jewish town” there were Catholic.

⁵⁰ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 75733, Letter of Israelitengemeinde to IKG Prossnitz, 23 February 1896.

⁵¹ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 62627, “Chronik der vierklassigen deutschen Volksschule in der Israelitengemeinde Prossnitz zusammengestellt von dem derzeitigen Oberlehrer Bernhard Weiner, Prossnitz, am 10. April 1882.” This “Chronik” contains much later material; 1898 appeal on 76–78, quotations, 76.

⁵² JMP, “Prostějov,” File 62631, Klassenbuch der israel. Hauptschule zu Prossnitz, 1864–65. This book lists all children by grade, along with their fathers’ professions. Note that by this time, the children all had German names, the boys, names like Karl, Maximilian, Gustav, Leopold, and Heinrich, and the girls, names like Theresa, Hermine, Rosalie, Regina, and Ernestine.

⁵³ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 64239, Katalog über den Fortgang und Schulbesuch der Schüler in der vierklassigen Volksschule in der Israelitengemeinde Prossnitz, Schuljahr 1874–75.” In the early 1870s, the Prossnitz Israelitengemeinde contained two Catholic school-age children, but they presumably attended school in Prossnitz/Prostějov city because they do not appear in the class lists. See File 34886/a, “Schulmatrik 1874–85; sic. 1871–78. At that point, the Prossnitz/Prostějov Jewish school was the second largest Jewish school in Moravia. The largest was in Nikolsburg/Mikulov with 300 students. See Schimmer, Statistik des Judenthums, 54–55.

⁵⁴ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 62873, “Klassenbuch über den Schulbesuch und Fortgang der Schuler der 1. Classe an der viercl. Volksschule zu Prossnitz im Schuljahr 1884/5”; File 62749, “Classenbuch…der 2. Classe…; ” File 62814, “Classenbuch…der 3. Classe…”; File 62815, “Classenbuch…der 4. Classe.” The gender breakdown of students was roughly equal in all subsequent years.

⁵⁵ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34886/b, “Schulmatrik der Schulpflichtigen und Schulbesuchenden Kinder an der vier-classigen Volksschule zu Prossnitz im Schuljahre 1885/6–89.” Some children were too old for elementary school and attended either Realschule or Bürgerschule.

⁵⁶ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34886/c, “Schulmatrik…Prossnitz…1890/91–95.”

⁵⁷ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34886/c, “Schulmatrik…1890/91.” The fact that so many of the Catholic children attended German schools may attest to the national indifference so prevalent among the poor, or their awareness of the value of learning German, or that they had German-speaking employers. On the role of national indifference in school choice and Czech nationalist pressure against it, see Zahra, Kidnapped Souls, 1–4, 23–32; on German nationalist pressure, Judson, Guardians of the Nation, 25–27, 39–49, 53–64.

⁵⁸ Österreichische Statistik, vol. 35, no. 1, “Statistik der allgemeinen Volksschulen und Bürgerschulen in den im Reichsrathe vertretenen Königreichen und Ländern auf Grund der statistischen Aufnahme vom 30. April 1890” (1892), 148–49Google Scholar, indicates that there were 245 school-age Jewish children in the entire district. Only 58.8 percent of them attended the Jewish school in the Prossnitz/Prostějov, but some of them probably attended Bürgerschule, making the percentage at the Jewish elementary school somewhat higher.

⁵⁹ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34886/c, “Schulmatrik…1894/5.”

⁶⁰ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 64184, “Classenbuch…I. Classe an der 4-classigen Volksschule zu Prossnitz, 1894/95”; File 64133, “Classenbuch…II. Classe…1894/95”; File 64132, “Classenbuch…III. Classe…1894/95”; File 64144, “Classenbuch…IV. Classe…1894/95.” Slight differences in numbers are due to the point of the school year in which the totals were calculated.

⁶¹ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 64127, “Schulmatrik an der vierclassigen Volksschule zu Prossnitz Isr. Gemeinde, 1899/1900–1905,” statistics for 1904/05. Only four elementary school-age Jewish children transferred out, in addition to 15 who attended Bürgerschulen or Realschulen. All Jews who transferred out attended German schools in all years.

⁶² JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34889, “Classenbuch, Volksschule der Isr. Gemeinde, I. Classe 1904/5”; File 64234, “Classenbuch…II. Classe 1904-5”; File 62757, “Classenbuch…III. Classe, 1904/5”; “Classenbuch…IV. Classe 1904/5.”

⁶³ Österreichische Statistik, vol. 62, no. 2, “Statistik der allgemeinen Volksschulen und Bürgerschulen in der im Reichsrathe vertretenen Königreichen und Ländern auf Grund der statistischen Aufnahme vom 15. Mai 1900” (1903), 220–23Google Scholar, indicates 181 Jewish school-age children in the Prossnitz Bezirkshauptmannschaft.

⁶⁴ Zahra, Kidnapped Souls, 32–48. The Moravian Compromise, which also created separate German and Czech voting cadasters in elections, contributed to the nationalization of ordinary people in the province. On the legal problems that resulted, see Jeremy King, “Who Is Who? Separate but Equal in Imperial Austria,” an in-depth analysis of how the Austrian courts balanced liberal concern for individual rights with “national rights” in the wake of Lex Perek and the Moravian Compromise. I thank King for sharing this as yet unpublished manuscript with me. King builds on Stourzh's pioneering work, Die Gleichberechtigung der Nationalitäten, esp. 213–28 on the impact of the Moravian Compromise.

⁶⁵ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34886/e, “Schulmatrik der schulpflichtigen und schulbesuchenden Kinder an der vier classigen Volksschule zu Prossnitz I. G. im Schuljahre 1905/6–1916/17,” statistics for 1910/11.

⁶⁶ Ibid., statistics for 1914/15; JMP, “Prostějov,” File 62955, “Classenbuch…Isr. Gemeinde Volksschule, I. Classe 1914/15”; File 34890i, “Klassenbuch…Isr. Gemeinde Volksschule, II. Klasse, 1914/15; File 62768, “Klassenbuch…Isr. Gemeinde Volksschule, III. Klasse 1914/15”; File 62767, “Klassenbuch…Isr. Gemeinde Volksschule, IV. Klasse 1914/15.” On Galician Jewish refugees in Moravia, see Marsha L. Rozenblit, Reconstructing a National Identity: The Jews of Habsburg Austria during World War I (New York, 2001), 66, 68–70.

⁶⁷ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34886/f, “Schulmatrik…Isr. Gemeinde Volksschule, 1917/18–1919/20,” statistics for 1919/20.

⁶⁸ In 1900, for example, only four Jewish women attended a teacher training school in Moravia, the German one in Brünn/Brno. In that year there were 703 men and 455 women in teacher training institutes in Moravia (Österreichische Statistik, vol. 70, no. 3, “Statistik der Unterrichtsanstalten in den im Reichsrathe vertretenen Königreichen und Ländern für das Jahr 1900–1901,” (1904), 58–59, 62–63Google Scholar). In 1883, Austrian law allowed school directors to hire teachers who practiced the religion of the majority of the students in their schools (Engelbrecht, 118).

⁶⁹ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34887/a, Protokolle, Teachers’ Conferences, 1892/93.

⁷⁰ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34887/c, Protokolle, Teachers’ Conferences, 1903/4, Protokoll, 20 September 1903.

⁷¹ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34887/e, Protokolle, Teachers’ Conferences, 1908/9, Protokoll 16 September 1908. Apparently at first, children went to a church for the instruction, but their comings and goings caused “Unzukommlichkeiten,” and the teacher came to the school beginning in 1911. See File 34887/f, Protokolle, Teachers’ Conferences, 1910/11, Protokoll, 31 July 1911.

⁷² JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34887/f, Protokolle, Teachers’ Conferences, 1910/11, Protocoll, 12 September 1910.

⁷³ JMP, “Prostějov,” no file number, “Katalog der Bibliothek in der Volksschule in der Isr. Gmd., 1868–1904.” On Joseph II as a German nationalist hero, see Wingfield, Nancy M., “Statues of Emperor Joseph II as Sites of German Identity,” in Staging the Past: The Politics of Commemoration in Habsburg Central Europe, 1848 to the Present, ed. Bacur, Maria and Wingfield, Nancy M., 178–205 (West Lafayette, IN, 2001)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Jews always loved Joseph as the monarch who issued the Edict of Toleration, removing many Jewish disabilities. For them, he was simply a Jewish hero. See, for example, Grünfeld, Max, “Äusserer Verlauf der Geschichte der Juden in Mähren bis 1890,” in Juden und Judengemeinden Mährens, ed. Gold, 8–22, at 16Google Scholar, and other essays in that volume.

⁷⁴ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34887/d, Protokolle, Teachers’ Conferences, 1904/5, Protokoll, 28 April 1905.

⁷⁵ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 71524, “Schul-Rechnung pro 1904.” The school paid 22.52 crowns for use of the gym that year.

⁷⁶ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 62627, “Chronik,” 155, printed flyer about the celebration.

⁷⁷ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 71605, Letter from Jüdischer Volksverein Prossnitz to Cultusausschuss, 4 June 1901.

⁷⁸ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 63218, Letter, Bezirksschulrat Olmütz-Land to IKG Prossnitz, 24 November 1909.

⁷⁹ For example, JMP, “Prostějov, File 51658, Protokollbuch, Teachers’ Conferences 1906/7, Protokoll, 7 June 1907.

⁸⁰ The protocols of the Teachers’ Conferences, for example, were stamped each month by the k.k. deutscher Bezirksschulrat, Olmütz Land. See JMP, “Prostějov,” File 56439, Protocollbuch, Teachers’ Conferences 1907/8.

⁸¹ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34887/a, Protokolle, Teachers’ Conferences, 1892/93, Protokoll 16 September 1892, and File 34887/c, Protokolle, Teachers’ Conferences 1903/4, Protokoll 20 September 1903, for examples of plans to celebrate the Kaiser's name day with special services for the school children in the synagogue.

⁸² JMP, “Prostějov,” File 63218, Bill for K 24.30 for 81 copies of the pamphlets, 5 December 1908; Letter from Ortsschulrat of the Israelitengemeinde to the Board of the Israelitengemeinde, 4 November 1908, outlining the ceremonies; File 34887/e, Protokolle, Teachers’ Conferences 1908/9, Protocoll, 6 November 1908, detailing the program.

⁸³ See, for example, JMP, “Prostějov,” File 62630, “Schulfeier an der deutschen Volksschule in der Israel. Gemeinde Prossnitz anlässlich der Enthüllung des Bildnisses des gewesenen Ortsschulraths-Obmannes Johann Beer, Sonntag, am 6. Juli 1890”; File 34887/a, Protocolle, Teachers’ Conferences, 1892/93, Protocoll 14 July 1893; File 34887/b, Protocolle, Teachers’ Conferences, 1894/95, Protocoll 17 September 1894.

⁸⁴ Bruckmüller, Ernst, “Patriotic and National Myths: National Consciousness and Elementary School Education in Imperial Austria,” in The Limits of Loyalty: Imperial Symbolism, Popular Allegiances, and State Patriotism in the Late Habsburg Monarchy, ed. Cole, Laurence and Unowsky, Daniel L., 11–35 (New York, 2007), esp. 13–14, 22Google Scholar.

⁸⁵ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 62627, “Chronik der Volksschule in Prossnitz Isr. Gem.,” 1898 appeal, 76–78, quotation, 78.

⁸⁶ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34887/c, Protocolle, Teachers’ Conferences 1903/4, Protocoll 5 June 1904.

⁸⁷ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 62629, “Festrede gehalten am 17. September 1904 anlässlich der Einweihung des neuerbauten Schulhauses für die deutsche Volksschule in der Israelitengemeinde Prossnitz von Oberlehrer B. Weiner (Prossnitz, 1904), speech, 5–14; quotations, 13–14. See also File 62627, “Chronik der Volksschule,” 106–16.

⁸⁸ For insight into the very positive attitude to Czech language acquisition, see JMP, “Prostějov,” File 34887/d, “Der Unterricht in der zweiten Landessprache,” prepared by Em. Metzel, March 1905, appendix to Protocolle, Teachers’ Conferences, 1904/5.

⁸⁹ On Czech in German schools, Bruckmüller, “Patriotic and National Myths,” 12, 14; and Burger, Hannelore, Sprachenrecht und Sprachgerechtigkeit im österreichischen Unterrichtswesen, 1867–1918 (Vienna, 1995)Google Scholar.

⁹⁰ JMP, “Prostějov,” File 62627, “Chronik der Volksschule,” obituary for Albert Trieschel, n.d., probably 1913, 162.

⁹¹ JMP “Prostějov,” File 62628, “Schuljahr 1918/19,” laconically notes: “Am 28. October wurde der čechoslovakische Staat proklamiert.”

⁹² JMP, “Prostějov,” File 56466, “Protokollbuch, Prossnitz IKG, 1908–1922,” Protokoll, 11 September 1919; Protokoll, 29 May 1921.

⁹³ JMP, “Přerov,” File 88021, Letter from k.k. Bezirksschulrat Prerau, 4 February 1899, 9 August 1899, 11 October 1910.

⁹⁴ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Letter from k.k. Bezirksschulrat to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 14 December 1882; Letter from k.k. Bezirksschulrat Prerau to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 28 July 1885; Letter from k.k. Bezirksschulrat Prerau to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 15 October 1890.

⁹⁵ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, School budget for 1878/79, 1880/81, 1894, 1895/96, 1908, 1909, 1910, 1911, 1912, 1913, 1914; Letters IKG Prerau to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 4 January 1882, 28 January 1886, 2 December 1903. The protocols of the IKG of Prerau contain regular references to subvention aid to the school, both in the yearly budgets and in special donations. See File 53904, Protocollbuch IKG Prerau 1877–1886; File 53899, Protokollbuch IKG Prerau 1886–1898; File 53905, Protocollbuch IKG Prerau 1898–1907. On the Moravian-Jewish Landesmassafond, see Haas, Die Juden in Mähren, 18, 48–50; Miller, Rabbis and Revolution, 49–51, 328–29.

⁹⁶ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Letter k.k. Bezirksschulrat Olmütz-Land to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 13 December 1909, 3 August 1911, 26 September 1911, 25 September 1912, 26 September 1913, 30 September 1914.

⁹⁷ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Letter k.k. Bezirksschulrat Prerau to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 23 May 1888; File 88021, Letter k.k. Bezirksschulrat Prerau to Ortsschulrat, Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 11 October 1905. By 1911, the church provided Catholic religious instruction at the Israelitengemeinde school. See letter of k.k. Bezirksschulrat Olmütz-Land to Ortsschulrat, Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 20 September 1911.

⁹⁸ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Letter k.k. Bezirksschulrat Prerau to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 23 May 1888.

⁹⁹ Weiglová, “Jews as a Barometer,” 99, indicates that in 1889/90, 1899/1900, and 1909/10, there were only two Jewish children in the Czech-language elementary schools in Prerau/Přerov. Österreichische Statistik, vol. 35, no. 1, 148–49, indicates only 168 Jewish school-age children in the entire Prerau Bezirkshauptmannschaft, so that at least 60 percent of all Jewish children in the district attended the Jewish elementary school. Since some of the 168 Jewish children attended Bürgerschulen, the percentage of district Jewish children in the Jewish elementary school is undoubtedly higher than 60 percent.

¹⁰⁰ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Letters from k.k. Bezirkshauptmann to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 31 March 1875, 22 February 1879. The 1875 letter complained as well that the school was filthy in general. The school was now a public school, and the authorities obviously expected it to comply with official regulations.

¹⁰¹ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Letter from k.k. Bezirkshauptmann to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 29 December 1882. The threat followed warning letters on 2 October 1882 and 14 December 1882.

¹⁰² JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Letter k.k. Bezirkshauptmann to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 3 June 1883. This letter followed an earlier letter of 19 February that had restricted the hours of kosher slaughter less drastically.

¹⁰³ JMP, “Přerov,” File 53904, Protocolle, IKG Prerau, 1877–86, Protocoll 8 December 1884.

¹⁰⁴ JMP, “Přerov,” File 53899, Protocollbuch, IKG Prerau, 1886–1898, Protocoll 4 August 1889.

¹⁰⁵ JMP, “Přerov,” File 88021, Letter from Deutscher Schulverein to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 19 August 1881.

¹⁰⁶ JMP, “Přerov,” File 53904, Protokolle, IKG Prerau, 1877–1886, Protokoll 7 July 1884.

¹⁰⁷ von Wotawa, August Ritter, Der Deutsche Schulverein 1880–1905. Eine Gedenkschrift (Vienna, 1905)Google Scholar. On support for Jewish schools, 25. Although the Deutscher Schulverein was not an anti-Semitic organization, and it never excluded Jewish members, it did make some concessions to anti-Semitic demands in the 1890s, allowing multiple branches (some accepting Jews, others not) in many places. See Judson, 49–52.

¹⁰⁸ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Protocoll 17 April 1888, on sending representatives to the school board in Prerau/Přerov. For a later interesting example of bureaucratic integration, see File 80821, Letter from k.k. Bezirksschulrat Prerau to Ortsschulrat of the Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 18 July 1906, praising the school for its excellent evaluation in its most recent inspection, but warning it to erect new gymnastics equipment. The files also contain much correspondence about creating modern lavatories in the school.

¹⁰⁹ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, circular letter of k.k. Bezirksschulrat Olmütz-Land, 24 November 1913.

¹¹⁰ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Letter k.k. Bezirksschulrat Prerau to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 17 January 1888, 3 March 1888, 23 May 1888.

¹¹¹ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Protocoll, Politische Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 2 February 1888. The Israelitsche Kultusgemeinde of Prerau/Přerov took the same position. See File 53899, Protokollbuch, IKG Prerau, 1886–1898, Protokoll 2 February 1888. The IKG board thought that it would only support unification if it had to.

¹¹² JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Letter from k.k. Bezirksschulrat Prerau to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 23 May 1888, 23 November 1888.

¹¹³ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Letter from k.k. Bezirksschulrat Prerau to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 30 May 1889, 5 June 1889, 25 February 1894.

¹¹⁴ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Letter of k.k. Bezirksschulrat Prerau to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 4 December 1893. Local authorities often called the larger community the Christengemeinde even though Jews lived there, presumably just to distinguish it from the Israelitengemeinde.

¹¹⁵ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Letter of k.k. Bezirksschulrat Prerau to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 11 April 1894.

¹¹⁶ JMP, “Přerov,” File 34712, Letter of k.k. Bezirksschulrat to Israelitengemeinde Prerau, 13 July 1896. Austrian law required an average of 40 students over a five-year period who lived within four kilometers of the school. See Zahra, Kidnapped Souls, 14; Judson, Guardians of the Nation, 24.

¹¹⁷ JMP, “Přerov, File 64500, Exhibitions-Protocolle 1909–1922, Letter to Deutscher Bezirksschulrat Olmütz-Land, 1919 (n.d., probably fall). In some places, the schools of political Jewish communities closed earlier when enrollments were too small to sustain a school, or the German School Association stepped in to create a new German school for all who wanted it. Such was the case in Kanitz/Kounice Dolní and Eibenschitz/Ivančice, and possibly also Gewitsch/Jevíčko. See Jüdische Volksstimme, 20 July 1908, 4. On the other hand, the Jewish political community of Misslitz/Míroslava maintained its school despite the fact that only about 30 students attended it in the early twentieth century. See Reich, Ernst, “Geschichte der Juden in Misslitz,” in Die Juden und Judengemeinden Mährens, ed. Gold, 387–405, at 405Google Scholar.

¹¹⁸ Erwin Tramer, “The Gift of a Sage: Life and Wisdom of Rabbi Dr. Friedrich Hillel” (unpublished manuscript, Leo Baeck Institute), 22. Hillel served as rabbi in Leipnik/Lipník from 1892 to 1928.

¹¹⁹ JMP, “Lipník,” File 75105, “Ausweis, Schule Leipnik Israelitengemeinde, 1871/72”; File 38017, “Hauptbuch” of school, list of girls, 15 October 1886, list of boys 1886/87.

¹²⁰ Arnold Hindls, “Erinnerungen aus meinem Leben” (unpublished memoir, Leo Baeck Institute, 1966), 10.

¹²¹ Österreichische Statistik, vol. 35, no. 1, 148–49, lists 181 school-age Jewish children for the entire Mährisch Weisskirchen Bezirkshauptmannschaft in 1890.

¹²² JMP, “Lipník,” No file number, Schulrat 1914–1918, List of registered students September 1915, List of registered students September 1916 (including five Galician and Bukovinian Jewish refugees).

¹²³ JMP, “Lipník,” File 75491, “Stunden-Eintheilung (referring to Bible as chumash in Hebrew, the traditional term for the Five Books of Moses)”; “Lehrplan des hebräischen Unterrichts an der vierklassigen Talmud Tauraschule der Israeliten Gemeinde in Leipnik, 1894”; “Stundenplan, October 1902”; “Lehrplan für den Religions- und Bibelunterricht an den II. Kl. Volkskschule in Leipnik, 30 January 1906.”

¹²⁴ JMP, “Lipník,” File 16014, Correspondence between k.k. Bezirksschulrat M. Weisskirchen and IKG Leipnik; File 16029, Letter from k.k. Bezirksschulrat in Mähr. Weisskirchen “An alle deutschen Ortsschulräte,” 19 January 1909; File 18314, Protokolle IKG Leipnik, 1908–1936, Protokoll 27 May 1914.

¹²⁵ JMP, “Lipník,” (no file number), “Schulrat 1914–1918,” Letter from Deutsches Landes-Kommission für Kinderschutz und Jugendfürsorgung in Mähren, 18 April 1914, thanking the Israelitengemeinde Leipnik for its contribution of K 5.50 to the Kinderschutztag “welche die Sache unserer deutschen Kinder hochhalten und zu fördern bestrebt sind.” The Israelitengemeinde received regular requests from this organization.

¹²⁶ The budgets of the Israelitengemeinde included the cost of Czech-language instruction. For example, JMP, “Lipník,” File 18316, Protokolle, Ortsschulrat der Israelitengemeinde Leipnik, meetings 23 November 1910, 15 November 1911, 30 September 1913, 18 November 1914.

¹²⁷ JMP, “Lipník,” File 18316, Protokolle, Ortsschulrat der Israelitengemeinde Leipnik, meetings 23 June 1910, 26 June 1910, 23 July 1910. The protocol does not indicate what the complaint was about. Nevertheless, since the Ortsschulrat decided to follow the decision of the Administrative Court of Justice, which in 1910 and 1911 dealt with several cases of complaints against “Czech” parents who tried to send their children to the school in the Leipnik political Jewish community in order to obtain a German-language education, it stands to reason that the complaints involved reclamations of “Czech” children from the Leipnik Jewish school. I thank Jeremy King for sending me his summaries of Austrian legal cases involving national ascription. The Leipnik Israelitengemeinde cases are 7845A, 7989A, 7990A, 7991A, 7992A, and 8023A.

¹²⁸ JMP, “Lipník,” File 16173, Memo to Leipnik Israelitengemeinde, probably from Israelitische Kultusgemeinde, n.d., probably late 1860s/early 1870s.

¹²⁹ JMP, “Lipník,” File 18312, Protocolle, Ausschuss, Israelitengemeinde Leipnik, 1884–1910, meeting 18 July 1886, 27 July 1886.

¹³⁰ JMP, “Lipník,” File 38010, Register of Incoming School Correspondence 1910–1920, entry 2 April 1920 from Bezirksschulrat M. Weisskirchen, “Auflassung der deutsche Schule und der Israelitengemeinde Leipnik”; File 18313, Protokolle, Ausschuss der Israelitengemeinde Leipnik, meeting 20 February 1919 on uniting the Isr. Gemeinde with the Stadtgemeinde in response to letter of Moravian Landes-Aussschuss, 14 December 1918.

¹³¹ JMP, “Lipník,” File 18314, Sitzungsprotokolle, IKG Leipnik, 1908–1938, meetings 22 September 1919, 16 December 1919, 18 May 1921, 20 November 1921, 29 October 1928, 16 December 1928, 6 January 1929.

¹³² JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24996, “Israel. Volksschule im M. Ostrau.” This school history was probably written in the early 1920s since the enrollment statistics Kraus provides end in 1923. A slightly expanded version of the history appeared in the Jüdische Volksstimme, 21 April 1932, 6. In Brünn/Brno, the Jewish religious community also hoped to create a German-Jewish school in the 1860s, but the authorities did not allow it because there were many German-language elementary schools in the Moravian capital that Jews could attend. See Brunner, Moritz, “Geschichte der Juden in Brünn,” in Juden und Judengemeinden Mährens, ed. Gold, 137–72Google Scholar, at 162.

¹³³ The Klassenbücher of each grade in the school each year indicate the curriculum. For an example from 1905/06, see JMP, “Ostrava,” Files 24848/c and 24848/d. For the third grade general studies curriculum in 1889/90, see (no file number), “Lehrplan für die III. Classe der vierclassigen mit dem Öffentlichkeitsrechte ausgestatteten Privatvolksschule der isr. Cultusgemeinde in Mährisch Ostrau, 1889/90.”

¹³⁴ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24969, “Stundenplan,” Winterhalbjahr 1911.

¹³⁵ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24992, “Lehrplan” for Hebrew-language instruction, 1910; “Lehrplan” for Hebrew and Religion, n.d.

¹³⁶ Wechsberg, The Vienna I Knew, 81.

¹³⁷ The following discussion of the social background of students, including Tables 1 and 2, is based on JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24957, “Schulmatrik der 4-klassigen deutsch. Isr. Volksschule zu Mähr. Ostrau, 1874/75–1886–87”; File 24901/c, “Classenbuch über die Schulbesuch und Fortgang der Schüler der 1. Classe an der vier classigen Volksschule zu Mähr. Ostrau im Schuljahr 1895–96”; File 24848/b, “Classenbuch…2. Classe…1895/96”; File 24864/c, “Classenbuch…3. Classe…1895/96”; File 24876/a, “Classenbuch…4. Classe…1895/96”; File 24873, “Schulmatrik, Volksschule der isr. Cultus-Gemeinde mit dem Öffentlichkeitsrechte, Mähr. Ostrau, 1885/6–1907/8; File 24898/d, “Klassenkatalog, Israelitische Volksschule, I. Klasse 1915/16”; File 24905/d, “Klassenkatalog, Isr. Volksschule, II. Klasse 1915/16”; File 24883/c, “Klassenkatalog, Isr. Volksschule, III. Klasse 1915/16”; File 24872/b, “Klassenkatalog, Isr. Volksschule, IV. Klasse 1915/16.”

¹³⁸ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24873, “Schulmatrik…1885/86–1907/08,” listing for 1900/01.

¹³⁹ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24996, School history, clipping from Jüdische Volksstimme, 21 April 1932, 6; File 24969, Letters, IKG Mähr. Ostrau to Israel. Volksschule, 10 July 1906, 25 July 1906; File 56205, Protokolle, Kultusrat Mähr. Ostrau 1900–1906, meeting 25 June 1906. All the records are laconic about the problem, but, at its 25 June 1906 meeting, when the Kultusrat decided to retain the school, it also decided to apply to the city for a subvention. On the cost of the school to the IKG, see File 56205, Protocoll 5 November 1900, budget for 1901. In that year, the IKG had to provide about 6,000 crowns to the school beyond what it collected in tuition. It is likely that the allocation grew as the school fees declined with declining enrollments. A description of this episode in Jüdische Volksstimme, 1 August 1906, 3–4, is, in Zionist fashion, very hostile to IKG leaders for trying to “assassinate” the Jewish school.

¹⁴⁰ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24996, Clipping from Jüdische Volksstimme, 21 April 1932, 6.

¹⁴¹ Ibid.

¹⁴² JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24957, “Schulmatrik der 4-klassigen deutsch. Isr. Volksschule zu Mähr. Ostrau, 1874/75–1886/87”; File 39103/a, “Classenbuch, Isr. Volksschule, I. Classe 1874/75.”

¹⁴³ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24888, Teachers’ Conferences 1875–1899, Protocoll 12 September 1885. Unfortunately, I could find no records of tuition releases in other years.

¹⁴⁴ The percentage of business employees among the Jews in Vienna was far higher (35 percent of the Jewish workforce), probably because of much greater opportunities for such employment in the metropolis. See Rozenblit, Marsha L., The Jews of Vienna, 1867–1914: Assimilation and Identity (Albany, NY, 1983), 47–70CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

¹⁴⁵ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 39070, Yearly inspection reports from Bezirksschulrat Mähr. Ostrau 1889–1928; File 24969, 1905.

¹⁴⁶ For example, JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24969, Stundenplan for summer term 1910 approved by Deutscher k.k. Bezirksschulrat, Mähr. Ostrau, 14 May 1910.

¹⁴⁷ See, for example, JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24969, Correspondence between the school and the Bezirksschulrat Mähr. Ostrau, 21 September 1910, 9 July 1911.

¹⁴⁸ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 56206, Kultusrat Protokolle 1900–1906, meeting 1 May 1900, electing IKG Vice President Alois Hilf as the representative to the school board. He represented Jewish interests in general, especially Jewish religious instruction in all the city's schools.

¹⁴⁹ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24969, Letters from k.k. Bezirksschulrat Mähr. Ostrau to Jewish school. Such instructions increased during the war years. See Files 24963 (1914–1916) and File 24964 (1916–1921).

¹⁵⁰ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24963, Letter from k.k. Kriegsfürsorgeamt, 22 February 1915, 13 March 1915, 16 March 1915, thanking the school for sending (altogether) 7 kilo, of knitted wear in that one-month period; Letter k.k.Bezirksschulrat, Mähr. Ostrau, 8 February 1916, thanking the girls for the warm clothing they had knit; Letter from the Mähr. Ostrau branch of the Moravian Red Cross, 2 May 1916, thanking school for its donation of 100 crowns. See also File 24964 (covering 1916–1921), Receipts for contributions to Red Cross and for war bonds.

¹⁵¹ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24964, Receipts from Deutsche Bezirkskommission für Kinderschutz und Jugendversorgung im Gerichtsbezirk Mähr. Ostrau, n.d., probably 1918; thank you note, 3 January 1917, for contribution of K 20 to fund to help German war orphans in Ostrau.

¹⁵² See, for example, JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24964, Letter from Hilfskommission 1915 d. Oesterreichisches Landeskomité für Palästina, 12 April 1918, thanking school for a contribution of K 108 to the “Kriegswaisen in Safed” fund.

¹⁵³ Elias, Ruth, Die Hoffnung erhielt mich am Leben. Mein Weg von Theresienstadt und Auschwitz nach Israel (Munich, 1988), 25Google Scholar. Elias especially loved her teacher Greta Gross (the daughter of local rabbi Rubin Färber), who taught at the school for most of the interwar period, leaving only when the school switched to Czech language of instruction.

¹⁵⁴ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 25000, Statistischer Jahresausweis, 1921, 1926; File 24997, Statistischer Jahresausweis, 1932.

¹⁵⁵ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24988, Letter, IKG Mähr. Ostrau to Jewish school, 1 June 1928. In her interesting dissertation, “Making Jews at Home,” Tatjana Lichtenstein notes that in the late 1920s, the Czechoslovak government put pressure on Jewish schools to use Czech language of instruction, but the school in Mährisch Ostrau/Moravská Ostrava resisted (214–15). I have seen no evidence of resistance in the archives, but the increase in Czech-language hours may be the result of the pressure (in addition to their own desire to teach the state language). Lichtenstein, “Making Jews at Home,” 195, incorrectly labels the school as Zionist.

¹⁵⁶ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 39105, Stundenplan, 1928/29.

¹⁵⁷ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24988, Letter, IKG Mähr. Ostrau to Jewish school, 25 May 1927.

¹⁵⁸ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 39105, Stundenplan, 1928/29.

¹⁵⁹ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24992, Lehrplan aus dem Religions- und dem hebraischen Unterrichte, 4 December 1918. Bible in the original Hebrew is not mentioned here, or in the 1928 curriculum cited above, but it is possible that some of the “Hebrew” classes for boys, held when the girls had needlework, could have focused on the Bible in Hebrew.

¹⁶⁰ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24992, Letter, Bezirksschulrat Mährisch Ostrau, to German schools, 18 December 1918, reporting order of the Ministry of Education and National Culture; 25 November 1918, on the voluntary nature of religious instruction for all students.

¹⁶¹ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 39105, Stundenplan, 1928/29.

¹⁶² Sources for Tables 3 and 4 and the following discussion, JMP, “Ostrava,” Files 24855/a, Klassenkatalog, Jüd. Volksschule in Mähr. Ostrau, I. Klasse, 1919/20; 24855/b, Klassenkatalog….II. Klasse, 1919/20; 24855/c, Klassenkatalog…III. Klasse, 1919/20; 24855/d, Klassenkatalog…IV. Klasse, 1919/20; Files 24882/a, Katalog über den Schulbesuch und Fortgang der Schüler in der 1. Klasse der vierklassigen Volksschule in Mähr. Ostrau, Schuljahr, 1925/26; 24882/b, Katalog…2. Klasse…1925/26; 24882/c, Katalog…3. Klasse…1925/26; 24882/d, Katalog…4. Klasse…1925/26; Files 24907/b, Klassenkatalog, I. Klasse, 1930/31; 24863/d, Klassenkatalog…II. Klasse, 1930/31; 24907/c, Klassenkatalog, III. Klasse, 1930/31; 24908/d, Klassenkatalog, IV. Klasse, 1930/31; Files 24922/e, Třídní Kniha (Klassenbuch), 1st grade, 1936/37; 24992/f, 2nd grade, 1936/37; 24862/b, 3rd grade, 1936/37; 24862/c, 5th grade, 1936/37. The class book for the fourth grade is not extant in the archives. The records for 1936/37 were in Czech.

¹⁶³ On the language choices of Slovakian Jews in interwar Czechoslovakia, see Rebeka Klein-Pešová, “Among the Nationalities: Jewish Refugees, Jewish Nationality, and Czechoslovak State Building” (PhD diss., Columbia University, 2007), 210.

¹⁶⁴ For example, see JMP, “Ostrava,” File 39065, German school board Neutitschein to Jewish school, Mähr. Ostrau, 28 March 1931, approving the curriculum; 19 December 1931, giving it good marks in its yearly inspection; File 39070, inspection reports from German school board for 1919, 1921, 1922, 1924, 1925, 1927, 1928. The school always received a good report.

¹⁶⁵ See, for example, JMP, File 24964, Letters from Bezirksschulrat Mähr. Ostrau to German schools, 18 December 1918; 5 March 1919, 18 February 1920; 10 March 1920. Notices about Czech independence day and Masaryk's birthday arrived every year. See File 24987 (1927); File 24988 (1928); File 24995 (1928/29), File 24993 (1931); File 39065 (1931).

¹⁶⁶ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24964, German School Board to German schools, 22 October 1921; File 24995, List of approved German books, 22 November 1929.

¹⁶⁷ See, for example, JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24962, Notices from the Bezirksschulausschuss für deutsche Schulen in Neutitschein, 1934; File 24956, 1935; File 24997, 1933.

¹⁶⁸ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24964, Bezirksschulrat Mähr. Ostrau to German schools, 5 March 1919; File 24993, 14 December 1931. Schools needed special permission from the Ministry of Education and National Culture to use any foreign material.

¹⁶⁹ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24992, German school board to Jewish school, 15 April 1926; File 24995, German school board, Neutitschein, 18 May 1929; File 24997, List of official texts for Volksschulen, 1933.

¹⁷⁰ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24995, Letter from director of Jewish school to president of IKG, Mähr. Ostrau, 27 February 1929. It is possible that for some years the school did have class on Saturdays. In 1927, in explaining how they would celebrate Czechoslovak independence day, 28 October, since it fell on a Sunday, the normal day of rest for schools, head teacher Ferdinand Kraus told the German school board that the Jewish school would celebrate on 27 October, a Saturday. See File 24987, Correspondence between German school board and Kraus, 18 October 1927 and 20 October 1927.

¹⁷¹ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24993, School Board Neutitschein to Jewish School, 30 March 1929, with note on back by head teacher Kraus, 2 April 1929, that the permission was permanent.

¹⁷² JMP, “Ostrava,” File 25000, Stundenplan 1930/31.

¹⁷³ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24997, Exchange of letters between German school board Neutitschein and Jewish school, 23 September 1932, 11 and 23 November 1932, 2 December 1932, 4 October 1933.

¹⁷⁴ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24987, Letter, German school board Neutitschein to Jewish school, 7 October 1927.

¹⁷⁵ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 25000, Statistischer Jahresausweis, 1921.

¹⁷⁶ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 25000, Jahresausweis 1928; File 24854, List of volumes in teachers’ library, 1933; Verzeichnis der Lehrer Bibliothek, n.d., probably early 1930s.

¹⁷⁷ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24963, Letter from Beth Hamidrash Verein, 7 April 1915.

¹⁷⁸ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24987, Letter, IKG Mähr. Ostrau to Head Teacher Kraus, 4 August 1927; File 25000, Jahresausweis, 1928; Jüdisches Volksblatt, 27 April 1920, 5; Central Zionist Archives, Z4/1659, Protocol, Executive Committee of Zionist Central Committee for Czechoslovakia, November 1924; Z4/3564II, Budget of Zionist Organization for 1925/26.

¹⁷⁹ Before World War I, all the teachers were Jewish. See, for examples, JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24866, Teachers’ Conference Protocols, 1901–1906, meeting 13 September 1901; File 39070, Material prepared for school inspection 15 March 1917. The school actively sought Jewish teachers, writing to teacher training institutes about Jewish graduates to fill positions. See for example, File 24969, Letter, Jewish School to the Director of the k.k. deutschen Lehrerbildungsanstalt in Prag, 15 April 1908; File 24963, Letters from k.k. Deutsche Lehrerbildungsanstalt in Prag, 16 June 1915, and k.k. Lehrerbildungsanstalt in Budweis, 17 June 1915, responding to Jewish school requests for Jewish graduates, of which they had none.

¹⁸⁰ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 39070, Letter, IKG Mähr. Ostrau to Jewish school, 7 September 1921; File 25000, Statistischer Jahresausweis, 1921.

¹⁸¹ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24964, Letter IKG Mähr. Ostrau to Jewish school, 6 April 1921; File 25000, Jahresausweis, 1926.

¹⁸² JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24987, Letter IKG Mähr. Ostrau to Jewish school, 25 May 1927.

¹⁸³ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24987, Letter, IKG Mähr. Ostrau to Head Teacher Ferdinand Kraus, 5 July 1927, with attached copy of a letter to Jüd. Schulverein in Brünn making inquiries. It is not clear what happened.

¹⁸⁴ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 25000, Jahresausweis 1928.

¹⁸⁵ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 25000, Statistischer Jahresausweis, 1929, 1930; File 24997, Statistischer Jahresausweis, 1932; File 39105, Statistischer Jahresausweis, 1933.

¹⁸⁶ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 39017, Stundenplan, 1938/39.

¹⁸⁷ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24987, School statistics, 1927; File 25000, Statistischer Jahresausweis, 1921, 1926.

¹⁸⁸ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24988, Letter, IKG to Head Teacher Ferdinand Kraus, 3 August 1928, complaining that school registration was “recht unbefriedigend”; form letter to parents of children who had not registered, 21 August 1928; responses from parents. One poignant response from Amalie Schmerz, 27 August 1928, noted: “Ich wünsche mein Kind nur in die jüd. Schule zu schicken, doch ist die Entfernung zwischen Wohnort und Schule zu gross, weil ich leider ausserstande bin mein Kind täglich zur Schule zu bringen, bez. abzuholen.”

¹⁸⁹ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24988, Letter, Josef Reisz to IKG, 29 August 1928.

¹⁹⁰ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 25000, Statisticher Jahresausweis 1928, 1929. Head teacher Kraus attributed the growth of the school to the growth of Zionism (File 24996, Clipping from Jüdische Volksstimme, 21 April 1932, 6). Zionism may have played some role, but I think the increase of hours of Czech language were more significant in the late 1920s.

¹⁹¹ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 39105, Statistischer Jahresausweis 1933; File 24956, School statistics, 28 June 1935.

¹⁹² Attendance records of children of Zionist president Josef Rufeisen in JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24882/b, Klassenkatalog, Jüd. Volksschule, Mähr. Ostrau…II. Klasse, 1925/26; File 24908/d, Klassenbuch…IV. Klasse 1930/31; File 24862/c, 5th grade, 1936/37.

¹⁹³ Elias, Die Hoffnung, 20, 26, 28.

¹⁹⁴ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 39105, Draft letter, Jewish school to Bezirksausschuss für die deutschen Schulen Neutitschein, 5 September 1933, informing the district committee that the IKG had decided to change languages on 28 June 1933; File 24997, Letter, Bezirksausschuss für deutsche Schulen in Neutitschein to Jewish school, 11 October 1933, acknowledging this change.

¹⁹⁵ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 39081, Letters of IKG to Jewish school, 9 February 1933; 5 February 1935.

¹⁹⁶ The party won 63 percent of the “German” vote. See Wiskemann, Elizabeth, Czechs and Germans: A Study of the Struggle in the Historic Provinces of Bohemia and Moravia (London, 1938), 200–06Google Scholar; Rothschild, Joseph, East Central Europe between the Two World Wars (Seattle, 1974), 125–29Google Scholar.

¹⁹⁷ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 39081, Gedächtnisprotokoll, written by Kornblüh in German about the 28 May 1935 meeting at the provincial school board in Brünn/Brno. The meeting must have been conducted in Czech, since all communication with the government had to be in the state language (Mitter, Wolfgang, “Das deutschsprachige Schulwesen in der Tschechoslowakei im Spannungsfeld zwischen Staat und Volksgruppe,” in Bildungsgeschichte, Bevölkerungsgeschichte, Gesellschaftsgeschichte in den Böhmischen Ländern und in Europa, ed. Lemberg, Hans, Litsch, Karel, Plaschka, Richard Georg, and Ránki, György, 82–94 [Vienna and Munich, 1988], at 85Google Scholar).

¹⁹⁸ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 39081, Gedächtnisprotokoll, 28 May 1935.

¹⁹⁹ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24961, Translation of letter from Jewish school to IKG, 7 May 1936, reporting an excellent report on fourth and fifth grade Czech-language instruction, as well as the permission granted by the provincial school board; letter of IKG to Jewish School, 4 May 1936.

²⁰⁰ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 24961, Report of Jewish school, 19 October 1936; File 24960, List of Teachers, 1937.

²⁰¹ JMP, “Ostrava,” File 39081, Draft letter of IKG to Ministry for Education and National Culture, n.d., probably 1933, requesting permission to use a textbook for modern Hebrew published in Warsaw; letter of IKG to Jewish school, 17 July 1934, directing it to teach “Palästinakunde,” Land of Israel studies, and Hatikvah to the children.

²⁰² JMP, “Ostrava,” File 39081, Draft letter (in German) of IKG to Ministry for Education and National Culture, n.d., probably 1933, and copy of the Czech letter the IKG sent.

²⁰³ JMP, File 39081, “Gedächtnisprotokoll,” 28 May 1935.

²⁰⁴ Österreichische Statistik, vol. 35, no. 4, 34–35, 38–39, 42–43; vol. 70, no. 3, 38–39, 42–43, 48–49.

²⁰⁵ Ibid.

²⁰⁶ Lichtenstein, “Making Jews at Home,” 216.

²⁰⁷ Friedmann, Franz, Einige Zahlen über die tschechoslovakischen Juden (Ein Beitrag zur Soziologie der Judenheit) (Prague, 1933), 23–24Google Scholar.

²⁰⁸ Résultats Préliminaires du Recensement de la Population du 15 Février 1921 établi par l'Office de Statistique de la Republique Tchéchoslovaque (Prague, 1921), 28Google Scholar; Administratives Gemeindelexikon der Čechoslovakischen Republic, II. Teil, Mähren und Schlesien, Slovakei, Karpathorussland (Prague, 1928), 1–99Google Scholar; Haas, Theodor, “Die Verteilung der jüdischen Bevölkerung in Mähren und Schlesien,” Jüdische Volksstimme, 23 April 1925, 2–4Google Scholar.