Jews in Norrkping

1
Jews in Norrköping
2
Jewish immigration

• 1779
• First Jews to Sweden
• King Gustav III
• Jewish regulations
• Economical guarantee
• demanded
• Three cities only
• Stockholm, Göteborg and
• Malmö

• 1782
• First Jews to Norrköping
• From Germany and Holland
• by horse and carriage or boat
• Well received in Norrköping

3
Jewish regulations

• 1782
• Laws for Jews in Sweden
• - Allowed in three cities only
• - Restricted professions
• - Not allowed to give evidence in court
• - No mixed marriages

4
Judaism and the Jewish congregation

• First monotheistic religion
• Founder is Moses
• Torah and Talmud
• First congregation in Norrköping 1782
• Founded by Jacob Marcus
• Education within congregation
• Own burial-ground

5
Synagogue

• Synagogue
• - Bet Knesset in Hebrew
• First small synagogue built by Jacob Marcus in
  1790
• Present synagogue from 1858
• Financed through gifts and fees
• 99 members in 1860
• Problems when wealthy members left Norrköping
• Declared historic building in 1978
• Today around 30 members

6
The most important Jewish families in Norrköping
7
The Wahren family

• Wealthy
• Textile mills
• Jacob Wahren
• Wool industry
• Big factory buildings by the river and waterfalls
  in central Norrköping
• Herman Leonard Wahren
• Expanded his fathers (Jacobs) industries

• Gustaf Mauritz Wahren
• Stock exchange trader
• Richard Wahren
• Textile mills Richard Wahren Co
• R. Wahrens AB

8
Jacob Marcus

• Arrived in Norrköping in 1782
• Permission to start factories and wholesale trade
• Sold colonial products,
• like coffee, spices and
• olives
• Factory for cotton printing
• Bankruptcy after economical crises in Sweden 1815

9
The Philipson family

• Philip Jeremias
• Arrived in Sweden and Norrköping in 1789
• Launched several companies
• Manufactured lacquer playing cards
• Jacob Philipson, son
• Owned big farms
• John Philipson, grandson
• Laid out several parks in Norrköping, the most
  famous is Folkparken

10
General facts

• Economy
• Most Jewish families did well
• Residence
• Lived in different parts of town
• Work
• Worked in their own companies and shops
• Textile mills
• House to house peddling

• Education
• Private tutors
• No Jewish schools
• Religious education in Synagogue
• Language
• Second generation often fluent in Swedish
• Traces of Jewish inhabitants
• Synagogue and the Jewish burial-ground
• The parks and the old factory
• buildings