New Jersey Jewish News
Monmouth County Story

Freehold barn eyed as site of new Jewish museum

by Jill Huber
NJJN Bureau Chief/Monmouth

Monmouth County may soon have its first Jewish history museum.

The proposed museum, which will contain information about the county’s Jewish residents from the 1700s to the present day, will be housed on the second floor of the 19th-century Levi Solomon Barn on Wemrock Road and Route 537 in Freehold. (Solomon was the son of a prominent Jewish merchant who lived in Freehold during the 1700s.)

“Our mission is to create exhibit space that will present visual displays that reveal the rich and unique heritage of Monmouth County Jewry and its contribution to the general community,” said Jean Klerman of Fair Haven, who cochairs, with Charlotte Kruman of Rumson, the Jewish Heritage Museum of Monmouth County Association. Klerman noted that Isaac Emanuel, a Freehold merchant, was the first Jew to settle in Monmouth County in 1720.

The idea for the Jewish history museum originated last year, when the Freehold Township Historical Preservation Commission told Klerman about the availability of the Levi Solomon Barn, which had been designated as a historical site by the organization. The commission had determined that the building should be used for historical purposes, Klerman said.

Klerman and Kruman agreed the structure would be the ideal place to house a museum. Late last year, they consulted with the Jewish Federation of Greater Monmouth County and with Bernard Hochberg of Freehold, the building’s owner and a past federation president.

Hochberg agreed to lease the top floor of the barn, which is 3,000 square feet, to the newly formed Jewish Heritage Museum of Monmouth County Association for one dollar per year. Hochberg also agreed to make all structural improvements and renovations at his own expense, according to Kruman; work on the interior and exterior of the structure may begin this year, she added.

The federation also will provide some assistance until the museum association becomes a self-sufficient organization, said executive director Howard Gases.

“We’re pleased that the Jewish Heritage Museum of Monmouth County will be established and that the federation was able to be a part of its founding,” Gases said. “We’re happy to provide some initial financial support to see that the museum becomes incorporated and self sufficient.”

Future funding sources to maintain the museum’s operation will include membership fees, donations, grants, and sponsorships; an annual operating budget amount has not yet been determined, Klerman said.

In the meantime, the museum association, which is now in the process of incorporation as a nonprofit association, will launch a membership drive, form a board of directors, and create a constitution and set of bylaws, Klerman said. Eventually, the association hopes to employ a part-time museum consultant and attract a corps of volunteers to operate the facility, she added.

But the county’s Jewish residents will have a strong say in the types of exhibits featured at the museum. In an effort to determine what the Jewish community wants to see represented there, letters will be sent to Jewish organizations, schools, and synagogues to solicit their input, according to the cochairs.

Shared history

Both Klerman and Kruman have a wealth of experience in the area of historical research. Klerman is the author of Peddler to Suburbanite: The History of the Jews of Monmouth County, which was published in 1980. She has also written material on the county’s Jewish residents for the Encyclopedia Judaica. Kruman was the chair of the Jewish Bicentennial Committee of the Monmouth Jewish Community Council and was also a contributor to Klerman’s book. She and her late husband, Daniel Kruman, who was the mayor of Deal from 1967 to 1979, were among the founders of the Monmouth Museum at Brookdale Community College in Lincroft.

Klerman and Kruman will conduct their own search for historical photos, artifacts, records, and documents, such as a copy of a 1778 map of an area known as Jews Town (now part of Colts Neck), and information about Jersey Homesteads (now called Roosevelt), an area in the western part of the county that was planned during the Depression as a cooperative agricultural and industrial community for unemployed Jewish garment workers. They also plan to offer a series of educational classes and lectures focusing on the county’s Jewish history, along with interactive displays for school-age visitors.

“We’d like to unite the Jewish population from the eastern and western parts of the county so their shared history can be combined,” said Klerman. “More than 11 percent of the county’s population is Jewish, and a large percentage lives west of Route 34. Diversity among religious ethnic groups is part of Monmouth County’s history. This museum will have something to offer the Jewish community and the community at large.”

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