Beth Sholom Synagogue is a Conservative Jewish synagogue at 8231 Old York Road in Elkins Park, a suburb of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. The main synagogue building, completed in 1959, was the only Jewish house of worship designed by Frank Lloyd Wright; it consists of a hexagonal base topped by a tetrahedron-shaped pyramidal roof. There is a doughnut-shaped annex south of the main building, designed by Israel Demchick and Thalheimer & Weitz, which is used as both a school and auditorium.
Beth Sholom's congregation was established in 1919 and originally occupied a building at the intersection of Broad Street, Courtland Street, and Belfield Avenue, which was dedicated in 1921. Many members moved to Philadelphia's suburbs after World War II, prompting Beth Sholom's first senior rabbi, Mortimer J. Cohen, to buy land in Elkins Park in 1949. The annex opened in 1951, and Cohen hired Wright to design the Elkins Park synagogue two years later. Due to various delays and construction difficulties, the synagogue was not dedicated until September 20, 1959, after Wright died. Beth Sholom merged with the West Oak Lane Jewish Community Center in 1978 and Temple Sholom in 2004. Membership declined in the early 21st century, and a visitor center opened at Beth Sholom Synagogue in 2009.
The main building is a National Historic Landmark and has a facade made of glass, steel, and reinforced concrete. The roof is made of corrugated plastic and wire glass, suspended between three steel-and-concrete beams. The hexagonal interior measures wide, with furnishings designed by Wright. Two vestibules to the west lead to a main sanctuary on the second floor, with more than 1,000 seats. The main sanctuary's floor slopes down toward the center of the room, with seats facing a bimah in the east, while its ceiling slopes up toward the roof. The first floor of the synagogue contains the Sisterhood Sanctuary, and there are also two lounges and a mechanical cellar. Beth Sholom Synagogue has received extensive architectural and religious commentary over the years.
History Background Congregation establishment and first synagogue Beth Sholom Synagogue's congregation dates to 1917, when twenty-five families collaborated to establish a congregation in Logan, a neighborhood in North Philadelphia. Jewish families had started moving to Logan in the 1880s, and the neighborhood housed 3,000 Jewish families by the late 1910s. Beth Sholom was incorporated in 1919; its name, meaning "House of Peace" in Hebrew, had been suggested by Cyrus Adler to commemorate the end of World War I. Although the congregation was officially Conservative Jewish, many of its members were formerly part of Liberal Jewish congregations. The congregants originally met in a tent, though in 1919, the congregation obtained a site at the intersection of Broad Street, Courtland Street, and Belfield Avenue, where they developed their first synagogue. It would later become one of at least six synagogues along Broad Street in North Philadelphia.
Mortimer J. Cohen was appointed as the congregation's first senior rabbi effective May 1, 1920, when he was 25 years old. During his four-decade tenure, Cohen enacted more religiously progressive positions such as English-language services, mixed-gender seating, a mixed-gender religious school, and organ performances. The first synagogue's cornerstone was laid on May 31, 1920, and the synagogue was dedicated on September 25, 1921. J. Ethan Feldstein and Edwin L. Rothschild were the architects, while Benjamin Bornstein (who later became the congregation's president) was the general contractor. The structure was a two-story Georgian Revival or Italian Renaissance structure with a facade of granite, brick, terracotta, and limestone. The sanctuary was variously cited as having a capacity of 1,200 or 1,900 people. It had a domed ceiling, a wood-paneled altar in the center, and twelve windows representing the Twelve Tribes of Israel. In total, the structure cost an estimated $175,000 or $200,000.
Soon after the first synagogue was completed, Beth Sholom's members began raising money so they could issue bonds to pay off the mortgage loan. Beth Sholom renovated the first synagogue for $25,000 in 1927, adding a Hebrew school. The opening of the Broad Street subway line in 1928 led more Jews to move to Logan, some of whom joined Beth Sholom. By the congregation's 10th anniversary in 1929, the surrounding area had become one of the largest Jewish enclaves in Philadelphia. The congregation had grown to include 400 families by 1935; its Hebrew school taught 350 children every Sunday, and members had formed groups for women, men, and youth.
Elkins Park annex After World War II, many urban synagogues across the U.S. moved to the suburbs, prompted by the increasing popularity of automobile travel. Beth Sholom was among Philadelphia's first such congregations to make this move, as many of its members had moved to the Philadelphia suburbs. The congregation's membership was rapidly declining, and some members' children had moved to the southern part of Montgomery County (which included the unincorporated community of Elkins Park in Cheltenham Township) after they got married. In 1949, Beth Sholom Congregation bought a site on York Road in Elkins Park. This site, costing $13,500, measured wide and was slightly south of Foxcroft Road. Although Cohen wanted to develop a new synagogue there, some of the congregants resisted the idea, so a school was built there. The congregation hired Israel Demchick to design a modern-style structure and requested the Cheltenham Township government's permission to establish a school and chapel. The cornerstone of the new Elkins Park annex was laid in November 1950. The congregation's onetime president Herman Bornstein and his son Benjamin were the general contractors.
The first part of the annex, consisting of the classrooms, was opened in September 1951. The full structure was dedicated in October 1952, having cost $540,000. The annex started hosting Shabbat services in October 1953, and Shabbat services and High Holy Days celebrations alternated between the annex and the original synagogue. The annex's school was formally renamed the Philip L. Sheerr Religious School, after one of the congregation's former presidents, in May 1954. An academy for Jewish culture was established there the next year, and the congregation's religious school was also expanded. The annex began hosting the Gratz College School of Observation and Practice starting in 1955. Within two years of the structure's completion, Cohen had expressed his displeasure with the annex's size, acoustics, capacity, and ventilation.
Development
In 1952, the congregation bought some land from Edith Breyer—the widow of Henry Breyer, who had founded the ice cream brand Breyers—for $700,000. The new land, adjacent to the existing annex, included of land, which contained the Henry West Breyer Sr. House. By then, Cohen was advocating for the congregation to move the synagogue to Elkins Park as well, expressing concerns that, if Beth Sholom did not move quickly, other congregations would take its members.
Planning and architect selection Cohen wanted the new synagogue to honor American liberty and the 300th anniversary of the first organized migration of Jews to North America. At the same time, he wanted to avoid older synagogue architecture styles, particularly the Moorish and Gothic styles, instead seeking a more modern design. Though the International Style was the prevailing modern architectural style of the time, Cohen eschewed it as too simplistic, since he wanted the synagogue to indicate clearly that it was a Jewish house of worship. Cohen had never created a drawing or painting before, and his knowledge of architecture was limited to Jewish styles, but he began devising sketches for what he wanted the new temple to look like. His early sketches called for an octagonal sanctuary centered around a bimah, in a similar manner to Sephardic Jewish synagogues. The congregation had not formally approved the plans, nor did it have the money, but Cohen was still determined to develop a new building.
The idea to hire Frank Lloyd Wright, a proponent of organic architecture, had come from Boris Blai, a local sculptor who was familiar with both Cohen and Wright. Although Wright was well-known, the scholar George W. Goodwin wrote that Cohen probably was unaware of the architect's previous work, such as Fallingwater and the Suntop Homes. Cohen ultimately decided to contact Wright in November 1953, sending Wright his sketches. Although Wright typically did not have a high opinion of potential clients who sent him sketches, he was impressed with Cohen's sketches and the sincerity of the rabbi's request. That December, Cohen visited Wright's suite in New York's Plaza Hotel to discuss the plan. Cohen appealed to the architect's sense of patriotism, likening the proposed synagogue to a Jewish ner tamid (eternal flame) and the Statue of Liberty, and Wright informally agreed. Wright said he could begin designing the synagogue immediately, even though he was busy with several other projects, and he advised Cohen: "Send me a few dollars whenever you can".
Wright had never designed a synagogue before, despite having been hired by numerous prominent Jews during the previous six decades. Sources disagree on whether he had declined previous synagogue commissions or whether other congregations had refused to hire him. In an article in The Forward, Gavriel D. Rosenfeld suggested that Wright may not have been hired because of anti-Semitic beliefs prior to World War II. By contrast, a National Park Service report said that Wright was not anti-Semitic and that he was willing to design a synagogue, just not one that lacked American elements. Goodwin stated that several Jewish congregations had declined to ask Wright to design their synagogues. According to Goodwin, "Wright did not feel any solidarity with the Jewish people"; instead, the architect took projects for Jews simply because they were wealthy and willing to commission elaborate designs. One of Wright's biographers, Robert McCarter, wrote that Wright believed he could be "an effective designer for all religions" by not giving preference to any religion in particular.
Design
Unlike many contemporary rabbis who had minimal involvement in the design of their synagogues, Cohen suggested various changes to the plan and architectural details. The congregation's board gave Cohen and Wright wide latitude in the synagogue's design. Cohen requested that the synagogue include 1,100 to 1,500 seats in its main sanctuary and another 200 seats in a smaller chapel; this would make the synagogue significantly larger than any of his previous houses of worship. With Cohen's permission, Wright changed the octagonal plan to a hexagonal one, and he modified his original plans for a simplistic entrance canopy to be more elaborate in design. Lewis Heicklen, the congregation's president, also worked with Wright on the development of the new synagogue. Wright showed Cohen the design—a loose representation of the Jewish holy site of Mount Sinai—in February 1954, to which the rabbi replied that the design exuded "beauty and reverence".