Adas Israel Congregation (Duluth, Minnesota)

Adas Israel Congregation was organized in 1900 under the combined name "Adas Israel and Chevra Kadisha." Historical directories recorded it at Third Avenue East and Third Street in Duluth, a port city at the western end of Lake Superior.[1][2] The combined name reflected the congregation's connection with a traditional Jewish burial society, and directories also recorded a cemetery owned by the congregation.[1]

Accounts have described Adas Israel as Minnesota's oldest continuously used synagogue and, more specifically, as Duluth's oldest-surviving Modern Orthodox synagogue.[3][4] The historic building was destroyed by fire in 2019, after which members continued holding services in community spaces and private homes while leaders considered a permanent new site.[5]

The 1907–1908 volume of the American Jewish Year Book identified Israel Teplitz as rabbi of Adas Israel and Chevra Kadisha. It listed Moses S. Cook as president, S. Karon as treasurer, and J. M. Oreckovsky as secretary.[1] The congregation reported 100 members and annual income of $3,300, with daily services conducted in Hebrew.[1]

The same directory placed Adas Israel alongside B'nai Israel, Emanuel, and Toferet Israel among Duluth's congregations.[1] A later historical directory again listed Adas Israel and Chevra Kadisha as organized in 1900 at Third Avenue East and Third Street, although an asterisk indicated that the directory had not obtained official information for the entry.[2]

Early sources provide estimates from different periods rather than a single continuous population series. The Jewish Encyclopedia estimated that Duluth had about 1,000 Jewish residents and three congregations in the period it described, while the 1907 directory estimated a Jewish population of approximately 2,000.[6][1] Duluth's Jewish population later reached a reported peak of about 4,000.[7]

By the time of the 2019 fire, a family-history account placed Adas Israel's membership at approximately 50 congregants, most of them elderly.[3] The smaller congregation nevertheless continued using a building associated with more than a century of Jewish communal life in Duluth.

Duluth's Jewish population expanded sharply after the discovery of nearby iron ore. Jewish residents also moved inland to Iron Range towns including Virginia, Hibbing, Chisholm, and Eveleth, where many became merchants; each of those towns once supported a synagogue between approximately 1905 and the 1950s.[7]

Duluth's broader immigrant Jewish neighborhood was located in the West End, where synagogues, kosher butcher shops and other Jewish-oriented stores, socialist meeting halls, and Hebrew schools supported a vibrant Yiddish-speaking community.[8] The sources do not identify Adas Israel's Third Avenue East building as being within that West End neighborhood.

A family-history account portrays Adas Israel as a Litvak-centered institution. It recounts that the author's great-great-grandfather reproduced memories of European synagogue life in Duluth and that a relative recognized a model of the Great Synagogue of Vilna as resembling the "Third Street shul."[3] In later years the congregation generally operated without a rabbi. Its summer Friday-night services began at 6 p.m., well before the approximately 10:30 p.m. sunset, in a practice attendees called "early bird Shabbos."[3]

The congregation's historic synagogue stood at Third Avenue East and Third Street.[1][2] The 1907 directory also listed an Adas Israel Cemetery three and a half miles east of Duluth and identified it as property of Adas Israel and Chevra Kadisha.[1] A later directory separately listed the Woodland Cemetery Association and a cemetery owned by the congregation; it does not clearly establish that those two listings referred to the same organization or site.[2]

A fire broke out at Adas Israel shortly before 2:30 a.m. on September 9, 2019. Initial reporting placed its outbreak in a storage room, and the assistant fire chief described the structure as "pretty much a total loss."[4] Later reporting on the criminal case said that combustible materials had been ignited outside the main building near a sukkah.[9]

During the blaze, Adas Israel leaders guided firefighters into the basement to retrieve Torah scrolls and other sacred items.[4] Firefighters carried the scrolls out in plastic containers to protect them from water. Reports initially stated that eight of the congregation's 14 Torah scrolls had been saved, although board member Mike Baddin acknowledged uncertainty about the count because half had been placed in storage and half in another person's home. Baddin said the recovered scrolls were intact because their cabinet had apparently been sealed at the top.[4]

Immediate past board president Phillip Sher, who said that he had attended roughly 6,000 services in the building, described watching the Star of David come down as "very, very saddening" and "a shocking event."[4] Rabbi Mendy Ross of Chabad of Duluth offered the congregation access to Chabad facilities and described the loss of a synagogue with so much regional history as a tragedy.[4]

Police found no reason to believe the fire was a hate crime, although investigators concluded that it had been deliberately set.[5] Authorities identified Matthew Amiot, 36, as responsible. They said that he used a lighter to ignite combustible materials outside the main building near a sukkah and then unsuccessfully tried to extinguish the fire by spitting on it.[9]

Amiot pleaded guilty to negligent-fire charges and was sentenced to three months in jail and 192 hours of community service, with credit for 36 days already served.[9] One firefighter was injured during the response.[5] After the fire, congregants used community spaces and private homes for services while leaders considered whether to establish a permanent new site.[5]

The strongest directory evidence records that the congregation was organized in 1900.[1][2] News accounts describing the destroyed structure as either 117 or approximately 120 years old in 2019 suggest construction or establishment dates around 1899–1902, but estimates of a building's age do not necessarily contradict the congregation's recorded organizational date.[4][9]

Descriptions of the synagogue's historical status also vary in scope. A family-history account calls it Minnesota's oldest continuously used synagogue, while JNS identifies it as Duluth's oldest-surviving Modern Orthodox synagogue.[3][4]

The Jewish Encyclopedia's Wisconsin entry lists "Duluth, with a congregation, Adas Israel," despite Duluth being in Minnesota.[10] Its separate Minnesota entry reports three Duluth congregations and identifies Emanuel as the city's Reform congregation but does not name the other two.[6] These entries document Adas Israel's early history imperfectly and should not be treated as evidence of its later institutional status.