Photo taken during the filming of the SPIRA Wedding Postcard: photographer unknown
Following is a brief narrative for each film shown below. If you have or know of a "pre-war" film produced in Munkács, click HERE to contact us.
Film 1: March 1933 - Huge crowds of well wishers gather in the streets of Munkács on the occasion of the wedding of the Munkács Chief Rabbi Lázár SPIRA's 18-year-old daughter, Frime Chaye Rivke, to Rabbi RABINOWITZ. Rabbi SPIRA makes a speech in Yiddish exhorting Jews in America to continue to keep Shabbos. The wedding party then enters the synagogue grounds, and the cantor sings blessings beneath the wedding chupah (canopy). The wedding concludes with festive Hasidic music. Newspaper accounts indicate over 20,000 people attended the celebrations.
Film 2: 1930s - Secular Jewish children singing in Munkács is the title of this film. However, the children that you see singing the Hatikvah or "The Hope" (later adopted as the Israeli national anthem) come from the Munkács Zionist Gymnasium (or school). The children, in fact, are traditional, but it is all relative in a town where a large section of the Jews were ultra-orthodox Hasidic Jews.
Film 3: 1930s - Jewish children studying in an orthodox religious school in Munkács. It seems they are learning a prayer through memorization due to a shortage of prayer books.
Film 4: 1930s - Ultra-orthodox Hasidic Jews are seen leaving a Munkács house of study and a young boy trying to buy a bible from a Munkács book peddler.
Film 5: 1930s - Jewish weavers in Munkács. It is interesting to note their working conditions and how everyone in the family worked.
Film 6: 1930s - Secular Jewish children dancing in Munkács is the title of this film. However, the children that you see singing the Hatikvah or "The Hope" (later adopted as the Israeli national anthem) come from the Munkács Zionist Gymnasium (or School). The children, in fact, are traditional, but it is all relative in a town where a large section of the Jews were ultra-orthodox Hasidic Jews. It is interesting to note the clothing worn by the dancers.
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[Public domain films from U.S. National Archives and Records Administration.]
Rabbi Spira and Wedding
Jewish Children Singing
Orthodox Religious School
Book Peddler
Jewish Weavers
Jewish Children Dancing Elozor
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