Archive - Jerome Abrams Papers

The Central Jewish Institute was founded in 1916 in Yorkville on New York's Upper East Side by the Orthodox synagogue Kehilath Jeshurun. Mordecai Kaplan, founder of the Reconstructionist movement in Judaism, was the rabbi at Kehilath Jeshurun, 1903-1909, and he inspired the CJI's founding. The CJI subsequently developed into an independent Jewish community center that aimed to integrate Judaism with the American way of life. In particular, it strove to vitalize Jewish education, then in decline as a result of the forces of assimilation. The CJI operated a school for children (Talmud Torah), a Hebrew high school, clubs for youth, an extension department, cultural activities for adults, and in 1919 began a program of summer camping which ultimately evolved into the Cejwin (CEntral JeWish INstitute) Camps in Port Jervis, New York. The founder and first president of CJI was Samuel I. Hyman of Kehilath Jeshurun, and its director until 1923 was educator A.P. Schoolman.

The CJI camp was begun by the CJI's Women's Auxiliary in 1919. Tillie Hyman, widow of Samuel I. Hyman, founder and president of the CJI, was particularly active in the founding of the camp. The first camp, referred to in the records as a vacation home, was located in Parksville, New York. In search of a permanent home, the camp moved to Warwarsing, New York in 1920, and then to Central Valley in 1921. In 1923 it settled in Port Jervis where, with different camps for each sex and age group, it remained. In 1930 it was incorporated as the Central Jewish Institute Camps, and in 1934 it was renamed Cejwin. Led by A.P. Schoolman from 1923 until the 1970s, the camps, while not Hebrew speaking, had a Jewish educational program.

Camp Ramah, administratively centered at the Jewish Theological Seminary with camps in the United States, Canada, and Israel, was founded in 1947. Like the Cejwin Camps, Ramah offers a Jewish educational program yet, unlike Cejwin, it puts a particular emphasis on Hebrew speaking.

Jerome Abrams (1926 - ), rabbi, camp director, educator, and educational administrator, received his BA and Hebrew Teachers' degree from Yeshiva University in 1948, a masters degree in educational psychology from Teachers College, Columbia University, 1953, and rabbinic ordination from the Jewish Theological Seminary in 1953.

Abrams was the director of several Ramah camps, 1955-1991, and of the Cejwin Camps, 1967-1978. He also served as the director of personnel for the Ramah camps, 1960-1964, as a visiting instructor in education at the Jewish Theological Seminary, 1960-1963, and in administrative positions at the Metropolitan Leaders Training Fellowship and the Melton Center for Jewish Research, both at the Jewish Theological Seminary.

Abrams began a doctoral dissertation on the Cejwin Camps at New York University in the early 1970s. The material from the Central Jewish Institute and the Cejwin Camps in this collection was gathered by Abrams while doing research on his dissertation.