Growing Up Manischewitz – Some Manischewitz History

When Laura Manischewitz Alpern moved to New York from Cincinnati in 1959, she was taken aback that strangers recognized her name. Her great-grandfather Dov Behr Manischewitz started baking matzahs in 1888, as a young immigrant in Cincinnati — and ultimately revolutionized the matzah business, producing square matzahs by machine. Her book, “Manishewitz: The Matzo Family” (Ktav), is a family history and the story of the iconic company, sold to a conglomerate in 1990. Alpern was recently visiting Manhattan, from her home in Geneva, Switzerland.

Q: What’s distinctive about your family?

A: Each of us has a special relationship with the family name, and we share a feeling that this makes us a link in the chain of the history of

American Jewry. Our family’s achievement was not just about building a business, nor was it a purely cultural achievement, nor precisely a religious one, but a combination of all of these.

What drove your great-grandfather toward success?

The quality of being ambitious is probably innate, or develops very early in life. The few facts I found about his childhood, from family stories and old letters exchanged between my great-grandfather and his father in Lithuania, seem to point to this conclusion. Behr had an older brother who stayed behind in Europe and remained desperately poor till the end of his life. The younger brother seems to have had a need to succeed that was lacking in his sibling. It is fascinating to see that Behr’s drive to excel was echoed in the following two generations, and in each generation it was the second son, not the oldest son, who took over the leadership of the company.

Do you see your family’s story as a particularly Jewish story?

Matzah is not just another product; it is a product laden with enormous emotional and religious significance. The difference between a matzah business and any other business was clear from the beginning. My great-grandfather faced major opposition from rabbinical quarters when he was just starting out — religious opposition to the idea of mass-production of matzah, which was traditionally handmade. If he had not been a religious scholar himself, he would never have been able to face the opposition.

How’s the matzah in Geneva?

I’m not sure I should say this, but it is delicious. It is made in Alsace, France, by two Orthodox Jewish families. Both families have a centenary tradition of matzah baking, and their matzah has that French touch: it is light and melts in your mouth. Manischewitz products are not available in Switzerland, so we can consume the French matzah with a clear conscience — and enjoy it.