Labor Lyceum

The Labor Lyceum was a community center in the Hill District for Jewish political parties, Jewish labor unions, and secular Jewish cultural activities. Local branches of the Workmen’s Circle and other groups founded Labor Lyceum Inc. in 1907 for the purposes of building a center for Jewish labor and socialist activity. The coalition broke ground on a building on Miller Street in 1916 and held a housewarming on February 4, 1917.

The three-story building had offices, a lecture hall, a public library, and community spaces. It was a meeting place for at least 13 Jewish labor, fraternal, political, cultural, and philanthropic organizations, including the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of American Local 86, the Baker’s Union Local 41, the Bread Salesman Union Local 42, the Fruit Dealer’s Protective Association, the Hat and Cap Makers Union, the Hebrew Beneficial Association, the Lamazer Relief Society, the Maretzer Relief Society, the Pittsburgh Installment Association, the Socialist Party of Pittsburgh-Jewish Branch, the Stogie Makers Union Local 1, the Workmen’s Circle, and the Young People’s Socialist League. The Labor Lyceum had a dramatic club, a choir and a Yiddish secular school.^[1]“Labor Lyceum,” Pittsburgh Jewish Community Book, 1921 (online—Historic Pittsburgh).

According to historian Dr. Ida Cohen Selavan Schwarcz, Labor Lyceum Inc. was likely the first white-owned organization in Pittsburgh to make meeting space available to African-African groups.^[2]Selavan, Ida Cohen. “Jewish wage earners in Pittsburgh, 1890-1930,” American Jewish Historical Quarterly, March 1976 [F160 .J5 J5 1976] (online—Berman Jewish Policy Archive). Labor Lyceum Inc. sold the building in 1930 following a decline in membership but lost the earnings in a bank closure during the early years of the Great Depression.^[3]Scoratow, Leon B. “The Arbiter Ring, the Growth and Decline of the Socialist Labor Movement in the Pittsburgh Jewish Community 1904-1947,” The Sloping Halls Review, 1997 (online). The building continued to be used for cultural, political and religious activities in the Hill District for many years. A pioneering production of the Irwin Shaw play “Bury the Dead” held in the Labor Lyceum in 1937 was among the earliest theatrical productions in Pittsburgh to have a racially integrated cast and audience.^[4]“New Theatre Presents ‘Bury The Dead,'” Communist Collection of A.E. Forbes [2000.07.080] (online—Historic Pittsburgh) The Church of God in Christ of Pittsburgh acquired the building in August 1937 to use as its church. The building was demolished in March 2018 over structural concerns.^[5]Derrick L. Tillman Labor Lyceum Demolition Digital Photographs [2018.0065] (catalog record).

Bibliography

Exhibit history

• Author: Eric Lidji
• Original: October 13, 2022
• Current: October 13, 2022