Zion Literary Society
The Jewish Encyclopedia
of Western Pennsylvania
A project of the Rauh Jewish Archives at the Heinz History Center
The Zion Literary Society was a Zionist youth organization active before World War I. An organization by that name was holding events at the Tree of Life Congregation synagogue downtown as early 1903. Documentation of its activities ends in 1906. Leaders of this initial iteration included J. Seligsohn, M. H. Alter, M. Zabarence, J. Marcusky, J. Marcus and Benjamin Litcher.
A second Zion Literary Society was formed on June 9, 1912 and was associated with the Zionist Council of Pittsburgh. Leaders included J. B. Bernstein, Samuel Caplan, Julius Levenson, Isadore Swiss and Harry Levitt. Its membership was limited to men ages eighteen to twenty, although young women often attended social events. The society hosted readings, recitals, debates and lectures. A photograph from 1914 shows the members on a field trip to the Heinz factory.
The Zion Literary Society published two issues of the monthly Zionist Bulletin in April and May 1915. A newspaper notice from late October 1915 notes efforts by Julius Levenson to organize a “new Zion Literary Society” composed of high school boys. The Herzl Literary Society, founded in 1915, later claimed to have been a successor to the Zion Literary Society.
