Lizzie Black Kander
[1] The Black family had previously lived in Green Bay, Wisconsin before their 1844 move to the South Side of Milwaukee.
[4] In her valedictorian speech, she “spoke of the need to restore economic individualism and political democracy to American cities”.
She believed that “social decay could not be entirely blamed on the effects of rapid industrialization, urbanization, or capitalism, but from the general wiliness of women to escape personal responsibility”.
She met Simon Kander, a native of Baltimore who had moved to Milwaukee in 1868, through their mutual interest in public school reform.
From 1890 to 1893, Kander worked as truancy officer to view the home conditions of Milwaukee's Russian immigrant families.
Because Kander refused to accept social reform as essentially Christian, she joined the Milwaukee Chapter of the National Council of Jewish Women (NCJW) which was established to provide sewing, cooking and English classes to Russian immigrants.
Kander believed Jewish women had an obligation to have a role in “advancing the history and customs of their forefathers.” Settlement achieved the greatest amount of success with Jewish communities because they oriented towards achieving middle class status through education; and settlement houses could help them “achieve this goal.” Settlement house was “their celebration of immigrant culture was meant to be a temporary way station along the road to eventual Americanization.” Kander was able to target this amongst the Jewish community in Milwaukee.
They set to “improve sanitary conditions, maintain school attendance among immigrant children, and help speed acculturation through recreation and skills class in sewing, darning, mending, crocheting, embroidery, painting, and drawing.” This was later renamed Milwaukee Jewish Mission at Emanu-El Guild Hall.
On March 27, 1900, Kander's Milwaukee Jewish Mission was combined with the Sisterhood of Personal Service to establish a settlement house on North 5th Street.
Her husband, Simon, with his real estate business and short tenure as a Republican State Representative, had many connections which gave her the opportunity to solicit contributions for her settlement work.
The immigrant girls would bring “American practices and values back from the settlement house into their homes.” These cooking classes helped break poor cultural diets through nutritional education of the young women.
Kander approached Metron Yewdlale, a Milwaukee printer, to help publish the cookbook, and he agreed to undertake the work, which was supported by selling advertisements.
[5] It later help provide the funds to expand the Jewish Community Center through the purchase of the Milwaukee University High School building.
This allowed “American” housekeeping to be taught through extension courses in the public school and could reach a wider audience of Milwaukee's working-class women.
