Abraham Cahan

Author Code: AABC

The son of Hebrew teachers, Cahan graduated from the Vilna Teacher's Institute in 1881. He became involved with anti-tsarist factions and fled to America to avoid the authorities. In New York, he worked for a time in a tin factory before taking a teaching job at the Young Men's Hebrew Association. He published his first article, concerning Tsarist Russia, in the New York World in late 1881. He married in 1886. He held editorial positions at the Arbeiter Zeitung and the Tsunkuft newspapers during the 1890's. It was during this period that he met Fredrick Engels, who greatly influenced Cahan's socialist philosophy. In 1896, he published his first novel, Yekl: A Tale of the New York Ghetto, which did reasonably well. He worked as a police reporter for the New York Commercial Advertiser during the late 1890's and from his experiences, published The Spirit of the Ghetto in 1897. Also in 1897, he established the Social Democratic Party, which he was associated with until 1902, when he joined the Socialist Party. Writing for the Jewish Daily Forward, Cahan's columns attracted a huge following and by the 1920's was the largest Jewish immigrant paper in America. Having favored Communism as an instrument for the overthrow of tsarism, Cahan later became a bitter opponent. He published his memoirs, Leaves From My Life in 1931. During the Second World War, Cahan revived his column to report on events on the Eastern Front and Jewish immigration. Suffering a stroke during 1946, his last years were spent at his home where he died of heart failure at the age of 91. His other works include The Imported Bridegroom and Other Stories (1898), The White Terror and the Red (1905) and The Rise of David Levinsky (1917).