Correction:
An earlier version of this story was corrected to clarify the amount of population growth seen in Akron's Jewish community.
Jewish merchants were doing business in Akron as early as 1845, according to Samuel Lane’s Fifty years and over of Akron and Summit County, one of the classic histories of the area from 1892. And Helga Kaplan’s 1979 dissertation, “Century of Adjustment: A History of the Akron Jewish Community,” cites sources that claim Jewish families began settling in the area in the 1850s and 1860s.
In 1881, the Jewish population was reported to be 175. By 1892, 11 years later, it had increased to around 300.
The influx of newcomers brought with it a reality — as members of Akron’s fledgling Jewish community died, they had to be buried according to their faith traditions. Generally, according to Jewish religious laws, Jews must be buried in ground consecrated in a way that signifies the land is considered holy and sacred and used exclusively for Jewish burials.
Two of Akron’s Jewish cemeteries are located about a mile and a half from each other, not far from Akron’s former Jewish neighborhood.
South Street Jewish Cemetery
The South Street Jewish Cemetery is Akron’s oldest Orthodox Jewish cemetery and is just under a half-acre in size. It’s located at the corner of West South Street and Lakeshore Boulevard in Summit Lake.
There are approximately 125 graves in the cemetery, most of which are from the early 20th century. An Akron Beacon Journal article from Sept. 10, 1999, noted that the first burial took place there in 1892 for Hannah Wise, age 43, who died in July of that year.
The most recent burial was of Charles Schneir in 1981.
For approximately 70 years, several members of the Schneier family were record keepers of the South Street Jewish Cemetery. (In most cases, the family’s surname was spelled “Schneier.” However, Charles’ surname is spelled “Schneir” on his gravestone and in his obituary. His father, brothers and nephew spelled their last name as “Schneier.”)
Samuel Schneier, Charles’ father, emigrated to the United States from Poland in 1905. According to his obituary in the Akron Beacon Journal, he moved to Akron seven years later and founded Schneier Sea Foods Co., later renamed Schneier’s Finer Foods.
Samuel’s obituary also said that he was an active member of the South Street Cemetery Association until his death in 1951. He had been the cemetery’s record keeper since the 1920s and was buried there. His wife Rose, their daughter Rose, and Charles’ first wife Pauline are other Schneier family members buried there.
After Samuel’s death, his sons George and Max continued to maintain the records until their deaths in the early 1980s. George’s son Jerome then managed the records until the Jewish Community Board of Akron took over management of the cemetery in 1996.
Orthodox Jewish Cemetery
The Orthodox Jewish Cemetery is located about a mile and a half from the South Street Jewish Cemetery. It’s tucked into a residential area on White Avenue between Fess and Tressel Avenues in the Sherbondy Hill neighborhood.
It’s not clear why this cemetery, often referred to as Sherbondy Hill Cemetery or Akron Hebrew Cemetery, was founded in 1907 when the South Street cemetery was so close by. Kaplan states that the Orthodox burials were more systematically approached with the founding of this new cemetery. There was also a Jewish section in Glendale Cemetery at this time.
The Orthodox Jewish Cemetery’s close proximity to Wooster Avenue (now Vernon Odom Boulevard) could be one reason why the location was chosen. According to Kaplan’s 1979 dissertation, Wooster Avenue had become the prominent area of Jewish settlement and business development in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Businesses in the neighborhood included grocery stores and tailors.
According to a May 5, 2016, article from JewishAkron, the Orthodox Jewish Cemetery Association was formed in October 1907. Three weeks after its founding, the organization purchased the land for a cemetery in the Sweitzer Allotment on Sherbondy Hill.
The cemetery is not identified in the 1915 Plat Book of Akron, but it does appear in the 1921 Plat Book of Akron. Fess Avenue was called Frances Street and turned into Clifton Avenue at the intersection of Washburn Avenue. Tressel Avenue was called Henry Street.
A year later, in 1908, the Sherbondy Hill Cemetery had its first burial, although the identity of the person first interred there is unclear.
Congregation Ohaiv Shalom of Barberton purchased a significant number of lots in the cemetery when the congregation was established in 1915, a May 13, 2004, Cleveland Jewish News article noted. Many of the congregation’s founders and their descendants are buried in the Sherbondy Hill Cemetery.
Founding families of the congregation included Axners, Barnetts, Browns, Cohens, Farbers, Glasses, Goldbergs, Greenbaums, Greenbergers, Koplans, Litwaks, Newmans, Rechts, Rogows, Sabetays, Sigalls, Silvermans, Skormans, Sparbers, Stans, Vendelands, Weinbergs, Weisbergers, Weisses and Wolfs.
The Barberton congregation closed in 1961 as Barberton’s Jewish population had moved to Akron or elsewhere.
South Street and Sherbondy Hill cemeteries are two of the four cemeteries that have been community-owned by JewishAkron for the past 20 or so years, according to a Feb. 13, 2024, JewishAkron article, and are overseen by a cemetery committee. The other two cemeteries are Workmen’s Circle and Farband Cemetery, both in Coventry Crossing.
Sherbondy Hill Cemetery is the largest and most active of the four cemeteries. Approximately 1,000 people are buried in the Akron Hebrew Cemetery, and about 10 burials still occur there annually.
The JewishAkron cemetery committee continues to work to improve the cemeteries, including fundraising, researching best practices for maintenance and hosting annual volunteer cleanup days. The next cleanup day is June 22 at the South Street Cemetery.
The gates at both the South Street and Sherbondy Hill Cemeteries are always locked, but access can be granted by calling the Shaw JCC of Akron.
Additional sources
Akron Beacon Journal articles, accessed via newspapers.com.
Summit County Fiscal Office online property database.