Bialystok’s strength rests not only in its extraordi- nary features but in its normal characteristics as well. The fifty thousand living there are doing reasonably well financially and also spiritually, like other Jews in Poland. Still, Bialystok was the first, at the end of the Ger- man occupation after World War I, to abolish its auto- cratic community leadership, replacing it with an exemplary democratic system that will go down in history. The Hebraist movement in Bialystok was only a part of the diffuse cultural advance in all of Poland. But when Bialystok established its Hebrew Gymnasium (high school), it was the rank and file Jews, not the radical Hebraists, who erected it. The tall, sturdy build- ing evoked the admiration of the local community as well as of visitors from near and far, especially since it could accommodate seven hundred students. The Yiddish influence in Bialystok was also only a EMANUEL NOWOGRODSKI part of the Yiddish movement in all of Poland and in the entire world. But with the exception of Wilno, no other Jewish town besides Bialystok was able to fashion such an intricate Yiddish school network, let alone a high school, despite difficult circumstances. The orphan problem became one of the most criti- cal social issues in Bialystok after World War I. Surely no other city had someone like Mrs. Rabinowicz, who, when the situation became next to hopeless, was the only leader in all of Poland who went to America to obtain the necessary assistance for these unfortunate children. It is possible to mention hundreds of other exam- ples of community and private initiatives in Bialystok, which clearly depict its special atmosphere of effervesc- ing creativity — a contagion transmitted from one to another — compelling everyone to outdo his neighbor. Such is the breeding ground for important accomplishments. THE “BUND” IN BIALYSTOK The "סמטם"‎ in Poland consisted of several hundred organizations. There was virtually no Jewish commu- nity in Poland without a Bundist representation. Each group had the same program, purpose and ideal. The Bund’s discipline was legendary. Nevertheless, the larger Bundist organizations were individualistic. This was especially true of the Bundist town collectives. Each collective had not only its own approach but its own color, smell and appearance as well. - The Bund in Bialystok had existed for a long time, deeply rooted in the Jewish population. It possessed a glorious history. Once upon a time, when Poland still belonged to the Czarist empire of Nicholas II, Bialystok was the headquarters of the central committee of the then outlawed Bund. The first mass arrest of Bundists took place there, carried out by the Czarist Ochrana. Also in Bialystok the first mass strikes of Jewish weav- ers broke out, led by the Bund. Behind the city was a forest that was the tradi- tional place for unauthorized meetings of the Bund, not only throughout the Russian occupation but also later during the years of the first German administration. In the beerhalls of Bialystok, where Russian weavers, tanners and porters used to go for a drink or to eat goose meat after a hard day’s work, they would tell each other stories about the Bundist representatives, their strengths and weaknesses, their heroism or their oratorical ability. During work breaks in the factories, political discussions among the Bundists and their 22 opponents — anarchists, socialists, Labor Zionists — took place. The proud Jewish white-collar worker, a second- or third-generation Bialystoker whose grand- father and great-grandfather were weavers, held these Bund adversaries in low esteem. He usually ridiculed them in a good-natured Bialystoker style. It was well known in the city: A worker is a Bundist; a middle-class young man is a socialist or a Labor Zionist. * * * Through the years of German occupation, from 1915 to 1918, and during the later period of the Polish- Russian War when Bialystok passed from one national jurisdiction to another, ultimately becoming a part of Poland, its outward appearance changed little. The life of the people generally and the Jews in particular, how- ever, did undergo significant shifts. The Bund in Bialy- stok also went through a radical transformation. Large textile industries in Bialystok lost their dis- tant Russian markets. As a result, the Bialystok manu- facturers began seeking new outlets for their wares. In the meantime, chronic unemployment developed among Bialystoker weavers and other workers in the large fac- tories. The crisis in the textile industry made a major impact upon the economic life of the city. At the time the Russian-Polish War of 1920-21 was about to end, the first emissaries of the central commit- tee of the Polish Bund arrived in Bialystok to reestab- lish contact with its former establishment. As it turned out, these representatives came upon a true disaster. The Bialystoker Memorial Book