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Description
This undated newspaper clipping from The Jewish Chronicle contains a review of an anthology of academic essays titled The Jews of South Wales, edited by Ursula R. Q. Henriques, the first edition of which was published by the University of Wales Press in 1993.
The review provides brief summaries of certain stories discussed in the book, including a peculiar "Victorian missionary tale". Also mentioned are the antisemitic Tredegar riots and the story of Rev. Simon Fyne who was briefly a minister at the Newport Mon Hebrew Congregation. According to the article, Fyne had high hopes for Israel. He believed that a Jewish state in Palestine could double as an arbitrator of international disputes.
The review is illustrated with a picture of the old Aberdare synagogue, now a residential property.
The Jewish community in Aberdare dates back to the 1860s. At first, the Aberdare Hebrew Congregation rented a terraced house on Seymour Street, which they subsequently acquired and converted into a regular place of worship. The first floor of the building was consecrated as synagogue in the late 1880s. From the 1910s to the 1930s, the congregation was at its largest with around ninety members. When the synagogue closed in 1957, the number was down to 35. The building, again a private residence, received a blue commemorative plaque in 2015.
Source:
'The History of the Jewish Diaspora in Wales' by Cai Parry-Jones (http://e.bangor.ac.uk/4987).
Depository: Glamorgan Archives.
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