Dvora Romm

Please see the illuminating document, "The Romm Printing and Publishing House", compiled and edited by Catherine Brun, the fifth great-granddaughter of Baruch Romm. It is a fascinating, comprehensive history of the famous Romm printing house, the largest in Eastern Europe in the 19th century, which was in operation continuously for more than 120 years. The document can be found under the Media tab in this profile. _______________________________________________________________________________

Shirley Amcis Portnoy: Dvora Romm was a well-educated and highly talented woman.

Aside from her skill in running the Romm Publishing House after her husband's untimely death at the age of 37, she was well-known for her philanthropy and for teaching (discreetly) the poor, the widowed, and the orphaned how to improve their lot. __________________________________________________________________________

Source:Litvak SIG Lithuania Death Records: ROMM, Debora / Dvora, daughter of Iosel /

Vilnius;/ 20/11/1903 14 Kislev ; Age 72; carditis

1903 F660 2205071 3 883 LVIA/728/4/107

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Deborah Romm:

Daughter of Joseph Bezalel Harkavy, and head of the Hebrew publishing firm of Widow & Brothers Romm, of Vilna following the death of her husband.

At the end of the 19th century the most renowned Jewish printing house was that of the Widow and Brothers *Romm in Vilna. The Romm family, which had begun printing in 1799, had its greatest success under the management of Deborah Romm (d. 1903), beginning in 1862. Romm took over the firm when she was widowed at 29 and expanded it with her brothers-in-law; helped first by her father and then by the enterprising literary director Samuel Shraga Feigensohn. She remained the major partner in the firm as it produced thousands of superior editions including the famous edition of the Babylonian Talmud.

(from Jewish Virtual Library)

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ROMM:   (print this article)     

By : Joseph Jacobs Peter Wiernik
Family of printers and publishers of Hebrew books in Wilna. The family formerly lived in Grodno, where the book-dealer Baruch b. Joseph Romm established a printing-office in 1789. The Romm Hebrew printing-office was the first in Lithuania, and its authorization by King Stanislaus August was considered an important event. In 1799 Baruch removed to Wilna, where he died April 29, 1803. The business was inherited by his son Menahem Man Romm, who in 1835 began, in partnership with Simḥah Zimel of Grodno, the crowning effort of a Jewish printer's career—the publication of a new edition of the Talmud. The first volumes of that edition bear the imprint "Wilna and Grodno"; the later volumes have that of Wilna only; but the work was really done in Ozar, near Grodno.

Menahem Romm died Oct. 13, 1841, and was succeeded by his only son, Joseph Reuben Romm, under whom the printing-house was formally established in Wilna in 1847, although the report of a conflagration ("Allg. Zeit. des Jud." 1840, No. 20) proves that it had even previously been of considerable size and importance. He died Feb. 28, 1858, and left three sons, David, Ḥayyim Jacob (d. Aug. 30, 1869), and Menahem Gabriel. David, who was the head of the firm, died suddenly March 9, 1860, while on his way from St. Petersburg, where he had obtained a practical monopoly of the Hebrew printing and publishing business in Russia. After his death the monopoly was broken, and numerous printing establishments sprang up in various parts of the empire. In 1863 the present firm name, "Witwe und Brüder Romm," was adopted; and the house has maintained its position as the foremost Jewish publishing concern in Russia, if not in the world. Deborah Romm, David's widow, took an active interest in the firm's affairs until her death on Dec. 3, 1903. Three of her sons reside in New York.

The Russian Hebraist Mordecai (Marcus) Plungian was corrector in Romm's printing-office from 1869 to 1873.

Bibliography: Steinschneider, Hebr. Bibl. ii. 58; iii. 22; iv. 50, 126, 153 (Benjacob's list);

(from the Jewish Encyclopedia)

My mother, Tilly Harkavy Amcis, A"H, was a first cousin twice removed of Dvora Romm. My mother had also always been a great admirer of the famous Yiddish poet, Avraham Sutzekever. Little did she know that her son-in-law, Rabbi Hershel Portnoy, turned out to be a first cousin once removed of Avraham Sutzkever.

The following is an excerpt of a presentation on Avraham Sutzkever delivered by Tilly (Taibe) Harkavy Amcis in 1998:

"In 1943 Sutzkever decided to join the Partisan Brigade that fought against the Nazis in the woods called Naroch. Weapons were badly needed! In the area there was a famous publishing company called ROMM that for centuries had provided the Jews of the world with publications of holy scripts, the Talmud and Hebrew literature.The Partisans decided that the lead from the printing plates should be converted into bullets to fight the Nazis in the Underground.

As Sutzkever described it in one of his poems, the Hebrew letters themselves became the weapons that the Jews used against the Nazis."

(Poetic justice!!!

                     --- Shirley Amcis Portnoy)

This is the famous "Widow" of the press.

Her husband David died on a business trip in Russia in 1860. At the time she was 29 and was left with 6 children, and one from David's previous marriage.

She took over running the firm with her two brothers in law,

The second Vilna Shas was started in 1866 and was produced by 100 devoted workers and 14 correctors. It was completed in 1880 and became the more famous version. It was printed slightly bigger.

[I have volumes from both editions - Michael Romm]

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From the YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews of Eastern Europe

Zeev Gries, “Romm Family,” in Gershon David Hundert, ed., The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe, vol. 2 (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2008), 1588-1589

'Romm Family'

“Family of printers and publishers in Vilna. The Romm family’s printing house, the largest in Eastern Europe in the nineteenth century, operated continuously for more than 120 years. In the central period of its activity, beginning at the end of the 1860s, the printing house underwent a process of modernization—overseen by Shemu’el Shraga Feigenzohn, a rabbi, entrepreneur, and administrator—that was a key to its success. Feigenzohn directed the firm for two decades beginning in 1867; he also wrote a history of the Romm printing house under the pseudonym Shafan ha-Sofer.

The founder of the Romm family printing house was Barukh ben Yosef, who began work as a printer in Ozery, near Grodno. In 1799, he established a printing house in Vilna, meanwhile continuing to work with partners (including one named Simḥah Zimel) in Grodno. Barukh’s son, Menaḥem Mann Romm (Mann), oversaw the work in Vilna, enlisting an expert typefounder, Lipman Mets, who created type exclusively for the press, creating a form known as “Vilna type.” Mann also became the exclusive printer for the Russian authorities in Vilna, which involved his printing, among other things, Christian prayer books, in which his name appeared on the title page as Manis Romm. In 1834, Mann and Simḥah Zimel decided to print the Babylonian Talmud (together with the Tosefta’ and Alfasi’s code). They hired as editor the scholar Betsal’el Katz, whose name appeared only in the last tractate to be printed, Ḥulin. Their publication of the Talmud led to a controversy with members of the Shapira family in Slavuta, who argued that the Romm house had trespassed on their rights and that they had been harmed economically, since their own edition of the Talmud had not yet been completely distributed. In 1836, Tsar Nicholas I ordered the closing of all Jewish printing houses except for one in Vilna and another in Zhitomir. For 5,000 rubles, the Romm family obtained the right to continue as the only Hebrew printers in Vilna. Subsequently, Menaḥem Mann and Simḥah Zimel issued a proclamation in May 1837, reassuring subscribers to the Talmud and other works (including ‘En Ya‘akov and the Shulḥan ‘arukh) of their commitment to the printing of these books. But in 1841, before their edition of the Talmud was completed, the printing house burned down. A year later, Menaḥem Mann died; his son Yosef Re’uven (d. 1858) succeeded him and continued to work with Simḥah Zimel. The Polish government, however, forbade the import of books, including fromLithuania, a factor that led to a loss of subscribers; at the same time, government censorshipbecame a major imposition. The censors, mainly converts from Judaism, sabotaged the text of the Talmud mercilessly, reducing its marketability. At the same time, editions of the Talmud were being printed in Prague (1839–1846), Czernowitz (1840–1849), and Vienna (1840–1849). Simḥah Zimel died in 1845, and Yosef Re’uven completed the publication of the Talmud in 1854.

Title page of Masekhet Shavu'ot, a tractate of the Babylonian Talmud (Vilna: Widow and Brothers Romm, 1883). (YIVO) When Yosef Re’uven died, his eldest son, David (1825–1860), inherited the business, though the title pages continued to use the phrase “In the Printing Shop of Yosef Re’uven Romm.” In 1858, publication of a new edition of the Talmud was begun by the Shapira family in Zhitomir; a year later, David Romm also began publication of an edition of the Talmud. The Zhitomir edition was completed in 1864; the Romm edition in 1866. Sales of the latter proceeded slowly. After David’s death, his widow, Devorah (d. 1903), began to manage the company, assisted at first by her scholarly father, Yosef Betsal’el Harkavy (d. 1864). The company’s income was divided among Devorah, who received 40 percent, and David’s brothers, Ḥayim Ya‘akov and Menaḥem Gavri’el, who each received 30 percent. (Menaḥem also took over the Russian-language printing business when the Russian authorities demanded the separation of the Russian and Hebrew printing operations, for purposes of taxation and so that the government could more easily control the number of books published.) From 1871, the title pages of books published by the company carried the words “The Printing House of the Widow and the Brothers Romm” (see image at left). Alexander II rescinded the limitations on Hebrew printing in 1862: in exchange for an annual tax of 20 rubles for every manual printing press, the industry was open to all. (For rapid, steam-driven presses, the price was 120 rubles for a small press, 240 for a large one.) Three former Romm employees thereupon opened their own, rival press in Vilna together with Shemu’el Fuenn. Fuenn wanted to print Haskalahliterature, but the production of daily and holiday prayer books—in direct competition with the Romms—proved more lucrative. In response, the Romm house, which was on a firm financial footing, lowered the prices of their books almost to their cost. Thus, the price of the prayer bookKorban Mosheh was reduced from 2.5 rubles to 0.5 rubles. Romm also began to print Haskalah books, but these generally had poor sales. Competition with rival printers in Vilna, however, did less harm to the Romm firm than an internal rivalry that broke out in 1866 between the brothers and Devorah. Eventually the business was divided among them, and it dwindled considerably in importance. Devorah turned to Feigenzohn in 1867 and asked him to take over management of the firm. He worked to resolve the differences among the owners and simultaneously to overhaul and modernize the technologies and procedures. Feigenzohn introduced stereotype printing, the process by which pages are cast in sheets of lead, making it possible to preserve editions of books and reprint them rapidly if demand arose without having to set the text in type again. He traveled to Berlin to buy the new machinery and hired professionals to operate it. A six-week strike by typesetters, alarmed at the prospect of losing their jobs, was resolved by means of an increase in their salary. Feigenzohn also worked to overcome the obstacles posed by the censor—at that time, the convert Iakov Brafman—by providing him with a regular “salary,” in exchange for which Brafman would examine every book intended for publication before it was printed. Feigenzohn introduced the policy of proofreading material three times to ensure the accuracy of the texts. Books were redesigned to attract buyers, and a policy of acquiring exclusive rights to publication was put in place. Feigenzohn directed the project of what came to be known as the Vilna Talmud, a production characterized by scrupulous proofreading and the addition of many variant readings and commentaries. At his behest, manuscripts held by various libraries were copied in order to add early, previously unpublished commentaries to the new edition. At the height of its production, more than 100 printers and 14 learned proofreaders were involved in the project. There was a substantial response to the appeal for subscribers in the fall of 1879. Demand for the new edition was so great that 22,000 copies of the first volume were sold in the first year (1880). Sales were hindered by pogroms in southern Russia the next year and by fires that damaged the plant and books in the warehouses. A decline in the number of subscribers and sales ensued, but there were still 13,000 subscribers when the final volume was printed in 1886. Menaḥem Gavri’el transferred management of the Russian-language press to outside administrators in 1901. When the new managers gave printing materials to revolutionaries, the authorities became aware of the practice. Badly frightened, Menaḥem Gavri’el sold the Russian part of the business for a pittance. After Feigenzohn left the printing house in 1888, it had gone into a period of decline, producing just a single new edition, the prayer book Kolbo (1895). Subsequently, Feigenzohn resumed management of the firm in 1903, the year of Devorah’s death. At the time of his return, the printing house held thousands of folio pages of the most important canonical works in stereotype, 15 presses were still in operation, and the firm held the rights to print classics of Jewish literature. What it lacked was capital. A small investment came from Bentsiyon Aharonovitsh, who financed the printing of several orders of the Mishnah, but more than his assistance was needed. At a meeting of Jewish leaders in Saint Petersburg, the rebbe of the Lubavitch Hasidic movement, Shalom Dov Ber Shneerson, horrified at the prospect of the closure of the Romm house, persuaded Baron David Gintsburg to rescue the shop, and Gintsburg invested 75,000 rubles. Feigenzohn paid the debts of the firm, but additional backing dissolved when Gintsburg died in 1910. World War I caused a further decline in the firm’s fortunes, and it passed into the hands of its creditors, who operated it until 1940. The importance of the Romm press in the cultural history of the nineteenth century cannot be overstated. During its existence, the Romm printing house published more than 1,400 books in both Hebrew and, to a lesser extent, Yiddish, in a variety of literary genres. Books devoted toKabbalah and halakhah appeared alongside the novels of Avraham Mapu and the stories of Ayzik Meyer Dik. Romm published Yitsḥak Ber Levinzon’s prolegomenon, Igeret ha-besorah(1824), to his extended program for the reform of Jewry, Te‘udah be-Yisra’el (1827, 1856). ‘Azaryah dei Rossi’s sixteenth-century translation into Hebrew of the Letter of Aristeas (Greek, second century BCE) was printed in 1818 and entitled Haderat zekenim. Translations from world literature into Hebrew and Yiddish soon followed. The first of these was a translation of the journal of a seventeenth-century Dutch traveler to the Far East, W. Bontekoe, into Hebrew, apparently by Menaḥem Mendel Lefin, Oniyah so‘arah (1823), published together with a translation of one of Joachim Heinrich Campe’s works, Masa‘ot ha-yam, by Mordekhai Aharon Gintsburg. The latter’s translation of Campe’s Masa‘ Kolumbus was published the same year, but the name of the publisher did not appear on the title page. A year later, Romm published Gintsburg’s Yiddish translation of the same work. Romm published Sefer ha-berit by Pinḥas Eliyahu Hurwitz (1765–1821) in 1818. This was an idiosyncratic, encyclopedic work combining philosophical and kabbalistic topics with reports on scientific discoveries. It was an important source of scientific information for many readers who knew only Hebrew and Yiddish. Much farther from normative literature was the introduction to algebra, Mosde ḥokhmah by the maskil Ḥayim Zelig Słonimski (1834). Much of the Haskalah literature failed to find a wide market, often remaining unsold. The Romm house continued to print rabbinic literature alongside works calling for reform. Several collections of the teachings of Eliyahu, the Gaon of Vilna, were printed as well as a number of editions of Ḥaye adam (1810, 1819, 1834), the popular halakhic work by Avraham Danzig. All this was in addition to canonical works such as the Talmud and the Shulḥan ‘arukh, prayer books, and Pentateuchs. Romm printed some Yiddish books as well, including Eli‘ezer Paver’s Gdulas Yoysef, which they reprinted several times (1817, 1822, 1833). Tkhines were published in Tikun shelosh mishmarot(1833). A complete list of Romm publications would reflect well the trends and cultural developments of East European Jewry in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Suggested Reading Samuel Shraga Feigensohn, “Le-Toldot Defus Rom,” in Yahadut Lita, vol. 1, pp. 268–302 (Tel Aviv, 1960); Bernhard (Ḥayim Dov) Friedberg, Toldot ha-defus ha-‘ivri be-Polanyah (Tel Aviv, 1950), pp. 99, 125–131; Zeev Gries, Ha-Sefer ke-sokhen tarbut ba-shanim 460–660 (1700–1900) (Tel Aviv, 2002), pp. 117–126, 133–134, 179–180, also in English as The Book in the Jewish World, 1700–1900 (Oxford, 2007), pp. 113–123, 129–130, 173; Pinḥas Kahn, “‘Al devar ha-defus shel Rom be-Vilnah,” Kiryat sefer 10 (1933–1934): 249–250; Pinḥas Kahn, “Le-Korot Bet ha-Defus shel Rom be-Vilnah,” Kiryat sefer 12 (1935–1936): 109–115; Ḥayim Lieberman, “‘Al defus ha-‘almanah veha-aḥim Rom,” Kiryat Sefer 34 (1959): 527–528; Raphael Nathan Neta Rabbinovicz, Ma’amar ‘al hadpasat ha-Talmud; Toldot hadpasat ha-Talmud (Jerusalem, 1951/52), pp. 134–135, 156–180, 223–245, 250. Author Zeev Gries Translation Translated from Hebrew by Jeffrey Green (submitted by Shirley Amcis Portnoy)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romm_publishing_house

The Romm publishing house was a famous publisher of Jewish religious literature, especially known for its 1886 Vilna Talmud, which still serves as a definitive edition.

Romm was founded in 1789 in Grodno, by Barukh ben Yosef Romm. It moved to Vilnius in 1799, where it expanded greatly under the ownership of Barukh's son, Menahem Mann Romm (d.1841).[1][2] Initially publishing halakhic and homiletic works, in 1835 it caused a stir by publishing an edition of the Talmud, whose publication had previously been undertaken by the Shapira family of Slavuta. After fierce controversy over whether this new edition was permitted by rabbinical law, with rabbis on each side unable to reach agreement, the death of a worker in the Slavuta factory during the controversy led to the Russian government intervening (Vilnius was at the time in the Vilna Governorate of the Russian Empire). The Slavuta publishing house was shut down, and to instill order amongst the Jewish publishers, the Russian authorities instituted a formal publishing monopoly, which Romm successfully bid for.

The Romm factory burned down in 1840, but was soon rebuilt, and prospered through both its monopoly privileges and the rapidly increasing Jewish population of the region. Upon the death of owner David Romm in 1862, the company was, unusually, taken over by his widow Deborah, and renamed to "The Widow and Brothers Romm". It was under this name that it produced a highly regarded new edition of the Talmud, completed in 1886, which is still widely used. The firm's last Talmud edition was printed in 1897, after which the rise of Zionism shifted Jewish publishing. When Deborah Romm died in December 1903, the firm also started to print secular periodicals and newspapers in Yiddish and Hebrew. This was not to the liking of the person who was the manager until then, Samuel Shraga Fiignzon (שפן סופר). Descendants of the widow Deborah Rom lost interest in managing the press, and several of her sons emigrated to the United States. The printing press got into financial difficulty. Baron David Günzburg from St. Petersburg, himself a scholar of Jewish affairs came to the rescue, and bought the firm in 1910

http://boards.ancestry.co.uk/surnames.romm/rss.xml

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Join us ONLINE for the second part in a three part series presented by Dr. Liz Shayne, HIWP Congregational Intern.

All are invited to attend and you do not need to have been to the first session to come to this one.

"The Industrial Revolution Meets the Digital Revolution"

Sunday, May 19th at 8:30pm, Online.

Zoom Link: https://zoom.us/j/284346538

Zoom ID: 284-346-538

One critical development in the history of the Gemara happened in a town in Lithuania called Vilnius. The story of how Devorah Romm saved her late husband's business and, in the process, printed the definitive edition of the Talmud is one filled with adventure, advertising, and the best technology the Nineteenth Century had to offer. And it also has a lot to teach us about what the internet and computers might be able to do for us now.

__________________________________________________________________________________________ https://vimeo.com/348447644/f339ee43ef

Short film about Dvora Romm and the printing of the definitive edition of the Talmud.

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https://www.geni.com/documents/view?doc_id=6000000175091110100&graph_node_id=profile-11235678

Description: Mordechai (Motti) Zalkin, “Deborah Romm: A Woman-Publisher and an Agent of Culture,” in Avriel Bar-Levav, Oded Israeli, Jonatan Meir, Avraham (Rami) Reiner, eds., The Way of the Book: A Tribute to Zeev Gries (Jerusalem: Carmel, 2021), 55-71 (Hebrew)