In the 1880’s jews started to immigrate to America mainly from Russia due to the mass pogroms that were occurring. Escaping persecution was one of the major reason jews came to America, and at this time there were about 1.5 million jews coming to the United States.

The Yiddish theater often was used as a platform to reflect current issues in society for Jewish immigrants. With that being said the themes about assimilation could often relate to many different immigrant theater groups.

The Yiddish theater reflected many issues and events that Jewish immigrants were forced to undergo and deal with. Many residents of the Lower East Side lived in tenement housing and had to work in sweat shops.  The play “Shop” by H. Leivick depicts the life of immigrant workers in a Sweat Shop and their struggles to assimilate into American culture while finding a way to hold on to their identities.

A pivotal event that effected the Jewish community in New York was the Triangle Shirt Waist Factory Fire.  It occurred on March 25th, 1911 and was one of the worst industrial accidents to ever happen in New York. Due to a lack of safety regulations over one hundred women died in the fire. Many were young jewish immigrant women. They were locked inside the building with no way to get out and as a result of the tragic event laws were implemented to enforce building code and safety regulations.

Yiddish theater not only depicted the difficulty of assimilating into American culture, but also the difficulty of finding a way to hold onto old jewish traditions and expectations. The two often collided causing it to be very difficult to find a way to be a jewish-american, rather than being one or the other. This was especially hard for Jewish-American women and as a result the difficulty of being an accepted American women while still managing to hold on to old Jewish ideals and values was commonly portrayed on stage.