Herman Bamberger

(Feb. 21, 1837 – Mar. 2, 1901). Herman Bamberger came to Indianapolis in his late teens, and he went on to make significant contributions to the city’s Jewish institutional life and public education system through his role in the establishment of the Indianapolis Hebrew Congregation (IHC), the Indianapolis Hebrew Cemetery (see Cemeteries), and Manual Training School. Bamberger also worked frequently with leaders of other faith traditions, promoted local and global philanthropic efforts, and achieved a position of respect among his fellow merchants. 

Bamberger was born in Hesse-Darmstadt (now part of Germany). He immigrated to the United States in 1855, arriving in Indianapolis a year later. He was one of the first German Jews to settle in Indianapolis in the mid-nineteenth century. Bamberger quickly became involved in the city’s Jewish community life. In 1956, he and fourteen other men founded the IHC, the first synagogue in Indianapolis. Bamberger served as the IHC’s first secretary and later as its president.  

Beginning in December 1856, Bamberger worked with an IHC committee to establish a local Jewish burial ground. On July 7, 1857, the group purchased two acres of land for Indianapolis’s first Jewish cemetery, the Indianapolis Hebrew Cemetery, on Kelly Street. The IHC sold portions of land to new synagogues as they formed in the city. 

Originally the IHC met for worship in rooms inside private buildings. As the congregation grew, Bamberger worked to secure a ten-year lease for an oversized hall in the Judah’s Block building, opposite the Marion County Courthouse (see Courts in Marion County), starting on October 8, 1858. The IHC invited Rabbi Isaac Wise, founder of Reform Judaism in America, to dedicate the place of worship. From this time forward, the IHC, though nominally traditional, began to follow the tenets of Reform Judaism.  

Under Bamberger’s leadership, the congregation built its first synagogue, located on East Market Street, in 1868. He oversaw the construction of a new, larger temple on North Delaware Street in 1899.  

As a businessman, Bamberger operated a hat and fur shop on East Washington Street from 1858 until 1894. His business supplied hats to the Union Army during the Civil War. In 1863, Bamberger enlisted in the 107th Infantry of the Union Army as a private. He later worked with the New York Life Insurance Company in the final years of his business career. 

In addition to his work with the IHC and his business, Bamberger was committed to social and civic causes. In the early 1870s, he served as president of the district lodge of the Independent Order of B’nai B’rith, a Jewish fraternal organization. Bamberger advocated for public education in Indianapolis, serving as a member of the first Indianapolis School Board and helping to establish Manual Training School. Bamberger was also an early board member of Cincinnati’s Hebrew Union College, the first rabbinical school in the United States. 

Bamberger engaged in charity and activism both locally and outside of Indianapolis. He contributed to a training program for prisoners in Indianapolis to learn trades. He also served as a director of the Cleveland Orphan Asylum. Bamberger advocated against antisemitism and worked to combat negative stereotypes of Jews in Indianapolis and nationwide. He challenged Indianapolis reporters for prominently highlighting the ethnic or religious background of Jewish criminal suspects in ways that were never done when alleged lawbreakers belonged to Christian denominations. Bamberger was a strong proponent for the rights of Jews in Eastern Europe, notably advocating for the rights of Romanian Jews in the late nineteenth century.  

In his personal life, Bamberger married Caroline Daniels of Cincinnati in 1861. They had five children: Michael, Ralph, Edwin, Florence, and Lilly. Herman Bamberger died in Indianapolis after an illness of several weeks and is buried in the cemetery he worked to establish, the Indianapolis Hebrew Cemetery.

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