The Lower East Side Tenement Museum :
Doll House Dioramas
More than ten thousand people lived at 97 Orchard Street between the years 1870 and 1915. You may visit some of the families below. Each dramatization is based on actual tenants.

Phillip and Olga Chereska live here with their daughter, Annie (age: 18 months), and four boarders. Samuel Maronschick, one of the boarders, is ill. At a time of rampant tuberculosis he'll be lucky if his problem is a terrible cold. Remedy? Olga will try "cupping." Cupping, a therapeutic practice used to draw blood from the ...
Harry (age 29) and Rosie (age 28), both from Russia, live here with their boarders, Herman Janovitz (age 26), Couple Kopokovsky (age 30) and Hirsch Klatter (age 45). Tonight, they probably will be going to a relative's Seder (ceremonial meal during the Jewish holiday of Passover). This allows them to labor in their personal home ...
Isidore Berg, uniform over his arm, is leaving for work. The baby, Rosie (age 2), has whooping cough and a visiting nurse from the insurance company has come to check her. Poor families, immigrant or otherwise, often carried insurance on each member of the family. It came from Metropolitan Life, and cost 5 cents a ...
Bessie Rubinsky (age 25), along with Morris (age 35), who is carrying boxes of matzoh into the kitchen, are "Americans;" their naturalization papers, proudly framed, hang on the wall in the front room. Bessie, whose name will appear in the City's 1918 voter's register, which she signs in Yiddish, will not be able to vote ...
This is the most crowded of the apartments--ten people are living here! The Confinos are Sephardic Jews from Kastoria, Greece, which was part of the Ottoman Empire. Because it is the first morning of the Jewish holiday period of Passover, which begins at sundown, this family is involved in preparation for the Seder or Passover ...
John Schneider is a saloon keeper and lager beer dealer. His wife Caroline (age 30) is preparing a "free lunch" for the saloon patrons while some of the "locals" sit and discuss politics. A child enters carrying a pail to be filled with beer -- a not-so-unusual sight at this time.
Julia Langolor, a widow, lives here with their son Henry (age 13) and her daughter Frederica (age 18). Julia is a laundress and supports herself by taking in laundry. Today she is not joining the women working in the courtyard because it is too cold. Her son, Henry, is lugging buckets of water into the ...
Born in the United States and the son of the building's original owner, Edward Glockner (age 24) is a blank-book binder. His wife, Caroline, has immigrated from the Kingdom of Saxony. The baby Louis has been diagnosed by Dr. Schneider as having capillary bronchitis. The doctor prescribes carbonate of ammonia but to no avail--he will ...
All the Shafers are New York-born but of German descent. Adolph (age 48) owns a shooting gallery, while his wife, Evelein, is a dressmaker. Charles and John are laborers. This morning the household activities are well along. John is about to carry the slops down to the backyard privy, Margaret is diapering the baby, and ...
Norman Gottberg (age 32) is a Polish immigrant and citizen. His wife Paulina (age 26) and in-laws, the Brouchards, are from Prussia. Mr. Gottberg is a lace dealer. Although skilled women in America and Europe are still making lace by hand, the samples shown here have been manufactured in mills in eastern New York state. ...