The B’nai Israel Synagogue and its attached Montefiore Cemetery are listed in the National Register for both architectural and local historical significance. The synagogue is the work of a master architect, Joseph Bell DeRemer, whose architectural career has been recognized with several prior National Register listings in Grand Forks and throughout North Dakota. The synagogue is in the Art Deco architectural style and one the great regional examples of its type.
Together with its associate cemetery, these paired resources embody Jewish traditions and provide significant testimony to the cultural diversity of Grand Forks. They both reflect broad patterns of American religious history, couple with the history of immigration, entrepreneurship, and cultural adaptation. Grand Forks was home to the largest Jewish community in North Dakota in the late 1800s. The construction of this synagogue in 1937 reflects the solid core of a unified immigrant community of faith. The cemetery landscape serves as a distinct reminder of the influential presence of Jewish residents in Grand Forks and stands as a symbol of diversity. Names of the persons interred in Montefiore cemetery are immediately recognizable locally as persons of civic influence, not only within the Jewish community, but also more broadly in Grand Forks’ civic life and the development of North Dakota.
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