Kosher and Jewish Life in Pikesville

The corridor along Interstate 795, which links Pikesville, Owings Mills and Reisterstown to the Baltimore Beltway (Interstate 695), contains one of the larger Jewish populations in Maryland. In the 19th and early 20th centuries Jewish immigrants to the Baltimore area first formed enclaves in East Baltimore not far from Johns Hopkins Hospital in neighborhoods such as Broadway East, Jonestown, Middle East and Oliver. After World War II, the Jewish community started to move outside of Baltimore City into Pikesville which was a sleepy outpost on a major road that led to Western Maryland. During the Vietnam War, and exacerbated by riots in 1968, many Jewish businesses left northwestern Baltimore following this exodus. Pikesville (and more recently its neighboring communities to the north, Owings Mills and Reisterstown) have been considered the center of the Baltimore area's Jewish community since the mid-nineteen fifties (referred to by residents as "100,000 Jews in three zip codes"). Many of the region's largest and most established synagogues and Jewish schools are located in or near Pikesville.