California’s Inland Empire: San Bernardino & Riverside Counties

Inland Empire Exhibition Hall

Harris Department Store, San Bernardino, circa 1970, #WSPostcard Collection

Harris Department Store, San Bernardino, WSJH postcard collection 

California’s Inland Empire consists of the vast lands of San Bernardino and Riverside Counties.

Jewish Pioneers started settling the Inland Empire in the early 1850’s.

San Bernardino County was split from Los Angeles County in 1853.

It covers over 20,000 square miles and is the largest county in the U.S.A.

The town of San Bernardino was originally laid out and settled by Mormons from Salt Lake City.

Jewish merchants from Los Angeles did wholesale business with San Bernardino and Salt Lake City, especially during the winter months, when the snows made trade with the East impossible.

Riverside County was spilt from San Bernardino County in 1893.

It covers 7,200 square miles.

Inland Empire Jewish Pioneers

Henrietta Ancker: Charitable “Women of Valor” of San Bernardino

Ralph (Rudolph) Anker: Pioneer Merchant of San Bernardino

Siegmund Bergel: Educator and “Grand Organizer” of San Bernardino

Isaac Brunn: Pioneer Food & Liquor Wholesaler and Civic Servant of San Bernardino

Ralph Greenhood: Revived the San Bernardino Jewish Community

The Remarkable Harris Family: Inland Empire and Los Angeles

Lewis Jacobs & Lewis Meyerstein: The Jewish Pioneer Bank of San Bernardino

Marcus Katz: Leading Jewish Pioneer of San Bernardino

The Kinderman Family: San Bernardino Jewish Pioneers

George Adolph Reich: Pioneer Pharmacist of San Bernardino

Early Pioneer Jews of Riverside, California

Inland Empire Jewish Organizations

The Founding of San Bernardino’s Paradise Lodge #237, B’nai B’rith, 1875

Rabbi Messing and the Hebrew Association of San Bernardino

Congregation Emanu El of San Bernardino/Redlands

Places of Interest

Murrieta Hot Springs: The Catskills of Southern California