About 1910, Yonah Schimmel, an immigrant from the Austro-Hungarian province of Galicia, used a pushcart to start his knish bakery. As business grew, a small store at 156 Allen Street was rented by Yonah. By 1916, Schimmel operated knish bakeries at Allen St., 74 Rivington, 44 Ave. B, and 144 E. Houston (across the street from the present knishery location). Around 1915, Schimmel went into partnership at the 144 E. Houston St. store with Josef Berger, who had married Yonah’s cousin Rose Schimel. Berger eventually took over the Houston St. store, retaining the original name. In the 1930s, a widening of Houston St. was undertaken in order to accommodate construction of the Subway system’s Sixth Avenue line. At some point in the 1930s the Houston St. store moved from the North side of the street to its present location at 137 E. Houston. In 1931 Josef Berger died, and his son Arthur Berger operated Yonah Schimmel's Knishery until he passed in 1974. Arthur's widow, Lillian Berger, continued to run the bakery until approximately 1990. Yonah Schimmel's has been family owned since its inception and is currently operated by Yonah's great nephew, Alex Wolfman. In 1995, the shop's then-owner, Sheldon Keitz, was implicated in a
loan-sharking scheme. The shop was amongst the locations where loans were repaid. It is as much a landmark as an eatery and has frequently been an artist's subject. A portrait of the Yonah Schimmel Knish Bakery by Hedy Pagremanski (b. 1929) is in the permanent collection of the
Museum of the City of New York. Jewish-Irish painter
Harry Kernoff painted this bakery on a trip to New York in 1939. More recently it features in the 2009
Woody Allen film
Whatever Works. In recent years the restaurant has delivered its knishes nationally through
Goldbelly, and has been featured in the site's YouTube series. ==See also==