In the mid 1950s, more than half of the lawyers in New York City were Jewish, and Jewish law students consistently graduated in the top ranks of the best law schools. But the elite crop of New York law firms had firmly established White Anglo Saxon Protestant identities and either didn’t hire Jews at all or didn’t promote them to their partnerships. That situation led to rapid growth of de facto Jewish law firms in the mid-twentieth century. Only a few decades later, there were no longer Jewish firms and WASP firms.

Episode 12 of Recognizably Jewish explores this history in detail, including the social, cultural, and business factors that contributed to the rise – and eventual obsolescence – of the New York Jewish law firm.