American ShtetlA compelling account of how a group of Hasidic Jews established its own local government on American soil Settled in the mid 1970s by a small contingent of Hasidic families, Kiryas Joel is an American town with few parallels in Jewish history, but many precedents among religious communities in the United States. This book tells the story of how this group of pious, Yiddish speaking Jews has grown to become a thriving insular enclave and a powerful