Remembering the Beloved Jewish-Owned Supermarkets of Bygone Baltimore

September 8, 2023 Jeremy Diamond

As the High Holiday season approaches, have you ever wondered which local Jewish-owned grocers employed Jewish employees who worked to support their own families?

Many “members of the tribe” worked in the local grocery industry — Holocaust survivors, immigrants, those who came up through the Great Depression era and those who simply had a passion for food.

Because let’s face it, food is a universal language.

In the 1950s and ’60s, Giant Food and Food Fair were the dominant supermarket chains in the Baltimore metropolitan area and had large Jewish representation in their executive offices, as well as at the store level (in fact, Giant continued this trend into the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s).

Food Fair supermarket was located in the Pikesville Shopping Center. (Photo courtesy of Jeremy Diamond)

Many families were able to afford the necessities and customary foods for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur break-fast meals because of their employment at Giant and Food Fair/Pantry Pride, among other stores.

Giant’s co-founder, Nechemya Cohen, and his son, Izzy, as well as Food Fair’s Friedland family, performed many acts of chesed (kindness) this way in the communities they served.

During the 1970s and ’80s, the many independently owned Jewish grocers (mostly Holocaust survivors, known by the term greenas) only trusted other survivors in management and store operations.

As immigrants from similar Eastern European countries, speaking predominantly Yiddish as a first language, there was a level of comfort and trust knowing the company owner and store manager or employee came from the same basic European village — or both experienced the same uprooting of their Jewish home lives during World War II.

Food-A-Rama supermarkets, owned by the Diamond and Schuster families, was a prime example by employing and entrusting fellow Holocaust survivors to manage several of their stores. They were trusted as family. It was not uncommon to have a Yiddish-speaking employee at the receiving dock of the stores, making sure deliveries and exact inventory were accounted for.

Founded in 1960, Food-A-Rama was a supermarket chain of 48 stores located throughout the Baltimore-Washington, D.C. corridor. (Photo provided by Jeremy Diamond)

Many survivors were given jobs “right off the boat” to help them provide for their families.

Ben Kowitz, a Holocaust survivor, along with his sons, Ben and Irv, owned and grew EZEE Markets stores with locations all around Baltimore City. The Kowitzes employed more than 100 people at their stores and gave them the opportunity to provide for their own families.

Based in Pikesville, Shapiro’s supermarket was the gold-standard local kosher grocer in the 1960s, ’70s and ’80s. Located at the corner of Old Court and Reisterstown roads (as well as at Randallstown Savoy Plaza), Shapiro’s — owned and operated by Harry Shapiro and his two partners — employed and welcomed countless Jewish workers and shoppers during the weeks before Rosh Hashanah.

Shapiro’s supported the Jewish community in many ways — employing talented people, sponsoring advertisements in banquet journals and yearbooks, and offering customers the very best quality in kosher food, especially around the High Holiday season.

Now but a fond memory, Shapiro’s closed in late 1990 after more than three decades in business, selling its name and much of its merchandise and equipment to Seven Mile Market, which opened in January of 1989.

Wishing all of you and your families a happy and healthy Shana Tova!

A Pikesville resident and the grandson of Food-A-Rama co-founders Paul and Sonia Diamond, Jeremy Diamond is the author of “Tastemakers: The Legacy of Jewish Entrepreneurs in the Mid-Atlantic Grocery Industry,” which is available on Amazon.

Jacob Applebaum contributed to this article.