Portrait of Sonia Alomis, The Vilner Troupe

Admin History/Bio: Alomis, together with her husband Aleksander Azro, was a founding member of the Vilner Trupe (Vilna Troupe, named for the city where it began), the critically acclaimed Polish Yiddish theatre company created during the First World War. The creation of the Vilner Trupe was a direct response to the call from Europe’s great Jewish intellectuals for an artistic, literary, modern Yiddish theatre that would not simply entertain (that was the job of the popular Yiddish theatre), but would elevate the form to a national art addressing the highest cultural aspirations of the Jewish people. Azro and Alomis performed and toured throughout the 1920s, gracing Yiddish stages all over Eastern and Western Europe and across America. When in Toronto, Asro and Alomis stayed with Dorothy and Henry Dworkin, who ran Dworkin Travel and helped bring hundreds of Jewish immigrants to Toronto. Dorothy was a healthcare professional who in 1922 founded Mount Sinai Hospital; her husband Henry founded the Labor Lyceum in 1913.

Repro Restriction: Copyright is in the public domain and permission for use is not required. Please credit the Ontario Jewish Archives as the source of the photograph.