The Workmen’s Circle is now The Workers Circle as Organization Embraces Change on the Cusp of its 120th Year

(New York, N.Y.)—The popular Yiddish expression goes, “May you live to 120 years.” Well, the Workmen’s Circle, founded in 1900, is about to celebrate that anniversary in 2020, and in the leadup to this milestone, the nonprofit has unveiled a new name: the Workers Circle.

This new name embraces the tenor of the times in gender-neutral fashion and with a nod to the organization’s century of activism at the fore of the labor movement, supporting worker rights to this day. It also more accurately reflects the organization’s original Yiddish name, Der Arbeter Ring, since Arbeter is gender-neutral.

“As the first woman to lead the organization, I am proud to uphold a welcoming and inclusive institutional culture,” says Executive Director Ann Toback. “Everything we do communicates our commitment to living our progressive values, and that includes choosing a name that reflects both our origin and our contemporary ideals.”

Ann Toback announced the name change last night at the organization’s annual benefit, at which she presented Mark and Seth Rogen with its Generation to Generation Activism Award.

The Workers Circle of today is a social justice organization that powers progressive Jewish identity through Jewish cultural engagement, Yiddish language learning, multigenerational education, and social justice activism.

Among its programmatic offerings is a network of schools, and in recent years their social justice-minded students recommended the organization’s name evolve, particularly as other large organizations – the Scouts and Police Officers Benevolent Associations among them – have embraced more gender neutral and inclusive names.

A secular Jewish organization, the Workers Circle remains deeply committed to social justice and roots its activism in progressive Jewish values, and in its origin story.

“Der Arbeter Ring was first founded in New York by Eastern European Jewish immigrants who arrived in an America that did not welcome them with open arms.  Their new homeland offered exploitive and often dangerous work conditions, cramped housing, and no support for their transition into engaged citizenship,” Toback said. “So our first members founded our organization as a mutual aid society to take care of and support one another on the journey to become proud and productive citizens.”

“In subsequent years,” Toback noted, “as their efforts were successful in integrating those of the great Eastern European Jewish migration into the rich fabric of the United States’ community, our organization’s mission evolved into one that fights for the rights of others.  Today we are a social justice organization steeped in our founders’ values and yiddishkayt connection to working for a better world for all.  We continue to fight for our immigrant brothers and sisters of all backgrounds and for working people everywhere. We are all workers, after all. We all work to pay our rent, to pay for childcare and college, to access health insurance. We all deserve safe work environments, equal access to professional opportunities, fair pay, and a healthy work-life balance.”

In recent years, the Workers Circle has joined forces with other nonprofits, advocates, and activists, helping lead and support campaigns that resulted in the passage of New York’s “Greenlight Bill,” which granted undocumented immigrants the right to a driver’s license, and the “Fight for 15,” which called for a living minimum wage.

The Workers Circle will plan special events throughout 2020 to honor this milestone year, including a March 2, 2020 fundraising reception that will include a conversation with Daniel and Nina Libeskind and Arlene and Alan Alda, two couples long dedicated to social justice and building a better world.