There is a Jewish expression: “What am I, chopped liver?”
While my people do make a wonderful chopped liver, this expression is instead a rhetorical question used to “indicate the frustration one feels when ignored and treated as unimportant”.
This feeling of being viewed as unimportant is the current one presently among many within the Tallahassee Jewish community with respect to its treatment by several local elected bodies and committees.
But for starters, I refer you to the Tallahassee Democrat story of Oct. 27, 2026, titled “Controversial cigar factory project in All Saints gets conditional OK”.
What words are missing from this headline? “Jewish”, and “Abraham (Alfred) Wahnish”.
Wahnish Cigar Factory building included in proposed redevelopment
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The historic Wahnish Cigar Factory property, located at 469 St. Francis Street, is a part of a proposed redevelopment project. (Alicia Devine/Tallahassee Democrat)
Abraham Wahnish was a Sephardic Jew who immigrated to the U.S. from Morocco in 1885, an early Jewish settler in Tallahassee, and became a very prominent citizen of the city.
The historic Wahnish Cigar Factory property, located at 469 St. Francis Street, is a part of a proposed redevelopment project.
Wahnish had his Wahnish Cigar Factory constructed in 1907; it remains an imposing structure located at 469 St. Francis St.
That factory was provisioned by shade tobacco grown on Wahnish’s 3,600-acre property near Blair Stone and St. Augustine roads.
The business employed up to 150 workers, and though Jim Crow laws enforced racial segregation, the Wahnish family’s decision to hire Black employees and White employees to work side by side, was a notable departure from the then racial norms.
If I sounded critical of the newspaper, it is not just this one article which has ignored Tallahassee’s Jewish community.
More: Controversial cigar factory project in All Saints gets conditional OK
Here I refer to the Tallahassee City Commission, the city and county appointed Architectural Review Board (ARB), and the city’s Development Review Committee (DRC).
If any of them consulted extensively with the Tallahassee Jewish community on the Wahnish building matter, I must have missed it.
Neighbors, please make amends.
I should mention the 119-year-old Wahnish building is listed both on the “National Register of Historic Places”, and in the Florida Department of State’s publication, “Florida Jewish Heritage Trail”.
Further the Wahnish building is structurally sound, and I believe could be integrated into the proposed 73-unit student housing project slated to replace it.
The plan to “redevelop” the building into oblivion comes on the heels of the city commission erasing the street name Wahnish Way, which ran through the middle of the campus of Florida A&M University.
Samuel Alfred Wahnish
Wahnish Way was named in 1966 by the city to honor Abraham Wahnish’s son, Sam Wahnish. Sam was Tallahassee’s first Jewish mayor (1939-41) and a co-founder of Temple Israel Tallahassee. We of the Jewish community are not sure what Mayor Wahnish did years after his passing, to have the honor withdrawn.
There is substantial support in the Jewish community for preservation of the Wahnish building. As individuals, the presidents of both Temple Israel and Shomrei Torah synagogues support restoring the building and installing historical markers on site.
The Wahnish family is shocked by the recent efforts to eliminate 135 years of Wahnish history in Tallahassee.
To its credit, the city commission recently voted for a temporary hold on demolition of the Wahnish building.
In fact, I believe all five city commissioners are supportive of finding a way to preserve the Wahnish Cigar Factory Building, and for saving Jewish history. For that, I thank each commissioner.
The city commission, the Jewish community, the building’s owner and the developer must all recognize that the elements of a win, win, win, win solution are only waiting to be discussed.
Now to get it done.
Donald Axelrad
Donald Axelrad is a retired FAMU professor and a congregant at Temple Israel Tallahassee. He can be reached at daxe@comcast.net.
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This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Jewish leaders intent on upholding Wahnish legacy | Opinion