Born: 16 April 1900, Belarus
Died: 9 June 1962
Country most active: United States
Also known as: Pearl Adler
The following bio was written by Emma Rosen, author of On This Day She Made History: 366 Days With Women Who Shaped the World and This Day In Human Ingenuity & Discovery: 366 Days of Scientific Milestones with Women in the Spotlight, and has been republished with permission.
Polly Adler, a well-known brothel keeper in New York, was arrested in 1935 after police raided her East Fifty-fifth Street apartment. She was charged with possessing a ‘motion picture machine with objectionable pictures.’
Polly was born in 1900 as Pearl Adler in Yanov, a Polish town in Imperial Russia (now western Belarus), to a traditional Yiddish-speaking Jewish family. To escape the growing danger of pogroms, she was sent to America at age 13 with a cousin, who left her there alone. After years of working in a factory, she got to know people involved in showbiz. She moved to the sex industry, becoming a madam of one of the most popular brothers of the jazz era at The Majestic, at 215 West 75th Street, with patrons from the world of politics, art, Broadway, and the legal system.
Adler gained fame after writing a best-selling memoir, “A House is Not a Home,” which depicted Jewish immigrant life in New York City and the underground world of the city’s brothels.
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