Cork, in the south of the country, is Ireland's second largest city and has been gaining cultural diversity for many years, with people immigrating from all over the world, particularly from Poland and various African nations.  A significant number of Jewish people have also moved to Cork City and County.

The first Jewish community to be identified in Cork was comprised of Sephardic Jews from the Iberian countries who engaged in the import and export of kosher meat to the West Indies. Amongst this small and flourishing community was Abraham Solomon - whose son Isaac was apprenticed by his father to the silversmith trade and became one of Cork’s great silver craftsmen of the 18th century whose work is greatly sought after.
The evidence of this community remains in the old maps of the City of Cork where the “Jews’ Burying Ground” is clearly marked located in the north-eastern area of Kemp Street. It has since been covered over by a municipal car park and coincidentally lies 100 yards from the present day synagogue.

The contemporary Cork Jewish community was founded in 1880 and mostly originated from a village called Akmeyan in Lithuania. Persecution and pogroms forced them to emigrate with America, the “New World” in their sights. However, sea-sickness, the desire to rest up, and a confusion of names (Cork / New York), as well as unscrupulous ship captains asking for more money, led many of the voyagers to stay in Southern Ireland. They made their way from the port of Queenstown (Cobh) to Cork where they settled in an area by the head of the River Lee called Hibernian Buildings. This area is still affectionately called Jewstown by the older non-Jewish residents of Cork (Corkonians). In recent years the City Council of Cork dedicated a small park in the area and called it Shalom Park, formally recognizing that part of the city where Jewish immigrants lived.

The Jewish Community began to flourish, and soon over one hundred families lived in the city; a Jewish school was founded and 2 synagogues were initially established, but eventually were amalgamated into one -