Sosúa Stories

Soccer games.   Once enough settlers arrived, they assembled two soccer teams: one for the homesteaders and another team for Batey settlers. The teams played against each other on most weekends, and also came together to form one team when other Dominican soccer teams came to town to play. At the time, soccer was a popular sport in the Dominican Republic. Most Dominican soccer teams came to Sosúa to compete against the settlers on a regular basis, but the Sosúans always won. After a while teams stopped coming to Sosúa to compete against the highly skilled Sosúans.

Sosúa Ship: Did you know about the existence of a ship named “SOSUA”?  The ship was built in 1912 in Norway and was chartered to the United Fruit Company. “SOSUA” weighed 1,185 tons and was used to transport bananas.  It was sold to Chile in 1935.

First Settler: The first settlers to live in Sosúa were the Weinberg family, Jacob and Emma with sons Ernst (10) and Alfred (4). They were given a very old house in Laguna (probably from United Fruit Company) with no bathroom.

First Barmitzvah: Ernst Weinberg

First Pesach: Was celebrated at the home of Jacob and Emma Weinberg

First Wedding: ?

First baby born: Catalina (Kate) Meyerstein. Born on the same day was Heini Entenberg in Puerto Plata,

First Britmila;  Kurt Heiss. The Britmila took place August 21, 1940.

First refrigerator: First place to house a refrigerator was the hospital.

First settler with a private car: Arturo Kirchheimer owned a Buick

First group to arrive in Sosúa: The Katz group

First Dominican student at the Escuela Cristobal Colon:  Olga Roman

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