Kelmė

Kelmė
City
Church of Kelmė
Flag Coat of arms
Kelmė is located in Lithuania Kelmė Location of Kelmė
Coordinates:
Country	Lithuania
Ethnographic region	Samogitia
County	Šiauliai County
Municipality	Kelmė district municipality
Eldership	Kelmė eldership
Capital of	Kelmė district municipality Kelmė eldership
First mentioned	1484
Granted city rights	1947
Government
• Mayor	Vaclovas Andrulis
Area
• Total	7.85 km2 (3.03 sq mi)
Elevation	128 m (420 ft)
Population (2011)
• Total	9,150
• Density	1,200/km2 (3,000/sq mi)
Time zone	EET (UTC+2)
• Summer (DST)	EEST (UTC+3)
Website	Official website

Kelmė church

Kelmė (<phonos file="Lt-Kelmė.ogg">pronunciation</phonos>) is a city in central Lithuania. It has a population of 9,150 and is the administrative center of the Kelmė district municipality.

History

Kelmė's name may come from the Lithuanian "Kelmynės", literally "the stubby place" because of the forests that were there at the time of its founding.

Kelmė was first mentioned in 1416, the year that Kelmė's first church was built.

Prior to World War II, Kelmė (Yiddish: Kelm‎) was home to a famous Rabbinical College, the Kelm Talmud Torah.

According to an 1897 census, 2,710 of Kelme’s 3,914 inhabitants were members of the town’s Jewish population, the vast majority of whom were merchants and traders and lived in the town.

People

• Antanas Mackevičius
• Aryeh Leib Frumkin, Rabbi
• Eliezer Gordon, Rabbi 1874–1883
• Yaakov Kamenetsky
• Elyah Lopian
• Alexander Ziskind Maimon
• Icchokas Meras, writer
• Zvi Yaakov Oppenheim, Rabbi 1883–1926
• Simcha Zissel Ziv, the Alter of Kelm

Twin towns

Kelmė is twinned with:

City	COA	Country
Biłgoraj		Poland
Hódmezővásárhely		Hungary

External links

• Official site of Kelmė district municipality