Moses J. Gries was born in Newark, New Jersey on January 25, 1868, the son of Jacob and Katharina Frances Holzer Gries. In 1881 he was accepted into the Hebrew Union College. For the next eight years he participated in classes at HUC while also attending Hughes High School and McMicken College (now the University of Cincinnati). In 1889 Gries received a Bachelor of Letters degree from the University of Cincinnati and was ordained a rabbi at Hebrew Union College.
Gries began his rabbinical career at the Mizpah Congregation in Chattanooga, Tennessee. He remained there until the autumn of 1892 when he became rabbi of Cleveland’s Tifereth Israel Congregation (The Temple) – a position he retained for the next 25 years.
In 1916 Gries shocked his congregation by announcing his intention to retire in 1917, after his 25th anniversary at the Temple. In June 1917 Gries preached his last sermon at the Temple and then withdrew from active rabbinical life.
Moses J. Gries died on October 31, 1918 in Cleveland. He was survived by his wife, Frances Hays Gries, whom he married in June 1898, and his two sons, Robert Hays Gries ( 1900-1966) and Lincoln Hays Gries (b. 1905).
–Excerpt American Jewish Archives, MS-53: Moses Jacob Gries Papers, 1850-1934
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