Club Náutico Hacoaj is an

Argentine Argentines (mistakenly translated Argentineans in the past; in Spanish (masculine) or (feminine)) are people identified with the country of Argentina. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Argentines, s ...

sports club A sports club or sporting club, sometimes an athletics club or sports society or sports association, is a group of people formed for the purpose of playing sports. Sports clubs range from organisations whose members play together, unpaid, and ...

headquartered in the Tigre district of

Greater Buenos Aires Greater Buenos Aires ( es, Gran Buenos Aires, GBA), also known as the Buenos Aires Metropolitan Area ( es, Área Metropolitana de Buenos Aires, AMBA), refers to the urban agglomeration comprising the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires and the adjac ...

. Although the institution was founded as a

rowing Rowing is the act of propelling a human-powered watercraft using the sweeping motions of oars to displace water and generate reactional propulsion. Rowing is functionally similar to paddling, but rowing requires oars to be mechanically atta ...

club, Hacoaj hosts a wide range of activities, including

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

field hockey Field hockey is a team sport structured in standard hockey format, in which each team plays with ten outfield players and a goalkeeper. Teams must drive a round hockey ball by hitting it with a hockey stick towards the rival team's shooting ci ...

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping wi ...

softball Softball is a game similar to baseball played with a larger ball on a smaller field. Softball is played competitively at club levels, the college level, and the professional level. The game was first created in 1887 in Chicago by George Hanc ...

tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...

, and

volleyball Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules. It has been a part of the official program of the Summ ...

, among others. The club is considered one of the most important institutions of the

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

community in Argentina, along with Club Maccabi.

History

Large numbers of Jews first came to Argentina in the middle of the 19th century. Those were the times when Argentina encouraged immigration from Europe. The first Jews arrived from

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...

, The Austro-Hungarian Empire and

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

, while other Jewish people came from the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University) ...

. Those groups established their homes mainly in the rural areas of Buenos Aires, Entre Ríos and Santa Fe where they worked as tenant farmers. During the decades of the 1920s and 1930s a second immigrant group arrived to Argentina, where they developed their professional careers in the biggest cities of the country, working as teachers, journalists, actors, and politicians. The districts where the most Jews established were

Villa Crespo Villa Crespo is a middle class neighborhood in Buenos Aires, Argentina, located in the geographical center of the city. It had a population of 83,646 people in 2001, and thus currently a population density of 23,235 inhabitants/km2. Villa Crespo c ...

Balvanera Balvanera is a barrio or neighborhood of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Origin of name and alternative names The official name, Balvanera, is the name of the ''parroquia'' (parish) centered around the church of ''Nuestra Señora de Balvanera'', erected ...

Flores Flores is one of the Lesser Sunda Islands, a group of islands in the eastern half of Indonesia. Including the Komodo Islands off its west coast (but excluding the Solor Archipelago to the east of Flores), the land area is 15,530.58 km2, and th ...

, Barracas,

La Boca La Boca (; "the Mouth", probably of the Matanza River) is a neighborhood (''barrio'') of Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina. It retains a strong Italian flavour, many of its early settlers having originated in the city of Genoa. Geography L ...

and suburban areas. As they usually did, Jewish people organized their social activities founding their own institutions such as temples, cemeteries, hospitals, committees and clubs. Mauricio Schverlij, a young Jewish engineer, had asked to be admitted as a member of a

club of

Tigre Partido Tigre Partido is a '' partido'' of Buenos Aires Province, Argentina, situated in the northern part of Greater Buenos Aires. The department covers a large section of the Paraná Delta and its low-lying islands. The main town of the division is ...

, but his request was rejected. Suspecting that the rejection was due to his Jewish origin, Schverlij called his own relatives and friends with the purpose of creating a rowing club that represented the Jewish community. On the night of 24 December 1935, a meeting was held, establishing the "Club Náutico Israelita" ("Israelite Rowing Club", in

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Can ...

). The word "Náutico" (Nautical) was to underline its rowing activities, as at that time it was the first club where Jews could practice that sport. One year later the club changed its name to "Club Náutico Hacoaj" in honor of its namesake, Hakoah (in

Vienna, Austria en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

), later destroyed by the Nazis in 1938 (coah/coaj/כּוֹחַ means power in Hebrew). Hacoaj started in a small rented place in Tigre, with a mooring, a few boats, tennis courts, basketball, bocce, football, a colonial-style main building, dormitories and a wooden dance floor.History of the club at Hacoaj official website

Facilities

It currently has four locations: * Sede Tigre "Roberto Maliar" (the original location, named after a longtime president of the club) * Club de Campo (country club located near the "Sede Tigre") * La isla (an island in the

Paraná Delta The Paraná Delta ( es, Delta del Paraná) is the delta of the Paraná River in Argentina and it consists of several islands known as the Islas del Paraná. The Paraná flows north–south and becomes an alluvial basin (a flood plain) between th ...

that can be reached rowing from the Tigre Location) * Sede Capital (a building in

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires ( or ; ), officially the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires ( es, link=no, Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires), is the capital and primate city of Argentina. The city is located on the western shore of the Río de la Plata, on South ...

, where social and sports activities are held during the week)

Club Sports

* Athleticism * Basketball * Boating * Bowls * Field Hockey * Football * Golf * Gymnastics * Judo * Netball * Paddle * Rowing * Softball * Tennis * Volleyball

Notable members

Daniel Brailovsky Daniel Alberto Brailovsky Poliak ( he, אלברטו דניאל בריילובסקי, sometimes spelled Brailovski, born November 18, 1958) is an Argentine-born Israeli former professional footballer and manager. He was born in Buenos Aires, Arg ...

(football), who played for

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

and

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

national teams *

Diego Schwartzman Diego Sebastián Schwartzman (, ; born 16 August 1992) is an Argentine professional tennis player. He has won four ATP singles titles and reached his career-high singles ranking of world 8 in October 2020. As a clay court specialist, his be ...

(tennis), reached 2017 and 2019 U.S. Open QF and 2018 QF and 2020 SF at Roland Garros.

References

External links

*
Official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hacoaj, Club Nautico Hakoah sport clubs Multi-sport clubs in Argentina Rowing clubs in Argentina Jewish organisations based in Argentina Argentine volleyball teams Golf clubs and courses in Argentina Diaspora sports clubs in Argentina