Grooming future Jewish professionals

Leah Greenwald Jordan fell in love with Judaism while studying for her Bat Mitzvah. Now studying to become a Reform rabbi at Hebrew Union College in Los Angeles, she is a summer intern at Congregation Beth Torah. What makes this story different from the typical summer-intern story is the fact she is interning at her family’s congregation.

Jordan, who celebrated her 24th birthday Aug. 22, is the daughter of Beth and Jerry Jordan. As is custom, she spent her first year studying at HUC in Jerusalem and just completed her second year of studies here in the states. She earned her undergraduate degree from the University of Kansas, majoring in English literature and minoring in history and French.

Her Jewish loves
Jordan’s path to the rabbinate may have begun while she was a student at The Temple, Congregation B’nai Jehudah. She said she had a “wonderful time singing with Cantor Paul Silbersher” (now the spiritual leader at Congregation Kol Ami) and learning all she needed to know for her Bat Mitzvah.

“I just really got into it through him. I felt like he had such a faith, as do most Jewish clergy, and that there’s a point to Jewish tradition,” she said. “I bought that. I took it inside of myself.”
While there are many ways to contribute to the continuity of the Jewish people, Jordan said she is attracted to the rabbinate because she is fascinated by history and literature.

“You have to know Jewish history and Hebrew texts and the Talmud and modern Jewish philosophy. I get to do all that,” she said.

Being Jewish was always important to the Jordan family. They attended services at least once a month when she was growing up, always had Shabbat dinner and “belonged to a really great chavurah.”

“We did all kinds of holidays together with the chavurah, and that was my Jewish life,” she said.

Jordan’s other big connection to Judaism came when she was selected to the Bronfman Youth Fellowship program after her junior year in high school. Bronfman Fellows spend five weeks in Israel studying Judaism and traveling the country.

“That was really where I met my best Jewish friends when I was in high school, and I still have three best friends from that program,” she said.

A mini rabbi
Jordan’s internship at CBT is part of CAJE/Jewish Federation’s Learning for Life program. (See below). The internship program allowed Jordan to meet many local Jewish professionals, visit several of the synagogues and take a tour of Jewish Kansas City.

“I’ve made good friends through this internship, and we’ve got to share the things we’ve learned. It’s been a good support group,” she said.

She described her summer job as being “a mini, amateur rabbi.” As such, she will stay at the congregation until after the High Holy Days.

“I do a lot of the things that Rabbi Levin and Rabbi (Vered) Harris would do, but on a less professional level because I’m in the middle of learning. I lead services; I deliver d’vrei torah and do sermons. I’ve been leading Saturday-morning Torah study while Rabbi Levin is recovering from his back surgery,” she explained.

The scope of Jordan’s summer internship changed dramatically after Rabbi Levin announced he would take a medical leave this summer. “Originally, I was going to shadow Rabbi Levin all summer,” she explained.

Instead of shadowing him, she worked with Music Director Linda Sweenie and Rabbi Harris, the congregational educator. But she still visited Rabbi Levin’s home twice a week for study sessions, explaining “he was very conscientious, knowing that I needed some guidance.”

Rabbi Levin said working with Jordan this summer was a pleasure.

“Leah is a fantastic student. She is a Bronfman Fellow, and it is a rabbi’s dream to sit and study with her,” said the rabbi, who returned to work earlier this month.

He said having Jordan visit this summer was a ray of sunshine for him in the midst of a difficult personal time.

“It was nice to remove myself from the fact I was on medical leave to be able to study with Leah,” he said.

Jordan is thrilled that the internship has gone well.

“It’s actually been really, really wonderful. I had a bad experience with a rabbinic mentorship this past year in L.A., and this has been a lot better,” she said.
Jordan may even have a chance to lead some prayers from the bema during the High Holy Days.

“That’s a big thing for me,” Jordan said. “I had a monthly pulpit last year in L.A., but it wasn’t the big, professional level that Beth Torah is.”

As a member of the congregation where she is interning, this summer could have been extra stressful for Jordan. But since her family didn’t join the congregation until after she was confirmed, she said she doesn’t feel a lot of pressure.

“If I were at B’nai Jehudah, and there were all of the old families that I grew up with, that would make me nervous because they have expectation about who I am,” she said.

“At Beth Torah I barely knew anyone there except Rabbi Levin and Marcia Rittmaster. I was a Hebrew teaching assistant before I went to college, but you don’t meet the families that way,” she continued.

One of the nicest things about the internship, she said, is expanding upon the personal connection her family has with Rabbi Levin. He presided over her father’s conversion to Judaism, her parents’ wedding and even her own baby-naming ceremony.

Jordan’s future
Instead of returning to HUC in the fall, Jordan is taking a year off to attend an intensive text-study program at Yeshivat Hadar in New York City. She will return to rabbinical school next year to complete her studies.

As much as Jordan loves teaching, she said she is torn as to what type of rabbi she will become.

“I would also love to be part of people’s lives in the way that a congregational rabbi is. If you teach, you have students, but I don’t know how often you’d be asked to be the one to do the bris or be the one that is the ritual figure, and I would like to do that as well,” Jordan said.

Six serve as Learning for Life interns

Again this summer, six college students who either grew up in Kansas City or who go to school in Kansas or Missouri served as interns at six Jewish organizations through CAJE/Jewish Federation’s Learning for Life program.

Learning for Life celebrated its 10th program year earlier this month and has been directed by Karen Gerson since its inception. This is the eighth summer for the internship program.

“The Learning for Life summer internship provides a professional work experience within the college students’ interests,” Gerson explained. “The success of the program is engaging these young adults in the Kansas City Jewish community and Jewish life. Out of the program’s 41 alumni, 13 are or have been in the field of Jewish communal service.”

This year’s interns and the agencies they served were:

• Aaron Elyachar: Community Kollel, assisting with its Ahoovim (adults special needs) program, working in volunteer services for Jewish Family Services and helping at Village Shalom as a leisure-program music assistant

• Leah Jordan: Congregation Beth Torah Rabbinical intern

• Erika Meltzer: Jewish Family Services assisting with the J-BLING program and KU Hillel

• Camilla Claiborn: Jewish Federation working with The Helzberg Leadership alumni

• Emma Paskin: Jewish Heritage Foundation

• Jacob White: Village Shalom serving as a Judaic program assistant

When the interns were not working at their agencies or congregations, they met together on Wednesday mornings for weekly networking and educational seminars. One of the purposes of the seminars was to help the interns learn more about the Jewish community through meetings with a wide variety of lay leaders.

Funding for the program is provided by the Helen and Sam Kaplan Foundation and the Shirley White Donor Advised Fund of the Jewish Community Foundation.

New rabbi in town emphasizes education

There’s a new rabbi in town. Rabbi Leigh Ann Kopans, 28, is a graduate of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College. She moved here this summer when her husband, attorney David Kopans, took a job with the Lathrop and Gage firm. And while the Kopanses have three children under age 4, the rabbi has already landed two part-time jobs: teaching in the Jewish Community Center’s adult-education program and leading Kehilath Israel Synagogue’s religious school.

A self-described “military brat” and a graduate of The Ohio State University, Rabbi Kopans returned to Ohio State after her ordination and spent the last two school years as director of religious life at Hillel’s Wexner Jewish Student Center. In fact, she graduated with a certificate in campus rabbinate.

Rabbi Kopans said she “appreciated the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College’s approach to learning about Judaism” and plans to use it as a model for her own teaching.

“The basis of Reconstructionist Judaism is the assumption that Judaism is an evolving religious civilization, and that’s the way the college approaches Jewish history,” she said “So in Year 1 you learn the Bible and Biblical Hebrew and theology. In Year 2 you learn rabbinic history and Midrash, then in Year 3 medieval, modern and contemporary thinkers. It gives a great basis for approaching any Jewish topic. You get the full history and layers of thought behind it.”

‘A progressive Jew’
There has never been a Reconstructionist synagogue in greater Kansas City, and the Reconstructionist Congregation Or Hadash recently folded after meeting for several years at a local church.

Rabbi Kopans is prepared to explain her beliefs.

“I usually refer to myself as a progressive Jew,” she said, “meaning I think Judaism is what the Reconstructionist Movement says it is — an evolving civilization. But other movements are addressing that in other ways, and I love how all the liberal movements address it, including modern Orthodoxy.

“We joined Beth Shalom because I met Rabbi (Adam) Stein at Brandeis Collegiate Institute while I was still in college, in 2002.”

And while she and her husband have three small children, Rabbi Kopans said she was “not cut out for” being a stay-at-home mom. Thus the part-time gigs.

“I was looking for a meaningful way to spend my time, KI was looking for a school administrator, and I thought it was a good fit,” Rabbi Kopans said of her position there. “I’m excited to start the new school year.”

KI expects about 20 children to attend religious school this year, and Rabbi Kopans said they would be divided into two classes, one older and the other younger.

She was in touch with JCC adult-ed administrator Jeff Goldenberg even before she moved to greater Kansas City, Rabbi Kopans said, and expects to teach a variety of settings, likely including the Melton Mini School.

“She has a reputation as a fine young teacher,” Goldenberg said in an e-mail.

Education is my passion,” Rabbi Kopans said. “I like giving sermons, but that’s not what gets me really excited.”

Rabbi Kopans said she would consider taking a full-time job in the future.

“Everything that may come up bears consideration,” she said. “We made it work with me working full time, so if a good fit came along, I would be excited about that, too.”

Schneider Children’s Hospital seeks support here

Quick: Think of a hospital in Israel. You thought of Hadassah Medical Center, right? So, as the old saying goes, when you’re number two, you try harder. That’s what brought Robert Socolof, executive director of the New York-based charitable supporting group Medical Development for Israel, to Kansas this week.

Socolof is beating the bushes, so to speak, visiting the Kansas City area and Wichita, Kan., on behalf of Schneider Children’s Medical Center of Israel — the only comprehensive tertiary pediatric hospital in Israel and the entire Middle East. (Visit www.schneider.org.il/eng for more on the Web). Socolof was in Kansas giving briefings and updates on the hospital to supporters and community organizations.

Socolof describes the work of the doctors at the hospital as “near-miraculous,” which gives him a raft of feel-good stories to tell at meetings like the ones he had in Kansas this week.
Schneider docs treat Arab and Jew alike; no questions asked. They led the Israeli emergency-response team that flew to Haiti immediately after this year’s earthquake. They have just successfully researched and tested breakthrough technology that will lead to the world’s first artificial pancreas.

“You can check it out on our Facebook page,” Socolof notes.

The 258-bed hospital handles all of Israel’s pediatric surgeries involving cardiac catheterization, liver transplant and multiple-organ transplant. Through their pediatric burn center, they operate a summer camp exclusively for children who are burn survivors. And on and on.

Getting the word out
The 19-year-old Schneider Children’s Medical Center shares a campus with the Rabin Medical Center in Petach Tikva, about halfway between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

Now it is making a concerted effort to get the word out about the good work it is doing and to seek support from the worldwide Jewish community. On his travels, for instance, Socolof is touting Schneider’s latest awareness campaign — a set of seven rubber bands in the shape of Schneider’s puzzle-pieces logo. It’s an attempt to get in on the current teen craze for wearing and trading the shaped bands.

They are $10 a bag, which includes three sets of bands — “One to keep and two to trade,” Socolof noted. “They would dress up the table at your next Bat Mitzvah party. It makes a nice party favor, or you could sell them as a mitzvah project.”

The goal of the rubber bands, like Socolof’s travels and meetings, is the same.

“We would like people in America to understand that there is this amazing, standard-setting, loving hospital for children; exclusively for children,” Socolof said.

To order sets of the Schneider-logo rubber bands, contact Danielle Cohen, assistant director, Medical Development for Israel, This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , or (212) 759-3370.

For more information about MDI or about Schneider Children’s Medical Center itself, visit www.mdinyc.org or call (212) 759-3370.

JAFI exec to speak about Jewish peoplehood

When the Jewish Federation of Greater Kansas City commemorates the 20th anniversary of Operation Exodus next week at its annual meeting, the featured speaker will have a lot in common with many of those in the audience. Misha Galperin, Ph.D., president and CEO of the Jewish Agency International Development, emigrated himself from Russia when he was just 18 years old in 1976.

“Our family came before the big wave,” he said, referring to the resettlement of more than 1 million Soviet Jews in Israel and North America in the 1990s.

The Federation’s annual meeting will be held at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 1, at the Lewis & Shirley White Theatre. The public is invited to attend and reservations can be made at www.jewishkansas.org or by calling the (913) 327-8103.

Galperin said the big difference between his experience and those who were a part of Operation Exodus is that during the late ‘70s and early ‘80s people essentially could leave Russia but after that, they were stuck there for a 10- to 12-year period.

Born in Odessa, Ukraine, Galperin set out to complete his education after his family settled in Los Angeles. He earned a doctorate in clinical psychology from New York University and is a graduate of the Wexner Heritage lay leadership program. He has worked as an interpreter, a teacher, a psychotherapist and an executive of social service, community service and educational institutions.

Galperin decided to concentrate his career in Jewish communal services for several reasons, he said, one being that he discovered the values and ideals of the Jewish people during his years of volunteer service for a variety of Jewish efforts. The other was because he and his family were the beneficiaries of various Jewish communal services and he saw the value of giving back.

He joined JAFI on July 1, but has served as an associate member of its board of directors since 2004. The Jewish Agency is involved in numerous activities including sending missions to Israel, aiding refugees and people in crisis and setting up new immigrants at absorption centers around Israel.

At JAFI, Galperin said his job is “everything that has to do with partnerships and relationships with other organizations, fundraising and public affairs.” That means he is in charge of the agency’s relationships with North American Jewish Federations, JFNA, JDC and other North American Jewish organizations and communities as well as with Keren Hayesod and other Jewish organizations and communities in Europe, Africa, Asia, Latin America and Australia.

In just the few weeks he has worked for JAFI he has already traveled through Eastern Europe and Israel.

Galperin is no stranger to the Jewish Federation system he now works closely with, most recently serving as the CEO of The Jewish Federation of Greater Washington, the sixth largest Jewish community in the United States. Prior to that he was COO of New York’s UJA Federation, the world’s largest local philanthropy.

In 2009 Galperin co-wrote “The Case for Jewish Peoplehood: Can We Be One?” with Erica Brown. It was published by Jewish Lights Publishing. His speech will focus on the topic of Jewish peoplehood.

“I enjoy the fact that I am engaging in the pursuit of this idea and engaging Jewish people with each other,” he said. “I will speak about the issues that confront the Jewish people and the new directions the Jewish Agency for Israel is taking to meet those challenges.”

As he wrote in one of his first newsletters in his new position, “When you believe in Jewish peoplehood you believe that we are all part of an extended family with a mission. Every once in a while, you realize that this description isn’t only symbolic or emotional. Sometimes it’s very real.”

In his new position Galperin said he is also excited about the opportunity to work with Jewish Agency Chairman Natan Sharansky who immigrated to Israel in 1986 after spending nine years in a Soviet prison. Since then he has led various human rights efforts.

“We are friends and he has been a hero of mine. He has made a significant imprint on Jewish identity for Jews the world over.”

Looking back on Operation Exodus

Twenty years ago, communism was crumbling in what we now call the Former Soviet Union. Jews who had not been allowed to practice their religion freely were suddenly able to leave the country. To do so, they needed money and support. So from 1990 to 1997, Jewish federations from across the country banded together to raise $1 billion to rescue and resettle more than 1 million Soviet Jews in Israel and North America.

The Jewish Federation of Greater Kansas City will commemorate the 20th anniversary of this communitywide effort — known as Operation Exodus — at its annual meeting Wednesday, Sept. 1 (See box below for details) Federation President Bill Carr said it is important to recognize Operation Exodus because its mission was a significant event in modern Jewish history.

“For those fortunate to have been resettled, their story is one of a flight from oppression and religious suppression to civil, economic and religious freedom,” Carr said.

“Operation Exodus also serves as a dramatic example of how Jews worldwide, and in our own Kansas City Jewish community, can galvanize to turn a challenge into an incredible opportunity. Literally, the lives of hundreds of thousands of individuals and their families will be changed for generations due to the success of Operation Exodus. They will be able to live freely as Jews, and the world will be the better for it. Our community owes a deep debt of gratitude to all the volunteers and Federation staff who worked tirelessly to accomplish this.”

Communal effort
Laura Breitberg, a therapist and case manager at Jewish Family Services, said Kansas City resettled about 1,000 émigrés during that time. An émigré herself, Breitberg moved here in 1990 from Odessa, Ukraine. She said the last former-Soviet émigrés settled here five years ago and will be sworn in as U.S. citizens today (Friday, Aug. 20).

Jewish Family Services and Jewish Vocational Services were the agencies largely responsible for resettlement. Case workers and volunteers worked together to address the émigrés’ day-to-day needs.

It cost the local Jewish community about $10,000 to resettle a family of four here — starting with transportation from Eastern Europe and including housing and resettlement services after they arrived. Federation volunteers, led by Ron Goldsmith, Merilyn Berenbom and the late John Uhlmann, made sure there was money to pay these costs. From 1990 to 1992, the special Operation Exodus fundraising campaign raised $5.2 million dollars. A portion of those funds went to help settle émigrés in other areas of the country and Israel. But most of it stayed in Kansas City.

Berenbom said Uhlmann deserves credit for the campaign’s success.

“He’s the one who decided this had to be a communitywide effort,” she said.

In addition, Berenbom said, Uhlmann and Bob Gast, then the Federation’s executive director, also brought a Jewish focus to the campaign, saying it was about the living covenant that’s been the Jewish story for thousands of years.

“It’s more than an agreement. It’s more than community. It’s more than family. It’s more than shared history, and it’s more than shared faith. It really means our shared future,” Berenbom said.

Kansas City’s young Jewish leaders learned about the problems of Soviet Jews at a national leadership conference. The attendees were so moved by the presentation they wanted to find ways to help.

To prove they were serious, Berenbom said, 40 young Jews met at a parlor meeting and pledged $64,000 to the cause.

“We really stretched because this is something we saw that they couldn’t do in the 1940s,” Berenbom said.

The resulting fundraising campaign evolved into a “huge community effort.”

“There were people who came from all parts of the community that wanted to be part of this,” Berenbom said. “The rabbis spoke about it from their pulpits. Many of the congregations’ social-justice committees set up apartments for Russian Jews who were coming here. People were invested in all sorts of ways; way beyond financial.”

Lifelong commitment
Berenbom is amazed at what Jewish Kansas Citians have done over the years to support resettlement. For many, it was near and dear to their hearts long before the actual exodus from the Soviet Union began. Cindy Singer remembers signing her first petition to “let my people go” in the early 1980s.

Singer co-chaired Kehilath Israel Synagogue’s resettlement committee along with Mindy Wajcman. Their group set up about 20 apartments during the early ’90s. If the community storage facility in the basement of the Jewish Community Campus didn’t have what they needed to furnish an apartment, Singer said they simply made announcements at shul.

“Someone always came forward with a TV or a kitchen table or whatever we needed. The community was really supportive,” Singer said. “Our local Jewish doctors and dentists were wonderful about helping out, too.”

One of Singer’s favorite memories of that time was a sukkah hop where her family’s sukkah was featured.

“As an older man shook the lulav, he teared up and said that he hadn’t shaken a lulav for over 50 years,” Singer remembered.

Singer also recalled that even though most émigrés came with only one suitcase per person, every single family gave her a gift from home.

“I have a collection of painted spoons, matryoshka dolls, scarves and perfume. Each item has a special spot in my home,” Singer said.

Michael Crane, who was a commercial photographer at the time, was so captivated by the resettlement process that he spent six months chronicling the lives of émigrés in greater Kansas City in 1990.

Crane first learned about resettlement through his wife, June, who was teaching at the Jewish Community Center’s summer camp. One of her campers was a 3-year-old Russian girl who didn’t speak a word of English.

“I thought it was amazing how these children adapted so quickly. But then I wondered just how terrifying this process was for the adults,” Crane said.

As he documented the process, Crane and his family met immigrant families at the airport and helped them set up apartments.

Lifelong friendships have been made during this process. Singer said she has attended Bar/Bat Mitzvahs, weddings and funerals for such friends. She is proud of what the community has accomplished.

“I truly believe that Kansas City facilitated one of the most comprehensive and successful resettlement and acculturation programs in the country,” Singer said. “Most émigrés now consider themselves Jewish Americans; a far cry from their fear of Judaism when they first arrived.”

Success stories
JFS’s Breitberg has worked for JFS for 18 years, first as a volunteer, and then becoming a resettlement case manager in 1992. Hers is just one of many émigré success stories.

“We wanted our kids to succeed,” she said. “We wanted them to have the opportunities we didn’t have because of anti-Semitism and depravation of human rights.”

Breitberg said many of the more ambitious middle-aged émigrés went back to school once they arrived in the United States, and that there are now a number of Russian-speaking doctors, engineers and IT workers in this area.

The current economic recession has hit the Russian-émigré community hard, she said.

“They are the most vulnerable population,” she said. “In many cases their English is not great, and, all of a sudden, when things weren’t going well, they were told ‘We can’t communicate well with you, so we will let you go.’ ”

Breitberg said those émigrés who are older than 55 often still need help.

“We’re still here to assist them,” she said of JFS.

As for becoming members of the Jewish community, Breitberg said the younger generation is definitely catching on. She said they are having baby namings and often seek a Jewish education for their young children. And they are trying to give back to the community.

“Many of the younger generation attended the Jewish Community Center, the Hyman Brand Hebrew Academy and went to Israel,” Breitberg said. “They have a pretty strong feeling about wanting to pay it back.”

JCC’s cycling instructor sets pace for giving

Some fundraising efforts include consultants, timelines, banquets and performances, while others are more grassroots, seat-of-the-pants type of affairs.

Count the recent $30,000 campaign to buy a set of new, indoor-cycling machines for the Jewish Community Center of Greater Kansas City in the latter category.

When longtime Group Exercise Instructor and Personal Trainer Tisha Polsinelli had to lead certain classes while standing on the floor because of a shortage of the stationary bicycles, she knew something had to be done. But there was no money in the JCC budget for replacements.

At first, she thought of raising $7,000 to buy six new, top-of-the-line bikes. Then she raised her sights to $30,000 to replace all 27 older models with new, magnetic-drive (as opposed to chain-driven) Kaiser brand indoor bicycles. Polsinelli said JCC Executive Director Jacob Schreiber and board Vice President Ken Sigman encouraged her to “go for it,” and she ran with the ball. She raised $30,000 in 45 days and plans to unveil the new equipment at a thank-you event for donors Sunday, Sept. 19.

Polsinelli demonstrated her commitment to the cause by buying the first bike herself at a cost of $1,100.

“I figured if I had the bike there, they would get on it and ride, and then they would be sold,” Polsinelli explained. “We gave them a free sample.”
In the end, 76 people donated to the cause, including early-morning cycling class member and attorney Sheldon Singer.

“I gave because the new bikes were not an actual necessity, but a benefit for those of us who enjoy (it),” Singer said via e-mail. “It appears that most non-profit organizations are in need of additional member support, including funding for special projects such as this one.”

Singer said Polsinelli’s charisma was a key.

“The success of the project is due almost entirely to Tisha’s effort, enthusiasm and vision,” Singer said. “Tisha genuinely cares about the well-being of the Center’s members and makes exercise a fun experience. She always goes the extra mile for her personal-training clients and other members who participate in her many classes.”

Artist’s colorful career in enamel on display

LAWRENCE, Kan. — While Herb Friedson has never made his entire living as an enamellist, it has always been his first love, artistically speaking. The evidence of that is all over the gallery walls of the Lawrence Art Center, as the show “Herbert Friedson, Six Decades of Enameling: A Retrospective” opened last Friday, Aug. 13, and continues through Sept. 4. (See below for details)

Friedson’s work can also been seen on the walls and the Torah ark of the Lawrence Jewish Community, where he was a founding member after arriving in town in the mid-1960s. The burning-bush mosaic on the doors of the ark doubled as Friedson’s master’s degree thesis at the University of Kansas.

Since he was a teenager in Cleveland, which is one of the United States’ centers for enameling, Friedson has loved creating works of art by using bits of colored, ground-up glass as pigments and then firing the resulting metal piece in a kiln, or high-temperature oven. He even kept a kiln in his New York apartment while he lived and worked there as a consultant to the textile industry in the early ’60s, he said.

After he completed his studies at KU, Friedson was offered a post as assistant professor, teaching silversmithing, design and jewelry making. He was a faculty member for seven years, but resigned in 1974 when he didn’t get tenure, and started a second career as the owner of a downtown clothing store, Harris Menswear.

However, Friedson continued to work in enamel and to show his works all the while, piling up a lengthy resume and many of the works now on display at the Arts Center. In addition to the LJCC, he has created commissioned Judaica for New York’s West End Synagogue, among other houses of worship.

A couple of years ago, Friedson began teaching classes in enameling at the Lawrence Art Center, which is where he met Ben Ahlvers, who is now the gallery director.

“I’ve had many conversations with Herb over the years about being an artist, the enameling process and teaching,” Ahlvers said. “He is an inspiration and great resource for someone like myself.”

While most people are familiar with the look of enamel from costume jewelry and the like, “It’s very esoteric,” Friedson admitted. “Most people don’t know what it is. They know pottery and sculpture and glass, but not enamel.”

And while he is limited by the size of his kiln, Friedson said, he prefers to work in the largest format possible these days.

“I don’t do any small pieces anymore,” he said. “I can express myself better in the bigger pieces.

“There are two basic approaches to enameling, and they are jewelry and painting. I take a more painterly approach than jewelry.”

Seeing the show

“Herbert Friedson, Six Decades of Enameling: A Retrospective” continues through Saturday, Sept. 4, at the Lawrence Arts Center, 940 New Hampshire St., Lawrence, Kan. Friedson will give a gallery talk at 7 p.m. Monday, Aug. 30. The center is open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday, and admission is free. For more information, visit www.lawrenceartscenter.org or call (785) 843-2787.

Community Archives wants your stuff

With its founding leaders, Sybil and Norman Kahn, having taken on a less active role in the past year or two, and with the advent of its first executive director, Judy Parelman, the Jewish Community Archives of Greater Kansas City is making a renewed push to save local history.

“We’d like to encourage people not to throw away their stuff as they downsize their homes,” said archives board member Betty Barnett.

Charitable foundation executives speak of an unprecedented wave of monetary wealth being handed down today from Americans who created and shared in the 20^th century’s prosperity to their survivors. Those same people have a treasure trove of historical artifacts that are in danger of being lost, if not for efforts like the archives, said David Boutros, who runs the Western Historical Manuscript Collection, of which the Jewish Community Archives is a subset.

“A lot of people don’t think of their own life or their family’s lives as having significance,” Boutros said. “They ask me ‘Why would you be interested in my stuff?’ The point is that they represent a lot of other people whose activities were not recorded and preserved. For instance, I have a 12-year-old’s diary, written in the 1920s. Her name doesn’t matter because she represents other girls from that period, and so we have insight into their experiences through that document.”

‘You don’t know what you’ve got’

Diaries, correspondence, business records, the records of Jewish organizations, related photographs and ephemera — all are potential fodder for the Jewish Community Archives.

“Sometimes,” Boutros said, “with organizational records, the only way that they have been found are in the personal files of someone who was an active member and who came to possess them after the organization disbanded.”

“You don’t know what you’ve got,” said Parelman, who told of recently uncovering a box of her late husband’s wartime photos in the basement of her home. “It’s like the wallpaper — you overlook it.”

Parelman worked as an educator for 40 years, the last 10 at a local charter school. She said she is pleased to take on the leadership of the Jewish Community Archives. “I finally found a group I wanted to be involved with because we are doing something really important that will be needed years from now,” she said.

The flipside to the archives’ collecting mission, Parelman said, is the use of that material for education, and she hopes to ramp up those efforts during her tenure by collaborating with other institutions and presenters.

“We are going to tell people’s stories,” she said. “It’s fascinating.”

Donate originals

The Jewish Community Archives exists as a discrete collection within the Western Historical Manuscript Collection, which is a joint effort of the University of Missouri system and the State Historical Society of Missouri. Boutros’ office is on the University of Missouri-Kansas City campus, but donated materials might wind up in one of four storage areas around the state, he said. Donations can always be recalled for study.

That means the material will be protected from deterioration brought on by the elements in the garage or basement, and, perhaps more importantly, from any potential dispute over ownership, Boutros said.

Parelman urged potential donors of material to make and keep digital copies for their own use and to then donate the original photos and documents to the archives.

“That way the originals stay safe, and the kids would probably rather have a digital copy, anyway,” she quipped.

For information, or to make a donation to the Jewish Community Archives, call Parelman, (913) 484-8186.

Saving Jewish history

By Betty Lyon Barnett, Special to The Chronicle

In 1900, my grandmother, Anna Lyon, wrote about her life in her diary. In 1950, I wrote about mine, and just this year my granddaughter wrote about hers. All of us unknowingly recorded history. Had human beings not documented their lives with pictures and words, there would be no record of what went before.

Though their purposes may vary, petroglyphs, or rock engravings, tell stories of their times. Museums are full of items that people saved to document their lives. Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto stored their memorabilia in milk bottles and buried them in the ground so that one day historians could reconstruct the past. We, too, have an obligation to preserve our histories.

The first Jew to take up residence in Kansas City was 23-year-old Henry Ganz in 1856, followed soon enough by a young fellow named Louis Hammerslough. What brought these men to the town of Kansas? From whence did they come? We now know these things through the preservation of writings and records.

Take, for example, Eddie Jacobson. After he and his friend’s haberdashery business failed, Eddie struggled to support his family, even moving in for a time with his in-laws. Even though his friend went on to become the president of the United States, without letters and records, no one would now the huge influence plain-spoken Eddie Jacobson had on the development of the state of Israel.

You may think of yourself as unimportant, but the truth is you have great value. You represent an era, a class of people whose history will only survive through the pictures, letters and documents you have put away in drawers and scrapbooks. It is vital information to know where you or your ancestors came from, how you lived and what you did. Your name may not grace a building, but your footprint will remain forever. If you wish to be remembered, you must leave a record of your time on earth.

The Jewish Community Archives, begun in 2002 by civil leader Sybil Kahn, has made it their mission to preserve the history of the Jews in Kansas City for future generations, with the goal of collecting materials and educating the public.

At the Jewish Community Campus, JCA has installed a permanent display case that traces the history of Jews in Kansas City over the past 80 years. B’nai B’rith Women have loaned their “Dolls for Democracy” collection.

Here is what you can do to help. Take the pictures and documents you want to save to FedEx Kinko’s and make copies, or scan them into your computer. Give copies to your family and give the originals to the JCA. We will see to it that they are preserved forever. If you or anyone else wishes to refer to the donated items again, they can be retrieved for viewing within 48 hours.

For more information, check our website, www.umkc.edu/whmckc/JCA/JCA.htm, or call Executive Director Judy Parelman, (913) 484-8186.

Remember: history is written from documents that survive.

Betty Lyon Barnett is a board member of the Jewish Community Archives.