The Charlotte Jewish News - November 2013 - Page 23
Memorial Building Is in Sight, But the Community’s Help Is Needed
By Brian Yesowitch, Hebrew
Cemetery Association Board
President
As the autumn approaches in
Charlotte, the outdoor swimming
pools close, children settle into
their school routines, and the
leaves change their colors.
Nowhere is nature’s beauty more
evident than on the beautiful
grounds that make up our Hebrew
Cemetery. Founded in 1867, the
Cemetery’s landscaping has ma
ture trees planted by generations
of Charlotte’s Jewish citizens so
that today we may enjoy their
beauty in every season.
We are all familiar with the Tal
mudic story about the old man and
the carob tree. An old man was
planting a tree. A young person
passed by and asked, “What are
you planting?” “A carob tree,” the
old man replied. “Silly fool,” said
the youth. “Don’t you know that it
takes 70 years for a carob tree to
bear fruit?” “That’s okay,” said
the old man. “Just as others
planted for me, I plant for future
generations.”
In the same spirit, I am asking
you now to consider participating
in our Hebrew Cemetery Capital
Campaign by pledging $200 a
year for five years. To contribute
to the care of our cemetery is a
great mitzvah. Your participation
is a wonderful thing to do for your
community today and for the gen
erations of Jewish Charlotteans to
come. You do not have to be a
cemetery member to participate in
the campaign. Furthermore, every
individual or family that pledges
$1,000 (payable over five years)
The nearly-completed cemetery memorial building.
to our Hebrew Cemetery Capital
Campaign may place the name of
a loved one or family, and be rec
ognized as the donor, on the ceme
tery’s Memorial Wall. This wall is
located prominently in the Mindy
Ellen Levine Chapel.
As evidenced by the tremen
dous attendance at our recent An
nual Memorial Service and by the
many personal conversations I
have had with community mem
bers, I know that the community
shares great excitement about the
completion of the Hebrew Ceme
tery Memorial Building. The Me
morial Building will provide
tangible benefits for our Charlotte
Jewish community.
Not only will we have air-con
ditioned and heated space for fam
ilies to hold funerals and
unveilings, but also the restrooms
and private family space in the
Berlin Family Room will improve
the funeral experience for families
in their time of grief. The Gore lick
Gathering Room will create space
for volunteer and community
groups to visit and learn more
about our cemetery and to partici
pate in grief counseling work
shops. Our Expansion Plan will
double the number of plots, and
provides for extensive landscap
ing improvements, including the
Silverman Fountain and the Blu-
menthal Garden.
Many of you already know the
centerpiece of our Chapel is the
Holy Ark that stood for many
years in Temple Beth El. During
our Annual Memorial Service, the
300 service attendees had an op
portunity to view the Holy Ark in
its new home. Comments that day
ranged from “breathtaking” to
“perfect.”
We in the community are
keenly aware of the gift Jewish
Charlotte families left for us in
1867. Although there were only
about a dozen families, they pur
chased enough land to accommo
date funerals for Jewish
Charlotteans for more than 150
years. In 2013, we have the oppor
tunity to add twice the number of
burial plots and to build a multi
purpose facility on Cemetery
property that will serve many re
ligious, cultural, and educational
functions for the next 150 years.
As a Jewish community, we are
called to honor the past, celebrate
the present and embrace the fu
ture. The Hebrew Cemetery needs
your help to complete the build
ing, the landscaping and the over
all expansion. WTiatever your
reason for pride in our Cemetery’s
expansion, I hope you will partic
ipate in our current capital cam
paign to completely fund the
completion of these projects. Gifts
of $1,000 or more, payable over
five years, will allow those donors
to have named plaques on our Me
morial Wall, but gifts of any
amount are welcome.
I hope you will join the over
one hundred individuals and foun
dations that have given to our
campaign. To those of you who
have given, our community and
our Cemetery Association Board
is most grateful. For those of you
who have not yet had the opportu
nity to contribute, I encourage you
to contact Sandra Goldman at
704-576-1859 or director@he-
brewcemetery.org. I, too, wel
come your comments and
questions. You may email me at
byshalomch@gmail.com. ^
NC Holocaust Commission Luncheon Honors
Survivors and Liberators
By Lori Katzenstein
At first look it seems like a
family reunion, a group of people
bound by a past, happy to be to
gether. Then the mood changes, as
each individual relives a piece of
his or her youth pain washes over
their faces. Here among friends
they dare to step back in time and
share their journeys to survival.
Many of these elderly are the chil
dren of the Holocaust.
“It seems the less time you
have the more you talk.” Suly
Chenkin was six months old when
she was separated from her fam
ily. Today she shared the experi
ences of her childhood in
Lithuania during a brunch spon
sored by the North Carolina
Council on the Holocaust at the
Jewish Community Center in
Charlotte. Chenkin was miracu
lously reunited with her family at
age 6.
Manfred Katz was not as fortu
nate. Liberated at age 17 from the
Kaiserwald concentration camp,
Katz learned that his parents and
younger sister did not survive.
Katz only opened up about his ex
perience after his children were
grown, “They needed to know
and that’s why I started talking.”
Now at 85, Katz speaks to stu
dents and teachers around the
State promoting tolerance and ac
ceptance. Also woven into the
group were WWII soldiers. Jesse
Oxendine was 18 when he liber
ated a camp near Berlin. “I could
n’t conceive of it if I had not seen
it.” Oxendine, now 87, says he
thinks about the horrors of that
camp everyday.
Charlotteans Mitch Rifkin and
Judi Strause volunteer with the
Holocaust Council. They bring
survivors together for various
events like this brunch.
Their goal is to honor those
who survived and allow them to
share their experiences so the mil
lions who did not survive the
Holocaust will never be forgotten.
Rifkin says he is always humbled
and thankful for the testimonies
presented by survivors and liber
ators. “Being around them, listen
ing to them share their
experiences, it makes me always
strive to be a better person.” ^
L
Hebrew Cemetery
ot Create I CnarioKe
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Photos from
luncheon taken
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♦
m\
TEMPLE
BETH EL
Open Mon-Fri
10-3
Fri night before/
after services
Sunday 10-1
during
religious school
We have a huge selection of holiday and gift giving
First night -Erev Thanksgiving!
SPIN THE DRtlDHJ ■^7