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Growing up in the Bible Belt (Northern Georgia south of Chattanooga, Tennessee), Baptist bred Lauren Krajesky could never imagine where she would be today. “I have to pinch myself,” she says. “I really am in a dream job.” A decade after becoming an executive...
Darva Gruber and Sharon Grossman share something besides their long membership at Temple Israel. They both love crafting. So, when Gruber became aware that Visit Williamsburg, as part of the nation’s 250th Commemoration, intended to create The Great American Birthday...
A Shabbat was clearly the right time to dedicate the new ark at Aviva Pembroke, the senior housing community now open at Pembroke Square in Virginia Beach.Naval Officer and woodcrafter David Small was our Noah, creating the home for the same Torah that was in the...
I am not a card player, nor have I played one on TV. But when my son Danny Rubin, the founder of the young men’s Giving Circle (now part of the Campaign division of the United Jewish Federation of Tidewater), Nadiv, asked if I would be a dealer for their May 13 Texas...
Cantor Elihu Flax to serve as part-time chaplain • Saturday, May 17, 10 am With a number of its Jewish and even some non-Jewish residents looking on, Cantor Elihu Flax affixed a fully kosher Mezuzah on the front door of Aviva Pembroke senior housing, located at...
Jacob Herber arrives in Norfolk July 15 Cyclist, scholar, father, mentor, musician, soccer, hockey, and baseball fan, U.S. history buff, Coast Guard Chaplain…and rabbi.That pretty much describes Jacob Herber, who assumes the pulpit at Norfolk’s Congregation Beth El in...
“Stunning” was the most frequent word heard as Beth Sholom Village and its friends in the Jewish community celebrated the official opening of Aviva Pembroke with development partner Pembroke Square Associates inside the seven-story structure off Constitution Drive in...
At 92, Ellie Porter is sharp as a tack with a keen memory, particularly of events 52 years ago that defined her life as a local community activist. “I was on the board of National B’nai Brith Women and a volunteer with Jewish Family Service here in Tidewater,”...
Those of us who attend major civic events, Jews and some non-Jews alike, wait for it. When a minister delivers the invocation, it is often with some religious fervor and a beseeching to the Savior “in whose name we pray.” But at the Hampton Roads Chamber’s recent...
Call them a well “oyled” machine.I am speaking of the quartet of Carol Smith, DeAnne Lindsey, Gina Rose, and Marlene Rossen who (along with Patty Shelanski) lead the unofficial culinary committee of the Congregation Beth El Sisterhood that plans, purchases, cooks, and...
On Martin Luther King Day, Vergie McCall was in her element, not just singing a spiritual to residents of Maimonides Health Center (formerly Beth Sholom Village), where she is a longtime volunteer, but leading a program with three “other” Jews. Yes, the 76-year-old...
I don’t “belong” to Ohef Sholom Temple, but on Saturday, Jan. 27, I felt as if I did. My friend, Paul Terkeltaub, invited me to attend Ohef’s first “Family Shabbat Experience” and to bring my son, daughter-in-law, and their two sons (ages 8 and 5), promising a morning...