November at the JMM

A blog post by education director Deborah Cardin.

I just finished compiling stats for November 2010 at the JMM. Every month, I tally our on-site attendance with separate categories dedicated to walk-in visitors, adult group members, schools, special events, and rentals. I am now in my 9th year as “keeper of the stats” and it is interesting to compare and contrast the ebb and flow of visitation over the years as we try and track trends and determine the various factors (weather, season, new exhibitions, popular programs, etc.) that seem to encourage higher numbers of visitors. School groups, in particular, are a special area of interest. As we work to promote our programs and resources to even larger numbers of school groups, I always pay particular attention to our monthly totals in an effort to discern how we can continue to grow our program.

November was a banner month for school groups. During the month, we served 834 students, teachers, and chaperones (as compared to just over 400 last November). One of the most influential factors driving school group visitation during the month was our installation of the exhibition, A Blessing To One Another: Pope John Paul II and the Jewish People. While many groups booked visits to see this exhibition – and we also saw the number of walk-in visitors rise – Catholic schools, in particular, demonstrated a high level of interest in bringing groups to see the exhibition. During November alone, we served 606 students, teachers, and chaperones from Catholic schools and universities.

One of the challenges in serving such large number of student groups is the limited space within the gallery housing A Blessing To One Another. As many of our docents have pointed out, ideal group sizes for a guided exhibition tour is 15 or fewer and yet, the average size group of students is larger than 50. It, therefore, becomes necessary to break the classes into smaller groups and rotate each group through various stations. This also necessitates bringing on additional volunteer docents and staff to help facilitate.

On November 16, 75 students from The Catholic High School, an all-girls school in Baltimore City, visited for a half-day trip. The large number of students necessitated some creative thinking as to how we could break them into smaller groups and facilitate meaningful activities with each group. We decided to split them into four groups. Two groups were combined for an Introduction to Judaism program in the Lloyd Street Synagogue (which can accommodate larger numbers of students) where students learned about Jewish history, traditions, and customs. This station proved to be a terrific complement to the Blessing To One Another exhibition where students could ask questions and probe the significance of Jewish ritual items.

Catholic HS girls participating in an Introduction to
Judaism program led by JMM docent Lois Fekete.

The other two groups were split between A Blessing To One Another and The Synagogue Speaks! exhibition that explores the histories of the three different congregational groups (including a Lithuanian Catholic church) that occupied the Lloyd Street Synagogue at different times in history. The Synagogue Speaks! station included hands-on interactive activities that encouraged students to work together in teams and to solve mysteries of how the building changed over time.

Catholic HS students creating watercolors in The Synagogue Speaks!

The program culminated with a presentation by Holocaust survivor Rachel Bodner who shared her personal experiences of life before, during, and after the Holocaust.

Catholic HS students listening to Holocaust survivor, Rachel Bodner

Through these various activities and presentations, students received an intensive learning experience that touched on many aspects of their classroom lessons. One of the teachers from The Catholic High School shared his feedback about the field trip with JMM staff: “Thank you so much for helping to plan our experience at the museum. My students had an amazing experience and are still talking about it today. I cannot express how grateful I am for the museum, you, your staff, the volunteers, and the wonderful programs that you have available. The other faculty members and myself were discussing how we can incorporate the museum into our curriculum to make it a yearly event.”

The next day, we received a visit by a joint group of students visiting from St. Frances Academy and Shoshana S. Cardin High School. This interfaith gathering of students of Jewish and Catholic faiths was inspired by the Blessing To One Another exhibition. Students were split into small mixed groups and toured the exhibition with the assistance of worksheets looking for examples of how Pope John Paul II worked towards building positive relationships between Jews and Catholics throughout his life. As I walked through the exhibit asking students if they needed assistance finding answers to worksheet questions, I kept hearing from students that they were equally interested in getting to know their peers from the other school and they were conversing about mutual interest in sports, music, etc. I took this as a sign that the program was successful!

Again, we received positive feedback about the field trip from both teachers and students. “I just wanted to thank you for the experience yesterday. It proved to be a wonderful example of Judeo-Christian camaraderie and dialogue. I thought it went great, and my students were genuinely interested throughout the visit. I could not even get anyone to admit to liking one part of the day over the other, they said again and again, that it was great from beginning to end.”

While we are always pleased to serve high numbers of students and teachers, we are even more concerned with the quality of the programs. Feedback that we receive through teacher and student surveys (such as the comments shared above) provides guidance as we plan new programs and activities. We are grateful to all of the JMM staff and volunteer docents who provided such superior service for school groups this month and look forward to developing new tours, resources, and activities in the months ahead.

While it was an exhausting month, comments from students such as this St. Frances Academy student, truly make it all worthwhile!

Barry’s Blog

A blog by Dr. Barry Lever. Click the links below for earlier entries in this series.

Post One
Post Two
Post Three

The last blog recounted our research at the Edward C. Papenfuse Maryland State Archives in Annapolis, Maryland. It was there, in the microfilm records of the Baltimore County Court’s marriage licenses that we first encountered the name of the “Minister- Ansell,” who two days subsequent to the issue of the marriage license officiated at the wedding that the Golombek Ketubah documents.

We also pointed out that the July 14, 1845 license No. 273 was granted to Wolf Solden and Teressa Habal. This revealed the bride’s English name and clarified the groom’s last name to begin with the letter “S,” rather than a “G”
as initially interpreted on the Golombek Ketubah.

Another very important issue however is raised by these few entries. The spelling of the groom’s name Solden on the marriage license differs from the last name he personally inscribed on his own ketubah. The Golombek Ketubah records the spelling of the groom’s name as Soldin, spelled with the letter “i” rather than with the letter, “e.”

This is a graphic example of how an individual’s name could move from its original spelling in the person’s native language to a different anglicized spelling, and even to a complete name change. Because of these spelling and translation anomalies it is often difficult to ascertain whether or not a researcher is tracking the same individual in the historical records.

The marriage license entry for the name of the Minister,”Ansell,” opened an opportunity to explore and clarify the role, if any, that this individual played within the hierarchy of the historic Lloyd Street Synagogue.

In a 1905, on the occasion of the Baltimore Hebrew Congregation 75th Anniversary, Rabbi Adolf Gutmacher wrote the History of the Baltimore Hebrew Congregation: Madison Avenue Temple.Author Rev. Dr. Adolf Guttmacher
Title page
The Madison Avenue Temple

According to this Baltimore Hebrew Congregational record the congregation occupied four locations prior to the dedication, on September 26, 1845, of its new building now known as “The Lloyd Street Synagogue.”

Lloyd Street Synagogue, c. 1864, 1997.71.1
Photo by D.R. Stiltz & Co. photographers.
Courtesy of the Ross J. Kelbaugh Collection.

Lloyd Street Synagogue today.

Participating in these dedicatory events was Rabbi Isaac Leeser of Philadelphia.

Rabbi Isaac Leeser

At the time, Leeser was a prominent rabbi who also served as editor of the Occident, one of the first Jewish journals published in the United States.

In the November 1845 issue of the Occident, Leeser describes in great detail those dedicatory events under the title of “Consecration of a Synagogue at Baltimore.”

Click the excerpt to read the full article.

From this we learn that the marriage license Minister, Ansell,” functions as Baltimore Hebrew Congregation’s Hazon or Cantor. This is also confirmed on page 33 of Rabbi Guttmacher’s book, History of the Baltimore Hebrew Congregation, where we also learn that Cantor Ansell first name began with the initial “A.”


Our next blog will continue the exploration of the lives and times as revealed through the Golombek Ketubah.

I want to thank my colleague, Deb Weiner, JMM Research Historian and Family History Coordinator, for bringing the website for the Occident to my attention.

The Synagogue Speaks!

A blogpost by associate director Anita Kassof.

Memoirs, scholarly journals, monographs. That’s probably what comes to mind when you think of Jewish Museum of Maryland publications. But think again. For the first time ever, we’re at work on an illustrated children’s book. Based on the popular exhibition of the same name, The Synagogue Speaks tells the story of the historic Lloyd Street Synagogue and the different people who worshipped there.

We are very fortunate to be working with illustrator Jonathon Scott Fuqua, whose intricate (and historically accurate) watercolors bring the story to life. This beautiful picture book will enchant both kids and adults. Here’s how the story opens:

Long before your grandparents’ grandparents were babies, before they walked or talked or tied their own shoes, I was built with shovel and pail, hammer and nail, brick and stone.

Long before skyscrapers were built or cars were invented, back when people traveled by horse and carriage, I rose from the ground.

I was a synagogue, new and proud.

And here are a few more of Scott’s wonderful watercolors:

Intrigued? The book will be published in early 2011, and will be available online and in the Museum Shop.

Excavations Begin!

As our loyal readers know we've had a lot of erosion in the mikveh excavation in the Lloyd Street Synagogue this past year because of flooding. In order to prevent further deterioration of the features that we had uncovered ten years ago, we will be filling in the excavation. But before that happens archaeologists will do a little more digging to try and answer some of our remaining questions about the Lloyd Street Synagogue and the Baltimore Hebrew Congregation who first built it.

Work began today with a general clean-up of the site -- removing the layers of dirt left behind by previous flooding. Below are a few images of this first stage.

Keep reading for updates on the excavation over the next few weeks. Who knows what we might discover this time!

Lloyd Street Synagogue and LEGOs?

Is the historic Lloyd Street Synagogue (1845) related to LEGOs ^®? You decide!



Photo courtesy of board member Duke Zimmerman.

The Upstairs of Lloyd Street Synagogue has Re-Opened!

Lloyd Street Synagogue is once again open for tours at 1 and 2:30pm on Sundays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays - as well as for private groups Sunday - Friday starting at 9:30am. The downstairs of the synagogue will not reopen until the spring when our new exhibition, The Synagogue Speaks, opens.

B'nai Israel Synagogue and our two exhibition galleries, Voices of Lombard Street: A Century of Change in East Baltimore and Drawing on Tradition: The Book of Esther, are also available to view.

The JMM is once again full price, which is free for members, $8 for adults, $4 for students, and $3 for children ages 12 and under.

A Mystery Visitor in LSS

Yesterday, as I was giving a tour in Lloyd Street Synagogue to a group from Yeshivat Rambam, I was briefly interrupted by an uninvited guest - a bird had made its way into the synagogue! All the third graders started giggling as the bird flew across the women's balcony. When we later hosted a group from the National Foundation for Jewish Culture in the afternoon, the bird was back, pecking at the top of one of our two chandeliers. Was there a tasty bug hidden up there perhaps? Being late in the day, a new issue dawned on me... How were we going to alarm the building? Thanks to our collection manager Jobi's logical thinking, I tried calling animal control but unfortunately, didn't get very far. I was redirected to the USDA-APHIS-Wildlife Services for Maryland, but they were closed for the evening. So the building was locked up and left. This morning, I received a call back from Wildlife Services, only to learn that we'd have to contact a private company. Oy. People have been working in the building all day, so I'm hoping the bird flew back out. We've talked to the alarm company, who will alert us if the motion sensors go off tonight. So we'll see if our bird buddy is gone or made itself a roost!

Lloyd Street Synagogue Summer Renovation

The Lloyd Street Synagogue is currently undergoing major renovations to add air conditioning and a new fire suppressant system to the synagogue. Additionally, a new congregation history exhibition entitled The Synagogue Speaks will be added to the downstairs. Due to these improvements, the downstairs of the synagogue will be unavailable to visit starting Sunday, June 7th, and the entire synagogue will be unavailable starting Tuesday, June 23rd. B'nai Israel Synagogue and a video tour of the two synagogues will be still be available. The Museum will be half priced during the renovation ($4 per adult, $2 per student, and $1 per child at 12 and under). We apologize for any inconvenience.