LITMIR.BIZ

      Photo courtesy of Michael Sumner

      Windsor’s first Jewish Zionists leave for Palestine in 1918.

      Influenced by the events of World War I and the resulting world situation, the Jews of Windsor continued to be inspired by the dream of regaining Palestine as a future home for World Jewry. Members of the local Hadassah group, which had likely been active since the beginning of World War I, not only held dances to collect funds for Jewish war relief but also knitted socks for the soldiers who had gone to Palestine.⁹⁹ The Zionist cause was further promoted by the Hebrew school students,¹⁰⁰ as well as by the members of the Young Judean Club, a group that, after choosing Mr. I. Rosenberg as its general organizer, elected Mrs. L. Rosa as its president, Miss Feldman as vice president, Miss I. Baum as secretary, and Mrs. May Cheifetz as treasurer.¹⁰¹

      Many other Windsor Jews actively participated in Zionist activities. In February 1921, Oscar Lehrman and Samuel Schwartz were delegates to the seventeenth Zionist convention in Montreal;¹⁰² in May of that year, Aaron Meretsky, Jacob Schwartz, and Barney Hurwitz represented the Windsor community at a special three-day Zionist Congress meeting in Toronto.¹⁰³ Three weeks later, Barney Hurwitz was made chairman of a committee that would raise $10,000 for Palestine; vice chairman was Samuel Schwartz, S. K. Baum, treasurer, (also a delegate to the 1922 Zionist convention in Ottawa and elected officer of the Canadian Zionist Organization), and H. Kolkol, secretary. Others belonging to the group were Max Cheifetz, Oscar Lehrman, H. Bercuson, Aaron Meretsky, H. Zeitlin, J. Mossman, A. Abrahamson, J. Loikrec, and J. A. Glanz.¹⁰⁴ He and I. B. Levin, representing the Western Ontario Division of the national and executive committees of the World Zionist Congress attended its Montreal convention in January 1926.

      During the 1920s, Windsor’s Jewish community heard many prominent speakers. They included Zionist world leader, Dr. D. Rubelsky, who, together with the noted Jewish writer and lecturer, Dr. Levin — considered one of the movement’s founders — asked that financial assistance be given to those engaged in the struggle for Palestine.¹⁰⁵ In May 1921, Dr. Chaim Weizmann, president of the World Zionist Congress, and Albert Einstein were scheduled to speak in Detroit.¹⁰⁶ Even though Einstein’s appearance was cancelled at the last minute, some two hundred people from Windsor turned out to attend the function.¹⁰⁷ Keren Hayesod started the United Jewish Appeal in March 1926. At its inaugural meeting, Border Cities’ Zionists were asked to raise $7,000 to meet the demands for the settlement of a flood of new immigrants.¹⁰⁸ Samuel K. Baum and I. B. Levin were put in charge of the campaign, assisted by J. Gelber, secretary; J. A. Glanz, treasurer; and Hadassah’s Frances Geller, the group ultimately collected $6,500.^109,110

      In October 1926, prominent members of Windsor’s Jewish community, anxious to improve their fundraising expertise, invited David A. Brown, chairman of the American United Jewish Appeal (UJA), to tell them about the national Palestine campaign he had organized in the United States eighteen months earlier. Following Brown’s talk, Jerry Glanz was elected chairman of the Windsor campaign, with Benjamin Brody serving as treasurer, and Jacob Geller as secretary.¹¹¹

      They were soon recognized as competent and dedicated fundraisers; J. A. Glanz became a national director of the Zionist movement in 1927, and on the local level, I. B. Levin was elected chairman, with Joseph Loikrec, treasurer, and Jacob Geller, secretary.¹¹² In the years to come, these local drives were even better organized. By 1929, for instance, after David A. Croll was named to lead one of these drives, he appointed various support committees. J. Kovinsky, Simon Meretsky, J. Gelber, D. Caplan, J. A. Glanz, Maurice Nathanson, and Nathan Cherniak were on the finance committee; Louis Kaplan became chairman of the pledge committee, assisted by Jacob Geller, Samuel Harris, Joseph Becker, Robert Cohen, Bernard Kaplan, I. M. Cherniak, and Sydney Nathanson; Rabbi Lebendiger, who headed the programs committee, was supported by Samuel Mossman and J. Gitlin. Also involved in that particular relief effort were Hadassah members Mrs. David Meretsky, Miss Frances Geller, and Mrs. Isaac Cohen.¹¹³ The activities of these and other Zionist organizations further increased during the 1930s: they met regularly and not only sponsored lectures by speakers who could outline the situation in Palestine, but also invited others who, in light of Adolf Hitler’s 1933 ascent to power, could keep them informed of the problems facing European Jewry.¹¹⁴

       The Talmud Torah

      While Shaarey Zedek had been the focal point of Windsor’s Jewish elite since the early years of the twentieth century, by 1916, Agudah B’nai Zion — primarily a Zionist organization — had begun to arouse interest among certain local intellectuals.¹¹⁵ Although Orthodox in their religious persuasion, these people were less insistent on continuing the shtetl ideology that had hitherto so forcefully controlled their lives, and more inclined toward the formation of a congregation with a decidedly Zionist orientation. Despite the fact that the Ford City congregation, Shaarey Zedek, and Tifereth Israel all had facilities for training their young, they readily supported Agudah B’nai Zion when it proposed to build a new school. In 1918, after sufficient funds had been raised at dances, concerts, and other social functions, a property was purchased at the corner of

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