The Mentsch Who Loved Dundalk
“Growing up in a Christian neighborhood gave me a [bigger] outlook on the richness of life,” said Ben. “My Dundalk was old Dundalk,” modeled on the “garden city” philosophy of Frederick Law Olmsted Jr.
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Author: Rafael Alvarez
Christmas Trees and Twists of Challah
In his 50 years at his family’s East Baltimore bakery, the good-natured Irv made scores of holiday cakes for goyim upon which edible Christmas trees were fashioned from upside-down ice cream cones.
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My First Rabbi
At St. William of York grade school just off of Route 40 West near his childhood home, Scheye said he was the first and only Jew his classmates had ever met. “I was not subject to prejudice against a group because there was no group. Just me.”
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Ralphie’s Summer Vacation: Shabbos in Memphis, Part 2
Dinner conversation included tales of doing the twist on a nightclub stage during Air Force Reserve maneuvers in Biloxi; the Nazi’s 1935 “perfect Aryan baby” photo contest won by a Jewish tot and how the Fragers once met a Baltimore couple in Mexico.
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A Talmudic Wrinkle in Time
It is not so much the beginning of a new calendar but an anniversary — of the very first moments of you and me and everything that came before us — Jew, gentile, beasts of burden, birds of the sky and fish in the seas.
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Wandering writer Rafael Alvarez with the King, Walgreens, downtown Memphis. (Photo by Macon Street Books)
Ralphie’s Summer Vacation: Shabbos in Memphis!
Sadly, I left the diner before realizing that Elvis – a teenage Shabbos goy when the Presleys lived downstairs from Rabbi Alfred Fruchter at 462 Alabama Avenue – had a favorite pre-coronation booth at the Arcade.
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You Are What You Read
What are the Jews of Baltimore reading during the dog days of August?
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At The Corner of Pulaski and Eagle
“Little Jerusalem” included two synagogues and a Hebrew school and was roughly bounded by Ashton, Eagle, Monroe and Smallwood streets.
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Keeper of a Forgotten Community
This is a Greek story. And a Jewish story. And a Baltimore story. Let’s start with the Baltimore angle since, more often than not, the Charm City lens provides the most humorous view.
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Rabbi Meyer Zywica and Frances Friedlander (daughter of Rabbi Louis B. Friedlander of Baltimore) on their wedding day, 1950. (Photo courtesy Jewish Museum of Maryland)
JMM Exhibit Celebrates Maryland Wedding Stories
Just Married! Wedding Stories from Maryland at the Jewish Museum of Maryland includes wedding gowns and garments; invitations, artifacts and accessories; wedding cake toppers and party favors; secular marriage licenses and ketubot; a groom’s “best suit” worn at his 1931 nuptials; and an empty cigar box from a 1904 reception.
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