2 THE JEWISH LEADER, APRIL 21, 2017 and it appears the award is not given out ev- Secret tunnels helped Mention & Menschen ery year. The National Storytelling Network is Jews escape Vilna NADINE LIPMAN dedicated to advancing the art of storytell- By Curt Schleier, Forward [email protected] ing – as a performing art, a process of cul- - tural transformation, and more. Leaves Award is presented to those members theyHolocaust use the latest Escape ground Tunnel,” radar the techniques latest episode to re-discover in the PBS an sciim- of the storytelling community whoThe have Talking made enceportant series piece “Nova” of Jewish follows history a group in Vilna. of scholars and engineers as outstanding contributions to the literary body of storytelling as authors, editors or collectors. - Napoleon called Vilna (now officially ) the “- late Hazzan Samuel and Dora Manchester who ofist thewho North.” encouraged It was his home students to to study ben science.Solomon Jews Zalman, made bet up Peninnah, of course, is the daughter of the ter40% known of a city as thatthe Vilnaboasted Gaon, 100 the synagogues, Talmudic scholarsix newspapers and Kabbal and the largest Jewish library in the world. But then came the Nazis. residedin New London!in the Jewish Federation office before it - was the Federation office (at 28 Channing St.) sity of Hartford, led the group that went to Vilna. Three years ago,Dr. he Richard said in Freund,a telephone professor interview of Jewish with historyThe Forward at the Univerthat he was approached by Dr. Jon Seligman, a noted archeologist with the Antiquities Authority of , who wanted to discover if any Family Bat Mitzvah photo! Judy, Kirk, Robyn, remnants of the Great Synagogue of Vilna might be found. Max, and David Engel, and Elsie Fetterman An architectural masterpiece built almost 400 years ago, the traveled to Israel to celebrate the Bat Mitzvah synagogue was destroyed by the Nazis and, after the war, the So- of Eden Gold, daughter of Bethami (yes, she did viets built a school on the site. go to Beth El Nursery School with many of our Freund was a logical choice for this assignment. His team had children!) and Ben Gold, granddaughter of Vita already completed about 30 similar projects around the world and Richard Goldstein formerly of New Lon- — in Israel, Greece and Spain and elsewhere — using new non- don and great granddaughter of Elsie Fetter- invasive technology for subsurface mapping originally devel- man and the great niece of Judy and Kirk En- oped for the oil and gas industry. gel of East Lyme. She is also the big sister to In 2015, Freund raised enough cash to do a preliminary sur- Yemima and Asaf. Eden read the megillah as vey, which revealed that part of the synagogue remained at a includes the extended. VILNA CONT. ON PG 4 they celebrated Purim with everyone. Picture Peninnah Schram Candle Lighting for Eastern CT area I was excited to hear from Peninnah Sch- that she is the recipient of the 2017 Na- Friday, April 21 • 7:17 pm ram Friday, April 28 • 7:25 pm - Friday, May 5 • 7:32 pm tional Storytelling Network’s TALKING LEAVES Award!focusing This on the award Jewish acknowledges oral tradition. the publica Friday, May 12 • 7:40 pm tion of her books of Jewish folktales and essays Ahavath Achim 2nd Seder reallyI tried esteemed to find company,more online, including but I guess some we of aremy Rabbi Ken Alter Allison Collins Matt Bureau at amongfavorite the children’s first to authors/storytellers:know...!!! But she is joiningJoseph second Seder Ahavath Achim with 50 in atten- Bruchac, Jane Yolen (another MOT), Fred and dance. - Donald. Last year’s winner was Linda Goss, Remember to send in your subscription National Award Winner of the Council of Jewish of Jewish Federations as the Outstanding Small Cities Jewish newspaper. 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