MUSEUM at ELDRIDGE STREET Annual Report 2014
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MUSEUM AT ELDRIDGE STREET Annual Report 2014 “This ranks with the historical 19th-century synagogues of Europe and Israel and is well worth a visit. Visitors of any religion will find a beautiful and graceful spiritual space.” Thanks to reviews like this, the Museum was awarded a 2014 Certificate of Excellence from Trip Advisor “This ranks with the historical 19th-century Letter from the synagogues of Europe and Israel and is well worth a visit. Visitors of any religion will find a beautiful Chairman and and graceful spiritual space.” Thanks to reviews like this, the Museum was awarded Executive Director a 2014 Certificate of Excellence from Trip Advisor 2014 was a year of continued growth for the Museum at The core experience the Museum offers is our guided tour of Eldridge Street. In June we opened a beautiful, new visitor the Eldridge Street Synagogue. Today close to 80% of American center and permanent exhibition on the Museum’s entry level— Jews trace their ancestry to the community of Jews who the culmination of more than two years of fundraising, arrived in America between 1880 and 1924, part of a massive planning and design. Our new center has a profound impact wave of migration. And yet, as time passes, and the Lower East on how people experience our landmark site and learn about Side changes, very few sites remain that mark their journey. its history. Now they enter an elegant and inviting admission The Eldridge Street Synagogue is one of those places. Here area. Our visitors are particularly drawn to the Museum’s new the Jewish immigrant experience comes to life. We are proud permanent exhibition which uses artifacts, Yiddish signs, stewards of this landmark site, and recognize our responsibility Judaica, and digital displays to tell the story of the Eldridge to the public to keep a connection to that history and heritage Street Synagogue and the community of Jewish immigrants alive. In that regard, we want to single out the contributions of who settled on the Lower East Side. If you have not been to the Museum’s forty volunteer docents. They donate their time Eldridge Street since the opening of our visitor center, we to the museum, share their knowledge and passion, and are invite you to come by this year. our most gracious ambassadors to the public. If you visit the Museum, they will share the synagogue’s history with you, but Our educational and cultural programs continued to flourish. more than that, they will make you feel at home. In particular we want to share the growth of our adult learning classes which continue a 127-year tradition of Jewish learning Global events, sadly, have made us aware of the need for in our space. Today, if you visit the Museum during a weekday heightened security at our Jewish landmark. Please be assured morning and peek into our Gural-Rabinowitz Family History that in 2014 we introduced new measures to ensure the safety Center you will find a group of engaged learners in animated of our visitors and staff. conversation about Jewish texts and history. But we are home 2014 saw the passing of Mildred Caplow, who served on the not just to adult learners. In 2014, 7,500 school-age children Museum’s Board of Directors from 1995 to 2014. We also will visited the Museum to learn about Jewish holidays, immigrant miss the active involvement of Susan Malloy, who passed away history, and architecture and historic preservation. in early 2015. These two remarkable women played a leading Our Lost and Found Music series had its most successful year role in the restoration of the Eldridge Street Synagogue and yet. We presented a dazzling array of Jewish music ranging leave behind a poignant legacy. from Scottish klezmer to synagogue music of the Baroque We want to thank our colleagues on the Museum’s staff and period, from Sephardic music to Hasidic songs. We are board of directors. Their creativity, dedication and talent ensure particularly heartened that young musicians who are part of that our site will thrive for many years to come. Finally, we want a movement to revitalize nearly forgotten Jewish musical to thank you, our community of supporters. Your generosity traditions see our site as the place to perform. In 2014 four helps ensure the preservation and continued life of our CD release concerts featuring the music of innovative, young American Jewish landmark. You have made this a welcoming Jewish musicians took place here. We were also home to and dynamic space for all. special events like the screening of a deeply moving film by artist and filmmaker Mark Podwal on his recent Terezin Ghetto Museum exhibition. Michael Weinstein Bonnie Dimun Chairman Executive Director Anna Shneyderman Aaron/OTTO Peter photo: Cover 1 2014 Highlights 2014 Highlights photos: Anna Shneyderman photos: The Museum welcomed 40,000 visitors in 2014, a 9% increase over last year. Visitors came from throughout New York City, the nation and the world. The Museum received rave reviews from visitors: we were ranked in the top 25 of more than 644 attractions in New York City by Trip Advisor and received enthusiastic reviews on-line, in guidebooks, on social media and in our visitor surveys. Our new visitor center opened in June 2014, providing a welcoming, informative and more secure entry experience for visitors. Our visitor center’s beautiful new permanent exhibition features more than 50 artifacts and updated interactive displays that tell the story of the Eldridge Street Synagogue, its immigrant founders and our Lower East Side neighborhood. Our volunteer docents, designated one of the nation’s Preserve America Stewards by The White House, welcomed more than 13,000 visitors, and delivered more than 1,000 tours. The Museum’s competitive internship program received dozens of applications, and provided eight college and graduate students with the opportunity to lead tours, assist in our cultural and educational programs, and conduct archival research. Our public programs included concerts, talks, family events, and the popular Egg Rolls and Egg Cream Festival, and were attended by over 14,000 people. 7,500 school-age children—the highest annual total for the Museum in its history—visited in 2014 to learn about Jewish history, holidays and culture. Our gala honoring “Champions of the Spirit” Walt “Clyde” Frazier, Mariano Rivera, Ira Berkow and Art Shamsky raised more than $450,000 for the Museum. Kate Milford 3 Are you related? Check our on-line database of early congregants to see if your family may have prayed at the Eldridge Street Synagogue eldridgestreet.org/original-congregants/ Exhibitions & Tours photos: Kate Milford NEW ORIENTATION CENTER AND PERMANENT EXHIBITION On Thursday, June 12, the Museum at Eldridge Street’s board members, donors, docents, and other friends celebrated the opening of our new visitor center. The project completely transformed the building’s lower level with a new entrance lobby, admission area and permanent exhibition. Immediately facing the viewer upon entering the exhibition is a large-scale reproduction of the Eldridge Street Synagogue’s Anna Shneyderman original 1886 architectural rendering, a testament to the grand vision of the synagogue’s immigrant founders. A nearby NEW ARTIFACTS AND STORIES FOR OUR illustrated map shows the immigrant pathway from Eastern GURAL-RABINOWITZ FAMILY HISTORY CENTER Europe to the Lower East Side and also introduces some of the There is nothing more satisfying than discovering old pho- congregation’s founding members, including banker Sender tographs of the synagogue’s earliest congregants or hearing Jarmulowsky, kosher meat makers Isaac and Sarah Gellis, their stories from current day descendants. That’s why we are and mikvah operator Gittel Natelson. The bulk of the exhibit particularly pleased to have updated the exhibition in the features artifacts from the Museum’s collection, many on Museum’s Gural-Rabinowitz Family History Center to focus display for the first time. These include beautiful silver and on family stories as told through oral histories and artifacts— velvet Torah dressings as well as more practical objects like some newly donated to the Museum’s collection. In 2014, the congregation’s early constitution and a ceramic spittoon. for the first time we saw the faces of early synagogue leader Restoration artifacts help complete the story, along with David Cohen and mikvah operator Gittel Natelson in updated digital displays by Potion Design. photographs donated by their descendants. Special thanks to the following for objects donated for our new exhibits: Randy The Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) provided the initial Anderson, Sarah Andron, Joseph Bachner, Stanley Bergman, Scott Crawford, $150,000 grant for this project, which then allowed the Museum to raise Bonnie Dimun, New Era Factory Outlet, Sharon Stein and Ruth Warembud. matching funds. We are grateful to IMLS and to the following funders: 180 Varick Street Corporation, Susan and Jay Anderson, Bloomberg, The David Berg Foundation, Inc., Naomi Gat, The David Geffen Foundation, The Feil Organization, Hyde and Watson Foundation, Blanche and Irving The exhibition…is simultaneously dense Laurie Foundation, Inc., Lucius N. Littauer Foundation Inc., Lonnie and Thomas with artifacts and relatively small. Schwartz Foundation, Amy and Charles Spielman Family Foundation, Jane and Frances Stein Foundation, and two anonymous donations. That appealing combination means one can take in the history lesson quickly before proceeding upstairs to the glorious main sanctuary, or linger downstairs and pore over historical documents, architectural fragments, Yiddish signs, personal effects and thumbnail biographies of leading figures in the congregation.” —DAVID DUNLAP, The New York Times Kate Milford 5 Education & Family Sara Lowenburg Sara Kate Milford OUR DOCENTS AND INTERNS Every day we are open, our volunteer docents bring to life the history of the Eldridge Street Synagogue welcoming visitors from all over the world.