The Man Who Changed My Life - Remembering Rabbi Meyer Fendel (Ep. 263)

hi this is D Orlowski and welcome to the rabbi Orlowski show and whether you're watching with our friends over at Tor anytime or wherever you watch or listen to your podcasts as always we are delighted to have you along for the experience and whatever platform you're watching on please don't forget to like share subscribe and comment it helps to push up the um I don't know exactly how it works in these things but it definitely gives it an opportunity for more people to be able to see the podcast and I have gotten tremendous response from people who hear about it and start watching it and has a certain addictive quality to it that's because of the subliminal messaging and the hypnotic uh things that we put into it so uh just you know I'm not even here this is AI That's slowly taking over the world and we have a sp ship for this episode sponsored by Y and aova Schell to uh two of my very very dear friends uh who are in my and I had this to actually give a Shear in their house when I was in America what is we have to be able to learn Torah together with you and so we cherish the opportunity equally valuable to us or perhaps even more so is that this podcast is one of the clear voices of genuine Torah ideology that you can always depend on to search for the EMS and the events around us and that extends itself regardless of any topic choice or content matter historical or current because we know it's coming from an authentic Torah perspective something which is surprisingly elusive in our modern perpetually media driven media driven world so we want to thank you so much for your inspiring impactful words of Torah but past and future we also D that you continue to be able to have the strength and ability for your voice to reach others and Inspire true Torah growth in all us Hashem wow that is so beautiful thank you so much unfortunately now we're out of time just kidding but uh thank you thank you very much and you know I know and I know that those are heartfelt very real uh words and it extremely meaningful and listen as my father used to say from your mouth to God's ears it should have the to be able to give us the to be able to reach more people I've said this many times that all of a sudden somebody will tell me I stumbled on this podcast I went back to the beginning and I watched the whole thing uh parenthetically um uh we I'll talk about this and in one of my other podcasts but I had somebody who put together highlights of season one and season two he just reached out to me and told me he's almost done with season 3 so uh maybe we'll put them all up together because uh when I watch the Highlight Reel even I am surprised of how incredibly good I am I just uh it just takes away from me so thank you so much everyone but uh if you have been one of these people who uh may have suddenly stumbled on uh onto this and then decided to go back to the beginning so remember there was one episode in season 1 uh that was the closest I've come to an actual rant I don't usually rant I usually try to express myself in as the schmell said a Torah true fashion that's going to be interesting and whatever I say is obviously you know coming from Torah source and in fact I met a rashash k Riva and he watches the podcast and he says yes yes I learned the correct way when you're making the lkas to squeeze out the liquid and yeah yeah he took notes so of course whatever we say it's coming from a Torah place but um there was one it's it's in the first season it's called it's a show not a shear and that was because I had gotten a reaction from a few people who said you know it's not nice to call it a show it's a it's a shear and uh I responded no it's not you know I don't usually give recipes inir sometimes I do you know and uh I don't uh usually bring on musical guests when I'm having a sheer you know or things like that but uh I I would like to believe that you know as the schmell said that this is um what we do is Torah true and although some sometimes we're funny I hope that we never fall into L sunus and though sometimes we may um move into uh more mundane topics you know I hope that uh it's there to enhance your vus Hashem and your yish kite you know I had gotten a few comments when I had my son schlomo on from schls meat if you want to reach out to him and get some wonderful Smoked Meats during K about the proper way to I run a barbecue and people say what what is this doing you know it's a show that's why and if I'm going to enhance the the uh experience for KI then it's meaningful but one of the things that sent me off and uh and got me upset was that now since I guess we're in our six year it must be six years already RAB mosha godman Z when SE it's the seventh year oh so it must be was yeah would have been seven years ago so Gman Z who was the assistant Dean and later the dean of uh the Hebrew Academy of Nassar County was nifter and um and uh he um uh and I spoke about him and someone said what do you why do I have to listen to this I don't know who this guy is why are you talking about this and that was one of the things that set me off this is this is my chance to say whatever I want if anyone wants to listen in I'm happy to have you along someone says to me so you know you just talk for an hour a week on this podcast and I said no I'm talking constantly it's just we film it for an hour a week but when you're not here I just keep talking with a camera without a camera I'm constantly talking I'm always going yeah but uh obviously if there's somebody who's deeply meaningful to me I'm going to speak about them you know I spoke about my good friend R ban Hammer who is nifter and like I say these things are important to me I mentioned that because Raa fendel who was the founder and the first dean of the Hebrew Academy of Nassar County was just nifter um I was supposed to speak at at the laeva but there was some sort of a mixup I don't know exactly what and uh I didn't have that opportunity but I consol Myself by saying I could have uh missed out on the opportunity to speak uh to the hundreds of people who were at Laya if not thousands but um but I consoled Myself by saying I'll have an opportunity to my audience of tens of thousands to speak about Ry fendel now uh when his son hillo was speaking um he said he had lost his mother now he lost his father he says now I'm I'm yam I'm an orphan and therefore you know there's hillo and there's David and uh and there's razy and there's Mindy and all of them are tremendously accomplished people and they all spoke but it made an impression on me and I'll tell you why in a second and then he spoke about the many people who were affected by what his father did and and by building the Hebrew C Nasa County whatever but I wanted to share my own story that's what I would have liked to have said and I wanted to say that although there are four there are thousands and tens of thousands of Yim who lost a father and a grandfather when re fendel was nifter I um did I was a scholar Residence at uh PES hotel for a few years and they decided to make a uh a program on shabas naku and um they brought me in and uh I was I was proud of the fact that they said you know um usually bring in a scholar of residence like you bring in someone to do uh aerobics or Zumba or something you know it's like you know but you actually attract people to come to the event and that's why I have a Chuka you know I would love I mentioned this many times I'd love to do pesak and show but I wouldn't mind doing a nice shabbaton in uh in America with a few of my famous speaker friends and uh you know maybe maybe we'll do that at some point but I thought that would be a a nice thing to do to get together with a a lot of us who all share the the same sort of values and get together in a nice hotel and have good food good sh and uh and have a good time anyway but um but I was doing this and I noticed that Rabbi stavsky was there and except for his family no one knew who he was and uh and I first time I I spoke I I said I want to acknowledge the presence of Rabbi stavsky who is we have Theus of having him this shabas America was a wasteland that's far his Torah went Rabbi wine tells the story when he came to when know he was in America he wanted to get aise and he went into judaic book shop and the guy laughed at him he said there'll never be a printed in America he says when the first one and I found the first one that was printed probably got it at Z bman you know he says I I sent him a copy but he it made sense I remember in the 1970s there was a book written by a conservative Rabbi called four paths to one God what were the four paths Orthodox conservative reform and Reconstructionist and he basically said that obviously conservative is the future of American Jewelry Orthodoxy is a religion for Old Men in the low East Side in the South Bronx you know and East New York and uh you know neighborhoods that are falling apart and turning into slums there's nothing left to it that's what he this this Rabbi posited his book in the early 1970s that I read and um and I found it interesting I found it interesting I've told this story before and so uh I guess if uh if it bores you you can you can skip ahead although I find uh that um um I was I was my my original Shear that I give when I'm speaking to a new group The F my go-to shear is what I call YB Jewish which is basically the first two lines of missil Sharm and I gave it once in meel in uh in Melbourne Australia and a girl came up to me and said a woman a woman came up to me and said this is the 12th time I've heard this year I said I'm sorry I I I would have done something else and I got a lot of material you know I'm not worried and she says no no no when I saw you were giving it I traveled here special to hear it she was already in Australia she didn't fly from someplace else yeah because as I said the first time I spoke in Sydney uh which was the beginning of my trip you know this country is really um inconveniently located I don't you're aware of this it's not near anything except for New Zealand and who cares anyway but um so she says no no no I TR to hear this because I get such every time I hear it and I thought that was interesting when I used us to um make cassette tapes before we had all these fancy technology and I would just record the shum that I gave um somebody said to me goes I love buying your toret tapes because that's the best investment because normally you listen to a tet tape okay you hear the idea and it's over he says but yours are so enjoyable I can listen them over and over again so I appreciated that I added it to my marketing but um uh so if you've heard this already and you know you don't want to hear it again just fast forward um because I want to put into context what Ryan fendel did um my father grew up in Brownsville came from a uh Orthodox home my grandfather was not a learned man um he was a shabis because he came from Europe and everybody was shabas and when he came to America he didn't have enough motivation not to be shabas he was not a very ambitious or hustling sort of a fellow yeah and uh my father on the other hand and he grew up you know not sh shabas going to sh every shabas he still remembers bringing the chalant back from the oven that that the baker would leave on the oven because it was took too much work to reheat it after shabas it would keep going and everybody would leave their chalant in it and he would bring home the chalant from the from the bakery you know he sang in the choir with the great Kazam he remembers the great Kazam and he loved kazus he would make me listen to the records to this day when I hear kazus I want to eat my own arm off you know but uh he had that and uh but eventually was during the Depression and he really had no choice he felt the there was no food it's not like when a kid comes home and says I'm starving there's no food in this house you know refrigerator is full no you know it's like my grandmother had to like save some pennies off to the side to buy milk for the children it was it was real hunger it was nothing as my father used to tell the story when he married my mother my mother grew up in a in a well-to-do house because her father had started the Green Line bus company if you know Queens he started with one bus and built it up and so they they were living in laurelon which at the time was considered a fancy neighborhood and my my dad came from the wrong side of the tracks you know but uh they got married and she learned how to cook from her grandmother you know and uh so she says what can I make you she says cabbage Brit that's what we we call cabbage soup you cabbage Brit so you know my mother made it because it's good but it's not like my mother's so he tried a different recipe tried another thing another thing and each time he would say it's good but it's not like my mother's and one time he was in the old neighborhood and she says to MOA would you you like some cabbage breid he says yeah he comes home and he tells my mother my mother's a terrible cook I was just so hungry I was happy to eat anything but that stuff is terrible yours is great so so he dropped out of school after 9th grade and he went to work to support his family to literally put food on the table you know and uh and that's it and back then if you wanted to work you had to work on chavas unless you were had tremendous Mis neish you hear stories of people from that time who would get a job on Sunday and then tell them on Friday I'm not coming in tomorrow and get fired and next week look around again and just keep going like this and going like this because that's how hard it was my father was didn't he didn't have a Jewish Education he barely had a bar mitzvah you know um and uh and so he really didn't have anything to to strengthen him so he went out to work and built himself up and eventually got married and uh moved out to Long Island when you move out to Long Island you basically leave Judaism behind right um the suburbs were being built in what was essentially Farm country and if you wanted to get out of the low east side and East New York and Brownsville and uh South Bronx and all these kind of places you moved out to Long Island you know you could buy yourself a house for $8,000 you know with a piece of land and uh you're living like a king Suburban you know so uh so my father told me years later he says I I I made a mistake he moved out to North Amer North americ Long Island is very very few Jews live there um merik which normally when I tell people I come from North America they say Merck and I say no merik is one of the large Jewish concentrations in Long Island it's also well too H I came from North Merck which was lower middle class and um and uh a lot of Catholics we had Sacred Heart down the street from us you know not too much Jewish so he says when I came in I asked I asked the real estate agent where are the schools where's the shopping where's the this I I didn't ask him where the synagogue was was a mistake there was none in North America um so uh so my father got together and by the way the later later years um three and a half miles from me in merik Rabbi Jeremiah Walberg one of the special people who falls under what I'm discussing this week uh a builder and a dreamer but he started over shoman Merrick and that was an orthodox synagogue and eventually they started a sh in the youngest of North America excuse me the the youngest of North Belmore which was only a mile and a quarter that's where I used to go to Davin and uh but these things didn't exist at the time so uh I mean you have to remember when my father moved out there I think my brother Gary had just been born so that was 1952 um so there was a group of people in East Meadow which was about a mile away who were starting a synagogue and my father was one of the founders who started this synagogue now one of the other Founders told me the story he says we all came from Orthodox families we weren't Orthodox anymore but we all came from Orthodox families and uh we contacted um the Orthodox groups now I don't know who that meant I don't know if it was Young Israel or if it was the OU or Wu whatever it was says and they had nothing to give us they said well if you want to start a synagogue and you know get yourself established and you want to join you know let us know he says we called out the reform and the reform told us what they could offer us was to people from that generation couldn't handle it my father did not become sh shabas until he was 67 but he was once in invited to a bar mitzvah in a reform in the reformed temple in Merck he drove cuz he used to drive to sh you know he drove there but he he came in and uh and they wanted to give an Aaliyah he said take over your yamaka we don't we don't give aiah to people with yam is my father said what yeah walked out I used to say if I had to label my father he was a non-practicing orthodox Jew you know his has were were very Orthodox you know he says but we contacted the conservatives and the conservatives came out and said we'll give you a rabbi we'll give you a caner we'll pay their salary for the first three years we will give you a constitution you will join United synagogue we have a men's club we have a Sisterhood um you know and uh and uh we'll help you get started we'll we'll give you um ideas how to set up a building fund and how to get he says it was readymade sh and this in fact is how conservative Judaism took off during the 1950s and 60s because as suburbanization took place the Orthodox did not have a mechanism to go out there and say here we'll help you start a Shore your community you want to have a sh we'll help you build a sh they didn't have a mechanism the rabbi and the can both came from Wu and uh and they were shabas um but the they had maeding and they used the microphone but they used the burn bound sitter they didn't use the Silverman sitter the conservative sitter you know so it was more traditional now my three older brothers went to the Hebrew school in the East M Jewish Center until they became Bar Mitzvah they had their Bar Mitzvah in the East Jewish Center you would wear Talis Talis back then was like this like little silk scarf that you just draped over yourself you know you didn't wear an actual Talis and um uh and uh you basically went through it and that was the end that was the end my father used to drag us to the east met Jewish Center on Russ Shan yam Kipper it was a absolutely uh terrible experience like I said said not a fan of kazanas and it went on forever and I didn't understand the thing that was going on it had no meaning to me had no relevance the three younger brothers you know there's like a eight-year gap between my third brother and my fourth brother so my father used to buy Nila um every year and he'd give the to the three young as boys and we had to stand up there on the stage for two hours while the kazm was going we're just moving from foot to foot and just you know we can't we can't stand that long but that was my my Jewish experience that's what I had growing up that's all there was you know and uh I remember that um they did a study in the 1970s of a 100 kids in a conservative synagogue three will become Orthodox seven will become reformed 30 will remain conservative and 50 would disaffiliate so we obviously were either in the 50% or the 30% we weren't going to become reform we weren't going to become Orthodox we would have uh maybe lasted another generation and then drifted off there was this meant nothing to us my father he would listen to the kazin and he'd remember when he used to sing with the Kaz and you know and Brownsville and it had meaning to matasa was nothing abely nothing and that's where we were headed you know um my father kept a kosha home because otherwise his father wouldn't eat there but uh outside we were more liberal more liberal interpretation um uh it was a very interesting form of kis that we kept outside of the house you could not [Music] eat no pork no bacon none of that kind of stuff stuff you could not eat shellfish you know I never had Lobster or clam or shrimp or or those kind of things scallops I don't know whatever they are you know um you couldn't have milk and meat together you know never had a cheeseburger but as long as it's a be and as long as it's an O and as long as it's not bz well you could eat it couldn't bring it into the house so if you wanted to go um to uh to the pizzeria down the block which was I I I only have childhood memories but remember it being the best pizza I ever had in my life ever ever Tony's or Vinnie's I don't remember what it was you know and you wanted to order a pizza that was okay but of course you couldn't put pepperoni on it you know or sausage pizza and if you want to take it home to eat it you had to eat it on the porch because the house was coaster and you couldn't bring it in you know interesting thing and you want to go to McDonald's you couldn't have a cheeseburger but you could have a burger burger you know Hamburger and ketchup was bad you know you want to go to Nathan's H I understand there's a Kosh of Nathan's now but there wasn't when I was a kid you know you could order a you could order a uh Frank foter but couldn't put cheese on it or anything like that you know obviously you know and and uh if you wanted to go out and order a piece of fish or a salad or there's nothing wrong with that you know so that was the kind of liberal kasas we kept but listen there was almost no shabas there was uh you know with Ripper my father built a c which was unusual we had a PES he would he would make the house pesic but um but a lot never heard of it BM I don't even know what that was you know we went to the uh we went when we went we went to the conservative synagogue you know and uh it was a color mless experience unbeknownst to me um the GD Torah who survived the war came to America and got together to start an organization called Torah masora R mha Feinstein R Yakov ketki R Rudin um you know uh I think this is before we have gifta she tells you know we have iron um uh you know all the people who had survived came together and they said look we we find America's and if we try to fight on every front we try to fight chabas we fight try to fight cash we're going to lose we don't have the power we're going to put all of our into one thing what's that building the day school movement we're going to make Yesa day schools and use to get whoever we can to open these schools and to put you know uh to have them go around and Rec could tell me them so uh this part of the story I uh I heard from greenblat it was a time he was living in my building had this to to get to know him and he said that he was in rosha finest shear and apparently rosha came back from one of these meetings and he says there's no Shear tomorrow everybody pick a town go out and start a day school good night good morning and Sh shut thear you know so he says I went over to him and I Saida he says I don't speak English says I don't speak English either don't worry I did fine you'll do fine and sure enough he went to Memphis and he um opened up a day school there and he says that's how it started and I went from house to house going to Jewish people and Yiddish asking them to send their kids to the school and that's how I that's how I built Yeshua day school so there were people like this ravski went out to Columbus Ohio I mentioned him earlier and there was nothing there and he built an orthodox Shore and he you know built it family by family and family and built from Community remember em Manuel Feldman went to Atlanta and he took this shw and he built it up family by Family by Family he's written books on the experience which are must reads for those who want to understand where where jewelry in America came from there was the people who were digging in the dirt you know to be able to build something you know and uh and the effort and the time that went into it was was something amazing you know and um and I don't know where you get the I don't know you get the courage to be able to do something like this I mentioned rby Walberg yeah they were starting an orthodox SCH in meric and uh they interviewed a number of rabbis they hired rabie wolberg because he has a beautiful voice and they figured they could save money he could also be the kazin and he told me he said I would call DAV for 9:00 and there was nobody there so I would walk up to the Amid and I would start daving and that's it out loud well the and people didn't show up till I was ding you know he says but everybody but when it came time for his Russia the shore was full he spoke for 45 minutes he was electrifying and eventually he built it into uh hundreds and hundreds of families but but you have to have the courage to walk out to where there's nothing and say I'm going to build something so there was individual by the name of R fendel he came out to Long Island and he wanted to take nassa County meaning okay for those of you who are not New Yorkers um uh Long Island is an island the part of it is Brooklyn and part of it is Queens that's not called Long Island that's called part of New York City there are five burrows Staten Island's an island Manhattan is an island Brooklyn and Queens are on Long Island the only part of New York that's part of America is the Bronx ironically and that's the five burrows so when people say long is land they mean nasau and suff County suff County forget about it I used to say when when I was running ncsy I I had nasau and suff County I said it's so big it's a suff if it's even a county you know it's all the way out there but nasau County there a tremendous amount of Jews hundreds of thousands of Jews so there was an orthodox sh all the way up in Great Neck and of course there was North actual Lawrence I don't think the young Woodman had started yet um and uh and uh there was um what actually Long Beach and uh there was one in Hicksville surprisingly and that was it that that time there was nothing there I didn't even know if hick was in the 1950s I'm just guessing you know so he bought an old house and he started kindergarten and he says I'm going to build a day school and there was nobody there there's no from people and he went around from family to family and encouraged people to come now you got to come you got to pay tuition you know uh your kids are going to be taught Judaism which you don't believe in not that you don't believe in Judaism but you don't practice any of the stuff you know families would go out to McDonald's you know after to school you know there was there was nothing there and he hired Torah true teachers to teach these kids how to become Jews how to how to um all all about Torah and Mitzvah yeah I don't know how he succeeded along the way he built the West Hamstead Community there was no orthodo West stead he took an ad out in the paper looking for nine men to start a Orthodox minion and he pulled them together and from that eventually came the young of West Hemstead and uh and and the whole Community turned into this enormous thing but this was uh this was a uh an anomaly existing in the middle of Long Island Echoes of this didn't reach us in North mer Echoes of this did not reach somebody in mipa Echoes of this didn't reach anyone in Roslin or or or you know all all all the little STL that made up Long Island all the little towns so he was drawing from West Hampstead and slowly other kids started coming in now when it was in uh I think eventually went up to 9th grade stopped at 9th grade um I know it's strange for those of you who went to regular yeshivas because you think of you know uh school going up to 8th grade but in the big bad world there's called elementary school that's 1 through six and then there's called Junior High that's 78th and 9th and then there's High School right um but uh 10th 11th and 12th so it went up to ninth grade yeah and uh eventually they built a building they knocked down the little house and they built a building and it was a pretty pit building but it was enough for their purposes in West Hamstead uh the building is still there and um and had some little land in the back for the playground and little part in the front playground you know that was basically it they worked hard to have a top uh secular education and work hard to do this and R fendel who was not trained in this he would go to um seminars he would speak to people he would hire people to be able to make it a a First Rate Academic School and at the same time he's got these kids who come from non from homes who are not from and he's trying to give them a Jewish Education very very hard to do they no one knew what kirv was what we call the modern kirv movement it started after The Six Day War you know but there were no cure of techniques there was nothing like that you had to just try to figure out what to do and and how to and how to work with these kids and how to educate them and Tor Mur was a resource and they were helping and providing things but it was uh you you you had to you know fly by the city of your pants as the expression goes and figure it out okay this was all going on we had no idea about it West hemid was this other world it was you know elron the last homely house on the side of the Misty Mountains if you appreciate the reference it was it was just oh its own little world that I knew nothing about um I only knew my conserv synagogue I knew East Meadow I knew North mer I knew mer every now and then I would go to the Amic Library I wasn't allowed to take anything out because I wasn't a resident but you know North America we had like six books you know what I mean and uh it was like really neb you know I don't even think they heard of the Dewey Decimal System you go to America they had audiovisual stuff and they had this a million books and all kinds of fancy things but you know I was one of the I was one of the you know lower class from North America I wasn't allowed to use their library but so that's about all I knew that was my whole life you know anyway I my three older brothers all went to Public School North school yeah um and the elementary school of course went up to sixth grade so one of my brothers the principal said to my father listen he's too smart for public school we can't really challenge this kid you're going to have to put him in a private school now my father who grew up in Brownsville in a yish speaking home who um uh who uh never finished nth grade what does he know about private school she going to send the Woodmere Academy you know I mean like there's no from private school he figures oh that must mean Yeshiva so he looked up is there yiva here and he comes across the Hebrew C na County and he goes down to rendel and he says listen I have this boy he's in seventh grade he says well does he know any Hebrew or does he know any Jew studies so uh he says well he went to afternoon Hebrew school in the conserv a synagogue but no not much so R Fel who as I mentioned was one of those Builders one of those MIM who always had Vision he says we'll take him he'll start seventh grade in secular studies and either first or second grade in lud hle lud kodes he'd have to go down there within six months he was in seventh grade for both of them he caught up was a bright boy you know and uh he was there for 7th 8th and 9th and there was no high school so um so he left and he went with his other two brothers to Calhoun um and uh you know the my other two brothers went for junior he to Brookside and then they went to Calhoun Calon again was like the the lower class high school you know the the rich mer kids went to can but we couldn't get into there because we we were poor schnooks from North America anyway they went to Calhoun and uh you know but when they went to enroll my brother Sur fendel convinced my father to send the three other children now this was a very difficult decision for my father because he had gone bankrupt now remember I'm 5 years old now he had gone bankrupt his his his business went bust and he had to rebuild it from scratch and I remember growing up with things being tight I don't remember hunger but I do remember things being tight and um um and and you know we didn't we didn't shop in Macy's we shopped in Klein's you know if if you know what I'm talking about you know it was the Walmart of its time you know but um um you know it was uh you know things were tight you know and uh to pay he was prepared to pay one tuition somehow but four tuitions R fendel said you have to give your kids a Jewish Education you have to send them here you know I said we'll talk to the scholarship committee we'll work out whatever has to be worked out you know uh but you have to send your children that was Rendell he was unbelievably persuasive now I'm going to say this he was not a dynamic speaker that was not his you know he had tremendous things to say but he wasn't when we think today a speaker pesak cronar because you know he had a stroke and he should have Raa um so uh you think of a dramatic speaker and R Walberg dramatic speaker R Fel wasn't like that he was an educator he was a and uh but he had this ability to convince people how he built from nothing you know and um uh he um he convinced my father and I remember my father said to me he says I said to him he says I'm afraid that you'll teach my children to become religious and they'll look down at me right and they said the first Mitzvah we teach is K of a you honor your parents my father said when I heard that I said this is a bed I could work with and uh and here I am a kid who only went to a conservative synagogue on Ripper um five years old and I'm suddenly dropped into Yeshiva wearing yamaka and a pair of tizas I had never seen tias in my life but this was a Yeshiva not that I knew what that meant but there I was in first grade you know um R Fel told me at one point one of the parents was complaining says you make these kids where yamak is and sitas none of them come from houses but yamak is and sitas you know you don't reflect the community right Fel said Yeshiva is not supposed to reflect the community it's supposed to set the standard for the [Laughter] community he was he he he was he was uncompromising now remember all the kids who are coming are coming from conservative synagogues it turns out I didn't know this but my East East Meadow had something like four or six busloads of kids going to Hank from my little conservative synagogue well it wasn't little from my conservative synagogue these kids are coming from all these conserv says the conservative rabbis from the synagogues came and said we would like to be involved on the school's board and he said right from said he says I pulled out the sh and said here is our school Constitution if you're prepared to follow this we're happy to have you on board that was it it was you know and you wore titit and you were y I don't care if you go home and and and eat trfe here you follow it along right Fel was a rarity he was a rarity besides the fact that like I say when I look at people like R fendel and R stavsky and and R Feldman and R Walberg and I look at these Builders who walked out to where there was nothing and in the infer fle ground of America dug with their fingernails to lay a foundation that today when you look at what Torah Judaism is today it's only because of the Day School movement the gulum who had that foresight and the people who had the courage to follow their instructions and go out and build toyra it's an unbelievable thing I can't even imagine it I don't know I okay I'm not a builder I don't know I know how to talk it's about it I don't know how to do anything when you see these people who start these organizations and build these things Etc you know was amazing so uh so I started in hang and uh and I was going through the grades and remember it um at that time it went up to 9th grade in this little building and so R fendell had a dream he was going to build an entire campus in Mitchell field now for those you who don't know Long Island Mitchell Field is in unale it's right near Hoster University and it used to be an Airfield in fact when Lindberg took off to fly nonstop from America to Europe he took off from Mitchell Field um today there's a large mall nearby in part of the land known as Roosevelt Field and um uh was uh built near by there little a little plaque remembering Lindberg but it was a large area and he got a shatak there and he built the building and he added to the building and he added to the building and he made it day camp in the building and and he transferred the seventh through 12th there the junior high in the high school and he decided to start a high school um my brother who was a grade ahead of me he was the first graduating high school class of Hank I was the second graduating class and it was very interesting he came up with a an interesting idea since he already went up to ninth grade he only made two grades and he made accelerated classes so you graduated after 11th grade you still needed two credits in English I that summer I had to go to public school uh summer school and I don't know what public school is like but I assume whatever it is summer school is even worse and this was not this was not a great experience for me although as you can imagine I Shone because there was no competition there were two three week courses and one six week course that you had to take so six week I took drama and remember we put on our t and you have all these like thugs who are in summer school and they're like sitting there with the book going uh I want to go to read this I had the largest part of course I was the stage manager and I came in costume and memorized my entire part and acted it out hey that was me but um um it was interesting we did Pig M and and uh I had a friend there and they made him Henry Higgins they made me Alfred uh Alfred dittle Eliza's father and um Everybody again was reading from the little book and we both memorized our parts and came in costume and acted it out you know was just just who I am but anyway um ah the but um um we uh we uh he finished it after 11th grade and then you had the option to continue in 12th grade and still do the mud KES and take classes at HRA but mostly he was pushing you he says look you have an extra year go and learn an ER he loved erel he had this strong drive for erel and the whole time he was building at one point apparently there was a day school in Beth Page maybe it was near that Hicksville Orthodox whatever it was it it was never really viable and eventually it was going to closed down and they came to R fendel and said can you save our school now he had a major um balos who he won over not a from fellow Mo hornstein horn construction you know and he would help him he would help him with construction and he help him with fundraising and help him with all kinds of things and uh and he um he says listen Mo he goes I have have to buy this school I have to keep it open so Moses says let's take a look and he says this piece of garbage look there are cracks in the foundation this this this that that that that that you know it was like no way don't tell he says I went to work on him and I said Mo I can't give up on these Jewish kids Mo you believe in Jewish Education Mo we got to save this and he just kept wearing him down until he agreed to support it so he now has Han West Hamstead he has another Elementary School uh was uh Hank it was called Mid Island Hank and then he had the Junior High in the high school in Mitchell field he has three campuses going with all kinds of different programs going on just just amazing things and um uh he had he just had Vision he had vision and he had he had the strength of character and the ability to build when uh the Yum Kipper war broke out I was in high school when the sixth day war broke out I was in elementary school I was in third or fourth grade and uh they told us to say to Hill and and we were hearing the reports the first first reports were that you know Tel Aviv in Flames is in flames you know I mean they're overrunning everything you know but when the 73 War took place I was uh nth grade e8th grade n nth grade just started nth grade and they came to us and said listen you know a lot of people in America have donated blood and uh we just can't get it to we don't have the money to fly it over he says he says he said to a bunch of his kids see if you can go raise money so in North Merck at the little Hills Supermarket I took a c day with a little sign please give money to send blood to Israel I had a big can and I just sat at the table and collected money to be able to send the money to Israel but but that's that's what H you know you got to go out and you got to do things you know um R fendel himself left because everybody was called up to the Army Israel is much smaller than it is today so he ran over and he became the assistant principal in uh he became the temporary principal in a school in in Israel like I told you he loved he loved ER he he didn't just talk he he answered the Clarion call and um that's the story P cron loves to tell he says at one point a kid says to him and says are you the new principal he says yeah how did you know he says because you walk around and don't do [Laughter] anything so uh so I fig you must be the Principal you know but uh but he just kept going it was just unbelievable I remember I had been running ncsy for nine years and I decided to um make a change in career I wanted to go into robab bonus so I uh so I went to I wanted to go to ER trell and sit and learn and then go back and come back to RAB bonus so I announced I was leaving ncsy and I was at the top of my game at the time uh I'm just repeating what people said and I was really I I had it I had everything running smoothly everything was good and I said I'm quitting and I'm going to a thr to learn and someone said to me we tell that to the kids you're not supposed to do it you don't listen when you talk when you give those half dollars and stuff that's for the kids they're supposed to go you're supposed to stay here somebody uh who was involved another Regional director who was from Yu he says that's as crazy as asking Hera to become a regional director what are you g to go and learn for you're just a just a original director you're a glorified youth director you know you're going have and learn become a rabbi what do you think you know so uh but like I say I heard I heard the Clarion call myself long enough that I felt I had to answer answer it you know and um uh R fendel was guilty of the same thing when Hank was finally beginning to become an established high school and built and he was and he had million ideas of what he wanted to do he just he was just mes do new things he said that's a moving T show and he loaded up the van and he moved to y Li picked it up and he left and he turned over the school to R Gman who's the assistant principal assistant Dean made him the made him the dean and Fel came to show maybe it's not my place maybe it's not my place but I will share with you what I do know RBI tats was in South Africa giving sh to hundreds and hundreds of people um was in or in Toronto giving sh to hundreds and 100 people they both wanted to come back toel when they came toell and uh they both shared a rebi ra Shapiro and they were both teaching in to a dozen guys and mha hounded both of them and said you're wasting your time here go go back to K and do God's will do what needs to be done because we don't leave the Earth you got to go so umat went to London started giving sham to hundreds of people RAB be went to America with gateways started giving sham to hundreds of people and uh even though their dream was to be in Earth TR now me anytime I get a serious offer I always look into it because if someone could convince me that RM is for me to go to and do something there W to do it when I spoke in Australia I spoke in the largest Jewish Day School in the world in Sydney or Australia and the fellow in charge sat down with me and said is there any way we could get you here and I said you know if you can show me that I can do something that nobody else can and uh I ask and if it's R then yeah I'll pick up and move out here we met for maybe an hour what I could do for the school what we could do it that we we walked away very excited never heard from him again that was five years ago but but I never say no I always look into it R fendel left where he was one of the cornerstones of Ken in in in America I'm not going to say the New York area in America CU I know there were other schools that turned to hang to learn his methods and what to do and how to go about it when he came toel he taught he learned he had a a girls summer camp but I don't believe that he accomplished what he would have if he stayed in America that's me for me to criticize but that's the person he was and I and I it's fun to speculate what would have happened if he stayed but it's it's a waste of time because he couldn't ER thr was in his soul he didn't just talk about it like people talk about it my friend R granowski who I've had on the had on the show um you know he used to go to uh to fundraise you know and he came to Chicago it was fundraising and this guy says does your Yeshiva say h on and he said no we follow the poim that say not to say hello he says that I'm not going to give to you cuz you're not a Zionist and he said I live in Israel with my children he threw down his hagga card he says I serve in the Israeli Army and you're a bigger Zionist than I am after that he would always say the biggest zionists are in Chicago I love I love the Zionist in America so the somebody once said that's the problem why B ke never really took over in America because if anyone took it seriously they moved to Israel there was nobody to take over you know and see it's why we didn't take it so seriously so we stayed there and worked but uh but R Fel was in his heart but the gift that R fendel had besides all of this was his ability to take somebody and make them feel that they could do anything make them believe when I uh do question and answers sometimes at events with parents the number one question that I asked get asked over and over again in different ways is why is the K system destroying my kid and I said because I started the Hebrew Academy of Nasser County in 1964 it's interesting I I uh I I met Ry fendell when I was 5 years old I've I've known him for six I know him for 60 years I said when you went in there you got a message from R Fel that you are a hero because you're saving Judaism and you're saving Torah and he made that clear and it didn't matter if you were bad didn't matter if you were good didn't matter if you were from didn't matter if you were academic you came to an orthodox School you are a hero and some people heard the message and some people didn't some heard it more and some people heard it less but he said you're you're are hero kids today get a message we don't need you here we got three other kids waiting for you spots step out of line you're G right Fel believed in you and he loved you and he believed in CLA when I was in high school there was a rebi who was a sh from mrai there was a laich uh teacher of like really for brenta laich um there was a some Wu guys there was uh yes people my rebi Reby whale who had learned in Lakewood under the riv iron re Warman who was m and this was the staff and he had a way of making it make make it sound like it made sense because his a was so big that he was just able to take every part of clel and make you feel like you're a part of it that's very hard to do especially in in today's day and age when everything is so sectarian to be able to do that is an amazing thing he was a family he was a family to my family and to me he came to every one of our family Simas my my father made sure that R fendel every guys with there he was part of our family I'll give you an example which to me personally I was already married I was already living in ell I was already in I was a rebi and I'd already finished my ncsy when my father died and right Fel called me up after I came out of Shiva on AR shabas how you doing you know everybody calls during the Shiva but it's we how you doing he called me every AR shabas for the entire year R how you doing I don't believe that I was singled out for special treatment I believe that every single kid in Hank got that same love and consideration so the world is an emptier colder place because the olavsky who Fidel chased after and pulled into the school eventually all of the boys became from eventually my parents became from and today my grandparents by my parents have over a 100 great grandchildren who are all being brought up in Torah and Mitzvah because of Rendell because he had the vision and the courage to build that 100 great grandchildren and you know how many families there are who share my story some even more dramatic thousands that were lives were changed around because of Ry fendel in the Hebrew Academy of Nassau County my friends the world is a poor place for him he made it to 97 I I feel like he he got such a not because of me in particular but because of the thousands and thousands of who didn't know how they would face a world without a r Fidel in it mosha for all of Cl Israel as he was down here that's it for this week if you want to find out more about the the show you can go to my website rowski dcom you can ask a question you can leave a comment and uh that's it until next time I am de olowski and this is the rabi olowski show it's the rabbi orlovski show Torah and S ready to go the Ravi orovi show knowledge and wisdom will help you grow lots of fun in every episode and we don't have to ride no we don't it's the rabbi orl show on Rabbi or.com T anytime yoube and more it's Rabbi orlovski show Torah and ready to go it's the rabbi oravsky show till next time so we meet again it's the rabbi Orlowski show it's the rabbi Orlowski show it's the rabbi Orlowski show