From the Nahe to the Rio Grande

A while back Mrs. Jude put up a post on her own blog about being a Jewish pioneer, being Jewish way out in the country, and some of the joys and hardships involved. Last week The Forward had an article The Joys of Cedar Rapids by Mitchell Levin. Below is an edited version.

An old Jewish folk tale tells of two travelers who meet on the road while fleeing Tsarist Russia. The first traveler asks, “Where are you going?” The second traveler responds, “To America. And where are you going?” “I am going to Madagascar,” replies the first traveler. “But Madagascar is so far away,” exclaims the second traveler. “Far away?” says the first traveler, as he resumes his journey. “Far away from where?”
I never tire of telling this tale, because for more than four decades, Madagascar has been my home. Actually, home is in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. But as far as most of my brethren are concerned, I may as well be from Madagascar. You see, I come from a place all but beyond the comprehension of most American Jews.
When I went to enroll my son in the Montessori school in Kerrville, Texas — Jewish population: zero — the teacher had a hard time controlling her excitement. She had studied in New York. She had met Jews there. Having Michael in her school would be “a cultural experience” for the other students. “Surely,” she asked in that questioning yet demanding tone so common to school teachers, “you will come and show the youngsters how you celebrate each of your holidays. It will be so good for them to hear Hebrew songs.”
Out here in small-town America, non-Jews assume that we know everything there is to know about Judaism and that whatever we say is “The Jewish Answer.” They cling to this notion, no matter how many times we tell them that if you ask two Jews the same question you will get at least three answers.
Observing the dietary laws, even in a limited fashion, is a challenge. Yet it is almost more imperative here than elsewhere, because it is a way of maintaining identity. If you run out of something, you can’t just run to the local store and pick it up. This is not Chicago, where the Jewel grocery stores sell fresh kosher meat, or Washington, where the Giant stocks items aimed at thousands of Jewish customers. This is Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
To be fair, while we still need to plan ahead, things are not as challenging as they used to be. Thanks to mass marketing, even in places with only a few hundred Jewish families you would be surprised at how many kosher products are available. And say what you will about Wal-Mart, but most of the cookies and crackers bearing their “house brand” are kosher. They even sell kosher bread at the discounter’s famed low prices.
When I came back to Cedar Rapids from my sister’s funeral, everybody in town — everybody Jewish, that is — knew that I would need a minyan for six out of the next seven days. This was no small challenge in a town with maybe 150 Jewish families and only one temple. On top of that, it was January, a time of ice and snow in Iowa.
Yet without fail, each and every night our little living room filled with people — men, women, traditional, Reform, it didn’t matter. One night the rabbi brought the confirmation class. And on more than one evening Jews drove up from Iowa City — a 60-mile round trip — just to make sure we hit the magic number.
Sure, it would have been so much easier in a big city. But there is a certain warmth and comfort that comes from community, that sense that out here in Madagascar we set aside what in a large city would be insurmountable differences in order to meet the human needs of our brethren.
When people ask, “How can you be Jewish in a small town?,” I remind them that Rashi lived in Troyes, a French town with a minuscule Jewish population. We may not be Rashis, but he certainly is an inspiration and a role model for what small-town Jewry can accomplish.

When people ask me now I can live out in the country, I point out that the communities such as Postville and Monsey started out with just a few individuals and grew from there. It just takes one person to start a community and G-d willing more will arrive. An example from my own family history.
Between 1860 and 1900 many of the Jewish families in the Nahe valley of Germany emigrated to England and America. Some of these were already related to my own immediate family, and would intermarry again after settling in America. One family, the Senders would settle first in Rockport, Missouri and then after traveling back to New York to marry a member of my own family would move to Trinidad, Colorado.

Temple Aaron, Trinidad, Colorado
There they would help build Temple Aaron, the oldest synagogue still in use in Colorado, and there they would be joined by cousins and others that had left the Nahe valley, and then as the community grew other individuals and families joined them. See, if you build it they will come.