After the lull of late December (in the workplace, at least) twenty students are shaking things up once again at the Yiddish Book Center.

I could listen to Professor Samuel Kassow for hours and not get bored because of his unmatched depth of knowledge about East European Jewish history, Yiddish literature, and Jewish music, art, and theater. On June 4-5, Sam will be making the trip up to Amherst once again for a program open to the public: The Jewish Metropolis: Warsaw and Vilna before the Holocaust...

Last week, a film crew from French public television visited the Book Center to interview Aaron Lansky, and then some of the young people that are part of the organization. Seven of us yunge mentshn sat in front of a camera while Rachel Ertel (or Rokhl af Yiddish) asked us questions in Yiddish and English about our roles at the Book Center, how we learned Yiddish, what we are reading in Yiddish, and the reasons we are working to revive/preserve....

I didn’t know anything about Ilene Gelbaum except that she was visiting the Book Center from California with her husband, and she wanted to tell her story for the Wexler Oral History Project. Ilene turned out to be a gifted storyteller with many stories to share. She talked about everything from meeting her husband in high school in Brooklyn, to her stint in the Peace Corps in Sri Lanka, to the five thousand (!) babies she delivered in her 40-year career as a midwife.