Hebrew School

The running of North Bay’s Hebrew School has always required the dedicated participation of volunteers. Since it was not always possible to find a rabbi, particularly one who could run the school program, it often fell on local members of the congregation to supervise the progress of students and fill in the gaps in years when there was no teacher, or when the program had been reduced to one day per week.

Nathan Rivelis directed the Hebrew School during the 1940s. Henry Wiseman and Morley Daiter were also past chairmen of the Education Committee. Typically, the local representative worked closely with Canadian Jewish Congress contacts in Toronto to find suitable candidates to teach the Hebrew School programs in the regional communities. Dr. Joseph Klinghofer, the educational director of the Canadian Jewish Congress in the 1960s and 1970s, for example, visited North Bay and other communities to supervise the progress of pupils and the education standards in the community programs as well as recommending candidates to teach the programs.

In 1962, it was reported in the congregation’s minutes that there were 28 students enrolled in the after-school program in North Bay, with six of the students coming once a week because they were from out of town. The other students attended three times a week, although the minutes also report complaints of frequent truancy from the program. Teachers around this time included a Mr. Mintz and Rabbi Haim Edery and Pinkis Wintraub (1938-45). Generally, the students reported a dislike for attending cheder after regular school classes and the strict disciplinary environment of the Hebrew classes. Although it was seen as a chore at the time, the respondents in the oral histories conducted by the Ontario Jewish Archives also reported that they were appreciative of the strong fundamental knowledge of Hebrew they acquired.

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