- Ottawa Jewish Archives
- Ottawa Jewish Historical Society fonds
- Interview with Elaine and Irwin Singer
Interview with Elaine and Irwin Singer
Description only — contact the archive8
- Held by
- Ottawa Jewish Archives via Canadian Jewish Heritage Network (incl. Alex Dworkin Canadian Jewish Archives)
- Dates
- May 18, 2008 (indexed as 2008)
- Level
- item
- Scope & content
- Elaine Singer is from Toronto, and moved to Ottawa with her husband, Irwin (Irv), in 1965, when he was offered a job. Her family are longstanding members of reform congregations; her grandparents and her great-grandmother were members of Long Street Shul, and later Holy Blossom Temple, both in Toronto. Elaine’s grandchildren are sixth generation reform members. Irv was an engineer at a firm, and then worked for his father’s manufacturing business, before returning to the firm after his father’s retirement. When the firm went out of business, Irv got a phone call from an acquaintance in manufacturing that knew of a job in Ottawa, which is why they moved. Elaine did not know much of the Ottawa Jewish community when Irv asked her to move there, aside from a few contacts that she had met briefly at functions in Toronto. Norman Zagerman’s nephew was bar mitzvahed at Holy Blossom on the same day as Elaine’s son, which is how she got to know his sister in law, Karin Zagerman, who helped Irv find an apartment in Ottawa. She also knew of Adele Abelson and contacted her, who was welcoming and helpful during their move– she eventually became Elaine’s best friend When they left Toronto in March 1965, their Rabbi at Holy Blossom advised Elaine and Irv to join a synagogue in Ottawa, but to start their own reform congregation as soon as possible. They joined Agudath Israel upon their arrival, but always made it very clear that it was only temporary, and ended up staying there for about a year. Elaine’s first impression of Ottawa was that it was a small town with few restaurants of note, and that the community was more orthodox. Though they had some conservative friends, they had little to do with the Orthodox community as it did not align with their values. Rabbi Clark invited Irv to a march, which is where they met some other reform families from out of town, such as Bill Danson, Bernie __? from Montreal, Anne and Jean Barnes from Toronto, and Maddy and David Alexander (Maddy was from a reform congregation in New York). Together, they held meetings in their homes and various spaces throughout Ottawa, starting around 1966. When the temple started, community members disapproved and did not make them feel accepted or welcomed; they sarcastically referred to the temple as “the church” and did not respect their judaism. However, Elaine felt strongly that in order to continue to do what they wanted, they would simply have to put up with it and not give into “fighting that nasty fight” with them. She felt that they were who they were, and that the people who were upset simply did not know any better. The Vaad accepted them because of their contributions to the cemetery on Herbert’s Corners Rd., where they have one of the six sections. They started off by meeting in homes, schools, and the Mont D’or (?) centre, before buying their own synagogue on James Street. They were there for about 6 months to a year, until it burned down. After the fire, the community was understanding and allowed them to use the basement of the Jewish Community Centre for the time being. However, the members did not like the restrictions placed on them when using the JCC, such as no open flames and having only kosher foods. While at the JCC, Elaine recalls that a rabbi came down to see their book sale, and she grabbed him by the arms to show him around, only realizing afterwards that she should not have touched a Rabbi. However, when she had people over to her house who were not reform, she made a special effort to provide them with kosher cookies, oranges, paper plates, and coffee to make them more comfortable. They went back to the Mont D’or club briefly, and then used a Unitarian church for a couple of years, which she describes as a beautiful, lovely place to hold services. Elaine regrets that they did not purchase part of that land to build on, and states that it was not uncommon for different places of worship to share spaces, and it would not have been an issue. In 1972, the temple hired their first part-time rabbi, Rabbi David Powell, who had been an assistant rabbi at Holy Blossom. Though he was a bright man, it did not work out, and they hired a full time rabbi that they met in Cincinnati, Rabbi Don Gerber, who was there for 8 years. Elaine had sent her youngest son to the only other afternoon school at the time, the Talmud Torah, which she thought was a “disaster” because the children were not well controlled and the program was not up to her standards. They started their own Sunday school and afternoon school on Gladstone, which was run by volunteers from the congregation. Elaine’s daughter, Margo Rosen, was the first girl in the city to be bat mitzvahed. Elaine and Irv were always involved in volunteering; Elaine belonged to the National Council of Jewish Women as well as Hadassah, and Irv belonged to B’nai Brith. At this point of the interview, Irv joins in and they discuss the temple’s progressiveness. The temple provides a safe place for interfaith marriage, and offers an education class for the couple to attend leading up to the wedding. They welcome gay and lesbian members and had a lecture series on the topic; Irv recounts how they had a naming ceremony for a gay couple’s daughter in the synagogue just weeks prior, which reaffirmed to him that “this is what we are here for”. They also discuss having Black-Jewish and Chinese-Jewish families, and even people who have no familial affiliation to Judaism but are curious, in their congregation. Elaine says that if people want to join the community, who are they to stop them?
- Location
- Holy Blossom Temple · landmark · confidence 70% · landmark:toronto · found as “holy blossom temple”
- Long Cres · street · confidence 50% · street · found as “Long Street”
- James St · street · confidence 50% · street · found as “James Street”
Where
More details
- Genre / form
- sound recording
- Format
- Audio
- Language
- English
- Harvested
- 2026-10-17T20:12:50Z · source datestamp n/a · cjhn