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Letter from the Executive Director

JCGC is ramping up for a very busy fall, after a very busy spring and summer! One of Cincinnati’s oldest Jewish cemeteries, Spanish Hebrew Society (SHS), is now part of JCGC. This historic Sephardic community cemetery has a fascinating history, which you can read about in this newsletter. We are honored to have this historic cemetery and its members affiliated with JCGC and we welcome Barry D. Levy from SHS to our Board of Trustees.

We were fortunate to have, for the first time, a Workum Summer Intern at JCGC. Eva Rosenthal, a Cincinnati native, currently majoring in Religion at Denison University, spent 8 weeks working on genealogy and other research for JCGC this summer. Two of Eva’s responsibilities were to enter all the data from SHS into our database, all of which is now available online. Eva also researched and wrote the history of SHS mentioned earlier. You can read more about the Workum Intern program and their visit to JCGC here.

In this newsletter, we’re also excited to feature a legacy statement from Judi and Mack Evans. Judi’s family has been involved at the Montefiore Cemetery in Price Hill for several generations and Mack has served on JCGC’s board for many years. His Board term is coming to an end, but we know we can count on them to continue to support our important mission, which they express so eloquently in their statement.

We will be sending out a dedicated events schedule in the next few weeks, with our lecture series information. In the meantime, we would like to mention three important upcoming dates:

  • September 16, 2018, from 11:00am-2: – JCGC will be welcoming visitors in our community cemeteries. At this traditional time of year, when many family members visit their dearly departed, JCGC volunteers will be on-site to help facilitate your visit. The following cemeteries will be staffed: Montgomery, Walnut Hills, Adath Israel Price Hill/Love Brothers/UJC Price Hill, Judah Touro/Shachnus/Montifiore/Hirsh Hoffert, and all of the cemeteries in the Covedale complex (Golf Manor/American Beneficial/Yad Charutzim/Northern Hills/New Hope/Tifereth Israel, and Knesseth Israel). For addresses and directions, visit: https://jcemcin.org/cemeteries/ For additional information, please call 513-961-0178.
  • October 26, 2018 @ 10:30am at the Kenwood – Rabbi Doron Kornbluth – End of Life and Afterlife: A Jewish Perspective on Death and Beyond
  • October 28, 2018 @ 11:00am at JCGC’s Walnut Hills Cemetery – Memorial Garden Dedication for Bill Riegel and Tour with Rabbi Gary Zola

Finally, JCGC has two major construction projects going on this fall, so please pardon our appearance in the Montgomery Cemetery, where necessary regrading and rehabilitation of the south side of the cemetery will be done, as well as work to improve the drainage in the area. There will also be demolition, rehabilitation, and improvements made at the Knesseth Israel Cemetery in Covedale. Please do not approach the marked construction areas. In addition, JCGC is undertaking a major effort to repair damaged monuments and replace damaged foundations of many monuments. In most cases, these are old monuments for which we do not have any living family members to contact. If you would like to help JCGC offset the cost to repair these monuments, donations can be made here. In some cases, this work may require moving monuments and markers while the repair work is being done. As always, never lean on a monument while visiting the cemeteries, as some may be unstable.

Wishing you all a Very Happy and Sweet New Year – A Shana Tova and Metukah!

In service of our mission,

David Harris
Executive Director