1911 Time Capsule to be Opened

BY DIANE GILES, kenoshanews.com

It’s not often that members of a congregation get a peek into the past to see and touch artifacts representative of their local religious origins.

But congregants belonging to the Jewish community’s Bnai Zedek Chabad will have such on opportunity on Oct. 17 during the celebration of their nearly 100-year-old synagogue.

During the event, a time capsule that was placed in the Bnai Zedek synagogue cornerstone in 1911 will be opened. The time capsule, records indicate, was filled with artifacts of early Jewish life in Kenosha.

Rabbi Tzali Wilschanski has no expectations of what could be in the capsule.

“I have no idea what could be in there,” Wilschanski said, adding with a grin, “maybe it’s Coca-Cola stock.”

The celebration and time capsule opening will be held at the Radisson Hotel and Conference Center in Pleasant Prairie. Gathering in appreciation of 100 years of keeping the spark of Judaism alive in Kenosha will be rabbis, congregational lay leaders and community members.

A special memorial will be held at the event for two pillars of the Jewish community: Bnai Zedek past president Dr. Leslie Fai and Bernice Rosen, past president of Hadassah, a local Jewish women’s group.

According to old newspaper clippings, the Bnai Zedek congregation had struggled in Kenosha a full decade before being able to build their synagogue at 1602 56th St.

The congregation started out as orthodox, changed to a conservative affiliation in the 1950s and about 10 years ago returned to orthodoxy.

“One of the easy signs of an orthodox synagogue versus a non-orthodox synagogue is the women’s gallery, because (in orthodoxy) men and women pray separately,” Wilschanski explained. “And the building on 56th Street has a women’s gallery and upstairs balcony, so it was built as an orthodox structure.”

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