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Thank you to the couples who have registered and submitted stories of their Ramah Romances to our website. Their stories are touching and inspiring. We know you will enjoy reading them. You can choose to read the stories from a specific camp or program, or see the names listed alphabetically. If you know of any Ramah couples that are not listed below, please tell them about www.ramahmarriages.org, or email us at ramah@jtsa.edu and we'll be happy to contact them.
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A-B Michael Abrams & Tami Kagan-Abrams Guy Alberga & Beverley Moskovic Alberga David Apothaker & Carol Mendelsohn Apothaker Shimon Steve Albert Arbel & Josie Zaldin Arbel Jeffrey Arnowitz & Tamar Brendzel Arnowitz Noam H. Arzt & Heidi Steinberg Arzt Steven Asher & Ina ("Louie") Elfant Asher Bart Axelrod & Charna Ockman Axelrod Howard L. Bach & Wendy Ziman Bach Andrew Barnett & Vivian Matusow Barnett David Baum & Alissa Solom Baum David Barras & Shelley Karp Barras Benji Bearman & Faye Hammer Bearman Aaron Michael Beitner & Marci Iliza (Orman) Beitner Norman Beitner & Ruth Beitner Ann Lipnik Jonathan Alec Baron & Alyse Michele/Bender Baron Mark Berman & Rachel Gordon Berman Martin Jeffrey Berman & Marylin Gottlieb Berman Matthew Binstock & Yaira Singer David Blecker & Norma Shifrin Blecker Saul Blecker & Nina Rabinovitch Blecker Andrew Bloom & Ronda Janowski Bloom Jonathan Scott Bloom & Michelle Emily Weisfelner Bloom Jeff Blum & Cindy Goldfarb Blum Shalom (Steven) Bochner & Orli Loewenberg Martin Bogot & Hadara Skidelsky Bogot Michael Bohnen & Joyce Oppenheim Bohnen Noah Borenstein & Amy Judith Heller Daniel Brandes & Shana Kurlandsky Edward Bromberg & Marian Wolarsky Bromberg Miles P. Bunder & Alida Krovetz Bunder
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C-F Jason A. Cathcart & Vicki Sykes Cathcart Marim D. Charry & Paula Spinrad Charry Alan Lee Cohen & Linda Appel Cohen Amir Cohen & Alysa Gerstley Cohen Arthur Cohen & Julie F. Silverstein Cohen Burton Cohen & Roberta Cheskis Cohen Charles Cohen & Jennifer (Jen) Neufeld Cohen Martin S. Cohen & Joan Freeman Cohen Aron Coleite & Tracy Strauss Coleite Mark Cooper & Amy Skopp Cooper Lawrence Michael Covitt & Melissa Chordock Covitt David Seth Cutler & Rachel Lea Fish Arnie Davidson & Penny Fleishman Davidson Elliot Dorff & Marlynn Wertheimer Dorff Paul S. Drazen & Susie Alpert Drazen Edward Edelstein & Anna Dicker EdelsteinDavid Ehrenkranz & Ilyse Braun Andrew Eisenberger & Jennie Goldress Sholom Eisenstat & Rifka Holtzkener Eisenstat David Englander & Stephanie Levitz Englander Michael Adam Feinberg & Alison Goldstein Feinberg Ed Feinstein & Nina Bieber Feinstein Daniel Felsen & Beth Glass Felsen Scott Forester & Betsy Brown Forester Jeffrey Simeon Fox & Beth Lauren Pepper Aaron Michael Frank & Laura Shaw Frank Joe Freedman & Sue Schwartz Freedman Paul Freedman & Wilma Levinne Freedman Robert (Asher) Freedman & Sharon Center Freedman Gigi Fried & Wendi Alana Portman Hillel Friedman & Betsy Gillman Friedman
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G-H Eric Ganezer & Tamar Skowronski Noah Garfinkel & Dina Goldman Garfinkel Barry Gavarin & Mindy Roth Gavarin Richard Gavatin & Linda Spitzer Gavatin Marshall Gilinsky & Lisa Gertsman Gilinsky Liron Gitig & Diana Marcie Goodman Gitig Craig Gittleman & Stacy Cooper Gittleman Ari Glazer & Stephanie Goldberg Glazer Steve Glazer & Andrea Soff Glazer Bernard (Baruch) Gold & Rananah Kliers Gil S. Goldberg & Cindy Schonbrun Goldberg Jonas Goldberg & Chelly Gilgore Goldberg Marty Goldberg & Sharon Zabitsky Goldberg Michael Goldberg & Sandra Polin Goldberg Steve Golden & Shira Sky Golden Nason Goldstein & Carole Orenstein Goldstein Steve Goldstein & Marlene Noveck Ronald Goss & Michelle "Mimi" Haligman Goss Joshua Gould & Melodye Feldman Israel Moses Gordan & Abby Leah Uhrman Dan Gottstein & Amy Schein Gottstein Ricky Gratz & Sarah Weinberg Gratz Pelleg Graupe & Elizabeth Davis Graupe Jared Green & Barbi Price Green Mark Greenberg & Missy Hecker Greenberg Seth Greenberg & Ilene Spark Greenberg Joshua Greenstein & Carol Goldklang Bill (William) Leigh Gross & Lisa Spertus Gross Daniel Grossberg & Millie Feinberg Grossberg Zave Gussin & Judy Gordon Gussin Jonathan Gutman & Renee Hoffert Gutman Jon Gutstein & Susan Mack Gutstein Richard Hammerman & Sharon Freiberg Hammerman Joshua Hammerman & Mara Aisenberg Hammerman Moti Hanochi & Naomi Stamler Hanochi Noah Hartman & Anna Robinowitz Hartman Michael Hecht & Sheila Diamant Hecht Joshua Henkin & Beth Berkowitz Jonathan Hersch & Julie Lipson Hersch Jon Hoffenberg & Sara Behr Hoffenberg Jeffrey Hoffman & Laurie Mark Hoffman Kenny Hoffman & Janet Andron Hoffman
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I-L Ron Isaacs & Leora Weinstein Isaacs Offer Isseroff & Nava Zwi Isseroff Aaron Jaffe & Claudia Grossman Jaffe Newton (Larry) Jassie & Lois Berman Jassie Alan Kaell & Diana Schachter Kaell David Kalender & Talya Hoffman Kalender Noah David Kalter & Shari Berman Kalter Sylvan Donald Kamens & Rhoda Roth Kamens David N. Kantor & Lynnsie Balk Kantor Liell Karni & Idit Sonnheim Karni Michael Don Katz & Betsy Dolgin Katz Stuart Katz & Marni Smith Katz Matthew Benjamin Kaufman & Robin Lewis Kaufman Stuart Kelman & Vicky Koltun Kelman Jeff Kopin & Beth Ginsburg Kopin Jonathan Kremer & Ellen Helfman Kremer Jerry Kriger & Bea Skolnik Kriger David Krohn & Risa Rosenbaum Krohn Larry Kroll & Jodi Feldman Kroll Josh Menachem Kulp & Julie Beth Zuckerman Simmy Kustanowitz & Ilana Edelman Kustanowitz Judah (Lakritz) Rand-Lakritz & Susan (Rand) Rand-Lakritz Michael Joseph Landau & Faye Andrea Goldman Ira Landman & Ursula Skolnik Landman Michael Laxmeter & Judith Friedlander Laxmeter Allan Lehmann & Joanne Schindler Michael Leifman & Sharon Samber Jonathan L. Levin & Sharon Pearlman Levin James L. Levin & Shira Nadich Levin Sheldon M. Levin & Nita Polay Levin Alan Levine & Barbara Portnoy Levine Micah Liben & Deborah Markowitz Danny Lipnik & Paula Pascoe Lipnik Eli Lipsky & Rinna Hoffman Lipsky Brian Liss & Judy Wendkos Liss Eric Lowe & Jennifer Prottas Lowe Howie Lupovitch & Marni Foster David Jeremy Lyons & Myrna Wedlan Lyons
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M-R Barry L. Magen & Cheryl Skolnick Magen Rick Malter & Rosalie Moss Malter Ivan Marcus & Judy Lefkowitz Marcus Ehud Marcus & Erica Neuman Marcus Yuval Marcus & Liz Horwitz Marcus Mark Marpet & Judy Spevack Marpet Jonny Mars & Abby Andiman Mars Toby (Daniel) Marwil & Ivy Elinoff Marwil Andrew "Coach" Scott Mayer & Marla Weiss Mayer Joseph Martin Menashe & Deborah Ann Musher Sander Mendelson & Adina Newman Mendelson Geoffrey Menkowitz & Elana Genut Menkowitz Daniel J. Merritt & Ruth (Booty) Newlander Merritt Aaron D. Michelson & Rona Mager Michelson Jonathan (formerly David) (former last name: Milgram) Rimon & Wendy Wolman Rimon Etan Milgrom & Deborah BarakYaron Milgrom-Elcott & Miriam Sheinbein Jacob Benjamin Millner & Jaclyn Shoshana (Saad) Millner Daniel H. Mink & Ronna S. Mink Larry Mishkin & Judy Teibloom-Mishkin Daniel ("Dani") Moskowitz & Miriam Wolf Neil Norry & Sharon Singer Seidman Robert Edward Novak & Yael Bauer Novak Richard Panush & Rena Joffe Panush Harry Joseph Pell & Lisa Eiseman Pell Micah Joshua Peltz & Rachel Miriam Zivic Laurence Pepper & Dana Lugend-Pepper Jonathan Petuchowksi & Leslie Yenkin Jeremy Platek & Lisa Resman Platek Stanley Platek & Celia Silverstein Platek Matt Plofsky & Brooke Morrison Plofsky Daniel Prober & Sharon Katz Prober Jeffrey Rabin & Amy Bernstein Rabin Judah (Lakritz) Rand-Lakritz & Susan (Rand) Rand-Lakritz Howard Rebenstock & Amy Gerstel Rebenstock Morry Re'em (Scholick) & Adina Friedman Re'em Barry Reichgott & Alexandra Bloch Jay Reisbaum & Tara Spitz Reisbaum Larry Reiter & Laura Fox Reiter Daniel Relles & Dina Lucas Relles Joel Rembaum & Fredi Breverman Rembaum Sanford Remz & Arlene Rosenkrantz Remz Peter Reynolds & Kathy Rauchwerger Reynolds Jonathan (formerly David) (former last name: Milgram) Rimon & Wendy Wolman Rimon Jonathan Gideon Robins & Leah Kaplan Robins Jason Philip Rogoff & Dara Elizabeth Schatt Scott "Lefty" Rosen & Ann Lesley Hamvas Rosen Joshua Rosenblatt & Rachel Mann Henry Rosenblum & Susan Ticker Jonathan Rosenstein & Edith Korin Rosenstein Adam Ryan Rosenthal & Jami Datnow Rosenthal Allan Michael Rosenthal & Wendy Wish Rosenthal Jeremy Rosenthal & Gwen Shelden Rosenthal David Harris Ross & Lauren Schmidt Ross
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S Jeremy Sacks & Belinda Mason Sacks Ari Saks & Rachel Einhorn Saks Robert J. Saks & Loretta Vitale Saks Eric Salmansohn & Marcia Bronstein Stuart Saposh & Linda Holof-Saposh Joshua Savitz & Naomi Himmel Savitz Larry Schachter & Phyllis Blyweiss Schachter Samuel M. L. Schafler & Sara Rita Edell John Schapiro & Sarah Asekoff Schapiro Andy Schiffmiller & Onnie Lovett Schiffmiller Ron M. Schneidermann & Jenny Sanderson Schneidermann Steven Carl Schoenberger & Louise Malamud Schoenberger Michael Schwab & Erica Gross Schwab Gershon Schwartz & Shuly Rubin Schwartz Ralph Schwartz & Marci Dickman Steven Schwartz & Iris Toker Schwartz Benjamin Segal & Judith Moldavi Segal Eric Segal & Karen Legman Segal Steven Seiden & Aviva Queen Seiden Bruce Allen Bromberg Seltzer & Deborah Tamar Bromberg Seltzer Joel Seltzer & Eliana Katz Seltzer Matthew Seltzer & Stacy Lipschutz Seltzer Saul Shapiro & Miriam Klein Shapiro Howard Scott Shafer & Lisa Kotler Shafer Josh Sharfman & Bonnie Levy Sharfman Chuck Sherman & Leah Hurowitz Sherman David Andrew Sherman & Julie Fishman Sherman Martin B. Sherman & Linda Diane Wallen Giora Shimoni & Lisa Katz Shimoni Andrew Shulkind & Sarah Zimbler Shulkind Ron Shulman & Robin Walzer Shulman Steven Sietz & Ephie Brand Sietz Alan Silberman & Margaret Auslander Silberman Judah Silverman & Margo Lightstone Silverman Israel Nathan Silverman & Gloria Sussman Silverman Bruce A. Sklover & Tamar Rader Sklover Michael Joseph Small & Sheila Berk Small Mark Snowise & Elisa Cook Snowise Jeremy N. Sokolic & Sarah Rubin Sokolic Ross Sommers & Hadas Bonnie Sommers Todd Sone & Shawna Goodman Sone Jeffrey Sosland & Mindy Weisenberg Sosland Philip P. Spectre & Barbara Lerner Spectre Daniel Spevack & Liz Arnold Spevack Harold Spevack & Harriet Greenfader Spevack Randy E. Spiegel & Debbie Krohn Spiegel Mark Spillman & Leslie Neuman Spillman Alex Stern & Sandi Arnowitz Stern Morton Steinberg & Miriam Bernstein Steinberg Loren Sykes & Rebecca Kaplan Sykes Marc Swatez and Elise Rice Swatez
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T-Z Howard Tamler & Nechama "Nancy" Imberman Tamler Bradley C. Tecktiel & Susan Fay Mayer Tecktiel Adam Joseph Titcher & Galia Daniel Jeffrey Tigay & Helene Zubkoff Tigay Moshe Tutnauer & Margie Weingarden Tutnauer Joseph Vander Walde & Joan Gimpel Vander Walde Daniel Varon & Stacy Krasner Varon Michael Victor Varon & Sepi Farivar Varon Dov Vogel & Gila Stamler Vogel Greg Wagner & Ilyse Reiter Wagner Barry Warren & Ruth Perlmutter Warren Michael Weiner & Lisa Shiner Weiner Eric Weinstein & Sarah Klagsbrun Baruch Weiss & Laura Blumenfeld Stephen (Steve) Weiss & Anne (Chana) Weinstein Weiss Irving Samuel White & Joan Kornbluth White Geoff Winston & Zip Benjamin Winston Moshe Ari Witztum & Elizabeth Komsky Witztum Carl Wolkin & Judy Rosenberg Wolkin Scott Wohlstetter & Robin Fox Wohlstetter Jonathan Woocher & Sherry Fleisher Woocher Eric Scott Yanoff & Dava Wiener Yanoff Matthew Louis Zerden & Lisa de Saxe Zerden David Zisenwine & Anne Brickman Zisenwine Sandy E. Zisser & Ann Lipshie Zisser Wallace Zuckerman & Deborah Cohen Zuckerman Daniel Zur & Briana Binstock Zur
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Ivan Marcus & Judy Lefkowitz Marcus Camps Attended: Connecticut, Nyack, Berkshires Met: 1958 Married: 1964 |
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Dan & Ruth Krasner Camp Attended: Berkshires (formerly Nyack) Year Met: 1960 Year Married: 1964 |
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Jonathan Woocher & Sherry Fleisher Woocher Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1965 Married: 1968 |
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Michael Laxmeter & Judith Friedlander Laxmeter Meeting at Ramah made it much easier to get to know each and come to love each other. We were engaged five weeks after meeting each other at Ramah - since we spent every day together - unlike in the city where you cannot do that on a regular basis. Camp provided the environment of an exclusive "city" in its own right. The rest is history! |
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Harriet Greenfader Spevack & Harold Spevack Married: 1967 Ramah is an ideal place for one to meet a spouse. Our son Daniel also met his wife Liz at Ramah in the Berkshires (see story and photo below). The people who attend or work at the camp already have a common value system. Jewish identity, worship and the importance of Eretz Yisrael are a central part of those affiliated with the camp. Common backgrounds make relationships easier and provide a good foundation upon which to build. Meeting in a relaxed atmosphere, away from the stilted and strained dating scene, enables young people to develop deep, lasting and meaningful relationships. Many of our best friends are still our camp friends from thirty-five years ago. Having a best friend for a spouse is a blessing. |
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Carl Wolkin & Judy Lynne Rosenberg Wolkin Judy and I were counselors in Edah Gimel where Shacharit services took place in a circle. Our eyes met one day, and one thing led to another. She wore big sunglasses, but I guess I could see through them to the person behind. As it happened (and I am not terribly proud of this fact) I had arranged for my then girl friend to come and work at camp, but on July 8 after spending an entire night sitting (that was all) by the lake and talking, I decided that my future was with Judy. Judy was an undergrad at Buffalo and I at Columbia and JTS Rabbinical School bound. Judy was in the first graduating class of the Hebrew Academy of Nassau County. I went to an afternoon Hebrew School at Temple Adath Yeshurun in Syracuse. I grew up in a non-observant home, she in a very observant one. Only in the wonderful Jewish atmosphere of Ramah could our relationship have flourished. Even after 36 plus years of love, I still believe it was bashert, as this poem Judy gave me shortly after we fell in love suggests:
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Sharon Pearlman Levin & Jonathan L. Levin Jonathan (then called "Yoni") was a graduate of the Mador Program at Poconos and was assigned (against his wishes, since he was a Poconos camper) to Berkshires. Sharon had been a madricha the year before at Berkshires and, though a year younger than Jonathan, was a seasoned second-year madricha. On the first day of staff week, the rosh edah convened a meeting of Machaneh Alef madrichim in Jonathan's bunk. Jonathan spotted this cute redhead, though he wasn't sure about a madricha who had never been a Madornik. Sharon accidentally left her raincoat in the bunk after the meeting. Jonathan saw that as a sign and determined to return the coat chivalrously that evening at the Shabbat dance. As Jonathan was about to lose his nerve to approach Sharon with the coat, she came up to him and convinced him to join her in the "yesh lanu tayish" line dance. That was their first night as a Ramah couple, and they continue to think of themselves that way. Their two children both attended Ramah (New England and Poconos), and they hope that their grandchildren (one now 7 months and one on the way) also will someday. Sharon and Jonathan celebrated their 35th wedding anniversary on June 25, 2005. |
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Jerry Kriger & Bea Skolnik Kriger
Camp Attended: Berkshires Married: 1971 I met Jerry my very first day at Ramah, the week before the campers arrived. The rest is history. In addition to my having met Jerry, we still count the people we met at camp among our closest friends, even with having made aliyah to Israel 27 years ago. |
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Eric Segal & Karen Legman Segal |
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Susan Ticker & Henry Rosenblum
Camp Attended: Berkshires Married: 1976 We met when she was taking Senior Life Saving. I was her victim but she was afraid to come in and save me. She said I was too big for her and we had taught kids never to put their own lives in danger. She failed the course but years later we re-met when I was the Hazzan of her parents' shul and was training her youngest brother for Bar Mitzvah. I guess we turned out to be compatible after all. |
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Shira Nadich Levin & James L. Levin
Camp Attended: Berkshires Married: 1973 Spent the summer of 1969 at camp (1st year on staff for both of us). We became very close friends - and developed a wonderful circle of friends. Within about 2 years we began to go out and were married in 1973 when we graduated college. |
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Sam Fraint & Deena Segal We met over dinner in the chadar ochel during staff week. It turned out that Deena was friends with a girl I had known in USY and I sat down, ostensibly with her, and impressed Deena by making the other girl laugh throughout dinner. Apparently, she was known among her friends as a sourpuss, so Deena grossly over-estimated my powers of humor. That night Deena was asked out by my best friend. He wanted to get her ice cream at the Red Rooster, 19 miles outside of camp on Rt. 22. He had no car and I had my father’s, which I was forbidden to loan to anyone, so I volunteered to drive them (and another friend who managed to worm his way into what had been a threesome.) At the Red Rooster I noticed that Deena, who was and is quite thin, was shivering from the cold. In an inspired moment in which my synapses became entangled with those of an entirely different person, I offered her something warm. She gratefully accepted my smelly old Levi's jacket, my most prized possession. On the way back to camp, I got a flat tire right outside a rowdy bar (now, I believe, a church). Drunken townies were everywhere and the fourth member of our foursome decided to treat the flat as an opportunity to imitate Mario Andretti's pit crew at Indy and change the thing within a minute or two. An hour later we were still there, my best friend was oily and cranky from the tire, and Deena was my girlfriend. |
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Kenny Hoffman & Janet Andron Hoffman |
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Jeremy Platek & Lisa Resman Platek Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1975 Married: 1990 Lisa and I actually met in college but learned early on that we had both been Ramah campers the same years and during two years of Nitzanim, had been in the same edah together (she was a munchkin, I was the cowardly lion). It apparently was meant to be. |
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Baruch Weiss & Laura Blumenfeld I met Laura at the Berkshires in 1975, when she was 11 and I was 18. I was her swimming instructor and made a very, very big mistake – I failed her. Not a smart thing to fail the woman you will marry 22 years later, especially when it turns out that she is the author of a book entitled Revenge. |
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Stuart Saposh & Linda Holof-Saposh Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1976 Married: 1977 |
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Steve Goldstein & Marlene Noveck Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1977 Married: 1993 |
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Howard Rebenstock & Amy Gerstel Rebenstock Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1977 Married: 2003 |
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Larry Kroll & Jodi Feldman Kroll
Camp Attended: Berkshires We met in 1978 as campers. We had an amazingly close edah that kept in touch and saw each other often throughout the years. We were close friends and kept in touch throughout college. Larry would often visit me at Tulane during Mardi Gras with some other camp friends. Our third year on staff, we started dating and realized fairly quickly that we would be together for the rest of our lives. We married in 1991 and recently celebrated our 14th anniversary! We are so thankful to Ramah for bringing us together and for the amazing friends who are still such a large part of our lives. Our 3 daughters Hillary, Rachel and Emma have all had the opportunity to visit Ramah where "Mommy and Daddy met." BACK TO TOP |
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Jeremy
Sacks & Belinda Mason Sacks Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1982 Married: 1992 BACK TO TOP |
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Jeremy N. Sokolic & Sarah Rubin Sokolic Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1982 Married: 1997 BACK TO TOP |
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Ira Landman & Ursula Skolnik Landman Camp Attended: Berkshires Year Met: 1983 Year Married: 1991 We met at USY encampment during tallis making. We both have enjoyed each other's company ever since - and hope that our children will go to a similar camp program at Ramah. BACK TO TOP |
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Naomi Himmel Savitz & Joshua Savitz
Camp Attended: Berkshires Although we first met one another in Shorashim (11 years old), it wasn't until we both returned to Camp on staff in 1989 (17 years old) that we started to date. I vividly remember watching Josh play softball, turning to a friend and saying, "I'm going to marry that guy." Little did I know it would really end up that way. We dated long distance for the next 6 years and were married in December 1995. This December marks our ten-year wedding anniversary. At Camp Ramah Berkshires I found my best friend, the love of my life and the greatest father for our two children, Ariella (5 1/2) and Nate (1 1/2). We have returned to Camp several times for alumni weekend and sit on the fundraising committee of the alumni association. Our daughter anxiously waits until she is old enough to go to the camp "where Ima and Abba met." |
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David Ehrenkranz & Ilyse Braun During staff week I was playing ultimate frisbee and I misthrew the frisbee and it landed near Ilyse...when I went to pick the frisbee up....we fell in love. |
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Larry
Reiter & Laura Fox Reiter We met as campers when Larry was in Gesher and I was in Machon. We were just friends then and did not begin dating until after we had graduated from college. But, like all Ramah relationships, we kept in touch and would see each other at reunions, college and parties. There is just something about the Ramah connection. Our wedding had a bunch of Ramahniks in attendance and we had 4 ushers and 4 bridesmaids who also attended Ramah (some siblings included...). |
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Craig Gittleman & Stacy Cooper Gittleman Camp Attended: Berkshires Year Met: 1985 Year Married: 1994 |
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Alex Stern & Sandi Arnowitz Stern
Camp Attended: Berkshires I had been at Ramah since Shorashim, but Solelim was Sandi's first summer. Never one to be shy, on her first day at Ramah, Sandi essentially threw her duffle bag on her bunk bed (the same duffle that I would be schlepping across Israel on Ramah Seminar), made two quick girlfriends and headed for the boys' kikar to introduce herself. We've been best friends ever since. Summer after summer we both returned to Ramah, and winter after winter we ran up our parents' phone bills. Even though we did not start dating until the summer of 1990, when we were on staff, we both have several remembrances of times where we began to know that we were more than friends. We were married in 1996, surrounded by all of our Ramah friends (many of whom played a pivotal role in the ceremony). We now have two beautiful daughters, Jessie and Abby. We can't wait until they go to Camp Ramah with the children of all of our best friends. |
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Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1985 Married: 2001 We first met when I was a counselor in Marcy's edah in 1985. We reconnected in 1996 when we were both living in New York City and were active in Ramah alumni events and social gatherings. We began dating in 1999 after spending some time together at Ramah over Labor Day weekend. We were married in 2001. |
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Aaron Michael Frank &
Laura Shaw Frank
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Attended: Berkshires Aaron and I met and became good friends on Ulpan Ramah Plus. He went to CES-JDS in Rockville, MD and I went to Solomon Schechter in NJ. Because of URP, Aaron came to work at Ramah Berkshires together with all his new Schechter friends. Our friendship grew and grew, and finally, right after Aaron's second summer as a rosh edah, we started dating! Our wedding was a Ramah fiesta, complete with a kayak "borrowed" by our friends from the Berkshires agam, and a huge sign saying "Ramah's Other Season"! |
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Eric Weinstein & Sarah Klagsbrun Camp Attended: Berkshires Year Met: 1987 Year Married: 1995 I’d worked the previous summer as rosh mayim at Camp Ramah in the Berkshires and returned for a day’s visit. I noticed Sarah Klagsbrun—a first-year instructor whom I’d remembered vaguely from when she was a camper—and made a mental note of the wide smile (and yes, the red bathing suit). Maybe things are different in Wisconsin or Georgia, but there weren’t too many blonde-haired, green-eyed Jewish women where I’m from.
Six years later, I was with two Ramah friends when one mentioned that he’d once gone on a date with Sarah, but she was too busy with medical school and didn’t seem interested. I thought I’d try. So I asked Richie Friedman, who knows everyone, to get me her number. In hindsight, I probably could have contacted Sarah’s parents, who are another Ramah couple (Poconos).
I called Sarah and asked her on a date. It was the night before her anatomy exam, but actually my timing was good. She and her roommate had just been calling out for their basherts during a study break.
Six months later, we were engaged at camp. Berkshires used to have a pre-season “day in the country” for alumni. I asked my old waterfront buddy, Mark Neustadt, to park a boat with the ring in it by “the rock” across the lake. I nervously swam out with Sarah, we got into the boat, and I returned home with my fiancée.
Now we have Eliana, a third-grader at Solomon Schechter School of Manhattan who just spent a week in Ta’am Ramah and is returning next year. There’s Benji (1st grade), whose good buddy at Nyack is Gabe Gerstel, whose dad Jon I met on my first day as a camper there when we were 8. And there’s Ari (7 months). I'm on the Berkshires Committee, overseeing facilities. I swim out to that rock every time I can.
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Michael Leifman & Sharon Samber
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Attended: Berkshires |
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Jennie Goldress & Andrew Eisenberger
Camp Attended: Berkshires Married: 1996 We sang Rad Hayom at the end of our wedding with all of our camp friends linked arm in arm.BACK TO TOP |
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John
Schapiro & Sarah Asekoff Schapiro We met while I was a JC and John was an AA. We "went out" for three long days and then broke up. We did not speak for the rest of the summer. Since John worked in the mail room, I always made the campers get the mail and toilet paper so that I would not have to see John. The next year we were assigned to work in the same edah (Joan Tannenbaum was our rosh). We started to go out again that summer of 1990. We dated all through college, got engaged in 1995, and married in 1996. We had many Ramahniks at our wedding, & Ramah was even mentioned during our wedding ceremony. John and I are now the proud parents of a beautiful 3 year-old girl named Grace Elizabeth (Liba Neshamah). BACK TO TOP |
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Liron Gitig & Diana Marcie Goodman Gitig
Camp Attended: Berkshires Married: 1994 |
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Andrew Bloom & Ronda Janowski Bloom Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1991 Married: 2000 |
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Daniel Spevack & Liz Arnold Spevack Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1990 Married: 1996 Little did I know that one day, Harriet Spevack, Rosh Mayim, and Harold Spevack, Rosh Teva (see their story above), would be my mother and father-in-law! |
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Our Ramah story really begins in Ramah Nyack, where Dan was a staff brat and I was a camper. It wasn't until years later that Dan and I officially met at Berkshires in 1990 during staff week. Though the exact location of our first meeting remains in dispute (I say chadar ochel, Dan says A-side igul), it was clear that it was the start of something special. We were married in October 1996 amidst lots of camp friends (and even some Amos Moses dancing!). We now have two boys, Eytan (Gesher 2018) and Noam (Gesher 2020), who love spending Labor Day at camp. |
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Michelle Emily Weisfelner Bloom & Jonathan Scott Bloom
Camp Attended: Berkshires Married: 2003 We met when we were 15 years old and both campers in Machon. Jonathan had been there for many years but it was my first summer. Although we were not originally close friends, we always remained in touch through mutual Ramah friends until the summer of 1995. Jonathan was on staff that summer and I came up for the night to see my sister's Bogrim play. We reconnected and started dating at the end of that summer. Though we spent some time apart in college, we began dating again on New Years Eve 2000. The rest is history. There must be something magical in the air there. If not, how could you explain how so many of us found not only love, but lifelong friendships there, that span well beyond our years as campers and into adulthood. |
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Camp Attended: Berkshires Married: 1995 We had actually met and dated briefly three years earlier in USY, but had completely lost touch until the summer of 1993. Ben knew I was going to be there because his father had the staff list before the summer began. I, however, was surprised to see him there. We spent the first day of staff week together talking and by the 4th of July we knew we would spend the rest of our lives together.BACK TO TOP |
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David Englander & Stephanie Levitz Englander Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1993 Married: 1997 Well, it depends who you ask but it all started on the bridge connecting A-side to B-side. Ramah changed both of our lives forever! After meeting for the second time (the first was when our younger sisters shared a bunk bed in their Machon summer), we had a lot of fun working together as staff members. One cold February night, we drove up to camp and David proposed right at the lamb and the wolf. We can't wait for our daughter Yaffa and our two sons Zev and Ayal to experience Ramah! |
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Harry Joseph Pell & Lisa Eiseman Pell Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1993 Married: 2001 |
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Lawrence Michael Covitt & Melissa Chordock Covitt Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1993 Married: 2003 |
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Yuval Marcus & Liz Horwitz Marcus Camp Attended: Berkshires Year Met: 1993 Year Married: 1995 We met at a Berkshires alumni reunion. Yuval had been a camper and staff member at Berkshires and Nyack. I attended with a group of friends. |
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Noah Borenstein & Amy Judith Heller
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Howard Scott Shafer & Lisa Kotler Shafer Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1994 Married: 1995 Howard and I met through Danny Perla, a mutual friend and Ramah Berkshires alumni. Danny wanted to set us up in August 1994. I told him that I was quite busy with my work as an intern at Mt. Sinai and I was planning to attend the Ramah Labor Day Weekend with my friend Elaine Lewis. Danny told me that Howard was also going to attend the reunion and that is where we met. Although it was not love at first sight, I think that the similarities in our backgrounds including attending Ramah and being involved in USY ultimately brought us together. We did not know each other in camp, but both attended in 1979 and 1980 and had many friends in common. My Solelim counselor, Liz Wallach, is the sister of Howard's good friend Adam Wallach. BACK TO TOP |
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Dan Gottstein & Amy Schein Gottstein Camp Attended: Berkshires, Wisconsin Year Met: 1994 Year Married: 1999 I attended Berkshires but Dan is actually a Ramah Wisconsin alumni. We met at college through Wisconsin friends I had met on my Seminar trip. We live in Chicago now but I still plan on sending our two sons Owen (3 1/2) and Micah (2 months) to Berkshires. |
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Joshua Rosenblatt & Rachel Mann
Camp Attended: Berkshires Married: 1999 We met during a staff week peulat erev, "Win Lose, or Draw." Josh disappointed the team by being an omanut counselor who couldn't draw. But Rachel didn't mind being on the losing team. By the time the campers arrived, we both knew that it would be a summer unlike any other. |
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Jason Philip Rogoff &
Dara Elizabeth Schatt |
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Jeffrey Arnowitz & Tamar Brendzel Arnowitz Camp Attended: Berkshires--Staff Met: 1995 Married: 1999 We met during our summer as counselors in Cohavim. We immediately hit it off, but only started dating during the last two weeks of camp. Little did we know that those two weeks would turn into a lifetime. The ideals and values that brought us to Ramah provided a great starting point for a marriage that lives with those same values. We love Ramah and can't wait to send our children. BACK TO TOP |
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Joshua Henkin & Beth Berkowitz
Camp Attended: Berkshires Married: 2002 We did not actually meet at camp. Josh was a counselor in my sister's edah, so when we ran into each other years later we knew who the other was from our mutual Ramah history. |
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Simmy Kustanowitz & Ilana Edelman Kustanowitz Camp Attended: Berkshires Met: 1997 Married: 2003 Ilana and I sort of knew each other when we were campers at Ramah in the Berkshires, but I was an edah older than she and we didn’t really become friends until we worked together on staff in 1997. From day one of Staff Week ‘97, Lani and I clicked in an amazing way. Within days, we were confiding in each other, sharing childhood stories, and simply enjoying every minute we spent together. We quickly became the best of friends, and that friendship only intensified as we worked together the following summer, as counselors for Gesher ’98. In ’99 we both worked in camp yet again, Lani in Gesher and me as JC Advisor. We were still platonic friends, but everything was about to change. In February 2000, we decided that we were finally ready to give this a shot. Our big, seemingly-risky decision began a journey that led to our engagement in 2002, our beautiful wedding in 2003, and countless incredible moments along the way. We’ve also made plenty of trips to Ramah to revisit all of our memories – those we created through twenty-two combined years in Wingdale – both independently and with each other. Lani and I often find ourselves thanking Ramah in the Berkshires for helping to shape who we are today. Many of our friendships, memories and positive personality traits were developed and nurtured within that small piece of land between Bet Am Bet and the marp. And yet with so much to be thankful for, we’ll never forget the most important part Ramah played in our life – it brought us together. |
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Camp Attended: Berkshires Year Met: 1998 Year Married: 1999 We met at the Camp Ramah Berkshires Memorial Day singles weekend, 1998. For me, Ted, it was love at first sight. At Oneg Shabbat, I saw her across the room. Her presence, her joy reached me, and I said to myself, "That's the kind of woman I want to marry!" For Judy, it took a few more months of courtship before she said, "That's the kind of man I want to marry!" We have now passed our 8th wedding anniversary, have a girl, Korina, 6, a boy, Daniel, 4, and our dog, Bashert, 11 (or as Judy tells people, her first Bashert!). |
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Ehud Marcus & Erica Neuman Marcus Camp Attended: Berkshires Year Met: 1999 Year Married: 2003 |
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Steven Seiden & Aviva Queen Seiden Camp Attended: Berkshires Year Met: 2000 Year Married: 2005 |
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Ari
Ungar & Rebecca Tobin |
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Mark Berman & Rachel Gordon Berman Although we didn't start dating until the summer of 2004 while living in New York City, we really go way back to 1982 when we were at the same elementary school. We didn't really know each other back then, but it was a beginning, as was our high school, day camp, and Camp Ramah. For us, Ramah was the most important link and we have so much fun sharing stories from our years there and going back to visit our special places, especially where we got engaged—the madregot. |
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Rafi Cohen & Michele Weber Met at Berkshires, Attended Poconos and New England Year Met: 2005 Year Married: 2006 We met on the Upper West Side of Manhattan the first time and were reintroduced at Ramah Berkshires at the Kehilat Hadar Shavuot Retreat. We are alumni of Poconos and New England. |
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Howard Tamler & Nechama "Nancy" Imberman Tamler Camp Attended: California Met: 1961 Married: 1967 |
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Joel
Rembaum & Fredi Breverman Rembaum
Fredi: I drove to Ramah that summer with my rabbi's family (from Phoenix), Moshe and Margie Tutnauer and their boys. The summer before was my first summer ever at Ramah, when at age 16, I was in Machon. It was such a great Jewish experience for me that it didn't take much convincing to get my parents to okay my going back as a counselor in training, called then The Ozrim program, but my mother cautioned me to "not fall in love with a rabbi." That first Friday night during staff week when I was sitting with the Tutnauers, one of Moshe's students from the Mador program three years prior, came to sit next to us so that Moshe would introduce us. He was a rosh edah so I was very impressed. He later claimed he had an "in" with Moshe and was eager to meet the new girl, a blonde from Phoenix. We talked for hours that night and by the end of the summer, we were in love. I called my mom to tell her I had met this great guy, who was a rabbinical student, and my mom said, "I told you not to fall in love with a rabbi!" That was the beginning of a lifetime of connection with Ramah for us, our four children who grew up at Ramah and our first grandchild who attended Gesher last summer.
Joel:
We met at Seudah
Shlisheet during staff week at Ramah in California in Summer 1963.
Fredi’s experience at camp had begun the previous summer, when she was a
Machon camper. In ’63 she worked as a CIT. Joel was among the pioneering
campers at Ramah California during the years 1955-59. Following a summer
in the Ramah National Mador (in Ramah Poconos) in 1960, Joel returned to
California and served as a counselor in 1961-62, and became a rosh edah
in 1963. In the days that followed that first meeting on Shabbat, the
"chemistry" worked and we became an "item." Fredi was entering her
senior year in high school and Joel his senior year in college, so our
relationship raised a few eyebrows. In fact we are less than three years
apart in age, but, as we all know, at that point in one's life, where
one is in school makes all the difference – except for us. In fact, we
had much in common. Both of our families were active in Conservative
shuls (Fredi at Beth El in |
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Ralph
Dalin & Hedy Loeb Dalin We met at age 12 in Edah Gimmel and were together at Ramah again the following summer. On the Shabbat following our wedding, we celebrated Sheva Brakhot back at Ramah in Ojai. BACK TO TOP |
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Allan Michael Rosenthal & Wendy Wish Rosenthal Camp Attended: California Met: 1965 Married: 1973 I began attending Ramah in 1961. I was a camper for 4 years, and I have been on staff for 36 years. My husband, Allan, and I met and dated for around a week when I was 16 and he was 19. We then attended different colleges and re-met when I was a rosh edah and he came to visit camp the summer of 1971. After our three children were born, I went back to camp on staff from 1983 to the present. Our children were raised at Ramah California, and they in turn were on Ramah's staff. Our oldest son, Jeremy, met his wife, Gwen Shelden, in 1997 when they were both rosh edot. Our second son, Adam, met his wife, Jami Datnow, when they were Nitzanim campers in 1988. They attended camp together in every edah for the next nine years as campers and on staff. They became serious in 1997 when they both were counselors in Ramah's special needs edah. Our daughter, Lindsey, was a camper and a staff member as well. She lives in New York City, and would love to re-meet a fellow Ramahnik from Ramah in California. BACK TO TOP |
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David Elcott & Shira Milgrom
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Nina Bieber Feinstein & Ed Feinstein
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Kathy Rauchwerger Reynolds & Peter Reynolds
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Etan Milgrom & Deborah BarakCamp: CaliforniaYear Met: 1973Year Married: 1978 |
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Andrew "Coach" Scott Mayer & Marla Weiss MayerCamp: CaliforniaYear Met: 1973Year Married: 1993 |
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Ron Shulman & Robin Walzer ShulmanCamp: CaliforniaYear Met: 1976Year Married: 1980 |
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Jeffrey Rabin & Amy Bernstein Rabin
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Josh Sharfman & Bonnie Levy Sharfman
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Tara Spitz Reisbaum &
Jay Reisbaum
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Gil S. Goldberg &
Cindy Schonbrun Goldberg |
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Mark Spillman & Leslie Neuman
Spillman |
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Ronald Goss & Michelle "Mimi" Haligman Goss Camp Attended: California Met: 1983 Married: 1985 |
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Steven Schwartz & Iris Toker Schwartz Camp Attended: California Met: 1983 Married: 1986 We were introduced by a mutual friend during the summer of 1983. |
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Greg Wagner & Ilyse
Reiter Wagner |
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Matthew Benjamin Kaufman & Robin Lewis Kaufman Camp Attended: California Met: 1983 Married: 2004 We were apparently in Gesher (8 years old) and Sollelim together, but didn't meet or become friends until our Machon year. I noticed Matthew because he always volunteered to lead morning services and read Torah. He is a beautiful singer, and I admired him for his intelligence, interest in Judaism, and guts for standing in front of a bleary-eyed edah and chanting every morning! I had a secret crush on him, but was too shy to say anything, so he never knew. After Machon - back at home - I invited him to my Sweet 16 birthday party, and he came (his mother had to drive him)! We barely stayed in touch after that; only a few emails and phone calls were exchanged through college. At age 26, in 2001, he looked me up and asked if I would be his date to a party. I agreed. We were engaged in 2003, and married in 2004. We attended the 50 Year Reunion in Ojai in December of 2006. It was beautiful. We held hands and kissed for the first time at camp. |
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Jonathan Alec Baron & Alyse Michele/Bender
Baron
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Miriam Wolf & Daniel ("Dani") Moskowitz
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Michael Abrams & Tami Kagan-Abrams
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Jami Datnow Rosenthal & Adam Ryan Rosenthal When we first met, we were nine years old - in Nitzanim. We were friends and pen pals for years, and had crushes on each other off and on.... Years later, when we were in college, we returned to Camp as Tikvah (now Amitzim) counselors, fell in love and have not been apart since. We had a long-distance relationship for three years of college, then moved to be near each other in the Bay Area when we graduated. We got married a few years later. Rabbi Reuven Taff, whom we have known for years from Ramah (he was Rosh Musikah), officiated at our wedding and there were many fellow Ramahniks there to celebrate with us. In fact, many of our best friends are people we met at Ramah. Clearly, Ramah holds a very special place for us... it has always been a major part of both of our lives, and always will be. (See also Allan & Wendy Rosenthal.) |
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Moshe Ari Witztum & Elizabeth Komsky Witztum Camp Attended: California Year Met: 1989 Year Married: 1999 Micky and I dated the year he went to Israel with Meritz, while I was back at camp. (We were friends a year earlier). When he returned from Israel, we had a long-distance relationship for a while. We decided the distance was too difficult and remained close friends for many years. When I graduated college, I moved back to Southern California and we started dating again. At our wedding day, I presented him a photo of us that was taken in 1989 on the hill, and he had a friendship bracelet I made for him pinned to the inside of his tuxedo. |
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Abby Andiman Mars & Jonny Mars
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Aron Coleite & Tracy Strauss Coleite
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Matthew Benjamin Kaufman & Robin Lewis Kaufman Camp Attended: California Year Met: 1991 Year Married: 2004 We were apparently in Gesher (8 years old) and Sollelim together, but didn't meet or become friends until our Machon year. I noticed Matthew because he always volunteered to lead morning services and read Torah. He is a beautiful singer, and I admired him for his intelligence, interest in Judaism, and guts for standing in front of a bleary-eyed edah and chanting every morning! I had a secret crush on him, but was too shy to say anything, so he never knew. After Machon - back at home - I invited him to my Sweet 16 birthday party, and he came (his mother had to drive him)! We barely stayed in touch after that; only a few emails and phone calls were exchanged through college. At age 26, in 2001, he looked me up and asked if I would be his date to a party. I agreed. We were engaged in 2003, and married in 2004. We attended the 50 Year Reunion in Ojai in December of 2006. It was beautiful. We held hands and kissed for the first time at camp. |
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Eric Lowe & Jennifer Prottas Lowe Camp Attended: California Year Met: 1992 Year Married: 1996 We were both working on a Ramah weekend. I had been a camper and staff (including summers) for years, and Eric had worked Hebrew high weekends as staff. We had a mutual friend who said we should meet, and another friend who introduced us up at camp. We flirted all weekend :) and as a joke said we should get married! When I got home and told my friend that I was going to marry this guy, he said "I guess that means you want his phone number!" We talked occasionally and lost touch..... about 6 months later I found his number, called again, we met up... and we've been together ever since. We are about to celebrate our 11th wedding anniversary, and we are taking our kids for the Chevrei Ramah alumni weekend in August. We are excited to introduce them to Ramah experience! |
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Lauren Schmidt Ross & David Harris Ross
Camp Attended: California Married: 2003
A Ramah Union
David Ross and Lauren Schmidt met for the first time in Los Angeles in May 2000. Or at least, the couple is pretty sure that was the first time. Raised in Palos Verdes Estates, David was an active member of United Synagogue Youth since his early childhood, and spent every summer at Camp Ramah in Ojai, first as a camper and then as a staff member. Little did he know that his future wife slept only a few bunks away during those summers at Ramah. Lauren grew up in Austin, Texas, and was involved with Young Judaea and various Jewish summer camps. In the summers of 1992 and 1993, Lauren traveled west to work as a counselor at Camp Ramah. Despite spending summers at the same camp and sharing a passion for music, Lauren and David knew that they must have interacted as staff together at camp but did not remember meeting each other when their paths crossed again through a mutual friend in 2000. "It’s almost impossible that we never even said ‘Hello’ through two entire summers at camp," David said. "But we really didn’t remember each other at all." Although they sensed a connection, Lauren still lived in Austin, and 2,000 miles was enough to dissuade David from pursuing a relationship. "I remember telling my friends, ‘Too bad she lives in Texas,’" David said. "I thought we really hit it off, so the distance was pretty disappointing." David’s disappointment soon turned to excitement when he traveled to Texas with his band, Milot Ha’Nefesh, to open for musician David Broza at Young Judaea’s 50th anniversary celebration in April 2002. Lauren watched, then met David and his band. Even though they barely remembered each other, sparks flew and, three weeks later, David was in Austin meeting Lauren’s family. After a 10-month long-distance relationship, Lauren packed her bags and moved to Los Angeles in February 2003. Only two months after her move, Lauren found more than matzah in the afikoman bag on the second night of Passover: David had hidden an engagement ring among the broken crumbs. |
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"Then I got down on one knee, and she said yes," David said. "It worked out well. We had been joking about wedding lists after we were together for three weeks, so it didn’t really surprise either of us."
The couple currently lives in the Pico-Robertson area and is strongly involved in the Jewish community. Lauren, a graduate of the University of Kansas with a master’s degree in social work from the University of Texas, is an LCSW and school therapist in Santa Monica. David, who graduated from UC Berkeley with a bachelor’s degree in music composition, works as a theater and music director at Temple Emanuel in Beverly Hills. They were married on Nov. 2, 2003, at Camp Ramah. |
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"It’s a little bit like ‘When Harry Met Sally,’" David said. "Their paths had crossed several times over 10 years, but nothing happened. The same was true with us — it just proves to us that it was meant to be." |
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Michael Adam Feinberg & Alison Goldstein Feinberg
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Ron M. Schneidermann & Jenny Sanderson
Schneidermann
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Israel Moses Gordan & Abby Leah Uhrman Camp Attended: California Year Met: 1994 Year Married: 2006 Abby and I first met in the summer of 1994 when we were both in Machon for the whole summer. Although we had both gone to camp before, I had always been first session and she was second. We then staffed together in 1996 and 1997 and were friendly, but it wasn't until we were Rashei Edah together in 2001 that we really became friends. At the end of the summer of 2002 we started dating and married four years late on 8/6/06. Ramah absolutely brought us together and we're both big fans of the institution! |
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Matthew Louis Zerden &
Lisa de Saxe Zerden
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Jeremy Rosenthal & Gwen Shelden Rosenthal Camp Attended: California Year Met: 1998 Year Married: 2000 |
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Daniel Varon & Stacy Krasner Varon |
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Deborah Ann
Musher & Joseph Martin Menashe |
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Michael
Victor Varon & Sepi Farivar Varon |
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Yaron Milgrom-Elcott & Miriam Sheinbein |
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Adam Joseph Titcher & Galia Daniel Camp Attended: California Year Met: 2003 Year Married: 2008 Galia and Adam first met when she was a member of a shlichut to Ojai in Summer 2003. They became closer friends upon her return summer in 2004, but it was not until Adam was studying for the year in Jerusalem (2004-05) that the two started to date. They maintained a very strong relationship across the world, Los Angeles, and Jerusalem for three years. Camp Ramah brought them together and provided the opportunity to know one another because otherwise they may never have met. |
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Paul Freedman & Wilma Levinne Freedman Camp Attended: Canada Year Met: 1960 Year Married: 1968 Met as campers in 1960, started going out in 1964 and married in the spring of 1968 returning as a couple that year. |
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Alan Lee Cohen & Linda Appel Cohen Camp Attended: Canada Met: 1968 Married: 1970 We met at Ramah in Canada in 1968, where we were both madrichim. After a year of long distance communication (no e-mails then) while Linda completed her degree at York University in Toronto and Alan was at JTS Rabbinical School, Linda moved to New York. We married in June 1970 and three days later were at Ramah in Canada for the summer. What a honeymoon! Our children attended Ramah in New England, Wisconsin and Darom. Our futures were decided at Ramah and we hope our grandchildren will be the next generation to attend Ramah. BACK TO TOP |
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Shimon Steve Albert Arbel & Josie Zaldin Arbel Camp Attended: Canada Year Met: 1969 Year Married: 1979 We met early in the summer of 1969 (my first summer at Ramah - Shimon had been going for a few years) when the Women's League were visiting and 2 senior (it was called Machon then) campers were chosen to speak to them. We were "just friends" for a long time, with mutual friends, in USY & seeing each other at ECRUSY events (I'm from Toronto, Shimon's from Hamilton) but we were not a couple. Shimon moved to Israel in the summer of 1973, and on a visit back to Canada in winter of 1976, bored because he had lost touch with people, looked me up. At the time, I was studying in Boston but was home in Toronto on winter break. We stayed in touch between Jerusalem and Boston, and got married in December 1979. We made aliyah in August 1984. We have three children. Rena was a Jewish Agency young shlichah to Ramah in the Berkshires after the army, & is now a shlichah in Manchester England. Noam is a company commander in Tzahal, and Adina is now making her plans for university study. |
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Daniel Zur & Briana Binstock Zur Camp Attended: Canada Year Met: 1971 Year Married: 1975 We met over the volleyball net the Shabbat afternoon of pre-camp, and have been eating sunflower seeds together ever since. Years later when visiting our children, we learned that the campers thought that Dan was hot and Briana was cool. Who knew? |
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Sholom Eisenstat & Rifka Holtzkener Eisenstat Camp Attended: Canada Year Met: 1971 Year Married: 1981 BACK TO TOP |
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Judah Silverman & Margo Lightstone
Silverman Camp Attended: Canada Met: 1972 Married: 1974 BACK TO TOP |
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Robert
Edward Novak & Yael Bauer Novak Camp Attended: Canada Met: 1972 Married: 1974 BACK TO TOP |
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Danny Lipnik & Paula Pascoe Lipnik Camp Attended: Canada Year Met: 1978 Year Married: 1984 We met at a square dance on the tennis courts. I was shy so I had my bunkmate Lynda Taller tell Danny that I liked him. At first he wasn't so sure but eventually he came around and we have been together ever since. BACK TO TOP |
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Martin S. Cohen & Joan Freeman Cohen
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Aaron Jaffe & Claudia Grossman Jaffe Camp Attended: Canada Met: 1981 Married: 1988 Aaron had been a camper at Ramah for many years and was away on Seminar when I spent my first summer at Camp Ramah in Canada, in 1980. I saw a notice that Ramah was hiring waiters and applied for the job. I returned as head waitress the next year and Aaron came on staff in the photography department. Two years later we both worked on the tripping staff and led canoe and hiking trips. We kept in touch, by old-fashioned mail, to a degree throughout college. In February, Aaron called me for my birthday and we ended up on the phone for an hour. He invited me to his college senior ball and I traveled from Ithaca to New York to attend. We started a long-distance relationship that continued while I attended law school. We were married in Niagara Falls in October 1988, with several Ramahniks in attendance. Our three sons, Joshua, Adam and Seth, have all attended Camp Ramah. We warned them to be careful —look what happened to us! |
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Howie Lupovitch & Marni Foster Camp Attended: Canada Year Met: 1982 Year Married: 1998 We first met when Marni was a bratty camper with her bratty friends. We re-met as staff members and friends. Seven years later the timing was finally right and we got together at another Ramah wedding. After love at third sight, we married two years later. |
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Guy Alberga & Beverley Moskovic Alberga
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Marty Goldberg & Sharon Zabitsky Goldberg Camp Attended: Canada Met: 1984 Married: 1987 |
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Michael Joseph Landau & Faye Andrea Goldman
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Mark Greenberg & Missy Hecker Greenberg Camp Attended: Canada Year Met: 1986 Year Married: 1988 |
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Jonathan Rosenstein & Edith Korin Rosenstein Camp Attended: Canada Met: 1989 Married: 1993 |
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Todd Sone & Shawna
Goodman Sone Todd and I met on a canoe trip to Silver Birches on Lake Skeleton the first week at camp. Todd was assigned to my trip as staff and we spent two days caring for 20 fifteen-year-old campers. |
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Camp Attended: Canada Year Met: 1992 Year Married: 2001 Eitan and I met in '92, mostly ignored each other until '95, and then were "just friends" until 2000. We hope to one day send all of our kids to Ramah! |
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Jared Green & Barbi Price Green Camp Attended: Canada Year Met: 1993 Year Married: 2000 Jared and I met when I was teaching, or rather trying to teach, his youngest brother, Shael, how to swim. We became friends that summer and started a long-distance romance during the ensuing school year, with him at McGill and me at University of Western Ontario. The rest as they say, is history... |
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Aaron Michael Beitner & Marci Iliza (Orman) Beitner Camp Attended: Canada Year Met: 1995 Year Married: 2005 We were on the same Yom Sport team. |
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Daniel H. Mink & Ronna S. Mink Camp Attended: Canada Met: 1996 Married: 2001 A thin wall in the crafts building separated them...but not for long! They had a shtetl-like wedding in the woods, where the groom harvested young maple saplings for chuppah poles and used his great-grandfather's tallit as a canopy. He also carved and put together a table to stick in the ground. The bride hand-lettered two traditionally-composed ketubot (just in case of breakage) on clay tablets and fired them in a kiln. She also hand-built 2 clay wine goblets (to be placed on the table) and glazed them with the words dodi-li, etc.
The underfoot glass that was broken was the light bulb from the woodshop, wrapped in a beautiful piece of silk. More than a dozen mishlachat were swept up from the camp on the way to the woods site and members of staff sang Israeli songs as everyone rejoiced. The food was brought up from the city and one wonderful couple (the parents of a camper) took photos and made a wedding album. It was a very hot day, and tears flowed copiously. |
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Daniel Brandes & Shana Kurlandsky Camp Attended: Canada Year Met: 1998 Year Married: 2002 |
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Daniel Grossberg & Millie Feinberg Grossberg Camp Attended: Connecticut Year Met: 1957 Year Married: 1966 |
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Ivan Marcus & Judy Lefkowitz Marcus How wonderful to be claimed by more than one Ramah!! Ivan and I spent our camping years at Connecticut where we were in the same edah but went out with others. We started going out together in Nyack the year it opened in 1961 and continued to see each other in Connecticut in 1962 before getting married in 1964. I had two years in Poconos in the Mador (1960) and Bechor (1965) Programs, some pre-camp at Glen Spey in 1968, worked as a teacher in Berkshires in 1968 and was a camp doctor at Berkshires in 1974. I am a long-time board member of Ramah Berkshires. All four of our children went to Nyack and the Berkshires. Two of our children met and married their spouses at Berkshires. Yuval, our oldest, met his wife Liz at one of the Berkshires Alumni Labor Day Weekends. They have three children, two of whom already attended Nyack. Our youngest logged the most camper years of all of his brothers at Berkshires and married a woman who also spent many years at Berkshires and was already interested in him then, but they started dating later. They are still very networked with Ramah Berkshires and many of their married friends are from camp. Ehud also is active in the local winter RBA and Erica co-chaired this year's Alumni Labor Day Weekend at Berkshires. All of this background is to clarify whether Ivan and I as a couple qualify for being a Berkshires couple with children who are also Berkshires couples. After the Arielle Greenbaum – Yoni Saposh wedding recently, it was brought up that they were the first second-generation Ramah Berkshires couple, if Ivan and I didn't count because we started going out at Nyack. The issue was whether Nyack, as the precursor of Berkshires counts. So, if you want to count us as a Connecticut/New England couple, we have no objection, as all of our camper days were in Connecticut. We even tried to find the place a few years ago, but it was all weeds blowing in the wind. In the Berkshires chadar ochel there is a wall of plaques of Ramah couples and Ivan and I, Yuval and Liz, Ehud and Erica are proudly there. |
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Saul Shapiro & Miriam Klein Shapiro |
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Stanley Platek & Celia Silverstein Platek Camp Attended: Connecticut Year Met: 1954 Year Married: 1957 I was a camper waitress in the Machon and my Rosh Edah was Chaim Potok. Stanley was a counselor of the youngest campers, or staff brats, as we called them affectionately. He was in the Marp. My friend asked me to come with her and visit him. We spoke through the window. When he came out, I visited his table as often as I could and somehow, we became a couple. This must have worried Chaim Potok , who stood by my bunk every night and waited there after evening activities to see that I got in. Well, that was my first year in Ramah. We were married three years later in the JTS synagogue. He was a rabbinical student and I was in the Joint Program at the Seminary. This September we will celebrate 50 years of marriage. We were staff members in Ramah Connecticut, Poconos, Nyack and Berkshires for 18 consecutive years. All of our children went to Ramah from infancy until they were staff members themselves. Now our grandchildren go to Ramah Berkshires. We are truly a Ramah family. |
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Michael Hecht & Sheila Diamant Hecht Camp Attended: Connecticut Met: 1954 Married: 1959 Camp Ramah connected us with a group of people who observed Judaism in a natural and positive way. Being a counselor at Camp Ramah showed that a person was a good choice for marriage! |
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Lee Levine & Mira Karp Levine Camp Attended: Connecticut Met: 1956 Married: 1961 |
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Sander Mendelson & Adina Newman Mendelson Camp Attended: Connecticut Met: 1957 Married: 1958 |
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Newton (Larry) Jassie & Lois Berman Jassie Camp Attended: Connecticut Year Met: 1957 Year Married: 1962 I think we met on the tennis court. Ramah was a great way to meet Jewish boys. We have been avid supporters of Ramah and tried to get our synagogue to support the program. With a change in leadership, it finally does. |
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Edward Bromberg & Marian Wolarsky Bromberg Camp Attended: Connecticut Met: 1960 Married: 1965 |
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Michael Bohnen & Joyce Oppenheim Bohnen Camp Attended: Connecticut Year Met: 1961 Year Married: 1969 |
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Israel Nathan Silverman & Gloria Sussman
Silverman Camp Attended: Connecticut Met: 1962 Married: 1963 |
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Steve Glazer & Andrea Soff Glazer Camp Attended: Connecticut Met: 1962 Married: 1965 We met during Steve's first summer at Ramah - Andrea had been a camper for years. We were married in June of 1965; and, after a two-day honeymoon on the Cape, spent the summer at the new Ramah in New England. Years later, Andrea served as business manager and winter director of New England. (Steve and Andrea are the first generation in a two-generation Ramah family. See also Ari Glazer & Stephanie Goldberg Glazer.) |
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Wallace Zuckerman & Deborah Cohen Zuckerman
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Jason A. Cathcart & Vicki Sykes Cathcart
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Vanessa Ivey & Jonathan SteinCamp Attended: Darom
Met: 2002 As a camper and a Seminar alum, it was only natural for me to return to staff at Camp Ramah Darom. Three weeks after high school graduation, I was on my way. During staff week, I became friends with Jonathan (a year older) because his younger sister was going to be a camper in my edah. He had never been to Ramah, but his sister had been a camper for many summers. Our friendship grew once the campers arrived because Jonathan came to see his sister a lot. The first Shabbat evening, he asked me to spend some time with him. We sat at the campfire circle and talked all night. From there, our friendship grew into dating. We spent the most amazing summer growing close thanks to Ramah. We took days off together, sat with Jonathan's sister "bein" between us during services, and spent evenings walking around enjoying the stars. After the summer, we continued a long distance relationship while Jonathan went to Israel for a semester and I started college. We dated for two and a half years long distance. He proposed in January 2005, and finally in August 2005 we moved together to Virginia Beach, VA. We were married in June 2006, in Memphis, Tennessee (Jonathan's hometown), and currently live in Orlando, Florida. |
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David Baum & Alissa Solom Baum Camp Attended: Darom Met: 2003 Married: 2006 We are from the same hometown but started our relationship at camp. Had it not been for Darom, we never would have had the relationship we did and wouldn't be where we are today! |
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Sharon Freiberg
Hammerman & Richard Aaron Hammerman Though we were both at Berkshires in 1964, we did not actually know each other then. Sharon was a camper in Machon on B side and Richie was a counselor on A side. We had many mutual friends at Glen Spey but did not know each other very well then. In November 1971, we both staffed a Seaboard Region USY convention in Hampton, Virginia and as they say, the rest is history! Sharon was present for the opening of Nyack, Berkshires and Glen Spey even though she lived in North Carolina. Ramah opened the door to the Jewish world for her. |
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Leora Weinstein Isaacs & Ron Isaacs We met as counselors at Camp Ramah in Glen Spey. After our wedding we celebrated sheva berachot at Glen Spey two years later in 1971. In 1988 we both returned to Ramah, after a 16-year absence, and for the next 13 years worked at Camp Ramah in the Poconos. I (Ron) served for a couple of years as Rosh Musica, and both Leora and I co-directed the Camp Ramah Family Camping Program and the Shabbat Plus study program for adults. Both our kids, Keren and Zach, attended Poconos Ramah for many years, and Keren's husband Aryeh attended Camp Ramah in the Berkshires. |
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David Krohn & Risa Rosenbaum Krohn We had made plans separately to be staff at Palmer. When Palmer closed that year, we were both arbitrarily (Who believes in "arbitrary"? We both believe it was the hand of G-d directing us to each other.) assigned to Glen Spey. We met staff week, and decided we would marry within two weeks. We attended Palmer together the following year where I had my aufruf the last Shabbat of the camp year. We returned in 1980 and 1981 to Palmer where I was camp doctor for part of each summer. We just celebrated our 33rd anniversary, and have, thank G-d, three grandchildren. |
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Dov Vogel & Gila Stamler Vogel |
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Daniel Paul & Randi Heskins Camp Attended: Glen Spey Met: 1971 Married: 1980 |
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Rick Malter & Rosalie Moss Malter |
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Richard Panush & Rena Joffe Panush Camp Attended: Israel Seminar Year Met: 1963 Year Married: 1965 I roomed on the first Israel Seminar with Ellen Panush Zelenko through whom I met her brother, Richard, a many year veteran of Wisconsin Ramah. We were both at U of Mich in Ann Arbor where we lived for a couple of years after we married. Rich was finishing up med school and I undergrad. |
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Martin Jeffrey Berman & Marylin
Gottlieb Berman On our way up to Mt. Carmel, Marylin was saying how she could not stand Southern accents and Danny Berger, an old friend from Ramah Wisconsin said meet Marty Berman from Jacksonville, Florida. Marylin said would you believe - a strong Southern accent? We went to Mador and then Wisconsin for two more years and then got married. |
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Richard Gavatin & Linda Spitzer Gavatin Camp Attended: Israel Seminar Year Met: 1968 Year Married: 1987 We met at Camp Ramah in Israel in the magical summer of 1968. We were both 15. There were two kids from Sweden. I was one of them. I met the girl who became my wife then. Her name is Linda from St. Louis, where we live now. We had a great time; this was the first summer that Camp Ramah was in Israel. We arrived in Jerusalem, the Goldstein Village, and before we even unpacked, we were taken to a big hall and given a lecture on security and safety. This was the summer after the Six-Day War. We traveled all over Israel for 7 weeks. We visited almost 100% of Israel. We were in Haifa, Safed and the Golan Heights in the North, Caesarea, Natanya, Herzliya and Tel-Aviv on the Mediterranean, Jerusalem, Bethlehem, in the middle of the country. We were at the Dead Sea, Ein Gedi (the most beautiful place on earth?). We visited Sde Boker where Ben-Gurion’s Kibbutz was, and we spent a lot of time in Eilat. We participated in an outdoor concert in Bethlehem with Richard Tucker and other singers in Verdi’s Requiem. Beautiful. What an atmosphere. We visited Hadassah hospitals in Jerusalem and my wife, who is a Five Generation Hadassah volunteer, regarded that as a highlight – we both now volunteer for Hadassah in the States. We were all over the place. We even ventured in to Gaza which back then – already – was a very unfriendly place. Linda and I were “boyfriend/girlfriend” in Israel. Very innocent, holding hands, but we were apparently lovers in our heart, as we never forgot each other after that. I went back to Sweden and she went to college (in Ohio, but still), and then she came to visit me in Sweden and I came to St. Louis and then I moved here in 1987 and we got married in a Conservative Synagogue. One of the signs that we were “close” already then, at the age of 15, was that one day we were given some “free” time in Tel-Aviv and I wanted to buy a gift for my mom in Sweden. I asked Linda if she wanted to go with me to help me pick out something. We found a necklace that I gave to my mother and that she wore every single day between 1968 and 1984 when she passed away. When I came to St. Louis, three years later, I gave it “back” to Linda and asked if remembered it. She did. We have no kids but Linda’s siblings do, and their kids are at Camp Ramah, and Linda’s brother, and sister-in-law (now a rabbi) used to be counselors at Camp Ramah. How important for my sense of belonging was Camp Ramah? Immeasurable. No words can adequately describe the role of that summer in my commitment to Judaism. It was the turning point for me and without that summer at Camp Ramah, I would most likely have gone the way most European young Jews go: Into assimilation. That is a one-way street with no return. Thanks to Camp Ramah I survived as a Jewish person! Thanks and Congratulations on 60 years and we wish you the best for the next 60! |
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Alan Kaell & Diana
Schachter Kaell
Met: 1970 |
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Jonathan Kremer & Ellen Helfman Kremer Camp Attended: Israel Seminar Year Met: 1970 Year Married: 1980 Ramah in Wisconsin, Ontario, the Berkshires and on Seminar gave me a love for Shabbat, Israeli dancing, and the best Conservative Judaism has to offer. I knew that I wanted to live Ramah 24/7. When I remet a Ramah Seminar peer while Israeli dancing at MIT, shared values and experience led to love and marriage. |
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Norman Beitner
& Ruth Beitner Ann Lipnik Programs Attended: Canada, Israel Seminar Year Married: 1977 My husband and I met at Camp Ramah in Canada and then went on Israel Seminar together. We both attended the University of Michigan and ended up in the same dorm. Our son, Aaron, also met his wife, Marci Orman, at Camp Ramah in Canada. They were campers together and also attended Israel Seminar together. However, he went to the University of Michigan School of Engineering and she attended Western Ontario. |
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Seth Greenberg & Ilene Spark Greenberg
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Aaron Michael Frank & Laura Shaw Frank
Met: 1986 Aaron and I met and became good friends on Ulpan Ramah Plus (I think it is now called SEE). He went to CES-JDS in Rockville, MD and I went to Solomon Schechter in NJ. Because of URP, Aaron came to work at Ramah Berkshires together with all his new Schechter friends. Our friendship grew and grew, and finally, right after Aaron's second summer as a rosh edah, we started dating! Our wedding was a Ramah fiesta, complete with a kayak "borrowed" by our friends from the Berkshires Agam, and a huge sign saying "Ramah's Other Season"! |
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David Kalender & Talya Hoffman Kalender Camp Attended: Israel Seminar Year Met: 1990 Year Married: 1991
We met in preparation for our work on Israel Seminar. Once the summer began, our friendship grew over a desperate team effort to find food as the Goldstein Youth Village meals were not gourmet experiences. We married in Israel the following summer. |
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Aron Coleite & Tracy
Strauss Coleite
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Noah Borenstein & Amy
Judith Heller
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Saul Fine & Nirit Shalom Fine
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Saul Blecker & Nina
Rabinovitch Blecker
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Geoff Winston & Zip Benjamin Winston Camp Attended: Israel Seminar Year Met: 1995 Year Married: 1996 We actually met during a course together but didn't get to know each other until the summer. One day one of the staff members told me that Zip had her eye on me. It turns out that she had told Zip that I had my eye on her. Six months later we were engaged. We worked Ramah Seminar the next year as well and got married four days later, with quite a few Ramahniks flying over for the wedding. We now have three kids with a fourth on its way any day now. |
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Matthew Louis Zerden & Lisa de Saxe Zerden
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Josh Menachem Kulp & Julie Beth Zuckerman
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Liell Karni & Idit Sonnheim Karni Program Attended: Israel Seminar Met: 1997 Married: 1999 |
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Eric Danis & Anat Moshe Danis In the summer of 2000, I (Eric Danis) worked as a madrich for Ramah Seminar in Israel. My co-Madricha was Anat Moshe. We got along instantaneously and worked well together. Despite the long hours and some tough campers, we had a great time together. There was a lot of chemistry between Anat and I, but professionalism and the long hours prevented anything of a romantic nature from developing (although the campers were still more than delighted to tease us and tell us that we were "going out"). Two days after Seminar ended I had to return to the U.S. (I had been in Israel a year). Although I knew I was going to make aliyah, I was very sad to leave my friend Anat and told her so. She agreed that it was sad and that something nice could have developed. She drove me to the airport and we were both quite sad. We stayed in touch (via emails and a few calls) for the eleven months I stayed in the U.S. (I stayed to work and save money), and we became very close as friends. When I returned to Israel (to make aliyah), Anat and I started dating after only three weeks had passed. Anat and I were married in the spring of 2004, and 5 of our Ramah chanichim came to Israel for the wedding! |
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Stuart Kelman & Vicky Kolton Kelman
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Norma Shifrin Blecker & David Blecker |
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Marlynn Wertheimer Dorff & Elliot Dorff
Programs Attended: Mador,
Wisconsin, Poconos |
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Martin Jeffrey Berman & Marylin Gottlieb Berman On our way up to Mt. Carmel, Marylin was saying how she could not stand Southern accents and Danny Berger, an old friend from Ramah Wisconsin said meet Marty Berman from Jacksonville, Florida. Marylin said would you believe - a strong Southern accent? We went to Mador and then Wisconsin for two more years and then got married. |
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Gershon Schwartz & Shuly Rubin Schwartz Camp Attended: Mador Year Met: 1970 Year Married: 1973 |
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Jeffrey Hoffman & Laurie Mark Hoffman I first saw Jeff on the steps of JTS leaning on his guitar. We were on our way to Camp Ramah in the Berkshires for the Mador program just out of high school. I flew in from Minnesota, and met awesome people in Mador! It was junior year on the one year program where we really got together, and spent many years at Ramah in Wisconsin after that. Ramah has had an impact on us that cannot be quantified and we both are very happy that we chose to spend the summer of '73 at Ramah!
Laurie and Jeff in the 1970s |
Laurie and Jeff with their children Shaia, Shulie, and Yossi, |
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Barry Warren & Ruth Perlmutter Warren Camp Attended: New England Year Met: 1966 Year Married: 1970 My best friend from school came to visit camp and her boyfriend from the previous summer. It was my first summer at Ramah. It was the first night of camp, and she went for ice cream with her boyfriend. His roommate invited me to join. That was 40 years ago. We celebrated our 36th anniversary last June; we celebrated Sheva Brachot in camp in 1970. |
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Robert J. Saks & Loretta Vitale Saks
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Alan Levine & Barbara Portnoy Levine We were both campers at New England for many years (starting at the camp in Moodus) and met in 1968. Alan was a waterfront counselor and I was the Omanut counselor along with Roz Arzt (whose husband Ray was the director for many years). |
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I was 17, on my way to college (Pratt) and Alan was 20, in between his sophomore and junior years at Brown. We returned to camp as counselors together in 1969 and we married three years later. We have three children, a daughter Alissa and a son Dana Ari, twins who are 26 and went to Palmer as campers for about six years each including Israel. Our youngest, Andrea, is a 10th grader and has been to camp for five years so far, LOVES it, and will be back this summer as a Nivonim camper. We hope that someday our family will be a third-generation Ramah family. |
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Daniel Prober & Sharon Katz Prober
Camp Attended: New
England Married: 1970 Dan and I met in June of 1967, right after the Six Day War. Palmer was an amazing place to be at that time, especially for me, as I was new to the entire Ramah experience, and was coming for the first time on staff. The camp was charged with incredible ruach. Back then, coming to Ramah on staff, with no prior Ramah experience, was a bit unusual. Dan and I were in the same edah, with Vicky Kelman as our rosh. We spent lots of time working together on staff, and then started spending lots of time together in general. Dan was at Brandeis and I was at BU, very convenient for continuing our Ramah romance. We have retained our Ramah zeal, as our three boys have all been campers, and the two older ones have been on staff also. I have been on the Ramah Board over the years, and we have been active fundraisers and cheerleaders for this most amazing institution. Ramah has a very special place in our hearts and we have been thrilled that our children have continued the circle. |
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Jonathan Gutman & Renee Hoffert Gutman Renee arrived the same day as the campers. I had been there for the staff week. It took until the first Shabbat for us to get together, but it was love from the start! |
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Arnie Davidson & Penny Fleishman Davidson
Camp Attended: New
England
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Allan Lehmann & Joanne Schindler
Camp Attended: New
England
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Noam Arzt & Heidi Steinberg Arzt
Camp Attended: New
England Noam and I met in 1974 and had an immediate friendship. We kept in touch throughout the year with reunions but it wasn't until the summer of 1975 that we became an official couple. I knew I would marry him. He lived in New York and I lived in Jersey so it was tough for the eight years that we remained a couple. We saw each other as much as possible on weekends, reunions, every year at camp and on Israel Seminar. We never lived in the same state so our long distance relationship was tough but love won in the end and neither one of us wanted a life without the other. We finally got engaged in 1981 while we were both juniors in college (he was at U of P and I was at Fairleigh Dickinson in N.J.). One week after graduation we were married and I cried through the whole thing. I couldn't believe we were finally married and I would finally see him every day. All of our Ramah friends were at the wedding and they were also at our boys’ b'nai mitzvah. They are lifelong friends. Ramah was a wonderful experience. We loved all of it....the ruach, the Shabbat outdoors, singing, dancing....our lives are enriched by that experience. On June 12, 2005, we celebrated 22 years of marriage and 30 years of friendship. We have two beautiful sons, Jeremy, 17 years old and Jesse, 14 years old. We moved from New Jersey to San Diego three years ago because we wanted a beautiful climate...and we got it. Our boys go to the San Diego Jewish Academy and we all live a very observant wonderful Jewish life. My youngest son reads Torah beautifully just like his dad. We have been to Israel as a family twice and next summer Jeremy will be going back for his Senior class trip. Jesse will be going to Ramah in Ojai, CA this summer. We are so jealous. We owe it all to Ramah for bringing us together. I can't imagine how my life would be without the influence of Camp Ramah. It has definitely shaped who I am today and in turn, my children are rich in Jewish identity. WE LOVE RAMAH! |
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Moti Hanochi & Naomi Stamler Hanochi |
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Andy Schiffmiller & Onnie Lovett Schiffmiller |
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Joshua Hammerman & Mara Aisenberg Hammerman
Camp Attended: New
England We were counselors in the same edah together and by the end of staff week, we were an "item." We met under the tree by bunk 32, the staff bunk. Coincidentally, we also went to the same college, but she was just entering her freshman year at the time we met. The intensity of Ramah life both served to foster and vigorously test our relationship during our three years together at the camp. Despite the challenges that we had to confront, and to some degree because of them, our memories of Ramah are very positive. |
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Joshua Gould & Melodye Feldman
Camp Attended: New
England We were both working in the same program and met the first night of staff training. We both did not want to be in a relationship. By the end of staff week we were a couple. We just celebrated 25 years of marriage and 28 years as a couple. The details and inside story is much longer and only for close friends who knew us then! |
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Sanford Remz & Arlene Rosenkrantz Remz
Camp Attended: New
England Arlene and I met as counselors in the Tikvah program. I was there after my first year of law school for my only year as a staff member. I was looking for the opportunity to come back to Ramah and doing something incredibly worthwhile that I had never done before (i.e., working with special needs kids) before spending every summer in my foreseeable future working as a lawyer. Arlene, who had just graduated college, was on more familiar turf, as she had been on staff before and was preparing for a career in special education. Ramah was a place that had previously opened both of us to the joys of immersion in a Jewish life. That special setting led us to discover the joys of a life together with each other. Ramah now brings that joy to our children, one of whom is still a camper. And I still get to experience it as president of Camp Ramah New England. |
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Camp Attended: New
England |
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Randy E. Spiegel & Debbie Krohn Spiegel
Camp Attended: New
England Married: 1982 I was a long time camper and staff member at Ramah Canada. I moved to Boston. Debbie Hershman was looking for staff at New England. I went there in 1979. In my second year, a kid from Canada was coming to New England and I thought it would be nice if I would befriend him—make him feel a bit at home. We both attended a CPR class (kind of mandatory) and I decided to be his partner. So, who was the dummy then? Anyway, it’s 25 years later, and we’re married 23 of those years and have four fantastic kids, spent many wonderful summers with Ramah and now the kids continue to enjoy. Tov Lanu B'machaneh Ramah! |
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Eric Salmansohn & Marcia Bronstein Camp Attended: New England Met: 1980 Married: 1984 Eric attended Camp Ramah in the Poconos for over 10 years, first as a camper and then on Sports staff. In 1980, he felt he needed to try something different so he went to Palmer. I had been at Palmer for 5 years as Mercaz staff and then as Rosh Mercaz. In 1980, I was completing my first year at YU's Wurzweiler School of Social Work and missed camp so much. So, as soon as my classes were over, I called Ramah and volunteered to do "whatever" was needed. A counselor had just left and I took over a bunk for the last two weeks of camp. Eric and I met, dated long distance through graduate school, and have been married for 23 years. Over the years, both our kids attended Ramah and the legacy continues with them... |
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Ralph Schwartz & Marci Dickman Camp Attended: New England Year Met: 1981 Year Married: 1983 Ralph was the Rosh Edah the summer that Marci came to Tikvah in Ramah Palmer to get experience in Jewish special education. Ralph likes to say it was the last year he was Marci's boss. - Since then our family has come in and out of Ramah (Palmer, Poconos, Jerusalem, Berkshires and Wisconsin) - and in and out of work in Jewish education for children and teens with special needs. |
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Mark Snowise & Elisa Cook Snowise Camp Attended: New England Year Met: 1981 Year Married: 1992 |
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Mark Cooper & Amy Skopp Cooper
Camp Attended: New
England Married: 1986 Mark and I met as roshei edot at Camp Ramah New England. I had been working at the camp for several years. Mark is an Ojai product who came to New England when fellow Ojai staff member, Gil Graff became director of New England. We dated for several years (off and on) while Mark was at JTS rabbinical school and I was at Hebrew University. After graduating, we both ended up in Boston. I was the assistant to the New England Ramah director, Mark was the associate rabbi at Temple Israel in Natick. We married in 1986. |
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Jay Stein & Missy (Tick) Stein
Camp Attended: New
England Married: 1989 My husband and I did meet at Camp Ramah in New England although we never dated there. I was a camper there in 1976, 1978 and 1980 and on staff 1983-84. Jay was a camper there at the same time but he was an edah ahead of me. The ironic twist is that when we were on staff together, he dated one of my best friends at the time, Beth Glass, and I dated a counselor named Daniel Felson. Jay and I have been married for 16 years and Beth and Daniel are married to each other as well. Jay and I have five children, two of whom went to Camp Ramah in the Berkshires and one who will be starting Camp Ramah in the Poconos this summer. |
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Daniel Felson and Beth Glass Felson
Camp Attended: New
England Married: 1994 Daniel and I were both Solelim counselors in 1984. We got to know each other well that summer and began dating in the summer of 1985. Through our experience at Ramah we were able to get a really good sense of where we both were "Jewishly" and had the opportunity to grow Jewishly together. This summer our oldest child will be a Solelim camper at New England. |
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Morry Re'em (Scholick) & Adina Friedman Re'em Camp Attended: New England--Staff Met: 1985 Married: 1987 |
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Seth Greenberg & Ilene Spark Greenberg
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Stuart Katz & Marni Smith Katz
Camp Attended: New
England |
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Yoni Charry & Yael Fischman |
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Micah Liben & Deborah Markowitz
Camp Attended: New
England Deborah and I are still engaged...B'shaah tova, the wedding is planned for August '06. Deborah and I both began at Ramah in first year Ilanot...but we "ran in different circles" throughout our summers as campers. When we were JC's in 1999, we became close, and went on to dance together in the Israeli dance performing arts group and serve as co-presidents of the Conservative minyan at Hillel at the University of Pennsylvania. We were dating by the time I left for Israel after graduation, and a year and a half later, we were engaged. When we returned to camp as roshei edot, we were gratified for the opportunity to spend time together doing the things we love: studying texts, sharing our enthusiasm with kids, and of course doing lots of folk dancing. |
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Bruce Allen Bromberg Seltzer & Deborah Tamar Bromberg Seltzer
Camp Attended: New
England At the start of second session, Bruce was relocated into my edah. We had lots of mutual friends and hung out together. After camp (during the winter), a bunch of us got together in NYC and we started dating then. We got married at the end of August, our wedding date set so we could spend that summer at camp, me as a rosh edah. We had an aufruf at camp and got married the weekend after camp ended. |
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Noah Hartman & Anna Robinowitz Hartman
Camp Attended: New
England Both being from Atlanta, we met on the way up to camp, although we were in different edot and didn't really know each other. It wasn't until we ran into each other in Los Angeles in 2002 that we met as adults. |
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Jonathan Gideon Robins & Leah Kaplan Robins Camp Attended: New England Met: 1992 Married: 2006 |
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Ari Glazer & Stephanie Goldberg Glazer
Camp Attended: New
England I am a second-generation Ramah marriage as my parents Rabbi Steven and Andrea Glazer are also a Ramah marriage. Stef and I must have met as campers as she was a camper in Shoafim and Magshimim and we were in the same edah although neither of us remembered the other (I was a schlepper and camper from Ilanot to Nivonim then Israel then staff). We met and worked as Nivonim counselors together in 1993 and connected during staff week. The rest is history as we have been together ever since. It is nice to see two of my Nivonim (and Machon) campers registered, Dave Cutler and Tamar Skowronski. |
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David Seth Cutler & Rachel Lea Fish
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Noah Borenstein & Amy Judith Heller
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Barry Reichgott & Alexandra Bloch
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Brian Liss & Judy Wendkos Liss
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Eric Ganezer & Tamar Skowronski
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Josh Menachem Kulp &
Julie Beth Zuckerman
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Camp Attended: New England Year Met: 1996 Year Married: 2001 So, Solelim '96 had to pray every morning and so it was Michelle and my tafkid as va'ad tefillah to coordinate the campers' tefillah experience. Not only did the campers have a great tefillah experience that summer but a new Ramah relationship was born. While it took some months and time to solidify our "coupleness," we always look back at that summer as the start of our life together. Incidentally, I always get a good laugh when I tell new counselors at Ramah that I met my wife on Va'ad Tefillah. It does get them to think twice about which va'ad they will choose!
We got married in August 2001 with many staff members and our old campers present. We continue to share our love for Ramah with our daughter Kayla who has been a staff child at Berkshires for as long as she has been born (2005).
Yes, we did make the leap from Palmer to Berkshires....always a good conversation starter with our Ramah friends! |
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Matthew Louis Zerden &
Lisa de Saxe Zerden
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Ross Sommers & Hadas Bonnie Sommers
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Ivan Marcus & Judy Lefkowitz Marcus |
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Camp Attended: Nyack Year Met: 1960 Year Married: 1964 |
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David Zisenwine & Anne Brickman Zisenwine Camp Attended: Nyack Met: 1963 Married: 1966 |
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Mark Marpet & Judy Spevack Marpet
Camp Attended: Nyack My husband and I met at Camp Ramah and decided to follow the trend of meeting one's spouse at Ramah along with three other couples. We have been married 39 years and have Harold Spevack and his actions to thank for it all. |
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Paul Neustadt & Barbara Mencow Neustadt Camp Attended: Mador, Nyack Year Met: 1968 Year Married: 1977 We met at American Seminar in Nyack, NY the summer of 1968. We were in the Mador Program at NE Ramah in Palmer, MA the summer of 1969. We had a wonderful group of friends that continue to this day to share our life experiences. Paul and I were close friends until 1974 when we started dating. Our wedding was June 26, 1977. We celebrated our 30th anniversary this year. |
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Barry Gavarin & Mindy Roth Gavarin
Camp Attended: Nyack Ramah in Nyack was a unique place in those years. Naturally, we were there for staff days and Barry had been there for "pre-staff" days. He had become friends with someone who was a friend of mine from home and when I got there there was a a natural chevra established. He told this friend that he was going to marry me. Nyack was very intense place because the kids left at 4:00 each day and that's when the staff worked on programming and socially interacted. Of course there was Shabbat, the camp was never closed for a weekend and we never wanted to leave!! Between the beautiful programming and the wonderful environment created by Rabbi Al Thaler our relationship flourished very quickly. I left for my junior year at Hebrew U. and we both came back the next summer. By the next summer we were married and we continued to come to visit camp for many years to visit over Shabbat. Some of our closest friends to this day are from those years at Nyack. |
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Edward Edelstein & Anna Dicker Edelstein
Camp Attended: Nyack We actually don’t know exactly when we met for the first time. We shared a mutual group of friends that always went out as a group and got together frequently during the year. We were lucky with our director, Rabbi Thaler, having a shul in Queens where we could keep the magic of Ramah going all year long. We both enjoyed Israeli dance, working on props and scenery for all the camp productions and of course going out to Janet Hogan’s diner just about every night of the summer. After working in Eddie's edah for two summers he asked me to be the Kadima advisor at his youth group for the year. Meetings led to dates and more dates and the rest as they say is history! BACK TO TOP |
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Bruce A. Sklover & Tamar Rader Sklover
Camp Attended: Nyack In 1977, Bruce was assistant chef and Tamar was in charge of the dining room at Ramah Nyack. We also ran the winter weekends retreats at camp. We started dating the first summer we met at Ramah while we were both in college and married about seven years later. Our two daughters have been Ramah campers at Berkshires and our older daughter would be like to be on staff at Nyack next summer.BACK TO TOP |
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Irwin Kula & Dana Kurzweil We met as staff members and were part of the same social circle for a few years. In the summer of 1978 we went to a game at Yankee Stadium with friends who had tickets to the game. We were sold out of the game so we spent a few hours circling the stadium and waiting for our friends. We have been together ever since. Our younger daughter is a fanatical Ramah Berkshires fan and like us, feels that there are not enough months of the year for camp.BACK TO TOP |
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Sandy E. Zisser & Ann Lipshie Zisser
Camp Attended: Nyack I always loved Camp Ramah. I was a camper at Berkshires for four summers. Sandy, too, loved Ramah - he was a camper at Nyack throughout his entire childhood and came there as a counselor as soon as he was old enough to be one. It was my first summer at Nyack - 1988 - and Sandy's third on staff. I came late the first day, after everyone arrived. I pulled up in front of New Dorm with another fellow staff member who had been there before. Sandy and his friend were sitting on the steps outside "hanging out" and "checked" us in. |
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In those days there was no official check in - but Sandy was a veteran. He had keys to the office so he went and got us all the things we needed. Then, for the whole first week of camp we never saw each other. I was new - and he was with his camp buddies.
After the first week of camp we all went home for July 4th. We returned to camp and a whole bunch of us went out to the movies. It was all for Sandy because it was the end of his eleven months of saying kaddish. I just went along with everyone else and to be introduced to Sandy. And I was - right before going into see Who Framed Roger Rabbit. From that night on - it was set in stone. We spent that summer falling in love in a place we love to be in - soaking up and craving this incredible Jewish environment. It is a place that feeds our soul. |
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After our marriage in 1992 and the birth of our first child in 1997, we were on a mission to return to this place that restores who we are each year. It was where we wanted to spend nine weeks of our year and where we wanted to raise our family - in a Jewish "ghetto" environment where the outside world rarely interferes in our lives there. We returned in the summer of 1998 and haven't left. Our children live in this place each year and learn to love being Jewish more and more. We walk around knowing it's the place that sealed our love where the people who watched us fall in love now play with our kids. It is family. It is home. |
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Jeffrey Simeon Fox & Beth Lauren Pepper Camp Attended: Nyack Year Met: 1993 Year Married: 1998 We officially met in USY, but spent summer of '93 working together at camp. |
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Matthew Binstock & Yaira Singer Camp Attended: Nyack Year Met: 1997 Year Married: 2001 |
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Noah David Kalter & Shari Berman Kalter
Camp Attended: Nyack Noah and I first met when we were counselors at Camp Ramah in 1998. Camp played a big role in our relationship. We always went our separate ways during the school year, but always looked forward to seeing each other during the summer. Camp gave us a chance to be together in a unique Jewish environment and have an amazing summer at the same time. I am very grateful for Nyack, because otherwise I would not have met Noah and be married to him today. Camp Ramah was/is a large Jewish influence in my life and meeting my husband and my friends there only adds to that amazing camp experience. I will always have a special place in my heart and mind for Camp Ramah. They are some of my favorite memories!!! |
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Scott Wohlstetter & Robin Fox Wohlstetter Scott and I met initially at Ramah Nyack, but didn't become friends until much later in 2001 when we joined a co-ed volleyball team through Makor in NYC. We started dating in 2002 and married in 2003. We have a 10-month-old girl who we hope will one day become a Ramahnik. BACK TO TOP |
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Jeff Storey & Marcie Kohenak
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Danny Jassen and Shiri Levy We met on the basketball court. He was the basketball director and I was on sports staff. BACK TO TOP
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Samuel M. L. Schafler & Sara Rita Edell Year Met: 1950 Year Married: 1951 Sam Schafler was a rabbinical student at JTS the year when I, Sara Edell, arrived from Toronto, Canada to NY to be a student at the Teacher's Institute. Before the camp season of 1950, the opening summer at Camp Ramah in the Poconos, we met for the first time at a pre-camp meeting in the second floor lounge of the Seminary building. Since Sam was the only one I did not know I introduced myself to him on the elevator after the meeting. As it happened we both needed to be in New York on the first day off, he to get his glasses repaired and I to see my sister Ethel. We left camp by car with our music director Aharon Entin who dropped Irwin Feldman, Sam and me off at Sam's home to overnight. I slept on the couch in his living room and awoke to see his father walking back and forth with tallit and tefillin as he davenned. For next day off Sam asked me if I would hitch hike with him to visit his mother, sister and aunt at their summer cottage, some 300 miles from camp. We did that enjoying one another's company. All the rest of the days off we spent together becoming good friends. We were counselors and teachers; each also headed one of the camp programs, I girls’ sports, he nature counselor. Not long after our return to the Seminary Sam proposed marriage and set a date for my answer. Since I had a hard time making decisions of such importance, I brought my mother to meet him. He came to Toronto for Pesach and we were married in fall. But what was most interesting is that Sam revealed to me that when he saw me at the Ramah pre-camp meeting the wild thought crossed his mind that he was going to marry me. We had a 40-year wonderful marriage and raised six children spending twenty-four summers in leadership positions in four Ramah camp sites with all or some of our children. Sam died in 1991 at age 62 from cancer while he was the acting president of the Hebrew College of Boston. BACK TO TOP |
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Neil Norry & Sharon Singer Seidman I am submitting this information on behalf of my sister and brother-in-law of blessed memory. I do not know how long they each attended the Poconos but all of their children and most of their grandchildren have attended Ramah. BACK TO TOP |
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Sylvan Donald Kamens & Rhoda Roth Kamens We met on the last couple of nights in August 1956 when I came up for just 10 days as a substitute madrich. We courted as I entered JTS and were married in 1959. BACK TO TOP |
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Marim D. Charry & Paula Spinrad Charry Since Paula and I married - after meeting in the Poconos - we served as staff members (with our children) in the following camps: Connecticut, Palmer (at two different times), Canada, and Berkshires. Our last summer as Ramah staffers was 1988, in Berkshires. |
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Benjamin Segal & Judith Moldavi Segal Camp Attended: Poconos Met: 1957 Married: 1964 We met as campers, began "dating" at age 14, have stayed together since. Our children have been involved at the Jerusalem Day Camp.BACK TO TOP |
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Marlynn Wertheimer Dorff & Elliot Dorff
Programs Attended: Mador,
Wisconsin, Poconos |
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Bart Axelrod & Charna Ockman
Axelrod
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Jonas Goldberg & Chelly Gilgore Goldberg We began our relationship at an LTF Kalla in Atlantic City in the fall of 1959 and by the summer of 1960 we were a couple. Since Jonas was on the Joint Program and then Rabbinical School, our real quality time was during the summers in the Poconos. We even made a "deal" with David Mogilner (z"l) that we would move our wedding date up to the beginning of June in order to spend the summer of 1963 at camp. David and Alex Shapiro (z"l) were two of the rabbis under our huppa. We are proud to count a number of other Ramah couples as good friends. BACK TO TOP |
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Arthur Cohen & Julie F. Silverstein Cohen We met at Poconos in 1960 and were "friends." We both lived in Brooklyn and started dating in the fall of 1960. We got engaged in 1963 and married in 1965. Our daughter went to Poconos from Tulsa, OK for one summer and spent one summer in Nyack. Both kids have been in Ojai, CA and now our granddaughter is a camper at Ojai. We have stayed in touch with many Poconos Ramahniks all these years and have served on the Board of Ojai. |
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Aaron D. Michelson & Rona Mager Michelson We met in the summer of 1961 and became friends. He went back to JTS in NY and I to high school in Philadelphia. We wrote each other over the years and married in 1966. We and our 5 married children and 21 (so far) grandchildren live in Israel. |
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Jonathan (formerly David) (former last name: Milgram) Rimon & Wendy Wolman
Rimon
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Shelly Dorph & Gail Zaiman Dorph
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Nason Goldstein & Carole Orenstein
Goldstein BACK TO TOP |
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Robert (Asher) Freedman & Sharon Center Freedman
Camp Attended:
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Jeffrey Tigay & Helene Zubkoff Tigay
Camp Attended:
Poconos
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Miles P. Bunder & Alida Krovetz Bunder Miles was asked to drive the Baum Meat Truck from NY with luggage. As he followed the bus of staff to camp, two girls made faces at him from the back window of the bus. When he arrived at camp, Miles set up a fake registration table and when Alida approached, he asked her to join him at the "No PDA" talk that night. They dated until January, when Alida broke up with him. Miles then asked Rabbi Mogilner (z"l), a close friend, to arrange for Alida to be assigned to Poconos the summer of '65. Jack Gruenberg was asked to pick her up from the bus station, and while driving to camp, mention Miles. The rest is history. |
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Jeff Blum & Cindy Goldfarb Blum Camp Attended: Poconos Year Met: 1966 Year Married: 1975 The camp environment fostered natural and comfortable friendships across genders. This allowed us to become friends first, then, many years later, lovers, all within the context of Jewish values, living as respectful and moral people. Our relationship is built on this foundation and has sustained us for over 30 years of marriage. Not only as best friends to each other, we have retained our camp friends and other Ramahniks as the people we feel most connected to in our lives. |
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Steven Asher & Ina ("Louie") Elfant Asher We both started at Ramah in the Poconos when we were 12, and continued as madrichim while in college. We met only briefly; he was one of the big kids. Years later, when Steve was living in New York and I was living in Cambridge, we met again at a Connecticut Jewish weekend retreat. We married 3 years later. We have 4 children who have gone through Schechter and Akiba, and our son Jacob has spent the last 2 summers as a madrich at Ramah's Philadelphia day camp. |
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Billy Landsburg &
Robin Sue Schwartz Landsburg Rabbi David Mogilner, z"l, told Robin Sue that he could see something special about the two of us. Forty years later we still have that special Ramah feeling in our lives. Our four sons all attended Ramah as campers and then as staff members. Other than meeting my wife, I thought the highlight of my experience was being Rosh Sport in 1970, but now that I am President of Poconos, I may need to reevaluate. |
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Noam D. Zelman & Susan Hirsch Good friends in 1967, a couple in 1968. Lost contact after a few years, until we met for a drink in Atlanta in 1984. Talk about bashert!! We married ten months later and are still going strong. Only from Ramah does a Philadelphia girl marry a Georgia boy and live happily ever after. |
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David Barras & Shelley Karp Barras
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Chuck Sherman & Leah Hurowitz Sherman Camp Attended: Poconos Met: 1969 Married: 1979 |
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Judah (Lakritz) Rand-Lakritz & Susan (Rand) Rand-Lakritz Camp Attended: Poconos Year Met: 1972 Year Married: 1981 We first met when I was in the oldest edah (Havurah at the time) and Judah was a counselor. No camper-staff relationships! We met again a few years later when we were both on staff. No staff-staff relationship... (I thought he was cute; he thought I was too square.) In December 1979 I called Paul Messinger, another Poconos friend that I had been on staff with during the summer of 1978 and who was home on leave from the IDF, to see if he wanted to do something. He said fine, but he had already made plans with Judah Lakritz, who had returned to Philly after completing his IDF service - Would it be OK for the 3 of us to go out together? I said sure, and the rest is history. Former Poconos director Rabbi Archie Ruburg performed our wedding and Paul Messinger was one of the witnesses. Since 2002 we have been going back to Poconos. Two of our 3 children, Shira and Eytan, have come along. As I write this, the third, Keren, is interviewing for a position with Ramah seminar! |
Susan and Judah in 1981 |
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The Rand-Lakritz Family in 2006 |
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Michael Goldberg & Sandra Polin Goldberg |
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Barry Blum & Amy Cohen Blum
Camp Attended:
Poconos
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Jonathan Hersch & Julie Lipson Hersch Camp Attended: Poconos Met: 1979 Married: 1990 Julie and I met in Halutzim in 1979. From the moment I met her, I thought she was the cutest girl at camp, but we didn't "go out" until Machon in 1981 (for almost 6 full days). We kept in touch through high school, but lost contact in college. In February of 1989, we bumped into each other at a water fountain in Boston. We were engaged that fall. Our three children have visited or attended Ramah every year of their lives! |
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David Apothaker & Carol Mendelsohn Apothaker Camp Attended: Poconos Year Met: 1978 Year Married: 1985 We met as staff working in the same edah. We did not begin to date each other until years later when we ran into each other again. |
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Andrew Barnett & Vivian Matusow Barnett
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Barry L.
Magen & Cheryl Skolnick Magen
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Sheldon M. Levin & Nita Polay Levin
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Steven Sietz & Ephie Brand Sietz
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Offer Isseroff & Nava Zwi Isseroff |
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Bruce Lipton & Meryl Sussman We were engaged around Thanksgiving 1991, and married on Hanukkah in 1992. Cheryl Magen, our chadchanit, made our ketubah and was one of our witnesses. Our other witnesses were Rabbi Seymour Rosenbloom (my home rabbi) and Rabbi Arthur Ruberg, director of Camp Ramah in the Poconos, 1976-1980. We had wanted Rabbi Eli Havivi, director of Camp Ramah in the Poconos, 1981-1984, also to be a witness. Unfortunately he was not able to attend our wedding because he was in "eivel" (mourning for one of his parents). Every year of our marriage we visited camp for a Shabbat, usually during alumni weekend. In 1998 Bruce became the Director of Finance and Operations for Camp Ramah in the Poconos, so now we have been back to camp every summer since then. Summer 2005 will be our 8th summer as a family. Our daughter Rachel (11/27/95) has all but two summers of her life at camp. Our son Avi (3/22/98) has spent every summer of his life at camp. He started at 3 months!! What is fun now is that every summer Bruce and I present a peulat Shabbat to an edah, either Machon (entering 9th grade) or Shoafim (entering 10th grade) about our relationship, which is really about making choices. We call the peulah"Al Tistakeil BaKankan Elah b'ma She'yesh bo" -- Don't look at the pitcher but what is in it -- don't judge a book by its cover. We use this name because of the assumptions we made about ourselves in 1987 and then learned differently in 1989. |
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Joel Seltzer & Eliana Katz Seltzer |
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Larry Schachter & Phyllis Blyweiss Schachter We met the summer of 1989, and were thrown into a two-and-a-half-year long distance relationship. I (Phyllis) continued working at camp until our wedding in 1992. This year our son spent the whole summer at camp. We have never been more jealous of our child. We are reliving our past through him. Our love of Camp Ramah has been officially passed to the next generation. |
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Aaron Soffer & Hannah Bloch Soffer Camp Attended: Poconos Year Met: 1991 Year Married: 2004 |
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Marshall Gilinsky & Lisa Gertsman Gilinsky Camp Attended: Poconos Year Met: 1992 Year Married: 2004 We were both campers for many years at Ramah Poconos but since we were four years apart, we did not know each other well. We had our first real encounter one oneg shabbat in the summer of 1992 when Marshall was visiting camp and Lisa was a JC. We kept running into each other over the next several years, in Washington DC and then in NYC. We had dated briefly in 1999 and remained in sporadic touch until December 2001 when we began dating seriously. We were married in May of 2004 on a lake in Vermont, where friends of ours from camp performed the ceremony. We recently gave birth to our daughter, Dahlia Cairn. |
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Josh Menachem Kulp &
Julie Beth Zuckerman
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Ricky Gratz & Sarah Weinberg Gratz Camp Attended: Poconos Met: 1995 Married: 2003 During the summer of 1995, we met for the first time as Shoafim campers at Ramah Poconos. Sarah was returning to Ramah for her fourth summer, while Ricky was brand new to the Ramah scene. A mutual friend from Ricky's bunk happened to ask us separately if we both thought the other was cute. We each agreed, and the relationship lasted an entire week, a whole eighth of the summer! For several years after that magical summer ended, we stayed in touch with each other through our close friends in our eidah. It wasn't until the summer of 2000 that we ran into each other at the Y100 Feztival in Camden, NJ. Sarah happened to be working in Cherry Hill, NJ for the summer while Ricky was working in Philadelphia. Our meeting at the concert was beshert and we decided to start dating again. This time, our relationship blossomed and we married in September 2003. Ramah Poconos holds a special place in our hearts. As dedicated Conservative Jews, we hope one day to send our children to Ramah so that they too will enjoy the unique experiences that Ramah has to offer. |
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Joshua David Abrams & Rachael Schultz Abrams Rachael and Josh met during the summer of 1995 as junior counselors. The following summer, they were counselors for Shoafim and became friends. After staffing family camp during the summer of 1999, they did not see each other for several years. They ran into each other in New York City during Simchat Torah at their friend Hillary's apartment. Rachael was working in New York City at the time, but for one assignment traveled two days a week to Philadelphia, where Josh lived. They exchanged emails and planned to meet for lunch. Lunch led to long-distance dating and it was two years before they ended up living in the same city. They were engaged in May 2003 and married in Baltimore, Maryland on August 8, 2004, celebrating with many Ramah friends. Ramah is extremely important to both of them and they are grateful that it led them to each other! |
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Michael Schwab & Erica Gross Schwab
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Eli Lipsky & Rinna Hoffman Lipsky |
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Daniel Relles & Dina Lucas Relles When we first met, we were friendly, and then kept in touch for a few years. We started dating the night of a Poconos alumni reunion (after a friendship of seven years), and the rest is history! |
Newlyweds Dan and Dina Relles
along with parents |
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Geoffrey Menkowitz & Elana Genut Menkowitz Elana and my sister grew up in the same edah at camp. In the summer of '93, I was Elana's younger brother's counselor. But we didn't really get to know each other until years later... In the summer of '97 we started "dating" - if you can call it that in the camp environment. After camp though, Elana went to Israel for a year. We didn't see each other at all and kept in touch sporadically at best. She was only able to visit camp for one day the following summer. We finally reconnected at the Hillel Leader's Assembly (held at Camp Moshava, a stone's throw from Ramah Poconos) in August of '98. Later that fall, I went up to visit her in Boston (using the Head of the Charles as an excuse) and the romance blossomed. We returned to camp the next two summers both working as rashei anaf. We got engaged in 2001 less than 24 hours before heading up to camp to serve as roshei edot (Elana was Rosh Bogrim, I was Rosh Gesher). That summer was our last at Ramah Poconos because, after finishing graduate school and getting married (chronologically ordered, not listed by importance), we moved to Georgia where I became the assistant director of Ramah Darom. This will be our first summer not at Ramah (in my case since 1987) as we are expecting our first child - and future Ramah camper! God willing, we'll all be back at camp next summer. |
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Eric Scott Yanoff & Dava Wiener Yanoff Eric and I met for the first time the summer of 1998. It was my first year on staff and his first year as a rosh edah. We connected instantly and actually hugged each other the first time we met for no explicable reason. Before the end of the summer we knew this wasn't just a "camp romance". We dated long-distance for 3 years, (I was in college in PA and he was in rabbinical school in Manhattan) spending long hours on the phone and commuting to see each other via Amtrak. For the next three summers we came back to work at camp. After graduating from college, I moved to New York and a little over a year later we were engaged. We got married in September of 2003 and celebrated with many of our Ramah friends. We look forward to sending our future children to Ramah and continuing the tradition. |
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Ari Saks & Rachel Einhorn Saks Camp Attended: Poconos Year Met: 2000 Year Married: 2006 |
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Yoni Shear & Michal Raucher
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Matthew Seltzer & Stacy Lipschutz Seltzer Camp Attended: Poconos Year Met: 2002 Year Married: 2007 We met at Camp Ramah in the Poconos in the summer of 2002. Matthew was a counselor, entering his sophomore year at the University of Maryland and Stacy was a junior counselor, who had just graduated high school and was preparing to attend Muhlenberg College. The Ramah community fostered our relationship by allowing us to discover just how many core values we share and opened our eyes to what our lives together could create. We could not have met at a more magical place than Ramah and we look forward to sending our future children to this wonderful place. |
Ramanhiks at Stacy and Matthew's wedding in 2007 |
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Yoni Shear &
Michal Raucher
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Jeffrey Kress & Adena Lebeau
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Burton Cohen & Roberta Cheskis Cohen Camp Attended: Wisconsin Married: 1953 |
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Zave Gussin & Judy Gordon Gussin While we were aware of each other in 1948, we began going together in 1949 when I was 15 and Judy was 13. We were both members of the LTF and saw each other at meetings during the ensuing year. We began going steadily with a date at a pre-season Bears game in September 1950. We went to each annual pre-season Bears game for the next 3 years, and were married on the day of the pre-season Bears game in 1954. The rest is history, having just passed our 51st anniversary. In addition to 4 children, we have 10 grandchildren, 5 of whom were born and reside in Israel (children of our oldest son). |
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Irving Samuel White & Joan Kornbluth White Yes, romance is key to this one - and it goes a lot deeper and longer than the stories you might find in a Hollywood movie. This romance is now 56 years old! |
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I’ll start with this one from my perspective, because God knows that men are a bit different in their perceptions than women, though not better of course (check out Vayetzeh in Genesis: When Jacob first laid his eyes on Rachel, he didn't make a coffee date, he didn't put her through a J-date personality inventory. No, he just knew, his soul—or unconscious, if you prefer—being his guide. Of course, you have to throw in a little synchronicity and a lot of chemistry.) It was at the beginning of the camp season at Ramah in 1949 that I first noticed Joan (Rachel, in Hebrew, honest—my name being Yisrael, having passed the divine test which Jacob was to overcome to become Israel). She was dancing Israeli folk-dances in the Beth Am of that time. It was the way she held her head to the side, with beauty and dignity, and the way she danced, that first hooked me. Of course I joined in the dance. I was in my second year as a madrich— sports counselor—and was a pretty good dancer myself. |
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I couldn't keep my eyes off of her as we danced and was sure, she couldn't have noticed me. After all, I was going on 22 years old and she was not quite sixteen. There was something about her that was "classy" in a very Jewish and European way—and indeed my own unconscious, which was shaped by my family's shtetl style, reached out to her. Forget the age difference, I said, and took a few shots from my buddies—whose names will not be mentioned—for "robbing the cradle". But, believe me, Joan didn't look like a child nor did she carry herself like a lot of other teen-agers. In other words, she faked me out so well that I was drawn to her no differently than Jacob was drawn to Rachel. And indeed, I kissed her very early on in our relationship. (I'm forever thankful that my good friend, Lillian Orzoff (z'l), sent Joan out, unseen by others, to be with me after "taps." Lillian later married my very dear friend, Ira Glick, whose three daughters all attended Ramah Wisconsin. ) |
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Herschel Kahn & Jody S. Kahn I was from Minneapolis. Jody was from Chicago. We both had a strong Jewish background and the environment at Ramah clearly nurtured our love for Judaic studies, culture and heritage. We thoroughly enjoyed the experience and continued to communicate after camp. Jody went on to study in Israel for a year. Upon her return she enrolled at the University of Minnesota and the rest is history. Fifty-one fabulous years that began at Ramah Wisconsin. |
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Martin Bogot & Hadara Skidelsky Bogot Leah Abrams, drama counselor, arranged for the two of us to play in a Tisha B'av night performance as Jeremiah and Bat Yisrael. Marty walked me back to the cabin that night and the rest is history. We were married two years later had four children and in 1971 made aliyah. We, our children and 15 sabra grandchildren are all still here. |
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Daniel J. Merritt & Ruth (Booty) Newlander Merritt Immediate attraction on many levels; besides, it was cold at night! |
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Rick Malter &
Rosalie Moss Malter Camp Attended: USY High, Wisconsin Met: 1955 Married: 1961 Rosalie and I met at the USY program at Logan Square Congregation Shaare Zedek in Chicago in 1955. We both were at Ramah Wisconsin in 1956. We continued to date throughout our college undergraduate years and were married at Temple Emanuel in Chicago in June 1961. The Ramah experience in the beautiful Northwoods of Wisconsin provided us with an appreciation of Judaism and nature that we continue to experience in the Sedona Red Rock area of northern Arizona where we now reside. The Ramah experience also introduced us to clinical psychology and psychoanalysis that shaped our professional education and life's work. We wrote a book together that describes the psychological model that served as the foundation for our therapy practice. I recently wrote an article "In Every Generation..." that describes my view of the dynamics of anti-semitism in every generation." Our work is on our web site www.malterinstitute.org. |
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Philip P. Spectre & Barbara Lerner Spectre Camp Attended: Wisconsin Met: 1955 Married: 1962 Barbara was reading a book on "the rock'" when I happened by in a canoe. I said something really foolish like, "Are you going my way?" From the moment she came into my canoe we have been sailing together. Ramah was and is a great and powerful influence on us both. It gave us direction in life, in our careers and influenced us to make aliya. Later we returned on Mishlachat with our children. |
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Moshe Tutnauer & Margie Weingarden Tutnauer |
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| Margie Weingarden and Moshe Tutnauer met at Ramah Wisconsin in 1956. We were both meltzarim! After a year of long distance communication (Moshe was at JTS and Margie at Wayne State in Detroit) we were married AT CAMP on August 25, 1957! Jerry Abrams, Ramah Director was our mesader kedushin. Efry Spectre and Sara Fisher Gillman organized the chuppa and the music. Our wedding was followed by the closing banquet/wedding dinner attended by 500 campers and 200 staff. The singing and dancing in the chadar ochel were not to be believed! |
Margie and Moshe's
Wedding |
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Our children and three of our grandchildren have been at various Ramah camps. We have been active with Ramah in Israel and Ramah in other countries since our aliya in 1972. We spent the summer of 1983 (in January!) at Ramah Argentina in Rio Ceballos with Marshall Meyer, z"l. We spent the summers of the 1990's teaching at the Ramah camps in Russia and Ukraine. Ramah has been a very import part of our lives for the past 50 years! Additional note from Jerry Abrams, Ramah Berkshires Director Emeritus: Prof. Shraga Abramson, z"l, the Seminary's professor in residence that year and noted Talmud scholar, was one of the edim. Additional note from Morton M. Steinberg, National Ramah President: I was at the wedding. It was held on the waterfront, in the early evening, followed by the traditional last night banquet. Bill Lebeau (current dean of The Rabbinical School at JTS) was a head waiter and he held one corner of the chupah. I took several photos of the ceremony with my brownie camera and gave the pictures to Morty (as Moshe was then known) when he was a scholar in residence at Beth El about 10 years ago. I remember it well! |
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David Jeremy Lyons & Myrna Wedlan Lyons |
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Bill (William) Leigh Gross & Lisa Spertus Gross Camp Attended: Wisconsin Met: 1957 Married: 1962 I met Bill in 1957 the first day of camp that summer. Sheila Goldberg noticed the new guy as we piled out of the dining room. His smooth friendly face was covered with patches of gentian violet, but Sheila struck up a conversation with him and we discovered that he was the younger brother of the handsome, Jim Gross whose baby face we used to swoon over the summer before. In fact, I was going with another young man that summer but Bill and I used to meet on the lawn and got to know each other over the summer months. Towards the end of the season Bill declared that he loved me and hoped that I felt the same about him. To my surprise, I did. We kept in contact over the next four years and continued our romance each summer. Camp Ramah was a very special place for me. Back in Highland Park I did not feel connected with my high school peers, but each summer at camp I blossomed. I could excel in art and dance though my academic interests were less rewarding. Also, the friendships we made over the years of attending camp were very special. The encounter with religion at camp helped form our personalities and was life-enriching. It was a privilege to have experienced the celebration of Shabbat in the special way it was during our summers there. We were married in 1962, and lived in Highland Park, Ill. after two years more in Boston. Bill attended Harvard and Harvard Business School. I spent three years at Boston University. After Bill worked as head of the sales department in my family business we decided to make aliyah. We have been living happily in Israel since 1969 Bill worked in many different businesses over the years then as a diamond agent. Finally he retired and spends most of his time doing research on his extensive Judaica collection. He is president of our budding Conservative, progressive, pluralistic synagogue and works closely with Rabbi David Lazar. I am spending most of my time in my studio where I make sculptures from found objects. In between I try to spend as much time as possible with our grandchildren, three precious little girls. Two out of three of our children live in Israel. Our middle son has lived in the USA for many years. My younger sister Cathy Spertus Orkibi met her husband at camp as well and moved to Israel two years before we did. My older sister Sue moved here with her family several years after we did. I believe our experiences at camp influenced our choices. |
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Hillel Friedman & Betsy Gillman Friedman Camp Attended: Wisconsin Met: 1959 Married: 1963 Betsy and I met in 1959. We were at the time otherwise involved. We re-met in 1961 and were married in 1963. Our two girls were both on staff at Ramah, Sarah in Nyack and Rachel in the Berkshires. Our eldest daughter, Rachel, met her husband, Mark Neustadt, in the Berkshires. This coming summer (2006), Mark is heading the waterfront there. Their two boys, Isaac and Tani, are enrolled in the gan. |
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Morton Steinberg & Miriam Bernstein Steinberg |
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Alan Silberman & Margaret Auslander Silberman She says: "It started when I was 12 and you were the camping counselor and took my tzrif on an overnight trip in the woods." He says: "I do not recall this and if it happened, I deny it." But then perhaps Rabbi David Mogilner (z"l ) knew what he was doing when he assigned an (almost) 17-year-old junior counselor to take charge of the overnight program and spend 35 nights out of camp. Whatever the "beginning," we found ourselves—in December1959—on an overnight train trip to an LTF kallah in Minneapolis. Margaret was the 15-year-old LTF'er. Alan was the 19-year-old chaperone and staff member. And in the middle of night, he received a visit—in the "lounge" at the end of the train—from Margaret and two of her girlfriends who could not sleep. And then, the two friends disappeared. A crisis! How did we avoid impropriety? The answer is pure Ramah legend: It took only a few moments to remember that Margaret's brother, Ira, was about to become bar mitzvah. The conversation, of course, turned to "What is his haftarah?” And the next hours were spent reviewing and chanting the words of Isaiah, Chapter 66—the haftarah for Shabbat Rosh Hodesh. Of course, staff-camper relationships cannot be, and were NOT. Indeed, the next summer, when Margaret was en route to camp with the then-mandatory stay at Chicago's Morrison Hotel, the counselor responsible for Margaret and several other young women made sure they were all in bed and—after a quick layla tov and a transfer of responsibility to another staff member, went out on the town with…Alan, of course. But wait, there's more: Two years later (after Margaret's stint at the first Ramah American seminar in Nyack), she was the staff member! Margaret was starting college at the University of Michigan, and Alan, a 21-year-old "Assistant to the Director," was off to law school in New Haven. So she got to go out on the town—that year, and the next, and the next! And, of course, summer romance faced the age-old question: "Will we still want to be with each other after 8 weeks?" And the answer (at least Alan's) was the equivocal "maybe"—a few visits to Ann Arbor and New Haven, yes, but no plans for any permanent relationship. Fast forward three more years. Alan is a lawyer in Chicago, beginning to become involved in the Ramah Wisconsin committee. Margaret is pursuing a Masters' Degree in Special Education in Michigan. But old habits are ingrained deeply—when you went to camp, you had to go to Chicago; when you went to an LTF Kallah in the winter, you usually went to or through Chicago. So where else would Margaret pick to spend a couple of days to visit? And if you are going to check up on people from the past, what could be more obvious then your Ramah connections? After some cajoling, Margaret was able to pry Alan's office phone number from Alan's mother, and Alan was smart enough to ask Margaret out that very evening! About 14 months later, with a pile of long distance phone bills between Chicago and Detroit, and a few airplane tickets, the choice was clear: it would either be marriage or mutual bankruptcy. One of Margaret's Ramah friends was getting married, Alan came in for the wedding—and as the long, long, weekend ended the question finally passed from Alan's lips—and it wasn't "What is your brother's haftarah?" The rest, of course, is history: now nearing 38 years of history. And the Ramah connection has remained one of the focal points—for both Alan and Margaret's involvement in Wisconsin and National Ramah activities, a further role as camper parents for daughter Elena and son Mark, and most recently adjusting to the newest Ramah role, as Bubbe and Saba of the latest generation of Ramah campers, granddaughter Lauren, a happy camper at the Chicago-area Ramah Day Camp! |
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Marlynn Wertheimer Dorff & Elliot Dorff
Programs Attended: Mador,
Wisconsin, Poconos |
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Bernard (Baruch) Gold & Rananah Kliers My college roommate, Mike Graetz, knew Rananah from Ramah and suggested we stay at her house before the camp season. Mid-way through the summer we were a couple. Our similar interests in Judaism and Jewish peoplehood united us... We now have nine sabra grandchildren. |
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Michael Don Katz & Betsy Dolgin Katz Camp Attended: Wisconsin Year Met: 1960 Year Married: 1964 We met on the kikar the first day of camp. Michael was holding a tikkun, preparing a Torah reading. We sat back to back at meals because we each were counselors in the oldest cabins. We not only participated in discussions about Jewish text and adolescents in Rabbi Nachum Gordon's JCC class, but also, Rabbi Gordon and his wife took the two of us together to a movie one free evening. Our real first date was in a canoe on Lake Buckatabon. In camp we shared our love of Judaism and of children. We talked about some of the big questions in life, sitting on the rock or on the point or walking on the garbage road. We imagined together the kind of life we wanted to lead. As if introducing us was not enough, Ramah took us on our honeymoon. Two weeks after we were married, we accompanied our campers (who had attended our wedding) on the Ramah Israel Seminar, our first trip to Israel. Jewish living, Jewish learning and Israel remain an important part of our life and that of our children up until today. |
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Ira Newlander & Ronna Schary We met on the train to camp....and what else can I say! |
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Martin B.
Sherman & Linda Diane Wallen We met at Ramah as campers and had many mutual friends although we were never a couple. We continued to write each other occasionally after Ramah, and Marty once visited me in New Orleans. When I decided to go to the University of Michigan, Marty was one of two people who I knew there. I called him the day I arrived on campus; we went out to dinner, and 40 years later we are sending our kids off to college, and looking forward to the next stage of our lives. |
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Martin Jeffrey Berman & Marylin Gottlieb Berman On our way up to Mt. Carmel, Marylin was saying how she could not stand Southern accents and Danny Berger, an old friend from Ramah Wisconsin said meet Marty Berman from Jacksonville, Florida. Marylin said would you believe - a strong Southern accent? We went to Mador and then Wisconsin for two more years and then got married. |
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Stephen (Steve) Weiss & Anne (Chana)
Weinstein Weiss I met Steve on the staff train up to camp in 1968 (I was 17 1/2.) when I sat on the arm of his chair to have a discussion with others around him. It was love at first sight, all the better because my other job at camp was as a swimming teacher, so we worked together daily. We saw each other in the best of conditions (Shabbat, etc.) and the worst of conditions (cold and wet, coming out of the water). This gave our courtship and union a healthy, realistic beginning. |
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Joseph Vander Walde & Joan Gimpel Vander
Walde The first time we met I was in Nivonim and Joey was a junior counselor in Bogrim. I had permission to miss the peulat erev and was sitting in my favorite tree overlooking Lake Buckatabon near the library. He was looking for one of his campers and when he saw me in the tree, told me to get down. I refused, telling him that I had permission to be there and although he was somewhat taken aback, he continued on his hunt for his missing camper. We met again two summers later when he was a counselor and I was a junior counselor. We became good friends over the summer and the friendship continued at the University of Wisconsin during his senior year and my freshman year of college. We didn't start dating until he had moved on to medical school in Philadelphia and I had transferred to Brandeis in Boston. It was through Ramah, both the camper's camp and the staff's camp - the shared work, play, discussions and problem solving that we were able to develop the close friendship and mutual respect that grew into love. |
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Howard L. Bach & Wendy Ziman Bach Camp Attended: Wisconsin Year Met: 1968 Year Married: 1975 We initially met through the Minneapolis LTF programs in the late 60's. It was the best source of both Ramah connections and reunions during the off camp months, but also connected us with the rabbis. The summer camp months allowed us to develop a similar group of friends, many of whom we still keep up with today! Camp brought out the best in each of us. It was the oasis where we could be ourselves, have fun and stretch to try new adventures and even relationships!!! This has worked for 32 years!! |
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Morris J. Allen & Phyllis S. Gorin
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Ronnie & Minda Garr Ronnie moved to Ramah Wisconsin from Ramah California the summer before we met at the urging of his friends from JTS. I was living in Israel after many years in Wisconsin, and came back to camp after a break of several years at the urging of Rabbi Burton Cohen - who was then the director in Wisconsin. |
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I came to camp in the middle of staff week as a first-year rosh edah. Burt gave Ronnie the task of teaching me how to do my job. We spent a few hours together right after we met and were married the following summer. Camp was and still is very much a part of our lives to this very day. We both grew up in Ramah and our four children have grown up in Ramah. When we met we were living in two different worlds - and we still live in two different worlds, but together - camp in the summer and Israel during the rest of the year. |
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Joe Freedman & Sue Schwartz Freedman
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Toby (Daniel) Marwil & Ivy Elinoff Marwil Camp Attended: Wisconsin Year Met: 1970 Year Married: 1972 We met the first night of camp after Kabbalat Shabbat Services and we married each other two years later. Ramah has been a big part of our lives since we have been children. We loved our years as campers, as staff and then as parents enjoying our two sons' experiences as campers and staff. For all of us, the best part of Ramah has been our long lasting friendships that were cultivated at camp. |
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Alan Kaell & Diana Schachter Kaell
Met: 1970 |
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Paul S. Drazen & Susie Alpert Drazen
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Jeff
Kopin & Beth Ginsburg Kopin
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Jonathan Petuchowksi & Leslie Yenkin
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Laurence Aaron Pepper & Dana Beth Lugend-Pepper Dana and I knew each other for two summers before we started dating during our Nivonim summer. She likes to say that we've known each other since Bogrim, but have been kissing since Nivonim. Different then getting to know someone outside of camp, we were with each other for many hours each day for eight weeks. We had a chance to see each other in many situations and we obviously liked what we saw. It was also a great opportunity for our parents to meet each other over a few summers before things got serious. Dana and I had our favorite spots around camp where we would walk & talk. There was a tree on Nivonim hill that had a hollowed out spot in it where we used to leave love notes for each other. Israel seminar and our staff year gave us the additional time together so that we knew it was meant to be. Now, going back to camp as parents, and seeing our daughter so happy there, where we were so happy, is very powerful. |
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Larry Mishkin & Judy Teibloom-Mishkin |
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Josh Barash & Devorah Lissek |
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Jon Gutstein & Susan Mack Gutstein Camp Attended: Wisconsin Year Met: 1976 Year Married: 1992 We first met in our Shoafim year and were again at camp together the next year in Bogrim. We were friendly but never more than acquaintances. We met up again in high school when we went to Ida Crown Jewish Academy in Chicago together. Again we weren't anything more than friends. After college we both wound up back in Chicago and our two groups of friends started hanging out together and we became best friends. We actually would fix each other up on dates, which luckily never worked out and we've been married now for 15 years so far.
Ramah has always held a special place in our hearts and the fact that we can say that we originally met there makes it even more special. We have two kids who have been going to the Ramah Day Camp and now my son is in his first summer at Ramah in Wisconsin. Hopefully next summer my daughter will enjoy her first summer there. Another very special fact is that my son is now a third-generation camper at Ramah in Wisconsin as my Dad went there as a camper the first year the camp started. |
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David Andrew Sherman & Julie Fishman Sherman |
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David N. Kantor &
Lynnsie Balk Kantor
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Steve Kane & Judy Thaler Kane Judy was a counselor in my Edah (Solelim) in Wisconsin, and I was the Rosh Edah (would this even be legal today?!). She had actually heard about me from a mutual friend before camp, and has said that she knew even prior to camp that we would have a relationship! I showed up in camp with this goofy wing-hat, and in spite of that we were "together" by the end of staff week. She returned to New York after the summer, and I went on to Rabbinical School at the UJ. After numerous visits during the year, we decided that we would both go to Nyack the next summer where her father was the director. She became Rosh Rikkud (which she still is 26 years later) and I a Rosh Edah for the next 8 years! We got engaged the following year in Israel (at the Kotel on Erev Shabbat/New Year's Eve) and got married in October 1983. Ramah has continued to be an important part of our lives, and now the lives of our children. Our oldest is currently a staff member in the Berkshires, and we are certain our other two will eventually follow. |
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Jeffrey Sosland & Mindy Weisenberg Sosland |
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David Dropkin & Marcy Dicker We were both working in the Tikvah program during the summer of 1981.The rest is history. We came back to camp as staff members in 1987 with an 18-month-old child and a 6-day-old child. She was the youngest child ever to be at camp. |
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Ron Less & Elyse Levine Less Married: 1994 We were at camp at different edot in 1981 and basically did not know each other. (She would never talk to a boy in a younger edah!) Ten years later, we met a party hosted by a Ramah alumnus and we have been together since. |
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Michael Weiner & Lisa Shiner Weiner |
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Marc Swatez and Elise Rice Swatez
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Loren Sykes & Rebecca Kaplan Sykes |
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Andrew Feig & Julie Flapan
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Michael Joseph Small & Sheila Berk Small Camp Attended: Wisconsin Year Met: 1985 Year Married: 1989 Thanks to a Fourth of July talent show, we met as counselors in 1985 at Wisconsin. Being at Camp let us discover that we had similar values, interests and a love for Jewish life. Together, we saw the moon set and sun rise many times that summer. Three years after we met, we became engaged on the mirpeset of the Sifriah, looking at the stars reflected on the mirror-smooth surface of Lake Buckatabon. We are fortunate to have maintained a group of mutual Ramah friends, some of whom now have children at Camp, as do we. |
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Steve Golden & Shira Sky Golden Camp Attended: Wisconsin Met: 1986 Married: 1988 We were both on staff the summer of 1986. Steve worked as a counselor in the Tikvah program and Shira was a counselor for a Bogrim girls' cabin. Although we both confided in someone else that we were interested in one another at the beginning of the summer, we didn't get together until the end. We dated long distance (Kansas City to New York) for two long years and got married a month after Shira graduated from college. |
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Giora Shimoni & Lisa Katz Shimoni
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Lisa (Columbus, Ohio) spent the summer working at camp before going to Israel to study at the Schechter Institute and Hebrew University. Giora (Nir Galim, Israel) spent the summer working at camp between finishing his army service and beginning to study at Beit Berl. The romance began instantly at camp (1986) and continued in Israel, where the knot was officially tied (1988). The camp atmosphere contributed to our union -- it enabled us to get to know the real person in each of us without all the exterior trappings and it provided, via the beautiful Wisconsin woods and lake, the perfect backdrop for romance. Today Lisa and Giora live (happily ever after) in Modiin, Israel with their four children (Maytal, Noam, Gilad, Yael). |
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Seth Greenberg & Ilene Spark Greenberg
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Matt Plofsky & Brooke Morrison Plofsky We met the summer of 1987 as Solelim counselors. Matt was a senior counselor and I was a junior counselor. We started our summer romance after cutting out early from a staff meeting in baytoh. "Wanna go outside and get a little air?" Matt said. After that it was history. Four years of a torturous long-distance relationship between Champaign and Cincinnati. We were engaged in November of 1991 and married a year later. Our ketubah was even designed with an overlay of the Ramah logo! Matt has gone back to be the camp doctor. By strengthening our spiritual lives, Ramah will always hold a special place in our hearts. It all still seems like yesterday. |
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Joshua Cohen & Sarah Bierman Josh and I always joke that we first met when I was in Sollelim and he in Nivonim when he was a CIT for the boys in my aidah. Over the years, he was a counselor in my aidah and I was on his staff when he was a rosh aidah. In truth, we didn't start dating until after all of that when I was in college and he was in rabbinical school. Ramah was always a part of us and remained a real part of our lives (and even our daughter's) as Josh worked for the organization. Now that we have moved on, we remember Ramah as a light in both of our lives and love that it's that connection that brought us together. |
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Scott Forester & Betsy Brown Forester Betsy was in graduate school after serving two years as a rosh edah at Camp Ramah in Wisconsin. I was on the Ramah Wisconsin Executive Board. During Pesach, Emily Soloff invited Betsy for a meal and Rabbi Soloff invited me too. Betsy and I met at the Soloff's home and although it was not a "fix up," we started dating. We were soon engaged and then married. We owe it all to Ramah and the Soloffs! |
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Joshua Greenstein & Carol Goldklang Camp Attended: Wisconsin Year Met: 1989 Year Married: 1995 |
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Shalom (Steven) Bochner & Orli Loewenberg Camp Attended: Wisconsin Year Met: 1989 Year Married: 1995 |
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Bradley C. Tecktiel & Susan Fay (Mayer) Tecktiel It was a typical Ramah summer romance that we continued during the year, despite being 1,000 miles apart. Ramah continues to be an important part of our lives. For the past eight summers we have been on staff at Ramah Darom. |
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Pelleg Graupe & Elizabeth (Betsy) Davis Graupe Technically, we met as campers, but really we met and became friends on Tzevet Solelim. Distractions such as television were not an issue. We had one another's undivided attention. The tranquil setting, with beautiful sunsets, peaceful nature and screaming campers helped us get to know each other very well. After hundreds of dollars of phone calls during our freshman year at college, and another summer together (again on Tzevet Solelim), we knew that it was more than a summer romance. We married four years later. Another four years later, we were happy that Rabbi Soloff was able to come to our first son's brit milah. |
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Andrew Shulkind & Sarah Zimbler Shulkind |
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Ronen Glimer & Amy Abrams We met during staff week in 1992. We dated the entire summer and broke up when we went back to school. We were in touch from time to time during college but when I moved to NYC (he went to college in NYC) we became close friends again. Everyone always thought we should get back together but we just thought of each other as a best friend. Six years later we decided to go on vacation together. We have been together ever since and we married in September 2004. Our wedding weekend was at Isabella Freedman Jewish Retreat Center - it was like being up at camp! I always dreamed of getting married at camp so it was really amazing. |
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Charles Cohen & Jennifer (Jen) Neufeld Cohen |
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Jon Hoffenberg & Sara Behr Hoffenberg |
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Dan Gottstein & Amy Schein Gottstein Camp Attended: Berkshires, Wisconsin Year Met: 1994 Year Married: 1999 I attended Berkshires but Dan is actually a Ramah Wisconsin alumni. We met at college through Wisconsin friends I had met on my Seminar trip. We live in Chicago now but I still plan on sending our two sons Owen (3 1/2) and Micah (2 months) to Berkshires. |
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Scott "Lefty" Rosen & Ann Lesley Hamvas Rosen We met during our Nivo summer as campers, but didn't start our relationship until we were on staff as JCs in 1998. Because we were from different states, our summers at Ramah were the only times we were able to be together, so Ramah will always be special for us because it was the place where our love was able to grow. We got engaged by Lake Buckatabon during staff week 2001 and put the foundation of the new Kopin staff center to the test as everyone danced around to celebrate our good news. |
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Michael
Rothmann Siegel & Marisa Ehrlich Siegel We met in 1997 as Solelim counselors. We continued to date from that point until 2003 when we married. We spent almost every summer at camp throughout the whole time we were dating, whether it was as staff or coming to visit for a week. Ramah is very dear in our hearts and is a great environment to find that one special person. |
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Noah Garfinkel & Dina Goldman Garfinkel We met in the Rikudiah Band, where he played bass and I played drums. Being a rosh kept me very busy, so we made time in the wee hours of the night to go for walks and hang out. |
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Benji Bearman & Faye Hammer Bearman |
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Steven Carl Schoenberger & Louise Malamud
Schoenberger We simply met at camp and became very close friends. Although I was interested in her we did not start dating for nearly three years, until the summer of 2002. We do, however, owe our entire relationship and its success to Camp Ramah in Wisconsin. We are currently spending our first year of marriage in Israel. |
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Alan Frankel & Kim Frankel
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Amir Cohen & Alysa Gerstley Cohen
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Micah Joshua Peltz & Rachel Miriam Zivic
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Gigi Fried & Wendi Alana Portman Camp Attended: Wisconsin Year Met: 2001 Year Married: 2007 My first summer at Ramah Wisconsin, Gigi and I met on the bus to camp and kept bumping into each other during the first few days of staff week. Although at first we didn't like each other, our feelings soon changed and we were together before the kids came. He was on the mishlachat and so, after a wonderful summer, he had to return home to Israel after camp. However, having stayed together all summer, we both agreed that we needed to try and make it work...6 years later, here we are! We thank Ramah for the wonderful, encouraging, loving atmosphere that helped our relationship develop and brought us together for those couple summers... which certainly helped with the airfare Ramah gave us a great foundation for learning about each other and growing together! Thank you for giving us the opportunity that really changed both of our lives forever! |
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Jacob Benjamin Millner & Jaclyn Shoshana (Saad) Millner Camp Attended: Wisconsin Year Met: 2002 Year Married: 2008 We met at Ramah in Wisconsin as counselors during the summer of 2002. Jacob's sister was a camper in Jaclyn's cabin and thought her brother was being especially nice by coming to her cabin to say goodnight every day...little did she know this was just a cover up to come see Jaclyn! |
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Ramah is under the educational and religious auspices of
National Ramah Commission, Inc., 3080 Broadway, New York, NY 10027 |
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♥
