By JANET STOICA

Since 1917 the Congregation Sons of Israel location in Webster has kept its sacred and reserved home in good standing. There are no weekly gatherings but there are beloved and humbling services a few times annually for the local Jewish community. Recently I had the opportunity to speak with a high school friend who attended services there for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur and perhaps other important holy days. Deborah Stayman, originally from Webster and currently living in New York State, educated me on several aspects of the local congregation site.

 The Holy Ark containing the Torah (Hebrew Bible).

“The local congregation was chartered in 1906,” said Ms. Stayman. “Members met on the third floor of a Webster Main Street building. At one time there were fifty families who belonged including my family.” Her parents were Bessie and Henry Stayman, former proprietors of Kulin’s Specialty Shop located on Webster’s Main Street when local shops were bustling with foot traffic and eager customers. I remember my mom taking me into Kulin’s when I was very young as she checked out lingerie and other delicate items offered by the shop. It was a quiet, orderly, and neat enterprise as I recall. The store offered children’s clothing, ladies lingerie, tablecloths, bedspreads, and blankets.

The local Jewish community bought its current building from an ethnic lodge group in 1917 and has remained at the same location for the past 106 years.

Deb’s father, Henry, who was mechanically inclined, became the quiet caretaker of the congregation building, checking on it weekly to ensure the exterior and interior of the building were in good order. “My dad was the kind of person who stayed in the background,” said Deb. “He wanted to keep an eye on things and didn’t want any recognition. He’d repair what needed to be fixed or contact an officer for major repairs. For over forty years, my dad would stay on top of things. His priorities were family, Judaism/synagogue, and the family business. On Sundays, he would putter around the house.” 

Henry was born in Worcester, went to Boys Trade School with the intent of becoming a printer. Because he was mechanically inclined, he decided to take a job at a gas station, eventually buying the business. When relatives introduced him to Bessie, it turned out to be a good match as they were married in 1942. A month later, however, Henry was drafted into the U.S. Army and fought in the European theater including the Battle of the Bulge. As a sergeant in the infantry, he was injured by a hand grenade. When the war ended, he came home. The couple had two wonderful daughters, Susan and Deborah.

The local congregation was not really large enough to support a full-time Rabbi, so on the Jewish holidays, a Rabbi or a rabbinical student would be contacted to participate in the holiday services. “There were no strict rules for a Rabbi to lead the congregation,” Deb stated. Deb and her husband, Jonathan, make it a point to attend services annually at the Webster congregation. 

During the New Year celebration of Rosh Hashanah, this year celebrated in September, the person leading the service will blow a shofar, a ram’s horn, signifying the beginning of the New Year.

“I remember most that there were pews at the congregation site,” related Deb, “and at some point in history, people would buy their seats and have name plaques placed on the pews. My grandmother, Eva Kulin, had a family pew on one side of the room and my grandfather, Samuel Kulin, had one on the opposite side. My mom would sit with her mother and my dad would sit with her father. Services were in Hebrew so I wasn’t aware of all the formalities. As a little girl, I remember playing with the fringes of my father’s tallit, a men’s prayer shawl, and then going to sit with my mom in her pew. Men and women sat separately then but this isn’t done anymore. Also, we had Hebrew school one to two afternoons weekly.”

After graduating from college, Deb spent 1-1/2 years in Israel staying in a kibbutz, a community based on agriculture. She would learn Hebrew for a half-day and worked on the kibbutz to pay room and board. She worked in the kitchen and later in a large chicken incubator factory. “A driver would go out and get local eggs,” said Deb. “Upon his return, the eggs would all be loaded into incubators. When the chicks hatched they had to be shipped to local communities quickly as there was only a 24-hour period for the hatchlings to be transported safely to their destinations.” 

I’m happy that our congregation is still there,” said Deb, “and I hope that it will continue for many years to come.”