Rabbi Israel Levi Hurwitz was born in Grodno province of Lithuania in 1893, the son of Simon Aaron and Chaya Hurwitz. He was educated in the Novogrodok and other yeshivot. He was active in Vilna as an orator and became a “shaliach” to Canada for a yeshivah in Hebron, Eretz Israel. In 1933, according to…
Category: Obit
Samuel Kernerman at 101: a man of three centuries
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For a man who has lived in three centuries, Samuel Kernerman, who will be 101 years old on January 19, 2000, has a simple request. “I just want to see my great-grandchildren grow up,” he said. He has 28 great-grandchildren. Interviewed at the Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre veterans wing, Kernerman, a veteran of World War…
Profile: Wilferd Gordon (1909-1994)
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As the son of the revered Toronto Rabbi Jacob Gordon and his wife Lifsha Gordon, Wilferd Gordon came to be respected and admired in his own right for his own profound learning, and he, too, came to exercise great influence in the Toronto Jewish community during its formative years. Wilferd, or Bill, Gordon grew up…
Obits: Goodman, Graubart, Grosberg & Hausman mourned (1982)
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Leo Hausman, studio photographer Leo Hausman, a photographer who did much work for and within the Jewish community of Toronto, died in Toronto in January 1982 and his body was flown to Tel Aviv for burial, the Canadian Jewish News reported on January 28, 1982. Hausman was born in Aachen, Germany and moved to Israel…
Service for Reb Fortinsky
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Yeshivah Torath Chaim held a “shloshim” service for Reb Israel Fortinsky in late November 1977, according to the Canadian Jewish News of November 25, 1977. Fortinsky was a scholar and teacher who had taught students in the upper grades at the Torah Chaim Rabbinical Seminary. Born in Poland, he came to Canada in 1926 and…
Obit: Bill Carrick, wildlife photographer (1920-2002)
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Bill Carrick, a Toronto-area naturalist and wildlife photographer who coaxed beavers, ducks, fish, geese, polar bears and other animals into acting naturally in front of the camera, has died after an accidental fall on the rural property he rented in northeastern Scarborough, Ont. along the Pickering town line. He was 81 years old. * William…
Obits: Hyman Breslin (d 1934); Reva Breslin, 1918
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Death silences toast of noted businessman while family mourns Clock stops in hallway as Hyman Breslin borne to grave “Trinken Lachayim” Jewish philanthropist years ago had vision of passing of wife’s mother From the Toronto Daily Star, January 2, 1934 With his life hanging by so slender a thread that death resulted an hour later,…
Sad case of Louis Brown, 1915
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Real Estate Losses Led to Brown’s Suicide Queen St. Tailor Suffered Heavily in Slump FEARED FOR HIS FUTURE Had Made Up His Mind to Die — Intimated He Would Leave Money to All Denominations, Though He Was a Russian Jew From The Globe, March 8, 1915 Although he was the holder of many mortgages and…
Obit: Nathan Smith (d. 1936)
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From the Jewish Standard, January 1937 With the passing of Nathan Smith, Toronto was bereaved of one of the most interesting and one of the most remarkable Jews in its city. The late Nathan Smith was like an oak transplanted from the old Jewish forest of Eastern Europe, a sturdy young oak which has taken…
Obit: Rabbi Jacob Mendel Kirshenblatt (c1904 – 2002)
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Rabbi Jacob Mendel Kirshenblatt, a spiritual leader and longtime teacher who taught thousands of bar and bat mitzvah students, died in Toronto on March 6, 2002. He was 98. Rabbi Kirshenblatt was honoured in February by Beth Sholom Synagogue and Congregation Beth Haminyan at a tribute dinner attended by many of his former students. Leslie…
