Celebrating 50 years of growth with the Detroit Jewish Community

THE JEWISH NEWS

3 CHESHVAN 57 53/OCTOBER 30, 19 92

Last Jewish JCC?

Detroit is the only major community center
with a "Jewish only" membership policy.

ALAN HITSKY ASSOCIATE EDITOR

ecause of the
threat of a law-
suit in Baltimore,
Detroit's Jewish
Community Cen-
ter has been left
with a unique sta-
tus: It is the only major
JCC left in the United
States that accepts only
Jewish members.
The Baltimore JCC
changed its membership
status two months ago
after a gentile applicant
threatened to sue when
she was denied member-
ship. Detroit would like
to retain its policy, even
if it is alone.
"We have 2-3 requests
per year," said Dr. Plot-
nitk, "and one or two
wind up coming to my of-
. fice. Most people, when

they hear our policy, back
off."
The JCC has a pur-
pose and objectives agree-
ment on its membership
application. It states in
part:
"The Jewish Commu-
nity Center has evolved
as an agency to provide
for the leisure-time recre-
ational, informal educa-
tional and cultural needs
of the Jewish communi-
ty. The Jewish Center is
a service organization
which has the objective
of helping the Jewish in-
dividual develop cre-
atively as a person, as a
Jew, and as a citizen. It
is committed to strength-
ening religious values ..."

JCC/page 19

PROFILE

The 85-Years-Young
Apple Man

Inside

CLOSE-UP

CCHAYIM

Bad Things, Good People

Judaism offers guidance
in the face of adversity.
page 59

INTERNATIONAL

Center Of Attention

Community center gives hope
to Croatia's war-torn Jews.
page 112

FOCUS

Singular Sensation

Unified Germany is looking like
the Germany of the 1930s.

Detroit's most famous psychic
has that certain feeling.
page 115

The Fourth
Reich?

.

Contents on page 5

• Story on page 24

Recovering Stolen Property

An Oak Park resident hopes to reclaim family land seized
by the Nazis and the Communists.

ELIZABETH APPLEBAUM ASSISTANT EDITOR

;tory on page 69

haim Rosenbluth was an Kraus said. "I have to take action."
If Mr. Kraus wins his case, it will likely be
aristocrat, an observant
Jew and a businessman. one of the largest settlements of its kind. The few
He owned thousands of Jews who have attempted to reclaim property
acres in his hometown stolen by Nazis or Communists generally are
seeking only their
of Humenne,
former homes.
Czechoslovakia,
0 "P
Chaim Rosen-
which he was
bluth's property
determined to
constitutes thou-
see remain in the family.
sands of acres rich
`There's going to be enough here for
with forestry and
generation after generation after gen-
possibly still con-
eration," he often told his grandson,
taining sawmills
Eugene.
and lumber facto-
But the property never came into the
ries. Mr. Kraus
hands of Mr. Rosenbluth's descendants.
doesn't know exact-
That honor went first to the Nazis, who
want
w
hat's
ours
back."
"We
ly
how much it is all
confiscated it when they took power
in Czechoslovakia in 1939, and then to the worth, but it's at least in the millions, he said.
The story begins years ago in Humenne, a
Communists, who seized control in 1948.
small
shtetl in eastern Slovakia The Jewish com-
Today, Eugene Kraus, of Oak Park, is deter-
munity
was founded in the 18th century.
mined to uphold his grandfather's covenant. He Its first there
synagogue, which had a thatched roof,
is about to file suit with the government of was soon joined by a chevra kaddisha (burial so-
Czechoslovakia to reclaim his family's land.
"I owe this to my family and my kids," Mr. RECLAIM LAND/page 30