jews d
in
the
All In The
Family!
While marking the JN’s 75th year, we
also spotlight multi-generational families.
A
s the 75th anniversary year of the Jewish
News comes to a close, we are sharing the
stories of a sampling of multi-generational
families.
In addition to these accompanying profiles,
each edition of the Jewish News will include a
new multi-generational family story through
May 3. That’s when the community gathers at
Congregation Shaarey Zedek in Southfield to
celebrate our 75th anniversary and recognize
the Davidson-Gerson-Wetsman-Saulson family
as exemplars for the myriad families — from all
walks of life — that have helped to make Detroit
one of North America’s most respected Jewish
communities.
Consistent with the theme of connecting our
Julie Wi tt watches her children Samantha and Brandon play.
past, current and future generations, we are invit-
ing readers to share multi-generational family
photos with us, along with a brief description
of those pictured. We plan on utilizing many of
these photos at the gala event. We also intend
to digitize these photos and include them in a
“photo album” that will be available through our
website.
Email digital photos (1mb jpgs or 600 dpi) to
msmith@djnfoundation.org. Include names of
people in all photos and what is going on. Family
statements also can be emailed to msmith@
djnfoundation.org; if your photo has been snail-
mailed, indicate that in your emailed statement.
Thanks! We will enjoy sharing your family with
the JN family.
Rabbi Solomon Cohen passed on the tradition to his son Rabbi Avraham Cohen, right, and grandson Rabbi Erza Cohen.
Three Generations of Mohels
The Cohens of Southfield are a cut above the rest and
they’re clearly used to cutting jokes as they are now
three generations of mohels.
It began with Rabbi Solomon (Shlomo) Cohen, who
immigrated from Israel to Rochester, N.Y., at age 24
in 1947. When he discovered there wasn’t a qualified
mohel around, he promptly filled the vacancy him-
self. During the next 40 years, Solomon circumcised
thousands of Jewish baby boys in Rochester and its
surrounding cities.
Family lore has it he was once pulled over for
speeding and, after a quick game of Jewish geogra-
phy, discovered he’d been the mohel at the cop’s bris.
(No ticket after that revelation.)
Solomon cherished being a mohel until he passed
away in 2002.
Like father, like son. In 1980, Solomon’s son, Rabbi
Avraham Cohen, relocated to Israel, where he became
a certified rabbi, sofer and mohel. He trained under
Shaarey Tzedek hospital’s well-known mohel, Rabbi
Yossel Weissberg. For six weeks, Avraham attended
between 8 and 12 circumcisions per day (except
Shabbat), getting more hands-on experience than
most certified mohels get in their first few years of
practicing.
Avraham returned to Detroit as a mohel and his
continued on page 28
26
March 15 • 2018
jn
Three Generations Of Piano Teachers
Julie Witt knows that talent can run in families. Her grandmother was a
piano teacher, she’s a piano teacher — and now her 13-year-old daugh-
ter has her own roster of piano students.
Somehow the musical gene skipped Witt’s father, Burton Weintraub, a
retired internist.
Her grandmother, Mathilda Weintraub, taught piano at the Detroit
Conservatory and introduced Witt to the instrument when she was 6.
“She had six grandchildren and I was the only one who developed a
real love for piano,” Witt said.
Witt studied communications at Michigan State University, with minors
in piano and dance.
While in college, she put ads in the MSU State News and the Lansing
State Journal offering piano lessons, and soon she had 10 students. They
would come to her dorm’s common room, and she would just go down-
stairs to teach.
Today, she has 32 students who come to her West Bloomfield house
for lessons.
When Witt started out, she didn’t expect piano instruction to be her
career. She worked for seven years in radio (promotions, news, traffic and
weather), but turned down a gig as a local TV weather reporter because
it would interfere with her piano teaching. After she married her hus-
band, Frank, and had children, giving piano lessons was a perfect job.
Witt started her daughter, Samantha, 13, and son, Brandon, 9, on
piano when they were 4. They practice twice a day, before they head off
to Hillel Day School and after they come home.
“They are so good!” said their proud mother. “Samantha won the
Detroit’s Got Talent competition [for young performers] six years ago,
when she was only 7!”
At her bat mitzvah last November at Temple Israel, Samantha played
piano to help illustrate her d’var Torah. For her mitzvah project, she
played for residents at Fleischman Residence, where her grandmother
lives.
Now Samantha has started to teach. To prepare her, Witt let her
observe lessons for a few months. Then Samantha, who is in eighth
grade, started teaching some beginning players.
After six to nine months, the newbies will graduate to lessons with
Witt, and Samantha will take on new pupils.
“The kids love her,” Witt said. “She’s still a kid, and she knows how
to make it fun.” And her mother is always within earshot to make sure a
lesson is going well.
— Barbara Lewis, Contributing Writer