46 June 27 • 2019
jn

From the DJN Foundation Davidson Digital Archive of Jewish Detroit History

Mike Smith
Alene and Graham 
Landau Archivist 
Chair

PHOTOGRAPH 
COURTESY OF THE RABBI LEO M. FRANKLIN ARCHIVES OF TEMPLE BETH EL, BLOOMFIELD HILLS, MI. 

Abraham “Aid” Kushner was known for his remarkable synagogue models. Here, in the 1970s, he is pictured in the Anna S. and Meyer L. Prentis Memorial Library at Temple Beth El with many of his models. 

O

n June 6, the Jewish Historical Society held 
its annual meeting and awards ceremony, 
a very nice affair. One of the awardees was 
Peggy Finkelstein, who received the Judith Levin 
Cantor Lifetime Achievement Award. Finkelstein 
is the director of the Peg and Mort Finkelstein 
Historical Archives at Temple Emanuel in Grand 
Rapids. Naturally, I like archivists, especially, those 
with a bit of vision.
Finkelstein has an impressive track record as an 
archivist. As her family historian for many years, she 
morphed into the director of the archive at Temple 
Emanuel and, beginning in 2002, when Peg and Mort 
began supporting the archives, she began to reorga-
nize them. “I wanted to make it user-friendly,
” she 
said. Well, she did, and is now working to digitize 
collections and make them even more user-friend-
ly. Along the way, she earned the Olson Lifetime 
Contribution of Local History Award from Grand 
Valley State University as well as a history award from 
the Historical Society of Michigan. 
Finkelstein’
s work raised another question for me 
— what does the William Davidson Digital Archive 
of Jewish Detroit History contain regarding Temple 

Emanuel, which is one of the oldest temples in 
Michigan in the state’
s second largest city? Its website 
claims it is the fifth-oldest Reform congregation in the 
United States. It was founded in 1857 by five German 
families and remained largely German until the late-
19th century. Its current temple opened in 1952. 
Searching for “Temple Emanuel, Grand Rapids” in 
the Davidson archive results in 540 pages citing the 
temple, with the first mention in 1917. In particular, 
I found a very good article in the Oct. 4, 1968, issue 
of the JN titled: “The History of Grand Rapids Jewry 
and its Founders.” 
The archive demonstrates that the JN and the 
Jewish Chronicle has and has had reporting on 
Jewish life throughout the state of Michigan, from 
Marquette and Mackinac Island, to Traverse City, 
Grand Rapids and Detroit. 
So, mazel tov to Peg! Good luck to her as she con-
tinues to develop the archives named after her and 
her husband. And may Temple Emanuel thrive for 
another 150 years. ■

Want to learn more? Go to the DJN Foundation archives, 
available for free at www.djnfoundation.org.

Looking Back

