16 | NOVEMBER 21 • 2019 continued from page 14 educators through on-the-bus lessons. “We want students to take pride in learning how the Jewish community in Michigan came to be, and how Jewish values brought from the Old World shaped our history and the identity we still carry today.” During the tour, teachers met with actors dressed in period costumes. At his campsite along the Detroit River at William G. Milliken State Park, pioneer Ezekiel Solomon spoke about his adventures delivering supplies to the British during the French and Indian Wars in the 1700s. At the Eastern Market, Sylvia, a young teen from the early 20th century, was the first of her family to be sent to America from her shtetl in Russia in hopes to earn enough for the rest of her family to make the passage. There, she sold the teachers apples for a penny. Teachers were then treated to a kosher hot dog lunch at the site of the old Tiger Stadium, where they ran the bases now used by the Police Athletic League and were told stories by a young Hank Greenberg who had to choose between playing in the World Series in 1934 or observing Yom Kippur. Sitting side by side at an outdoor picnic table making beeswax Shabbat candles were Robbie Terman, archivist for the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit, and Jeanne Weiner, JHSM volunteer and a project adviser for the trip and workbook. “It’ s unusual for kids to be interested in history,” Weiner said. “But when they get older, they wish they had talked and interviewed their grandparents and parents about what life was like for them. We hope this trip will inspire our Jewish students to engage and go back to discover their family history.” At their last stop, educators learned about the history of the community’ s Jewish congregations — from the first founded in 1850 to their migration to the suburbs in recent times — as they examined the decaying architecture of the sanctuary of the Beth El Transformation Center on Woodward Avenue. Educator Linda Shapiro marveled at the ornate ceiling full of Jewish symbolism, Hebrew texts from the Torah and murals depicting moments in Jewish history, just as she did when she attended pre-confirmation classes there.Rabbi Arianna Gordon, director of the Tyner Religious school at Temple Israel, said about 100 sixth-graders will participate in the trip this year. “We appreciate the enhancements JHSM has made to build family and multigenerational connections into the curriculum,” she said. “Now, when kids come to Detroit with parents and grandparents, they can better appreciate its vibrant past and how, as Jews, we are connected to that past as well as the city’ s future.” The program, supported by grant seed money the first three years, has been free to area synagogues. With the seed money gone, JHSM is seeking sup- porters to sustain the program. The JHSM board decided the program can no longer be offered free starting Jan. 1. To help fund Traveling Trunk, contact JHSM Executive Director Catherine Cangany at (248) 432-5403 or ccangany@michjewishhistory.org. Jews in the D LEFT: JHSM supporters Michael and Donna Maddin, JHSM Executive Director Catherine Cangany, JHSM educator Tova Schreiber who played a 1910s Eastern Market peddler during the tour, JHSM supporters Shari and Stan Finsilver, and JHSM Traveling Trunk curriculum designer and docent Cheryl Blau. BOTTOM: “Sylvia” selling apples at the Eastern Market.