Always connect

As my son’s daughter Tehila was approaching her bat mitzvah, the two of us embarked on a day of volunteering during Sukkot when she was off from school.

With the aid of a WhatsApp group called JLM English Speaking Volunteers, I signed us up for morning and afternoon projects and mapped out bus routes to reach them.

The afternoon activity was in an industrial-zone warehouse, where the ultra-Orthodox nonprofit organization Tachlit runs many projects. Our job was packing fresh fruits and vegetables that get delivered by other volunteers every Sunday to Thursday to about 1,500 addresses: needy Israelis, lone soldiers, displaced families, and families of reserve soldiers, among others.

I usually find people from Bergen County volunteering in Israel, especially during holidays, and sure enough I was soon bagging eggplants with a couple from Englewood.

Get New Jersey Jewish News's Newsletter by email and never miss our top stories Free Sign Up

Tehila was put to work cleaning soil off kohlrabies from a huge bin; the volunteer in charge felt it wouldn’t be respectful to send out dirt-encrusted veggies.

I asked this lovely and obviously American woman her name, and she said “Beverly Luchfeld.”

Well, I’d never met Beverly. But I recognized her name from my 20 years in Teaneck. Beverly was the “Shabbos robe lady.”

She manufactured fancy Friday-night hostess robes favored by many women in ultra-Orthodox enclaves in Israel, Monsey, Lakewood, Passaic, Borough Park, London, and Antwerp. Teaneck was not a primary market, but occasionally she ran local sales of overstock.

The business was born in 1993, when she was living on Manhattan’s Upper West Side and manufacturing swimsuits.

“I saw that women were wearing flannel bedroom robes to the Shabbos table, and it bothered me immensely,” Beverly told me. “In South Africa, they wore elegant hostess gowns, and a friend asked me to make her one like that.

“It was tartan green plaid with a big collar and a lace doily on top of the collar, with pleats at the top of the shoulders that opened like wings. I actually didn’t care for it, but she wore it to her table — and 200 requests later, I was in business. I wanted to elevate the Shabbos robe to reflect fashion and create a gorgeous gown that you could nurse in and still look like a Shabbos queen.”

During covid, many of the stores that stocked her merchandise closed. For eight months, she had her workers making facemasks for ambulance crews locally and in Israel. Eventually, she found them all other jobs, putting an end to her 30-year reign as “the Yves Saint Laurent of Shabbos robes.”

Living in Teaneck since 1994, she and her husband, Jack Flamholz, who died in 2016, were champions of environmental causes. The Jack Flamholz Water Sustainability Project, inaugurated at the Hawthorne School in Teaneck in 2017 and featured in the Jewish Standard, is based on an Israeli rainwater conservation system and uses Israeli equipment.

“I lived in Jerusalem from 1969 to 1977, finishing my degree in Yiddish literature and Jewish history at Hebrew University, and earned an MBA at Baruch when I returned to New York,” Beverly told me.

“My sister lives in Ramat Gan along with all the children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren of mother’s two stepbrothers. Our mother made aliyah from Montreal at age 92 in 2014. She enjoyed four wonderful years in Ramat Gan.”

Beverly, now 73, would like to make aliyah too. But because her three children live in New York, Baltimore, and Boston, she struck a compromise. She spends half a year in each country, devoting huge chunks of her time and expertise to volunteering.

“In 1973, when the Yom Kippur War broke out, I was executive director of the Israeli branch of the World Union of Jewish Students,” a Jewish Agency program. “We had a conference on how to conscript volunteers from all over the world.  After that, the Jewish Agency would call me every time a war broke out and ask me to conscript volunteers. Before the Internet, it wasn’t easy.”

Beverly was in Jerusalem on October 7, 2023, and sure enough the Jewish Agency sought her assistance. She heard that Tachlit (“Purpose”) was lacking volunteers, so she went to the warehouse every day for two months to assess the needs.

Founded by Jerusalemite Aaron Cohen, who became religious after achieving success in business, Tachlit not only distributes tons of produce weekly but also provides medical transportation for the seriously ill, restaurant vouchers to individuals and families in difficult straits, aid to Holocaust survivors, “adoptive families” for  the Jewish holidays, remote Torah study for people who are isolated or in crisis, hot Shabbat meals for the needy, and more.

David Amor, “a wonderful paid manager,” oversees the produce warehouse with the help of three retirees. High school students fulfilling their community service requirement are among the volunteers who come to pack daily.

Beverly recruited more adult volunteers to help with the packing and to lend professional expertise to improve the operational, financial and technical workings of the organization. She opened a WhatsApp group and created committees of volunteers who cleaned and painted the space and organized supplies more efficiently.

Additionally, she is trying to increase the organization’s visibility to potential overseas donors, because its ultra-Orthodox leaders aren’t proficient in English or in promoting Tachlit outside their own circles.

“They are so thankful for our group, and anything I ask for they do,” she said. “They’d never have been able to sustain their projects this year without us.”

Beverly comes to pack every Monday — fortunately, that was the day I chose to go with Tehila — so she can see what still needs improvement. On other days, she helps in the office or works the phones from home.

She also started another WhatsApp group, Volunteer Brigade, to promote various other volunteer opportunities in Israel.

During the half year she’s in Teaneck, she learns in the community Beit Midrash at the Jewish Center of Teaneck three days a week, teaches English to immigrants at the Teaneck Public Library, and helps hospice patients create an oral or pictorial life history to leave as a legacy.

I asked her what motivates her to give so much.

“I don’t feel I give; I feel I get,” she replied. “I am a doer. Keep me busy filling my days with good things, and I’m happy.”

After Tehila and I finished our two-hour shift, we were weary and grungy from the hard physical work. But my granddaughter surprised me by saying that she’d like to volunteer for Tachlit during her next school vacation. That will probably be during Chanukah, when Beverly is back in Teaneck — though I have no doubt we will meet other volunteers from Bergen County.