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Vol. 35 No. 36
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A new era in education at L.B. synagogue Jonah, were living in Brooklyn Heights when the pandemic hit. They moved to Tampa to live Beryl Jackowitz was born with her father for a few and raised in Tampa, Florida, months, but they missed New by an observant Conservative York and wanted to move back. Jewish family. Being Jewish But they wanted to find somewas a very big part of her life where new to live, and they chose Long Beach. It reminded as she grew up. them of Fire She went to JewIsland, where Beryl ish Day School, and and Michael had participated in met. United Synagogue In Brooklyn, Youth, a group for their children had Conservative Jewattended a synaish teens across the gogue preschool. country. After she When they arrived earned a degree in in Long Beach in history from the September 2020, University of Pennone of their to-dos sylvania, she mainwas to find a new tained a close con- BERyl JACkowITz synagogue where nection with Israel Education director, they could really throughout her 20s Temple Emanu-El “plant our flag,” and 30s. Before she Jackowitz said, and got mar ried, she took her fiancé, Michael Jack- participate fully, one where they liked the clergy and felt owitz, to Israel with her. “I was just really trying to comfortable. The problem was, forge my own connection and nothing was open and active, path,” Jackowitz said. “Because with Covid still a major conas we get older, we change our cern. Lucky for them, they got connection to religion, of course, but once I became a par- some suggestions. “My husband was Reform ent, it was critical for me to reand I was raised Conservative,” establish a formal connection.” Jackowitz, her husband and Jackowitz explained, “so we their two children, Abe and Continued on page 9
By BRENDAN CARPENTER
bcarpenter@liherald.com
I
Herald file photo
Ricky Weisenberg, center, who had celebral palsy, died on aug. 7, at age 66. His mother, ellen, died in 2016. His father, Harvey, is a former state assemblyman.
A lifetime of advocacy, all without speaking a word By BRENDAN CARPENTER bcarpenter@liherald.com
Ricky Weisenberg, who had cerebral palsy, spent his life trying to help people with physical disabilities. He couldn’t speak, but that never got in his way. Weisenberg, who was living at the AHRC Nassau group home in Plainview, died on Aug. 7, at age 66, of complications of pneumonia. Weisenberg was the adopted son of longtime Long Beach resident Harvey Weisenberg, a former police officer, city councilman and state assemblyman, and his late wife, Ellen. Ricky was the main motivation, his father often said, for his decades-long
focus on helping those with disabilities, just like his son. “God gave me an angel, a saint and a mission,” Weisenberg said. “The angel is Ricky, my special child. The saint was my wife, and my mission is to help people. Ricky changed my life.” Ellen Weisenberg died in 2016. Ricky lived in group homes upstate, in Melville and in Pittsburgh before spending the last 30 years in Plainview. At the AHRC Nassau residential facility home there, his family said, he was once mistreated and abused. As a result, his father introduced Jonathan’s Law in the Assembly in 2007 — named for Jonathan Carey, a child with autism who was killed that year by a care Continued on page 4
t was critical for me to re-establish a formal connection.