Biddeford
Biddeford is located in York County, and was incorporated in 1855. Known for its long and productive history as a mill town, the textile mills attracted a diverse wave of immigrants, most of whom came to the area from Ireland and from the French-Canadian province of Quebec. Most early Jewish residents worked as peddlers and shop owners, supporting the mill community.
Biddeford Jewish Census
(estimated)
1910-1975
(Saco numbers included from 1955)
Biddeford
Congregation Etz Chaim
1907 - present
Temple Shalom Etz Chaim
Affiliation
Rabbi
Location
Website
Phone
Non-denominational
Cantor Beth Strassler
36 Bacon Street, Bath
www.EtzChaimMe.org
(207)443-4606
Congregation Beth Abraham
Congregational Timeline
Circa 1880
The first Jewish residents, mostly immigrants from Lithuania, Russia, and Poland, began to arrive in Biddeford-Saco.
1894
Gatherings moved to St. Anthoine’s Hall, a social hall which came to be known as “The Jewish Hall,” located at 26 Alfred Street.
1945-1947
Rabbi Akiba Zilberberg served the congregation.
1954-1967
Rabbi Boris Gottlieb served as the congregation’s last full-time rabbi.
Circa 1980
Several young Jewish families began to move to the area, sparking a revitalization of the synagogue.
2007
Membership numbers reached 100 families in time to celebrate the synagogue’s 100th anniversary.
1890
Members of Biddeford’s Jewish community began meeting informally at people’s homes to worship, using Torah scrolls they had brought with them from Europe.
1900
Rabbi Hirsche Hazid became Biddeford’s first rabbi, serving until 1907 when the congregation determined they could no longer afford to pay a rabbi full-time.
1948-1950
Rabbi Benjamin Roth served the congregation.
Circa 1955
Membership numbers began to decline, with a low of 25 families by the late 1960s.
1987
Synagogue discontinued its Orthodox affiliation and began to operate as an unaffiliated synagogue, thereby drawing a much larger and younger membership.
2017
Cantor Beth Strassler hired and continues to serve the congregation.
1892
A Hebrew Congregation was officially set up in Hyman Goodkowsky’s second-floor apartment on Alfred Street.
1907
As a solution, the congregation created a combined position of a cantor, kosher butcher, shochet, and janitor. Chlavno Cantor served in that role for five months, after which Joseph Caplan took on the position for the next two years.
1950-1953
Rabbi Edmund Neiss served the congregation.
1967
Synagogue closed its doors for over a decade, except for High Holiday services which were conducted by visiting rabbis or cantors.
1988
New Hebrew school began weekly classes.
CongregationEtz Chaim
Clergy Leadership:
- Rabbi Hirsch Hazid, c1900-1907
- Chlavno Cantor, spiritual leader, shochet, 1907
- Joseph Caplan, spiritual leader, shochet, 1908-1911
- Morris Nathanson, spiritual leader, shochet, 1936-1945
- Rabbi Akiba Zilberberg, 1945-1947
- Rabbi Benjamin Roth, 1948-1950
- Rabbi Edmund Neiss, 1950-c1953
- Rabbi Boris Gottlieb, 1954-1967, the congregation’s last full-time rabbi
- Cantor Beth Strassler, 2017-present
Arnold Shapiro
Arnold Shapiro was raised in Biddeford, attended Hebrew School at Congregation Etz Chaim and celebrated his bar mitzvah in 1944. In 1980, he became the president at a time when other board members wanted to close the synagogue due to a lack of membership. He spent countless hours doing everything from organizing High Holiday services to attending bar and bat mitzvah services, recruiting volunteers and supervising building repairs. For over 30 years, Arnold Shapiro selflessly guided the congregation to become the vibrant community it is today. The Arnold Shapiro Community Service Award was created to honor his lifelong commitment and service to Congregation Etz Chaim.
Beth and David Strassler
David and Beth Strassler grew up in New York and moved to Biddeford in 1982 where he set up his first medical practice while she commuted to UNH to teach Occupational Therapy. Despite having chosen career paths that can be all-consuming, they were determined to also “live their lives.” They had different spiritual journeys that led them to highly value their Judaism. Although welcomed upon arrival by Biddeford’s Congregation Etz Chaim, it was on the brink of closing. They gradually took on leadership roles with a focus on customizing services and programs to meet the needs of the community. David Strassler now serves as the synagogue president and Beth is an ordained Cantor. “We were working so hard just to have this place be viable. Since I was ordained, the community did hire me part time as a spiritual leader. I feel part of that is connecting with the community at large. We assembled people and said, ‘What’s important, what do you want?’ Then we worked to make that happen. That’s not a traditional Jewish religious institutional approach, that we’re facilitators for what the community wants. I think that’s really important.”
Making Women Count
As an Orthodox synagogue, only men counted toward the minyan at Congregation Etz Chaim. And since women did not “count,” they generally did not attend services. Generally, they came to the synagogue to worship only on the High Holidays and sat apart from the men in the sanctuary’s balcony, reached by a staircase in the bell-tower.
When the bell-tower was razed, the women’s section was relocated to a second sanctuary separated from the main sanctuary by a wall with many sheer-curtained windows which enabled the women to hear the service but not view the men running it.
Since Etz Chaim’s shift from its Orthodox roots, egalitarianism has been upheld in every respect with mixed seating and women and men serving in equal numbers on the synagogue’s board of directors. The staircase to the sanctuary’s balcony is long gone, leaving the balcony unreachable – a reminder of the marginalization of women, a practice Etz Chaim has left in the past.
