25th Yartzeit of Rabbi Yankel Kranz

Editor’s Note:
The following is excerpted from a paper that was written by Sarah Kranz-Ciment when she was a teenager and needed a hero for her high school thesis. She chose her father, Rabbi Yaakov Noach Kranz, O’bm, who had passed away when she was only ten years old. The Kranz family always intended to publish the thesis, but somehow the time was just never right.

COLlive is pleased to feature this story (in an abbreviated and updated format) in commemoration of the 25th Yahrzeit of this legendary, pioneer Shliach, Rabbi Yaakov Noach (Yankel) Kranz.

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MY FATHER WAS A SHLIACH
By Sarah Kranz-Ciment

Do you believe in giants? Most people don’t, but here is the true story of a twinkly-eyed, rosy-cheeked, 6’4 giant with a smile as wide as he was tall. That was my father, Rabbi Yaakov Noach Kranz, of blessed memory.

When the Frierdiker Rebbe, Rabbi Yoseph Yitzchak Schneerson, Ob’m arrived in the United States in 1940, he set off a chain reaction that would spiritually impact thousands of men and women. One of those people was my father.

It began when the Rebbe famously looked at a schedule of the Long Island Railroad and sent emissaries to every major city in which it stopped. These emissaries established Lubavitcher Yeshivas in several cities including: Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Chicago, Illinois, and most importantly to my story, in Worcester, Massachusetts.

At about that same time, on a drastically different continent, a baby boy was born, whose life would be transformed by a teacher in the Worcester Yeshiva. It was there that the small seed planted by the Frierdiker Rebbe would blossom to impact the life of my father and the Jewish communities he would serve for the rest of his life.

My father was born in 1941, on the second day of Chol Hamoed Pesach, to Yoel and Miriam Kranc. He was born in Odessa, during World War II, while his family was running from the Nazis. My grandparents were simple, G-d fearing Jews who were determined that their newborn son, (their Ben Zekunim) would have a Bris. With great Mesiras Nefesh, my grandparents managed to find a Mohel, who they always believed was a Lubavitcher Chossid. I would like to believe that too, but we will never know for sure.

The family suffered hunger and cold during the fierce battle of Leningrad, and my father became very sick. Everyone advised my grandmother to just leave him on the side of the road because he was slowing down the rest of the family and endangering all their lives. “I have already lost one child to this war” she said, “and now Der Aibishter has blessed me with a child in my old age, as a replacement. I won’t give Yankele back.” He miraculously survived.

In 1950, the Kranz family managed to immigrate to the United States. Their boat docked in New York Harbor, less than thirty days after the passing of the Frierdike Rebbe. (During that same month, on a different ship, the Friedman family including my mother also arrived in New York.)

They ended up settling in Danielson, Ct., where they purchased a small chicken farm. Young Yankele attended public school, but his parents wanted him to have a proper Bar Mitzvah. When they heard about a rabbi from nearby Worcester, Mass. who gave Bar Mitzvah lessons, they arranged to have him teach their son. The teacher was Rabbi Yisroel Gordon and that connection would unleash a tidal wave that is still producing ripples today.

As Rabbi Gordon began studying with my father, he realized that this was a special boy who showed great promise. He wanted to send him to a yeshiva, and wrote a letter to the Rebbe asking for advice about what to do with the young prodigy. In the letter, Rabbi Gordon mentioned that he would try to persuade the parents to send him to a modern Jewish school in New York. In response, the Rebbe answered “and why should he not attend one of our schools?” Rabbi Gordon found the courage to suggest to my grandparents that their son enroll in the Lubavitch Yeshiva in Brooklyn. To his astonishment, they readily agreed.

When my father entered the yeshiva at thirteen, he was almost six-feet tall and had no knowledge of Chumash or Gemara. They placed him into the third grade where he comically towered above the other boys. He didn’t stay there long though, because within a couple of weeks he had graduated to the fourth grade, then fifth, etc. until by the end of the semester, he was already studying with boys in his own age group. And shortly thereafter he actually began to tutor the younger boys.

One year, my father wanted to go back home to be with his family for Pesach. His teachers were concerned about Kashrus and they consulted with Rabbi Yoel Kahn, who at that time was already a Mashpiah to many students. “Don’t worry about this bachur,” he told them. “In fact, send him home because he will turn his entire family around!”

Something else happened that year which would also have long-term repercussions. Rabbi Gordon had also been tutoring Bonnie Shatzman, another promising student in Danielson, and he also persuaded her parents to send their daughter to Bais Yaakov in Brooklyn. That young girl became Breinah Sheine Deitsch, O’bm and in an incredible incidence of ‘Bashert,” her son would later marry the daughter of Yankel Kranz.

The Years of Shlichus

Detroit, Michigan

My father continued to excel in his studies in Niglah and Chassidus and became passionate about Shlichus. He married my mother, Fay Kranz Greene, in 1964 and accepted a position in Detroit as a rabbi in a new Shul that Rabbi Berel Shemtov had acquired. “Shlichus as we know it today, was not always so popular” said Shemtov. “Your father was from the first Shluchim, and he threw himself into Avodas Hakodesh, and remained on Shlichus up until his very last day. Not only did he raise children who are Shluchim, but he also raised Baalei Teshuva who today are Chassidim and even Shluchim themselves.”

Shlucha and prominent lecturer Rebbetzin Chaya Teldon, was one of a group of students from the Detroit Talmud Torah, whom my father sent to Bais Rivkah in Crown Heights. She remembers being one of “Kranz’s Girls” as they were called, because there were no words at that time to describe this new phenomenon of sending girls to N.Y. Mrs. Teldon once spoke to my class in Pittsburgh, and she told us how she and a group of her friends had spent a Shabbos with my father in a secular camp. “We stayed up very late with the campers on Friday night and slept in a little on Shabbos morning. Your father was not happy and said ’I didn’t bring you here to sleep.’ These words are true today. Not in this lifetime are we here to sleep.”

Rabbi Yehoshua B. Gordon, O”BM, legendary shliach and teacher was a lifelong friend and colleague of my father. He was the featured speaker at my father’s Shloshim and began his talk as follows: “In the summer of 1956, a young seven-year old boy was sent off to summer camp in the Catskills. He was lonely, scared and homesick. No one took him seriously- no one except a very tall fifteen year-old waiter. He took the young boy under his wing, treated him like an equal and made him feel 10-feet tall. I tell you this story tonight” said Rabbi Gordon “because I was that seven-year old and that waiter was my beloved friend, Rabbi Yankel Kranz.” He later told me that my father had “one of the keenest minds I have ever encountered” and that he “wrote the book on Shlichus.”

S. Diego, California

The Kranz family moved to California in 1973, where Rabbi Shlomo Cunin had just opened the first Chabad center on the campus of San Diego State University. We were there for only three years, but in that short time, my father turned the Chabad House into a dynamic force for Lubavitch not only on campus, but also throughout the area. He brought in three additional Shluchim families, transformed the local day school into a Chabad mosod, opened a Jewish Book Store, and built a beautiful Mikvah, which is still in use today. My father left behind a blossoming Jewish community that has become a thriving center of Yiddishkeit in Southern California.

Mr. Maury Steiman, O’H, a businessman in S. Diego, once offered to buy my father a motorcycle and he actually took him up on it. “A Kapotah flying in the wind,” was the way Steiman described it. ”This certainly made him popular on the campus and attracted many students. Personally, I will never forget the first time that Rabbi Kranz took me to the Rebbe. The Rebbe told me that he was making me ‘the Jewish Mayor of S. Diego’ and I’ve tried to live up to those words ever since.”

Richmond, Virginia – the Last Stop

In 1976, my parents were appointed by the Rebbe as Head Shluchim to the states of Virginia and West Virginia. My family moved to Richmond, a beautiful city on the banks of the James River, where I was born.

My father was to find that Virginia and California were miles apart both literally and figuratively. While the Jews in S. Diego welcomed ‘outsiders’ with open arms, Richmonders didn’t really consider you one of their own, unless your grandparents had come over on the Mayflower. Yes, Virginia had many historical attractions, Civil War monuments and even a small Shul. But it never had Chabad.

In what was perhaps his most selfless act in Richmond, my father began spending the first three hours of each day, personally teaching my three brothers: Yossel, Yoel and Menachem. This was a great Mesiras Nefesh for him, as it cut drastically into his already limited time. “When I first came to Richmond, your father wanted me to help with the teaching” said Rabbi Yosef Itkin, now a shliach in Pittsburgh. “I told him that ‘I came here to be a Shliach, not to teach frum children.’ Your father wasn’t happy with that and said ‘the most important thing in my life is to teach my children.’ I remember that when your brother came to Yeshiva in Pittsburgh, he learned extraordinarily well and this was all due to your father.”

Mr. Morty Brown was one of my father’s first supporters in Virginia. “My two daughters will never forget that it was in your father’s Sukkah that they promised him to only marry Jewish husbands. And they both did! Your father and I actually met when he asked to use my office to print labels for The Richmond Jewish News, a weekly newspaper that he had just founded and which became an immediate must-read for the Jewish community.”

Radio Show, Singles, Bumper Stickers:

As the years passed, my father availed himself of every new emerging technology to enhance the spiritual life of the Jews in Virginia.

”Good morning and welcome to the Lubavitch Jewish Hour,” was the opening of the popular Sunday-morning radio program initiated by my father and narrated by my mother. I remember that Hebrew school teachers would listen to the program on their car radios, from as far away as Tennessee, and incorporate what my mother taught into their lesson plans for the day.

In 1987, in response to the alarming rate of intermarriage, my father initiated a then groundbreaking computerized program to introduce Jewish singles. It was called ‘Chosen People.’ With a database of hundreds of Jewish men and women it was responsible for several marriages and gave my father tremendous Nachas.

My sister Layah recently founded a website called getyourget.com, to help women who need a Jewish divorce. She credits my father for this idea. “Years and years ago, he told me about an idea of his to start a bumper-sticker campaign called ‘Get Your Get.’”

My brother Yossel tells us that whenever he comes up with a new idea or program, he will inevitably find that our father already had notes on something similar in his files.

Expansion

It was also at this time that my father set his sights on expanding Chabad throughout the state. In 1983 he opened the Tidewater branch of Chabad Lubavitch in Virginia Beach and hired Rabbi Aaron and Reichel Margolin to be its director. He also looked to the North, to the growing bedroom communities of Washington D.C., and established Chabad Lubavitch of Northern Virginia, directed by my brother-in-law, Rabbi Sholom Deitsch and my sister Chanie.

The ‘Farbreng Inn’

My father had always envisioned a ‘live and learn’ center on our property, in which families could stay for Shabbos or Yom Tov without driving. It was a wonderful concept, but an expensive one and in 1988, all the years of hard work finally paid off and we celebrated the Hachnosas Sefer Torah for the new Lubavitch Center. Situated on four acres of land, the building was architecturally innovative with its dome-like roof and interior twelve brick arches. In addition to the usual classrooms, dining room, kitchen etc., there were also 16 bedrooms with private baths, all centered around a magnificent Shul. My father himself was the contractor for the job.

In those years, we would get many calls from Jewish tourists, asking if there was a kosher place to stay or eat while they were visiting the many Virginia attractions. It occurred to my father that perhaps the building could be used as a hospitality center for Jews outside of Virginia as well. He placed an ad in The Jewish Press in New York, advertising rooms, kosher meals, Minyanim and Shiurim. That first Shabbos, all the rooms were taken. And so, accidentally yet inevitably, ‘The Farbreng Inn’ was born.

We welcomed thousands of Yidden, from every nearby state and from every background. Most of the guests had never really been exposed to Chabad and they came in the door warily; but they all left with a newfound love and appreciation for the work of Chabad and for the Shluchim. Many were inspired to write and visit the Rebbe and to learn Chassidus. Wherever anyone in our family travels, even today, we will inevitably meet someone who was there and who has a story to tell us.

The Final Months

My father was always ahead of his time – but tragically his time was almost up. It would be his son, Rabbi Yossel Kranz, and his wife Nechomi, who would direct the Farbreng Inn and Chabad of the Virginias.

In March of 1991, my father was r’ch’l diagnosed with cancer. It was the same week that Layah was getting married to Rabbi Yossi Lipsker, but the wedding was both festive and freilach. My parents told no one about his illness or that he was scheduled for surgery immediately after the Sheva Brochos. A few of the guests noticed that my father seemed a little pale and he told them it was because he had fasted in honor of the wedding,

That summer, before I left for Camp Emunah, my mother and I went to the Rebbe for dollars and I asked for a Refuah Shelamo for my father. The Rebbe said “Du Zolst Hubben A Gezunte Mamme.” (You should have a healthy mother.)

Less than five months after the initial diagnosis, on Erev Shabbos Kodesh, the sixth of Elul, 5751, my father passed away in his office, in the Lubavitch center to which he had dedicated his life. He was brought to Kevura on that very same day, in New York, near the Ohel.

My uncle Rabbi Manis Friedman, always says that my father was much more than his brother-in-law. “He was my mentor and my teacher. Some people pass away and people treasure their memory. Some people even become a memory. Yankel stood for absolute truth, and truth does not end. He is here with us forever. He is not a memory.”

Epilogue:

Chabad of Virginia has become a major force for Jewish life in the South. His children and grandchildren are B”H his successors today in Richmond, Fairfax, Swampscott, Boca Raton and Riverdale. The small spark that was lit by Rabbi Kranz has burst into a fiery torch that will surely continue to illuminate the lives of all who knew him.

The following is a list of Chabad Mosdos throughout Virginia, which are BH flourishing today:

*Chabad of Virginia, Richmond
*Jewish VCU (Virginia Commonwealth University)
*Rohr Chabad House at The University of Virginia
*Chabad at Virginia Tech, Librescu Center
*Chabad Lubavitch of Tidewater
*Chabad Lubavitch of Northern Virginia
*Chabad Lubavitch of Alexandria-Arlington
*Chabad of Shenandoah Valley
*Chabad-Lubavitch of Reston and Herndon
*Chabad Tysons Jewish Center