South Florida Benefactor of Chabad Remembered

While workmen transformed the Chabad of South Broward building’s exterior from South Florida stucco to the look of Old Jerusalem, Rabbi Raphael Tennenhaus remembered the man who envisioned a Florida Jerusalem campus.

“Jack Mandel was one of our largest benefactors, one of our best friends through the years,” Tennenhaus said on May 8 following a memorial service for Mandel on his third yahrzeit. He died in 2011 at the age of 99.

Mandel was a personal friend and a generous supporter of the Chabad for three decades, Tennenhaus said. He gave the Chabad “well over $1 million,” Tennenhaus said later.

His vision was “to have the Jerusalem look and to keep on growing,” the rabbi said. Mandel encouraged the Chabad to establish a Hebrew school, a pre-school, and a college for teachers, Tennenhaus said. “His message was a humble message. We miss him and we will never forget him.”

Tennenhaus said Mandel sought him out. “He came to see me in 1982,” Tennenhaus recalled. Mandel, who spent winters in Hollywood, prayed at the Chabad, he said.

Mandel came to the United States from Poland at the age of nine and he often said praying at the Chabad reminded him of the shtetl, Tennenhaus said.

“They cut payos at Ellis Island,” Tennenhaus said. “They never cut the payos in his heart.”

Rabbi Moshe Schwartz, Chabad of South Broward’s administrator, said: “Jack was so special to us. He always had an uplifting word. The truth was in his heart.”

Jack Mandel, and younger brothers Joseph and Morton, went from being Cleveland industrialists to being Jewish philanthropists.

“He was in the business world but Jewish tradition to him was of extreme importance,” Rabbi-Cantor Yossi Lebovics said. “He was an old school Jew who really appreciated the warmth of the shtetl. He appreciated the melodies. He said this was what davening sounded like in the shtetl. That was the greatest compliment I ever received.”

Rabbi Mendy Tennenhaus was a child when he met Mandel. “As I grew older, we kept in touch,” he said. The young rabbi said he studied in Cleveland and went to see Mandel a few times. “He was a mentor; someone with experience,” Mendy Tennenhaus said.

With age, you see the bigger picture, he said. Mandel was “someone that was willing to share all the time what was on his mind.”

Mendy Tennenhaus said he noticed “the way [Mandel] cared for everyone and everything.” He added, “For all thetzedakah that he gave, he cared for the institutions.”

Reprinted from the Florida Jewish Journal.