Here’s My Story: Sunset, Sunrise

Mrs. Sterna Malka Katz

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My father, Rabbi Moshe Yitzchok Hecht, was one of the first emissaries that the Previous Lubavitcher Rebbe sent in the United states. In 1942, he was dispatched to open a yeshivah in Worcester, Massachusetts, which he did very successfully.

Then, in 1946, my father received a telegram from the Previous Rebbe, stating: “Now is the time for you to move to New Haven.” On that very same day, he boarded a train to New Haven, Connecticut, to begin his work anew. I was three at the time, and our family has been there ever since.

In addition to his organizational skills, my father was a brilliant orator, and on occasion, the Rebbe would send him to visit various Jewish communities on his behalf. In 1948, my parents were sent to South America on a six-week mission to visit several communities there, in particular those hosting newly arrived refugees who had survived the Holocaust. They were to meet with the survivors, gather them together, and strengthen them in their Jewish observance. The Rebbe requested a detailed report on how the Jews in these places were faring physically, emotionally and spiritually, as well as how these communities were doing in terms of Jewish education, kosher food, Shabbat observance, and family purity.

Some time after their return, our family merited to have a private audience with the Previous Rebbe. Despite not understanding the conversation, I was mesmerized by the shining countenance of the Rebbe’s holy face, and his loving smile.

I also noticed that there was a wheelchair in the room and after the audience, I asked my father about it. He told me of the Rebbe’s great self-sacrifice under the Soviet regime, and how the suffering he had endured in prison had taken a physical toll on him.

The evening after one Shabbat in the winter of 1950, we received a phone call telling us the devastating news of the Rebbe’s passing. The date was the tenth of Shevat. My father was extremely distraught. After a flurry of activity, we rushed to the car and set out for Crown Heights.

On the way, somewhere around Greenwich, we stopped for gas. “I know where you are going,” the attendant said, after taking one look at my father. “I heard on the news that the Grand Rabbi had passed away. You must be going to the funeral.”

When we arrived, my father immediately went to 770, where he remained for the entire night, while the rest of the family continued on to the home of our grandparents in Williamsburg. The next morning, my grandfather took me and my sisters to 770. There were thousands of people standing there in the freezing cold. Most of the assembled did not look like chasidim; they had grey hats, were clean shaven, and spoke in somber and hushed tones. I had never seen anything like that scene before.

When the Previous Rebbe’s casket was carried out of 770 on the shoulders of his weeping chasidim, a collective wail burst from the crowd. I can still hear that sound till this very day. Many of those people were Holocaust survivors. They had lost everything. They came to America broken and depressed, but when they needed a listening ear, a helping hand, a sympathetic soul, they would turn to the Rebbe.

And then, only a few years after losing their entire families, they also lost a beloved and benevolent father.

Now, following the success of my parents’ trip to South America, the Previous Rebbe had told my parents that he wanted them to go on a similar mission to Brazil. Once again, they accepted the task without question, and it had been planned for the summer of 1950. But, following the Rebbe’s passing, my father was unsure how to proceed. And so he asked the Previous Rebbe’s son-in-law, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson – or as he was known to us then, Ramash – what to do.

Although my father had been sent to New Haven as an emissary of the Previous Rebbe, the yeshivah he ran in New Haven was under the auspices of Chabad’s central outreach and educational arm, Merkos L’inyonei Chinuch. Since this organization was headed by Ramash, my father was privileged to have many interactions with the future Rebbe, and we would often come along with him to New York to visit Ramash in his office, which was the command center of Merkos. Ramash would discuss many things with my father, but he always made sure to interact with us children, smiling, asking us questions and oftentimes giving us gifts; it was a very warm relationship.

When my father consulted with Ramash about his trip to Brazil, the answer was clear: “My father-in-law assigned this mission to you – you have to fulfill it.”

So my father set about preparing for his trip, but this time my mother was unable to join, in part because I had become quite ill. I was still young and do not recall exactly what the illness was, but apparently it had started earlier that year, when a gland in my throat became infected, putting pressure on my windpipe and making it hard for me to breath.

When my parents took me to our doctor, a very dear friend of my father and an active community member, he examined me thoroughly before declaring that I needed an operation, as the situation was dire.

“First, I need to ask my Rebbe,” my father replied. Ramash had not yet accepted the mantle of leadership, but there was no question in my father’s mind that he was already the Rebbe.

“No operation,” was the Rebbe’s response. Penicillin had just become available at that time, and the Rebbe advised that I be given double doses of the new drug and all would be fine.

When my father told the doctor that he would not consent to surgery, the doctor was livid. “What does a rabbi know?” he exclaimed. “I am the expert here!” And with that, he cut off all ties with my father.

I recovered fully and the issue never presented itself again, thank G-d. But when my father left for Brazil, I was still recuperating at home. One day during his absence, the phone rang and my mother picked it up. “This is Schneerson speaking.” The Rebbe used only his last name, without any titles. “How is your daughter?” My mother was completely taken aback. Having sent my father away to fulfill the mission of the Previous Rebbe, the Rebbe felt a personal responsibility to look out for my father’s sick child. Even back then, before officially acceding to the leadership, he showed us how to care for every Jew: man, woman, and child.

Mrs. Sterna Malka Katz and her late husband Rabbi Binyamin Katz, of blessed memory, were sent as Chabad emissaries to New Haven in 1967 to join her parents, Rabbi Moshe Yitzchok and Rivka Hecht. Mrs. Katz, who continues to serve as a Chabad emissary and an educator, was interviewed in July of 2023.