Meet the Wyner Family Jewish Heritage Center for an evening at Newbridge on the Charles to celebrate historical and contemporary work to document and preserve ritual objects and spaces in our Jewish community. Ruth Fein Research Fellow Samuel Gruber will give a talk about historic ark builder Sam Katz and the history of synagogue architecture. Carol Clingan will be presented with the Community Preservation Award.

Join us for wine, hors d’oeuvres, and a lively program and award presentation. 

Space is limited, and advance registration is required.

Samuel D. Gruber

Samuel D. Gruber has been a leader in the documentation, protection, and preservation of historic Jewish sites worldwide since 1988. He was the founding director of the Jewish Heritage Program of World Monuments Fund (1988-1996) and Research Director of the U.S. Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad (1998 through 2008). He presently directs Gruber Heritage Global, a cultural resource consulting firm, and is president of the not-for-profit International Survey of Jewish Monuments. He has taught as part-time faculty in Art History and Jewish Studies at Syracuse University since 1994 and has also taught courses at Binghamton, Colgate, Cornell, Temple Universities, and Le Moyne College.

Carol Clingan

A native of Chelsea, Mass., and an avid genealogist, Carol Clingan is a board member and the head of research projects for Jewish Genealogical Society of Greater Boston. She is also past president of Action for Post-Soviet Jewry, and a former board member of Vilna Shul and Temple Beth Elohim. She serves on the Wyner Family Jewish Heritage Center’s Advisory Board, and we honor her for her extraordinary efforts to preserve and rehome artifacts, ritual objects, and architectural structures from historical synagogues. Most recently Carol has worked to preserve a mural painted circa 1898 for a synagogue in North Adams, Mass., which was hidden away in an attic for nearly a century—until she found a future home for it at the Yiddish Book Center.