Pastor's synagogue restoration makes connection with KC family

By: Beth Lipoff, Staff Writer

The synagogue in Heubach, Germany, underwent a drastic renovation because of Pastor Johanna Rau's efforts.

Kansas City native Randee Krakauer Kelley found herself in the State of Berlin Parliament earlier this year, watching as Johanna Rau received an award for her work restoring a synagogue in Heubach, Germany, the hometown of Kelley’s great-grandfather, the late Kansas City clothing merchant Bernhard Adler.

Kelley was present because she nominated Rau, a Protestant pastor, for the Obermayer German-Jewish History Award.

"Most of the people living (in Heubach) now have no experience with Jews. She is using it as a teaching tool;" they are interested because she "made them interested. She was completely the driving force," Kelley said.

Rau’s work to restore the synagogue, which is now used as a museum and multi-cultural community center, brought the two women together.

"My whole view of this is very different from that of a Holocaust museum. It's important to see what (German communities) lost when they lost their Jews, and not just that the Jews were killed," said Arthur Obermayer, whose foundation sponsors the award.

";In a sense, (Rau) has become a model for the people in the community to understand and respect the former Jewish life that was there."

Initial interest

Johanna Rau first became interested in Judaism as a German schoolgirl, when she was assigned to read “The Diary of Anne Frank.” As a theology student, she went on to read books by Elie Wiesel and to study Christian-Jewish relations, even participating in a program at Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

She discovered the Heubach synagogue when she and her husband, who is also a pastor, were assigned to nearby Kalbach to serve the four surrounding communities. Heubach today has about 800 residents. After seeing the run-down building, Rau got the idea to restore it as a community center. While researching its history, she learned it had been a synagogue from 1843 to 1937.

"I just wanted the building to be restored, because I loved it right away, and because I could see it as a place which could tell the stories and hold the memories of the Jewish men and women who once lived there. I always hoped it would become a place of learning," Rau said.

After the Jews had to leave Heubach in 1937, the building became a rathaus (city hall), then temporary housing. Later, a motorcycle gang squatted on it, using it as its headquarters. When Rau decided she wanted to restore it, the structure was a shambles, with a leaky roof and missing walls and windows. Although 40 of Heubach's 100 Jews died in the Holocaust, there was no memorial to them.

Heubach is in the Hesse region of west-central Germany, about 70 miles east of Stuttgart.

In 2002, Rau launched her project and began gathering donations to buy and restore the then-159-year-old building. She obtained 200,000 euros each from the European Union’s preservation program and the state of Hesse, 100,000 euros from the State Office for Memorial Preservation, along with other donations for a total sum of 780,000 euros (about $1.2 million).

Living history

After she had raised the money to restore the synagogue, Rau used various genealogical sources, including JewishGen (www.jewishgen.org), to contact descendants of former Heubach residents.

"Sometimes, when you get in touch, or try to get in touch with someone, you get no response, sometimes a short one. Sometimes people are curious about who I was and were a bit shy," Rau said. "For some descendants, it is, of course, also a very emotional thing to go back in time and to reconnect to the place their ancestors came from. Some might have been unsure, and I think it was very, very courageous that they answered me and dared to be in contact."

Rau tracked down Kelley’s address in Las Vegas via the Kansas City, Mo., Public Library, and sent her a letter.

Finding descendents such as Kelley has helped bring to life the stories Rau had uncovered. "We would never have known how life went on for this young Jewish boy, Bernhard Adler, who left his parents and went with two of his siblings for good into an unknown country," Rau said.

Adler came to Kansas City and established the Adler’s clothing store that operated for the first half of the 20th century.

"I gave her information that helped her, but she gave me far more information, taking our family back two or three more generations than we knew about it," Kelley said.

Kelley learned a lot about her ancestry, but at the same time, the natives of Heubach learned new things about their town.

"For the Heubach people, it is an ongoing process to learn about the village's history, in which Jews played a big role," Rau said. "For such a long time, this was hidden and an area people did not dare to touch, but now they can come and learn (in a humble, village way) and they see how many people from outside are coming; this is something new for the Heubachers but something they like and are proud of."

As a result of Rau's efforts, there is now a local program teaching children the basics of Judaism. She hopes to develop an e-learning program about the rural Jewish communities of Hesse in the 19th century. The synagogue's Web site, www.synagoge-heubach.de, details its many activities, but is currently available only in German.

What is the award?

After working with Pastor Johanna Rau on the Heubach synagogue-restoration project, Randee Kelley learned about entrepreneuer Arthur Obermayer, president and founder of the German Jewish Community History Council of the Obermayer Foundation. Kelley decided to nominate Rau for the Obermayer German-Jewish History Award, sponsored by the foundation.

The awards honor non-Jewish Germans who have made significant volunteer efforts to preserve Jewish heritage and culture in Germany. A seven-person jury, including Obermayer, selected Rau for the honor. Award recipients received an unnamed sum of money to help fund their continuing volunteer efforts.

Putting together the nomination took some intense work, as Kelley had to gather documents supporting her descriptions of Rau';s work and get testimonials from others Rau had connected with during her project. Kelley also wrote an essay detailing the impact Rau’s work had on her.

From 30 nominations, five projects won Obermayer Awards this year.

For details on nominating someone, visit http://www.obermayer.us/award/index.htm.