Interview with Sara Wagner, June 9, 2017

ELY: My name is Carol Ely. I'm the Louisville liaison for the Jewish Heritage Fund for Excellence Jewish Kentucky Oral History Project. Today is June 9, 2017. It's my great honor and pleasure to interview Sara Klein Wagner here in Louisville, Kentucky. Thank you for agreeing to do this interview, Sara.

WAGNER: My pleasure.

ELY: We appreciate it. We're gonna start with some family history and background, and then get on to your current experience, really, as head of this Jewish Louisville community. So, uh, can you, uh, tell me first when members of your family first came to America? What stories do you know about--about your ancestors?

WAGNER: Sure, sure. So, my grandmother, Bessie, was born in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1895.

ELY: Hmm.

WAGNER: Um, she was one of eight children, and I know they came here somewhere, maybe 1890-ish--I'm not a hundred percent sure of the exact, um, period. They, uh, came from Poland, settled in Louisville--I--I don't have all the 00:01:00details, but I know--

ELY: --wh--what was--

WAGNER: --the folklore.

ELY: --her name?

WAGNER: Bessie Leifer (??)--

ELY: --okay--

WAGNER: --was her married name.

ELY: --Leifer.

WAGNER: Yeah. So, she was married twice. Um, she was married to my grandfather, Zelig Klein. They moved to Atlanta, where my grandfather passed away, at a young age. So my grandmother moved back here to Louisville and married, um, Izzy Leifer, who was a widower, and ended up, um, having a--they had another child together, and she had some stepchildren, who are considered my full cousins, and aunts, and extended family, um, and spent most her life in Louisville.

ELY: Do you know what brought them to Louisville, as opposed to, say, an East Coast Jewish community?

WAGNER: You know what, I really--I don't. I wish I did.

ELY: Do--do you know anything about their history in Europe? You said Poland. Do you know what kind of community they came from?

WAGNER: Um, y--the stories--the stories I know are more about when they came here. Um, I'm--I'm thinking through my four sets of grandparents--

ELY: --right--

WAGNER: --and extended family, and I don't wanna mish--mish-mosh them together. Um, what I really know about this part of the family, and my grandmother Bessie was a Levine. Her parents were Benis (??) and Mary Levine, and the reason some people might bump into the name is that my grandmother Bessie's younger sister, Stella, um, dedicated the sanctuary at Keneseth Israel several years ago, and their--so my great-grandparents' name is on the sanctuary at--at K.I.

ELY: Um-hm.

WAGNER: Um, they were founders, and very involved at K.I., and the predecessor congregation to--to Keneseth.

ELY: Um-hm.

WAGNER: Um, and so most of the folklore and stories that I know are really about my grandmother's siblings and, um--I--I'm not sure I know as much as I should about--about her parents. Because it was a very colorful--

ELY: --it's--

WAGNER: --group of eight siblings, so.

ELY: Well, it sounds like your family stayed--was a big family that stayed together--

WAGNER: --yes.

ELY: --here in Louisville. And, uh, the--Keneseth was Orthodox at that point, so they came from a traditional background.

WAGNER: Absolutely. A traditional family, um, big shabbats together, lots of conversations about cheder instead of Hebrew school, and ev--everything revolved around the Jewish life, and the Jewish community, and how close they lived to the synagogue, and how close they lived to--to each other.

ELY: So when Keneseth was downtown, they lived downtown, too?WAGNER: Yes.

ELY: The Preston Street area?

WAGNER: Um, I know my grandmother ended up on Oak Street--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --um, and that they all lived in the same vicinity, um.

ELY: Right, the classic was to be initially, right, what's known--

WAGNER: --right--

ELY: --just east--

WAGNER: --right--

ELY: --of downtown, and then everybody moved south of Broadway to Old Louisville--

WAGNER: --right--

ELY: --so, Oak Street--

WAGNER: --right, right--

ELY: --fits that--that pattern. Any of your other grandparents, whose stories you're familiar with?

WAGNER: So, uh, my grandfather, um, Zelig, uh, who I obviously never 00:04:00met, um--little bit of an interesting story, which we found recently--

ELY: --go ahead--

WAGNER: --there was a--there was always a story--I want to say they also came fr--he also came from, perhaps, Lithuania, and that the family was on their way to, um, North America, and stopped in Ireland, and there's folklore, and there's been a history written by other members of the Klein family. We're not really sure if they stopped to refuel, if they stopped to get more food, if--there was one story that they needed Kosher food, and then there was another that there was a horse thief somewhere involved on board--(Ely laughs)--and in the family, so for some reason they stayed in Ireland, and lived in Dub--Dublin for many years. And we just thought my grandfather lived in Dublin, but we found on one of the ancestry pages recently, when we looked, that he was actually born in Dublin. So I was very excited this, um, St. Patrick's Day, that I'm--I'm a quarter Irish. Who knew?--

ELY: --yay--

WAGNER: --for his few years in Ireland, so--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --um, he moved to Louisville when he met my grandmother. The only interesting factoid I really have is that they spelled Klein with a C, at that point, and there was a grocery store, Ben Klein's, um, grocery store, and he spelled it K-l-e-i-n, so my grandfather changed it to K-l-e-i-n, because he thought that was--that was the way to do it in--in Louisville. Um, so I--I--I always said later, he--I grew up dur--during the first years of court-ordered busing in Louisville--that my whole life changed because m--my grandfather saw a grocery store name. I would've been bused different years. I would've had different friends. It would've changed my whole--(Ely laughs)--trajectory, so.

ELY: Um-hm. So, uh, about their occupations, you mentioned, uh, grocery store--or that was just the--the name, not the profession?WAGNER: Um, oh, no, that--he was actually--Zelig was a peddler, and--and in the garment business, and there's also a folklore again--don't know if it's true--that when 00:06:00he was in Atlanta, he was working with Mr. Burdine (??), um, so, unfortunately, he didn't live long enough to find out if it would've been Burdine and Klein's, which would have been lovely. Um, so that was his business. My stepgrandfather was a carpenter, and, um, my mother's family is from Wisconsin. I have another grandmother who was born in 1902 in Wisconsin, and--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --I always thought it was kind of neat that I had, uh, grandmothers born in the United States, and grandfathers born in the, uh--in Europe.

ELY: So, uh, your parents--what--what are their names? And--

WAGNER: --um, my--

ELY: --were they both born here?

WAGNER: Sure, sure. My dad, who was born in Louisville, is Bill Klein, or William Harris, and he is known as Willie Harrie to most people, because one of his uncles is--is--was Willie Levine, so they had to have a younger Willie Harrie. Um, my mom is Myra Klein. She was born in Wisconsin, and they 00:07:00met, actually, at a wedding of cousins, who lived here--Margie and Av Chetikoff (??)--one from Wisconsin and one from Louisville, my dad's first cousin--and they were set up at the wedding, and ended up dating long distance, and, um, my mom moved to Cincinnati, because it was not appropriate to move to Louisville while they were dating, and she was a teacher. Um, I love the story that they actually got engaged at Camp Livingston, at some sort of singles' weekend, where they knew that they were spending the weekend together. And my, um, dad proposed over the weekend, which many, many years later, I met my husband working at Camp Livingston, and I also got engaged at Camp Livingston. But my husband didn't know that, at the time, so.

ELY: You told him later, though.

WAGNER: I told him later, and I--

ELY: --um-hm.

WAGNER: -- have a daughter working at Camp Livingston right now--

ELY: --uh-oh--(laughs)--

WAGNER: --so pressure's on.

ELY: Yeah. Well, it sounds like that Jewish identification was really strong in your family--

WAGNER: --um-hm--

ELY: --if the kids were going to Jewish camps, so w--what kind of 00:08:00atmosphere were your parents raised in? Were they raised Orthodox?

WAGNER: Um, so my dad was definitely raised Orthodox. Um, I like to say that there are certain things I just took for granted, ev--of my dad. Some people would call him secular, some would--would, you know--different people would define his practice differently. Um, he's ninety-one today, and he still puts on tefillin every morning, and davens every morning. Sometimes he goes to minyan; sometimes he does it at home. But it's--it's not, um--it's pretty normal if I show up at his house now and find him with his tallis on in the morning, and that's just part of his routine. And we'd go on vacation, and he would bring his siddur with him. He would bring his ta--tallis and his tefillin. Um, and I think it's because he was saying kaddish from a very young age, because he lost his father--

ELY: --hmm--

WAGNER: --so young, and that he felt that that was his obligation, and, um, has stuck with him. Um, you know, grew up in a kosher home, and went to 00:09:00synagogue every shabbat, and sh--Satur--Friday night was obviously an important part of the family. Um, my mother grew up in a family that I would say was more traditional, but it was a small town in Wisconsin, and, um, my husband and I joke that both of my parents kept kosher when they were growing up, but when they got married and--and started a family in Louisville, chose not to keep kosher. And my husband and I ended up keeping kosher for a long time. We, we brought the tradition back. My mother quit--my mother's family quit keeping kosher, because her father owned a, uh, grocery store in Wisconsin. And once her grandmother passed away, they decided that they could buy meat from their--bring meat home from their own grocery store, and made that change.

ELY: Um-hm.

WAGNER: Um, but my grandmother and all of my aunts, and cousins, and everyone--kosher was just--was the norm. Um, I grew up going to K.I. 00:10:00with my mom every shabbat--I--I thought that's what everybody did--and sat with my grandmother and all of her sisters, and, um--you know I still walk into K.I. and I can see the seat where Bessie, and Yeda, and Gertie were sitting, and getting in trouble from the rabbi, because they talked very loudly--ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --and always brought hard candy, um, which, you know--(Ely laughs)--unwraps very loudly--

ELY: --unwrapping, right--

WAGNER: --um, so yeah, that was just part of--part of the norm.

ELY: So--

UNKNOWN: I'm gonna pause you real qui--

[Pause in recording.]

UNKNOWN: And we're rolling--

ELY: I'm s--

[Pause in recording.]

ELY: So, it sounds like K.I. itself, as an institution, has played an important part--

WAGNER: --um-hm--

ELY: --in your family's life. Are you still a member of K.I.?

WAGNER: So, we joined A.J. probably about fifteen years ago, but we've remained supporters of K.I.--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --associate members, whatever they, you know--

ELY: --okay--

WAGNER: --label they've put on us, but certainly.

ELY: So just, then, going back--your family was there through the tr--transitions--

WAGNER: --um-hm--

ELY: --in K.I., from being downtown and being uh, very much 00:11:00affiliated with the Orthodox tradition--

WAGNER: --um-hm--

ELY: --to adopting mixed seating--

WAGNER: --um-hm--

ELY: --and moving to the suburbs, and ultimately becoming a Conservative congregation. Was your family involved at all in those decisions? Do you know how people felt about it?

WAGNER: Um, yeah, my mom was really the one who was more active in leadership roles--she was on the board at K.I., and she was chair of the religious committee, and N.C.S.Y., the youth group, and president of the sisterhood. So I remember having many more conversations with my mom than my dad about what was going on. I remember thinking K.I. was a little bit liberal because of the mixed seating--I only knew of K.I. on Taylorsville Road--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --and I was very active and participated in N.C.S.Y, the Orthodox youth group, starting in third grade. Um, and we would visit other congregations and other communities that had a mechitza. So I thought we were the trendy ones, um, until, honestly, I went away to college, and I met Howard, and 00:12:00he's--comes from a classical Reform background, and I really started understanding all the different streams and branches. And that was around the time that, that K.I. was moving in the direction of becoming, um, Conservative. They had already joined a Traditional movement, at that point, because K.I., as I recall, was no longer allowed in the Orthodox movement, because--

ELY: --I think so--

WAGNER: --there was no mechitza--

ELY: --right--

WAGNER: --um, so we fit in this special category of Traditional. And then somewhere around the time I was in college, again, they brought in, maybe, the first Conservative rabbi. There was a Rabbi Seiger, who was here for maybe a year--it happened to be the year I got married. And, um, I remember the angst in the community, um, people trying-- you know, that wanted to hold on to, um, the--the tradition of being--leaning more Orthodox, and--and 00:13:00certainly, in my family, the conversation was--my mom has always been very comfortable with things the way they are. She never learned Hebrew. She--if you go into K.I.--I doubt they still have these books--but they had little blue paperback books for--mostly the women, who di--never learned Hebrew, or never went to Hebrew school--with all the transliteration. So everyone had their siddur, and then a group of, uh--a lot of the moms and grandmothers--would have the--the book and transliteration. So even, um, you know, when--when it started to change, I would say my dad probably didn't really care so much. Um, my mom had a hard time with the change a little bit more. I remember, um, they had the first women's egalitarian Torah service at K.I. I remember participating, because I had a bat mitzvah at K.I., back in 1978, and didn't read from the Torah. I only had a--read fr--my Haftorah. Um, and I remember being 00:14:00excited about the change, and I remember my mom just kind of being very, um, polite and supportive that I like the change, but she had no interest in the change, which has stayed current through my daughters' bat mitzvahs--

ELY: --hmm--

WAGNER: --where she has had no interest in having an aliyah, um, so it's been an interesting journey.

ELY: So for your mother, it wasn't so much a feminist--uh, or pro-feminist issue. It was more, "I'm comfortable with what I grew up with."--

WAGNER: --right--

ELY: --and, hmm.

WAGNER: I--I think she probably, you know, at that point in her sixties or seventies, was not comfortable being one--somebody that--especially since she didn't know Hebrew--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --um, did not want to put herself out front and have to be in that role--

ELY: --sure--

WAGNER: --um, but she certainly wanted it for her granddaughters if that's--if that's what they wanted, so--

ELY: --right. So, you said that she was very active. She was on the--

WAGNER: --um-hm--

ELY: --synagogue board--

WAGNER: --um-hm--

ELY: --and, uh, what--what other roles did your parents, uh, take in 00:15:00the Jewish community?

WAGNER: So, my dad owned a drug store, called Klein Drugs, and he worked probably twenty-four seven, so--

ELY: --where was the store located?

WAGNER: --um, it's--it was on Fourth and M, which is--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --a few blocks from Churchill Downs.

ELY: Um-hm.

WAGNER: He--he didn't have a lot of time to volunteer. Um, the syna--the synagogue was definitely their world. There's also--I don't know if you're familiar with A.Z.O.--it's a pharmaceutical, um, Jewish fraternity--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --that they were both very involved in. Um, they were both involved in B'nai B'rith for a while. They were not Federation volunteers, per se, um, you know--supporters of the JCC, but that wasn't where they showed any leadership. It was really the synagogue, um, and it was really my mom who found more time, and had more time to--to volunteer. And, you know, I remember, as a kid, um, K.I. used to have this mother-daughter banquet every year, and everybody came. The sisterhood put it on--I can't believe we did this, when I think 00:16:00about it now--but we practiced, and put on a show, and everybody sang, and danced, and--and all of these things. And one year--it must have been the year that my mother was being installed as sisterhood president--and I remember standing in the hallway, waiting to go onstage, and seeing my mother give a speech--I don't remember any of the speech--but that she was in front of everyone and being installed. And I remember being so proud, and "That's my mom," and then we were going onstage. So, a--absolutely left an impression on me.

ELY: Um-hm.

WAGNER: The other, um, is that she was always going to meetings, which I--I know lots of people say. They remember their parents always going to meetings. And we say that now, when we're--when I'm talking to parents right now who are volunteers--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --well, um--it's time I'm not spending with my kids, but I want my kids to understand why I'm going to a meeting, why this is important. And so I think that really left an impression on me. There was even the infamous day I broke my arm at the JCC on the merry-go-round. Um, when my mother picked me up 00:17:00from Hebrew school, and a friend who shall remain la--nameless--although she'd love to be in the Oral History Project--(Ely laughs)--I'm sure--Kim Gordon Frankenthal--um, who gave the, um, merry-go-round a little extra push, and I fell off, and my mom saw me fall. But she went to a meeting before she took me to the emergency room. She thought--

ELY: --ahh--

WAGNER: --some ice would be fine, that I'd be fine. And then she came home, and my arm had swollen, and--and I'll always remember but she got to the meeting before we made it to the emergency room. So, for good or bad, that was --

ELY: --hmm, we're--we're lucky that didn't push you out of Jewish communal service entirely.

WAGNER: I've had a lot of experiences at the JCC before working there, so--

ELY: --um-hm, yeah. We'll, talk a little bit more about that. So just, for the record, when and where were you born?

WAGNER: Sure, I was born here in Louisville in 1965--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --um, spent most of my life--well, spent my entire childhood here in Louisville. Left to go to the University of Wisconsin, and then I 00:18:00went to Boston, and went to Brandeis University for graduate school--

ELY: --right--

WAGNER: --worked to Boston, and headed home.

ELY: We'll get to all of that--

WAGNER: --okay--

ELY: --in detail--(laughs)--so--

WAGNER: --okay, back to Louisville--

ELY: --back to your childhood. Uh, you have older brothers, I believe?WAGNER: I have one older brother, Zell.

ELY: Will?WAGNER: Zell. Z-e--

ELY: --Zell--

WAGNER: --Z-e-l-l.ELY: And is he in the community?

WAGNER: He is. Named after Zelig--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --from--from before. Um, he, uh--he's been here--he's been here forever, and, um--seven and a half years older than me, so we had much different experiences growing up. But he, um--he stayed in Louisville. He works for Chase Bank. Um, has been active in--in--in a lot of things, mostly the day school. When Eliahu was--was around, his son went to Eliahu, and my sister-in-law, who has since passed away, Kim--Kim and Zell were very active in--in the day school, and bingo, and all the things that made up the day school, so--

ELY: --um-hm. And where did you live, growing up?

WAGNER: We lived most of my life off of Taylorsville Road, on Deibel Court, which is, um, near Breckenridge Lane. I thought the whole world lived in a little court, like I did. There were four Jewish families, who all had girls my age--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --um, including people who might be in other histories--um, Sam and Marlene Gordon, and--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --Arlene and Harvey Kaufman, and the Aucuins (??), and I just--I thought every little street had, you know, four or five Jewish girls that--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --that did everything together. I thought was the, uh--the way everyone lived.

ELY: Um-hm. So did you share holidays together?

WAGNER: Um, not so much holidays. That was with--those were with my family. Um, but I would say we were in and out of each other's' front doors and back doors, um, on a daily basis, and called each other's parents aunts and 00:20:00uncles, and, you know, um, spent pretty much every waking moment together if we could.

ELY: Um-hm. So, you spent a lot of time with your family, you said. So who was surrounding you and your family? Who lived in Louisville? Your grandparents, and--

WAGNER: --um, sure. So my grandmother Bessie, my, uh, s--my--her second husband, my step-grandfather, passed away when I was probably around five or so--I spent every shabbat, again, at K.I., with my mom, who then went to work at the drugstore with my dad. But then I went to lunch, every shabbat, with my uncle Chuck, and my grandmother and her sisters--lots of times at the Blue Boar, um--

ELY: --hmm--

WAGNER: --and then spent all of Saturday with my grandmother Bessie, a lot of times spending the nights and getting picked up early in the morning to go to Sunday school. Um, but lots of times--lots of Sara-Bessie time, so--

ELY: Um-hm. And, so what was a typical Passover, say? What--what 00:21:00would your family do?

WAGNER: Um, when my grandfather was alive, and then, I think, for many years, we would have Passover at my grandmother Bessie's. Um, I do have memories of my step-grandfather Izzy reading everything in Hebrew, and everybody very excited to eat, but we had to, you know, make sure he--he got through the entire Haggadah in Hebrew. Um, you know, I remember years, you know--years later, the typical--I remember labeling everybody's Haggadah and picking out their parts ahead of time, and making sure people knew ahead of time what their roles were. Um, and sometimes having friends and family to our house, um, for Passover.

ELY: So, other holidays, did you build a sukkah on Sukkot, and--?

WAGNER: We never--we never built a sukkah. I--my husband and I build a sukkah, um, every--I should say my husband--

ELY: --I think Sukkot has had a revival, I think--

WAGNER: --say my husband built a sukkah--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --I won't take credit.

ELY: And, um, the High Holidays, you went to K.I., and walked there?

WAGNER: Um, we drove. I went through a period where I walked--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --um, but, yeah, it--it was the extended family.

ELY: So, uh, you've mentioned Sunday school and Hebrew school--at that time, how was it structured in the community? Did you go to the JCC? To a joint program, or what?

WAGNER: Sure. So, Hebrew school was at the JCC, on the second floor, two days a week. Um, at one point the older kids went on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and the younger kids on Monday-Wednesdays. Um, I think by the time I graduated, it was all Monday-Wednesday. And then Sunday school was at K.I., and it was just the kids from K.I. Um, I remember even Hebrew high school--I know that they've extended now to eleventh grade, and I--I remember being in a class where we went through eleventh grade, and they--they brought in some creative 00:23:00classes, and calligraphy, and--and I re--and Janet and Sonny Meyers teaching "Death and Dying." Um, but there was also an incentive they had put in place, if you were a madrichah, or if you were working at the Hebrew school, and they helped us with trips to Israel. So I remember, I--I worked at the Hebrew school with, um, Anita Seiden, who, uh, always taught the Aleph class, and had some great experiences doing that as well.

ELY: Um-hm.

WAGNER: My first job.

ELY: --(laughs)--first job, teaching Hebrew school.

WAGNER: Um-hm.

ELY: And, uh, for, uh, regular school, where did you go to school in Louisville?

WAGNER: Um, so I graduated from Atherton--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --and I actually was in Seneca's district, um, but a couple of us--actually, give a shout-out to Mrs. Gale--Annette--uh, Annette Gale, who was a counselor at Meyers Middle School, and also later became one of my volunteers, when I came back to town. She really encouraged, um, Kim Gordon and myself to go to Atherton to take Hebrew, and so we were transferred to Atherton, 00:24:00because Judy Barron taught Hebrew there, and they didn't at Seneca, so, um--thrilled to be able to go to Atherton.

ELY: Yeah. And, y--people who went to Atherton--I think a slightly older generation--talked about a certain social exclusiveness of, of the clubs there, and that they affiliated with clubs at the JCC, BBYO, and so forth--because they didn't feel welcome at Atherton. Had that changed by the time you went there?

WAGNER: Yeah, I--I think we felt welcome, but we loved, um, the clubs at the JCC so much, and BBYO so much, that that was our thing. I know that there were people my age, who certainly participated in sports, um, and played field hockey or played basketball at Atherton. Um, but our home base was always the JCC, and, you know, it might've even been a little bit different with my brother, who's seven years older than me--that he may have felt something a little 00:25:00different. We also--we didn't join BBYO until the end of ninth grade. Um, I guess they didn't want the ninth graders influenced by the--the high schoolers, at that point--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --and I don't remember being a freshman at Atherton and feeling that I was missing out, that we couldn't do anything--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --that there was just a, um, closeness between the Jewish kids--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --that was obvious. That we had something--there was a bond and there was something else. We were going to see each other every weekend, when everybody else wasn't going to.

ELY: Right. So you were involved with activities at the JCC from a pretty young age. What kinds of things did you do there?

WAGNER: Oh, you know, the typical. Um, I learned how to dance. I went recently to a class in the dance studio, the, uh--some sort of fitness class--when I had a déja vu of standing at the--the barre in the--in the, uh, dance studio. Um, took everything from photography --went to day camp. Um, I have a 00:26:00picture of my day camp cabin from my first year on my bulletin board in my office, which cracks me up a little bit. Um, back in the day, where they used to have a school bus pick us up to take us to camp. And then I went to, um, Camp Ben F. Washer, which was the Louisville camp, uh--overnight camp at Camp Tall Trees, for two years, until they closed the camp. Um, trying to th--and then obviously--or not so obviously--BBYO was, was really important to me. Um, I've been very active in NCSY with--with K.I. and kind of thought that was my trajectory. And I lost an office, and the next day--

ELY: --ah--(laughs)--

WAGNER: --or so, there was a, um--

ELY: --you changed parties--(laughs)--

WAGNER: I did. There was a MIT (??) office for new members in--in modern -----------(??), and someone said, "Well, just run for an office here." And the next thing I know, I never looked back, so--

ELY: --um-hm. So you were, uh, actively helping to run these organizations, too.

WAGNER: Yeah, yeah. I had a great experience, and I--somewhere 00:27:00between camp and BBYO is why I ended up doing what I'm doing today. There's no doubt.

ELY: Yeah. And camp does clearly play an important role in your family history--

WAGNER: --yeah--

ELY: --and not just your life--

WAGNER: --yeah--

ELY: --and, uh, was it many of the same people you knew in Louisville that you met at camp, or was it a combination?

WAGNER: Um, once I went to Camp Livingston, it was really, um, a new group of--of kids. At Ben F. Washer, it was, uh, pretty--pretty much an entire Louisville crowd.

ELY: Um-hm.

WAGNER: The nice part of Livingston and BBYO is that it's--they're a lot of the same kids. It's Kentucky, Indiana, Ohio, and--and--so a lot of my friends that I made at camp, we ended up, um--it was a camp friend that ended up being my counterpart when I was on the regional board, and he ended up being in our wedding, and comes in every other year for Passover now, so--

ELY: Well, in a minute, we'll get you out of--

WAGNER: --okay--

ELY: --Louisville--

WAGNER: --okay--

ELY: --and into the wider world--

WAGNER: --no, no, it's fine--

ELY: --but is--

WAGNER: --I love Louisville--

ELY: --is there, uh, any other people that you feel were an influence on you during the time you were growing up here?

WAGNER: Oh, absolutely. I would say, in--during the high school days of BBYO, um, I had a couple interesting experiences. But I would say Stuart Pass, who was our advisor--or who was the director of the teen department, was incredible. Um, uh, Sheila Miles was our advisor for Modern -----------(??), and I know rabbi and Sheila had been in town for a couple years. He--I was in his first eighth grade class, so I remember. And, um, you know, they--they really gave us the opportunity. We say that BBYO was student-led, and they really allowed us to lead, and--and make mistakes. Um, you know, I received some scholarships along the way, and some help to go to conferences, some help to go to Israel--things that really, you know, were life-changers--game-changers for me. And I would say there was, um--there was one day at the JCC that I've referred to 00:29:00before, when I'm--when I'm talking to people, but we had hosted--I guess two Israeli kids were in town, and there was a teen campaign for the--UJC campaign. And, um, the kids from BBYO who were in charge stood up and talked about, you know, we could each give up a pizza a month, or whatever the equivalent was. And that we had a responsibility to give. And the Israeli kids spoke about their experience growing up in Israel, and I had just been to Israel the summer before, with BBYO. And I went home and I told my mom--I guess I was sixteen--I said, "I've figured out what I want to do." She said, "That's great. What do you want to do?" And I said, "I want to take people to Israel. I don't wanna move to Israel--I have no desire to--to make aliyah. But I need to take people to see Israel." And I don't think I have fully concocted what--what all of that meant, but I think it was really the first seeds of, I wanted to help other--I wanted to help other people see what I had connected with, and help people 00:30:00connect with it.

ELY: What about that experience in Israel moved you so much? Was there a particular incident or relationship?

WAGNER: I don't even know that it was the trip to Israel as much as coming back and seeing the Israelis in Louisville telling their story in front of my peers, that connected with me almost more. I loved my trip to Israel--I had a fabulous time--but I think bringing it alive in the patio room at, at the JCC, and--and seeing--connecting it with the campaign, that we could help, and that we had a role and responsibility, and--it might've been back when he had a project renewal town in Netanya, as I recall, and--and, you know, that we had a collective responsibility. It wasn't--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --"us and them," that it was really "we." And--and I think that was the--it was just starting to--well, a lightbulb was turning on, of some sort.

ELY: Had, uh--during your time growing up in Louisville, did you ever 00:31:00experience any, uh--antisemitism may be too strong a word there--

WAGNER: --yeah--

ELY: --but any sense of otherness that--that made you uncomfortable?

WAGNER: Um, I would say the only times I really remember feeling anything like that were probably more instances that occurred when I spent time at my parents' drugstore, and, um, playing with kids in the neighborhood down there, or just people asking questions that felt uncomfortable--about what it meant--meant to be Jewish, or being called a Jew, and it didn't feel--as a compliment, or warm and fuzzy--ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --um, not--not so much.

ELY: Um-hm. So, um, ti--time to go off to college.

WAGNER: Yeah.

ELY: Where did you decide to go?

WAGNER: I went to the University of Wisconsin in Madison--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --um, partially because my mother was, uh--was an alum of Madison, and I saw it for the first time in the summer, and thought it was beautiful. --(Ely laughs)-- I had not processed--

ELY: --it is beautiful in the summer, yes--

WAGNER: --I did not process the winter. Um, and the other was, everybody from Louisville and everyone from BBYO was off to Bloomington, in Indiana. And I really wanted to--I wanted to meet new people, and I wanted to stretch my wings, as they say, and I wanted to try something new.

ELY: Um-hm. So when you were there, were you also involved in Jewish activities on campus?

WAGNER: Um, a little bit in Hillel, a little bit--I actually volunteered for BBYO and gave tours to Wisconsin--chapters looking at the University of Wisconsin, that sort of thing. And then I ended up joining a Jewish sorority, um--swore I wasn't going to join one, and, by the time I was done, I was rush chair, and president, and, um--(Ely laughs)--almost spent a year traveling for them, so, yeah.

ELY: Um-hm. What about the--the sorority changed your mind?WAGNER: Um, I did it because it was very--you know, it was the first weeks of being in a new campus, where I didn't know people, and I thought going through rush was a great idea--I would meet people. My roommate, um, a Jewish girl from Minneapolis, 00:33:00was going through, because her mother was in SDT, and she was checking it out. And she ended up dropping out of rush. I joined SDT, so I talked to my roommate's mother every Sunday about how the sorority was going. Um, but I--I just thought it was a chance to make a very big campus smaller. It was a brand-new house. Um, they did not look like the rest of the girls, in--blonde and short shorts, singing and dancing on the front steps. They were really a bunch of camp girls from Camp Herzl, and Sabra, and--and Camp Ramah, and it just felt very familiar. Um, so I thought I'd just join. I didn't think I'd get so actively involved, but the next thing I knew, I was sucked in.

ELY: Um-hm.

WAGNER: In a good way.

ELY: In a good way. And, academically, what did you major in?

WAGNER: Um, I ended up majoring in sociology, after a few other 00:34:00options that I crossed off the list.

ELY: And at--were you formulating in your mind the idea of Jewish communal service as a career?

WAGNER: So I started off thinking, um, social work. And I took some classes in social work, and in psychology, and I stumbled into a sociology class that I loved. And then, when I was at Camp Livingston as a counselor, um, Janet Elam, who now works for the Jewish Community--JCCA, nationally--um, was our camp director, and we were sitting around in the chadar ochel at night, and she asked everyone, "What are you all majoring in? What are you all thinking of doing?" And I told her that I thought I wanted to get a--a--a--a degree in social work, but that I thought I wanted to work in the Jewish community, maybe at a JCC--I--I didn't fully understand the breadth of the Federation movement, at that point. Maybe in something in community relations. And she said, "You do know there are master's programs in Jewish communal service." And I said, "No, I have no idea." --(Ely laughs)-- Um, so she told me, uh, all about 00:35:00Brandeis, and Baltimore, and some other programs, and I went back to Madison and met with the Hillel director, and did some more investigating, and the next thing I knew, I fell in love with the, uh, Brandeis idea.

ELY: Um-hm. So, um, just to stay in Madison for--

WAGNER: --yeah--

ELY: --a few more minutes--

WAGNER: --yeah, always--

ELY: --did being in a different, but not necessarily larger, Jewish setting--did--did you feel anything change about your view of the Jewish world and your relationship to Louisville at that point?

WAGNER: Um, well, a couple things. I loved--there were probably--maybe three thousand Jewish students at--in Madison--

ELY: --not--not bad--

WAGNER: --it's a--it's a pretty large Jewish community. Um, and pretty diverse. A lot--a lot of students from Chicago, um, so I felt like I was exposed to, um, students who had had a Jewish, um, life that was much different than 00:36:00mine--growing up in a bigger city, maybe not being as involved in a youth group, or, um, different experiences just because they lived in a big city. They didn't have to--maybe they didn't have to do some of the things we did. Um, or chose not to. And, um, I guess the other was, I had family in Madison, my mom's cousins, and they belonged to a Reform temple, and I celebrated holidays with them. And then Howard ended up going to the University of Wisconsin, and just the--you know, just--that was really when--again, when I started to understand and appreciate that all streams of Judaism had--had value to them. I would say that, in my Keneseth upbringing, that message never came through loud and clear. It was, uh, Judaism is a tree, and the trunk of the tree is Orthodoxy, and everything else may fall away--the leaves may fall off, but Orthodoxy is the answer--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --even if we weren't strictly Orthodox. Um, so really, in 00:37:00Madison, I really learned from people to appreciate different viewpoints, and I had some friends--some very close friends who were really involved in USY, and I really, um, learned a lot about the c--conser--what it meant to be a Conservative Jew, I really learned from my friends in college.

ELY: Um-hm. In Louisville, for a long time, there's--and some would argue still is--a kind of split between the--the Traditional community and the Reform community. It's--it's certainly changed over time--

WAGNER: --yeah--

ELY: --but perhaps when you were growing up, there was less wringling between the Reform and Traditional branches?

WAGNER: It was so separate that we had cotillion, um, for sixth graders--and we had two cotillions. We had, you know, the Conservative, Orthodox cotillion and the Reform cotillion. And--and there were rabbis that I looked up to at my congregation, for a lot of good reasons, but they also made it--I 00:38:00was--I took--my takeaway impression--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --was that we had the answers, and we were right--especially from NCSY--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --which is why I'm glad that I had the BBYO--

ELY: --right--

WAGNER: --experience--um, is that, you know, there was right, and there was other. They might not have said "wrong," um, but we were right, and, you know, college--that's when you're supposed to figure that out. And so certainly, in a Jewish sense, that--that made a much different impression on me.

ELY: Right.

WAGNER: I left thinking about the world differently.

ELY: And you mentioned that you met your husband, Howard, at camp, but then he was at, uh, Madison, too?

WAGNER: Yeah.

ELY: Tell me--

WAGNER: --funny how that works--

ELY: --about Howard--(laughs)--

WAGNER: So, um, Howard and I met at Camp Livingston as counselors. He, um, spent his freshman year at Ohio State, and had never really wanted to go to a state school. So he had always planned to transfer. So he ended up transferring after visiting me in Madison. He fell in love with Madison. Um, and he came 00:39:00to Madison, um--I guess it was my junior year--and, um--and then, when I went to Boston, we decided we would go to Boston together. And then we had to--we--we got married while we were living in Boston.

ELY: Um-hm. So he made the move with you, because you were going to Brandeis?WAGNER: Yes, yes.

ELY: And, uh, we'll talk about Brandeis in a minute--

WAGNER: --yeah, yeah--

ELY: --so what was he doing in Boston while you were there?

WAGNER: Um, he--he's an accountant, and he was working at one of the Big--Big Eight firms, that they had at that time, and, um, we just decided it would be great to explore a big city, and do it together. And, um, yeah, we were on the journey together.

ELY: Where's his background? Where is he from?

WAGNER: He is from Toledo, Ohio, and, um, he--the most he's--he has a more interesting story than I do. His mother was, um, from Romania, and was born--okay--was born in a, um, DP camp after the war, and --am I good?

[Pause in recording.]

UNKNOWN: Action.

WAGNER: Um, so Howard's family story's a little more interesting. His mother, Bella, was born after the war--she's from Romania--she was born in a DP camp, and, um, her family--her family had lived through the Holocaust, and her brothers were both hidden by partisans during the war. And, uh, they ended up moving to Toledo, because her father and her grandfather--but her father at the time--um, was a kosher butcher. And they had survi--he had survived the war, and HIAS [Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society] needed to match him up with a city that needed a kosher butcher. And Toledo needed a butcher, so that's how they ended up in--in Toledo, so--

ELY: HIAS, just for our listeners, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society--

WAGNER: --correct, correct--

ELY: --which helped resettle, uh, people before and after the war.

WAGNER: Correct.

ELY: Right. So, um--so, you're in Boston; you've started Brandeis. Tell me about your experience at Brandeis, which is certainly--

WAGNER: --yeah--

ELY: --the most intense Jewish experience.

WAGNER: Yeah, it was--it was great. So, as I said before, I thought about, um, an MSW, and I had looked at schools, um, to get a master's in social work as well--at that point, just checking everything out--but when I went to visit Brandeis, Joe Reimer, who may still be a professor at--at Hornstein, um, was teaching a class, and it was a group of students sitting around in a lounge in a building in Brandei--at Brandeis, and I remember him talking about, um, Moses giving the community the--the Torah, the Ten Commandments, and he made some comment about--but, you know, we don't take this--sometimes we take this literally, but we know it's not literal. And the lightbulb that I learned in Madison, from opening my eyes and starting to attend services that weren't Orthodox only, and being exposed to Reform and Conservative services, all of a sudden, Joe Reimer--whatever the sentence was that came out of his 00:42:00mouth, it totally clicked for me. And I said, I have to go here. Because he just made everything I learned at K.I. make sense. That I don't have to take it all literally, and, as someone who wants to work with the Jewish community--which is what I knew I wanted to do--the opportunity to study and be in an environment with eighteen other students that also wanted to work with the Jewish community just seemed too good to be true.

ELY: Um-hm.

WAGNER: Um, and so we--you know, we learned the basics of--how do you structure your environment? How do you have an agenda? How do you work with a volunteer? What does it mean to be a--an affiliated Jew versus a marginal Jew? It would be, who is a Jew, and law of return conversation was going on globally. It was in the same time period where we were marching in Washington to free Soviet Jews.

ELY: So what years were you at Brandeis?

WAGNER: Um, '87 to '89.

ELY: Um-hm.

WAGNER: So, during the March on Washington for--to free Soviet Jews. 00:43:00Um, so I couldn't think of a better place or a better--huge Jewish community, as a laboratory to learn about Jewish community--um, than Boston. I also remember Joe Reimer, in my interview, he asked--well, two questions--he asked me about being president of a sorority--what's that all about? And I had to explain what a Jewish sorority was all about. And then he asked me where I saw myself in five to ten years. And I said, "Not in Louisville, Kentucky, but in a city like Louisville." And he--he asked again, why? And I said, "Well, I think that's where I can do more." I think people that want to help in this field are more needed in a midsize community than in a Boston--I mean, you have plenty of people here. Um, I don't know that I see myself going back to Louisville, but I see myself in a city like Louisville. Um, so, when I saw him years later, I reminded him that I told him that I was headed back to the Midwest at 00:44:00some point.

ELY: And so, um, at Brandeis, did you do internships or do, uh, professional experiences?

WAGNER: I did. So I had two field placements. Um, the first year was Harvard Hillel, which, again, on this journey to really understand the breadth of Jewish experience beyond my Keneseth experience, was a game-changer. So I worked as an intern at Harvard Hillel, where they had three rabbis on staff--they probably still do--a Reform, Conservative, and an Orthodox rabbi. They had, um, three minyans. They had three shabbat services, and then everyone would come together for shabbat dinner. I worked with the Soviet Jewry student committee, which was incredibly exciting at that moment in time, and the--the speakers you could bring in when you're at Harvard Hillel--(Ely laughs)--are pretty unparalleled.

ELY: Resources, that's what--

WAGNER: --pretty good--

ELY: --Harvard has, resources--(both laugh)--

WAGNER: --um, but it--but it was--it--for me, it was great, because I went to staff meetings with the--the entire staff, including three rabbis. 00:45:00And I watched three rabbis of three different streams interact, and talk about the kids, and be respectful of each other's, you know--where they were coming from, of--of their perspectives. My supervisor was Rabbi Kaminsky. He was the Reform rabbi. He gave me another gift that I didn't appreciate until many years later, that affected what I--what I feel like I've had an opportunity to do in Louisville--which is he was the first--I don't want to misquote this--but he was one of the first rabbis in New England that was performing interfaith marriages. He invited me to sit in on several conversations he was having with couples that he was counseling before the wedding. And I remember thinking, Why am I in here? And I was engaged at the time, so it was a very surreal conversation, watching other people who were getting married, and, obviously, they were talking about religion, and their future families, and how they would integrate 00:46:00their--their customs, and all of the above--and I really didn't click to it until many years later, when here in Louisville we started, um, working with the Jewish Outreach Institute, and really went on a, um--on a journey, to make sure that interfaith families felt included and not excluded. And I had flashbacks to sitting at Harvard Hillel with Rabbi Neil, and understanding why he wanted me to be a fly on the wall, back in that room.

ELY: Yeah, the--at, um--

WAGNER: --sorry--

ELY: --the time, that was pretty radical for--

WAGNER: --um-hm--

ELY: --a rabbi to be involved with that, and this has been an ongoing conversation in the Jewish community ever since, in how to handle interfaith, uh--interfaith marriages and interfaith families. Did you feel like your views were changed by sitting in on those meetings? Did you start out, perhaps, with a lack of sympathy for that, and come around? Or what--what happened?

WAGNER: I--I know, at the time, I found it--not--not in a judgmental 00:47:00way, but I found it awkward, especially because I was--I was engaged, and I was, you know, looking towards my own experience. And I had a lot of question marks about, really? How is this going to work out? But they were lovely people, and I wanted it to work out for them. But I--but I did feel a bit uncomfortable, that I was kind of spying on their life. Um, again, I--while my Jewish upbringing felt a little bit m--much more traditional and conservative in--in the boundaries, the rest of my life growing up in--in Louisville was pretty liberal, in, in every way. And so I--I think it was just a matter of time for me, that my Jewish thinking caught up with the--the rest of the way--my perspective on how I saw the world.

ELY: Um-hm.

WAGNER: Um, and--and I think was able, again, to put the pieces together pretty easily, but I had the privilege of working with a group of interfaith 00:48:00parents here, starting I guess twelve years ago, that were really--almost starting their own chavurah of interfaith couples, and looking for someone in the Jewish community to connect with. And when I met with a group of moms, I remember, twelve years ago--because I remember how old my youngest child was at the time--um, there were Jewish moms and there were Christian moms, and they were talking about what they wanted for their children. And they wanted something from the Jewish community, and they just didn't want the door shut in their face. And--again, I remembered being with Neil Kaminsky. And, um, another kind of powerful moment I had much later, Jewishly, was Louisville was one of the first communities to participate in Birthright Israel as a pilot community, to send teen--to send high school kids to Birthright Israel. And then they phased that out and went to all college and older. So I was at the 00:49:00opening session for Birthright Israel, many years ago, when Avraham Infeld--talk about a privilege--when Avraham Infeld, um, introduced Birthright Israel to, to the world. And he described that, when every Jewish child is born--this goes back to the interfaith family in a minute--um, when a Jewish child is born, the parents should just see that child with a little ticket, tied to their tiny little foot--(Ely laughs)--because someday they have the opportunity to go visit the Jewish homeland. But it wasn't just the people who were both parents were Jewish. It was every Jewish child, however you want to define that--mother, father, any of the above. And I remember Avram talking about--there's a generation of kids that may not connect with what it means to be Jewish until they're twenty years old, and we give them the opportunity to show them what their birthright was. Um, so, again, a lot of the pieces, for me--I'm just very fortunate--kind of came together and tell a story, and, um, a lot of 00:50:00it goes back to going to Brandeis, and having the opportunity to study in a--in a atmosphere that was respectful of Reform, Conservative, and Orthodox.

ELY: Um-hm. And, uh, you stayed in Boston for a little while after that? Worked--

WAGNER: --um, we were in Boston for three years.

ELY: Okay.

WAGNER: I probably would've stayed longer. My husband was not a big fan of, uh, the commute, and he was working as a tax accountant--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --so he didn't really get to enjoy Boston so much.

ELY: Right.

WAGNER: Um, we looked to come back to the Midwest, and I had a job interview in Cincinnati, and when I came home, um, my mother told me that there was a job open at the Federation in Louisville someone had told her about, and that Rabbi Miles was going to be the next chair of the community relations council, and they were looking for a new director. And I knew that I was really interested in community relations, after I finished my JCC career--I had been 00:51:00working at the Boston JCC. Um, so I went in to meet Alan Engel. I had a resume with me because I was interviewing in Cincinnati, and I was just home for the holiday. And the next thing I knew I was totally engaged in this conversation with Alan. I interviewed for two jobs in Cincinnati, and I ended up interviewing for the, for the job in Louisville. And the next thing I knew, we were moving to Louisville, Kentucky.

ELY: Um-hm. So, when you came back to Louisville, had Louisville changed in the time you'd been away? Did you feel like you were coming back to exactly the same place, or did it feel different because you were different, or the place was different?

WAGNER: Um, it definitely felt different for me, because why was--I was coming back married. Um, I also, as I--I grew up at K.I., and I grew up at the J--at the JCC. I didn't grow up in the Federation part of the community--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --I--it--it's not that it was good or bad. It just was not 00:52:00front-central in our life. So when I came back and started meeting the volunteers, a--and the peop--the connections were not necessarily all there for me at the Federation the way they might have been at the JCC. Um--

ELY: And at this time, the Federation and the JCC were definitely separate entities--

WAGNER: --um-hm--

ELY: --with separate funding, and separate boards, and--

WAGNER: --completely separate--

ELY: --separate traditions, and bylaws, and everything, right.

WAGNER: Completely separate. And I ended up, um, volunteering right away at the JCC, to be the advisor of L'Chaim BBG--I wasn't ready to let go of teens, because I had been the teen director in Boston. So I kind of had the best of both worlds. David Weinberg, who was our CFO, was also the--at the Federation--was also the advisor of, um, the boy's chapter--I think it was Pi or Mu Sigma, at the time--and so, back at the Federation office, David and I were always talking about the teens, and BBYO, so I had my little, you know, influence--

ELY: --right--

WAGNER: --that I wasn't ready to--to totally give that up. But I--I 00:53:00loved being immersed in the Federation piece. I absolutely took the job for the community relations--

ELY: --so tell me--

WAGNER: --piece--

ELY: --more about what the community relations council did--did then--

WAGNER: --so the commu--

ELY: --to some extent does still, to some extent--

WAGNER: --sure, the community relations council, um, is--is really the one table in the community that everyone is represented. And at that point, we had an American Jewish Committee, and we had an ADL representative, and, um, NCJW, Hadassah--everyone was represented around the table, and it--and it's a place for everyone to try to come up with agenda items that represent the whole of the community the best we can, and to be the voice of the community. Um, I used to say--and I was very young when I--I was twenty-five when I started in that job, um--you know, I was put out front to represent the Jewish community in the larger community. So, for me, who had decided I wanted to work within 00:54:00the Jewish community, I all of a sudden found myself being the representative to everyone else outside, which I ha--had to adjust my thinking to. I was on the, um, K.I.C.--the Kentucky Interfaith Communities, and ended up being president at one point, but it was all clergy and me. Um, and it definitely--a huge learning experience. But the, the CRC, we addressed issues of working with the schools. We worked with teachers. We worked with the school system. Um, certainly addressed issues of advocacy--we're involved in--were and still are involved in communal issues of, um, you know, fighting the antisemitism, or, or fair rights for--we were involved in the, um, welfare to reform policies. It's part of the national JCPA, or Jewish Council of Public Affairs, but I think, for 00:55:00me, the most important part about that period--I worked with JCRC for twelve years. I would say the first few years, the most influential people, besides Alan, who--Alan Engel, who was an incredible mentor--um, was absolutely Lewis Cole, um--alav ha-shalom--the sweetest, most gentle, kind, um, intelligent thinker that Louisville's probably ever had. Um, Lewis had been a past president twice of the national organization, and he really took me under his wing. He loved that I was a Louisvillian, and that I came back for this job. Um, he used to take me out to lunch all the time, to just talk about the community, to talk about the biggest issues of the day. Um, he--he was in--just an incredible man, but just he--he was just--he was incredible to me, um, and definitely taught me so much. And then, clearly, um, you know, Rabbi Miles was my first 00:56:00chair for three years, and had been my Hebrew school teacher, and, you know, it was just such an easy transition to work with Rabbi. And Rabbi Rapport was my second chair, um, so I was really blessed for my first six years with people who could make sure I understood the ropes and--and get the big picture in a way that I couldn't have just, you know, dove in by myself and got that.

ELY: It sounds like you got a lot of support. Often--

WAGNER: --um-hm--

ELY: --women, especially young women, are not really seen as authorities, uh, in--in a role like that. But you felt like you were accepted and supported?

WAGNER: Oh, absolutely. I mean--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --Alan--Alan is a great teacher. He also knew, um, you know, how much to give me, and--and how quickly. He didn't just throw me out there. Um, he--and--the very first, uh--the largest project I worked on, at the very beginning, was--it was the twenty-fifth anniversary of Nostra Aetate, 00:57:00um, which was the Catholic acceptance--or the Pope's okay-ing, that the Jews were not responsible for the killing of Christ. And I remember going to the Cathedral of the Assumption for, um--for, uh, a talk about Nostra Aetate--it was one of many events happening. And it was the day I met Rabbi Rapport. He was speaking, and the representative for the interfaith, um, portion of the archdiocese was a nun whose name was Sister Marie Goldstein, which raised other questions--

ELY: --right--

WAGNER: --and I remember Sister Marie and Rabbi, um,--Rabbi Josh, um, debating, sitting in the Cathedral of the Assumption, and just the sheer ability and nuance he had a--after she spoke to say, you know, very gently--well, you should excuse us if we're not grateful that, after years, and years, and 00:58:00years of antisemitism, and all of the horror that came from teaching that the Jews were responsible for the killing of Christ, that now we should celebrate and have a party. And let's take a pause, and let's talk about what this all means, and what's happe--I mean, he was just so eloquent, um, and so dynamic, that I couldn't wait to work with him. And--and, thankfully, had the opportunity, so--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --had some great mentors.

ELY: Right. So you were very visible as a Jew in the community, you know--

WAGNER: --yeah, from day one--

ELY: --representing the whole community. Are there any particular, um, incidents or, um, breakthroughs that--that you'd like to talk about?

WAGNER: Um, can we take one break for one second--only because I have sciatica. If I don't stand up for five s--

ELY: --oh--

[Pause in recording.]

UNKNOWN: Okay, we're rolling.

ELY: Uh, so, during the time that you were at the CRC, were there any incidents or, uh, breakthroughs, or particularly memorable experiences that 00:59:00you'd like to share?

WAGNER: Um, lots, but I'll try to come up with a couple. One is, when we--we were working on Black-Jewish relationship--our relationship with the African-American community, and we had some members of the committee, including, um,--Mark Isaacs had been our chair--who felt like they had a really strong relationship with some leadership from the African-American community, because they went to Ballard High School together, so, you know, this should be easy. And I remember us, as the CRC, really wanting to have a more meaningful relationship with the African-American community, not just--we had a Martin Luther King program together at a church once a year. And that we wanted to be helpful in some way. And, at the end of the day, we ended up having Reverend Kevin Cosby come to a--a CRC meeting, and he spoke to us, and then--I don't remember who it was--but members of the committee just said, "What 01:00:00can we do? We really want to help." And it was that moment when, um--we ended up having a relationship going forward--but Reverend Cosby said, you know, "We need to do certain things for ourselves. Here's where we are as a community. Here's where we aspire to be. We don't need you to do this for us." And it really changed the dynamic of--what is our role? And--and let's not think that our role is necessarily bigger--bigger than it is. And we don't have the right to tell another community how we should help them. And I thought, as a group, it was an incredible moment for us, to be reflective. Um, another was, with the JCPA, there were resolutions that we passed every year. And so some of them are overtly Jewish, and some of them--people question why is the Jewish community weighing in on this topic. And one year, the communities--every Jewish community was studying what our--what our, um, perspective on the death penalty 01:01:00should be as a Jewish community. We had interfaith groups here in Louisville that wanted us to be part of coalitions, and I would say it was--we probably spent six months studying the issue. We had people come in and speak to us, with different perspectives. Um, I think Rabbi Rapport might have been the chair at the time, or Maura Temes, but I remember the two of them, very vividly, in the--in the conversation, when it came down to a vote, and Rabbi, um, Rapport talking about being able to look in the mirror when he got up every day, and living in a society that okays the death penalty, as something we--we put our hechsher on, versus, um, other people in the room thinking of the visceral--what if it was my family?--and, at the end of the day, we v--we joined the coalition to oppose the death penalty. But it was incredibly painful, and it 01:02:00was one of those conversations that we had to take to the Federation board, because we're a committee of the Federation, and we had, you know, the tough discussion of--there will be donors--that are major donors--that will not agree with this discussion, and what point does the Federation, um, veto something that the CRC does. And, in my twenty-six years, they never vetoed anything the CRC did. That might have been the closest we came to it, and they did not, in the end. But that w--that was a pretty powerful moment to--for the CRC to be given the--the ownership to stick with what--what they had brought to the table, and to watch that dynamic on the Federation board, as well, to, uh, allow the CRC to--to stand with their decision. There were lots of moments like that--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --but that one's hard to forget.

ELY: Um-hm. Well, just to go back--

WAGNER: --yeah--

ELY: --and revisit your personal life--

WAGNER: --sure, sure--

ELY: --for a moment--at some point in there you had some children, so--

WAGNER: --I did--

ELY: --tell me about your kids.

WAGNER: Sure. Um, I have three daughters--Talia, Elana, and Yael. You will see a theme there, that there was a period where I really wanted to move to Israel, um--(Ely laughs)--for a couple years. I had this dream of a sabbatical in Israel. Um, I also thought, our last name is Wagner--we need a little ethnicity here. Um, so three beautiful girls, who now are twenty-four, twenty, and thirteen.

ELY: Um-hm. And, uh, they went through the same sort of Jewish education that you did--

WAGNER: --yeah--

ELY: --in Louisville?

WAGNER: --I mean, yeah, it's been really, um, instructive to me, especially in the, the role I have now, to see the different experiences my kids have had--not because they're my kids, but I can tell that the experience for all Jewish families has changed in a--in a ten-year period, from my oldest to my 01:04:00youngest, I can--I can--I can see it--ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --um, I would say Talia probably had the m--closest experience to what I had, just because--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --she's the oldest, and--and the Jewish community was a little bit more--even the families were a little bit more cohesive, with her group, when--when--when she was born. Uh, very tight-knit group of Jewish friends. Um, they met--they all met at the JCC or at preschools around the city. Um, became friends with all of her friends' parents. Maybe it's because she was the first, and--and that's how it rolled. Um, you know, she certainly went to Hebrew school, worked at Hebrew school, um, worked at Camp Beber, um--just finished working there a couple years ago. And, um, you know, the Jewish community--she joined a Jewish sorority, and, uh, had some very similar experiences--went to Israel as a teen. And, um, Elana --same kind of thing. Little bit 01:05:00more active, I would say, in school, than, than BBYO, and was a field hockey player. And Yael, who's, you know, just starting high school now--I can see it's a completely different world. Again, it might be she's my third--our third--um, and it might be that the world has changed a little, that there's just so much competition, so many other activities, that the Jewish stuff doesn't always come first. Whereas, with Talia, it did. Uh, again, it might be my family, and it--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --might be, um, instructive of the world changing, so--

ELY: And, uh, you've been affiliated with A.J., you said, and, uh--in your home, with you and Howard, what kinds of traditions, rituals, holiday experiences--

WAGNER: --sure, sure--

ELY: --have you tried to provide for your kids?

WAGNER: So I'm--I went home from work one day at the Federation--really maybe the first year I was here --and H--Howard and I had this long 01:06:00conversation about--I don't want just going to work to be my Jewish experience, because I could see that happening very easily--

ELY: --um-hmm--

WAGNER: --that that's it--

ELY: --professional Jew, and that's it--

WAGNER: --that's it--

ELY: --right--

WAGNER: --um, so let's just pick something that's going to be ours to remind ourselves that there's something beyond my job--or at least for me. So at that point we decided to keep kosher, um, because we had a lot of friends who kept kosher. We had a lot of friends from Boston, we had a lot of friends in Louisville, at the time, who kept kosher, and we just wanted anyone to be able to eat--eat in our home. So we, um--we kept kosher for twenty years. We--we stopped recently, which is another story. Um, but so--there was just certain things that we decided early on that we had to make the commitment. Um, we've been the house with the sukkah for a very long time, and, um, you know, shabbat dinner--I wouldn't say every Friday night, but we try to light the candles every Friday night. My parents light the candles still, every Friday night. 01:07:00Um, I think, you know, we just try to weave in the things that make sense for us. And, um, fast-forwarding many years later, between becoming vegetarians, and experimenting with different things, um, we decided that kosher wasn't really doing it for us anymore. It wasn't giving us what we wanted it to, twenty years earlier. So now we're--we're in the same exploration as everyone else, looking, um, for things that make the most sense to bring it in to our day-to-day life, or--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --monthly life, whatever that might look like.

ELY: --um-hm. And your parents are still alive, and--

WAGNER: --my--

ELY: --part of your life?

WAGNER: --yes, very much so.

ELY: That's lovely.

WAGNER: Um-hm.

ELY: And what neighborhood do you live in now with--where do you--

WAGNER: Um, so we live in Lancaster Manor, which is off of twenty-two, near Ballard--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --High School.

ELY: Um-hm. All right, so, you're at the CRC--

WAGNER: --yeah--

ELY: --and what was your next professional step?

WAGNER: So, um, as the CRC director, I also worked with the young women's division, when I started. Somewhere in that twelve-year journey, I graduated to the women's campaign, and women's philanthropy, um, which was a whole new, eye-opening experience. Um, the best part was I went, um, one or two--I guess, two or three times--to Israel, with the chairs of the women's campaign. And, I don't know if you're--if people are familiar with the Lion of Judah Division--it's when the--it's made up of women internationally, who give five thousand dollars to the annual campaign every year, based on the fact that, during Operation Exodus, or rescuing of the Soviet Jews, it cost five thousand dollars to rescue a family--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --so they created this Lion of Judah division. So, my--again, I took the position for CRC, but then I was introduced to the campaign piece, um, as part of my portfolio, and just being able to spend time with women who 01:09:00have the wherewithal and the opportunity to travel anywhere they want, to spend their money anywhere they want, and to be surrounded by women who chose--choose and chose to spend it on making their Jewish community--to commit to making their Jewish community stronger, and give back, um, kind of changed the whole--the trajectory for me. So I ended up, after twelve years with CRC, becoming the campaign director at the--the Federation. Um, never in a million years, when I came back to Louisville, did I think I would end up, um, leading the fundraising component for the community, and, uh, it was an honor. I learned a lot, and I learned to appreciate, that, um, everybody's decision is a personal decision, and, you know, we--we can't judge people for what they choose to do, and when they choose to do it. Our job is to give people the 01:10:00opportunity to participate and, hopefully, make them feel that they can make the world a better place, and that we have a--a mechanism and an avenue to do that. So it's a humbling experience to be in the fundraising part of the--the agency, but, again, Alan was a good mentor. I learned from the best. And I spent a lot of time in the campaign, which I ended up, um, then becoming the associate director of the Federation, which led to other roles within the organization, um, including leading towards, uh, what eventually became the merger with the JCC.

ELY: Um-hm. They--tell me more about the circumstances of that merger. What was the state of the community and the organizations at the time, and what was the process, and what was your role in it?

WAGNER: Yeah, yeah. So I get called, probably monthly, from communities now that are considering merging their Federations and JCCs, and someday I should write a book, or a how-to, or a how-not-to. Um, back in--you know, it was 01:11:00about nine years ago--so back around 2008, I would say the Federation--I would give us a solid B. We were doing some really good things. Um, we also had probably plateaued with fundraising. Something neede--something needed to happen to--to get people excited. Um, we had a lot of committed volunteers, a lot of committed donors--couldn't tell where the next big energy boost was going to come from. Um, people were passionate about Israel at the time. People were still--we were giving a l--uh, uh, twenty-seven percent of the campaign was going overseas, so there was a--there was, uh, a good feel for both local and overseas needs. Um, the JCC at the time, from where I was sitting, was struggling a little bit about finding their identity. There had been 01:12:00some ups, and there had been some downs, and there were some financial issues, and there had been a lot of changes in leadership. And one day, um, the J--well, the JCC had been coming to the Federation, and asking for additional dollars from planning and allocations, and then, after the fact, needed additional funds to meet, um, some deficit needs. And there was some talk of perhaps the JCC selling the property, by some of the board members--I don't know that that was the whole board or if it was just a few, um, ad hoc board members. And so we were approached as--at a Federation executive committee meeting, by the leadership of the JCC, who basically said, we're not sure what we're going to do. We might sell the building. What can you all do to help? What do you wanna do about this, basically. And, um, looking for a place to come together in the conversation, because we're all in it together. Um, as I recall, part of what the first part of the process was, was that the Federation had 01:13:00started to get heavily into programmatic the--side of things. We were--we had started PJ Library and we had a successful Kesher Kentucky teen program that sent kids to Israel, and, I would say, especially for young families, there was kind of a dearth in the community of--where do you go? There wasn--that was one reason PJ took off.

ELY: PJ is--?WAGNER: PJ Library is a probably ten-year--ten or twelve-year-old program, um, created by the Harold Grinspoon Foundation, where Jewish families that sign up once a child is six months old to--it was six years old at that time--they receive a--the child receives a book in the mail every month--a Jewish book. And it has questions, and--and, uh--(coughs)--excuse me--opportunities in there for parents to have--um, speak to their kids about the book and learn together, as a family. And then we created with it--as many communities did--programs and family events to--to--to reintroduce 01:14:00people or--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --introduce people for the first time. Um, so there were conversations between the Federation and the JCC about perhaps bringing all of our programs together first, and figuring out if there was a way to maybe put all the Jewish programs together under one umbrella, um, and then eventually give those to the JCC to move forward. But that had nothing to do with the, um--the financial concerns of--of the JCC. So, at the end of the day, we created, um, first a small group, and then a larger group--we created a progra--a project called, um, it was "yachad ka--yachad kadima"? Something with "yachad"--I can't remember. Um, and we created steering committees and task forces, and there were four chairs, and we had, um, facilitators come in, and all kinds of strategic thinking. And I remember sitting at the Rudd Center at Jewish 01:15:00Hospital, doing one of these visioning projects--which the best part was, the entire community was there. It didn't matter if you were wearing a Federation hat, or a synagogue hat, or a JCC hat--the--the community came for it. And, um, we were asked to do the headlines of what you want the JCC to look like in "x" number of years. And I think if we did it today, it would be the same headlines. We want the Jews to have--the Jewish community to have a place where we feel at home, and we come together, and we're proud, and everyone's welcome, and--and it's sustainable, and all of the--most people want it to be everything to everybody.

ELY: Um-hm.

WAGNER: Um, so that commi--that committee moved forward--this is just Sara Wagner's theory of how we ended up where we are, but my perspective was, as that theory--as that--those committees and--and work groups were moving forward, simultaneously, A.J. and K.I., um, had been talking about merging, 01:16:00for about a year. And they had several committees and had gone through ritual issues, and--and which building would they use, and Sunday schools, and every element of what that might look like, down to the youth group. And it--the--towards the end of the--the line, I don't ever remember which congregation--I don't want to misspeak--um, pulled out, and said, We're--we don't want to do it. We're not going forward with this. And I think the community really had felt hopeful, that this was going to happen. So I think--fast-forward back to the Federation and the JCC--that the leadership of, um--that was around the table at that point, particularly the governance committee for this project, saw that somebody could back out at the last minute, just like the synagogues, and they fast-forwarded the whole process, and said, Here, let's create the bylaws, let's merge. And within a month--I feel like it was pretty quick--we merged and made the decision that we would 01:17:00figure out the details after. That we got married first and that we would spend the first year living in our kind of separate spheres, and do our work, and then figure out how to integrate and bring it together. So I think, for us, it was probably the best move--we didn't--we didn't wring our hands over it--um, but I think it was the circumstances of the--the synagogues, for what--

ELY: --I hadn't heard that perspective before--

WAGNER: --that's--one, one woman's perspective.

ELY: Was there opposition to it, or did it just seem--once you had done it--it just seemed like, yeah, this was what we should have done.

WAGNER: Um, I think there was a lot of angst from people who thought we couldn't get along, and I never really could wrap my head around--did they mean the professionals, or the volunteers? Um, what I think the volunteer leadership didn't realize is that the professionals had been working together forever. I mean, we collaborated on programs. We--we--we talked about who our 01:18:00constituents were. We--we--we shared volunteers, and we knew of each other's experiences. Um, and we both just kind of had our--our separate lanes of what we were trying to accomplish. Um, I think it was not so difficult for th--not as difficult, at the beginning, for the staffs to come together. I'm sure there were certain staff that, that were holding on to "change is hard," including some of the Federation staff, who eventually moved into the JCC building, and made them nervous and uncomfortable because it wasn't their home. But they--some are still there, and love it. Um, but I--you know, I think there had been a us-them on both--in both agencies, um, and when we started with a new board, um, by and large, the board was made up of community members, not people who came to the table with a JCC or Federation hat. They were certainly around 01:19:00the table, but they were not, um--we weren't overwhelmed by that--that was the entire make-up--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --so I think that also helped us move forward more quickly.

ELY: Um-hm.

WAGNER: It was--it was an interesting period.

ELY: Right. And, at that time, there had been some changes in other agencies in the community--Jewish Hospital was going through a transition--

WAGNER: --yeah--

ELY: --the Day School closed--

WAGNER: --yeah--

ELY: --at some point in there. Was there a sense that you were, uh, consolidating resources in order to move forward together, as opposed to separate things--WAGNER: --oh--

ELY: --besides the JCC?

WAGNER: --oh, absolutely. I think, um, Akron, Ohio, which, you know, is a town that we can picture the size of, and what they can accomplish, and then Austin, Texas--had merged or kind of created their Federation out of nowhere, because it's an emerging, growing Jewish community. I think we looked at those two models of coming together--uh, my glass is always half full, so, from 01:20:00my perspective, it was what--what's the best that can come out of coming together? And, certainly, I tell people today, because I lived at the Federation for, you know, nineteen years or so before we merged--however many years--it--there's no "us and them," and there's no, "Ugh, what are they really thinking? What do they really mean when they say that?" We--we're all in this together, and the people that sit around our board now clearly want everyone to be successful. And I'm sure that's where people were when we weren't merged, but people also had to put their stake in the ground and take care of their agency, and--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --um, uh, again, I think we looked at Austin, and we--we--we brought people in from Austin. We brought people in from Akron. We tried to learn, as best we could, from other models. And there are a lot of communities who've--who've merged now, um, and they're calling us to figure out 01:21:00what works, so--

ELY: And you provide advice?

WAGNER: I provide advice--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --uh, best I can, and, you know--different circumstances for everyone. Um, you know, it--it can't be about the current leadership. Some communities call, and that's their answer, because they're--they don't have the right leadership, or they're unhappy with their leadership. That--you--you can't do it for that. You have--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --to do it for the community, and because we have a job to get done for the community, and, you know--having one marketing department and one business department--how can that be bad for the community? To--to streamline--streamline some of those things.

ELY: Um-hm. And you were the assistant director at the time that the merger happened--is that correct? Of the Federation?

WAGNER: Assistant or associate, I don't remember--

ELY: --oh, all right, associate--

WAGNER: --assistant, associate, I don't know--

ELY: --associate director--

WAGNER: --whatev--

ELY: --and, uh, you became the head in 2015. You were--were, um, were you the anointed one? This was seen--(Wagner laughs)--as the next step? Or 01:22:00did you have to go through a competitive process?

WAGNER: So that's funny. So, um--so, when Stu Silberman was hired, I spent, I guess, the first year running the campaign, and we were still at the Federation, and I was kind of just in my own little bubble, doing what--what we had always done. And then, year two, we started moving staff over to the JCC, and, um, Stu asked me to--to move into a couple different positions at the JCC. And I was very, very hesitant. Um, Alan Engel had just retired, and I was very hesitant to walk away from the campaign. Um, and, at the end of the day, he--he convinced me to become the C.O.O. of the JCL, which really meant running the JCC's day-to-day operations, and, and kind of more of the--I don't know--vice-president of the JCC--it doesn't matter what the title is. My job was to worry about the internal mechanics of the JCC--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --um, which for me was kind of exciting, but was a completely different challenge. I had worked at the Federation, where we had thirteen employees, and, as I said, I was representing us outside of the community. I was working with donors and volunteers, and all of a sudden there's a staff that, in the summer, is up to 300 people, and it's about customer service, and member satisfaction, and rebuilding committees, and all that sort of thing. So I, um--I had a hard time walking away from the campaign, because I was worried about it, um, but I was able to shift, um, and f--I had the opportunity to learn the JCC piece of the business. Um, I went to the JCC executive meetings for four years, so when Stu, um, decided to move on, they asked me right away if I was interested in the job. Um, I don't know that I took very long to think about it. And the next thing I knew, um, I did interview for the--the--the job, and went 01:24:00through a very quick process, um--shared my resume, had the interview, um, and basically was told, you know, if--if they saw my resume, that I had run a campaign, and had the CRC experience, and then led the JCC, and I was coming from out of town, they would probably invite me back for a second visit. --(Ely laughs)-- So, um--so that's where we ended, and I very quickly became, um, the C.E.O. I would say there was maybe a month, from the time Stu announced he was leaving to the time I took over. So I never really had a runway to even think about how this was going to work. Um, but just anecdotally, the other day I asked someone--I asked our HR director for a list of everyone's anniversary dates, so that we could recognize staff for certain milestone anniversaries. And they were in order of how long we've each worked at the agency, and I 01:25:00was at the top of the list, with twenty-six years. Um, so I decided that maybe I just--you know, they asked me because I'd been there the longest, and it's my turn. So--(Ely laughs)--it depends how you look at it.

ELY: Longevity--

WAGNER: --that's right--

ELY: --is what does it--

WAGNER: --right--

ELY: --does it. Um, were you the first woman to run the Federation?

WAGNER: Uh, yes, yes.

ELY: Okay. And was that acknowledged as a milestone, or by then was everybody just so comfortable with you in a leadership role, it didn't--

WAGNER: --yeah, no, I don't, um--

ELY: --no big deal--

WAGNER: --it was only acknowledged--definitely by, um, my oldest daughter Talia. Definitely thought that was pretty awesome. Um, and I would say there were some very--at the very beginning, I remember some people thinking it was--it was great--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --maybe some of the women that I worked with in the Women's Division for so long. But, for the most part, people rolled right past that.

ELY: Right. Well, one of the things that you don't necessarily think of first, as far as challenges to Jewish community, is security. But that 01:26:00turned out being one of the issues that you've had to deal with--

WAGNER: --um-hm--

ELY: --in the last year, with, um, knowing that there were a series of--

WAGNER: --yeah--

ELY: --bomb threats made to Jewish communities. And it seemed that eventually that would get to Louisville, and it did.

WAGNER: Yeah.

ELY: So how did you prepare for the prospect of that happening--WAGNER: --yeah--

ELY: --and then how did you react when the JCC did receive a threat?

WAGNER: Um, so the interesting part, for me personally, is that, when I was in the CRC role, there was always a component of security woven into that, whether it was--I received all the complaints about antisem--semitic, um, instances in Louisville. Um, we--we don't have an ADL in town, so I've had years of getting the hate mail, and seeing the, the nonsense that creeps up every once in a while. Um, at the beginning of my term, maybe three weeks into this, in 2015, we actually had a bomb threat that was not public, um, that we handled 01:27:00very quickly and found the person right away. And, long story, but were able to track down the person fairly quickly. Um, so we had gone through that drill. Um, it was a--a note saying something that could've indicated a bomb, and it was left on my desk. And Talia was working at the JCC, and was in my office when I opened it up. So I felt like I--before this--this most recent event, that I'd already had a--we, at the Center, had had really kind of a dry run, and everybody handled everything so well. Um, security has to be at the top of the list. We, um--we have drills all the time. We change our emergency response plan all the time. When I go to JCCA conferences, you know, the lead sessions are with the FBI, and they're on security. Um, it's--it's just the day and age we live in. So, when these started happening at the other JCCs, uh--my husband likes to say, and I think he's right, that I think the morning we 01:28:00received our email, which was our bomb threat, um, I--I knew that other JCC, on a network that we received, had received one that morning. And I said, "It might be our day." Um, because I knew eventually they would find Louisville. And--and it--it was that day. And--and everybody was fantastic. They knew exactly what to do. Um, our job is to change it up, and keep it moving, and keep people practicing. And we have an incredible staff, um, and people who are very creative. We test our staff every once in a while and, you know, have drills that they don't know are coming, or leave something, maybe, that shouldn't be where it is, to see if anybody raises their hand or calls attention to it. Um, we have eighty-five preschoolers in our building every day of--you know, every weekday of the year. So we--we can never let our guard down. And it's really one reason I'm really excited about J-Tomorrow, and the possibility of 01:29:00building a new building or being in a new facility. Part of it is really, um--[phone buzzes]--sorry, let's turn off ------------(??), and then I'll--sorry about that. Oops, I might have answered that instead of turning--so I, uh, again, I think the security piece, um--it--it comes with the territory now and it has to be on the top of our list. Uh, the rally that happened for us after we received the bomb threat. That I didn't see coming. We--some communities that happened, some it didn't, but as soon as we hit the news, that, um, there'd been a bomb threat to the Louisville JCC--phone calls, people stopping in my office, Dr. Babar from the Islamic Center came over, within hours, to offer his support. Um, members who are not Jewish, who have been members of the JCC for years, wrote letters about, "not at my JCC." And people kept asking, What 01:30:00are you going to do? What are you going to do? We wanna do something. And we played through, very quickly, a couple options. We talked about a Kabbalat Shabbat, and inviting the entire community, um, and people really wanted to come together. So we came up, within, you know, a couple days, of having this "We are together" rally. Um, you know it--it was invigorating. It was incredible to see the people who showed up on the--on the front lines. Um, in the--on our front porch, of the JCC. We happened to have a BBYO basketball tournament that was here at the same time, with kids from JCCs who had also received threats. So, when someone asked them, when--you know, a lifetime from now, a generation from now, do they remember antisemitism when they were in high school--they're going to have a much different answer than I did, because they're feeling it all the time. The, the calls we get now from parents, through the CRC, 01:31:00that--that have--kids are having swastikas written on their desks, or people are calling them "kikes" in 2017. Side by side with their friends of other diverse backgrounds being--being treated differently, it's amazing and unbelievable.

ELY: Um-hm. And the Jewish community has also gone out of its way to support the Muslim community.

WAGNER: Absolutely.

ELY: Is that through the CRC, or--

WAGNER: Yes, it's--

ELY: --what is the--

WAGNER: --absolutely through the CRC. We have a great relationship--we have for years--with members of the Islamic Center. Um, we brought in, through our partnership with Israel last year, a group of women who were Bedouin, Muslim, Christian, Israeli, Jewish, that were on a tour, and they--they have a cooking project where they get together to learn about one another. Um, things like that really break down walls for us, and right now we're trying to start a women's group, in a similar fashion, here in Louisville, and, and expand past 01:32:00the--the friends we have at the Islamic Center, to--there are other mosques in our community that we haven't really, um, opened the doors to yet, that we would like to. So we will--we hope to expand it, and--

ELY: --and you think through women's groups is the, sort of--WAGNER: --absolutely--

ELY: --the cutting edge of doing it.

WAGNER: I think, um, like everything--um, you know, the--women tend to want to build the relationships, e--more easily, and, um, are, are willing to put themselves out there. Food is--is a--a no-brainer--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --to connect people to one another. We did resettle a Syrian refugee family last year. We did it with the mosque. Um, a lot of CRCs, or a lot of Jewish communities, reached out to Syrian refugee families, but not with a--not with their Muslim friends. I have to say that, um, Mayor Fischer and 01:33:00his Compassionate City initiative gives us, kind of, a--you know, a breeding ground that maybe some other communities don't have. The history we have in Louisville, with the Festival of Faiths--

ELY: --um-hm--

WAGNER: --and, um, we're just--I think we're really fortunate that we have the seeds to be able to do that. Certainly, you know--it's a year since Muhammad Ali passed away, and the community coming together and feeling connected to, to his desire to bring us together--you know, it's hard to ignore those kinds of signs in your community. So I--I think it's incredibly important and, um, poignant for our CRC to take the lead on that.

ELY: Um-hm.

WAGNER: One step at a time.

ELY: And you're going through a planning process now--

WAGNER: --um-hm--

ELY: --about the future of, I guess, specifically the Jewish Community Center, but, by expansion, the Jewish community--

WAGNER: --right--

ELY: --so how has that process unfolded?

WAGNER: So it's exciting. Um, it's how you approach this with urgency 01:34:00and also the responsibility of patience enough to do it correctly. Um, we've had so many different starts and stops over the--probably the past fifteen years--of what should we do with the physical building of the JCC. And we're really trying to approach this as the--the JCC at the end of Cannons Lane is this iconic part of our community. It--it's not going away today or tomorrow. It is serving us well. But it's not going to serve us well forever. It's--it's--we're out of space in the auditorium, we're out of space for our early childhood program, it--we're out of space for camp. Um, where do we need to be in the future, and--and how can we make sure it's sustainable? So we're really taking the approach of looking at--wha--what needs need to be met? And how will we serve them? And then, what is the right space to have those services take place in? So I know a lot of people think we're focusing on the building. I 01:35:00like to say we're trying to find not just the right size building, but the right space. And it might be more than one space. Um, and we have several work groups and a steering committee, um, the--

ELY: --public meetings--

WAGNER: --we had publi--we've had three public meetings so far, for people to share with us what they would love to see happen. And now we're in the--I would say the next two to three months, we're in the stage of prioritizing. And that means, does it meet our mission? Is it financially realistic? Is it sustainable? Um, you know, where--where does it fit in the entire rubric? And then we'll come back to the community, hopefully with some new, exciting opportunities, that we haven't been in before. But I would say, uh, a good portion of it will be our core businesses. We know--we know what business we're in, so--

ELY: Well, we're almost out of time--

WAGNER: --okay--

ELY: --but I did wanna ask you, um, having the experience of 01:36:00fifty-some years in this community--what do you see as the real strengths of the Louisville Jewish community, and what do you see as the challenges that need to be grappled with?

WAGNER: So, let's do the challenges first--

ELY: --okay--

WAGNER: --and get them out of the way--

ELY: --so we can end on a positive note--

WAGNER: --that's--that's right--

ELY: --yeah--

WAGNER: --um, the challenges are that, a, I think people want everything. They r--they want us--they want us to be everything, soup to nuts, the whole--the whole thing. I want to find it in the Jewish community. Um, the other is--I don't know that--we don't have the champions that we need for certain things in this community. I'll use the example of a day school--

ELY: --right--

WAGNER: --which we don't have anymore. Some communities--smaller than us, larger than us--will always have a day school, because there are champions for that day school, who will go ensure that the funds are there for it. Um, you know, I--I could look at a Columbus, or an Indianapolis, or a Memphis, where 01:37:00they have one or two big families, uh, or donors, who are their go-to people that, no matter what, you know they'll get them through. And Louisville is more of a collective--we count on everybody, and we don't have that one stop that will--that will just help us if all else--you know, if all else fails. Um, so it's a challenge, and it just means we need to try that much harder. And the, um, breadth of people that we have, that are participating--which are incredible--needs to be wider than it might be in a community that has that one big champion. Um, I think the other challenges are, like every community in North America--affiliation means something different today than it used to mean, and we can't wring our hands over what it used to be. Um, whatever the percentages are--fifty percent belong to a synagogue, or "x" percent belong to a Jewish institution. The truth of the matter is, if you read the Pew 01:38:00study, ninety-four percent of the Jewish respondents said they're proud to be Jewish, and they're proud of their Jewish identity. So what do we as a community, going forward, give them that they need? Because they obviously feel connected, and they want to be Jewish. And they just might define it a little bit differently than the organized Jewish community defines it. So, obviously a challenge, but if you look back on Jewish history, you know, we're not wandering in the desert anymore. No one needs to follow the leader out of the desert to--to the Promised Land. We need to bring people with us, and we need to help them on their journey. And we need to let them lead us, as well, as to where do they want to go? Um, I think the strengths are that we have incredible people in this community. Whether they've been involved for decades, or whether they're just getting involved now. I think there's a misnomer, that everybody's from Louisville, and that all of our leaders grew up here. Fifty percent of the people here didn't grow up here, and they're looking for the same 01:39:00things that the people who happened to have been born in Kentucky are looking for. Um, I look at our young leadership award winners--just from last night--all three of them are transplants to Louisville, who call Louisville home. And they're raising Jewish families in Louisville, Kentucky, and they have expectations, and I think they're going to help us build them. So I think it's, you know, the--the pluses are--are obviously the people. Um, there's always something new and exciting around every corner, if we allow ourselves to be flexible. We--we've got so many possibilities, and we have to try things, and allow ourselves sometimes to fail, and then pick ourselves up, and try again, so--

ELY: Okay. Well, thank you so much--

WAGNER: --it's my pleasure--

ELY: --for sitting down for this interview. It was, uh, really enlightening, and--and a pleasure.

WAGNER: Thanks for doing it.

[End of recording.]