Submission #28333 by Congregation Beth Shalom Men'S Club - Northbrook, IL (643)
2023
I have read the 2023 Torch Awards Program Guidelines.
Tuning into the Chicago News and Sports Media
Educational Programming
Page 1
The Congregation Beth Shalom (CBS) Men’s Club most popular regular program is our Sunday morning breakfast speaker program. Following our 2021 TORCH award winning To Your Good Health series, we began a series featuring local members of the Chicago media. We invited speakers from sports radio, news radio, and sportswriting to educate and entertain our synagogue membership in person and on Zoom.
Sunday morning breakfasts with bagels, lox, and eggs prepared by the CBS Men’s Club is a longstanding tradition for years. It’s a time to kibitz, hang out with friends, and provide breakfast for our congregation after morning minyan or to the parents dropping off their kids at Sunday School. Sitting and eating is a good thing, but if you can learn something interesting when doing it, it is even better.
In 2019-20, our Club produced a very successful and TORCH award winning Sunday morning breakfast speaker series on health and wellness, entitled To Your Good Health. When setting up our calendar of events for 2021-22 and 2022-23, we wanted to find topics interesting to bring people to shul on Sunday mornings especially as COVID restrictions were being lifted and we were able to serve breakfasts in the synagogue. Besides work and family, the most common topic of conversation amongst Jewish men tends to be sports. With a rich sports tradition in Chicago as well as its highs and lows, this was a perfect topic to attract our members, both younger and older.
Our co-president, Steven Lessman, has worked in radio and advertising for many years and is very familiar with many media personalities. Our programming vice president, Lawrence LeVine, also is very well connected in the community. Their combination of resources resulted in a wonderful roster of speakers and topics.
On September 23, 2021, we hosted Steaks in the Sukkah in the outdoor sukkah that our Club annually builds. This was the first Club sukkot-related dinner since COVID and our annual opening dinner, so we knew that we needed to have an exciting activity. David Schuster, a long time friend of Steve and a sports radio producer and personality for many years, previously was a panelist for our Packers vs. Bears Zoom event that we held with Congregation Beth Israel Ner Tamid’s Club from Milwaukee in the fall of 2020. After cooking a wonderful kosher steak dinner featuring brand new Men’s Club steak knives, David grabbed a mic to discuss all things related to Chicago sports including his experience covering the six-time NBA Champion Chicago Bulls. He spoke on every Chicago pro sports team, local college teams as well as telling us about new controversies in sports and the media, spinning interesting anecdotes, and answering tons of questions. This event attracted over 60 men for camaraderie, fun, and the mitzvah of eating in the sukkah.
Our next very well received event in this educational series was for a Sunday morning breakfast on November 7, 2021. We were very fortunate to bring in Pat Cassidy, one of the morning anchors for WBBM Radio. He co-hosted the morning rush hour show informing Chicagoans on the news and especially the weather and traffic for over 40 years. Pat spoke on his experiences seeing news media change, the growth of the internet, and how people have consumed their news over the years. This event brought in over 50 synagogue members for our popular breakfasts. At this time for ease of serving and while meeting health safety protocols, the bagel accoutrements were all in single-serving packages.
Like most of our synagogues and Clubs, the Omicron variant of COVID caused some shutdowns of activities, but not to the same extent as it was in March and April of 2020. Our synagogue medical committee did not permit communal meals in the building temporarily. This caused us to pivot for our next two speakers on January 23 and February 6, 2022. At the beginning of the pandemic, we initially offered boxed breakfasts to be picked up at the synagogue the morning of the presentation, but, with waning numbers over that time, we did not offer a breakfast component for these two speakers.
On January 23, 2022, we hosted Justice Robert Gordon, a synagogue and Club member, to speak on his work in interviewing many former baseball players. Much of his interest in baseball has been compiling the history of Jews in Baseball where he curates a list through the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY. He also was instrumental in obtaining autographs for an art project showing portraits of Jewish ballplayers throughout history creating in Chicago. This program attracted about 40 attendees from across the country, since it was held on Zoom.
Two weeks later on February 6, 2022, we had another speaker on Zoom as a part of this series. Jonathan Eig is a local author who recently published the book, Ali: A Life. Jonathan had rare and exclusive access to Muhammad Ali in the last few years of his life and became his authorized biographer. This was an engaging discussion regarding this book, his experiences with Ali, and his other books on sports, the Chicago mob, and the history of the birth control pill. This program also attracted about 40 attendees from across the country.
We got back to in person meals as Omicron waned in March. On May 1, 2022, we had our next speaker as a part of our series. Bill Cameron is a long-time Chicago political reporter on both TV and radio. With his career at City Hall, he had a unique perspective seeing the craziness and controversy of Chicago city government, policy, and politics over the years. It was an engaging discussion given the history of the Jewish community in Chicago, most of our members’ having lived here their entire lives, and the impact of city politics on lives in the suburbs. Approximately 50 attended this event in person. Approximately 50 members four synagogue attended this very interesting discussion.
For our Opening Dinner of the 2022-23 year on September 21, 2022, we brought in Randy Merkin. He is a local sports radio program director, producer, and personality. He spoke on his history of being a Jewish kid from the south suburbs and how he started his career using moxie to make connections and meet many sports personalities gaining access for interviews. This parlayed to being a producer for radio and tv. As interesting events with delicious food do, we had 70 attendees from our synagogue.
Our last presentation in this series occurred on November 20, 2022. We brought in popular sports talk radio personality, Laurence Holmes. He answered questions across all areas of sports as well as how he prepares for his daily shows. He happened to grow up in the same suburb of Chicago as did our last speaker, and he also brilliantly spoke on the necessary alliances between the African-American and Jewish communities in order to build bridges. About 50 attendees packed out Winter Garden for this breakfast talk.
Our series proved to be a success considering that, at the beginning, we were learning how to get back together as the pandemic was improving. As COVID numbers changed, we had to change our plans and move to an online format, yet attendance at programs was still at a high level. The numbers during Omicron were lower as there were no breakfasts included, but the popular topics and engaging speakers enabled our Club membership and others from the overall synagogue membership to participate. This series also attracted younger members since sports is such a popular topic. The breakfast times occurring around the same time as drop off for Sunday School added convenience, and this helped with attracting younger men with kids in school.
In 2019-20, our Club produced a very successful and TORCH award winning Sunday morning breakfast speaker series on health and wellness, entitled To Your Good Health. When setting up our calendar of events for 2021-22 and 2022-23, we wanted to find topics interesting to bring people to shul on Sunday mornings especially as COVID restrictions were being lifted and we were able to serve breakfasts in the synagogue. Besides work and family, the most common topic of conversation amongst Jewish men tends to be sports. With a rich sports tradition in Chicago as well as its highs and lows, this was a perfect topic to attract our members, both younger and older.
Our co-president, Steven Lessman, has worked in radio and advertising for many years and is very familiar with many media personalities. Our programming vice president, Lawrence LeVine, also is very well connected in the community. Their combination of resources resulted in a wonderful roster of speakers and topics.
On September 23, 2021, we hosted Steaks in the Sukkah in the outdoor sukkah that our Club annually builds. This was the first Club sukkot-related dinner since COVID and our annual opening dinner, so we knew that we needed to have an exciting activity. David Schuster, a long time friend of Steve and a sports radio producer and personality for many years, previously was a panelist for our Packers vs. Bears Zoom event that we held with Congregation Beth Israel Ner Tamid’s Club from Milwaukee in the fall of 2020. After cooking a wonderful kosher steak dinner featuring brand new Men’s Club steak knives, David grabbed a mic to discuss all things related to Chicago sports including his experience covering the six-time NBA Champion Chicago Bulls. He spoke on every Chicago pro sports team, local college teams as well as telling us about new controversies in sports and the media, spinning interesting anecdotes, and answering tons of questions. This event attracted over 60 men for camaraderie, fun, and the mitzvah of eating in the sukkah.
Our next very well received event in this educational series was for a Sunday morning breakfast on November 7, 2021. We were very fortunate to bring in Pat Cassidy, one of the morning anchors for WBBM Radio. He co-hosted the morning rush hour show informing Chicagoans on the news and especially the weather and traffic for over 40 years. Pat spoke on his experiences seeing news media change, the growth of the internet, and how people have consumed their news over the years. This event brought in over 50 synagogue members for our popular breakfasts. At this time for ease of serving and while meeting health safety protocols, the bagel accoutrements were all in single-serving packages.
Like most of our synagogues and Clubs, the Omicron variant of COVID caused some shutdowns of activities, but not to the same extent as it was in March and April of 2020. Our synagogue medical committee did not permit communal meals in the building temporarily. This caused us to pivot for our next two speakers on January 23 and February 6, 2022. At the beginning of the pandemic, we initially offered boxed breakfasts to be picked up at the synagogue the morning of the presentation, but, with waning numbers over that time, we did not offer a breakfast component for these two speakers.
On January 23, 2022, we hosted Justice Robert Gordon, a synagogue and Club member, to speak on his work in interviewing many former baseball players. Much of his interest in baseball has been compiling the history of Jews in Baseball where he curates a list through the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY. He also was instrumental in obtaining autographs for an art project showing portraits of Jewish ballplayers throughout history creating in Chicago. This program attracted about 40 attendees from across the country, since it was held on Zoom.
Two weeks later on February 6, 2022, we had another speaker on Zoom as a part of this series. Jonathan Eig is a local author who recently published the book, Ali: A Life. Jonathan had rare and exclusive access to Muhammad Ali in the last few years of his life and became his authorized biographer. This was an engaging discussion regarding this book, his experiences with Ali, and his other books on sports, the Chicago mob, and the history of the birth control pill. This program also attracted about 40 attendees from across the country.
We got back to in person meals as Omicron waned in March. On May 1, 2022, we had our next speaker as a part of our series. Bill Cameron is a long-time Chicago political reporter on both TV and radio. With his career at City Hall, he had a unique perspective seeing the craziness and controversy of Chicago city government, policy, and politics over the years. It was an engaging discussion given the history of the Jewish community in Chicago, most of our members’ having lived here their entire lives, and the impact of city politics on lives in the suburbs. Approximately 50 attended this event in person. Approximately 50 members four synagogue attended this very interesting discussion.
For our Opening Dinner of the 2022-23 year on September 21, 2022, we brought in Randy Merkin. He is a local sports radio program director, producer, and personality. He spoke on his history of being a Jewish kid from the south suburbs and how he started his career using moxie to make connections and meet many sports personalities gaining access for interviews. This parlayed to being a producer for radio and tv. As interesting events with delicious food do, we had 70 attendees from our synagogue.
Our last presentation in this series occurred on November 20, 2022. We brought in popular sports talk radio personality, Laurence Holmes. He answered questions across all areas of sports as well as how he prepares for his daily shows. He happened to grow up in the same suburb of Chicago as did our last speaker, and he also brilliantly spoke on the necessary alliances between the African-American and Jewish communities in order to build bridges. About 50 attendees packed out Winter Garden for this breakfast talk.
Our series proved to be a success considering that, at the beginning, we were learning how to get back together as the pandemic was improving. As COVID numbers changed, we had to change our plans and move to an online format, yet attendance at programs was still at a high level. The numbers during Omicron were lower as there were no breakfasts included, but the popular topics and engaging speakers enabled our Club membership and others from the overall synagogue membership to participate. This series also attracted younger members since sports is such a popular topic. The breakfast times occurring around the same time as drop off for Sunday School added convenience, and this helped with attracting younger men with kids in school.
Page 2
Original Program