The last time I visited my sister this past spring in New Orleans, I had happened to go to Anshei Sfard, an old shul, perhaps a national landmark - I wouldn't be surprised. It was like a classical style shul, I want to say, as it was nice, but it was falling apart. The congregants were mainly old people - I don't mean that in a bad way, don't get me wrong - and the rabbi was a Chabad rabbi whose family lives in the area. They only had services Saturday and Sunday morning, I believe, though they had bagels for breakfast the Sunday morning I went. Their lack of population was due to the shul being downtownish and having been built before many Jews left for the suburbs, like Metairie. So why am I posting about this shul now? I just found out that the shul was apparently devastated by Katrina. And since I had taken some photographs of this shul pre-Katrina, I thought I would post them. Enjoy.
4 comments:
Beautiful architecture. I am afraid to ask what the shul looks like now...
So my sister tells me that it probably wasn't damaged all that much.... It's still a beautiful shul, though. Maybe I'll get to see exactly how badly or not so badly it's doing in a few weeks.
Can you please update your post to say that (according to my information) Anshei Sfard was not damaged, though another shul, Beth Israel, which many people probably saw pictures of a ZAKA guy taking Torahs out of the ark was so destroyed that it will probably end up being razed. Thanks!
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