One day nearly seventeen years ago, when we were still relatively new in Sudbury, I was sitting in my office at the Chabad Center of Sudbury when I heard a knock at the door. I opened the door and saw a tall and very friendly older gentleman, who introduced himself as George Kittredge of Boca Raton, Florida.
His friendly smile and warm demeanor and the sparkle in his eyes, told me that I was standing in front of someone who was very kind and special. He told me that he was here visiting family and when he heard that a new Chabad had opened in town, he knew he had to stop by and say hello.
He proceeded to give us lots of encouragement and told us how much he loved the work of Chabad across the globe in big and small communities, as well as in the far corners of the earth. He told us about his uncle David Chase and how much he loved Chabad and how he too had gone to Brooklyn to visit the Lubavitcher Rebbe. He told us that we have a special mission and job to accomplish, and we will succeed and things will come together and people will appreciate what we are doing in the community.
He left a check as a donation to help us along in the journey, but perhaps more importantly, he left us with a huge boost of encouragement and warmth, to inspire us to keep going and make things happen.
The conversation took place nearly seventeen years ago, yet it feels like it took place last week.
This week as we escorted George on his final journey to his eternal resting place, his encouragement of seventeen years ago, that he expressed from the bottom of his heart, is still ringing in my ears.
In recent years, George moved back to Sudbury to be near his amazing family. During this time, I had the merit and honor of spending many a Friday afternoon or Jewish holiday visiting George.
He would see me and the Yarmulka on my head and he would come to life, as the very depths of his soul were joyfully triggered. We would chat, sing Jewish melodies, make the Kiddush, don Tefillin or shake the Lulav, and he would always be engaged and let you know just how much he appreciated these moments.
His constant smile and happy demeanor made a true difference to the caregivers that worked with him and to all who knew him or interacted with him. My children got to know him and enjoyed the interactions they had with him, and he always loved to make my little daughter laugh and smile.
As he would answer Amen or say a blessing with me, it was obvious that a mighty strong and determined Jewish heart and soul was beating inside this great but modest man.
At the funeral and through the many people I spoke with over the last few days, I found out that his encouragement to us seventeen years ago, was the story of so many others who interacted with George over the years, who always received a smile, personal attention, or a boost of encouragement and warmth.
He was an amazing husband, father and grandfather and a true community builder and visionary. His enduring legacy will be the many lives that were touched, inspired or cared for, through his business interactions or philanthropic work over so many years.
As the casket was being covered at the cemetery, my colleague Rabbi Noach Kosofsky, shared with the crowd, that as a young child, George along with his brother, had been among the first ten students at the Lubavitch Yeshiva Day School in Springfield, that had been founded by Rabbi Sholom Gordon, a student of Rabbi Joseph Schnersohn, in 1945.
Rabbi Schnersohn had subsequently written a letter to a Mr. Resnick who helped found the school in which he praised him for helping make a Jewish education happen for these “ten young sheep, whose voices of prayer and study have certainly reached heaven and brought so much joy, like only children know how to do”.
Indeed, the Jewish values and education that George received from his parents and educators as a young child, became the bedrock principles with which he lived his full life of kindness, warmth, generosity and so much more. These were the values which he shared with his family and so many others, and which his amazing family have all inherited and are continuing.
In his final hours, I visited George one last time. We knew his end was near and I felt that this was perhaps the goodbye. He wasn’t responding. but looked so peaceful and calm, in the presence of his beloved family who showered him with love, care and dignity until his last moments.
I began to softly sing the Shema Prayer with him. It is a prayer that describes living with G-d’s values wherever we go and passing them on to the children and the next generation, values and a vision which encapsulates the values that George lived by. I watched as he attempted to move his lips along with the first words of “Shema Yisrael” and recite these two powerful words that had shaped his values throughout his life, one last time, before he returned his soul to his creator.
From beginning to end, George lived a modest but great life, who touched and helped many thousands of people. The world is a little dimmer, but his light and impact will endure in far more ways that we can all imagine.
May the soul of Reuven Ben Mordechai be bound up in the bond of eternal life and may his memory be a blessing and inspiration to all who knew him.
Our sincere condolences to his daughter Bonnie Morrissey and and family and Wendy and Mike and their families.
Bonnie Morrissey wrote...