This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, Feb. 23, 2010 - LFor more than five decades, Ida Stack happily performed one of the world's hardest jobs: teaching young children Hebrew after they had already spent a full day in a classroom.
"Kids were tired? Challenge them with games. Kids were sullen? Get them to sing songs. Kids didn't want to learn? Smile gently and carry a big mental stick," Rabbi Jeffrey Stiffman wrote in a eulogy prepared for Mrs. Stack's service on Tuesday morning at Congregation Shaare Emeth. "Ida Stack refused to be cowed by these facts."
At less than five feet tall, Mrs. Stack was smaller than some of her students, but Stiffman said: "She was the most dynamic teacher I had ever witnessed in action. She was a natural teacher who exuded energy and wisdom all the time."
A longtime resident of University City, Mrs. Stack died of infirmities at Delmar Gardens West on Saturday. She was 88.
"She really touched far more lives than she knew," said Aram Schvey, one of Mrs. Stack's students in the mid-'80s who now teaches international human rights at Georgetown University Law Center. "She was an institution in the St. Louis Jewish community.
"She was my Hebrew teacher as I feverishly prepared for my bar mitzvah," Schvey said. "So I can attest from personal experience that Ida combined a sense of humor with the patience of a saint."
Ida Hankin emigrated to this country from the then-Soviet Union with her family when she was 7 years old. It was 1929 and anti-Semitism was dangerously on the rise in the Soviet Union. The family settled in Pittsburgh where she later attended the University of Pittsburgh. She and her husband, Norman A. Stack, the former executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of St. Louis, moved to St. Louis around 1950.
A Half Century of Teaching
Mrs. Stack would soon embark upon a lifelong mission of keeping Jewish culture, Yiddish and Hebrew alive. For more than 50 years, she taught Hebrew and Sunday school at Congregation Shaare Emeth, where she also served as a music and choir director. She taught Hebrew for four decades at Camp Ben Frankel in Makanda, Ill., where she was also a program director. She also taught at the Central Agency for Jewish Education for more than 30 years.
Michelle Brooks, director of teacher services at Central Agency for Jewish Education, was, like her father Loren Landau before her, one of Mrs. Stack's students. Brooks said Mrs. Stack taught "the crucial year": Aleph, the first year.
"That first year is so crucial in setting the foundation for learning Hebrew," Brooks said. "It's a difficult language, but she made sure we knew our stuff. She clearly had a passion for teaching."
Mrs. Stack often took her show on the road to diverse venues, including "interfaith circles," where she worked to build coalitions. Stiffman recalled that the first issue of the Jewish Light he ever read had a photo of Mrs. Stack leading a group of nuns in dancing the hora, the well-known circle dance. Music was one of her signature teaching methods.
She also taught through performances with the Yiddish Theater of St. Louis, where she served as a co-director, and through other special programs.
One such program was "The Revival of Yiddish," a performance in story and song by Mrs. Stack and Rabbi James Stone Goodman in 2002 at Congregation Neve Shalom. Goodman had learned his Yiddish from Mrs. Stack, whom he'd met in 1981 when he came to St. Louis and Shaare Emeth.
In a 1990 interview with the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Mrs. Stack had declared that she could teach anyone to speak Yiddish in less than a minute.
''OK, repeat after me, 'Ah, ya, ya, ya, ya,' '' she said. ''OK, now say that again, using a different inflection and proper hand motions. See, you're speaking Yiddish."
She gave Goodman the extended lesson: For three or four years, she tutored him weekly at her home. The results were outstanding.
"I later went to the summer Yivo Institute for Jewish Research, the primo Yiddish organization in the world, and I tested out of Intro to Yiddish because of her," Goodman laughed. "We weren't fooling around. She was extremely good to me; she was a true mensch.
"She was completely devoted to what she did. She almost single-handedly brought that Eastern European Jewish culture to this area. She was a ball of fire."
And a great role model for her children.
In a 2007 interview, Richard Stack said he learned the essence of teaching and his life's philosophy from his mother.
"She devoted her life to the teaching of all things Jewish -- Hebrew, Yiddish, music, theater," Richard said. "And she taught people of all ages. Her motto is 'to teach is to touch'" and, he said, her rise above difficult life experiences taught him "to always look on the bright side."
A Woman of Valor -- and Many awards
Mrs. Stack was a longtime member of Hadassah St. Louis Chapter. She was the subject of several features in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and the Jewish Light. She received numerous awards, including
- an award for her work with the Yiddish Theater;
- an Outstanding Volunteer Award from the state of Missouri;
- a KMOX Hero of the Month Award;
- the Mitzvah Star Award from the Jewish Community Center
The Ida Stack Scholarship Fund was established in her name at Shaare Emeth, and March 13, 1983 was declared Ida Stack Day by Gov. Christopher "Kit" Bond.
In 1999, Mrs. Stack was named the Woman of Valor by the Business & Professional Women's Division of the Jewish Federation of St. Louis, and in 1998 was honored as a Woman of Worth by the St. Louis Gateway Chapter of OWL (Older Women's League). In 1991, she received the Nancy Elbaum Makovsky Teaching Award for excellence in Jewish teaching from the Central Agency for Jewish Education.
"We've lost our greatest teacher," Stiffman said.
Mrs. Stack was preceded in death by her husband, Norman, who died in 1991, and her parents, Samuel Hankin and Reva (nee Etkin) Hankin, and a brother and sister, Dorothy (Max) Podosky and Irv (Mildred, living) Hankin.
In addition to her sons Richard Stack (Beverly Ress) of Silver Spring, Md., and Jerry (Cheryl) Stack of St. Louis County, she is survived by four grandchildren: Rachel and Jordan Stack and Reva and Gabriel Resstack.
Mrs. Stack's funeral services were Tuesday morning at Congregation Shaare Emeth, with interment at Beth Hamedrosh Hagodol Cemetery in Ladue.
Memorial contributions may be made to the Ida Stack Scholarship Fund, in care of Congregation Shaare Emeth, 11645 Ladue Road, Ladue, Mo. 63141.
Gloria Ross is the head of Okara Communications and the storywriter for AfterWords, an obituary-writing and production service.