PART ONE
Lillian Freiman
THE WOMAN WHO iNSPiRED GENERATiONS TO USE THEiR POWER FOR GOOD saved 11,000 orphans from perishing in the Holocaust, Freiman’s work DOVR OHӳ D EURDG DQG ODVWLQJ OHJDF\
Lillian Freiman, founder of CHW
Henrietta Szold, who founded
Hadassah in the United States in 1912, and Lillian Freiman, who founded the organization in Canada LQ OLYHG UHPDUNDEO\ GLәHUHQW lives. Henrietta Szold had her heart broken, never married, never had children, never knew material comfort and lived, at the time, to the advanced age of 84. Lillian Freiman, got married, had children, lived a relatively privileged life, and passed away at the young age of 55. %RWK ZRPHQ XVHG WKHLU SRZHU IRU JRRG Like Szold, who not only founded Hadassah, but also a night school, the Jewish Publication Society, and 28
ORAH MAGAZiNE SPRiNG 2022
Betsy Rigal, Lillian Freiman’s granddaughter, has written about her accomplished grandmother who was born Lillian Bilsky in Mattawa, Ontario in 1885. The family was large and the home was always full of relatives and friends, and open to new immigrants and those in need. As a young woman, she organized the Hebrew Benevolent Society in Ottawa, which foreshadowed her life’s work. In 1903, she married Archibald Jacob Freiman, who owned the Freiman’s Department Store, and the couple had three children: Dorothy (Alexandor, 1906–2000), Lawrence (1909–1986) and Queene Esther (Luxenberg, 1912–1997). Never letting a busy family life stand in the way of her desire to correct injustice in the world, she turned the family home at 149 Somerset Street West in Ottawa into her personal headquarters, hosting meetings for her countless causes. Lillian Vineberg-Goodman, who was born in February of 1941, just IRXU PRQWKV DӳHU KHU JUHDW DXQWɍV passing, describes a matriarch who has been a guiding force in her family for generations: “She was a woman who, if she saw an injustice
in the world, would question it as, ‘What are we going to do to correct it? We have to stand up and be counted.’”
Lillian Vineberg-Goodman, great-niece of Lillian Freiman When the First World War broke out, Freiman set up sewing machines in her home and organized Red Cross sewing circles to send blankets and clothing to soldiers overseas. She co-founded The Great War Veterans Association, which would become the Royal Canadian Legion, and gathered women in her home to sew cloth poppies. She chaired the Poppy Campaign from 1921 until her passing. %\ WKH ӫUVW &DQDGLDQ +DGDVVDK chapter was founded in Toronto and by 1919, Lillian was elected