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All the news of the Five Towns
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Vol. 99 No. 27
Picking healthier food in lawrence
High school grads celebrated
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JUNE 30 - JUlY 6, 2022
Aiming to avoid the ‘summer slide’ Peninsula library kicks off its reading program by lISa MargarIa lmargaria@liherald.com
Hosting a party with crafts, games and snacks to mark the kickoff of Peninsula Public Library’s Summer Reading Program had its serious side. “It’s about keeping the kids reading over the summer,” library Director Carolynn Matulewicz said at the June 22 event. “We are always focused on that — I hate the word, but that crazy summer slide where they slip behind.” Matulewicz noted that her friends who are teachers “feel like they have to spend two months catching up” with their students in the fall “because they haven’t done anything over the summer.” “We’ve designed a summer program that will encourage them to read, encourage them to come
to the library for different activities, and encourage them to do some STEAM” — science, technology, engineering, arts and math — “and STEM type of programs that we’re going to offer,” Matulewicz said. At the kickoff party, children were given reading logs, which they can fill out and turn in for prizes throughout the summer, calendars, fun worksheets, stickers and bookmarks. PPL has hosted a summer reading program for at least 30 years, according to Matulewicz. The Collaborative Summer Library Program chooses and trademarks the summer reading theme, which PPL and many libraries nationwide use as a template. Highlighting this year’s theme, Oceans of Possibilities, the library, on Central Avenue in LawContinued on page 7
Lisa Margaria/Herald
YISroEl ISaacSoN, 11, left, and his brother, Nesanel, 6, signed up for Peninsula Public Library’s Summer Reading Program at a kickoff party on June 22.
New book recounts mother’s Holocaust memories by lISa MargarIa lmargaria@liherald.com
In keeping with her mother’s philosophy of informing the world, longtime Woodsburgh resident Sandy Schipper Wolberg published a book about her mother’s experience surviving the Holocaust, “A Soul Beneath the Earth: A Holocaust Memoir of Faith and Resilience,” in June. Roughly 50 neighbors and friends crowded into Blue Door Books in Cedarhurst for Wolberg’s book launch on June 22. Her husband, George, described it as a “milestone” and a “great accomplishment,” adding, “It was a labor of love for her.” Wolberg, who grew up in
Montreal, noted the difference between her mother and father, both Holocaust survivors. Her father, Mendel Schipper, did not talk about the Holocaust, while her mother, Freda (née Perelmuter), “always spoke about the Holocaust,” Wolberg said. “It was her mission to teach the world and tell the world what really happened,” Wolberg added. “So, my whole life, I heard all the horror stories. And I always asked her to write it down. To write a book. And she always demurred, saying, you know, I don’t want to bother you.” Freda was 91 when she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2013. That was when mother and daughter decided to get to
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It took me a long time to really put (the book) together. It was a hard thing to do — and a hard thing to let go once it was finished.
SaNdY WolbErg Author
work. “So, as typical of a strongwilled Holocaust survivor, she dictated the ter ms of the arrangement of our writing,” Wolberg recalled. “So what she did was, she called us every night from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. She
said that she’s going to talk and I am going to type.” For three months, Schipper spent her days preparing notes to share with her daughter at night, and then called her in New York from Montreal. “I don’t even know how she did it, because she was really sick,” Wolberg said. Each day after the nightly call, Schipper would make Wolberg read back what she had
written. “She had to approve it,” Wolberg said. “She knew that she wouldn’t be around to edit the manuscript.” So, eight years ago, “That’s how the book came to be,” Wolberg said. After Schipper died in 2014, “It took me a long time to really put (the book) together,” Wolberg said. “It was a hard thing to do — and a hard thing to let go once it was finished.” She added that Continued on page 9