The Synagogues of the JCRS Campus
The Jewish Consumptives’ Relief Society was established in 1904 and continued in existence until 1954. In its 50 years of serving consumptives, the campus was home to four synagogues.
The First Synagogue
The first synagogue of the Jewish Consumptives’ Relief Society was constructed in 1906 and was endowed by Mrs. Bath-Shebba Fleischmann of Omaha, Nebraska, and was a 12x31 tent that served the early needs of the Jewish community (The Sanatorium, 1907, p. 92).
The ark of the first synagogue was donated by Simon L. Bresler of Denver and the Sefer-Torah were donated by the Ladies Shroud Society of Denver. [Bresler married Etta Solomon, the sister of Jacob Solomon and daughter of Isaac Solomon for whom the second and fourth synagogues were named.] The first tent synagogue was dedicated on October 7, 1906 (The Sanatorium, 1907, p. 92).
The Second Synagogue
The cornerstone was laid on April 16, 1911, and dedicated to Jacob Solomon who had died of tuberculosis in 1910. Colorado Governor John Shafroth was the keynote speaker. Dr. Philip Hilkowitz was the Master of Ceremonies and Rabbi Charles Kauvar, Dr. Charles Spivak, Mr. Henry J. Schwartz, and Mr. Nathan Striker all also spoke during the event (Denver Jewish News, 1925, p. 4). This was the first permanent synagogue erected in Jefferson County, Colorado.
The Third Synagogue
Between 1920 and 1922, the JCRS Sanatorium built the New York Pavilion for Men at the east end of the campus. The Beth Jacob Solomon synagogue obstructed the view of the new Main Infirmary and interrupted the developing campus quadrangle of the hospital grounds. As a result, the Beth Jacob Synagogue was demolished and from 1922 to 1926, the Denver Pavilion for Women was the temporary place of worship for the JCRS community.
The Fourth Synagogue
The final synagogue was designed by William and Arthur Fisher in a stucco Moorish style building (Barnhouse, 2020) with a capacity for 70 people (NRHP JCRS Nomination Form, Section 7, p. 3). The ground-breaking ceremony was held on July 25, 1926, and the cornerstone was laid on December 24, 1926.
According to a 1925 article in The Sanatorium, “the new synagog [sic] is to be known as the Beth Jacob, in memory of the son of the late Isaac Solomon of Denver. Mr. Solomon built the old synagog [sic], which was moved to make way for the main infirmary [The New York Building]. Mr. and Mrs. Fink, Mr. and Mrs. Moe Solomon, Mrs. Etta Bresler, Mrs. M. Marx, Mrs. A. Goodfriend, Mr. Harold Bresler and Miss Sadelle Fink, all members of the Solomon family, had the honor of breaking the ground for the new structure” (The Sanatorium, 1925, p. 104).
The application to the National Register of Historic Places states that the synagogue “is a one story, irregularly shaped building of stretcher bond brick. The vestibule and study have terracotta stucco fronts. Extensions project at the front and rear of an auditorium, which seats seventy. The auditorium has six two-center pointed Gothic stained glass windows on each side. The vestibule, supported by cast stone columns, contains a center front main door which has a recessed transom and side surrounds of colored mosaics. The pyramidal roof is edged with a sawtooth course of brick and is painted silver” (NRHP JCRS Nomination Form, Section 7, p. 3).
Winifred Ferrill, who was Lakewood’s lead historic curator in 2007, said that the synagogue is “the oldest religious building left standing on its original site in Lakewood” (Schrader, 2007).
The synagogue eventually became known as the Isaac Solomon Synagogue and served the JCRS community for three decades and continued as an active synagogue for the early AMC years as well. As AMC became increasingly separated from its roots in the Denver Jewish community in the 1980 and 1990s, the synagogue fell out of active use as a place of worship. However when Regan Headrick “began working on the campus in 1996 before RMCAD bought it, Torah scrolls were still being stored inside” (Beaty, 2017c).
In 2000, the Isaac Solomon Historic Synagogue Foundation (ISHSF) was established and received a 99-year lease for the synagogue and Tucker Tent on the JCRS|AMC. On March 1, 2001, The Denver Post reported that among the members of the Isaac Solomon Historic Synagogue Foundation Board were Bernie Goldman, Jeanne Abrams of the University of Denver University Libraries, and Thomas Slaga of the AMC Cancer Research Center (Sinisi, 2001). Later, in 2002, a historic assessment of the Isaac Solomon Synagogue was completed (City of Lakewood, 2009) with the assistance of the Colorado Historic Society (ISHSF, 2005) with $10,000 (State Historical Fund, 2021, p.147).
When the Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design purchased the JCRS/AMC campus in 2002 (Hathaway, 2010), the synagogue and the Tucker Tent remained with the Isaac Solomon Historic Synagogue Foundation Board. Over approximately a decade, the foundation received $71,789 for “restoration and stabilization” (State Historical Fund, 2021, p.147).
At the time of the sale, AMC Cancer Research Center was criticized in the local Westword press for selling the historic property and Westword columnist Michael Paglia wrote that he hoped that RMCAD would not “screw it up nor damage” the historic campus (Paglia, 2003).
Defending the sale of the property, the National Volunteer Organizer at the AMC Cancer Research Center, Diane Jarbawi, said that “we [AMC] would never have sold our campus to people who do not respect or understand the history that is AMC… the buildings are named after those people and their chapters. RMCAD will keep all of the names on the buildings and will not be touching the exterior, merely renovating the interiors and bringing them up to code” (Jarbawi, 2003). Such is the respect for the prior history and use of the property that RMCAD “donated it back to us [AMC], and many local business people and lay leaders are on a committee with our Scientific president and me [are organizing] to restore the synagogue and build a museum that will house all of our archives and history” (Jarbawi, 2003).
Years later, on May 23, 2006, the Isaac Solomon Historic Synagogue Foundation published its first newsletter which included a tribute to RMCAD and its students:
The foundation is blessed with a host organization that is both eager to help our mission and to learn more about JCRS history. Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design, which purchased the campus in 2003 [sic], takes seriously its stewardship of the synagogue and of the community’s history. One of the first collaborations between this foundation and the College was the design of our logo. All of the students in a graphics arts class submitted logos and we chose the one you see at the top of this newsletter.
An interior design class took paint flakes from the ceiling of the synagogue and analyzed them, so we now know the original color for the renovation. A model-making class has created a to-scale model of the building that has been given to us for use in presentations, and a visual sequencing class created books based on the stories of patients, one of which is being published. Other classes at the college have heard the ISHS story and are considering further ways to be involved.
Unfortunately, the Isaac Solomon Historic Synagogue Foundation eventually folded and the museum was never completed. On July 18, 2014, Chris Leppek of International Jewish News wrote that “Eugene Kay, the last chairman of the JCRS Isaac Solomon Historic Synagogue Foundation — which until early last year had a 90-plus year lease on the building — told the Intermountain Jewish News that, in late 2012, the foundation forfeited the lease and returned control of the former synagogue to the Rocky Mountain School of Art + Design” (Leppek, 2014).
Fortunately, the University of Denver Beck Archives has the Kiddush cup, Yad, Torah Shield, Ten Commandments Plaque, Bimah Cover, and presider’s chair from the 1940s as well as other artifacts.
As custodians of the historic JCRS property, the Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design have not supported preservation. RMCAD President Maria Puzziferro was known to order artifacts of the past to be removed and removed to dumpsters; President Chris Spohn equally avoided embracing the campus’ history; and President Brent Fitch has ordered the removal of artifacts from the hospital era of the 3rd floor of the Texas Building as well as art installations from the early years of owning the campus such as the iconic RMCAD “R” at the entrance to the Texas Building.
The pews are now stacked in the rabbi’s room behind the ark with the bimah and a dozen or so mannequins used by the Fashion Department of the Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design. The mannequins are brought out annually for the Colfax Marathon as well as for class purposes (Biassou, 2018).
The once beautiful wooden ark is now cracked under RMCAD’s care and the nave or main gallery of the synagogue is used to store collapsible tents for the college.
The deterioration from 2006 to 2017 and 2022 is a disgrace to the history of the JCRS campus.
Note the deterioration from 2006 to 2017 of the dais and ark as well.
Below are photographs illustrating the deterioration from 2006 to 2017 of the south windows.
The Isaac Solomon Synagogue and other buildings on the JCRS|AMC campus were placed on the U.S. Department of the Interior National Register of Historic Places in 1981.
However, according to National Historic Preservation Act of 1966 (amended 1981), not only is the Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design not legally bound to maintain the historic buildings, “the listing of a property in the National Register places no restrictions on what a non-federal owner may do with their property up to and including destruction, unless the property is involved in a project that receives Federal assistance, usually funding or licensing/permitting” (National Park Service, n.d.). However, the daughter of Bernie and Susan Goldman has suggested the $71,789 which the foundation received for “restoration and stabilization” was not well managed (State Historical Fund, 2021, p.147).
Regardless of whether the lack of maintenance by AMC and RMCAD is not a crime or a violation of being listed on the National Register of Historic Places, it is strange that RMCAD markets the historic nature of the campus while not fulfilling its stewardship to preserve the property that it has owned for 20 years, and the synagogue the college has owned since 2014.
On April 11, 2016, Meaghan Carabello, spokesperson for the Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design, told the Arvada Press that “RMCAD does not have any immediate plans for the [Isaac Solomon] synagogue, but students and faculty alike have a reverence for its importance in Denver’s history” (Wallace & Johnson, 2016).
With all that reverence, it is hard to understand how the beautiful 1925 synagogue became so dilapidated.
Today, the structural foundation is sound and the leaded-glass windows are intact (though one window on the south side is stuck in the open position). However, the synagogue has suffered significant water damage from its leaking roof and the wooden floors are heaving (Schrader, 2007).
Most of the buildings on the JCRS campus are connected by a series of tunnels (see below), but the tunnel connecting the synagogue to the rest of the systems has been intentionally collapsed.
There are also toxic gasses from the ground that make the synagogue unsafe at this time as noted in the warning sign in the upper right corner of the photograph below.
And there has been negligible maintenance and no attempts at restoration by the Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design. On September 3, 2019, Adam Forrest, RMCAD Vice President of Operation, Regan Headrick, Director of Facilities, and Tom Keefe, Assistant Professor of Humanities, met to discuss the yahrzeit boards in the Isaac Solomon Synagogue.
In preparation for the meeting, Professor Keefe and RMCAD Vice President for Online Education, Robin Anderson, wrote a brief summary of the importance of yahrzeit boards in Judaism.
Fifty-five names are carved into the yahrzeit boards of the Isaac Solomon Synagogue on the campus of the Rocky Mountain College of At + Design. Yahrzeit boards are placed on the walls of synagogues (Brunn, 2015, p. 3845) as reminders for the requirement “to commemorate annually the deaths of parents, siblings, spouses, and children (Brunn, 2015, p. 3844).
In addition to the neglect of the nearly 100-year-old structure, no one has prayed kaddish on the anniversaries of these 53 men and two women who established and maintained the property that is now the home of the Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design. According to Grodin (2011), the lack of yahrzeit can lead to “incomplete or extended mourning” (p. 549).
As a solution, Matt Harris, Assistant Professor of Fine Arts, offered to make molds of the memorial boards, and Jim Reiman, Chair of Photography, offered to take a high-resolution photograph that could then be scanned and used as a template for Matt Harris to cut a replica using a high-end router saw. Neither proposal was accepted by the college.
While Rabbi Tzvi Steinberg of Zera Abraham has offered to receive the yahrzeit boards, the leadership of RMCAD has not seen fit to maintain the synagogue adequately or release the wall memorial to those who would take care of the yahrzeit boards.
Although the Isaac Solomon Synagogue is “the oldest religious building left standing on its original site in Lakewood” (Shradar, 2007) and the spokesperson for the Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design, Meaghan Carabello, banally said the school has “a reverence for its [the synagogue’s] importance in Denver’s history” (Wallace & Johnson, 2016), the Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design has allowed the historic synagogue to deteriorate. Twenty-years ago, Westword columnist Michael Paglia wrote that he hoped that RMCAD would not “screw it up nor damage” the historic campus (Paglia, 2003). Now we know the answer.
References
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