Dream It, Do It

On his 13th yahrtzeit this 17 Adar, a tribute to the indefatigable Reb Eli Teitelbaum Photos: Family archives It was the 1960s, and Eli Teitelbaum was just a bochur when his star began to rise. The son of a rabbi from Kew Gardens, Queens, Eli was short, focused, a powerhouse of energy, and determined to channel his talents, charisma, and easy rapport with children into Klal Yisrael’s future: the youth. “It’s no exaggeration to say that he was one of the Founding Fathers of American Yiddishkeit in the 1960’s — or that there was no yeshivah boy in Brooklyn who did not know Eli Teitelbaum’s name,” says Rabbi Shimon Grama, former National Director of Pirchei Agudas Yisrael.