Blazing a Path for Torah in America 

Reb Mordechai Ozer was born in the year 1858 in Seirijai (Serehey), Lithuania, a suburb located 70 km. west of Suwalk. This idyllic shtetl once had as its rov, for a period of one year, none other than the Vilna Ga’on. The hamlet is surrounded by lakes, and the Yidden of the town supported themselves by farming fish and shipping them down river.   

His father was Avrohom Moshe, and his mother Toba. In 1876, he married a native of Seirjai by the name of Esther Chaya Cohen. His remarkable chinuch career was begun back home, for in 1888, we find a number of articles from Lithuania, in which we read about Reb Ozer’s instrumental role in founding chadorim in Serehey. 

The couple had seven children from 1876-1890, at which time R’ Ozer set sail for America. He was joined by his wife and children in 1894.  In 1905, we find the family in a tenement at 189 Division Street, in the heart of the Lower East Side, near Allen, Essex, and Ludlow Streets.  

By 1920, the Simon home was at 704 Willoughby is located a couple of houses over, a distance of two minutes’ walk, from 655 Willoughby, which was the longtime location of Yeshiva of Brooklyn, of which Reb Ozer was the Rosh Yeshiva at the time of its founding in 1908, as noted in the ledgers of the yeshiva, as well as numerous newspaper articles from that time in which we read of both his leadership of the yeshiva and its students, as well as advocating for the well-being of the yeshiva at gatherings all around Williamsburg.  

Simultaneous to this, we read fascinating testimony from a guestbook belonging to Yeshiva RJJ, in which dozens of Gedolim who visited the yeshiva between 1900-1950 registered their impressions of this unlikely makom Torah in the wilderness of America. A number of them attested to the caliber of the principal, Rabbi Simon. 

Last Hours Spent in Holiness. 

In our contact with Rabbi Simon’s family, we were sent a letter that Rabbi Simon’s son sent to his uncle, describing the last hours of Reb Ozer on this earth, and how they revolved around teaching Torah and learning Torah, with davenings in between. Reading these lines, we can picture this chinuch pioneer making the trip across the Williamsburg bridge from his home on Willoughby (near Yeshiva of Brooklyn, which he was the founding Rosh Yeshiva), and making his way to RJJ on the Lower East Side’s Henry Street on that Friday of Parashas Lech Lecha, as he must have done thousands of time before that. Only that this time would sadly be the last. 

 “Dearest Uncle Julius. We have received your letter and read carefully everything you had to say. 

“On Friday, November 15th, my dear father may his soul rest In Peace, awoke in the morning as usual, and left the house to visit the Yeshivah Rabbi Jacob Joseph School, where he held a conversation with the teachers in regards to the affairs of the school of which he showed a great interest. On his way home he was accompanied by a Hebrew teacher and spoke to him regarding his life’s history, stopping at a shoe parlor for a shine. 

“Father reached home about a quarter to three o’clock, took his bath as usual [it was a Friday], changed his clothes, drank a glass of tea, and then went to synagogue. He returned home at half past five, made Kiddush, ate supper, and complained of no ailment. Later, he commenced learning his seforim. Ending his learning, he arose, and took a glass of tea…

“Before retiring, he took off his coat…left his seforim on the table, as was his custom…At half past two he awoke, complaining of a pain, placing his hand on his heart….Aunt phoned for a doctor and sister Mollie. Before she returned with the water, father was dead. 

“It was 2-45 when G-d took him from us.”

His passing was at his then home at 652 Willoughby Street, directly across the street from Yeshiva of Brooklyn, and of the large Tiferes Yisroel Shul (could that be the above –referenced ‘synagogue’?) Rabbi Simon was laid to rest on the historic Mt. Carmel Cemetery on the following Monday, in the section of Yeshiva Rabbeinu Jacob Joseph, ascending to Shomayim to reap the rewards of decades-long impact in Old Williamsburg.