This article originally appeared in Yated Neeman, Monsey NY. and is reprinted here with their permission

By Zev Meisels

The past week marked 35 years since the passing of the great askan and tzadik, R' Elemelech "Mike" Tress z"l. I am his eldest grandchild, one of the two or three to actually remember our grandfather, and I've undertaken to set down some of the family's memories of him, and to try to paint a picture, however inadequate, of the activities and character of this unusual man.

Before I begin, let me mention an interesting phenomenon. It has been a long time, and much water has flowed under the bridge since my grandfather's petirah. Yet, scarcely a week passes in which his children are not approached by someone who wishes to convey his love, his gratitude, his friendship for Mike Tress. Over the years, there have been literally hundreds, perhaps thousands of these encounters. And each of those who approach express memories of such clarity and freshness that it is as if they speak of one who died just a short time ago. This strikes me as a rare thing, and it behooves us to seek an understanding of it. From whence this deep connection? Why does the memory of Elemelech Tress remain so clear in the minds of so many?

What is interesting too is that many of these people describe themselves as "good friends of Mr. Tress," or as "one of Mike's closest friends." Can one person be the "best" or "closest" friend of so many?

Allow me another short preface, a moment's reflection on the extent of Mr. Tress's devotion to the cause of Klas Yisrael. My grandfather began public life as a wealthy man. By the time he died, not a penny remained of his personal fortune. Everything had been spent on klal projects. Often, there was no money available for household needs, and he, and my grandmother yb"l, were forced to borrow heavily, and sometimes, to simply do without. But in the face of every difficulty, he not only persevered, but remained enthusiastic. Wealth meant nothing to him; never for a moment did he regret his choice to forgo a life of affluence. When he was very sick, and required heart surgery for which there was no money, there came the news that the Esquire Shoe Polish Company, which he founded but abandoned because the co-owners insisted that it be kept open on the Shabbos, had been sold to Revlon for many millions. One of Mike's daughters said to him, "Imagine if we would still own Esquire! There would be no problem with money for the surgery. How different our lives would be!" He answered, with unmistakable meaning, "Boruch Hashem. Yes, how very different our lives would be."

Mr. Tress was bound, heart and spirit, to R' Elchonon Wasserman Zt"l. The family relates that before R' Elchonon left America for the last time, he told Mike, "The fate of Torah in America rests upon you," or words to that effect. Most people would recoil from a burden of that sort. But Mike Tress, a young man, shouldered the burden willingly, taking personal responsibility wherever he could for all facets of Jewish life and education. No difficulty was too great, no task unworthy; there was nothing he would not undertake for his brethren and for the honor of the Ribbono Shel Olam. Recently, one of Mr. Tress's sons encountered Mike's colleague, Mr. Moshe Swerdloff. When he praised Mr. Swerdloff for the mesiras nefesh he displayed in the years after the war (see further below), Mr. Swerdloff answered, "You think that was mesiras nefesh? You don't know anything about it. Your father - he had mesiras nefesh. He didn't know where the next penny was coming from; there was no day and no night for him; he took responsibility for everything." He concluded, "If you didn't know Mike Tress, you don't know anything about mesiras nefesh!"

His Communal Involvements

We turn now to Mr. Tress's accomplishments in the communal sphere. His work with the Vaad Hatzala is well known, and there exists a widespread, though erroneous, perception that this was the sum of his communal involvement. Nothing could be farther from the truth. In fact, the Vaad Hatzala - whose holy work was of vital importance - was only one of numerous projects to which Mr. Tress devoted his time and his talents.

Here are some of the klal endeavors of R' Elemelech Tress.

Agudath Israel of America: Mike Tress is responsible for the stature and influence enjoyed by today's Agudath Israel of America. With R' Elchonon Wasserman zatzal as his inspiration, Mike, along with a cadre of devoted colleagues, breathed life into the Agudah, stimulated its members, gave it focus, and built it into the important and effective organization it is today. The activist culture of today's Agudah rests, in large part, on the solid foundations laid by Mr. Tress during his decades as its head. In addition, Mike had the foresight to bring into the Agudah, and to take under his tutelage, the man who would so skillfully guide the Agudah in the years following Mike's death - his beloved younger cousin, R' Moshe Sherer z"l.

Pirchei, Zeirei and Bnos Agudath Israel: There was perhaps no project that consumed more of Mike Tress's interest and energy, on an ongoing basis, than that of Pirchei and Zeirei. Mike recognized and believed, as few had until then, that Torah could take root in America, but only if the Jewish youth could somehow be infused with, and made excited by, Torah principles. To this end, he created, or vitalized, the youth organizations of Agudath Israel. But Mike was not a one-minute-manager issuing instructions to subordinates. He was involved in the minutiae of each Pirchei group. He would speak at Melave Malkas and organize outings, and make it his business to develop personal relationships with even the youngest boys. He would involve himself in their lives and send them to yeshivos, and if they needed clothing or spending money, he would provide it. Often, he would travel miles on a Motzaei Shabbos to attend a Melave Malka in some out-of-the-way, dilapidated neighborhood, to be greeted by only a handful of boys. No matter. He would stand before them and orate as to a large crowd, igniting them with his fiery words, imbuing them with love for the gedolim and for Klal Yisrael, and implanting within them the strength to stand against the alien currents of American society. He and his young Zeirei colleagues would sing songs of dveykus with the boys, they would dance for hours, and such was the emotional fervor and the bonds they forged that years later, Pirchim and leaders alike remember the sublime joy of those moments. There is no question that his endeavors, and those of his colleagues, were in large part responsible for creating the kernel of what would later grow to be the American Torah community that we know today.

Camp Agudah and Camp Bnos: Here we have the project that perhaps lay closest to Mike Tress's heart. He saw, as few others did, the enormous potential of a Torah-based summer camp in influencing the youth, and the great danger that threatened if no such camp was provided. Prior to the establishment of Camp Agudah, children spent the long summer vacations on the streets or beaches, or in secular, co-ed "Jewish" camps. To provide an alternative, Mike, established Camp Agudah. For the boys who attended Camp Agudah, summertime was transformed from a time of decay into a time of Torah growth. A large percentage of the campers came from non-Torah homes, and Camp Agudah was their first exposure to genuine Judaism. Many of these boys, after a summer in camp, were induced to transfer to yeshivos, and subsequently became productive members of Torah society. A letter to a head counselor at the mid-summer change of trips illustrates Mike's personal involvement in the camp and his vision of the camp as a vehicle of societal change. After praising the young man for his efforts, Mike writes that he has interviewed a number of returning campers, and while they have had an enjoyable summer in the country, they have not been imbued with the principles of the Agudah as he would have expected. Mike then exhorts the leader to sing Agudah songs with the campers and to generally instill in them the Agudah spirit - of emunas chachomim, ahavas Hashem and ahavas Yisrael. Mike's devotion to Camp Agudah was demonstrated in the following way: When Camp Agudah was purchased, the bank refused to grant a mortgage without substantial collateral. Mike put up $75,000 (an enormous sum in those days) in stock holdings, almost all that remained of his fortune, to guarantee the mortgage. It transpired that the bank, without informing Mr. Tress or the Agudah, sold the securities to pay off the mortgage, leaving Mike virtually penniless. It seems fitting that the cause nearest his heart - Camp Agudah - was in a very real sense financed by Mr. Tress himself.

The Refugee and Immigration Division: This was the department of the Agudah Youth Council that focused on assisting the Jews of Europe throughout the years of World War II. It is the part of the Agudah's work that is most closely identified in the public mind with Mike Tress, and rightly so, for never, throughout the years of the war and its aftermath, did Mike's attention stray from the plight of Europe's Jews, and never did he forget what was at stake. The young men of the Refugee and Immigration Division, under Mike's direction, worked tirelessly, ceaselessly, procuring affidavits to allow Jews to emigrate to America, lobbying the State Department, raising funds, sending food and money to European Jews, finding housing and jobs for those who reached America, and generally attending to the needs of fleeing Jews in all the far-flung places in which they found refuge. In the course of this work, Mike cultivated relationships with the highest officials of the State Department, with First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, with Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau, and with numerous other government officials. He left no stone unturned in his efforts to render assistance to his persecuted brethren.

The Save-A-Child Foundation: In the post-war years, the Agudah Youth Council established the Save-A-Child Foundation. Its mission was to rescue Jewish children whose parents had hidden them with non-Jews during the war. Mr. Tress dispatched the newlywed Mr. Moshe Swerdloff and his wife, Estelle, along with Mr. Herman Treisser, to Belgium, where they undertook to identify Jewish children and spirit them out of the country. Their work was extremely dangerous, and in fact, resulted in the jailing of Messrs. Swerdloff and Treisser for a period of time. Nearly 100 Jewish children were rescued, often from Catholic missions, as a result of this work.

Eretz Yisrael: The period following WWII saw an enormous influx of Jews into Eretz Yisrael. With the increased population came the need for new housing, new schools, and facilities for the many war orphans of Europe. The Jewish Agency and the Israeli government discriminated against Orthodox Jews, and in many cases, worked actively to pull Jewish orphans away from the religious traditions of their parents. Mike Tress threw himself heart and soul into funding the numerous undertakings of the Israeli Agudah. The American Agudah sent tens of thousands of dollars worth of clothing to Eretz Yisrael, and for years supported tens of nurseries and kindergartens of the Chinuch Atzmai Torah Schools network. During the 1948 siege of Yerushalayim, the American Agudah undertook a Food for Jerusalem campaign that ultimately netted over $60,000. And throughout the early fifties, the American Agudah raised a large percentage of the funds needed by Chinuch Atzmai.

The Hungarian exodus: Agudath Israel, and Mike Tress personally, were deeply involved in rescuing Jews from Hungary in 1956-57. In the battle between the communistic government forces and the anti-communist rebels, both factions persecuted the Jews. The "underground railroad" established by Agudath Israel succeeded in spiriting out of Hungary close to 1,000 Jews, and assisted thousands of others who escaped by other means.

North African and Middle Eastern Jewry: In Mr. Tress's waning years, he concerned himself closely with the plight of the Jews of North Africa and the Middle East, who were targeted by the anti-religious activists of the secular Zionist movement. Mike worked closely with the Sephardic philanthropist Isaac Shalom in the development of the Ozar Hatorah network of schools, and even traveled to Morocco on a fact-finding mission.

These were only some of Mike Tress's activities on behalf of the klal. It must be emphasized that the above represents a cursory treatment of these matters - further development of these themes is beyond the scope of this essay. Those who wish to acquire wider knowledge of Mike's work in his many areas of endeavor may consult Yonason Rosenblum's excellent biography, They Called Him Mike (Mesorah Publications 1995).

His work with individuals

All of this - Mike's abiding love for Klal Yisrael, his sense of responsibility for the nation - flowed naturally from the deep ahavas Yisrael that lay at the core of his being. He felt and demonstrated the most intense love and respect for every human being he encountered. Mike had none of the false pride, the arrogance, that builds walls in the heart and sunders Jews from one another. His heart was like a vast open hall, capacious and welcoming. The Tress home was frequented by many poor, downtrodden people, who would come for food, for company, for solace. Mike treated them with the respect that most people reserve for distinguished guests, and expected his children to do the same.One of his daughters remembers that before every Tress simcha, Mr. Tress, who was a very busy man, would personally phone several widows, whose husbands had been people of prominence, but who now lived lonely lives. He would assure these women that their presence at the simcha was important to the family, and he would insist on sending around a car to take them back and forth.

Mr. Tress traveled often, but he never returned from a trip without a gift for his wife, and, during the years his mother-in-law lived in the house, without a gift for her as well. Now, this is not all that uncommon. What is uncommon is that on at least two occasions Mike returned not only with gifts for his womenfolk, but with jewelry that he purchased for various husbands that he knew were not in the habit of buying gifts for their wives. He would tell the husbands that when he saw this jewelry at bargain prices, he immediately thought of them, and he would then gently suggest that they present it to their wives.

There were two brothers in Williamsburg who were afflicted with terrible speech inpedemint. It was agony to listen to them, and few people had the necessary patience. Now, Mike Tress was a popular man, and everyone wanted to walk home from shul with him. But every Motzaei Shabbos Mike would wait for these two brothers, and walk home with them. His ahavas Yisrael was such that he found the patience and sensitivity to do what others found impossible.

There was an unfortunate Jew named Mendel who would regularly dine at the Tress home. Mendel was a bit of a nebbich. But Mike treated him like a person of importance. When he had a fit at the table, Mike took him out to the backyard for fresh air, and sat with him until he felt well again. One of Mike's daughters was a picky eater, and would eat almost nothing of what was served in camp. The cook felt that this reflected poorly on her skills, and complained to Mr. Tress. Mike begged his daughter to eat, because, he explained, he feared that the cook would worry that he would think that her food was not tasty, and would remove her from her position. There is a businessman in Boro Park, who, whenever he meets a Tress, speaks of his love for R' "Meilech" Tress. When he emigrated to America, he was penniless. But, he says, every Erev Shabbos Mr. Tress would bring him fifty dollars, to take him through the week.

Recently, one of Mike's sons, my uncle, was at a supermarket, purchasing a popular brand of kosher cookies. An older man approached him, and asked if he enjoyed this particular brand. He replied in the affirmative, and the fellow informed him that he was in fact the manufacturer of these cookies! He inquired after my uncle's name, and when told that it was Tress, he exclaimed, "Der zun fun R' Meilech Tress?!" He explained that when he arrived from Hungary in the fifties, he knew not a soul in America. He wandered the streets, he had nowhere to live. Someone advised him to visit the Tzeilemer shtibel and seek out Mike Tress, who davened there every morning. He did so, and, in his words: "I was a stranger to him, but Mr. Tress treated me like a son! Whatever I needed, he provided."

Another Tress son was in Florida when, at shacharis one morning, he encountered an elderly gentleman - clean-shaven, wearing a golf cap - who, upon reading the inscription on my uncle's tallis bag, began hugging and kissing him. The man explained that he arrived in America after the war a broken man - his family had been killed in the camps and he was without friends, without work, without money. He sought out Mike Tress, and Mr. Tress found him a job, a place to live and eventually a shidduch as well. The son born of that marriage, the man stated proudly, serves as head of a kollel in New York.

In the late fifties, a certain Hungarian Jew turned to Mr. Tress for help. He had been admitted to the United States after the Hungarian Revolution. However, he had a handicapped son, who, because of his disability, had been refused permission to enter. The man's wife stayed behind in Hungary to care for the son, while the husband worked to gain them entry to the States. Mike gave the problem a great deal of attention, and ultimately presented it to the former First Lady, Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt. She brought her influence to bear upon the Congress, and they passed a special bill allowing this particular boy to enter the country.

I wish to emphasize that these anecdotes are a few leaves in a great forest. There are, literally, thousands of such stories. And each demonstrates the same thing: That Mike Tress had a big, big heart overflowing with ahavas Yisrael; that he felt the pain of another Jew as his own pain; that he would go to any lengths to alleviate that pain. The Ramban teaches that the mitzvah of v'ahavta l'reyacha kamocha, loving one's fellow as oneself, is the most difficult of the mitzvos, for it requires a person to suppress his inborn sense of self-regard. R' Elemelech Tress mastered this mitzvah.

His relationship with his family

As busy as Mr. Tress was, he always made time for his family. When he would come home late at night, he would help the children with their homework, sometimes even writing compositions for them. (In fact, one daughter's essay on the life of Theodore Roosevelt - ghostwritten by Mike - won a state prize!) He took a great interest in the chinuch of his children. Every Sunday, he would arrive at Torah Vodaath after davening to speak to the rabbeim about his sons' progress in their studies. (Obviously, these were not among the boys' happiest moments.) On Thursday nights, there were family shopping trips, to Lane's or Klein's, where Mike would purchase clothing for the children. On Shabbos afternoons, he would take long walks with the older children, sometimes to the fire station, sometimes over the Williamsburg Bridge. And during the summers, the family would travel to Clove Lake Park every Sunday, where they would picnic under their special tree, and run races and play ball together. Every one of the older Tress children remembers those Sunday trips as some of their happiest times; they speak movingly of their father's exuberance on these outings, and of how they could just feel his love for them.

And his love was returned, measure for measure. When he would come home after work and eat his late supper, all the children would come to the kitchen to sit with him as he ate. They would burst with pride when, on their weekly walks, every person they would meet would stop to speak to their father. More than one of his children have told me that they thank the Ribbono Shel Olam that they were privileged to be born into his family. Mike's involvement with his family was of such intensity that one of his daughters, upon reading about his communal activities in his biography, exclaimed, "But when did all this happen? He was always home with us!" In short, what the world saw of Mike Tress's goodness and sweetness was only another expression of what his family saw at home - the ahavah, the kindness, welling up in that big heart, flowing over to encompass his neighborhood, his city, his people all over the world.

To return to the questions posed at the beginning of this essay: From whence the deep connection many still feel to R' Elemelech Tress? Why do so many consider him to have been their closest friend? Why, after long years, does his memory remain so clear? I see only one answer: People considered him their closest friend, they felt he loved them, because he was their closest friend and he did love them. There remains a deep connection to him because the waters of his heart ran so very, very deep. There was room enough in his generous heart for the poverty-stricken Jews of Eretz Yisrael, for the downtrodden Jews of the DP camps, hungering for a taste of human warmth, for Jewish children held by Catholics in Belgium, for the refugees of the Hungarian revolution, for Morrocan and Algerian children, for Jewish public-school boys, for his Pirchim, for his Zeirei colleagues, for his own family. Behind all his endeavors, underlying all his activism, this was always the constant theme, the steady refrain - ahavas Yisrael, ahavas Yisrael, ahavas Yisrael.

I close by expressing, in the name of all the family, our thanks to the Ribbono Shel Olam that we have merited a father and grandfather of such greatness and stature, whose memory has been a blessing to us, and from whose life we have learned so much of avodas Hashem. We are grateful also for the continued presence among us of our beloved Bobba yb"l, who was a devoted wife to our Zaida in his lifetime, and who has been devoted to his memory throughout the many years since his petirah. We wish her lange, gezunte yorin replete with much nachas from her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and, b'ezras Hashem, from generations to come as well.