Heart and Sole: Golden Slipper
Celebrates 100 Years
SASHA ROGELBERG | STAFF WRITER
C Th e organization’s Passover League, now a part of Gems, gives hundreds
of Jews a seder to attend, who otherwise wouldn’t have had a place to go; and
Gems’ Human Needs and Services program gives aid to those in and outside
the Jewish community who may need a dental procedure, a wheelchair, a roof
repair, among other needs.

Th ough the organization’s format and programming have changed, the goal
of serving the community was baked in from the start: “What I can tell you
is not going to change is the need will
still be there,” Golden Slipper Club
& Charities Board President Dave
Simon said. “Where the need is in the
Jewish community and the greater
community, Golden Slipper is there.”
hristopher Lawrence doesn’t remember the fi rst Golden Slipper Gems
event he attended four years ago, but he does remember the company
he kept.

“Th ere’s a very coherent group of folks here, a regular group of folks who’ve
been going there for years,” Lawrence
said. “So it was just very nice to meet
in that context and to get to know
each other.”
Attending a lecture with his broth-
er-in-law, Lawrence was not only
struck by the unique chance to spend
time with a family member but with
Masonic Beginnings
the opportunities to spend time
Golden Slipper had its genesis at the
with like-minded folks — those who
poker table when, in 1922, a group of
shared his love for learning — which
Jewish Masons met to play cards and
he valued as a former educator.

split their winnings. Th ey delegated
Th ough Lawrence was new to
the monies to community members
Golden Slipper Gems, the organiza-
in need of essential goods, like coal
tion was hardly new to the concept
or milk, the organization’s website
of creating community through peo-
said, which was the prototype of the
ple-oriented programming.

HUNAS program on which the orga-
An early Golden Slipper Square Club event
Golden Slipper Gems is part of the
nization still prides itself.

Courtesy of Golden Slipper Club & Charities
three-pronged Bala Cynwyd-based
Th e organization originally was
organization Golden Slipper Club &
called the Golden Slipper Square
Charities, which also includes Golden Slipper Camp, which will celebrate its Club, with “Square” paying homage to its masonic affi liation, according to
100th anniversary this month. A gala will be held on March 26 at 6 p.m. at the Elliot Rosen, a past president of Golden Slipper Camp and the organization’s
Cescaphe Ballroom at 923 N. Second St.

de facto historian.

Over the past century, Golden Slipper has served the Greater Philadelphia
A quarter-century aft er its founding, the Golden Slipper Square Club
community through programming for older adults at two campuses and a approached the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia and asked which
summer camp serving 500 kids and providing scholarships and fi nancial aid demographic was more in need: the elderly or youth. Th e Jewish Federation
to those who need it.

identifi ed youth as the priority, and the Golden Slipper Square Club immediately
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