obituaries
F SASHA ROGELBERG | STAFF WRITER
ormer Jewish Federation of Greater
Philadelphia executive and Gratz College
President Ernest “Ernie” Kahn died on Oct.

11. Th e Center City resident was 96.

During Kahn’s 36-year career serving the Jewish
community in Philadelphia from 1978 to 2014, he
acted as the director of allocations and planning,
associate executive vice president and interim exec-
utive director on three occasions. Kahn was the
interim president of Gratz College from 1997-’99.

According to a 2020 Jewish Exponent article about
Kahn becoming an honorary trustee of the Jewish
Federation, Kahn served on almost every committee
the organization off ered.

“In the Jewish communal world, when you’re
in a high-level position of authority, you’ll always
fi nd someone who doesn’t like you or how you do
your job. I doubt you’ll fi nd anyone who didn’t like
Ernie or how he did whatever job he did,” said Jay
Steinberg, a former Jewish Federation of Greater
Philadelphia offi cer and director.

Kahn, despite his busyness and status as an
“Energizer bunny,” according to American Jewish
Committee Philadelphia/Southern New Jersey
Regional Director Marcia Bronstein, still took time
to chat with colleagues and visitors, wanting to learn
their stories. He was the center of the web of connec-
tion at the Jewish Federation and beyond.

“He was the institutional memory of the Jewish
community of Philadelphia,” Bronstein said.

Along with stories of the Philadelphia Jewish com-
munity, Kahn contained a multitude of stories, both
victories and tragedies, of Jewish communities all
over the world.

Born in 1926 in the eastern German city of
Schwäbisch Gmünd, Kahn was 8 when the Nazi Party
rose to power. Forbidden by law to attend school with
his Christian counterparts, Kahn moved to Stuttgart,
where the closest Jewish school was.

Ernest “Ernie” Kahn served as an executive at
the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia
from 1978 to 2014.

Th e Kahns avoided the plight of many German
Jewish families with the help of Kahn’s father’s
friends and customers of the family’s retail stores.

Kahn also had a maternal aunt living with her hus-
band in New York who was able to provide fi nancial
assistance and ensure the family stayed together
during their journey to the U.S.

Th ough Kahn was forthcoming about his child-
hood when asked, his family doesn’t have a clear
picture of how exactly he survived the Holocaust.

“At various diff erent times, my father has given
credence to the various diff erent stories, which leads
me to believe that there’s probably an element of truth
to almost all, that there was not just one series of
events,” daughter Rachel Kahn Ross said.

Th e Kahn family arrived in the United States — by
way of France and England — on the Queen Mary in
the fall of 1939, and Kahn had a formal bar mitzvah
shortly aft er arriving.

Despite his tumultuous childhood and journey to
the U.S., Kahn never described himself as a Holocaust
survivor or refugee.

“Th at would not be my father’s style, to either see
himself as a refugee or as a Holocaust survivor,” Ross
said. “I think I can say he considered himself to be
among the very fortunate.”
He received a bachelor’s degree from the City
University of New York, a master’s degree in social
work from the University of Chicago and a doc-
torate in education for social movements from the
University of Maryland, where he later worked as an
assistant dean at the school of social work. Kahn also
was involved at the Baltimore Hebrew College.

By the time he moved to Philadelphia in 1978, Kahn
was 52 and a seasoned Jewish professional. Toward
the end of his career at the Jewish Federation, his
biggest challenge was retiring, colleagues and family
said unanimously. Daughter Beth Kahn remem-
bers her father stepping down, but then helping the
Jewish Federation with a project, which over and over
became a return to employment.

“His work was very, very important to him,” she
said. “He was very committed to the Jewish commu-
nity. ... Next to his family, it was probably the most
important thing.”
When he wasn’t working, Kahn enjoyed going to
the theater and symphony with his wife Marcia of 67
years, who died in February, and traveling, including
on a trip with his grandsons to Schwäbisch Gmünd
and Stuttgart in 2017 to visit his childhood home,
family store and synagogue.

On a 2015 Jewish Federation mission to Israel,
Kahn and his family visited Yad Vashem. At one
point during the guided tour, he split off from the
group and started telling a couple of stragglers about
his childhood during the Shoah. Th e group eventu-
ally swelled and congregated around Kahn.

“We gathered a following of about 30 other peo-
ple behind us,” Beth Kahn said, “who decided they
wanted to listen to my dad tell his story.”
Kahn is survived by his two daughters and two
grandchildren. JE
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26 NOVEMBER 3, 2022 | JEWISHEXPONENT.COM
Photo courtesy of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia
Ernie Kahn, Jewish Federation
Executive for 36 Years,
Dies at 96