We start near the end of the 19th century in Russia. This is a time of discrimination and physical violence against the Jewish communities under the Tsarist regime. Opportunities are limited for Jewish residents of that era of Russian history but emigration is not discouraged. So, somewhat prior to World War I, when great changes to Russia would occur, a smart lad of a Jewish Russian village, who would go by the name of Alfred P Orleans in the United States, was sent to Philadelphia to become a doctor and was expected to return to his village after graduating to fulfill that capacity. Philadelphia was a center for medicine and its study in the US at that time. Extinct names such as the Medical Department of Pennsylvania College, The Philadelphia College of Medicine, The Franklin Medical College, Penn Medical University and several medical colleges designated in some way as Eclectic intermingle with the medical schools that we are familiar with today. It is impossible to determine which school Alfred Orleans attended but several things became clear by 1914: World War I and the changes that it created on Russian society, (above we see the tricolor flag of the Tsar's Reign in 1890 and the Bolshevick flag of 1920) not to mention the threats to travel across continents precluded his return and it is very possible that changes to territorial boundaries (above, notice how Poland is a province of Russia in 1890 and an independent country in 1918 after WWI) would have made the effort even harder so Orleans decides to build a career, although not medically related, in Philadelphia and not his homeland. In hind sight, this is a wise move as this instability leads to the assassination of the Tsar and the installation of the communist regime headed by Lenin.

The Philadelphia of the early twentieth century is very different than the city of today. Possibly the greatest manufacturing dynamo ever created, the city was the American home of textile manufacturing as well as the transportation center of the country. It was also an incubator of various technologies during this time. During World War I Philadelphia's manufacturing capacity supplied the doughboys in Europe and the city would repeat this feat during World War II. It had a significant banking presence although even by this time this was being eclipsed by New York. It was a city that awarded both entrepeneurship and family lineage which is not an easy proposition. Above, we have provided several famous logos of Philadelphia businesses.

Alfred Orleans becomes an insurance salesman and is successful enough to establish his own agency after a time although the Pennsylvania insurance laws (if such existed at the time) would have made the term "agency" quite different than it is today. In Orleans case, much of his sales were done on the street and perhaps house to house. This agency still survives as A P Orleans Risk Management.

Philadelphia, in terms of population density, was also very different from today. Not as packed as New York with its tenements, the city nevertheless was much more congested given that farmland occupied what is today the Great Northeast, much of Logan, Mount Airy, the Oak Lanes and West Phila. In this, Orleans saw a possibiliy and in 1918 began a career, in addition to insurance sales, in home building. At one time, the AP Orleans home builders was active in almost every part of the city but by the late 1950's began to expand into the adjoining suburban counties and by the 1960's was a major presence in homebuilding along the east coast.

1918, as Orleans starts this new career, is also interesting in the scheme of things as far as the city is concerned. In the middle teens (1913 through 1915) Philadelphia suffers through a yearly siege of scarlett fever. As this subsides, war fever takes over as the country moves closer and closer to armed combat with Germany and her allies in World War I. By 1918, the city is in a patriotic fever and there are considerable marches and demonstrations supporting the doughboys - the American expeditionary force in France. The factories are humming creating the equipment needed by the troops. But there is a fly in the ointment. Somewhere in the middle of this country a flu develops that is transferred to Europe by the American soldiers being sent there. As in all flus, it starts to spread throughout the world. It's about to make an appearance in the city at about the same time that the citizenry is encouraged to mingle together at a War Bond rally that precedes a march of troops and citizens through center city. It is probable that this spreads an already very infectious disease and within a few weeks time Philadelphia is literally bled dry by this disease known as the Spanish Influenza. It was not uncommon for people to go to work in the morning, feel ill by the afternoon and be dead by the next morning. The city is ravaged for about a month until the illness expends itself. This is an auspicious time to create a business but apparently it has no affect on Orleans' budding construction company.

Census records seem to indicate that by 1910, Orleans (pictured, above, in later life and through the 1930 census) had married and he and his wife had at least one child, Marvin. Marvin was part of the Army air force during World War II and Marvin's visit to Florida for flight training during the war would be significant for the company in later years. However, before we discuss World War II, we should note that the Orleans building company suffers setbacks during the great depression as did all homebuilders. Luckily, the insurance wing is still going strong as Orleans refused to abandon this part of his career. The money still coming in from insurance sales and premiums allows Orleans to survive the 1930's, a situation that most homebuilders at the time were not able to duplicate.

A similar situation occurs in the late '60's/early 70's when through consolidation the Orleans' construction company survives but in 2010, during what is now called the Great Recession, the company undergoes bankruptcy and today has no Orleans' family participation.

World War II allows us to include another party, JEVS, that is also involved in this script. Originally the Jewish Educational and Vocational Service, this agency has served Philadelphia since 1941 and is presently headquartered at 1845 Walnut St. One can assume that the creation of this agency which occurs after the Great Depression was not at first focused on the native Jewish population of the city. At that time refugees from Europe were arriving into Philadelphia and JEVS was used to help these refugees get jobs and settle into the city's life. One assumes this situation only expanded post war. And, the emphasis would be changing both in terms of the types of vocations and the citizens trained. A shift to providing services for all of Philadelphia would have been evident through the years to the point that the official name of the agency has been changed to JEVS to indicate that the agency's services are open to all.

Besides JEVS, the city's residential stock of housing is expanding. This montage involves several maps of the Eastwick and Overbrook area that can be found at the Philadelphia geohistory web site dealing with land use. Left is 1942/62 land use in Eastwick. Eastwick is probably the last area of the city to be settled per home construction but even here indicated in red blocks are new developments during the period 1942 through 1962. The blue line pertains to expansion of the airport where this section of the city was ceded. The maps to the right indicating land use in 1942 and then 1962 in Overbrook is even more pronounced. Construction of residential housing in the city was rapidly expanding. So, expansion also comes to the A P Orleans construction company as the entire city and all its neighborhoods seems to be in a constant stage of home construction after World War II. This is also true throughout the country including the Philadelphia suburbs. It's the time of the baby boom. Orleans competes with the Levitt company and others in the creation of entire neighborhoods. Marvin Orleans becomes infatuated with the Florida market and in the end his father and he become owners of country clubs, malls and office buildings in that market. They take over an already existing home builder, Palm Aire, and that company becomes involved with large amounts of home construction throughout that state. We mention this in this light: Home construction needs skilled workers in a variety of vocations and it might be this situation which leads to our next montage.

With several very succesful companies, Alfred (A P) Orleans becomes a civic figure in the Philadelphia area and finds himself on several charitable and non profit boards of Directors. It's probable that in some way the Orleans family becomes involved with JEVS and its expansion plans in the 1970's. At first a JEVS vocational institute is created within center city but it soon expands with the help of many contributors and the Orleans' companies. In 1979, the A P Orleans Technical Institute takes up residence on Rhawn street in Northeast Philadelphia occupying an Orleans' built building. This is so successful that a new building is built in 2007 on Red Lion road as the Institute relocates. Much of the career training pertains to home construction although other vocations, like court reporting and human resources, are represented. The Orleans institute is wholely owned and supported by JEVS which allows it to run special programs in this facility as needed.

JEVS, situated on Walnut street in Philadelphia, also runs services in its facility downtown. One of the yearly events pertains to summer interns. High school students, through the Lasko College Prep Program, and college students, through the Franklin C. Ash Program, work as summer interns in various capacities within the JEVS organization and other Jewish Federation of Philadelphia programs. One of the JEVS coordinators in the summer intern program is Rhonda Cohen pictured above. In this capacity Rhonda has been in contact with many of the counselors of the various high schools of the school district of Philadelphia. One counselor, whose name has graced some of the scripts of this web site, that Rhonda has become friendly with is Lee Friedman. In the course of several discussions Rhonda knows that Lee attends many Israeli and International dance events throughout the city. And this link will work out well since it was decided by the JEVS administrators that this year, 2012, the summer interns would be treated to an Israeli dance event. Rhonda therefore queries Lee as to who could DJ this event scheduled for July 17th. It's taken a while, and we apologize for the roundabout story line, but here's where Israeli dancing will interact with A P Orleans and JEVS and how this web site becomes involved.

Don Schillinger grew up in Buffalo and studied IT and data processing in Arizona. He arrived in the Philadelphia area when he was hired by the University of Penna.'s IT department. It's while working there that he has an introduction to Israeli dancing during the 90's while such dancing was occurring in downtown Philadelphia at the Gershman Y. As Don has reported somewhere, he thought it would be a nice way to meet women and we don't think Don is the first guy to have thought such. Although he may be the most successful when he meets Karen, now his wife, as she relocates to this area from Washington and pursues her interest in Israeli dance. By the late 90's Don is spelling Rob Malerman at Cafe Israel in the Northeast on Sunday nights. This leads to Don turning his hobby into a full time position as he quits Penn and starts RAKDAN specializing in weekly Israeli dancing events in the Philadelphia area (which are covered in this web site's index page under weekly events) and in DJing specific affairs such as weddings and Bar/Bas Mitzvahs. Don finds, and anybody who has attended a Don DJ event would agree, that he has a natural affinity for teenagers and he is now a fixture for hosting teenaged parties in the Philadelphia area. He has also expanded having several younger DJs to handle the demand. It is Don that Lee recommends for Rhonda to call. But, she is trying to reach Don during an especially heavy May as far as DJ party demands. They play telephone tag for several weeks until Rhonda queries Lee as to what to do. Lee suggests that Rhonda contact someone who Rhonda is already familiar with and another part of the puzzle that makes up this script is about to be set in place.

For some time Rhonda has been working out at a well known Athletic facility in King Of Prussia, the old Bally's which was bought out in Dec '11 by LA Fitness. The Bally's name has not been removed from the building so both names are used to identify the facility. On Tuesdays and Thursdays she does the boot camp program with Georginna (second picture above), a Spin class on Thursday with Mark and on Fridays joins a group in the pool. This group is very famous in gyms throughout the King Of Prussia area. Originally known as the Bally's buddies, they will also respond to the name LA Buddies or even LA Fitness buddies. This group does a lot of interaction outside of the Bally's facilities including some dinners, parties, skiing and biking events. In fact, at the end of 2012 they held a white elephant Christmas party and you can see photos of this by clicking here. Another outside activity of the group is that most are part of the King Of Prussia Optimist club, a national organization devoted to kids. The King Of Prussia optimist club has several other tie ins through its members that include the offyougo group that meets most days at the Valley Forge Barnes and Noble. This group has several people who have tried Israeli dancing and know of Don. One of the members of the offyougo group who is an optimist also regularly attends the Friday morning Bally's buddy water aerobic classes not to mention being a regular at Don Schillinger's Thursday night Israeli dance session. He has found that being a member of all this activity has given him about two degrees of freedom of separation from anyone but even he will be surprised to find that someone in the pool that Friday knows several other Israeli dancers. Rhonda knows him from Bally's but is not aware of his dancing activities. Yet, it is to this individual that Lee directs Rhonda in Rhonda's quest to contact Don Schillinger. Doesn't this sound like an episode of Seinfeld?

And here's where this web site comes in. Some time in late May as Marc Rauer is stepping into the pool, he is surprised to find himself approached about this as Rhonda asks him to make contact with Don Schillinger. Of course, by time Marc does this, Rhonda and Don have already gotten together and the date, location and program have been set. It turns out that Don will be away at that point but he will send one of his younger DJs to run the program. Rhonda also invites Marc to the affair and Marc offers to take some shots for Rhonda and later for this web site. There will be one more surprise, as you will see, but everything now is set for July 17th: Don Schillinger will provide the DJ to host an Israeli dance party for the summer JEVS interns supervised by Rhonda Cohen at the A P Orleans technical institute on Red Lion road in Northeast Philadelphia which will also be attended by our representative, the aforementioned Marc Rauer.

Note: the pictures above in this montage try to document the various twists and turns in this story. So we see shots of the the Toronto Isreal Israeli Dance Weekend 2011 that both Lee Friedman and Marc Rauer attended, Bally's pool, Barnes and Noble, A taste of the Suburbs at the King Of Prussia Mall and the Bally Buddies at play.

Well, it's about 1:30 Pm on July 17th. Our photographer, Marc Rauer, is motoring along Red Lion road. The Orleans tech building is built below the flight path and to the north of Northeast airport. At one time this airport was built among fields and farms. But the post-war development of housing and commerce in the Great Northeast, much of it led by A P Orleans, has seen the airport become almost like another neighborhood development, although commercial, in the area. In fact, the internet service provider for this web site, Voicenet, is housed not far from the Orleans tech building. The montage above shows the approach to the building and our correspondent's move to the appropriate location within.

Don is away so a substitute, one of his associate DJs, will be the center of entertainment. The left of the montage above features Aley. But it also answers another question of this web site: who was the early DJ at Darcy and Micah's wedding from the month before. The pictures to the right of the montage provide the answer: this is the same DJ, Aley, in a different dress for that evening.

As Aley tends to his equipment, JEVS' laiason to this event, Rhonda Cohen, takes the stand. She welcomes everyone to this event including the interns, those who prepared the room for the event, the DJ and even our representative whom she already knew from Bally's pool although this may have been the first time that he has appeared in front of her in anything other than a bathing suit. Tactfully, this is not mentioned.

As Rhonda ends her welcoming remarks and we await Aley's beginning remarks, the camera pans around the audience. There seems to be more girls than boys, something that the girls will have to get used to as they attend future dance events. It is easy to predict that for this afternoon there will be more female participation than male. The first photo shows that one of the girls has a edge on everyone else as she shows a few steps in Israeli dance that she had picked up from somewhere else.

Ally begins teaching one of the composite line/partner dances that is part of the Israeli dance repertoire. A portion of the dance has the participants in a line (all the shots above pertain to this part of the dance) and then at the appropriate part there is a coupling to complete the dance. This coupling includes one of the partners kneeling while the other circles around. In normal circumstances we would see the male partner kneeling as the female partner moves around him. This could be romantic, but not today. Most couples this afternoon will consist of two girls. So above we see the prep for this dance.

And the music begins. Israeli dance requires its participants to have certain skills: there is a physical requirement to do the dance moves but there is also a mental requirement to remember the sequence of the dance steps. In most cases this is the harder of the two. However, this group has some advantages and this pertains to memory. Younger people have an advantage over older people in this as their memory is much sharper. The older dancer, of course, has more experience but for this afternoon Aley is showing every dance and its steps and these young people's short term memory capacity is an advantage.

This montage, and the dance done per the pictures, would be readily recognizable to any Israeli dancer. Aley has chosen well. This montage shows the dance Nigun Atik. This is probably the easiest dance in the Israeli dance repertoire consisting of counterclockwise steps, sways left and right with clapping and steps into the middle of the circle. This is a staple of beginner Israeli dancing and everyone should be able to do this. Aley, after an appropriate demonstration, has gotten the group into a circle and off they go. You are seeing the participants as they do this dance.

When we debriefed our photographer, he was very adamant in praising Aley's control of the situation. Apparently Aley had been learning from Don. An example of this is shown above. Don utilizes a particular line dance, Turkish kiss, when he wants to challenge his audience to learn and perform better. Similar with Aley. At the appropriate point, having taught both couples and circle dancing, Aley moves his audience into learning the aforementioned Turkish Kiss. The dance choreography is a lot of fun but somewhat complicated forcing the participants to rely on the feel of the music and their memory of the steps. This montage combines the teaching and performance of this dance and you can see that Aley, similar to his mentor Don, is right in front of the participants as they perform. And, keep in mind, Aley like Don, is doing this in a mirror oriented way substituting all things left for right (and vice versa) while this takes place.

There is always a question on this web site as to whether participants are acting for the camera or are they really enjoying themselves. We ask our photographers to try to take some shots that will prove our contention that Israeli dance is infectious. We think this montage of the participants performing Turkish kiss answers this question. These girls (and the lone guy also pictured) really are enjoying themselves. Whether it's the music, the steps, both or just the movement, the eyes and expressions don't lie.

After a while Aley started to show dances that our photographer did not recognize. These were for the most part line dances which younger people tend to like and relate to. This last montage shows various dancers as they interact with these steps and music. This session lasted about two hours and was not the last time that it was referenced by and with JEVS. Two weeks after these pictures JEVS held a luncheon downtown to honor the Franklin C. Ash and Lasko College Prep Programs and these interns. Previous participants, not to mention some of the sponsors such as Franklin Ash, attended and/or spoke at the luncheon. Included in the visitors was our photographer, Marc Rauer, who appreciated an acknowledgement of his contribution to the dance event although he's somewhat hazy as to what he did to deserve this. But this web site knows: it is through his efforts that you have been entertained by pictures pertaining to an Israeli dance event that was quite extraordinary. For those who may every now and then look at this site, it should be clear that you have not recognized any of these dancers in these photos. And, even more importantly, these are younger people participating. Perhaps they will at some later date join the various dance classes that we cover on this web site which would be a great legacy and lasting result of this July 17th event.