2020 Report to the Community

President’s Report: Taking Histories

As a practicing physician I must have taken over a thousand (patient) histories. I took them not only to get to know my patients better, but also to understand the context of their complaint and thereby more effectively treat them.

We are all aware that our city, our state, the nation and the world have been suffering grievously in recent months – with disease, economic uncertainty, social injustice, and an epidemic of mistrust. The challenges can seem overwhelming. But as difficult as these times have been, still a good place to begin to look for answers is to take histories (and to share them).

This Annual Report records another chapter in the history of the Jewish Museum of Maryland. FY ’20 will be remembered as a year that came to a difficult end, with the museums doors shuttered for the last three and a half months of the year (March 17 to June 30). But that isn’t the whole story of the year. Coming off of the most successful project in JMM history (FY ‘19’s Inescapable: The Life and Legacy of Harry Houdini), this year our Feldman Gallery played host to two more JMM-original exhibitions: last summer’s Fashion Statement and Scrap Yard: Innovators of Recycling that premiered in October. By December we were running full steam, noshing on cookies at the Hanukkah bake-off, acquiring headsets to make synagogue and neighborhood tours more accessible, and playing the Scrap Yard board game nearly daily with visiting school groups. On February 9th a fabulous concert with Lori Şen kicked off the much-anticipated folk music edition of JMM Live. On February 27th more than 300 people gathered to celebrate the student history/art projects in the international competition sponsored by Beit Hatfutsot (Baltimore would ultimately produce an international winner for the sixth year in a row!).

Then came March.

What happened next is one of the things that make me most proud of my affiliation with JMM. In the face of COVID 19’s unexpected impact on our community, Team JMM did not throw up their hands, but rather rolled up their sleeves and made an amazing pivot to digital. Two weeks before the governor ordered us to stay at home, JMM began work on a new family activity website:  www.wondernauts.org. They also increased the frequency of our digital newsletter, adding new content every week. They started planning for live events as well, beginning with the fifth anniversary of the Freddie Gray Uprising. A live lecture on Jews and the Civil War with our director in early May, brought together 159 screens, an estimated 200 plus guests from across the country for a talk that was both amusing and thought-provoking (one of the many reasons we are going to miss Marvin when he retires at year end). Museum professionals working side-by-side (but at least six feet apart) with our colleagues at the Associated also were busy figuring out how to keep the JMM healthy financially. The Federal PPP loans were critical but so were the responses of the Board and general membership to our spring appeal. Despite pessimism in the stock market, we doubled our donations from last spring’s campaign. I want to add my personal thanks to all of you who contributed.

So what’s my prescription for JMM? I recommend we remain focused on our mission of connecting people (now more important than ever) and that we all get plenty of exercise…exercising not only our brains, and our wallets, but also our dreams for a better future.

Robert Keehn, M.D.

JMM Board President, 2019 – 2020

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