On this Shabbos before Purim 2026, as we look forward to “A Revolutionary Purim” theme at UAlbany this 2026 (as part of the 250-year commemoration) wanted to share this 1972 memory I heard from Mr. Feivel-Phil Chandler (who, along with a friend Reb Yisrael Bindell, was influential and helpful in bringing my parents, Rabbi Israel and Rochel Rubin, as the Rebbe’s Shluchim to Albany and setting them up in their first apartment here).
It’s a long story, but Reb Feivel Chandler and Reb Yisrael Bindell were part of a small group of Albany High School students, from Temple Israel and Beth Emeth and other local synagogues, who were experiencing a personal Jewish renaissance, and seeking opportunities to more richly connect with their heritage. There are many parts and backgrounds to this fascinating story, their personal journeys, the impacts and ripple effects.
After some time, and a life-changing bus trip to Crown Heights, a few of these boys met up and very much connected with Reb Isser Brickman. Reb Isser was a hearty and earthy Chassid of the old sort, Russian born and raised, deeply steeped in Chabad teachings and traditions, who was then living and working in Albany as a Shochet (ritual slaughterer). At the time Reb Isser lived above the new Shomray Torah, the Shteeble on New Scotland Ave. He became a mentor to them, they became very close with him. See this piece we once shared about Reb Isser Brickman and building the Sukkah.
At that farbrengen, Reb Isser Brickman told them, “We have to make a Revolution in Albany!”
Feivel/Phil vividly recalls Reb Isser farbrengening about this “revolution” – this valiant all-in dedicated effort towards a dramatic transformative change. He felt as if Reb Isser was channeling the Friediker Rebbe’s charge. It’s something that stuck with Feivel for years and decades to come – to this day.
Reb Isser Brickman moved out of Albany soon after, but his call for revolution lived on. Feivel and Yisrael asked the Rebbe to send a Shliach to Albany. That’s when the Rebbe sent Rabbi Israel and Rochel Rubin here in 1974. Among other things, they started work on campus in 1975 and purchased and started Shabbos House in 1976. We are part of that revolution.
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There’s a notion that revolutions need to disruptive and destructive, breaking all in its wake.
But there’s type of revolution that many of us – those of us who get behind the wheel of a car – see each day. On your car dashboard there’s one dial (unless you’re car is digital) of numbers you look at all the time and that’s the speedometer.
But there’s another dial, the tachometer, which has numbers 1-8 and it measures the rotational speed of the engine. Most normal driving is in the 1-2 range, occasionally 3 for acceleration, but usually not much higher than that. The tachometer measures RPM in the thousands, which is usually why it’s labeled “RPM X-1000” because a 2 on that meter = 2,000, and a 3 = 3,000.
What does RPM stand for? Revolutions Per Minute. To keep a car going, it takes thousands of revolutions every minute, to keep driving on. Especially if you’re going up hill or want to maintain speed, gotta keep the revolution going!
These under-the-hood revolutions don’t make all that much noise, they don’t break anything, but they keep pushing onward, turning and turning, powering through. Often in life we need that extra push, that energy and drive, that ability to rise up and go against the flow, and that takes internal personal revolution, not standing still and status-quo. This, too, is a revolution!