Editor’s Note: The following article is by Matthew Sporn, a Richmond-based freelance journalist and a member of Temple Beth-El. He researched the history of Congregation B'nai Shalom, a former Richmond synagogue founded in 1965 by ten families seeking a more egalitarian Jewish community. The piece is currently published on Medium and we are pleased to share this informative article with the community,  Several historic photos and newspaper clippings are included here. 

By Matthew Sporn

In 1965, ten Richmond-area families made a decision that would shape Jewish life on the city's western edge for more than two decades.

At the time, they belonged to Congregation Keneseth Beth Israel, one of Richmond's Orthodox synagogues. While deeply committed to Jewish tradition, they sought a more egalitarian congregational experience, one in which families could sit together and women could participate more fully in synagogue life.

Together, they founded Congregation B’nai Shalom. Among those founding families were Arthur and Marilyn Samuel, Max and Minnie Messler, Tosia and Herman Joel, Lou and Betty Weissbecker, and Frank and Sadie Friedenburg, along with five other families who shared a vision of creating a new kind of Jewish community in Richmond.

Their first home was not a synagogue, but a converted house on Patterson Avenue.

From those modest beginnings, B'nai Shalom would grow into a thriving congregation of more than 200 families, educate generations of Jewish children, build a synagogue on Three Chopt Road, and become an important chapter in the history of Jewish Richmond.

Today, however, much of that story survives only in photographs, newspaper clippings, letters, plaques, and memories preserved by former members and their families.

It is a story that should not be forgotten.

More importantly, it is a story that deserves to be told.

Building a Community

The congregation's earliest years were defined by determination, optimism, and a willingness to build something new.

Membership grew steadily, and soon the converted Patterson Avenue house could no longer meet the congregation's needs. Plans were made for a permanent home on an eight-acre tract along Three Chopt Road in western Henrico County.

On May 4, 1969, members gathered there for a groundbreaking ceremony. Photographs preserved by The Valentine show congregants standing in a wooded clearing, envisioning a future synagogue that had yet to be built.

The vision soon became reality, thanks largely to the congregation itself.

Contemporary newspaper accounts describe members spending six nights each week after work helping construct portions of the new facility. 

Engineers, chemists, businessmen, jewelers, and other volunteers contributed labor and expertise to reduce costs and move the project forward. 

One article noted that among the volunteers there was "not a carpenter among them."

Yet they built it anyway.

The workers paused only on Friday evenings, setting aside construction for Shabbat services before returning to the project afterward.

Their efforts became even more urgent when a fire damaged the congregation's Patterson Avenue building during the construction period, increasing the need to complete the new synagogue. The fire disrupted more than the congregation's physical home.

Cheryl Messler recalled that in the aftermath, Sunday School and Hebrew School classes were temporarily held in the homes of congregants until the new synagogue could be completed.

Even in crisis, the congregation adapted.

Jewish learning continued around dining room tables and in living rooms across Richmond, sustained by families determined not to let the interruption of a building become the interruption of a community.

The volunteer spirit that defined B'nai Shalom remained vivid in the memories of its members decades later.

Robert Levy, whose family was among the congregation’s many, recalled working alongside his father and other congregants during construction of the Three Chopt synagogue.

"My dad worked side-by-side with Max [Messler] and the others, physically building the shul. I laid a few bricks myself, and put up some of the aluminum siding on the outside of the building.”

Cheryl Messler, daughter of longtime congregational leaders Max and Minnie Messler, remembered construction of the synagogue as a family affair.

She and fellow congregant Robert Levy both recalled learning practical skills, including spackling, while helping around the building site as children.

One family story has endured for decades.

Minnie Messler often recounted how Cheryl, exhausted after a long day around the synagogue, fell asleep atop a pile of sheetrock on the bimah itself.

At the time, the sanctuary was unfinished. The bimah was little more than a platform surrounded by lumber and drywall.

Years later, Torah would be read there. Children would celebrate bar and bat mitzvahs there.

Before it became the spiritual center of the congregation, however, it was simply part of a construction site where families worked side by side and children grew up helping create something larger than themselves.

His recollection echoed contemporary newspaper accounts describing members spending evenings and weekends helping construct the synagogue that would become the congregation's permanent home.

The Three Chopt property itself reflected the congregation's vision for the future. In addition to the synagogue, the site included the residence of Rabbi Morris C. Katz, who helped guide the congregation through many of its formative years.

What emerged from those years of labor was more than a building.

It was a home built by the very people who would worship there.

The Heart and Soul

Few people embodied that spirit more fully than Max and Minnie Messler.

For years, the Messlers stood at the center of congregational life, helping guide B'nai Shalom through periods of growth, celebration, and change.

A 1999 Richmond Jewish News article reflecting on the congregation's history included an interview with former Rabbi Jerome Berkowitz, who served B'nai Shalom from 1978 to 1982.

In that interview, Berkowitz described Max and Minnie in simple but memorable terms:

"The Messlers were the heart and soul."

Recalling his arrival in Richmond, Berkowitz remembered Max helping his family settle into the community and observed that "nothing would stop him when it was for the benefit of the shul."

Congregational records show that Max served multiple terms as president, from 1976 to 1979 and again from 1980 to 1983. His leadership coincided with some of the congregation's most successful years.

The congregation later honored him for his years of outstanding service and devotion. Even after B'nai Shalom's merger with Temple Beth-El, his commitment to Jewish communal life continued. In 1995, Temple Beth-El recognized him for his service as a board member.

While Max helped build institutions, Minnie helped build community.

A Richmond Times-Dispatch feature on Purim traditions highlighted Minnie, B'nai Shalom's kitchen chairman, preparing hamantaschen and helping organize the congregation's annual Purim celebration. 

Alongside photographs of congregants working together, the article shared recipes and traditions that connected Richmond Jewish families to generations of Jewish practice.

Like countless synagogue volunteers, Minnie helped create the warmth, hospitality, and sense of belonging that transformed a congregation into a home.

More Than a Synagogue

B'nai Shalom was never simply a place for worship services.

It was a center of Jewish community life.

The congregation maintained a religious school, active Sisterhood programs, youth activities, holiday celebrations, and a congregational newsletter, The Shofar.

Its members gathered not only for worship, but for education, social events, and fundraising efforts that helped sustain the congregation.

Among the most memorable of those efforts was bingo.

Games were held three nights each week: Sunday and Tuesday evenings at the synagogue on Three Chopt Road and Thursday evenings upstairs at the Giant Open Air grocery store on Westmoreland Street in Henrico County.

For many members, bingo was more than a fundraiser. It became part of the rhythm of congregational life, bringing people together while helping support the synagogue's programs and operations.

For Lynn Burris, daughter of one of B'nai Shalom's early leaders, many of the congregation's most enduring memories are the simplest.

She remembers worshipping in the small house on Patterson Avenue before the move to Three Chopt. She remembers Sunday School teacher Stuart Levet and participating in a children's play.

She also remembers the Oneg after Friday night services.

"I would get my cheeks pinched by all of the old people," Burris recalled. "It was the price to pay for that delicious punch!"

The punch, she remembers, was made with sherbet and Sprite or ginger ale.

She also recalled that Minnie Messler likely led the Sisterhood during those years, and remembered members selling monogrammed pocketbooks as a fundraiser.

The details may seem small, but together they reveal something essential about B'nai Shalom. It was not simply a synagogue.

It was a place where memories were made.

The congregation's reputation for warmth extended beyond its membership.

In 1975, Virginia Delegate Ira Lechner wrote to Max and Minnie Messler after speaking at B'nai Shalom, thanking them for their hospitality and describing the congregation as a welcoming and "haimish" audience.

The word captured something essential about B'nai Shalom. Visitors often came away remembering not only the congregation's programs, but its people.

A Congregation Comes of Age

By the early 1980s, B'nai Shalom had become a thriving congregation of more than 200 families. Its Hebrew school educated dozens of students. Children grew up within its walls. Families celebrated weddings, bar and bat mitzvahs, holidays, and life-cycle events together.

The congregation's success was perhaps best symbolized on May 17, 1981. That evening, members gathered to celebrate the burning of the synagogue's mortgage.

For any congregation, a mortgage-burning ceremony represents more than a financial milestone. It reflects years of sacrifice, fundraising, volunteer labor, and shared vision.

Twelve years after members stood in a wooded clearing imagining what might be, they had achieved something remarkable.

The congregation owned its home.

The event drew Virginia Lieutenant Governor Charles S. Robb, who later wrote to Max Messler congratulating the congregation on the achievement and expressing his hopes for B'nai Shalom's continued success. Looking back years later in his 1999 Richmond Jewish News interview, Rabbi Berkowitz reflected on the significance of those years. "The joy and simchas and services we brought to that side of town signified a very special chapter in Richmond's Jewish history," he said.

Legacy

On July 1, 1987, B'nai Shalom formally consolidated with Temple Beth-El.

The merger brought together two congregations with shared commitments to Jewish worship, education, and community life.

Although the B'nai Shalom name gradually disappeared from everyday use, its influence remained.

For a time, the former Three Chopt property continued serving the Jewish community through religious education and later as the home of the Jewish Community Day School.

Today, another congregation worships on the site. The building's occupants have changed, but its purpose as a gathering place continues. Some of

B'nai Shalom's most treasured possessions continue to serve the Jewish community today.

According to Cheryl Messler, the lecterns on the bimah and the Ark used by the congregation were handmade by a fellow member during B'nai Shalom's early years.

Decades later, those same pieces remain in use at Temple Beth-El's Religious School on Parham Road.

Their continued use serves as a quiet reminder that B'nai Shalom's legacy did not end with the congregation's merger.

It lives on, not only in memories, but in the objects crafted by its members and still used by new generations of Jewish children.

The story of B'nai Shalom is not the story of a congregation that failed.

It is the story of a congregation that succeeded.

It grew from ten families gathering in a converted house on Patterson Avenue into a vibrant community that helped shape Jewish life in Richmond for more than two decades.

Its members built a synagogue, educated children, celebrated countless simchas, and created a community that touched hundreds of lives.

Today, much of that history survives because people preserved it.

Taken together, those fragments tell a larger story.

B'nai Shalom was not a footnote.

It was a community.

It was a home.

It was a significant chapter in the history of Jewish Richmond.

And it is a story that deserves to be told. 

Author's note: This article grew out of a collection of photographs, newspaper clippings, letters, congregational artifacts, and personal recollections preserved by the family of Max and Minnie Messler and shared by former members of B'nai Shalom.