Step through history this season as Beth El celebrates 150 years as a congregation. The exhibit "Jewish Life in Mr. Lincoln's City" has been brought to Beth El as part of this celebration. Mounted by the Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington , the exhibit is on display at here through December of this year.
Approximately 50 items depicting Jewish men and women are exhibited, 
representing an array of stories that characterize the lives of the community during the Civil War. The images are supported by interpretive text that illuminates the conflicts of that time. The viewer encounters photographs of individuals, images of wartime Washington and Alexandria and other materials, arranged on panels. The displays extend through the synagogue entry and main hallway. Notable events and issues from 1860 through 1868 are covered. The design of the exhibit evokes the 19th century with wood and brick.
The communities of Washington and Alexandria are represented both by figures familiar with celebrity and those who conducted life as private citizens. Viewers encounter figures that range from the notorious to the heroic. From Eugenia Phillips, arrested for espionage, to the decorated soldier, Leopold Karpeles. Many of the images are presented in life-size reproduction. Balancing the units which feature individual stories, are specific thematic units. The division between Confederate and Union sympathies is covered in one panel; one unit is devoted to Alexandria, occupied by Union troops early in the war. This is balanced by a panel on Beth El congregant Isaac Schwarz. Taken together, the presentation expands the viewer's understanding of established residents and recent immigrants building our community during a period when adventure, intrigue and armed conflict charged the atmosphere.
One particular set of panels and a crate-mounted flipbook presents Beth El's founding families, during the Civil War era. 
This array is positioned near the entry to our Social Hall, and is complemented by a display on Beth El's founders, including Joseph Brager (pictured) The current display, "Heritage and Legacy", provides 22 portrait photographs in our wall case. It documents a selection of the congregation's founders and their children. The biographies of these individuals is mounted on the adjacent wall, with an essay that delivers a sense of Civil War Alexandria. The research derived from Beth El's archive, combined with contributions from local collections and our community. It features images and stories from the family holdings and memories of congregants, such as Marjorie Harris, Dorothy Traub and Steve Harvith. These contributors were crucial to the construction of this vivid picture of Beth El's early life. The display consists of reproductions of cabinet cards and unique 19th century prints which range from 1850s photography through images made in 1904. Around the High Holidays, a few of the original photographs will be on view in the case. The display lends some prominence to names which have some familiarity in our community. It links these names to faces which evoke the past. We hope that viewers will look for these links, and recognize something of ourselves in Beth El's salute to our origins.
Special thanks to archivist Melissa Miller as well as Rusty Olshine, who has provided an elegant display, subtly invoking both the Blue and the Grey, as well as the Union,which endured even such an era of conflict
