Rabbi Gedaliah Anemer was born in Akron, Ohio. His early schooling was at Tiferas Yerushalayim in New York, and he attended Telse Yeshiva from 1944 to 1956 where he was a talmid of Rabbi Bloch. He received smicha in 1952 and was Rosh Yeshiva of the Boston Rabbinical Seminary, a joint venture of Lakewood and Telshe Yeshivot, in 1956.

Rabbi and Mrs. Anemer came to our congregation from Boston. They arrived as we moved into our first building on Eastern Avenue in Riggs Park, Washington.

At that time, the congregation had about thirty paid-up member families and decided to engage this full-time rabbi to coincide with our move in 1957 to our own “permanent” quarters.

After a few short years, the demographics of the Riggs Park community threatened the existence of the congregation. We were losing members to other neighborhoods. Under the leadership of Rabbi Anemer, the congregation made a bold decision to create a branch in the suburbs where there was not yet an orthodox congregation. The shul bought land on University Boulevard to build there. When the University Boulevard shul was completed, there were about sixty people davening regularly in their home.

It was not long after the University Boulevard building was completed that the congregation outgrew it. We bought a rambler on North Belgrade Road and converted the basement into a place to daven. During this time, we also bought land and built the Arcola facility as the North Belgrade building was quickly outgrown, too - even though we started the Hashkoma minyan to alleviate the crowding at the “nine o’clock” minyan. We moved into the Arcola building in 1974.