Future for farm: energy, ag and the Grateful Dead

FALLS VILLAGE — Tucked away in a quiet corner of a quiet town is the Isabella Freedman Jewish Retreat Center, which runs a wide variety of programs encompassing the spiritual, the environmental — and, coming up, the Grateful Dead.Executive director David Weisberg started at Isabella Freedman in May. A couple of weeks ago, he met with a group of interested parties to begin a discussion of how to broaden the scope and reach of the center.The question of how to include the town and community is now on the table. Topics include sustainable agriculture and renewable energy.“We’re looking at a grassroots, nonacademic, renewable energy conference” as one activity that could attract a diverse group of participants, Weisberg said.Later this month, a program called “Seriously Funny,” with Roseanne and Geraldine Barr is scheduled.And Weisberg mentioned two other thematic possibilities for merging Jewish spirituality with pop culture: one on Jews and comic books, and another on the Grateful Dead.“There are a lot of Jewish Deadheads,” said the affable Weisberg.Weisberg has considerable experience running nonprofits — the Jewish Federation Community Center in Harrisburg, Pa., for 10 years, and the last four years with Friends of the Arava Institute, also in Harrisburg, concerned with environmental studies in Israel.He graduated from Penn State in 1990, with a degree in American studies.His wife, Jamie, is a volunteer at Isabella Freedman, and their two youngest daughters attend the Lee H. Kellogg School.Weisberg is happy to be at the center, he said.“It’s a beautiful place — there’s no other place in the Jewish world with so many possibilities. It’s almost an anti-institution.“Whether we like it or not we tend to divide people — by their [religious] affiliation, social status.“People are allowed to come here and find meaning in the way they fnd best. It becomes a place where magical things happen.”