Rabbi Levi Wilansky is the assistant director of Chabad of Maine. Feel free to join Chabad’s public Seders on April 1 and 2. For more info, or to RSVP, visit ChabadofMaine.com/Passover2026. When people from outside Maine hear that I’m a rabbi in Portland, many people are intrigued to learn about our thriving Jewish community. In fact, our city has a rich Jewish history that goes back further than most people realize. Jewish life began in the 1870s and ’80s, when Jews fleeing pogroms in Eastern Europe settled in the Munjoy Hill and East Bayside neighborhoods. Arriving with little money and...