Carr, Judy Feld, 1938- : Judy Feld Carr, human rights activist and community leader, was born in Montreal, Quebec in 1938. She was raised in Sudbury, Ontario where her father was a well-known fur trader. She received her bachelor's degree in music education from the University of Toronto in 1960 and her master's degree in musicology and music education in 1968. She taught music in Toronto and married her husband Dr. Ronald Feld who passed away in 1973. In 1977, she married Donald Carr Q.C., a prominent lawyer and community leader. In 1982-1983 she served as the first woman president of Beth Tzedec Congregation, the largest synagogue in North America.
Over a period of 28 years, Judy Feld Carr was personally responsible for the rescue of 3,228 Jews from Syria. Her humanitarian work began in 1972 when she and her late husband learned about the plight of Syrian Jews trying to flee violent religious and racial persecution in Syria. After the creation of the State of Israel in 1948, thousands of Syrian Jews fled the country. The Syrian government denied those who remained behind the right to emigrate and made it extremely difficult for them to travel abroad. Life for the Jewish community in Syria during these times was precarious at best. After much persistence and a great deal of difficulty, they established contact with the Chief Rabbi of Syria. Together with a small group of volunteers and supporters, they sent religious articles and books to the beleaguered community. To call attention to their plight and suffering, they also established a human rights campaign to lobby the Canadian Jewish community, politicians, government officials and the media. After the death of her husband, she chose to continue their life-saving work. To fund the rescue effort, the Board of Governors of the Beth Tzedec Congregation created the Dr. Ronald Feld Fund for Jews in Arab Lands. At great risk to her own personal safety, she established a clandestine network of trustworthy agents and confidants which spirited out thousands of refugees from 1973 to 2002. She was known only as Mrs. Judy to those she helped. Most of the people she smuggled out of Syria settled in Israel or New York. She also managed to secretly remove some of the community's Sefrei Torah and other religiously significant works, manuscripts and books.
Judy Feld Carr received many awards for her selfless devotion to the welfare of others. She was made a Member of the Order of Canada in 2000. She received the Queen's Jubilee Medal in 2002. In 2002, she received the Wiesenthal Award for Tolerance, Justice and Human Rights. She received an honorary doctorate from Laurentian University in Sudbury in 2000 and a doctorate of humane letters from the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. She received the Saul Hayes Human Rights award from the Canadian Jewish Congress in 1995. She was named the Woman of the Year at Brandeis University in Boston in 2002. The University of Haifa presented her with the Humanitarian Award of Merit in 1995.
Her achievements were chronicled in "The Ransomed of God - The Remarkable Story of One Woman's Role in the Rescue of Syrian Jews" by Professor Harold Troper, Malcolm Lester Books, Toronto, 1999.
