A word of thanks for Eddie Paul
Eddie Paul providing a close-up encounter with one of our rarest artifacts after last week’s presentation Etz Chaim, Kabbalistic Divinity Maps, and Golems: The Tree of Life in Safed, Prague, and Montreal, for the Blue Metropolis Festival 2025.
Eddie Paul’s legacy and achievements are not those found in scholarly papers or books – unless you read between the lines or seek out the words of acknowledgement. For countless publications and projects, he was simply the subject expert in the background who helped scholars (young and old, Jewish and non-Jewish alike) navigate the esoteric channels necessary to conduct authentic, original research. Not only has Eddie directed the public’s attention to thought-provoking circulating books, non-circulating reference material, rare and ephemeral collections in the library, but over the decades, he has helped grow the collections, catalogue them, and travel with them to classrooms, synagogues, and churches. Eddie has also revitalised long-dormant ephemeral collections of newspaper clippings, pamphlets, and other limited-edition materials about Jews and Judaism in Canada by guiding students and scholars in the 21st century on their existence in a way that no algorithm could. To be sure, decades of tacit knowledge are irreplaceable.
Between 2021 – 2024, Paul secured two new sizable donations of miniature books, one belonging to Lilly Toth (1,119 books) followed by that of her peer, Daisy Gross (approx. 1,500 books). The JPL now has one of the largest miniature book collections in Canada. It offers a unique lens with which to discuss the history of printed material, and the collecting legacies of Holocaust survivors in Canada.
Eddie Paul sharing some of his expertise within the Ephemeral Collection alongside Outreach Coordinator Ezell Carter.
In the last decade, Eddie has increasingly stepped out of the stacks and into the public eye. In 2014, in honour of the 100th anniversary of the Jewish Public Library, Paul initiated what would become the longstanding and fruitful patronage of Dr. Michael D. Paul, z”l, to create our Rare Books Initiative (RBI). Through this initiative, Eddie both conducted and oversaw research on the antiquarian books housed in the JPL’s Special Collections. In the decade since this initiative began, he has hosted in-person and online workshops with more than 40 collaborating institutions, for local and international attendees. Simultaneous to the launch of the Rare Books Initiative, Eddie also expanded access to collections through exhibitions. He curated the show, A Roomful of Dwellings: The antiquarian books of the Jewish Public Library, and its accompanying catalogue. In 2017 he co-curated Decanting Memory: A Celebration of 500 Years of Jewish Printing in conjunction with Michael Kent, and the Jacob Lowy Collection of Library & Archives Canada.
Storytelling is often cited as part of Jewish identity, and it has indeed been at the core of Eddie’s approach to pedagogy. Eddie Paul — the kind and welcoming face at the Jewish Public Library — has impacted generations of people in ways that we may never know.
If you would like to leave a message for Eddie on the occasion of his retirement, we invite you to comment on this post or if you would like to leave him a private message with your contact information, you may do so here.