Debra Polsky photo Courtesy Dallas Jewish Historical Society
Debra Polsky, executive director of the Dallas Jewish Historical Society, died unexpectedly at age 69 earlier this month, according to members of the organization, who expressed “sadness” and “deep loss” in a written statement.
“Since 2012, Debra has been the face of the DJHS,” reads an obituary on the organization’s website. “She fostered a deep love of Jewish Dallas and the mission of DJHS … and devoted herself to her work. Debra’s leadership and support provided a solid backbone on which to grow the agency into the powerhouse she always envisioned.”
City Council member Jaynie Schultz, D11, said on social media that Polsky was her dear friend.
“She was an inspiration for all of us and spent her life serving our community in too many ways to count,” Schultz wrote. “She was an innovator, a thinker and a loyal friend, and I was blessed to have her in my life for 36 wonderful years.”
Polsky lived and worked in New York, Tennessee, Nebraska and California before coming to Dallas in 1989 to fulfill her career in Jewish communal service, according to an obituary.
Once here, she hit the ground running, her peers note, “developing strong professional relationships between DJHS and several Dallas Jewish, secular and cultural organizations and improving outreach within the community.”
In addition to her official job — which included implementing community-relations, financial and donation-tracking systems at the DJHS, applying for grants and advocating to preserve Jewish history, to name a few—she volunteered with nonprofits including SMU Jewish Studies and Dallas Memorial Center for Holocaust Studies. Plus she was a Judaism teacher at the Florence Melton Adult Mini-School for 25 years.
Two of her more significant efforts, according to those mourning her death, included preserving historically significant structures and building a robust collection of Jewish stories.
The Jewish oral-history project is a digital effort that allows anyone to listen to stories of influential Dallas Jews. Polsky oversaw 100s of submissions, and added her own. She also was instrumental in the preservation of The Rosenfield House or Blue House near The Cedars, the last remaining home in a neighborhood built in the later 1800s for Jewish merchants.
Preservation Dallas wrote on Facebook that Polsky “was an incredibly knowledgeable historian and enthusiastic leader, and was a very strong partner in preservation.”
Polsky’s family and friends celebrated her life at a service last week.
