Jackson Free Press

Rachel Jarman Myers brings southern Jewish history into Mississippi classrooms with a special interactive program: a traveling trunk.

The trunk holds all kinds of artifacts from early turn-of-the-century Jewish shopkeepers in the South, such as photographs, maps, census records, ship manifests and business records. It also contains board games and lesson plans to teach kids in kindergarten through 12th grade about 19th-century European immigration to the American South.

"Students and teachers have enjoyed this wonderful hands-on educational opportunity," said Michele Schipper, chief operating officer at the Goldring/Woldenberg Institute of Southern Jewish Life, or ISJL, in a release.

"(The Traveling Trunk) demonstrates how these Jewish immigrants, who have always been a tiny minority of Mississippi's population, have made an impact on their communities," Schipper added.

For Myers' work coordinating the Traveling Trunk program, Schipper nominated her for a bi-annual award from the Mississippi Historical Records Advisory Board. The board provides professional assistance, resources, and programming to support the preservation and accessibility of the state's invaluable historical documents and records.

Myers won the 2013 Award for Use of Historical Records in Grades K-12.

"I'm so pleased to receive this award, especially since it acknowledges the inclusion of historical material in the Traveling Trunk," Myers said in the release. "One of the most special activities in the trunk uses records from the Bernheimer & Sons store in Port Gibson. Students are instructed to be the historians, critically thinking about what we can learn from documents that are over 100 years old. For many, it is the first time they have had access to historical material. This is important because like so many ISJL programs, the materials and lessons in the trunk program are intended to lead all students and participants to understand, engage with, and appreciate the history of cultural and religious diversity in their communities."

Myers, 27, hails from Connecticut. She graduated from Brandeis University in Waltham, Mass., in 2008 with a degree in religious studies, and has worked for the ISJL since then. She served two years as an education fellow, before taking on the role of Museum and Special Projects Coordinator in 2010.

"I was this little Yankee girl coming in and learning about fried food and SEC football, and I ate it up," Myers told the Jackson Free Press in 2011 about her move to Mississippi. "After I bit into it, I knew this is where I wanted to be forever."

Myers is also a talented musician, best known locally for singing with the popular former Jackson girl group The Bachelorettes. The group took its style from 1960s groups such as The Supremes, The Shangri-Las and The Dixie Cups.

Last April, she married Mississippi native Chris Myers, an architect with Cooke Douglass Farr Lemons Architects and Engineers ("a nice southern boy from Batesville," Rachel Jarman Myers said). The Jackson Free Press featured Chris Myers as a Man We Love in 2009 and Rachel Jarman Myers as a Chick We Love in 2011. The couple lives in Fondren.

ISJL provides educational and rabbinic services to southern Jewish communities, preserves the rich history of the southern Jewish experience, and offers community engagement opportunities and inclusive cultural programs throughout the organization's 13-state region.

To learn more about the ISJL and its programs, visit www.isjl.org. Myers blogs about her experiences at myjewishlearning.com.