In March, a professor at Viterbo University in La Crosse received an award from Israel, according to an April 9 article on the Jerusalem Post website.
Prof. Jesus Jambrina of Viterbo received on March 25 the Medal of the Four Sephardi Synagogues. It was presented by Dr. Abraham Haim, president of the Council of Sephardi and Oriental Communities in Jerusalem, who traveled to La Crosse to make the presentation.
Jambrina is an associate professor and the coordinator of Viterbo’s Latin American and Latino Studies Program. He was honored for his research into, and help with preserving, the medieval Jewish quarters of the city of Zamora in Spain.
The council announced in October that Jambrina would receive the award. In a Nov. 9 Jerusalem Post article, Jambrina said his grandparents had moved to Cuba from a village near Zamora.
He therefore grew up hearing about the city and when he researched it later, he learned that it had a significant Jewish community that had been largely unrecognized. He said some 90,000 Jews left Zamora when Jews were expelled from Spain in 1492, according to the Viterbo website.
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