In pre-war Poland, the chassidim of R. Avraham Mordechai of Gur would boast that their Rebbe had tens of thousands of chassidim who did not put on tefillin, nor did they fast on Yom Kippur. If a listener questioned this statement, they would take him to any local cheder teeming with happy, young faces, adding: “These are some of the Rebbe’s most ardent followers.”

It is common to compare the relationship between a chassid and a Rebbe to that between a father and a son. True as this is in general, it has a unique meaning when applied to the relationship which children share with the Rebbe. The energy and intensity the Rebbe would show at a children’s rally or at Lag BaOmer parades was singular. When he would speak to children at yechidus or while distributing dollars for charity, he was focused on them entirely; it was as if there was nothing else in his world at that time. The stories that follow try to capture something of that relationship.