Every Jewish community has one: that understated individual who, sitting outside the limelight, serves as the foundational pillar upon which the entire community stands.
One such woman was Sandy Landes.
“She was truly a special person,” reflects Rabbi Yosef Levin, who has led Chabad-Lubavitch of Palo Alto, Calif., with his wife Dena since 1980. “She essentially started a Chabad House before Chabad even got here.”
Dedicated and persevering, Landes, along with her husband Dr. Yehuda Landes, were instrumental in bringing Chabad to Palo Alto, about 35 miles south of San Francisco. Landes passed away at the age of 92 on March 22, 2025.
As the Orthodox Jews living closest to Stanford University Hospital, the Landeses for decades opened their home to patients and their families, especially for Shabbat, when they needed to be near the hospital, taking care of their every need. At times, visitors stayed for weeks on end.
“We hosted people from all walks of life, from a Chassidic family from Mea She’arim to less religious Jews who weren’t as familiar with Shabbat. My mother opened her door without hesitation, and she was an incredible homemaker,” recounted her son, Rabbi Yehoshua Landes.
“My dad would invite all sorts of people, and she would never refuse,” said their second son, Danny. “She would clean the house top to bottom, cook and bake a delicious spread, and make them feel so at home.”
These early efforts laid the foundation not only for Chabad’s arrival, but the establishment of a thriving Jewish life in what later came to be known as Silicon Valley.
Young Prodigy to ‘Superwoman’
Born in 1932 in the Bronx, N.Y., Landes was raised in a tight-knit secular Jewish family, to an Eastern European mother and American father. She graduated as valedictorian from Hunter College High School in 1949 and went on to earn an undergraduate degree from the University of Chicago, in addition to a master’s degree in physics from the University of Rochester. It was there that she met her husband, Yehuda Landes; they married in 1956.
California was back then a land of opportunity, and the young couple packed into their car and drove west. They settled in Palo Alto, where Sandy found work as a physicist, and her husband pursued his doctorate in psychology. Jewish life in northern California was scarce back then, but the couple was committed to building a Jewish home. Not yet Orthodox, they served as board members at the local Conservative congregation, and tried their best to keep a kosher home. Early on, Sandy made extra efforts to bring meat in from Chicago that was of a higher kosher standard.
They had three children: Yehoshua, Danny and Susan. Once she had her first child, she took a pause from her work as a physicist and became a full-time homemaker.
“Even before becoming religious, she was always deeply connected to her Judaism,” said Susan, reflecting on her mother’s lifelong devotion to her heritage.
Finding Chabad
Life changed drastically for the Landeses in 1974. Looking to buy a pair of tefillin for his eldest son, Dr. Landes encountered his first Chabad rabbi, Rabbi Yitzchak Newman of Long Beach, Calif.
Totally unfamiliar with Chabad, he asked Rabbi Newman the single most important interview question he asked of every rabbi applicant at the non-Orthodox congregation where he served on the board: “Do you believe in G‑d?” Unlike the usual evasive answers, Rabbi Newman quickly and unhesitatingly responded, “Yes!” The exchange marked the start of the couple’s lasting connection with Chabad-Lubavitch.
“It was a turning point for our whole family,” remembers Rabbi Yehoshua Landes. “Introduced to a vibrant and meaningful Judaism for the first time, my parents decided to change their entire lifestyle to become Orthodox Jews and Chabad Chassidim in the space of just a year.”
As they studied and became more and more familiar with the teachings of the Rebbe—Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, of righteous memory—they insisted on helping to establish a Chabad center and community in Palo Alto, a place they could call home.
Through their persistent efforts, the Landeses played a critical role in the establishment of Chabad in Palo Alto. In 1976, they had Rabbi Aron Berkowitz brought down, and he began leading services from his garage, where the nascent Chabad House initially struggled to form a minyan. However, with the couple’s unwavering support, the community flourished, hosting everything from weekly Shabbat services to weddings and bar mitzvahs. After four year, Berkowitz left for southern California to start a new Chabad center in Huntington Beach. It was the Landeses who led the efforts to draft a new Chabad emissary to take over the shul and to lead the Jewish community, ensuring the continued growth of the nascent Jewish presence that had been built up from zero.
The Landeses contacted Lubavitch World Headquarters in New York and began speaking almost daily to Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky, the late vice chairman of Merkos L’Inyonei Chinuch—the educational arm of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement—who served as the point person, on behalf of Merkos, for the establishment of Chabad centers. Shortly after, Rabbi Kotlarksy got in touch with a prospective candidate, Rabbi Yosef Levin, and sent him to scout out Palo Alto as a place for him to take over the Chabad community.
“When they brought Rabbi Levin down to visit in the summer of 1980, my mother cooked up a storm,” Yehoshua Landes recalls. “And whatever she did then, together with my father, obviously worked, because after much investment from my parents, Rabbi Levin formally accepted the role.”
For the first three years, Sandy Landes herself served as Chabad of Palo Alto’s treasurer, helping Levin balance the books so they could effectively promote Jewish events and activity. She was also active in their local branch of the N’shei Chabad women’s group, and when the Levins opened a Gan Israel summer camp she was first in line to host the camp counselors for meals.
“The Landeses were there through thick and thin,” says Rabbi Levin. “When we went through financial hardships, it was the Landeses who got me through it to continue full-steam ahead. Sandy was very much in the fabric of the community.”
‘The Paradigm of Logic’
In 1984, with her children grown up and out of the house, Landes went back to work. By this time the Palo Alto region was leading the world in computer technology, and so in her 40s she taught herself computer coding from scratch and got a job at Hewlett-Packard. “I learned the value of hard work from Mom,” her daughter, Susan, shares. “She retired at 70 and they wanted her to keep working.”
“What was so amazing about her was that she worked a full day, and then would come and would be cooking, cleaning, like a new person, running a house, just like that,” says Yehoshua. “That also included having lots of guests—hachnosas orchim. She taught us a different level of hachnosas orchim. She was a superwoman.”
A woman of no frills, she always said things as she saw them. With her, there was no beating around the bush.
“The grandchildren named her ‘Grandma Battleax,’” says Yehoshua, “because she was very straight-forward; no airs or graces. She didn’t care about clothes, shoes and handbags … she said things as they were. Battleaxe—in a good way.”
Landes didn’t attach value to superficial things and was not a materialistic person, although her son Danny notes she may have had a weakness for chocolate.
Yehoshua has a favorite story that demonstrates his mother’s razor-sharp wisdom: “It happened while I was serving as a student rabbi in Perth, Australia. I had a weekly class with university students and one week, a very bright radical atheist decided to challenge me. I struggled to refute his arguments, and I could see that he was having a negative impact on his fellow students. so I called my mother in, as she was visiting at the time. After listening to him talk for two minutes, she simply said, ‘You’re an idiot. Your logic is flawed.’ The room fell silent as she dismantled his reasoning step by step, causing his entire argument to crumble. What took me weeks to accomplish in my outreach, she was able to accomplish in under 45 minutes.”
Landes was a staunchly religious woman. Growing up, her daughter Susan remembers how her mother would only allow chalav Yisrael milk in their home: “The local grocery store did not sell kosher milk. We would take turns as kids, going to the farm with Mom, to watch the cows being milked from start to finish, deeming the milk chalav Yisrael and acceptable for us to drink. I vividly remember the process. It was fun! She only wanted us to have the best, and everyone therefore felt comfortable eating in our house, even the strictest of rabbis.”
Landes’ niece later recalled that her life’s trajectory was drastically altered by her aunt’s unfiltered honesty and deep care. In her younger years she’d been involved in Indian mysticism, exploring other paths away from her Judaism. At a family reunion, Sandy turned to her and declared: “Nu, when are you going to settle down, marry and start a family?”
“I couldn’t imagine anyone else in the family having the guts to say that to her,” recalls Yehoshua. “My mother was a straight-shooter. My cousin told me that thanks to her, my cousin made a complete U-turn in her life and has started dating exclusively Jewish men who want to have a traditional Jewish home. She did, in fact, settle down, marry an Orthodox Jewish guy and start a nice Jewish family.”
‘The Engine That Kept the Train Moving’
After her husband’s passing in 2004, Landes continued in full force with her dedication and care towards her family and community. Dr. Landes had significant correspondence with the Rebbe, discussing his psychological work with a particular focus on meditation.
“Everything my father accomplished after his marriage, whether professionally or with regard to his varied work for Chabad Houses around the world, none of it could have been accomplished without my mothers’ aid and facilitation,” says Danny Landes. “She wasn’t merely a willing spouse, a helpful spouse. She was the engine that kept the train moving along smoothly and rarely derailing.”
In addition to her children, she is survived by grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
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