Rieders, Nichols featured in recent news articles

From the April 1, 2012, Williamsport Sun-Gazette

Two Lycoming Law Association members recently made the paper! Cliff Rieders was featured on the front page of the Sunday Sun-Gazette with an article about his efforts to recover Jewish religious objects that lay in the Vatican's basement. The article appeared with the rather provocative title, "Taking on the Vatican."  Read the article.

On the same day, the Sun-Gazette documented the remarkable public service carrier of Bill Nichols.  He started with the Jaycees, and he is still active with the Water and Sewer Authorities.  In January the Association honored Nichols with its Community Service Award.  Read the article.

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Taking on the Vatican
Man wants Jewish items documented, returned

April 1, 2012

The specific list of Jewish religious objects that lay in the Vatican's basement long has been disputed, but one local man, heading up a foundation named for his father, wants to see the items documented, catalogued and possibly returned to a representative of the Jewish people, such as The Israel Museum in Jerusalem.

Local attorney Clifford A. Rieders, president of the Herbert Rieders Foundation for the Recovery of Objects Judaica, has been in communication with the Vatican in an attempt to learn what it possesses.

"I want the Vatican to tell us what's really there," he said.

Rieders hopes to be invited to meet with the Pope and Cardinal Farina, through whom he's communicated thus far, in the fall.

The desire to discover what items the Vatican has began in the 1980s when Rieders' father read an article by Dr. Manfred Lehman about Jewish objects, art and possessions at the Vatican. Lehman took a strong view that most of the Vatican Judaica was obtained improperly because of persecution by the Catholic Church.

After Herbert's death, the foundation began to explore the Vatican Judaica collection, how it arrived in the Vatican and what its future may be.

The foundation has one of the greatest collections in the world about what is in the Vatican, Rieders said.

Last fall, the foundation released a documentary titled "Vatican Judaica, Golden Treasures, The Vatican Jewish Collection" to educate people on what their collection reveals and what scholars believe is there.

"It debunks a lot of myths as to what may be there," he said.

As the documentary grows in popularity, Rieders has been asked to speak around the world, but he still is waiting to hear if he will talk to the Vatican.

"I would love to do that," he said.

Some of the rumors about the Vatican's collection come from pop culture. The Ark of the Covenant is considered largely because of the Steven Spielberg film Raiders of the Lost Ark. Another item is the chalice of Jesus because of Dan Brown's novel "The Da Vinci Code," in which the main character uses clues in Da Vinci portraits to find the location of a religious relic.

Unlike the novel, Rieders wants to keep what he is doing based on fact.

"I'm not interested in sensationalism," he said.

Most scholars feel the items rumored to be in the Vatican, which also includes the menorah from the Second Temple, no longer exist, Rieders said.

Instead what they believe is inside are the oldest original manuscripts and the oldest Bible.

Over the centuries, the Bible has been censored and edited, he said. Scholars can receive a clearer picture of the original text by looking at older copies.

People today know what was written upon the Ten Commandments, but by having manuscripts from people who originally wrote about them, it gives scholars more with which to work.

As an example, Rieders provided the sixth commandment, "You shall not murder." He asked if that meant it was permissable to kill in self-defense.

In addition to the manuscripts, he said there could be important objects of art that were used in religious ceremonies to show how people lived.

In the last few years, the Vatican has begun to catalogue, Rieders said.

"The Vatican has been showing more," he said. "We're seeking total disclosure."

The manuscripts could be extremely valuable study aides for anyone who studies archeology, history and religion, Rieders said.

Foundation for Recovery

The Herbert Rieders Foundation for the Recovery of Objects Judaica is working to cooperate with the Vatican to get the answers, the disclosure and the voluntary returns it seeks.

As an alternative to returning the items, Rieders said one possibility is to have a joint depository, perhaps in Jerusalem, so the objects and manuscripts can go back and forth.

The foundation is the only organization in the world to receive answers to the questions it posed to the Vatican, according to Rieders.

"It was a very feisty response," Rieders said. "They're very protective of what they've got. The breakthrough is that they responded ... It's the fruits of almost 50 years of work."

Sister Jacinta Cosica answered the 17 questions on behalf of Cardinal Raffaele Farina in 2007.

She gave a detailed explanation of the history of the Vatican Jewish collection, which seems to begin immediately following the Sack of Rome in 1527.

"The Vatican Library collection of Judaica consists only of ... Hebrew books, both printed books and manuscripts," she wrote. "At present, aside from several hundreds of early printed books, The Vatican Library holds 907 Hebrew manuscripts."

All of the manuscripts are detailed in the "Hebrew manuscripts in the Vatican Library: Catalogue." The Hebrew Incunabula are listed in "Hebrew Incunabula in the collections of the Vatican Library."

"Regarding the supposed existence of a 'catacombs collection,' we may state definitely that such an allegation is baseless," Cosica wrote.

She also denied that the Judaica collections held in the Vatican Library are not a bulk of stolen property and that the Judaica items will not be excluded from public display.

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More than 1/2 a century of community service
Awards, honors highlight work done by Bill Nichols

April 1, 2012

Benjamin Franklin said, "well done is better than well said."

For William "Bill" E. Nichols, getting things done never seemed to be a problem.

Nichols, 83, has held many different leadership roles and sat on numerous boards and committees within Lycoming County to help improve the community.

He has lived in Williamsport his whole life, aside from attending college at Penn State University and Dickinson School of Law, and three years in the Navy as an Anti-Submarine Warfare officer during the Korean War.

Nichols began practicing law in 1957 at the former law firm of Furst, McCormick, Muir, Lynn and Reeder, now the McCormick Law Firm. His expertise was in wills, estates, taxes and corporate organization and planning.

Nichols practiced law for 51 years before retiring at the age of 79 to take care of his late wife, Patricia.

"I was a small town lawyer and I enjoyed the practice in a small town," Nichols said. "Most of my clients were not only clients, they were friends. I enjoyed it very much."

He began his community involvement in Lycoming County by becoming active with the Jaycees, who presented him with the Young Man of the Year Award.

"That (award) launched me into a lot of things," he said. "I was Cancer Crusade Chairman on the Lycoming County Lung and Respiratory Disease Board for over 20 years in the early days. I was on the Visiting Nurses Board and we started Meals on Wheels."

Nichols was the founding father of STEP Inc. - Social Services Training and Education Program - which he formed in 1964 and served as their president for five years.

"I think the main thing back then, 1964, President Kennedy had passed the Economic Opportunity Act," Nichols said. "The mayor (at the time) came over to my office and asked me if I would start an organization under that act. The organizations are called CAP - Community Action Program - organizations ... That organization I formed was called STEP."

STEP is now a bi-county organization with an office in both Lycoming and Clinton counties and employs about 250 people. It helps with early learning, housing options, workforce development and employment, community collaboration and independent living.

Nichols also has served on the James V. Brown Library Board for the past 50 years, serving as chairman twice. He said the library has become very sophisticated over the years and he is very proud to have been a part of the improvements that have been made to the library, physically and internally.

He also has served as president of Williamsport City Council, and in 1972, he was on a commission to change the form of government in the city, he said.

"The city adopted a mayor-council form of government, which we have now, and I was on that council and chairman of it for the first four years," Nichols said. "In those four years, we developed the administrative code for the city ... making it more unified and efficient."

He served as chairman for the Williamsport Lycoming Foundation for several years, where he changed the organization to a not-for-profit corporation.

"The West Branch Symphony in Lewisburg asked us (the Foundation) for $25,000 a year for five years for a director, and we said we would do it if they did two things," he said. "One, you have to change the name to Williamsport Symphony, and two, you have to hold them (concerts) up here in our theatre, and they did. And that was the birth of the Williamsport Symphony."

Nichols has served the community as chairman of the Water Authority since 1978 and is on the Sewer Authority Board. He was on the board for the former Williamsport Hospital, now Williamsport Regional Medical Center, for eight years, and he also has served on the boards of the Lycoming Law Association, the Williamsport Chamber of Commerce, the Lycoming United Way, Lycoming Tuberculosis and Respiratory Disease Association, the American Cancer Society, was editor of the Lycoming Reporter and served as solicitor for the Lycoming County Historical Society for more than 40 years.

He was honored by the Lycoming Law Association in January with their newly created Community Service Award, which has been named after Nichols.

"It's a matter of interest, and that is my main interest, to do these things," Nichols said. "Everyone has their own hobby and I guess maybe this kind of stuff turned into being my hobby."

In addition to the work he was doing for the community, he also enjoyed playing tennis, golf, dry fly fishing and has always had a passion for singing.

"I sang all my life. As a boy (I sang) soprano," he said. "I sang at Covenant Central Presbyterian Church ... I sang for about the last 50 years at Trinity Episcopal Church. I sang a solo every Christmas Eve. And in high school, we used to have a quartet - we called it Three Sharps and a Flat."

Of all of the things Nichols has done in his life, he is most proud of his family. He is the father of five sons, two of which live in Williamsport, and one daughter. He has 11 grandchildren and one great-grandchild.

"My greatest happiness is my family, I have a great set of children. They are all very successful," he said.

Nichols has a wealth of knowledge about the history of Williamsport and the changes the community has gone through over the years.

He attributes that knowledge to 83 years of living in Williamsport and to staying active within the community.

"All of these things I've done, I have learned a lot about the community," he said. "This is my home."