Aly Raisman Gets Cheers Back Home
Stunned: Aly Raisman watches as she was placed fourth in the individual women?s Olympic gymnastics competition. Image by getty images
A line snakes down the lawn of the red brick town hall topped by a gold cupola of this New England town founded in 1711, today a suburb of Boston. So many fans have arrived to cheer on Aly Raisman, the hometown Olympic hero, for an “Aly Rally” that overflow rooms are opened and some are even turned away.
A crowd of some 500 people, a mix of pony-tailed preteen girls, former classmates, and residents who have ducked out of work, has come together as a community to watch a live feed of Raisman competing for gold in the women’s all-around gymnastics event at the London Olympics. Among them is Susan Faber.
Faber, 71, is Raisman’s maternal grandmother and she is nervous.
“She grew up overnight in my eyes,” Faber says of Raisman, who as captain of the U.S. women’s gymnastics team helped lead her squad to gold on Tuesday. “I can’t wait till she gets home so I can put my arms around her.”
After the rounds of “Let’s Go Aly” cheers subside, Faber sits perfectly still and watches the large screen hanging over the town hall’s sprawling stage as her granddaughter warms up for her uneven parallel routine.
For more, go to Haaretz.com
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Dive In
-
Fast Forward A federal agency survey reportedly asks Barnard employees if they’re Jewish
-
Fast Forward NIH bans grants for schools that boycott Israeli companies
-
Fast Forward An elite Jewish society at Yale fractures over its director’s embrace of Itamar Ben-Gvir
-
Fast Forward After outcry, Cornell president cancels pro-Palestinian performer chosen for campus concert
Most Popular
- 1
Opinion The dangerous Nazi legend behind Trump’s ruthless grab for power
- 2
Opinion I first met Netanyahu in 1988. Here’s how he became the most destructive leader in Israel’s history.
- 3
Opinion Yes, the attack on Gov. Shapiro was antisemitic. Here’s what the left should learn from it
- 4
News Who is Alan Garber, the Jewish Harvard president who stood up to Trump over antisemitism?
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward A federal agency survey reportedly asks Barnard employees if they’re Jewish
-
Opinion A Palestinian leader just gave Trump an unprecedented opening to pursue peace
-
Fast Forward NIH bans grants for schools that boycott Israeli companies
-
Fast Forward An elite Jewish society at Yale fractures over its director’s embrace of Itamar Ben-Gvir
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.