A home away from home.
For the people who live in these mountains, the ones who keep coming back, and everyone in between. The door is open. You are expected.
The same view, four times a year. That is the whole pitch for this place.
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Who we are
The lamp is already there. We only bring the match.
The Lubavitcher Rebbe often described his emissaries as lamplighters — the ones who walked the streets at dusk with a long pole, reaching up to lamps that were already full of oil and waiting. Nothing had to be added to them. They only needed someone willing to come far enough to reach.
Some of those lamps, he said, stand in difficult places — on a bridge, out at sea, far from anywhere anyone would think to look. Those were the ones he cared about most, and it is why Chabad went to small towns and remote corners long before it was obvious anyone was there to find.
Lake Placid is one of those places. A long way from the nearest large Jewish community, and full of people who arrived for a season, a job, a race or a life, and quietly assumed their Jewish life would have to stay behind.
It doesn't. A Chabad House was never designed as an institution — the first ones were somebody's living room, and the idea has not moved on much since. No membership, no dues, no test at the door. Whatever you know, whatever you keep, whatever you have or have not done in twenty years: you are already one of us, and we are simply glad you found us.
The people here
Two people, sent with a purpose.
Opened 2026 · Chabad-Lubavitch in the High Peaks
Chabad of Lake Placid is Rabbi Chaim and Henchi Langsam — Chabad-Lubavitch emissaries to the Adirondacks.
They are part of a worldwide family of the Rebbe's emissaries: thousands of couples sent to every corner of the world, in cities and in places far smaller than this one. Lake Placid is now one of those corners.
Which means a worldwide movement has a local address here. Write to it and one of them reads your note personally, and answers it themselves. No committee, no office, no queue.
How to connect
Start with a coffee.
Nothing here asks for a background, a commitment, or a level of observance. Come once and you are a regular.
- I
Coffee on Main Street
The easiest way in. Good coffee, an unhurried hour, and whatever happens to be on your mind. Send a note and we’ll find a morning.
- II
Torah, one to one
Short, real, and never over your head. One idea, an honest conversation about it, and no expectation of what you do next.
- III
Tefillin, anywhere
A minute of your morning, wherever you already are — the trailhead, the rink, the parking lot. We’ll come to you.
For athletes & coaches
You came here to train. Bring the rest of yourself too.
Lake Placid is one of a handful of towns anywhere in the world where the winter-sports venues never went quiet. The ski jumps, the sliding track at Mount Van Hoevenberg, the speed-skating oval and Whiteface are all still in daily use, and the athlete training center here has been active since 1982, with resident athletes living on the complex or out in town among everyone else.
Which means that at any point in the year this small mountain town holds a rotating population of Jewish athletes, coaches, physios and parents — here for a training block, a camp, a race weekend or a whole season. Far from home, on a demanding schedule, in a place with no Jewish infrastructure to fall back on.
We are that infrastructure. Not a program, not a commitment — just a familiar face in a town where you don't have one yet. Tefillin before a session. A coffee on a rest day. Someone to reach when you want to mark something, or simply want an hour with another Jew.
The place
There is no wrong time to come.
Six million acres of park, forty-six High Peaks, and a lake in the middle of town.
Based in Lake Placid.
Open to everyone across the High Peaks — Saranac Lake, Tupper Lake, and the miles of road in between.
Support the work
None of this is funded by anyone but us.
No membership, no dues, no ticket at the door — which only works because other people decide this should exist. Every gift goes straight into the next coffee, the next class, the next pair of tefillin brought to somebody in this town.
Make a donationSay hello
Tell us as much or as little as you like.
Living here, passing through, or in town for a training block — send a note. A real person reads every message.
- Where
- Lake Placid, New York — exact location on request
Stay in the loop
Candle lighting times and what is happening locally.