Nissan Mindel was born in Riga, Latvia in March, 1912, one of nine children, to Yaakov Yitzchak and Bunia Mindel.[3] His connection with Chabad started in 1928 when the sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, lived in Riga.[4] In 1930, He traveled to England where he stayed for a few years and where he got married in 1937,[5] after which he returned to Riga. He left Riga for America by way of Sweden together with Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak and his entourage,[6] arriving at New York in March 1940,[7] and settled at Long Beach where he was one of the founders of the Young Israel of Long Beach.[8] He died in Crown Heights, Brooklyn in 1999.[9]
In the United States, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak suggested that Mindel translate Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi's Tanya into English, an effort that had been attempted numerous times before without success.[10]
Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak also requested that Mindel write a monthly magazine for children. The first issue of the children’s magazine, Shmuessen Mit Kinder (inYiddish), was published for Hanukkah 1942. A second monthly, Talks and Tales (in English), was added shortly afterward. These two magazines were published every month for the next 47 years. Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson checked every issue of Talks and Tales before it went to print, continuing to do so after he became Rebbe, and Rabbi Chaim Mordechai Aizik Hodakov checked the Shmuessen Mit Kinder.[11]
After the war ended, his wife was able to join him in the United States. She helped with translating and proofreading the children’s magazines and other works.[11]
In 1942, He accompanied Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak on his trip to Chicago, and in 1947, he sent him to France, England, and Germany on several fact-finding social and educational missions.[11]
In the 1950s and 1960s, Rabbi Menachem Mendel sent him numerous times to Russia, to retrieve manuscripts and to strengthen the spirits of the Jews behind the Iron Curtain; to South Africa for Jewish communal matters; to the Suez Canal for the printing of the Tanya; and to Israel for communal matters and meetings with dignitaries and political figures. In the 1970s and 1980s, he sent him to Washington, D.C., and to Albany, New York, for conferences on education and aging, as well as on missions to Russia to retrieve manuscripts and books and to Israel for educational purposes.[12]
Mindel recorded a great deal of Chabad history and helped edit the memoirs of the sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak.[13]
Mindel authored works published by Chabad's Kehot Publication Society including the first official translation of the Tanya in English.[2] His works include:
The Tanya – the official Chabad English translation of the Tanya
Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi – a biography of the Chabad movement's founder
