Jewish girls rarely had a bat mitzvah ceremony when Helen Kaplan came of age in Price Hill in southwestern Ohio.
But 84 years after she turned 12, Kaplan will have her bat mitzvah October 15 in her religion's holiest of places - Jerusalem.
The ceremony for Kaplan, now 96, and eight of her fellow residents at Cedar Village retirement home will be the centerpiece of a 10-day trip to Israel that began Monday.
The widowed mother of five children, 11 grandchildren and one great-grandchild says she's excited to be going to the land of her people.