This first installment of Historical Sketches, focuses on the organizational skills of the Chabad-Lubavitch leaders, describing their far-reaching efforts on behalf of the social and communal well-being of their brethren, beginning with the founder of the movement, Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, known as the Alter Rebbe. 

Penned by Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe, this monograph describes the process with which Rabbi Schneur Zalman imparted to his earliest followers the basic tenets of his newly developed Chabad philosophy, and tells of the challenges faced by Rabbi Schneur Zalman from two main camps that opposed the growing Chasidic movement: the Mitnagdim and the rising Haskalah (Enlightenment) movement.