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“It’s been a great ride,” says Yosef Langer with one of his patented ear-to-ear smiles.

Coming from the motorcycle-riding Orthodox rabbi, now celebrating his 30th year with Chabad of S.F., that’s saying a lot.

Langer’s personal milestone happens to coincide with the 30th anniversary of the annual menorah lighting at Union Square. San Francisco was the first city in America to mount a public event of this kind, and today the custom is duplicated in hundreds of cities around the world.

The rabbi remembers Chanukah 1974 well, when his friend, the late rock impresario Bill Graham, first built the 22-foot high candelabra known as the Mama Menorah. He recalls going up in the cherry-picker truck, dodging pigeons and lighting the candles.

In many ways, that light has never gone out for Langer and his wife Hinda.

The two are virtual institutions in the Bay Area Jewish community, and pioneers of much of what Chabad has accomplished in the region over the years.

Langer became a known figure thanks to his role in the menorah lighting. But the custom was not universally accepted at first. Many were uneasy about a public ceremony, fearing it blurred the line between shul and state.

But the community embraced the event from the get-go and it’s been part of the local holiday scene ever since. “[Public menorah lighting] took off around America,” says Langer, “and the more the opposition, the more the flame grew.”

Over the years, various celebrities have joined Langer at the lighting, among them Carlos Santana, Theodore Bikel, mayors, police chiefs and other city officials. Graham, a Holocaust survivor, was present at the event each year until his death in 1991.

But for Langer, the best part has been seeing the look in the eyes of Jews who gather to celebrate, particularly Russian Jewish immigrants. “These people had never expressed their Judaism in a public way,” he says. “To see them out in the open touched me. Reaching out for the flame of the miraculous is still applicable in our times.”

And that’s just at Chanukah time. Langer has 30 years of memories from his tenure at the helm of Chabad of S.F.

An Oakland native, Langer was a merchant seaman when he met former S.F. Chabad Rabbi Chaim Drizin. “He told me the Merchant Marines were not the place for nice Jewish boy,” recalls Langer. “He sent me to Chabad House in L.A. and then off to yeshiva in New York.”

After Langer’s return to the Bay Area, Drizin relocated to New Mexico. At the time, there were only two local Chabad houses in northern California. Today, thanks in large part to the work of the Langers, there are 23 Chabad rabbis from Carmel to Sacramento.

“People are hungry for their roots and tradition,” explains Langer. “They see a sense of pride and realness in the way Chabad rabbis bring Judaism to life.”

Langer took an iconoclastic approach to Jewish outreach. His trusty Honda motorcycle, complete with bumper seat, became the Mitzvah Bike. Residents grew accustomed to the site of the long-bearded rabbi cruising the city, looking like a member of ZZ Top.

Among the Langers’ proudest achievements is the opening of the Shalom School, now in its second year. “The school was a major point in my life,” he says. “To have a permanent home for the Chabad community enables us to keep our families intact and to work as a family.”

There have been moments of sorrow as well, none more anguishing than the fire at his home, set earlier this year by his 33-year-old son Avi.

But all in all, Langer has loved every minute.

“It’s an honor and a joy to serve my community here,” he says. “The message of the menorah is that a few Maccabees were able to conquer the great armies. I look at Hinda, myself, my Chabad colleagues in the Bay Area, and we have the fire of the Maccabees to touch every Jew and beyond.”