Abe Lynn
Abe Lynn was born in Dallas on April 3, 1899, to parents who had emigrated from Poland and Russia, from places he recalled as Bialystok and a town near it. His father came first to New York, worked and saved enough to bring over his wife and the two children born in the old country, Morris and Sarah, before the family moved to Dallas and settled in the North Dallas neighborhood that was home to many Jewish immigrants. His father worked as a peddler carrying dry goods to the country, and at times ran a store and a wholesale produce business. The family was strictly Orthodox, keeping kosher with separate dishes for meat, milk, and Passover.
Abe grew up in the North Dallas area once known as Frogtown or Little Jerusalem, living on Harwood near Wichita in a two-story house his father built in 1909. From a very young age he and his brother Bill sold newspapers on downtown corners, bringing all their earnings home to their mother. He attended Cumberland Hill School and Dallas High School, where he played baseball in 1918, and studied Hebrew at the Tiferet Israel shul under Mr. Weinstein and at home with his father. He did not graduate high school, and afterward trained at Metropolitan Business College and worked as a stenographer for firms including Sanger Brothers, the Texas and Pacific Railroad, and a produce company.
Abe later sold encyclopedias for Collier's, ran his own business until 1949, and served two years in the Pacific during World War Two. Returning home, he and his wife bought and ran private schools, including a kindergarten, and adopted two children whom he raised as Jews. Over the years the family lived in North Dallas, South Dallas, on Beverly Drive, and finally on Norway Road. A member of Temple Emanu-El since his youth, he grew more distant from formal religious observance in later life. He recalled the T.O.O. Club, the YMHA above Dreyfus and Son, the Columbian Club, the mikvah at Tiferet Israel, and the many Jewish peddlers, butchers, and saloon keepers of early Dallas.
Full Transcript
Hey, Lynn. It is June the 30th, 1983, and we are here in the Dallas Jewish Archives room. All right, this is Ginger Jacobs, and we'll be talking with Mr. Lynn. Now, Mr. Lynn, how long have you lived in Dallas? I was born here in 1899, the fourth day, third day of April. Where were your parents from? Poland, Sualga Bernie, which was Russia at the time, and Bialystok. When did they come here, do you know? They came here about 1889 or 1890, back in the day. Do you know why they left Russia or Russia? Yeah, the old man left on, I think he kind of left the army, I don't know.
Did they come to, where did they come to when they came here? He came to New York, but Dad came first, because he made enough money to bring him a mother rope. And my Morris, my sister Morris, and my sister Sarah were born in the old country, the rest of us were born here. How come he came to Dallas? How did he happen to come to Dallas? Well, all the rest of the Hebrews were coming here too, and all of them settled in one spot, made it nice in North Dallas. Did he know people who lived in Dallas before he came here? Well, not unless they were the Jews of his spot, and I don't know who were here first.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. When did your mother come? She came to Dallas with him. Did she come to Dallas from Europe? No, yeah, from, no, she met him in New York and probably come move to Dallas. My dad worked in New York first and then came here. I see. Was there any Jewish education when you were growing up in Dallas? Oh yes. They had the commentary was in school and the shul and Mr. Weinstein was the teacher. Which show was that? To Ferris Israel on Highland Street which is now Hackard About what year was that Oh that was I went anywhere from about 1906 through high school My dad would take me and I'd have to sell papers on the street all day long, and at night I'd have to take, listen, learn Hebrew, and I didn't get my listens, and I didn't graduate high school.
about a credit or two. And in place of getting my lessons, they gave me the Hebrew, which wasn't too good. He wasn't a good teacher? Who? Mr. Weinstein. Yeah, well, my mother said he was a good teacher, but he didn't know too much. He was like most of the bridge players. The professional bridge players, teachers don't know how to play, don't know how to play but know how to teach, and that's the same thing with him. What school, grammar school did you go to? Cumberland Hill High School. And then we went from there to the Chicken Cup, which was on Bryan Street. We went to the sixth grade, then you went to the Chicken Cup, which is a four-story frame building next to Bryan Street High School, or Dallas High School at the time.
You went there for the seventh grade and then you went to high school. I see. Now you're calling it the Chicken Cook. What was the name of the school? The school was Bryan Street High, Dallas High School, but that was just a framed building beside the high school. And we called it the Chicken Cook, which was the high school. That was the nickname. Yeah, but that was part of the high school? Oh, yeah. And they just used that for seventh grade then? I guess it was. I don't know whether it was part of the high... I don't think it was probably the grade. Just the seventh grade is all it was.
Yeah. Then what time did you go to Hebrew school? When you... Hebrew school. We went to the summertime. We had to sell papers in the evening after school to bring money home. And probably went there in the summertime. You didn't go to Hebrew school during the winter? They didn't have classes during the winter time? Well, probably did, but probably went to Weinstein at night on Sunday. And Dad would teach us at night. What did he teach you? He taught us Hebrew out of the Old Testament He was much of a teacher but we would just take the Old Testament and we would read it and he would explain what it was which was a very poor way of teaching this Hebrew but we did get the Hebrew lesson Did he ever use a siddur, the prayer book, or did he just use the...
Food. Your daddy. Oh, yes. Now my mother, my mother could read Hebrew and could translate it word for word. She was well educated, my dad could too, but my mother was better. Get out of here. Now how did they teach you? Did they just teach you how to read? That's all. Just to read. How to read and then that's all they did, would teach you how to read. My dad would teach you how to translate it. Now in going to grammar school, you said you went to... How many grades were there in grammar school now, in the high school? The sixth grade, Cumberland Hill School has had it to the sixth, and then the seventh grade was over next to Cumberland Hill School, next to Dallas High School is what the name of it was.
It's been changed a dozen times. Right. And the seventh grade was there. When the seventh grade you got promoted, you went to the high school the first year. They didn't have any eighth grade in those days. And how many years then did you go to the high school? Four. Four years. They had the same four years at that time. About what time frame, years, in terms of years was that? Who? When did you graduate in high school? What year? I didn't graduate. Well, when would you have? 1918. Okay. You mentioned or you showed me a picture of your baseball team that you participated in. High School team, Dallas High School team, the spring of 1918.
Did many Jewish kids play athletics? There wasn't any. Were there any? There wasn't any. Most of the Jews in those days, when they graduated, when they got out of grammar school, they quit. They didn't care. That was something And you tell somebody who was going to high school it like he was going to college Did they when the Jewish kids quit what kind of jobs could they get Well some of them did and some of them didn't. Now Mara Chosky probably never went past the sixth grade. Then what did he do when he finished the sixth grade? He went to work for the bank. He took some lessons, banking lessons, so he says.
And what did you do when you graduated high school? I went to work as a stenographer. Now, where did you get your training? Did you take typing? I went to Metropolitan Business College about six months and I was a stenographer for about four years. And then from there I went to work for, no, when I got out of high school I worked for Sanger Brothers, that's where it was, for four and a half a week. Then I went back and took this course and worked as a stenographer for a while, I worked for a produce house, a Jackson produce company for about four years. and after that time people were making average man $25 a week was a big salary.
This paid me $30. I was doing more of most of the work. I was doing, we had a bookkeeping machine and I checked all the invoices. And that's, they didn't want, I started to quit and they paid me that much money to go. After I left there, I went to work for Collier's on the road selling encyclopedias. And I made too damn much money and I didn't have the sense of the way. Average man is making $25 a week and now he's making $300. Selling encyclopedias? Oh, yeah. A lot of people are in town. They give you a gift to Jesus. Call on schools. I made enough money in one or two weeks to buy a brand new automobile.
From then on, I was in a gender spy business until 1949. I was 43 years old, or a forgotten witch. And I sold out my business and I quit and joined the CBs and spent two years over in New Guinea fighting the Japs. When I came back here, my old lady had been teaching school and she called somebody somebody, if she wanted to hire somebody to work in the private school, she said no. So we bought the school, she sold out, and we bought the school. And then after a while we bought another one. And that's where we lived for the last thirty years. About what years were you, before you sold Encyclopedias, were you working for Sanger Brothers?
I worked for Sanger Brothers by 1918, oh, I forgot. And then I worked there for about three weeks. Then I worked for the Texas and Pacific Railroad company for about four or five months, six months. And then I took that snog, that's where it was. Did you do, or what did you do like with Texas and Pacific? Oh, I didn't file anything a kid could do. So it was all clerical work that you were trying, I see. And then you went into sales. Um, what about your Jewish observance at home? They were strictly, my folks were strictly Orthodox. everything was kosher. They had meat dishes and milk dishes and they had dishes for Passover and they had dishes for everything, knives and forks and everything else that was thick and kosher.
How have you changed over the years? I don't eat ham, I don't eat pork, and a lot of things that I haven't done that I shouldn't be getting old and angry, I tell you I belong to Perry Nichols since 1913 and when the kids were growing up I sent them to the temple because they wouldn understand what it all about And I been paying my dues even after they were grown I still belong to it and we go on Yom Kippur and Russia shunning for years and I've been paying it and one about three four years ago I got a letter from one of the advertisers and I went and said If you don't pay so much money, we'll drop you as a member of the Temple Emanuel.
I wrote back, you're absolutely correct. If anybody don't pay you this much money, they shouldn't be dropped and dropped me. Now all of a sudden, I got me a letter right back. We would stay in there. Then the next year, they wrote a letter and said, if you don't answer this letter, you won't get any tickets to go to Rush, Southern, Yonge Kipper. I didn't answer, and they didn't send me any tickets, and that's the only time we ever went to Rush, Southern, Yonge Kipper. And I quit. And I got a letter from the rabbi, and they wrote Arthur Stern and Dr. Loeb and all the young folks or something.
I don't know what it was. And I got mad and I don't send them any money. The money that I used to send to the temple, I turned around and gave them to the parish. Now, what about the rest of the holidays? Did you attend synagogue as a child? As a child, yes. But I got grown old. When did you make the break and how? Oh, what the hell, after I got grown and on my own, I didn't go to any. I'd go to Yorkside for my folks, and I'd still go, and I'd go to Washington and Yonge Kippert. But I can't even go now because I can't sit still that long in the parathysmal.
Do you go part of the time now? Once in a while I go for a little while, since I can't take it. Let's talk about where you lived in Dallas. I lived in Harwood, Rosewood, and Wichgau Street. From what years Well we lived there for they probably lived on Alamo Street That I don know No we lived on Harwood Harwood in Wichita And then in 1909, I don't know before that, but Dad tore down that house and we moved in the house next door. He got by the property rather. And we moved next door and he built that house in 1909. Two story house. Is that the one on Wichita?
On Harwood. On Harwood? Harwood and Wichita. Oh, alright. That was a little, well, one time it was Frogtown and then called Little Jerusalem and then Old Mexico. It was Rosewood in Wichita, they've changed it to Harwood. I don't know why. Oh, okay. Okay. Okay. Up until, so he built that in 1909, you said? 1909. I remember it had on a MCMIX. Uh-huh. How long did you all live there? We lived there until 1929. We still lived there. I think they moved to South Dallas right afterwards. We bought a house on South Boulevard. South Boulevard and what? We lived there. About what years? Oh, about 1929 when my mother died in 54.
What was the, do you remember the address or the cross streets? 1904? What do you mean? South Boulevard? When you're in South Boulevard. 1904. That's right next to the railroad track. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. What about afterwards now, where did you move? Well then, after my mother died, my sister bought a house and my brother, Sam, lived with her and they bought one out on Greenwood Heights, Greenwood way over up Greenwood Street over here and close uh back over in that direction over the west Near Lemon? No, it's up towards... It's in the better part of it. It's up there on the other side of the university or uh...
Greenway Parks? That's where it's at, Greenway Parks. Greenway Parks, okay. Then after... Tell what year? Give me a year, Frank. My sister lived there. I didn't. Oh, you didn't live? What about where you lived then? There I still, where in the hell was it? Daniel Freckner, I guess. Oh, I lived on Homer Street. And then I was married and we moved back here and had this school that was after, after I come back to the war. So my mother must have left there. My mother lived in South Dallas in 1954 until she died. Then after that they moved. Esther moved. Sam. Now, um, yeah. Sprang it up to the present day, after you moved to Homer Street, that would...
Well, we moved over in that school. We were busted right after the war. We bought the school and we lived in one little room back then. Okay. and made a little money and we pulled around and adopted a couple of kids. So I bought a house across the street on the corner of Rock Martin and Hershel. We stayed there about two, three years. So I made a little more money and we bought a house on South Boulevard. Can you give me an idea of the year? What? Year, year, year. Oh, let's see. We walked to school in 45. We walked the other one in about 46.
We adopted the kids in 46. And that's when we moved out of the school on that house on Throckmorton, whatever it was in Herschel. And that was in 1946. We stayed there until about, oh, we stayed there until about 52. 53 and then we bought this house on South Boulevard. And then where did you go from South Boulevard? South Boulevard, which stays there about 58. And we sold this house on South Boulevard, which was bad, for $33,000. It's worth a half a million a day. Anyway, and we bought a house on Norway Road, that's where we are now. We've been there since 57, 58. So you moved from 7,058.
I'll tell you another thing, we had, but Dad bought all that property in Harwood and Wichita, oh I guess we had about 30,000 square feet. We had that and sold that for Pace for about 15 years ago. Sold some on Cedar Springs. What kind of school did you have? What kind of what? School. You said you bought a school. A nursing school, kindergarten. She had the kindergarten. She taught first grade. Was that one of the first or earlier kindergartens in Dallas? I don't know what they had, but at that particular time, about a year or two later, they just asked us to open another school in South Dallas, and we bought one with another woman.
woman. And opened one up there and we no more than opened it up and all of a sudden they moved the temple south and left us high and dry. There was nothing fun of there but a bunch of niggers. And we sold out. We didn't lose any money on it, maybe. That was in the early 50s, wasn't it? What about the Jewish organizations over the years? Well, I belonged to it at that time about 19, 19 or 20. I belonged to it. We had one, kids who started one was a T.O.O. Club. And after a while, it was just for the youngsters, and after a while, it got so good that all the older men were in there.
We were about 22 years old, 30, 35 years old men were getting in there, and they messed it all up. What does the T.O.O. Club stand for this? I don't know. You don't know? Do you remember the year that you formed it? The Morris Fares are the ones that probably... Morris and No the Chessman boys that who they were Willie and Harry About what year That was about 19... that was about 1919 to about 22-3. And that... it was it. What did they do? You know, what type of club? Well, it was social clubs and we used to take the girls and take them to the...
They all go together and go to the majestic theater and take them out to a picnic, a hayride. And it was pretty nice. Until, like I tell you, they all got in there. Ben Goldberg and a couple others in there that's a whole hell of a lot older. Every 10 years older got in there, and that blew it. Did you know Ben Goldberg? No, I don't remember Ben Goldberg. What about some of the other organizations you remember? That's the only one I know, not unless they had a YMHA downtown right over, well it was right up over at Rivership at the time. I don't know who was there now.
Yeah, but what year was that? Do you remember? Yeah. They must have been about from 16 to about 21, 22. Now Dreyfus was located with... Right under the bottom. We were right over Dreyfus. But where were they, were they still on Elm and Irving? They weren't on Elm and Irving then. No, they were on Maine. Okay, Maine and... Oh wait a minute, they were on Main and Irving when they took the... Not Main and Irving. They were up further. Okay. Up there in front of us by the Southland Hotel. Do you remember where the Southland Hotel was? Because it still is? I don't know why it's still there or not.
That's on Harwood. Southland Hotel, Southland's on Main Street. Oh wait a minute, yes, I'm sorry. That's over close to where the... Well it's just kind of called... Near Griffin. I'm going to touch, uh, Dreyfus was catecholored. Okay. Okay, we were talking about the, uh, Dreyfus and Son. Well, Dreyfus and Son was on Main and Mowry, it's on the... corner And the YMHA was over How is it that the YMHA has the area over the store do you know How is it that the YMHA was able to have the room over the store? It was a big, a driver's only had the bottom floor. And the top floor was probably empty.
They didn't use all of it. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So they leased it, is that it? I don't know how they did it. You don't know how they did it? I don't know how they did it. I was 15, 16 years old when they all played the tennis courts. What were some of the things you did up there? What were some of the activities? Well, they played basketball, and they played handball. That's about all they could do upstairs. Did they go after school? Well, we would do that on evening, maybe on Saturday evening or Sunday. Was there somebody, an adult, that worked with you? Well, there may have been, but I don't know.
Somebody, they didn't show us how, when they were 15 years old, hell if you didn't know you did. Did they just go in the room or what happened? They grew up this one and they had the... I don't remember. All I know, you're about to have a couple of baskets this way and one this way. And we played basketball in there. Do you remember when they bought the building on Pocahontas? Pocahontas? On Pocahontas Street where the YMHA moved afterwards? in South Dallas. I don't remember. It was just south of the... Who was it? The YMHA? The YMHA. They called it the Parkview Club and the YMHA took it over.
Oh, they might have done that. Must have been about 1920 because they probably bought the old Elks Club building. The old club moved there by 1921-22 on Main Street. 1920 on Main Street. That's probably when they bought it, after they moved out. The old Colombian club was down on Irving Street. Did you never went to the YMHA when it was on Pocahontas Possibly once I don think so Mm Last time I got grown hell out of it doing a lot of other things I shouldn't. Only I wish I'd have done more. Come on. What about your housing over the years when you were in were in North, Old North Dallas, when you were in Frogtown.
Was it frame? Was it rigged? What was the house? Well, the house on Alamo Street was probably a frame house. And then before my dad bought, built this house on, on, on Harwood and Wichita, it wasn't frame. The only thing is we didn't have, we had the toilets were on the outside. And we didn't put any, put in the inside bath and toilet. And I was about, until my sister Sarah got married, it was about 1912. She got married December 12th. We must have put it in a little before. She and Robert Stern lived with us for, oh, until Eugene was born. He lived with us about four years.
And then they moved to South Dallas. Was that the usual, that a lot of the parents have the kids living with them after they got married? You had to do that to get married. You had to have to get married. You didn't have any money. About what year? You said 1912. Well, they must have moved about 1917, somewhere in 1970. He bought a house on Pennsylvania. Mr. Stern, Robert Stern. Let's go back to organizations for a minute. Were there any other organizations you were a member of? No. The Columbia Club was for the rich folks. There wasn't any, the only club that we had was like I tell you, the T.O.O.
club. We had a bunch of us kids organize it. And they've got so good that till all the other guys jumped in it and first said, You know, there wasn't it, and we all quit. About what year was that? That must have been about, uh, I think from 19 to about 22. What about other organizations for the years? That's all. What about some of the civic organizations, the non-Jewish organizations you remember? thing I've blown through the Elks Club Elks Lodge I've been playing poker there ever since well to tell you the truth well the rest of the Jews would quit and go to work my mother let me play poker with them at night and I used to win more money off of them playing poker than they would work and I would take all that money and give it to my sisters they didn't mean anything come in those days that i may win 12 15 20 a week and i've been doing that ever since since i've been 18.
they poke with the best of them i just some people have card sense and some don't i play bridge with the best of them i mean the best in the world i could hold moan i don't know what i could now You play bridge? Badly. McKinnon Street, and there were just four-room houses with no baths. If there were, I don't know. I think there was a bath. There was no hot water. He had three and then he had bought one. He bought some property across the street on Cedar Springs. And he built one house and the other one was still there. It was an old house.
What did he do? Was he a builder? Did he get into the building? No, my dad was a peddler. Of what? Well, he'd pick up dry goods and carry it out in the country and he'd bring that back in and swap it like most of them did. That what he did Had he done that in Europe too before he came No my dad I think when he left here before I can remember that they had a little store and the store burned down. And that's when he left. That's as far as I can remember. So he was always a peddler then when he came here?
He didn't change what he was doing? Well, he did. At one time, many were, wait a minute, now he was, he was in business with old man Golden, with the golden pickle cup that was here, Simon Golden, old man. They run a store a little while. And then he was in the produce, the wholesale produce business on Camp Street, about 1978, till about four or five years. All right, let's talk about the houses now. As he built those houses, were they all framed? All framed. They were all framed. They were just put up together to rent. They cost them, in those days, about $400. And what about the houses you lived in?
Well, that's the house. Now, the house we lived in was a good house. We put in 19-nine, I think it cost us about $9,000, two-story house. You had twelve, eight kids, so you had to have a big house. Was it also framed, or was it brick? It was framed, all of the frames. That was the one on Wichita. It was framed, but it was a good house because we had it, I can remember that we had a German named Norman to build it, and he was supposed to have it rat-proof. But a cat got up in there and killed it, and went to stake it, and we had to tear it out get it up.
What about when you moved to South Dallas, were those homes brick or were they framed? Framed. And Norway Road? My house on Norway, it's a brick. And on South Boulevard, it's a brick. And I don't mean South Boulevard, I mean Beverly Drive. When did you live on Beverly Drive? From 1952 to about 1958 nine And what were the size streets Beverly and Well we were between we were just about block and a half from Turtle Creek We were east of it. Just reading up trying to tell you, we sold it, I paid $21,000 for it. We sold it for $33,000 and they got it on the market today for $500,000.
And all those property that we had that lived on, we had a lot of property around Harwood and Wichita and we sold out to Pacebois. We had about 30,000 square feet. Well now, you lived on Beverly Drive then in the 40s. When I was what? At what year span? About 1948. Well, let's see. The kids were about, from about 1948, 49, until about 56 or 57 back in there. But the stairs got to the stairway got to his feet, but he couldn't make it. Well, let's talk about the family structure over the years. And did you just live with your immediate family as you were growing up, or did you have grandparents?
No, no grandparents. Folks just lived there, and I lived with them. My father wanted to stay home until I was 40 years old. Did you ever have anybody, any relatives living with the family or daughters? Oh, if they did, Uncle Louis lived, most I can remember, Uncle Louis Lynn lived with mother with the folks way back before he got married, about 19, before I can remember. Did he live for a long period of time? Not too long. Did anybody else ever live in the household? Did the kids folks? No. What about boarders? No. Did the kids contribute to the household as they got older and worked?
Oh, yes. I did. They only paid board They did pay From what year From the time that they were able to make any money at all they paid the board And I used to go out and sell papers when I was five years six years old and Brother Bill, who's three, four years younger than I am, we did it and we brought all the money home. And my little brother, Sam, he'd give him money to go sell papers and he wouldn't see him for a week. What would happen with Sam? Sam? Yeah. Oh, Sam was a musician. No, but you said you'd give him money to sell papers and you wouldn't see him for a week.
Well, I don't know where in the hell he went to nobody. He got mad in 19-hell, in 1917 or back in there when we started World War I. and got mad and he was 14 years old and joined the Navy. And what have I wanted? He's younger than I am. Now, if you want to know something about my other sisters, I'll tell you. Okay. My sister, Celia Teachman, Mary Teachman, she never got out of, well, she went to high school. she got 30 in English and 40 in whatever she'd get, you had 30 and 40. But she had two boys, one of them died in 27, he got hurt, he was just a youngster and he had, before they had all this antibiotics, and he died, and he sent her, other boy went to college, J.D.
J.D. graduated college at 19. was a geologist, and he made a fortune. And Celia made a fortune, too. She was smart. She went to work for the city, at the city hall. And I don't know how she worked it out, but she worked somebody out of 21 acres at the Grand Prairie. They still have it. And J.D., J.D. got to be a geologist, and then he went in 40, when he was 46 years old, he wanted to be a doctor and he said he was too old. So he went to Florida, he moved to Florida, and he took law course and he was the top, He's the only one I ever knew that could read a page and he could tell you verbatim what it is and tell you about it next week.
Now, Esther was a young man. She never got married. She graduated from the university and was a lawyer. and Daisy went two years to college. That's the only college we had and she married Dr. Loeb, Peter Loeb, Sam Loeb. She died a few years ago and they got a boy named Peter. He's one of the biggest doctors they got over here at the Methodist Hospital. Now Bill has got three kids and this boy, they tried to get him into medical school and he couldn't make it. He just didn't have the grades and he took a book somewhere up and he got to be an OD.
And he's going to Florida and he's made, got a clinic down there, he's doing He went in Fort Mileywell, about thirteen years old. And Arthur Stern, he's got a boy that was graduated from Brown, top student, then he went to Harvard and took a lawyer course and was a top student at Harvard. He was a big lawyer. Now that's your sister's son. That's my sister's grandson. Okay. Celia's grandson. Okay. Okay. I'm not going to tell you about the rest of them are no good, but I'm telling you about the goodies. Well, they're all all right. Nobody's been in trouble. Sam used to be a musician, played with the biggest orchestra in town.
He had a very nice voice. What orchestra was he with? I've forgotten at the time. I don't know. By the way, we're at it now. You put down Friedman. Did you put him down there? No, I will. Is there any intermarriage in the family? What do you mean? Have any of you married people who are not Jewish Yes including me About how many have married people that are not Jewish Just Morris and myself Are the kids Jewish or are they not Jewish? Well, I raised mine as Jews and went to the temple and mine are adopted. And what they do after they leave me, I have no control over.
What about Morris? Morris? No. They're all Gentiles, I imagine. Did they have Jewish training, or did they never have any Jewish training? They never had any trouble with it. Morris moved to Garland. We never saw much of Morris at all after he got married. What about the Jewish community, generally, as you were growing up? What are some of the things you remember about the community, the synagogue? Well, I tell you, the only thing is they came here from the old country and all they ever had in the old country, they had shul. The women would do the work and the men would go to shul.
They couldn't get out. And that was their club. What else could they do in the morning? They'd go to shul in the morning and they'd sit there and talk. and read the Bible, the hummish, and talk about it. And they brought it over here, and they thought they'd do the same thing. And it worked on me a little while, but I finally got tired of it. They can give you too much religion, and you run. What about the kids that you were growing up with? Did you see that same pattern? Oh, the Pabalaskis, they're still at it. My Rachowski's boys, no, one of them, his brother, not.
Oh, yeah, I guess about 10% of them didn't marry Jews. Now, mine, as you could say, is as much as Jews anybody. We go to the temple and associate with Jews, and nobody knows the difference. After all if you want to know about it it a religion you got your Semitic race anybody can be a Jew You got this nigger they got a big nigger congregation in New York of Jews with the nigger rabbi did you know that Yes. Best baseball player on the Los Angeles is Jewish, Karoo. So actually it doesn't make any difference whether you're Semitic or not. If you're a Jew, you'll Jew you.
What about... Well that is, of course I'm concerned, of course you're better off married to. I don't care what you say. It's not too good. not too good. And even at that you have trouble. They all divorce right now one another. They used to never do it anymore, but they do it. What about Jewish education when you were, after you went to Pharaoh to Israel? Do you Do you remember any of the Jewish education there? I can read Hebrew and I can translate some of it. Well, when you sent your kids to Temple, though, because they wouldn't understand it, didn't they have any Jewish education at Tepherah?
They didn't. Or wasn't there a school at Tepherah? No, I thought they would be better off over there where they could understand it. See, we never spoke Yiddish at all. My mother spoke Yiddish and I could understand them. but we don't and they went over there and in fact my daughter sang in the choir over at the temple what about some of the other aspects of the jewish community were you involved with the jewish community after you got married oh as long as i knew them I didn't run off from them, but when you get older, you're friends. My biggest trouble I belong to, I like to play cards.
And that's what ruined it. I should have been a professional gambler. I could, they could have said, they'd often send me to Las Vegas to play for them. I wouldn't do it. I'm still hoping. Yeah. But it more like work and I don want to work I don want to I I got all the money I want to live on I don want to throw away what I have Do you remember Rabbi Greenberg here in Dallas? I think so. He came after, after, uh, Bernstein. He might have come before. I don't know. What was he? Which congregation was he? Rabbi Greenberg? Greenberg. I believe he was at, uh...
There was one at Temple Emanuel. But was there another one in there? The temple is up in Greenboro. I don't know who was the temple of Manning. Could have been the Remainish, you're sure. Well, the Remainish is out, isn't it? Yeah, but this was a long time ago. This would have been in the teens when you were growing up. I remember they were on Peabody. Oh, okay. When? What year? Well, I don't know. That's where it was. You see, the trip of Israel moved from North Dallas over on Grand. Right. And from Grand they moved back out here. Right. Right. What about the shill that was on Peabody, though?
I don't know. But there was a shill on Peabody? I'm pretty sure there was. About where? I don't know. Do you remember about the year? It must have been after we moved to, it must have been after 20, I don't know what year they were there, what time they left, but they were there. Do you remember some of the people that were members of that show at that time? I didn't know, the only thing I only know about the kids was the kids that I associated with them. Did you go to kindergarten? There was a school? Well, I had a public kindergarten right there at Cedar Springs and I guess it's what they call it, Ashland, I don't know.
There wasn't a Jewish kindergarten? No. What about Jewish federation? What about the Jewish federation? Do you know from the Jewish Federation? I'll tell you what they did have. They had back of the, to parrith Israel they had what they call a MIGV. You know what the MIGV is? Well they had one back there. Until you had, you could take a bath at home. Did everybody use that MIGV every Friday? I imagine so. They wouldn't use it every Friday. They were probably after the women did it after they menstruated. That's what it was for. You said about, you talked about outdoor plumbing. Did any of those homes have indoor plumbing or were they all built with outdoor plumbing and then added?
With outdoor. Except, well, what we had when Dad built this house in 1909, we had outdoor plumbing until 1912. What about the streets up there and the development up there? Some of those streets weren't paved in town. No, none of them was ever paved while I lived there. It was much later. In fact, Cedar Springs was paved in about, oh, about 1908, 1909. Some of them were not paid until the 60s. I don't know whether Harvard Street's paid now or not. It's fine. Can you think of any of the other things you'd want to talk about as far as the Jewish community? Well, I can tell you about the things that hadn't lived there in North Dallas that wasn't Jews.
That did, I can tell you they had, well, I'll tell you the first thing they had, the baldy houses were on the other side of the courthouse. then they moved it on Griffin Street back back on Griffin. Yeah. And? They were there. Yeah. That's all they were there. Of course over on Cedar Springs right across from there they had Kenimer Yeah He had ice wagons And right there by the automobile companies over there right off of between Pearl and Olive on Main Street they had to cross that He had a wagon yard Because that isn't Ross, really? On Cheetah Springs. While I'm here I think about a wine yard.
Okay. Were there tracks down Pacific then? Is that what you're talking about? What did you say? Rail tracks, where they would be? Oh yeah, railroad tracks was in, in, that was about 19, hell I don't know, when I was selling newspapers, was there probably about the 1917, 18. Commerce Street had Bodark blocks. You know what Bodark period? They had Bodark blocks until about 1907 or 1908 back in there, and they tore them up and paved it. You were talking about the body houses. What about the police in those days? Well, the red light district, there was nothing to it. It was illegal. It was legal?
Oh, yes. Red Light District was legal. Okay. Were there any Jewish people involved in that? Oh, I'll tell you the only thing I remember, the fellow named Coffin, best I can remember, he got in trouble some way down the line. How? He ran a saloon and he was shacking up with some whore and they got into a fuss or fight and he killed them. Who killed him? Kaufman. Best actor. I don't know whether it's true or not. About when was that? Well, that's what I must have been about. I don't know. All I just heard him talk about it. He killed the woman? He killed a man.
He and a man got an argument over the gal. Okay. Okay. Okay. You have no idea when the man would have been? I don know All I know is that he got in trouble Old man caught me What about saloons Did many Jewish people own saloons Yes, Uncle Louie had one, and Kaufman had one. Louie Lynn had one on Alamo and McKinney, on the corner. What were the saloons like? Nothing in the morning people get in there and drink beer and stand up, drink beer and whiskey. Women wouldn't lie in them. They'd have to come in the back door. Did they have food there too?
Well, they had the free lunch. And you could go in there and get some crackers or cheese. And when we were news kids, we'd go in there in the saloon and hustle newspapers. and when he wasn't watching, we'd snatch us a little something deep. And he'd have that seltzer bottle and he'd whack you with it. Did you have corners? Oh, yeah, we had corners. We had one right the way the Dolphins Hotel is there for years. And the Magnolia Building, that was the best corner. We were there for years. Bill had one side and I had the other. We worked the corners over the, across the street, over in the hotel.
And Bill and myself would do the selling. And we used to bring in anywhere, back in those days, we'd bring in $15, $20 a week and give it all to Mother. We wouldn't keep a nickel. Now would she give you an allowance for the money? No. We didn't need an allowance. We didn't want an allowance for what? Did you go to a movie? I don't remember. I didn't care so much. We played baseball. We were more athletically kind than to go to a movie. Who cared about a movie as long as you could play? We played baseball at night. Where did you play? out in the street.
Then we used to play up at Summit Play Park, which is up on Randall Street up on Pliny Avenue I think is the name of it now It still there That is where all the kids played It wasn Jewish but it was a community center That where we all played We learned to play baseball In fact, when I went to high school and played on the baseball team, the coach wanted to know if there was any more kids going to high school that played on this team. We were that good. Did I give you a Ramachki on that? No. Now, did all these people who live in North Dallas go to the Ferris this room?
Yes. some of them yeah they are what he prefers okay was the general pattern that the membership of the synagogues would live near the synagogue well that's the only thing i know they live within oh they're living in a few blocks that is north dallas but when but south then that is a different proposition i remember one time we lived in north dallas and they built the show in south dallas and i drove up there an automobile and drove in front of the show no man while says was uh why don't you what do you want to park in front of the show said why don't you mark up a little bit don't look good i said i'm not a hypocrite i know i drove the car you know i drove the car the man up there knew I'd be with the car.
What the hell is he hiding it? About when was that? About what year? Oh, that would have been about that must have been about 25, 26. Well, is there anything else you remember? Oh, well, I don't know. A lot of things I'm not going to tell you. Well, you know, I'm interested in Jewish related activities and what the city is doing. Well, that is really the only thing that I know that most of the Kablowski boys are doctors and lawyers. My Frank Byers boys, a couple of them are doctors, and married doctors. My folks, they're all lawyers, most of them, and they're doctors. Dr. Lowe, Peter Lowe, the biggest doctor over here at the Methodist Hospital.
You ever hear of them? Yes. What about the Jewish butcher shops? Uncle Frank had a butcher shop. Frank Byrus, he'd run a butcher shop. And Golden, Golden run one. Did you put Golden down there to have them? They run the butcher shop. Uncle Frank Byers. That's a, I don't know who else, oh yeah, what the hell is a man's name? I can't think of his name. About what year did Frank Byers remember that you were showing? Do you remember? Was that when you were a little kid? Yeah. He's my uncle. Okay. He was my mother's brother. Okay. I'm trying to think of this other one.
Was it Lader? Was it Abramston? No. He used to have a shift. Roback? No. Fromm? Fromm was the shift. Yeah. I think Fromm had the butcher shop. Okay. Fromm had the butcher shop. But now, Frank Byers, up until what year did he have the butcher shop? That I don't know. You don't remember? No he had a grocery store but I don know Where was that located On Elmo Street right there close to Alamo and Cedar Springs Okay Do you remember if it went until after the First World War You don't remember? I don't remember. Okay. Can you think of any of the things, articles or papers or papers?
Well, the only thing that I know that most of the Jews that sent their kids to college, they're all doctors and lawyers, they're all professional men that went to college. What about the parents? Oh, good. The who? The parents of these kids, what did they do? Well, they all were a- they were peddlers. Except a few of them, Baker, like I tell you, uh, old man Ablin had a, uh, Ben Ablin had, uh, gold storage until he messed up with it. I don't know whether he's gonna tell you what happened. Come on. You gonna quote me on this thing? No. Anyway, that was one. And you take the way the Donski boys got started, this one up here, is one of the boys, the neighbor, Rachowski, went to...