Bea Fox
Bea was born Beatrice Finneberg in Berkeley, California, in 1905, one of four children. Her father worked in the wholesale silk business and was sent to Dallas as a company representative, bringing the family to the city when Bea was a young child. They first lived at the Park Hotel on South Ervay Street, near City Park, alongside several other Jewish families, before her father bought a home in South Dallas around the mid-1910s. Bea's mother came from a notable Texas family; her grandfather Morris Lewis was one of the founders of Mexia, Texas, and her mother made her debut at the Phoenix Club in Dallas. Her father's parents had emigrated from Russia, and he grew up in Richmond, Virginia, before coming to Texas.
Bea attended Colonial Hill School, Forest High School, and Southern Methodist University, leaving before completing her degree when she married. In 1927 she wed Rudolph Fox, whose family came from Corsicana, where his grandfather Alexander Fox was longtime president of the small Reform temple and owned a fine department store. The couple lived in South Dallas near Bea's mother while her father traveled, and in 1952 they moved to a new home on Arked Lane. Rudolph worked his entire career for Southland Life Insurance Company and served as a temple usher. After his retirement the couple traveled widely, visiting Europe seven times, Israel twice, and the Orient. Rudolph passed away about three and a half years before this 1988 interview.
The heart of Bea's life was Temple Emanu-El, with which her family had been connected since her parents' 1899 marriage. She was confirmed in Rabbi David Lefkowitz's first class in 1921, taught Sunday school for 29 years, and served as a supervisor when the temple lacked an assistant rabbi. She remained deeply active in the sisterhood, chairing the Youth Education Sisterhood (YES) Fund for many years and being named honorary lifetime chairman, and she also led tours for the National Council of Jewish Women. Bea recalled the temple's growth and gradual movement toward more traditional practices, warm friendships with rabbis including Lefkowitz and Levi Olan, and the loss of her youngest brother Edward, a bomber pilot killed in action over Europe in 1943.
Full Transcript
This is Rose Biederman. The date is Wednesday, November the 2nd, 1988. I haven't coughed this morning. Today is Wednesday, November the 2nd, and I'm Rose Biederman. I'm interviewing B. B. Finnenberg-Fox. B. Finnenberg-Bietress, but you can call me B. All right. Either way, because my name is Bietress. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Yeah. Do most people call you B? Everybody calls me B. Good. and I'm interviewing her in her home at 6331 Arked Lane. And this interview is part of the oral history project that is being jointly done by the National Council of Jewish Women and the Dallas Jewish Historical Society. And I'm going to first ask you to state for the record your full name, and when and where you were born, if you like.
Do you want me to talk to her? Uh-huh. I am Beatrice Finneberg-Fox. I was born in Berkeley, California, October 31st, 1905. I moved to Dallas when I was about six years old, and coming to Dallas, my family moved moved to the Park Hotel at that time on South Erby Street, which is now the Ambassador. That was, the City Park was my playground when I was a little girl. Oh, wonderful. And I had been through the gazebo recently with a tour from Temple Emanuel, Sisterhood, and walked into the gazebo that I used to play in as a little girl. So, now what else? You haven't asked me if there was a zoo at City Park, do you recall?
No, there was never a zoo there. Were there one or two animals? No they had at one time they had a creek a little tiny creek and they had the visabo and it is still standing and the windmill that was there is still standing and all the houses and things have been brought in but there was nothing on that except it was Zabo and the windmill and that where several other Jewish families lived there and that was our playground. What brought your family to Dallas? My father was in the wholesale silk business, and he moved to Dallas for his headquarters. We were in Berkeley, California, and they moved him to Dallas for his headquarters.
Do you know why? Was it because of the industry here, the fashion industry? The B. Hart & Company was the company he was with, and they sent him down here to be their representative. They were just part of this company down here in Texas. And later on, it became other places, and then he took up other lines. My father was a traveling man all his life in the silk business. That's interesting. I would... Let's come back to your growing up in Dallas and talk about your grandparents. I believe you said that your grandparents were married by Rabbi? No, my mother and father were married by...
My mother and father were married by Rabbi Kahoot of Temple Emanuel. He was here just two to three years, 1888, 1890, and 1900, I think. He married my mother and father in 1899. That is when my family were first connected with Temple Emanuel, which is many, many years ago. And my parents lived in Fort Worth for a short while, and then they moved to California, and I was born. I mean, I was born and raised in California and moved here. and for a while I lived, as I said before, at the Park Hotel. And Fanny Kinnigsberg, that is the one that you should try to get in touch with, Mrs.
Stephen Kahn. And we were raised together as little girls. And Zelna Eldridge was raised at the Park Hotel with us. And Dr. Howard Ernst, who has passed away, he was raised at the Park Hotel. So there was about five Jewish families that lived there. And then my father bought a home in South Dallas and I was raised and lived in that home from about 1914 or 15 maybe or 16 until we moved out here in 1952 So all that time I lived on Lanoi in South Dallas. When you lived at the, at the... Firepark? I guess that was like an apartment hotel. It was an apartment hotel, I know.
Well, you were, I guess, a little girl then. What was life like living in a hotel? Uh-huh. Well, we had a main dining room. All of our meals were taken in the main dining room, and our apartment was a living room and a couple bedrooms. They didn't have cooking facilities. So our three meals a day were taken in the main dining room, and it was great living there because we had the whole park to play in. And there were several of the Jewish, there were several of the Jewish others. There was another girl who doesn't live here anymore, and her name was Shinx, Carolyn Shinx.
And she lived in the hotel too. So we had our little group that played together, and I didn't go to school yet until we moved out in South Dallas, and that's when I started going to the Cornel Hill School on Wendelton And I went to the Colonial Hills School, then I went to Forrest High School, and then I went to Southern Methodist University. I didn't get my degree. I married before I got my MRS degree instead, of my BA or BS degree. Well for the record, how many children in your family? There were four children. My oldest brother, Morris L. Finneberg, now of course he's Morris L.
Finneberg Sr., and I was next, Beatrice Finneyburg was next, and then Louis Finneyburg Jr. was next, and then Edward I. Finneyburg was the baby. We had three boys and one girl. And we were all raised and went to the same schools. We all went to Crono Hill School, Forest High School, and Southern Methodist University. We all went. And I assume you all went to Temple? We all went to Temple because my dad joined the Temple. of the year we moved to Dallas, which must have been about 1914 or 1913, and we all went to Temple. That was down on Irby Street the old Temple and I can remember going to the holidays and the kids the children had to sit upstairs in the back upstairs We couldn sit down with our families It was small And I can remember my mother and father, and then my mother's mother lived with us always, and she used to go with us.
Interesting. Do you remember anything else from the temple on Irving? Who was the rabbi there? Rabbi Greenberg was the temple, the rabbi. and he was our rabbi for many, many years, and then for two years, we didn't have, one or two years, we didn't have a rabbi. And then Dr. Lefkowitz came into Dallas about 1920, because he, my brother Morris and his wife Frieda, Frieda were married by Dr. Lefkowitz, and that was the second marriage he performed in Dallas. And I was confirmed in 1921 in Dr. Lethwitch's first class, and I taught Sunday school the year after I was confirmed, and I taught Sunday school for 29 years.
Oh, my God. And I, for two years, we did not have an assistant rabbi, and I was a supervisor of the Sunday school. So I had been connected with Temple since I had been a little bitty, tiny girl. My life has just grown up in the Temple. Rabbi Lefkowitz certainly had a well-known reputation here. What do you remember about Rabbi Lefkowitz? I remember Rabbi Lefkowitz being the inspiration, I should say, of my religious life. He was a kind, dear, loving person, the most understanding, and the kids, we all just loved him. And I used to go out with his son, Harry. That was his second son.
He had two sons and a daughter and then another son. His younger son, David Leckler's junior, was a rabbi. And he is retired in Shreveport, Louisiana. But I went with Harry, his second son. I went out with him quite often, dated him. And Helen was older than I am. Well, she was, I should say, was older than I am. So, I don't know where else was Dr. Lefkowitz. And no one called him towards the end, the latter years of his life. I didn't call him Dr. Lefkowitz, I called him Uncle Dave. And I was so close to him, he asked me to please call him Uncle Dave.
And his wife, I called Ann. Now Dr. Lefkis did not marry me because he had to marry his niece in Cleveland, Ohio, or Cincinnati, wherever it was, I forget. And her wedding was the same week as mine, and we didn't have airplanes at that time. So Rabbi Merifel from Fort Worth came over to marry me. But during the ceremony, the doorbell rang, and it was a long telegram from Dr. Lefkis to us. And I have that in my bride's book now. I still have the telegrams. I imagine you've seen a lot of changes in temples since the early days. Oh, yes. The first doctor left, which was very, very performed in his way.
We didn't have the candles or the kiddush on a brasham at night, and he wanted to wear a little tiny, like a band, like small talus, but the congregation didn't want it. And the congregation since then, I can see, has gone back a little towards the more conservative because the rabbis now where, Rabbi Zimmerman, our new rabbi, and Liza Stern, where a talus. Oh, really? They were a beautiful talus. And they, of course, for years we've had the kiddush on the temple on Friday night. We have the kiddush every Friday night at the beginning of the services. You're saying that they didn't do that not when Dr.
Leftich was alive. So that's one of the changes you've seen. That's one of the changes I saw come in a little more of the conservative. Uh-huh. Because Dr. Leftich wanted that, but the congregation at that time would not allow it. Uh-huh. Any other changes that you've seen? It's grown to be such a large congregation. It's grown to be that when, I think when my father joined Temple, I think there was 200 or 250 families, and that's when we were down on Ergy Street, the old building. Uh-huh. And John Rosenfield taught me in Sunday School. He was one of my teachers. Oh, my. And John Rosenfield was the, was the critic, the musical and editorial critic, of the Dallas Morning News, and he taught me.
And his, the Rosenfield Hall in the old temple in South Dallas was named after him That how far back I remember some of those people I remember there was I think the temple on South Boulevard Wasn there a Mallinson Hall Yes the Mallinson Hall Do you remember anything about that family? Yes, the Mallinson Hall. Fred Mallinson married B. Wertheimer, and she was from an outstanding family here. And B. Wertheimer and Fred Mallinson, that was his family, where he died, and then she moved up to New York and married a doctor, and just recently she passed away. She was related to the, she was in Wertheimer, and she was related to the Munzesheimer family.
And that is a family that you should get in touch with, too, the Munzesheimer. Well, that's Marie Bitterman. Yeah, that's Marie Bitterman's family, yeah. Do you remember any of the other, I guess, old families at Temple that had a great influence on Temple? The Rosenfield family? Well, it was the ones that really had it were the people of wealth. It was the Kramer family, the Sanger family, and the Pikes, and Leon from A. Harris and Leeon Harris and his wife had a great deal of influence on the temple, and the Marcus family, Shirley Stanley Marcus's family, Herbert Senior and his, there were four boys in that family.
And they were certainly because they were very important, because the year I was confirmed, Herbert Marcus was the president of the temple, because he presented us with our confirmation certificates and dr lethress gave each one of the confirmants a bible with a special little note in the front that he wrote and i gave my bible i i gave my bible to the temple they asked me to give it to them but i do not know where it is over the temple it's somewhere in the temple it should be families over there they had a um a few years ago they had a big celebration i think I think it was the 100th year of the temple.
Oh, uh-huh. And I gave my Bible to be put on display. Uh-huh, uh-huh. That's the last I heard. I don't know where it is. Well, I'm sure it's being tabbed up for history. It's there someplace. Yeah. Because see I was in Dr Edwards first Confirmation class and I started like I said before I started teaching Sunday school the next year Since you taught so many years do you recall if there were any changes about in the Sunday school or the teaching? No, it was just, it was changed after I left. Oh. Because it was run just like a Sunday school. We had report cards every month and we had lessons to be, you know, to be planned.
Planned. Planned. And I remember I had some surgery and I couldn't teach for a while and my husband, who was born and raised in Corsicana, Rudolph Fox, taught my class. And Rudolph and myself are married June 12, 1927, and he passed away about three and a half years ago. But he went to, we went to temple until he died every Friday night and sat in the same seats, the two back seats on the middle section, every Friday night. And if we were not there, the rabbis would pray that we were sick, that you had to tell them if we were going to be out of town.
But we went every Friday night all of our life to Temple. That's wonderful. Every Friday night. And we were always very friendly with all of the rabbis. And Rabbi Olin had been in my home for dinner, and Rabbi Klein had been in my home for dinner, and Rabbi Jack Benparad was a very, very close friend of ours. And then Rabbi Lou Silberman, who was here for many, two years, many years ago. I haven't heard from him in about a year, but we've kept in touch with him all these years. I guess I should ask what you remember about Rabbi Owen. Rabbi Owen was my very dear close friend.
I remember, this sounds funny, but I remember the day I met him. I had a sweater on. In those days, his sweater, he didn't wear it real tight. But my sweater was real tight. And he looked at me and he says, oh, I'm going to remember you as the sweater girl. And he always said about me, he always, see I had, I had been so active in Temple Sisterhood that I had been head of the Youth Education Sisterhood Donation Fund for about 20 years and he made me honorary lifetime chairman of that. And Rabbi Owen always said B Fox can never say no because of the Y Fund She always only knows yes she never says no to anything Rabbi Orr and myself are very very close close friends Was he, um, did he change temple as far as being, the congregation being as reformed as during Rabbi Lefkowitz?
No, but a little bit, not very much, but he was not on the, he did not do much changes. Okay. More changing, I'll be frank with you, is right now with Rabbi Zimmerman. Oh, okay. Because Rabbi Zimmerman does keep kosher, and he is from a religious family that way, I mean, a very, I would say more of an Orthodox family. And there's more changes going on now than I've ever really seen in the temple, as I belong. And what about the sisterhood? You've been active in sisterhood, and is sisterhood basically the same? I've been active in sisterhood, very active, since the day I got married.
Oh, okay. And I've been vice president of Sisterhood a number of times, and I've never wanted to be president because that's a lifetime job. I mean, when you're there, I mean, it's a 24-hour-a-day job. And I was vice president of that and president of many, many, many committees, but I have been chairman of the Youth Education Sisterhood, which we call the YES Fund, for about 10 to 12 years. And like I said, they made me honorary chairman. I'm still chairman of it. I still collect all the money for it. That's the way it stands right now. And I still am active. I go to all the board meetings and I go to all the luncheons, and I'm very active whenever sisterhood does.
I used to cook the luncheons, help cook luncheons when we were in South Dallas at the South Boulevard. And then I've been in the kitchen for many, many years. In the last two years, I've sort of given it up and let the younger people take home. Yeah. But I've cooked in the kitchen for the sisterhood luncheons all my life. Well, has, I guess the sisterhood is basically the same, or has it had a lot of changes? The sisterhood has had changes to the fact that the old timers are the ones that still do all the work and we can't, it is not as active, well it's as active, but not quite as strong as it used to be.
Our meetings are not as large as they used to be. The younger generation had more outside things to attend them than they used to when I was young. People with children can't come to the meetings as often because they don't have the good help that they used to have. But sisterhood is just about the same as it was. And like I said, that has been a great part of my life, is sisterhood. It's always been a part of my life. In fact, the whole temple has been a part of my life. Um, I'm going to ask about your, is it grandparent or grandfather that was active in Mahaya, Texas?
My grandfather, Morris Lewis, was one of the founders of Mahaya, Texas. How did that come about? Uh, he went, he just, I guess, moved down this part of the country and moved there and built a business. He had a grocery store, he had a drug store, he had real estate, and he was a big real estate. My grandfather was a very wealthy man. Where did he come from originally? He originally came from Kennysburg, Germany. Uh-huh. And he had, he brought, he brought one brother, Saul Lewis, his brother over here, and he brought two or three sisters. One was Mrs. Sarah Ephraim, one was Mrs. Marks, Mrs.
Yedda Marks, and the other was Hannah Leventhal. Those were his three sisters, and he brought over here and educated. Do you know why he came to Texas? I have no idea. Okay. When did he come to Mejia? Do you know approximately? Well, my mother was born in about, I said, 1879, and he was well established when she was born. So, I really don't know, he must have been there a number of years. And then he also lived in Hillsborough, Texas, from the time they lived in Hillsborough. Was that before Mahea? I think that was before Mahea because my mother, no, it may have been afterwards, I really don't know.
Okay. how he came to Texas, what route, or why he came? I have no idea. But my grandmother... And where was she from? My grandmother his wife my grandmother Clara Louise Lewis was born on a little boat I guess you call it a little boat going down the Mississippi River Oh my goodness And they were hoping that she would get to New Orleans before my grandmother they would get there before my grandmother was born. But my grandmother was born before they reached the port. And they would call those little ports landings. And there was a Lily Lewis landing, which was my mother, and there was a Kate Lewis landing, which was my mother.
And my grandmother's name was Solomon, and there was a Clara Solomon landing, too. They called it after her. And that's, instead of making ports, they called them landings, and that was down in Mississippi. Now what were they evidently, do you know why they were coming down to Mississippi? I suppose the family was moving down to this part of the country. And my grandmother, her mother was not Jewish, but she took up the Jewish religion that far back. My great-grandmother Solomon, and her picture hung in a Jewish orphan's home in New Orleans. There was a home down there for the Jewish children in an orphan's home.
And my great-great-grandmother was one of the founders of that, and her picture hung in the building until it was torn down or burned down or something. Oh, how interesting. Now, I've been told that you, your family, it's the same family of Chaim Solomon? That's right. Chaim Solomon was my, I can't say my great-great-grandfather or my great-great-great-grandfather, but he was in the Army during the Civil War, and he gave his complete fortune to the Southern part of the southern army to help support the war and that was my great great great grandfather i'm sure i'm getting it right maybe a little another great in there i don't know his name was haim solomon and his name of course is in the history right and i found out that my mother's name lily lewis was in one of the history books i don't know from why but rabbi levi olin told me when I was telling him about my family, he told me that there was something about Louis Lewis.
Do you know how to spell the Lewis, the last name? L-E-W-I-S. Okay. And that is the way my father spells his first name L Most of them spell L But my father spelled his name L his first name his given name but their name was L his name was my grandfather And my grandfather died very young, he was only 42 years old when he died, and my mother was the oldest of the family, and she had three sisters and one brother, and her youngest sister and brother were twins. Do you know where she met your father? How they? She met him in Fort Worth, oh, she met him in Fort Worth, somewhere.
But I did forget to say there was a club here before, it was a Columbia club, and I had forgotten the name of it, but my mother made her debut there. The Phoenix? The Phoenix Club. Your mother? My mother made her debut at the Phoenix Club. Oh, how interesting. And that was the first time she was really out with a young man, as they said. Her parents, her, my grandfather was alive at the time, I think. They took her and then she had her date to take her home. Oh, how interesting. My mother made her debut at the Phoenix School. I had forgotten the name Phoenix School.
That was the, it was really right down in town almost at that time. Yeah. The temple was right down, right behind where the Adolphus Hotel, in that area. Right. Right in that area. Yeah. I remember that part of it. Oh. That's wonderful. I'm going to ask you a little bit about growing up. When did you move to South Dallas? How about how old were you when you moved to South Dallas? We were at the Park Hotel, I'd say two or three, four years, something like that. Okay. About anywhere from two to four years at the Park Hotel. And then we moved on Lenway Street. And we lived there until we moved out.
After my mother and father moved to New York for a period of time, when Rudy and myself were married, we lived at home because my father traveled. And we lived at home because of being with mother. And my oldest brother was not at home. So then when we moved out here in 1952, I think, we moved out here. And we were just here one year when my mother died. And then two three years when my father died And they were buried down in the Mandel Cemetery in Dallas And my grandparents so my mother parents Clara Louise and Morris Lewis were buried in the Reformed Cemetery in Fort Worth, I think it's called the Heaton Rest.
And that cemetery now is completely filled up for many years, and they had to buy a new area. It's not right next to it, it was much farther out from that cemetery. And that cemetery, my grandmother made the street down when my grandfather died. She had the street paved in there, and she put all the trees down the street to make it beautiful in the very beginning. With South Dallas, did you grow up in a, was that a Jewish neighborhood, the area where you lived? South Dallas was, I'll put, was extreme, all Jewish, because on the holidays, when Forrest High School would almost close up on Rosh Hashanah, or Yom Kippur, or something like that, and when the school was on, they wouldn't be, they would not make us be responsible for our lessons that day, and we didn't even have to have an excuse from our parents that was in the school when we came back, and being absent that day, because the South Dallas, The 4th High School was 9 tenths Jewish, I would say.
Maybe that's a little extreme, but it was 3 fourths Jewish people at that time. South Dallas was the, that's where all the Jewish people lived was in South Dallas. Were there, in addition to having Jewish neighbors, were there clubs, or what were the other activities that children could be involved in? There weren't many activities, to be frank with you. Okay. We just played in our neighborhood with our friends and whatever went on at Temple. Our parents took us to Temple for the different things, but they weren't clubs. And I don't remember the Boy Scouts or the Girl Scouts. I never remember my brothers being a Boy Scout.
And I was never a Girl Scout. I never remember any of that. We didn't have that. Did anyone go to the Jewish Community Center? Do you remember that? Well, we really didn't have a Jewish Community Center for a long time. And they had one many, many years later, and I was grown. It was right behind the Park Hotel, right in that area. But it was not too popular, too much from Temple Emanuel. It was more from Sheriff Israel. I see. It was a distinction. What do you mean? Well, at that time, the boys and girls from Temple Emanuel went together, and the boys and girls from Shurath Israel went together.
Now, it just doesn't make any difference where you go. But in those days, you went with a group in your temple. That's what they did when I was a little, when I was small. Of course, later, it became different. Did it just happen that way, Or was it... I don't know why it was that way. Okay, okay. It might have been some of the people just decided that they wanted their children just going with Reformers and the Conservatives just going with the Conservatives. There was Auguste Ockham was the other big temple at that time too. Well, that was Orthodox. That was very Orthodox. And then the Tiferetism, of course, came in much later.
What holidays do you remember celebrating when you were little? Oh, just like we do now. Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Sukkos, Hanukkah, and Hanukkah was a great thing in our house. My brother, my little brother, liked Christmas too because he said he got practice Christmas and Hanukkah both, but Hanukkah was a big thing. We got our present every night, and we used to call, we used to say, our Hanukkah bush. What would you do with these records? Just put them in the archives room? Right, uh-huh. How did, what did you do on Saturday? When you were little, did you go to Temple on Saturday morning? Oh, I went to Temple on Saturday morning, even when it was down on Erby Street.
The girl that lived next door to me, her name was Leo Sacks. She was a little bit older, and so she could take me on a streetcar. And I went every Saturday morning to Temple. Was there a children's service, or just the... Just the plain service, there wasn't too many of them. Temple services, really, for children, started more when we came to South Boulevard. When we moved there, then it became much more active. But I went even down on Erie Street. I've always loved Temple, I guess. It was just born in me, I think I can say. I just loved Temple. And when I was eight seven or eight years old that was my and I would not pick up a needle and thread on Saturday for anything My folks were very always reformed But I wouldn write a letter on Saturday I wouldn pick up a needle and thread or anything or cut anything with a pair of scissors because I didn think that should be done on the Sabbath That was evidently the way it was in your home.
Well, it was just me. Oh, it was just you. Just me. I've always been the most religious one in my family. It just seemed like, I don't know why, I guess maybe it was just born in me. I don't know. Uh-huh, uh-huh. We talked about the Jewish holidays. Did your family celebrate the other holidays, like Thanksgiving and... Yes, Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving, I will say Christmas, because we didn't have a Christmas tree, but we had Christmas presents. And we didn't believe in Santa Claus after a certain age. You had to believe in Santa Claus when you went to the public school. It was, everybody else believed in it, and there was no way you could tell a child that there was no Santa Claus.
But we celebrated all, oh, well, Thanksgiving was a big day in our home. And right after Temple, of course we had such wonderful help. Mother had two help, always living on the place. And we always had a big dinner after coming from Temple on Yom Kippur. And the New Year's Day, the Jewish New Year's, we had a beat. And for Sukkot, we always had a dinner. We celebrated all the holidays. At least that's the way the Temple people, and that's where Dr. Leftlitz, And of course I don't remember Dr. Greenberg too well, although his daughter went to school with me. He had one daughter and we went to school together, but I was very young when he left.
So your whole family would get together? Yes. Well see I don't have much family. Okay. I have very, very little family. So you had, you mean it was just your immediate family? Just the immediate family. Okay. Did your mother work? No. My mother was very spoiled. My dad had her, my mother was the little queen of the house. She cooked some, but she always had a maid. My dad was always able to have good help for us Did the help live behind the house Yes we had a servant room that had a bath and everything At one time my oldest brother had a pony that was way way back and he had a little pony.
But the help always lived on the place. My mother always had help, because my dad traveled, and he did not want her without help. So the help took care of the laundry, the house. The laundry, the house, and the cooking. And the cooking. Where was the shopping done? Do you remember anything about grocery shopping? Oh, yes. At one time, Mother used to have to order it, and when I grew up... What do you mean, order? Well, they had a grocery store. The Levines, the Jewish people for Levines, had a grocery store, and Mother ordered everything from them, fruit and things like that, and... They would deliver it?
They would deliver it for them, and then when I began to drive the car, that was my job on Saturday, to take Mother down to the grocery store and do her week shopping. Do you remember where that store was? Yes, it was the, I think it was what, Piggly Wiggly? That was the first chain store down on Forest, Forest and Colonial. Yes, I remember taking Mother down always. And a friend of ours, a Mrs. Beck, the Becks lived around not very far from us. And I used to see his mother, Mrs. Beck, Mama Beck, and I picked her up and went to take her home when she had her groceries.
So that was my job, was to take the mother to the grocery store back. About when did you get the car? You mentioned when you got a car. Well, no, we had, the family had a car. My oldest brother was, they lived with us when they first married, and he drove, and I started driving just about the time I was confirmed. Oh, I see. Okay. I was confirmed in 1921, and that's when I started driving. Uh-huh. And the car, it was a great big car, and I was the chauffeur of the car until my next brother started riding. Where did you meet your husband? How did you meet your husband?
Well, I was out with Maurice Beck at the Adolphus Hotel dancing, and he knew Rudy, and Rudy was with a Glacier girl. And Rudy lived in Oak Cliff at that time because he had just moved from Corset, Canada, not too many years, not too long. What kind of business was he why did he move to Dallas Was it because of business No he moved to Dallas because Rudy mother died when he was a little boy and his oldest brother moved to Dallas to be with them the Magnolia Company Magnolia Petroleum And that was owned by Corsicana people. Oh. And that's the reason that he came down.
And when he came and his other brother came down, Rudy's second, he had two brothers. Then Rudy came down after he graduated from high school. He was working here quite some time before I met him. But it was a love at first sight when we saw each other. Love at first sight. We met and in two months we were engaged, but we didn't get married for a year. I'm going to ask, what was the Carthacaner family? You said the Carthacaner family owned Macdonia. Do you remember who that was? Right now I can't remember. Okay, okay. I've never heard that, so that's why I was asking.
Okay, I forget who the Corsicana people were right now. Was your husband from a Reformed family also? Oh, yes. The Reformed little temple is still in Corsicana, and his grandfather was president of the temple. Rudy used to say that his grandfather, he told me, his grandfather was president of the temple all through his life, nobody else. You can't remember anybody. What was his grandfather's name? His grandfather was Alexander Fox, and he had quite a good, he had one daughter, but she married a Catholic and became a Catholic, so we were very close, but, and she and I were very, very close. I was her favorite niece, anyway, by marriage, but I was her favorite one of the family.
She's been there a number of years, and I still keep in touch with, her granddaughter lives here, and I see and talk to her once in a while. Her daughter used to come up to visit Dallas, but she passed away. But Rudy's little cousin, which is second cousin, there's here in Dallas. But they're Catholics, and so I don't get to see them. So, his grandfather was very active in the temple? Very, very active. A very big money supporter, and I know when they were redoing the temple over in Corsicana, that was before Rudy died, he said, Honey, I give the temple a manual, so I'm going to So we sent a nice jack down to the temple in Corsicana to redo it, because they were going to tear the temple down.
Right. And the Gentile people were the ones that kept that going. Yes, it's a very interesting story. It's a very interesting story, because, and there's something unusual about Corsicanon. There's one cemetery, the Reformed and the Orthodox are in the same cemetery, which I had never heard of any place before, because I never knew the Orthodox would want to bury in a Reformed Jewish cemetery. Well, it's a Jewish cemetery, so. Yeah, but they usually have their own. Yes. Because, you know, the Orthodox believe in burying in a shroud and things like that where But it's just one cemetery all together. It's kept up very beautiful, and I still keep the membership of the temple up there with Lee's family.
I don't get down there, but I still keep the membership up with the Fox family down there. Do you know when was his grandfather the first of that family to come to Corsa Canada? Yes. Do you know why they came to Corsa Canada? No, I don't know. And I really didn't know as much about his family as I did. I knew more. I don't know why he came to the farm. Okay, okay. They just... What business was he in? He, his grandfather. Uh-huh. He owned a Fox store. It was a department store. Oh, okay. And it was supposed to be, they called it later, in later years, they always referred to it as the Little Neiman and Marcus because it was such a very fine store.
It had nothing but fine, fine merchandise. And up until a few years ago, the name was on the sidewalk in tile. Fox. A Fox and brother. Because he had a brother that went in business later years with him. But the name was on the sidewalk until just maybe eight years ago. I think they remodeled the street a little bit and took all of that up. But it was supposed to be quite a lovely story in this time. So after you were married, you naturally stayed with Temple Emanuel. Oh, I was always with Temple Emanuel. So your affiliation didn't change? Oh, no. If anything, it got stronger.
No, because when we got married, I was teaching Sunday school when we got married. Well, I started teaching Sunday School in 1922, it was confirmed in 21, and I started teaching that fall of 21. Did your husband teach or just when you were Well he taught for a while Yes he taught for a while after he got started with me taking my class he started he talked for a while and the kids were just crazy about him one would say one wanted to be in mrs fox's class and one wanted to be in mr fox's class and oh i have so many of these boys that i know that have grown and are very successful doctors And in fact, the president of the temple that just died, Henry Schlinger, I taught him in Sunday school.
So I taught some of these men. They're really, I'd say, I tell them they look older than I do. Because I wasn't terribly much older than the children. Because I started teaching them as soon as I was confirmed. Did your holiday observance change after you were married? Or was it basically the same as you? Basically the same. It's just basically the same today as it was then. Because, you know, my... Now, Rudy was one of the ushers of the temple even in South Dallas. And on Young Kipper Day, we went the first thing in the morning, and he ushered for both services, and we stayed until the last part of the services.
We didn't even leave the temple. We stayed there the whole day. This year, I couldn't do it because I just felt it was a little bit too hard for me. But up until this year, I stayed every day, fasted, and stayed every day from the time the temple would open in the morning until the last of the services at night. After you were married, did you belong to any kind of social, were there any social clubs that you might have joined, or? No, the only thing I ever joined was the sisterhood and the council, but there was no really social clubs. Okay. I've just wondered what kind of business your husband was in.
All his life he worked for one company, the South and Life Insurance Company. And he retired when in 1960s, well he had to retire at 65. It was a force. And he was born in 1901. So he retired when he was in his 66th birthday. That made him 65 after he had his 66th birthday. And we did travel to Europe. We went to Europe seven times. Oh, that's amazing. And I've been to Israel twice, and we've been to the Orient. Oh. And after we retired we took a lot of our savings and said well we going to enjoy it And we really did So I been to Israel twice I went with the choir a few years ago Oh wonderful The choir had a trip to Israel and anybody could go And they asked me, the rabbi asked me where I'm going, and Sargon, Simon Sargon, asked me where I go.
So I went to that trip without me. That's the first time that I had been on a trip without him. So we had about eight trips across. I'm going to ask you if you remember the Ku Klux Klan in Dallas. Do you have any memories of that? Very, very little, truthfully. I remember mostly what the papers, of course, at that time. We didn't have TV when they were in their height, but the papers and newspapers, I really I know that in our neighborhood over there in South Dallas, we didn't have any trouble. And we never had any trouble out here. They used to say they'd burn the crosses in the yard and things like that, but we never had any trouble.
You never saw anything. I never saw anything at all, except what you read in the paper. And that's all I knew about the Ku Klux Klan. Do you remember any kind of anti-Semitism when you were growing up or at any time you knew I knew? The only thing I knew sometimes at school, they would say, call us Jew haters, I meant the Christ haters, and they were Jew haters, they said, and they called themselves Christ, and said that we killed Christ and things like that. But we were taught to ignore them and not talk back to them. And if they said anything, just walk on and throw about your own way, because Dad said because they were ignorant, and we knew what we were, and we knew what our religion taught us.
So we never had any trouble. Once in a while my brother would come home where he'd had a fight. Somebody said he was a Christ killer or something like that, and he'd have a fight with him. But it never really entered our home in any way, shape, or form. You've never worked in the business world? No, I've only worked for Sisterhood Council. That's about the only thing. I been chairman of the tours for Council for about 16 years Now what is that I still sell their tours In fact I received something yesterday in the mail One year see when we sell a tour for Council Council gets a certain commission Oh, I see.
And I received something yesterday in the mail about the new tours that were coming in. One year I turned over $2,000 to Council, getting checks and things, you know, from the tours for our commission on dividends. I'm going to ask you to mention about your family. You have three brothers. Yes. And if you would just say a few words about them. Well, my oldest brother is 87 years old. They live in Cleveland, Ohio, and his wife had a stroke about six years ago, and she's in a wheelchair. She's paralyzed in one leg. And this last October they were married 68 years. Now he went to Temple Sunday School?
He was confirmed and he was the one that was the second person that Dr. Lefkowitz married. He married in 1920 because he was married 68 years and she was related to Leon Harris and Arthur Kramer of A. Harrison Company. That was her family her name was fox but another fox family from my fox my my husband's family and the brother i was second in family in the family and the next one was lewis jr and he was married to dorothy samuels who was a granddaughter is a granddaughter i should say of simon david of simon david's grocery store and then my youngest brother edward was killed in the service in 1943 he was a pilot and he was killed and went down in his plane in the ocean he was not we never did get his remains but he flew across the ocean himself with his squadron that was 19 he was just over there about a year when he was killed in europe yes he was killed over the bay of escape right over between France and Spain.
They were jumped by eight JU-88s and shot down. And some one or some of the boys were saved out of the plane because he there was a dingy a little extra dingy that my brother threw in the bottom of the plane and they got that out and one or two boys were saved but my brother went down in the plane with six of the ten boys. And of course he was He had many air medals and Oakley Clusters and the Purple Heart. We got a wonderful citation, a beautiful citation from the President Roosevelt that we had framed. I had it put away right now. I did take it down after a while, but I used to keep it on the wall.
And he was a pilot of a Liberator 4-motor bomber at that time, and that was the biggest plane made at that time. And he enlisted in the Army before, when they were drafting him for a year. He enlisted. He did not wait to be drafted. He enlisted. And he lost several of his friends were killed in the war. And he was the baby of the family, not married. Uh-huh. Before you started, I really don't know much about his family because his parents died when he was very young. But you say your father was born in Richmond, Virginia. My father was born in... Did he grow up there?
Yeah, he grew up there. When his parents died, after his father died, he was on his own because he didn't have his My father and mother came over from Russia, and then my dad was born here, and then they didn't have a couple of children, and they died. My dad was, it was a pretty hard time because my grandfather, you know, was an immigrant, and they had a hard time getting along. So, but I... You know, I don't think we made that distinction. When we talked about your grandparents and Mahea, that was on your mother's side. That's on my mother's side. Okay, so now we're speaking about on your father's side, and his parents came from Russia, and he grew up in Richmond.
Richmond, uh-huh. And do you know when he was born, approximately? Yes. He was born in, I think it was in 1872. My mother was born in 79, and he was born in 72. And he was born in? In? Virginia. In Richmond, Virginia. Okay. And he had a cousin up there. I think an uncle came over his grandfather I mean his father brother came over and had a daughter and I think had one daughter must be because somewhere or another dad had a cousin there but they were born so many many years And I got most of my mother's history from her because my grandmother lived with us and she had a bedroom with me.
And she used to tell me all of the tales. Oh, how wonderful. Too bad you didn't have a tape recorder. Isn't that a shame? Because grandmother used to talk to me at night, and she used to tell me about different things, and she used to call her father, my grandfather, she used to call him my old man and my old man. She was so spoiled that he used to send everything home from the grocery stores, a barrel of sugar, a barrel of flour, a barrel of apples, a barrel of oranges, everything, and the drugstore, everything was sent to her. She never had to turn her finger.
She was really a queen. She was really a queen. And when my grandfather died, it was unfortunate that that day his will was torn up or lost or something, and she was cheated out of a lot of money. She would have been, all the property out in the panhandle, not that oil property, would have been, was hers, but it was sold for taxes. In those days, they didn't notify you. And she would have been a multi-multi-millionaire Those things, that's the stories that I got. They did well on those things. That was so many, many years ago, because my grandfather was only 42 when he died.
My mother was just 16 when they went to Europe, and he died shortly afterwards. Now, I want to go back to your father. He evidently grew up in Virginia. When did he leave Virginia? And do you know how he came to Texas? I don't know. All I know is that he lived in Waxahachie at one time. But you don't know what brought him to Texas? I have no idea. Okay. And he lived in Waxahachie? He lived in Waxahachie. That's why he used to have his pictures taken in Waxahachie. Yes. Yes. And do you know how he met your mother? No, I don't. I really don't.
I never asked. I don't know how. They must have met very formally you know because it isn like now You go out and you meet a boy you have a Coke at the store and you say hi Somebody tells you you meet a boy in two three weeks you good friends and so forth But I don't know, but I do know my mother, she made her debut and that was the first date she'd ever had. I mean, the first time to go out along me. And that was here in Dallas at the Phoenix Club. I'm glad you remember the name of that. It's the Phoenix Club.
So you don't know whether they met here in Dallas or where? I don't know. Okay. It would be interesting to know, you know, how social work. I think they must have met, I think that my mother, you see, mother never lived in Dallas. She came up to Dallas to make her debut. I see. From Mahir. Or Hillsborough, it might have been Hillsborough. So you feel that she actually lived in one of those two places and met him? Yeah. Okay. Because Waxahachie, you see, they were kind of close around there. Yeah. My mother never did tell me how she met Dad and where she met me.
I don't even remember. I really don't. That part I never met. Funny of all those things, I know a lot about the family background. Did your parents ever talk about, well, or rather your mother, did they have a synagogue when she was growing up in Mejia or in Hillsborough? No, my grandfather, my mother's father used to hold the services on the holidays, and if there was a funeral, my grandfather used to help bury it, because he couldn't marry anybody. You had to be able to have a license to marry. But if there was a funeral, he would perform the funeral, and they didn't have a temple, they'd have their, for Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, and for Passover, why they would get together, like I guess a Revahol or something and have the services.
And my grandfather used to do that. He wasn't, there was a Nussbaum family, and this is a Lewis family and a Nussbaum family, and the, what was their name, the other family? I can't call their name right now, Jewish family. There were about three Jewish families and that was all. So they would get together? The Brins. The Brins Because my grandmother had twins and Mrs Brin helped her take care of one of the babies And Mrs Brin had twins and my grandmother helped her take one of her babies helped take care of the Brins, the Nussbaum's and the Lewis's. They were the three families. And that was in?
That was in Mahe and Hillsborough. I think that some of the Brin family went to Hillsborough. Because there was some I knew down there. It was one of my mother's... One of my mother's cousins married a Nussbaum. Sylvan Marks, they lived here in Dallas, married a brain... He was from Grosbeck, and Grosbeck was another son. I had a great uncle and aunt, and my grandfather's sister lived in Grosbeck. And Margaret Marx, did you know? Uh-huh. See, Margaret Marx, her husband was my mother's first cousin. Oh. Because his mother was Jenna Marx, and that was my grandfather's sister. He brought her over from Germany. And, in fact, Margaret Marx right now lives in Salt Lake City.
Uh-huh, that's what I was told. Because she's lost her eyesight. Oh. I think her son lives there, is that him? Uh-huh. And I got a, I received a check from Bertha Newman, who was my co-chairman on the White on the white yes she still sends us checks once in a while too uh she sent a check i think for uh for um ray israel for his last honor he had uh-huh so but margarita's um well i was at margarita's wedding and i got the um i got the little silver wedding ring out at that time they used to in the wedding case they used to put a heart and they used to put a wishbone for good luck and a little silver wedding ring.
Oh really? And I, and you had to be careful when you cut it not to bite into it, and I got the wedding ring out of the little silver wedding ring, little tiny pieces. I got that out of her, Margaret Marx's wedding cake, I remember that. Now it wasn't the real wedding ring, was it? No, a little, little tiny, tiny, little miniature things. I see. A little tiny heart. Like a favor almost. Uh-huh, yeah. Oh, and that was baked in the cake. Uh-huh, it was baked in the cake. I don't think that custom is done anymore. No, but they used to do that, and I got that out of her cake, I remember that.
And at least when they were cutting the cake, they said, oh, here's the wedding ring, they saw part of it. So I know somebody said, oh, that bee habit. My family all called me Trace. They never called me Bee, that was my nickname. The aunt I was named after, they called her Little Trix and called, I was Little Trix and she was Beatrix. For Beatrice, that's a nickname for Beatrice. And somebody said, oh give her this next piece, wait a minute. They called me and said, you have to have this piece of cake because the wedding ring is sticking out on me. So I was in my teens, I was just a youngster then too.
Because mom gets quite old. Where were weddings held in those days? We were married at home. At home? Uh-huh. Where was Marguerite married? In her home. Oh. Mm-hmm. And all of my friends, the only one that, now this boy that called me while we go out, but he and his wife, they had a big wedding and they had it at the hotel. They married a year before we did. But most people just married at home. You didn't think, and why they didn't marry in Temple? One wedding, the first wedding I can remember in Temple, Dr. Lefkowitz's daughter, Helen Lefkowitz. Oh really? That's the first wedding I can remember.
Could you ever remember temple weddings being held in temple Until latter year Oh I don mean now but I mean in latter years way way back latter years in married in temple but way back nobody thought of marrying in temple they'd go to the hotel with a big wedding if they wanted something like that but they just didn't get married at temple I don't know why. Well, I never thought, but now when Rudy died, Rabbi Jerry Klein asked me definitely to bury Rudy from Temple. I had not thought of that. Oh, uh-huh. But the morning I went over to make the arrangements, he really was just six, six weeks, seven weeks.
He had a stroke. And he was six, seven weeks. And Jerry said, Have you thought about the Temple? And I said, No. He says, well, the temple itself, we at the temple, want Mooney buried from the Refuge Chapel, so he buried from the Refuge Chapel. It was the last place he was with. He loved the temple so much. So nice.