Dora A. Goldstein
Dora was born in Dallas in the Pearl Street area on August 16, 1908, in the home of the family who first took her parents in. Her parents had come straight from Europe to Galveston, arriving after the great flood, and were eventually sent on to Dallas, where a Jewish organization met them and helped them settle. Because they could not yet speak English, the community assisted them from the very start. The family moved often during Dora's childhood, living in small frame houses off Cedar Springs, on Powhatan Street, on Cora Street, and later in apartments owned by Barney Schwartz on Corinth Street and on Browder Street in a small Jewish section.
Her father worked as a jobber, buying and selling merchandise, and at one point opened a small family clothing store at Elm and Hawkins in Deep Ellum, where the family lived in a single room behind the store. When that business could not support them, he returned to jobbing. Dora married David in the mid 1920s and, during the hard times following the 1929 crash, the couple worked for the Ginsberg family before opening their own clothing store in Deep Ellum in 1929. They lived behind that store for more than eleven years, moving in with two children and leaving with six. Their customers were largely Black residents, and Dora recalled being treated with kindness in the neighborhood.
Dora spoke of a childhood marked by antisemitism, recalling frequent fights at Stephen F. Austin school after being called slurs and defending her younger brother. She attended shul at the Romanian congregation as a girl and later joined Shearith Israel and worshipped at Tiferet Israel. The family eventually moved to South Boulevard during World War II, then to North Dallas, before retiring around 1955 and moving to an apartment near Preston Road. About three years later, her husband David died of a heart attack at age sixty. Throughout the interview she remembered a time when neighbors of all backgrounds helped one another survive, valuing people for who they were rather than what they had.
Full Transcript
Today is August the 31st, 1989. I'm Rose Biederman and I'm talking to Dora Abramson Goldstein and we're here at the JCC. Dora, I hesitate a minute because I thought I remembered your name was Abramson. And would you please tell us where you were born and the names of your parents? I was born in Dallas where the market is now in the house that the old folks, U.K. lived in Dallas, Texas, August 16, 1908. Was that in the Pearl Street area? Uh-huh, Pearl Street area. Do you know if there were other Jewish families in that area? Well, no I don't because I was born there. All right.
I didn't live there very long, maybe a year. Why did your family move? Because the Utahs had a big family. They had, I think, like five kids, and the two of them was seven. All they had was a two-bedroom little two-by-four house. Was there a bathroom in the house? Yes, there was. Okay, okay. There was one bathroom, and then the Jewish society found us a place in North, I guess you call it North Dallas, off of Cedar Springs, and there was a little Romanischer shul I remember there. Okay. You know what street that was? I know it when I pass it, but I don't remember.
Okay. At that time, it was called North Dallas. We don't call that area North Dallas today. North Dallas. Yeah. Not like North Dallas now. Right. But at that time, it was called North Dallas. It was north of downtown but it was in the area today where the Fairmont Hotel is and a little bit north of that around the Maple Terrace and the Stonely It was right off of Cedar Springs Right. And you recall the Ein Schwarz, they started in that area. That was the Remanische Shule. Yeah. That was the only shule that was there. How long did your family live in that area? We lived there.
I think my mother had, I was there and my brother Dave was born there. And from there we moved to Palhattan Street off of Akert Street. And we lived there for a long time. What kind of a house was that? Was that like a frame house? There were no brick houses in those days. Everything was wood. And a small house? And a small house. Didn't have but two bedrooms. All houses had two bedrooms, one bathroom, and you were lucky. You know, after all, 1910, and that was right before the war. Uh-huh, uh-huh. And then from there, from Powhatan Street, my daddy decided to go into business for himself on Elm Street.
What business had he been in? He had never been in a business. He was always a jobber. Uh-huh. He would buy things, sell it, buy something else, sell it. Uh-huh. But he was always traveling, and here my mother already had three or four kids, and she didn't want him to travel. So they decided to go into a little business, and they lived in the back of the store. And where was this? On Elm and Hawkins. Oh. And what kind of a store did he open? It was a little dry goods store. Dry goods, uh-huh. Not like a dry goods store. It wasn't a dealer's store.
Right. Was it mostly men's clothes or women's or just men and women and children? Just like family clothing store. Because in those days they didn have all the things that they have nowadays I mean whatever you went in to get you bought what they had What kind of customer, who were the customers? Were they white or black? They were my girlfriend, Kelly. They were mostly black people. That was a black neighborhood. Always was a black neighborhood. That was what was called de bellum. And who was it that said that their father had a butcher shop? Someone in there said that their father had a butcher shop.
I know Lewin had a butcher shop in Deep Elm. Yeah. And Engelberg had a butcher shop. And Engelberg. And those were the only two butcher shops that I really remember. Uh-huh. Yeah. And now, like. And you say that the family lived in the back of the store. My family did. So what was it, just one room or? One room. Uh-huh. One room. Just like a petition from the front of the store. That's right. We didn't have a lot of merchandise, didn't have the money to buy it. And then from there, my father couldn't make a living staying there, so he decided to go back to jobbing and gave up the store.
And we moved off of Pacific Avenue going north, right in front of the Bryan Street High School was a little street called Cora, and we moved there. Okay. And I was about 11 or 12 years old then. And then. Was this also a frame house? Everything was a frame in those days. There were no brick houses. Everything was frame. And then I was about 12 or 13 years old, and we moved from there My father had started jobbing with B Schwartz and they go out on the road and buy merchandise buy stocks that were going bankrupt or out of business and my daddy would sell it And we moved to one of B Schwartz apartments on Corrine Street Now who is B.
Schwartz? Is that a lady? A man. You didn't know B. Schwartz? What does the B stand for? Barney. Barney Schwartz. But he went under the name of B. Okay. That was Rose Barshop's father and mother. Oh, I didn't know that. Okay. Yeah. Okay. What's the matter? You guys. So Mr. Schwartz, he had a... He had apartments there on Corinth Street, Cigar Street. Is that close to Irby Street? Yes. Okay. like one block off of Worthy. Now it's stairs, right? And we lived there for a couple of years, And then we moved down the street to Browder Street. That was the street where the Waldemans lived.
Okay. The old folks was. Irving and all of them lived there. And Max Einhorn lived there. That was a little Jewish section. All right. Now, I've seen pictures. Some houses on Browder were two-story. Was this? All wood. But was this a one-story? house that you lived in on Browder? Yes. Okay, okay. In fact, it was an apartment. A duplex? A duplex. Okay, okay. I don't remember who lived next door. Okay. I think one of the Ginsberg sisters lived next door. You know, in those days, I just don't want to forget those days because nowadays everybody eats everybody. There are no nice people nowadays. If you find somebody nice, it's a miracle.
Everybody tries to do you. What was it like then? Everyone helped each other? Everybody helped each other. How? With whatever they could. You mean like... Like my husband and I worked for the Ginsbergs. We lived in a one-room... What was the name? Oh, you wouldn't... Oh, maybe you do. Do you remember the old folks, Harris, that lived on Linway, right off of Irvey Street? You don't remember that. We lived in one room there, but we worked for the Ginsbergs. Even though Carfair was a nickel in those days, my husband and I would walk home from Elm Street all the way to Lindley, and we would walk.
Now the Ginsbergs, they just couldn't stand it, and they would make us come to their house for dinner. And their house was, the whole family was there, maybe twenty people. And everything was put on the table, and whoever grabbed first got to eat it. But you got something to eat if you didn't eat this, you ate this, or this, or this. You ate something, you weren't particular. Like, it's not done. It's too done. Like nowadays. So we were all together. Everybody was like family. Even families are not together nowadays. It's sad. It's sad. They go by what you have and not who you are. Well, do you think everyone was like in the same situation and they had to help each other?
Yes, they had to help. To get to survive. Well, don't forget, in those days it was right after the crash, the stock market crash in 1929, 1930, nobody was rich. So everybody, the Jewish people, the Goyim I don't know, but the Jewish people, all try to help one another My husband didn have a job so the Ginsburgs gave him a job When did you get married 1924 And then I couldn find a job and they gave me a job Not much money, but something was better than nothing. That's not the way they look at it nowadays. First they want to know how much and what hours.
Anyway. I'd like to go back to Browder because you said it was like a lot of Jewish people lived in this area. Yes, uh-huh. And did you really? Aaron Spelling's family lived there. I went to school with Aaron Spelling's brother, Mara, that died. Oh, uh-huh. See. Before Aaron Spelling got big and I went to California, I used to see him, we used to talk the whole time. But you know. Aaron Spelling in a newspaper article that I read said that he has terrible memories of living on Browder Street. Well, we all do. We didn't have enough to eat. We didn't have a good place to live.
The Gentile people harassed us in school. How? When I went to school, I had a fight every day. At least one fight a day in school. Verbal? Called me a damn Jew, called me a sheeny, called me a dirty name. I wasn't going to take it. They would pick on my brother. They would knock him down when I came out of school. Man, I used to tear into them. Next day, I had to go to the principal's office. I said, fine. If you get this one and this one and this one that started the fight, you can put me in the corner. Unless you do something to them, you ain't going to do nothing to me.
Even the teachers were bad to the Jewish people. I know one time I had a bad stomachache and I had to go to the bathroom and I raised my hand and she wouldn't look at me. I raised my hand and I knew if I didn't hurry I wasn't going to make it. And I just picked up and walked out. Walked. I ran to the bathroom. Wish you were going to make me stay in, make me do this. No you don't. I said if I had cracked all over your floor you want to make me clean it up I wasn going to do that I said no way What school did you go to Stephen F Austin the one that right there by Baylor Hospital now At that time, the school was down there with the Baylor Dentistry.
Oh, uh-huh. And they moved the school down to Washington and Gaston. I went one term to that school, but I started down at Hall and Gaston is where I started. My brother Dave went there. I mean, even though it was hard times in those days, at least the people were different. You can take anything when people are nice to you or want to try and help you. When my husband and I decided to go into business in 1929, we had people that loaned us money. Nowadays you've got to sign your life away before somebody will loan you anything. No, no such thing. So, I mean, I don't know whether that was good or not.
You know, when my husband and I were married, he was a softie. You could come to him with any soft story, and you got it. One certain party, and I'm not going to mention his name, because I'm sure you would know him too, was always trying to sell my husband something. One time he came, and he tells my husband, Oh, David, I got a deal. What is a deal? See, and I worked with my husband in the store. He opened up, but then I always got down there. As soon as I sent the kids to school, then I got down there. And this was like in February or March after Christmas.
He said, I got a chance to buy a whole bunch of fruitcakes. That same place that's in what, Waxahachie? Corsicana? Corsicana. Oh, really? They had a lot of fruitcakes left over. And so my husband said, well, how are you going to sell fruitcakes now? Christmas is over, Thanksgiving is over. I'll sell them. My husband, good natured husband, he says okay He gives them the check to buy it Then when I came down he tells me what he did I wanted to kill him How are you going to sell fruitcakes You have to hold them until November Well, which is what they had to do. They had to take it to that place in the market where you store a cold storage.
Oh, like a cold storage. Uh-huh. Is that right? And finally, I don't remember if it was right before Thanksgiving, he got someone to buy it. Oh, he was all excited. So when I came down, I said, well, how much money are we making? Oh, we're breaking even. I said, what do you mean you break it even? You've got to have the money to pay for the storage for six months. But you're getting rid of all the fruitcakes. I said, getting rid of them? $5,000 is what we paid for. All you're getting is $5,000. What about interest on the money? What about the storage? Anyway, my husband was getting ready to go to New York to World Series.
Hi, me darling. So he sells it and he comes in with the check. I was lucky I was there. He wanted my husband to endorse the check because it was made out to him and my husband. He wanted my husband to endorse the check and give him half his money. And I said to my husband, you know, the school I went to, you didn't figure that way. So this guy says, well, we're partners. I says, partners to what? Where's the money you put up? The interest that has to be paid, the storage that has to be paid. So you need notes of all of that.
So I took the check away from my husband, and here my husband's on pins and needles to go to the football game, go out to the airport. So my husband says, come on, take me to the airport to this guy. And he thought that he was going to get some money out of my husband. But my husband didn't have any money. I had the check. He never talked to me after that. And he never came... He came around one time. He was selling something else and I was there. I said, if you take one more step in this store, I'm calling the police. My husband, but I'm still not what you would call.
Over, before I say yes, it's got to be something. Did you, didn't you live at one time on South Boulevard? I know that was probably. Probably after we moved out from that store. We lived in that store for 11 1⁄2 years with six children. Now, wait a minute. After you married and started a business, you lived behind the business and raised your children there. Had two children when we moved in. Had six when we moved out. Oh. Moved to South Boulevard. Uh-huh. Now, South Boulevard was considered a Jewish neighborhood. A Jewish neighborhood. What was it like to live in that area? All right, by that time...
Around what time is this, in the 30s? No, 40s. In the 40s, okay. It was during World War II. Oh, okay, okay. Times were getting better. Yeah. People had made money or were making money, which included us too. Yeah. And we did make money, and the children went to grade school and high school to Forrest, and John Henry Brown, and it still wasn't, the people still wasn't as nice as they had been when they were poorer. that they all had a little money, they were driving a new car, and they were taking a trip already. They were already not the same kind of people. To me, I don't know, maybe I should I should have been that way, but I never was that way.
I came from poor background. I was poor. I worked hard to work myself up. With a six husband and six children it was tough Nothing was easy And then we moved away from there We moved to South Dallas That was a big deal. And then one day, Mr. Palaszczuk that owned the house, we didn't buy the house, we only rented it. You were renting the house. Mr. Palaszczuk, did you know him? Came by one day and he said, I've got a chance to sell the house. So I said, well, what were we going to do? We had good credit in the bank. We were well-known, never cheated anybody to this day.
And so the bank loaned us the money to buy a $3,000 house. Imagine $3,000. So we bought the little house. From Mr. Polisher. I see. So you stayed in the house. So we stayed in the house about another ten years. I see. That we lived there. The meantime of World War II, we were, thank God, doing good, saved money. And then we decided it was turning black, the blacks were moving in. Right. In fact, the Abramsons next door to us, and he was a butcher's in... Oh, uh-huh. They lived next door to you? Where was their butcher shop? Forrest Avenue, right there at Grand and Forrest, by Blend Brothers Bakery.
Remember Blend Brothers, Bakery and Delicatessen? That was my sister. Your sister? Oh really? Uh huh. Blanche and Issa was my sister. And so they sold their house to the Schweitzer's. Well after that it was hard living with Schweitzer kids, you know. We always were used to Schwarzers, but by that time is when the Schwarzers were getting putsy to putsy, you know. They wanted their freedom too. They were entitled to their freedom but they didn do it right Even today they don do it right I mean anyway so we decided we could afford to move Two of our daughters were married already We had two more homes and two boys homes So we decided to move.
We moved north Dallas. We built the house. And we lived there like five years. Business was turning. It wasn't... You're talking about on D-Pen? D-Pen. Yeah. The business section was going to pot. Other businesses were moving in, it was changing. So I said to my husband, I said, Well, a friend of ours in California wanted us to go into another business with him. And I said, You know, Daddy, maybe we ought to. So he said, well if we go into business with him, we open up here in Dallas, we'll have to give up the house, we'll have to come back to work. I said, well, I'm still young.
I was about 50 then. I'm still young, still rich. I don't know, five or six years, we retired. So that's what we did. We sold the house. And what time, was this in the 60s? It was in 1955. Oh, 1955. And we sold the house, and we rented an apartment. So we lived in an apartment off of Preston Road and Bandera, behind the pink brick wall, which was really nice. I mean, you didn't have to worry about the plumber, you didn't have to worry cutting the grass, nothing. And it was really nice. And then it was like three years after that, and he died. He had one heart attack and that was it.
He was sixty years old just in the prime of his life to live I was fifty and he was sixty We were just getting you know all the kids were married and we had everything for ourselves And we would come and go, there you lose your mate. I only had the two boys in Dallas, the four girls were scattered all over the United States. and the Lewins had the meat market and what was it like in Deep Elm were you afraid? I never was afraid the colored people treated me better than my own family don't forget every two years I had a baby and every time they saw me and I was pregnant and I worked in the store all day so I never could get my exercise.
At nighttime, when we closed the store up at 10 o'clock, either my husband went to the baseball game, and we left the children sleeping with a sitter, and I would take my walk. I'd walk all the way from B. Fellum all the way to Sanga Brothers. So a lot of times the colored taxi cab drivers would see me and they'd holler at me, you want me to give you a ride? No. Sometimes coming back, though, I couldn't walk, and they would take me right to my... Even the streetcar conductor would let me off right in front of my door. But it was... Even the black people in those days, the white people treated them better.
They treated the black people better in those days than they treat the black people nowadays. I don't know why. That's interesting that you say that the white people in those days treated the blacks differently than today. Can you explain how? Or do you know how? Can you explain it? Well? I think because even the white people weren't well off and they didn't have the good things. People had even worse. So they were more compassionate. I know. Was there any trouble between the blacks and all the Jewish shopkeepers? Never. We never had any trouble. We had more trouble with the few white customers than we did with the blacks.
I think that black people have cooked their own goose in a lot of things. They get out and they demand. You can't demand. You have to work for it. Look at all the black people that's on welfare. Why can't they get out and work? In the 30s, in Deep Elm, that was a hard time for everyone, Depression, where there are a lot of blacks out of work, they would just be sitting on the sidewalk. That's when the government made that WPA program and that helped. That's what they need to do nowadays. The government needs to make some program that's unemployed from work. They should not give help to people that care for them.
They should not give money to people that can work. Only old people and babies. What about all the gambling that was going on in Deep Elm with the blacks? Was that... This week they won and next week they lost. This week they pawned everything and next week they took everything out and we did it again Didn make any difference Didn make any difference Did the black women work They all had a maid job Nowadays my son Doc had a maid working for them and one of the kids called her a maid and she said I'm not a maid, I'm a housekeeper. That's what's wrong with the black people.
I don't blame them for wanting to be better. Yeah. Did they live in the neighborhood or they came to that area to shop? Some, like mine, we had a little house in the back and she lived in the back. You mean on South Boulevard? Uh-huh. Uh-huh. But I'm in in Deep Elm. Did they live in that area? No. They just came there to do their business. That was the shopping center for the black people. Yeah. I think we ought to say on the tape, for the record, that many areas blacks could not shop at. Not that they could not shop. They couldn't afford to shop.
So how did they shop on Deep End? Did they get credit or...? Well, sometimes we gave some of our good customers a little credit. Because we knew they would come in that weekend and pawn something, and whatever it was that they owed us, we would take it out of whatever it was they pawned. But we didn't give all of them credit. Well, I understand. So it was really cash. They had to have the cash. So when they had to have cash, they usually brought in something to pawn to get cash. But white people did the same thing? Yes. They needed cash, they brought something in to corn.
They didn have the credit like today Oh God knows That what went to corn shop business Yeah See But now anybody can go to a bank and borrow just on their signature They don't have to have anything on anything. So, but... I know it's getting late. Do you have anything, any comments you'd like to make or something that you didn't talk about that you wanted to say? Well, life is good nowadays, but I still like the old times better. I mean, all the neighbors got together, either at our house or at somebody else's house, or we went to shul Friday night. Most of us went to shul.
What shul did you go to? Well, in those days we went to the Gooders' office. And then when they went out of business, we joined with Sheriff Israel. But that's in South Dallas. What about when you lived on Browder Street or...? On Browder Street, there was a little shul on... Where's that in front of us, sir? Powell Patton. That was Ashishvar, wasn't it? That was the remainder shul? And then when we moved away from that neighborhood, we moved up there in your neighborhood. We moved off of Linway and Holmes, at the top of the hill. So we went to Sherry's history. Well, the Good Asylum would have been closer.
They didn't have a good assignment yet then. When you moved to What year was that 1922 So well a Guduzahem building was built in 26 Oh, it was? Uh-huh. So we went there. Then when Guduzahem built, my parents had moved to Pennsylvania and and Hornerworth, around the corner from the U.S. apartment. So we went there. Our boys were born this foot from there. Our girls were confirmed from there. Are your parents buried here in Dallas? They what? Are your parents buried here in Dallas? I'm sure. I didn't share Israel. Did they come from Europe? Came straight from Europe to Galveston. Oh, did they? They came into Galveston right after the big flood, and they couldn't keep them in Galveston, so they sent them to Palestine.
Well, in Palestine they didn't have a Jewish people, so they sent them to Dallas. I see. Of course my mother was pregnant with me. And then the Federation, I don't remember who it was, like a Federation, met us, because my parents couldn't talk to them, so they met us, and they took us to the U-taces. Very, very interesting. Thank you very much. Come along. Yeah. Thank you very much, Dora. It was very interesting. Bye.