Edith “Edie” Kuhne
Edie was born in Brooklyn in 1924. Her mother died when Edie was eight, and she and her younger brother were raised for a time by their mother's sisters while their father, a traveling toy salesman who represented the Gund company, worked. Eventually the family reunited in an apartment on Ocean Parkway, and when Edie was twelve her father remarried a woman she considered her mother all her life. A gifted student, Edie skipped grades and graduated high school at sixteen, attended Brooklyn College at night, and pursued acting. She was offered a radio role on Duffy's Tavern but turned it down two weeks before her wedding. She met Harold, an Eagle Scout, at a Boy Scout camp, and they dated four years before marrying.
In late 1946 Harold, who worked in the textile industry, came to Dallas for a job, and Edie followed in January 1947 with their young daughter Ellen. Housing was scarce, so they first stayed at a hotel and then rented an unusual log house on several acres near Buckner Boulevard, where they lived for three and a half years and where their son Kenneth was born. They later moved to a small house on Glendora near Preston Road. Through Harold's business connections with the Lambert brothers of Sewanee Manufacturing, the family quickly found a warm welcome and lifelong friends in Dallas.
Edie and Harold were deeply involved in Temple Emanu-El, helping raise funds for its new building and for the Jewish Community Center, and Harold helped start the temple's Boy Scout troop. The couple organized creative, inclusive community events, including an elegant, affordable dinner dance and a members' art show that benefited the temple. Edie devoted years to scouting as a leader and den mother, and hosted foreign exchange students, including Alfreda from Sao Paulo, Brazil. A passionate cook, she passed her love of food to her family. In later years she lived at a Dallas senior residence, facing life with humor and three guiding mantras about accepting change and doing what needs to be done.
Full Transcript
right my name is Pauline graier and I'm a volunteer for the Dallas Jewish historical society and I am here today on November the 4th 2013 and I'm here to interview Edy cun k u h NE e and Edie um I know you told me a long time ago that you in Herald Mary very young would you tell us about that and how you all happened to come to Dallas well uh we were married a week be let's see Harold was 3 years older than I and I was a week before my 20th birthday when I got married and I met him when I was 16
so we dated for 4 years and of course don't laugh but in the old days you dated you didn't live together you lived with your family um and so there was no sex until we got married not that anybody has to know that on camera um it was just a different world at the time um we were married lived in Brooklyn uh you want to know before that tell me about your parents well um my mother died when I was eight I have no recollection of my mother whatsoever you would think that an 8-year-old would have some memories I do not my father was a
very devoted father he was a traveling salesman and uh right after my mother died I lived with one of her sisters and my little brother lived with another sister after a certain length of time we switched uh so they each had the benefit of both of us I don't know where my father lived when he came to town but uh he didn't live with them or with us and then finally he did get an apartment and a housekeeping and we all lived together uh grandparents I only remember my father's mother who was a shriveled up little old lady and uh one time when she was
about to sit in a chair she had cataracts she missed the chair and fell and so she went to the hospital of course this is all very it nothing follows here um but that's the way I talk anyhow my mother and I that's you know now this is my second mother my father remarried when I was 12 and she was my mother all my life terrific lady we had a wonderful relationship anyhow we went to the hospital to visit my grandmother and in those days they did not allow children in the hospital you couldn't even go into the lobby so I stayed in the car
my mother went up to visit my grandmother and she came back laughing and I was so upset how could you be laughing when grandma's in the hospital she said oh Edie please she in the old days they used to keep the chart at the foot of the bed and my mother looked at the chart and my grandmother had told them that she was 60 when she was probably 90 something so my mother thought that was very funny and she said Mama how could you possibly tell them such a thing she said do they have to know so that was that story okay that takes care
of that that's pretty funny it was funny at the time uh where and when were you born in Brooklyn uh when in 1924 and uh how did you have happened to come to Dallas a job of course um my husband worked for a very large textile company in New York and it was really the textile company that was the college for all the textile men in the industry that came after that um many of them most of them either opened their own businesses or they went on to become sales reps in different parts of the country uh the company was conall marks I have no
idea if they're still in business I would imagine so so we came to Dallas for a job at that time they didn't promise and they didn't guarantee but they said maybe possibly hopefully you will earn $55,000 a year wow we thought we were millionaires because that was a lot of money at that time that was in uh 1946 okay that's how we came to Dallas and what did my parents do for a living my father was a toy salesman now we're going back again um my father represented Gund gnd which is still a very very large company in the stuffed animal business um and as
happens with most salesmen their friends very often are people in the same industry because they all go to the the uh trade shows together so I had samples from other people as well as all my father's samples and in those days stuffed animals were only bears and dogs not like today we get a giraffe and a lion and everything else um so I had all of his samples and of course they were my dear friends and at night they would all be in bed with me uh and uh I learned to love my teddy bears at my at my dogs do you still have any
of them so uh I don't have any of those but I still have two dogs um where did you live as a child um also in Brooklyn uh I can't tell you exactly where because one Aunt lived in one area and the other lived in another and then when we had the apartment we lived on Ocean Parkway and Avenue f for anybody who's listening if they know where that is it happened to be a very upscale neighborhood very nice and right down the street was the um uh the um riding school and I did learn how to horseback ride and we used to ride in
Prospect Park and there was a bridal path all along Ocean Parkway that led to Prospect Park and one time I was um riding with one of my mother's friends a grown man of course uh and uh I was stopped and given a ticket because I was feeding on Horseback and which they did there were police on Horseback in the park to make sure that people weren't doing that uh what was the neighborhood like it was very very fine very nice were there any was it a particularly Jewish neighborhood I wouldn't know remember that I wouldn't know at all mhm um what did you do for
amusement well I remember horseback riding other than that I don't remember anything else in particular so you and Harold got married you were 19 and he was it was a week before my 20th birthday so he was 23 20 and 23 and then how long after that did you come to Dallas um let's see if I was born in 24 20 years later would be 44 44 uh the Herold came down here at the end of 46 and uh we were living in an apartment of course in Brooklyn because in Brooklyn at that time everyone lived in an apartment unless they were old or Rich
the people who were old or Rich lived in homes but everybody else especially young couples lived in apartments so Harold came down without me to find an apartment for us and at the end of 1946 there were no Apartments in Dallas except for the little cracker box apartments that were on ther right off Northwest Highway which was strictly for veterans and Harold was not a veteran he had a perforated eard drum and so that's another story you'll just love when Harold was called for the draft uh and he was examined and the doctor examined him and checked his ears and he said okay kid you're
in and Harold sat there the day before in the newspaper it was advertised that Lippy D Roa who was a famous baseball person was 4f because he had a perforated eardrum so Harold sat there and he thought what am I going to tell my mother and Edy if they accept me when they didn't accept D Roa and so he sat and the doctor said young man you can go and he said well doctor and for Harold Harold was not a big talker uh as you know um he said Doctor I I'm I'm just so delighted that my eardrum is healed he said but I've always
been told that I had a perforated eardrum and so the doctor doctor came over to look again and he yelled at the nurse give me some clean instruments how do you expect me to examine without clean instruments blaming it of course on the instruments and he said of course you've got a pated eardrum your forf get out of here so that's how Harold was not a veteran therefore we couldn't live in those little cracker box Apartments which was very thankful and so that was that so he came home I actually came down January 47 with Ellen my baby and uh we were living at the
adice and uh since Harold had been staying there the manager liked him and he said I'll give you a room way in the back and I'll get you a crib and he said I'll kind of forget that you were there because it was still the end of War years and people were not allowed to stay in the H in the hotels for more than three nights because they had so much business and so we stayed there and the first morning Harold went to to work and well before that we went down here I'm going on and on um we went down for breakfast and uh
Ellen at age well she wasn't quite two Ellen could speak very well um we went to breakfast and she was sitting between us and we gave her a menu and so she the waitress was standing between the two of us and the waitress says what does the child want and I said elen dear what would you like like for breakfast so she looked at the menu and looked up at the at the waitress and said I'd like prunes and cream and then she said I want whatever cereal she wanted I don't remember that the prunes and cream I remember and the waitress looked at me
and said she can't read C she I mean it was enough that she could talk um so that was it so Ellen and I went back up and Harold went to work and he went to see suan manufacturing company which was owned by the three Lambert Brothers there was Irv Murray and Seymour uh there had been other salesmen who came to Dallas prior to Harold's trip here and they were older so Murray became friends with one herb became friends with another and Seymour who was Harold's age said he's mine and he said where's your wife and baby and Harold said they're at the hotel he
said well they're not going to stay at the hotel all day get in the car we're going to go get them and take them to my house and in that day that time most of the young couples and especially the Jewish young couples lived in South Dallas in off of Forest Avenue and he lived on wend delin and anybody who is old enough to remember probably remembers when delin so we went to visit them and they lived in a very tiny house as most of the young couples did and um the two Ricky Lambert who was Ellen's age the two of them sat out in
the backyard playing and then Margie called them in for lunch and she made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches they each had half and chocolate pudding for dessert with milk and my child ate everything in Brooklyn I used to bake a lamp chop and bake potato for her every day which she didn't eat I ate I was ready to kill her however I learned that you don't feed your child a lamp chop a b potato so that was that um education uh tell me about your experience in school I only remember Junior High School I was very smart at that time um first of all in
elementary school I skipped the grade it used to be like 3A 3B 4 a 4B was separate classes I did the whole 4 A and B together because I was so smart then when I went to Junior High they had a um again some kind of Rapid Advance where I did a year instead of two years so I got into well actually I got out of high school at for at 16 um the only thing I remember about junior high it was mon talk Junior High School um that's about all remember oh yes I had one very good friend who's still alive Michelle summerr it
was Michelle duel DL um and I just remember her and she's the only one actually she's the second oldest person in my life my brother being the first or the longest person and Shelly the second um she now lives in Florida and she's very sick anyhow we do talk I call her she calls me um hi High School I remember working in the library and I decided that I was going to read every book on the Shelf I don't remember the A's the authors um I got I only remember to be Bank to beachcraft I think it was I have the book I finally got
the book it was called the man who started clean and it was about a young man who a very wealthy young man who has an automobile accident and they discover that he has a form of Amnesia where he reverts to infancy I mean he performs like an infant he kicks and he screams of course he was supposedly crying and uh there's a young Doctor Who figures out what's wrong with him and little by little brings him back to normaly uh that's what I remember about um about working in high school in high school I I wasn't quite as smart but I did graduate at 16
uh and uh I wanted to be an actress but I did go to Brooklyn College at night because I wanted to be an actress during the day so I used to go to the uh radio Studios at that time it was radio of course and the um uh what I trying to think of the advertising agencies to audition and everybody told me I was fine but they never got around to calling me for a job and um I finally was called for radio there was a program called Duffy's Tavern it was kind of like a cheers program if anybody remembers cheers that they would remember
but Duffy's Tavern was kind of the same thing and there was a Miss Duffy and I did not have to audition again I was offered the job of Miss Duffy but that was to 2 weeks before I was getting married and I said oh I can't I'm getting married little did I stop to think that you could be married and be an actress so that was the end of my career there however when I came to Dallas uh there was a little theater across from the Melrose hotel and the uh it was called the courtyard players and the director was a young woman from New
Orleans and I was given a part in in um what was the name of the show oh dear at this moment I can't private lives H private lives no no um I know it very well but right now I can't think of it at any rate I had the part of the woman who was out on the bake all the time and um uh we played for 10 nights and of course my husband was the babysitter at that time and then I got a call from bar lumet Sydney lumet's father lumet or Lum however he says it uh he had a little theater on Cedar
Springs it's of course long gone and um he called me to take the part of uh uh here goes another one I I I know it so well and I'm right now I'm not thinking but again he was offering me the role whatever it was oh it's on the tip of my brain but it's not coming out uh think of it in the middle of the night I'll call you at any rate I had to refuse because I couldn't have my husband babysitting all the time so that was the end of my career uh and after that my career became scouting Girl Scouts brownie Scouts
Den mother there um oh by the way Harold was instrumental in starting the Boy Scout Troop at Temple Emanuel uh so we had about 12 years of scouting I guess in Dallas uh Harold of course had been an eagle scout in fact oh I never told you I met Harold at Boy Scout cab my brother was at Boy Scout cab which was up in the mountains the ader rondex or someplace like that and I was going on a business trip with my father and mother my that is my my stepmother was my mother and so we went to see my brother to tell him goodbye
and Harold came bounding out of the woods and that's how I met Harold and um that was the beginning all right fast fast forward uh what's next working career I talked about that what did you do in high school college did I did kind of covered that tell me some of your work and memorable projects um there were a lot of projects here at Temple um hold the page down a little bit oh excuse me it's obscuring your face at Temple memorable projects uh in the old days Temple and other Jewish organizations used to have dinner dances at the hotel usually at the baker which
doesn't exist anymore because the baker was a good place for dinner and dancing um for the couples who could afford to go to these parties it was an expensive evening and we were all quite young uh because they had to get a babysitter and I don't remember what it cost for the dinner uh and um sorry stop for just a minute stop for just a minute let me let me change this and get it started again excellent excellent this is wonderful exactly what I'm looking for oh my God it's like night and day wonderful can you push push that over to me thank you well
there is coffee and tea and lemon water and cucumber water this is great um I'm happy I'm very happy any okay wait wait just let me start it again okay wonderful lady interesting the reason I bring up this dance business uh we decided har and I wait wait wait wait okay let me make sure that I've got it on and it it is recording yes you decided that it wasn't fair to have this sort of annual dinner dance downtown because it left out so many of the young couples who could not afford it so we decided that we would have a dinner dance at Temple
uhhuh in the big room and we were given permission to go forward with it and Harold made the U invitation and it was written in French and it was on a card and everybody at Temple received this card and of course you read the somehow you read the French first and at the bottom it said for translation turnover and on the other side it was in Hebrew so that immediately got everybody's attention they had no idea what there we go oh come on can't have a cold I haven't had a cold in 100 years I just don't get sick I'm sorry I don't know where
this came from well we're we're going again now so this is fine okay we're the U we stopped where the we're talking about dance that we arranged invitation uh so that was the invitation and of course they did subsequently receive something else that told them where and when and we knew we had a friend at Neiman Marcus and I called the friend and asked if there was any chance that we could go to Neiman's warehouse and borrow some of their props because we wanted this dance to be very elegant so we borrowed the red ropes and we borrowed the Wooden Soldiers at the entrance and
it was very very fancy of course and then we knew someone who knew what was the orchestra Leader's name rman mhm yeah Joe rman Joe rman and we engaged him and because it was a temple and because it was all the Jewish people he gave us a very very good deal uh we didn't pay him a lot at all and he brought his orchestra and then I think it was Wall's delicatess and we prevailed on them to make trays for each table with cheese and coal Cuts Etc and uh they did that for a very nominal charge so we actually charged the couples as I
remember it was $10 or $12 for the evening which was to pay walls and Joe wman really we didn't have to pay the temple for the use of the room and we didn't have to pay neimans for the use of their props um and it was a huge success because because everybody showed up and um it uh it it it hasn't been done again to my knowledge but it really was something to do because it it did bring a lot of people into the activity uh and it was something they could all afford so that was number one the number two thing and it was
always Harold but I was always part of what he did um we had an art show which you may remember and the members of Temple were to contribute their own work it could be sculpture it could be painting it could be whatever and uh that took a lot of work because as the pieces came in we had to have a place to store them and we had to have insurance to be sure that they were safe uh I'm sure the place was somewhere a temple but I don't remember that exactly anyhow when the time came for the show again we had a friend who uh
had these huge panels on which you could hang your paintings and they allowed us to borrow them at no charge so that these panels was hung all around again in the big room at Temple and uh for display and we had um the evening before the the actual show we had a pre-show where people were invited to come and it was a very elegant evening and if I remember correctly we may have served wine and uh there was they couldn't purchase anything but they could still take notes on what they wanted so that the next morning they could get there early and hopefully get a
low number because we gave out numbers as they lined up uh and they could race to the piece that they wanted to make sure that they could buy it uh it was very successful the temple benefited from the sale the people who contributed did not receive they they just made a donation so the temple benefited whatever we collected and it was a huge success and it was a very elegant evening and the day of the show it was murder because people really raced to get there and they lined up and got their numbers and they made their purchases and uh again it was another very
successful event which I don't think they've ever done again which they should because it really worked um I don't remember a lot of other stuff um I noticed it says who is your role model I have to say Pauline graier could be a role model for me uh because I think Pauline does a lot of things that I'd like to do and she does them very easily and uh you're teasing you're teasing me let's let's go on Edie uh you told me one time about the house that you lived in over by White Rock Garland the uh the log house well we were staying at
the hotel going back again and Harold was visiting one of his customers can't think right now of his name and he uh asked him where his wife and baby were and he told him at the hotel and he said well I know I have a friend who has a home out in the country at that time forny Road off Buckner Boulevard was out in the country and he said uh this man is a doctor and uh the house is a log house on 5 Acres that they use only as a summer home and he might be interested in leasing it to you renting it to
you uh and of course this was January so we were pretty safe for a few months and so we went out to see it and I went out of my mind every step in or every stair step in the house was a half log and the doors in the house were huge huge doors with giant brass hardware and the rooms were enormous there were 80 drawers and cupboards in the kitchen and the sink was in a cabinet where I had to stand on a little stool to open the doors to use the sink it was a real old old log house but it wasn't a
log cabin the living room was 30 or 35 ft long 20 ft wide and 25 ft high with white pine beams going across the ceiling with a huge uh Wagon Wheel chandelier in the center uh with a firplace that we could walk into with 4ft logs um and that was the only heat that we had except for a little uh heat you know in those days they we had little heaters floor heaters that would stand in Corners so that would be at one end of the 30t room and the fireplace going at the other and of course where we had company we would have that
going all day but heat rises so it wasn't really warm but everybody was very happy to be there the dining room which we didn't need really as a dining room because the kitchen had this tremendous table with benches uh so the dining room had our pingpong table and we had a cover for it so that we could cover the pingpong stuff and use it as a buffet table which we did when we had company and uh we had a lot of company because most of the couples that we met had never been out there I mean that was on the way to Pleasant Grove Pleasant
Mound Urbandale was about a mile from the house that was about the closest uh and the couples that we met just had never been out there they lived in University Park probably um and so when we invited they came and very often they would stay overnight because we had lots of room and lots of extra beds uh and uh it was just it was a wonderful introduction to Dallas and um we lived there for 3 and 1/2 years and then the owner did want it back and uh in fact at Christmas time there was a um caretaker's house out in the back of the property
and at Christmas time the owner used to invite his friends and Harold joined them all men to make little toys for children they made wagons and little um sort of little doll carriages uh so that was a big thing that went on there but we did live there for three and A2 years and Kenneth was born at that time so we've always said Kenneth and Lincoln were born in log cabins but Kenneth really was born in the hospital uh but you know we gave credit for that uh then from there we moved to a tiny house that still exists on Glendora right off Preston Road
it's the second house the Corner House was a very large home this was the second house on Glendora on the north side of the street so small that in the dining room we had our baby grand piano the kitchen is the best way to describe the house I had a drop leaf table one side was closed against the wall and we would open the other side when we ate Kenneth was in a hi chair Ellen sat at one side Harold at the other and I was in the middle I could open the refrigerator and get the milk I could take the pot from the stove
and bring it to the table and I could put the dishes in the sink that was the size of the kitchen um at that time we had a television set and in those days the television set was probably 8 by 11 like a piece of school paper today and our friend RZ noin the novin had a jewelry and pawn shop downtown on commer Street and Grandpa owned it at that time and RZ and Ralph Ralph was the son of Grandpa uh RZ Ralph used to work at the store Raz was on What's My Line which was a television show with um odia uh the woman
very welln journalist at any rate again I can't think of names uh and it's not because I've lost my memory I just I'm not thinking of them now oh it started to come but it didn't at any rate Ros was on the show and you had to sign in the contestants had to sign in and she signed her name and RZ was a very handsome woman um well quaffed and goodlook jewelry goodlooking clothing and uh they they had to the the judges had to try to guess her profession or her her work and because of her appearance of course they gave her credit for owning
a modeling studio for uh owning a hairdressing Salon owning a a lady's Boutique uh being just all sorts of wonderful things that they could think of but she had put she had written down that she was a lady porn broker which was the occupation at the store so of course they did not guess her job but the reason I brought it up was that we had this tiny television set and when Raz came on we jumped from our seats to stand right in front of it because it would have been very difficult to see from sitting back in the chair anyhow although the living room
wasn't that large that was when we met the Raiden family uh they lived down the street and um their daughter Mara came down to play with Ellen they were about six or seven years old I think about seven they were brownies in the Brownie troop um and when Mara went home her mother was very upset because she couldn't find her and she wanted to know where she was and she said she was playing with that new little girl down the street and she said what new little girl she said oh you know her mother she's a lady with the big red hair that was how
that they identified me at that time so that's how I met Bernice and Sam Raiden and that was a good 60 years ago because the girls were seven or eight probably and my daughter was just recently 68 so I've known the ridens for a long time and they now live here with me um and what else what else what else um I'm running out of stories oh you're being wonderful tell me um any the experiences that you've had with the girls who have come and become your foster children oh yes of course um Alfreda from so Paulo Brazil was our exchange student for senior year
in high school Ellen went to Hillcrest um Freda um I didn't know at the time who was it um real Wolfram was the person who used to interview the families uh to decide if they should have an exchange student and she granted us the privilege I didn't know at the time Freda happened to be Jewish and she told us long afterwards that her father would not have allowed her to come had she not been with the Jewish family we didn't know that and she was not put in our family because she was Jewish in fact my husband at the time would have preferred a little
French girl uh because that would have been a laa uh however we did get Freda Freda spoke English very well so she and she was from she from so Pao Brazil yes and uh uh she was very bright and the first night that she was here we decided to take her out to a cafeteria which we thought would be an interesting experience and um we said uh H by the way Freda if we had a steak how do you like your meat and she raised her foot and pointed to the sole of her foot she likes her meat well done and we were rare eaters
so we had to get over that um it was all it was very wonderful uh Freda was here during one of the years when we had a big snowstorm and she had never seen snow before and I still a photograph of her bundled up outside shoveling snow and she brought in snowballs and put them in the freeza and when I asked her why she was doing this she wanted to be able to take them home and I assured her that they would not be transportable so that was that some years later after Freda went home and was married and had children she called and said
she was coming back with the children because they want wanted to see snow and this was in February and in February we generally did not have snow that one time we did I don't remember which month it was but I remember February because it was my daughter's birthday month and I remember her first birthday party when they were all 2 years old the children were playing outside with no coats or sweaters or anything so when she said she was bringing the children to see snow in February I said it's it isn't likely that we're going to have snow she said oh you'll do you'll think
of something so they arrived on a Saturday afternoon and it was very hot I mean really hot weather and um they came after a 17 hour trip which it was at that time and now it's only 10 hours to S Pao because now it's a non-stop flight um and uh the children were tired and uh I suggest suggested that she put them to sleep let me give let them take a nap well they slept right through dinner and there were let's see Freda and her husband and the two children and Harold and myself and our two children and as I recall Harold's mother and my
mother were there so we were 48 10 people in the house and we managed to bed everyone except that freda's husband slept on the couch in the den Harold slept on the couch in the living room and there was a love seat and since I was short I slept on the love seat in the middle of the night I heard the all talking Portuguese and I called elsio the husband and I said elsio are the children hungry what is it they want he said they want to go out and see the snow so we jumped up that night in Dallas there was 7 in of
snow no and we reached reached out we we got a spoon and a dish and we reached out the door and and got some snow for them to feel U they certainly couldn't go out in the middle of the night and they just couldn't wait for morning well of course they didn't have the proper clothing so they were wearing my long evening gloves they were wearing plastic uh garment bags on their legs to over their shoes uh because they they weren't dressed for snow but they did go out and build snowman uh and it was quite an experience and I don't know if they've ever
seen snow again since because they don't get snow in saalo uh but that was very exciting for them and so as Freda said I knew you'd think of something that is lot credit I got a lot of credit um what about any now you're Jewish and you raised your children Jewish and what kind of welcome I know I heard you say you were active in the temple um so um you found out a welcoming situation when you came into Dallas oh yes indeed but Temple at that time was in South Dallas Temple Emanuel and um I just I remember um Raymond Lambert's SP miter if
anybody remembers ra knows Raymond Lambert he's an architect um Raymond Lambert's B Mitzvah was a temple in South Dallas and since I was friends with the Lambert family uh I had helped arrange some of the food because food is my thing uh for the reception afterwards and uh Gladis Lambert his mother always gave me credit for having done the reception which I know I didn't do but I remember participating at Temple there then of course when Temple was going to be built um most of us worked on the committee to raise funds to approach people to raise funds which I also did for the Jewish
Community Center um and of course finally our Temple was built and it was quite wonderful and I think it's about time right now where they're looking for funds to Spruce it up a bit again um but that was you know we we were we were very much part of all that kind of growing up thing uh and of course the children went to Sunday school and they were confirmed and the fun thing when Kenneth was confirmed Kenneth did resemble his father very very very much so and at that time there was a walk out in the courtyard of Temple where all the families were lined
up with the students and the guests walked around to congrat at everyone and again I don't remember the name of the man who walked by Harold was standing there first then Kenneth and then me and he shook Harold's hand congratulated him shook Kenneth's hand and congratulated him and then said to me Edie I have never seen a boy look so much like his father and I said well that's very easy to understand because he is from his first marriage and with that man walked on Kenneth who was had gotten quite tall at the time looked down at me and said Mom how could you do
that I said did I lie which I didn't so that took care of that that was a fun time so that was uh that was my big remembrance of of confirmation for Kenneth I don't remember Ellen's um but um that was it I'm not I'm not a very good Temple person these days um course i' I've just stopped driving so it's going to be a little more difficult to attend the functions in the evening especially uh during the day uh we do have drivers here who will take us wherever we want to go so that's not a problem um but I haven't I really haven't
been that active uh in recent years don't ask me why just haven't been um I still am a member I'll I still will be buried there and have oh I I just met a very interesting Rabbi Lawler or something like that was his name I was at a funeral just the other day for a very dear friend uh who is not a temple member uh be simply because these people lived in France and then they moved to Dallas for 6 months a year uh then finally sold their property in France and now have property in Mexico I guess for tax reasons they probably can only
stay 6 months at a time I don't know enough about that but my friend the husband died just recently uh so I was at the funeral and this this Rabbi was very interesting uh he announced to people that there is a custom of throwing dirt on the coffin and he said he said things change all the time he said if you feel that you want to of course we certainly would appreciate it if you do he said but please don't feel uncomfortable which was very nice for him to say that because most of the people who were there I think I may have been one
exception but most of the people who were attended this funeral were people who are patrons and very very closely attached to the symphony and the Opera and I don't think that there are that many Jewish people who are in that situation uh and looking at them I didn't recognize I mean I got there early so I was sitting with the family because I was sitting um but most all of them all of them were surrounding the area and and looking at them I didn't see anyone that I recognized um so it was I the the rabbi was very interesting in that he made the guests
feel very comfortable about any anything that was traditionally a Jewish thing to do uh and of course it was a military funeral as well uh so Soldiers with the flag and the whole thing uh anyhow going to get into that um uh oh funny incident yes about the funeral about burial you got to talk about everything I tell people here all the time we're all going to die what's the big deal um my stone is there next to part of my stone is Harold my name is there my birthday is there the only thing that they have to put in is my uh final date
and when there is a funeral in this little property they cover all the stones with carpet I attended a funeral and I'm always early for everything and I happen to walk in and sit at the end of an aisle where there was a split in the car the carpet stopped and then there was another carpet when I looked down I saw my name I didn't realize that I was sitting right over my spot and then there were two women who came and came from the other side and came to the end and they said well you really get here early I said well I actually
came to check on my spot and with that they looked down and they said oh you are crazy because they could see my full name what cemetery was this it's at it's Bartman and it's in the um Mount of Olives or it was the Jacobson the coy and Ruth Jacobson bought the property and all of their friends are there and of course the big joke was that the boys could play golf and poker and the girls could play bridge afterwards and all that um but they bought it originally for their son which was a very early funeral that was too sad um but that's that's
where we are in fact I didn't know where the property was and we did attend another funeral that was over in an area that I think was more sherith Israel people and um so when we drove over there I said to Harold oh why don't you show me our place so we drove around and it's a little circle so we drove around the circle and I said to him you're going to put me there with all the smell from the cars driving around anyhow that was just to be funny but that where we are and uh it's nice to know funny thing oh how did
this happen just the other day we're talking I was talking to somebody about living a very long time a very very long time I mean I tell people I'm going to be in 20 years but we were talking about way in the future and I said if that happens and people go and look at the stone and we were talking about maybe like 2085 and I'm still alive and they'll look at the stone and say my God you was born in 24 you didn't die yet be very amusing if I really outlived a lot of people e you have such a wonderful attitude you you
go on with your life with no complaints ever why don't you share a little of this this is for your grandchildren for and for people in our community if they want to look at it but think of it as as advice what you leave to your granddaughters oh my granddaughters know me pretty well in fact um when my youngest granddaughter who lives here in Dallas uh who has by the way the most incredible ladies Boutique shop on mckin Avenue that every woman should become acquainted with because it is really fabulous it's called wow because that's what it is it's wow um when she was in
public school and I have I still have a copy uh she wrote a composition about her grandmother she said my grandmother Ed spelled e d e e uh is has a great imagination and when she comes to our house the first thing she does is take everything out of the refrigerator and change it into something else so I have always told people you know like the at Ellis Island they said give us your poor and hungry and we will whatever make a home for them I've always said give me your leftovers and I'll make you another meal uh it's just one of those things that
I can do um and besides it's fun but she wrote this whole thing about my grandmother with what she can do to food and uh and she would like to grow grow up and learn to cook with me but she really outd does me these days she's real good in fact everyone in my family Cook well except my husband and my son-in-law uh I once said to Harold why don't you ever try cooking he said why should I cook when I have you and then one time he said to me why don't you try try taking some photographs I said why should I do that
when I have you cuz Harold did take a lot of photographs and with my son-in-law it's the same thing my daughter was a very good cook and my son-in-law was a very good photographer so and then my daughter became a very good photographer as well uh my brother is an excellent cook my sister-in-law is fanatically good my son is excellent he had his own restaurant in Mall Idaho he built the building and had the restaurant and did the cooking uh Mall Idaho is 2 and 1 half hours north of Boise it was a very small town about 2500 people when he lived there and he
had a very elegant restaurant the conservatory it was called was very inexpensive at that time uh we had a grand opening I had a photograph of the pile of champagne bottles out in the backyard after the party because he entertained everyone in town with his Odes and with champagne we paid for it uh a year later we had a closing party because in Mall Idaho in those days and this was what 25 years ago in Mall Idaho it was a town where they ate pizza and hamburgers so his restaurant was not highly successful I mean there were people many people came from Boise because he
had an excellent reputation um but the uh the mall people didn't frequent it it may have been the kind of place they went to to celebrate an anniversary or a birthday but that didn't quite make it for any long term so it was only open for about a year but mall is an interesting place today I think someone told me that La Hoya California moved into maau so today there are sh o p p where in the old days when he was there there was a general store that sold everything and that there are you know fancy little shops candle shops and that sort of
thing that you would find in a more upscale area and uh but Kenneth moved to New Mexico uh outside of Santa Bay which he loves and he's there um and my other granddaughter lives in Milton which is a suburb of Boston and her shop which is wow uh is in Newton and is extremely successful uh and she was kind enough to introduce her sister who opened wow here to the dealers that she works with so that uh Alexa's shop will be as wow as as Erica's shop and uh that's this is a fascinating Ed you are remarkable a font you are a person we need
to come back this is this is part one let us say see very good um well as for I mean I'm sure you're going to discuss or maybe not uh living here at festar uh and I don't mean this to plug festar but we are one of the most popular of all the senior places for several reasons we're very small all we have perhaps 150 maybe 160 guests uh most of the new places have 300 people uh and you don't really get to know them personally as people do here so here everybody knows everybody and I always say we're like a big family living in
a big house and if someone doesn't show up at dinner one night you don't know if they went on vacation or are they at the rehab around the corner or are they across the street at Presby uh and it's that kind of thing um it's it's very important that uh that we're in a good neighborhood we're close to North Park we're close to every kind of shopping and of course the hospital is right across the street which is helpful um the corridors are very short in most of the new places the corridors are very long but I mean really long and uh the fact that
we are built in a circle uh and there are two elevators you don't have far to go to the elevator so the short corridors the good location and we have what everybody says is the best dining room of all the senior places so so much for five star and and may I ask your age may I ask your age do you mind I'm 89 and a half 89 and a half yeah and I'm not thinking of celebrating my 90th but I have been inviting everyone to my hund and I haven't decided exactly what we're going to do I don't really want to have just a
dinner I mean everybody has a dinner uh I thought it would be fun to rent not rent but hire or book like a Carnival Cruise uh you know for a 3-day weekend wouldn't that be fun would that be fun well you've got a long way to go that's 11 more 10 and a half years that's no big deal uh and the funny thing is I started to make a list of out of town people that I felt would be interested to come to my 100th birthday party and most of them are younger so that they would you know they'd still be alive um I wound
up with 50 names wow and I thought having a 100 people would be part of the fun of doing it so that didn't leave me many people in Dallas because in Dallas I think I could easily come up with 50 or more I'll come so oh you're invited of course and um at any rate it's a lot of fun talking about it uh there are there are other people older people seniors as we're known uh who say oh it's enough already you know it's like oh and I I just uh there there's no I I tell people it's attitude not age it really is uh
and especially if you're well I mean if you're sick if you've got something really wrong that's a little tough but um everybody gets a little something and I think as a closing note I'll give you my three mantras the first one you'll forgive me because it's I use a dirty word happens everybody gets a little something the second of course is the forever thing everything in life changes so you got to go with the flow and the third thing is you do what you have to do when you have to do it and that's all there is to it that's right I cool thank you
and that's that's about all you can say thank you a oh that's