Full Transcript
now hazel right before we started you told me you don't make a great Texan because of three things I don't discuss politics weather and sports I you know I just love that line that's a great one well 1925 Pittsburgh Pennsylvania you remember anything about Pittsburgh at all no because I left Pittsburgh when I was 20 months old my father died those days were very difficult times my mother was left penniless and so she had to move back with her parents of lived in Louisville Kentucky and that's where I was raised talk to me about your grandparents that you lived with they were usual ordinary nice
Jewish people my grandmother was a severe diabetic my grandfather took care of her nothing unusual or different they were just very nice what did your grandfather do he was a tailor his father before him was a tailor and that his father father was a tailor and interestingly enough their name was passim attic and the reason for this unusual name was would never knew until or aunt as an adult looked it up and found in the French that patch cementery meant to embroidery to sew and back when named the court in Russia back in those days mimic both the French and the Italians languages french buildings
are French so names her last names were passed out that they were named has somatic so the names were passed up when they went to travel abroad when they want to come to the United States is that when they got the name passed out no I think the name was back in the great grandfather's day okay i mean i don't know but around the 1,800 1,700 some words in there people were only named by their first name and you were the son of aaron you didn't have a last name but when the population became so great they passed out last names and this goes back
a couple centuries so i can't tell you if it was just for jewish people are for the entire population because i never hooked it up but my guess is it was for everybody but the name came down as past somatic do you remember your grandparents on your dad's side did you ever know them very little unfortunately my father died when i was 21 and we went through the years there was some association i'm not saying that was none there was some but it's a whole family that I don't include did your mom ever remarry no unfortunately she didn't it was our wish that she would
in fact there were several good opportunities but she turned him down you had a brother and sisters of both older both older yeah yeah do you remember high school law school was very difficult the entirety because when I was a child I had primary tuberculosis and I was in what they called sanatoriums in those days I don't think they exist anymore but they were hospital like places I was there for four years and so I never went to the second third or fourth grades when I was 12 I was released and my mother took me to the local grade school and the principal looked at
me and said put her in the fifth grade and that's a true story I wanted to graduate when I was 17 like everybody else so I went to summer school I took extra subject store in regular school and I graduated when I was 17 so it wasn't that I had a high school every day the same homeroom it didn't exist did world war two affect you at all my brother was a sailor we lived in Louisville and all I was at the dating age and everybody was in the service so the only people that the young girls could date where the soldiers from Fort Knox
so that created a problem when did you meet your husband I had an address its passed away who was well known in Dallas Gladys ash and her daughter was engaged to a fella who's uncle was dying who had severe heart problems and that i was doing private nursing at that time I was a registered nurse so they needed nurses and I was invited to dallas to come nurses gentlemen and my husband was a blind date here in dallas it was he in the buff in World War two yes he was a sailor later he was in a public health service so he was involved in
the war effort right was he you know where he was stationed he was stationed basically in California and other places but basically California now did you get married before the water after the war oh well after the war my husband was a junior in medical school when we got married now where did you go to the school after high school to become a nurse i went to a hospital and ozone art memorial infirmary what did you guys get married we got married in 1950 why ok and then where did you settle down she was in medical school at the University of Texas Galveston so we
lived in Galveston while he was in school I nursed and supported the family he graduated and we moved to New Orleans because he joined the Public Health Service that for his internship and later he took a residency at the eye hospital in New Orleans and was there we were there for some years so it was seven and a half years total between the time we got married we moved back to Dallas at rest was an education at seven and a half years now what was the reason you came back to Dallas my husband was born and raised here and it was his wish it we
moved here okay now where were your children born to were born in Louisiana cuz my husband was in school I have one daughter i was born in Texas when you were in dallas what did you get involved in I have a son in the early 70s he was 17 he came down with schizophrenia it's a disease of the brain it's a thought disorder and it's very serious and mental illness is a subject that people don't like to talk about its and family and friends they didn't know how to adjust to it nothing evolved for a number of years he was in and out of hospitals
that guy was believed that it was the way the child was raised back then that's what people believe that's what people believe so the years went by and at nine ten years later an organization came to town current name the National Alliance for the mentally ill it's a national organization with groups in major cities all over the United States and it is now in parts of the world and national alliance is to advocate for people who are mentally ill and their families I got thoroughly involved I no matter what it was I was a piece of it I was on the original boards Dallas Nami
calling it by its initial Dallas Tommy 1985 Texas nami started I was on that original board and I go down to dallas county courthouse and advocate for police protection and housing a new name that i was down there it got so that all the commissioners to me by my first name were you the first person in dallas to get involved in this organization i claim to be i can't prove it but I claim to be because from the 1980s maybe early nineties there were a lot what they called forums where people would come down either from the feds the state or local and would invite
people to come speak for five minutes I there was one advertised in the paper i got there at nine o'clock and people had got there by eight o'clock and signed in so violent name was pretty far down the list i SAT there all day from nine o'clock till five o'clock and listen to everybody talked about all the physical problems they were having from wheelchair to blindness to you name it people got up and spoke about their problems I got up like five minutes of five and spoke about mental illness and listened to the last two or three speakers and I was the only person in
that room that spoke about mental illness one the panel came over and shook my head and says you keep up the good work young lady on another occasion right after that there was another form in another city and I got a group of people together and we went gave our speeches on Mental Illness it came back to me a week or so later that we were the only people in all the years that had come to speak on that illness so I I claim to be the original advocate good for you now it's grown quite a bit azimuth it's growing to mend ously over the
years there has been a reasonable amount of acceptance and people have found out that we're there and I have a few items that I'm very proud of one is I wanted to raise money for people who are mentally ill but they live on the streets because of their illness and there is nothing at the bottom that I wanted to raise money for these people so I said how can I do it and I said I don't want to send out a letter or solicitation because I'm the furan thority the garbage can is a short distance so i said i want to make it humorous people
will laugh at it i gave the money to various agencies that support it mentally ill people with their promise the money would be used for the street people that are mentally ill to come in off the street and get services from this last year was my 25th year so i decided to close it out with good feelings for having it and I have found another resource that will continue the project i started it i thought it up i did it i oversaw it the whole nine yards my son is medium high level he has his own apartment he has a part time job and he
gets so long in the world you look back with a sense of satisfaction of what you've accomplished as parents we took care of we have always accepted the responsibility of saying to his welfare when it's Rome do for a living Jerome it is a retired ophthalmologist he had a very active practice he has now a part time job he goes down to public health service and he ought its charge for people claiming benefits said he loves his part-time job most of the people that belong to our organization our caucasians and I wanted to start an ami for the Afro Americans I knew that I couldn't
do it I personally couldn't do it so I found a nice young afro-american and he and I started that afro american support group here in dallas looks are very very proud of are you involved at all with the Jewish community in early years a little bit but as of that noldor I've stopped and I don't drive anymore so my complete social life is limited what was the happiest time in your life well I have a happy marriage I think doing my Nami work was there were some years that's been 20 30 hours a week just doing Nami stuff I didn't have to work for a
living and spent all those year it was a happening and the most really a very happy time he's ever get a recognition for all your volunteer work the various agencies would have a lunch and give me a plaque many people in the city recognized my ability the recognition that really pleases me most there's now an agency a public agency called North Star and money comes down from Texas to pay for the care of indigent patients and one of the items under North Star is a clinic that's run by green oaks green oaks is a psychiatric hospital and the CEO is Tom Collins and one of
the things that he started because the pressure people who needed hospital care there was no beds that's a tremendous issue hearing of no beds for these people and he started a program called 23 hours service that meant that the police could bring and people could enter for 23 hours and after 23 hours some people could be sent home some needed to go to the hospital some people whatever they can make decisions in 23 hours and this service has been extremely effective well there was a judge he decided that a private hospital could not run a charity program and he was going to close it down
so a group of people went to commissioners poor to complain that this was going to be closed down by this gentleman and I was one of the people who spoke on behalf of green oaks so as I entered the courtroom I handed a one of my copy of the speech to Tom Collins and said would you like a copy and I proceeded on my turn to get up and make the speech the next day he presents me with the present I opened it up and it is a large gold leaf and a note that he wrote and the note says that this is the highest
award that he gives any of his employees and that he had been noticing my efforts through the years and thank me it was the moment of my life I had it framed and it's it's a nine hallway you and Jerome had three children you have three grandkids three great grandkids and you spent almost your entire adult life giving back to the community working with mental health so what advice does great-grandma want to leave for the next generation my attitude is by my manner of living and what I have done is they want to see it if they want to copy it but I've never you
don't lecture to today's young people period lead by example you did a great job today thank you for sharing all this well thank you
