Laura Saffir
Laura Saffir's parents came from the Russian Empire, her mother born in Bialystok near Warsaw and her father from a community near the Baltic Sea. Her father emigrated in the early 1890s to avoid conscription, arriving in New York with little English and about five dollars, sent onward to Texas by an ailing aunt and uncle. He peddled matches, shoelaces, and hairpins through East Texas around Tyler, Longview, and Nacogdoches, obtaining his citizenship papers in Nacogdoches. He eventually settled in Bonham, where Laura was born during a fierce storm, and later moved to Garrison after brief ventures in dry goods and a bakery. In Garrison he built the largest building in town, running a store that sold everything from groceries to furniture and caskets.
Growing up as the only Jewish family in Garrison, Laura recalled a rugged but content childhood of wash tubs, outdoor privies, hickory nutting, mulligan stews, and Sunday drives by horse and buggy. Despite anti-Semitism, including being called a nickname she later understood, her parents kept Jewish traditions alive with Hanukkah candles, homemade challah and bagels, matzah ordered from St. Louis, and Passover dishes. In February 1907 the family moved to Dallas so the children could grow up near synagogues and a Jewish community. They lived in a Christian neighborhood on Thomas and State Street, and Laura attended William B. Travis School and graduated from old Dallas High School, counting classmates such as Max Rosenfield among her contemporaries.
In Dallas, Laura first attended the Temple Emanuel Sunday school before affiliating with Sherith Israel, where her husband later became a fifty-year member. She was deeply involved in the synagogue sisterhood, ran countless rummage sales, and delivered Thanksgiving baskets to the poor. She joined Hadassah in the early 1930s, sewing layettes and folding diapers for hospitals in Israel, and rose to serve as local president and later as state president overseeing Texas, Oklahoma, and Louisiana. She attended national conventions and met leaders such as Henrietta Szold and Susan Brandeis. In later years she devoted herself to City of Hope and to Golden Acres, particularly its Purim Carnival, over more than two decades of service.
She met her husband while visiting New York as a graduation gift from her parents, and they married three years later.
Full Transcript
To Mrs. Laura Toplitz-Saffer this morning. And it is November the 25th, 1975. Okay. How long have you lived in the Dallas area? Since 1907. And how did you come to Dallas, or your family? When did your family come to Dallas, and why? We came to Dallas in February of 1907. We lived in a very small community in East Texas, the only Jewish family there. We lived there for about until I was 12 years old. And my mother and father thought it was time to come to Dallas or come to a large city where there There were synagogues or places of worship where we children could have an entirely different environment.
I guess that would be the main reason for I having moved to Dallas. It was a large centrally located city at the time and we've been here ever since. Now I understand your mother and father, Mr. and Mrs. Toplitz, came from Russia I believe originally and did they go to Bonham and how did they come to Texas? My mother was born in Bialystok, a little community out of Warsaw, not too far from Warsaw. My father was born in Ruskatingan, near the Mammal, the Baltic Sea. And my father came over, I'd like to say they came to avoid the army life that he would have to get in to enlist, or not enlist, they would draft him, take him, it was just a matter He was sort of going.
And he came in early 1890s to be exact I think about 1892 He had an uncle and aunt living in New York and like all young men leaving those foreign Shores had a paper, a tag on his clothes. He spoke no English, nothing but Russian, perhaps some German, and when he landed in New York, his only relative, an aunt and uncle, both ailing, both very poor had him come to their home they were ill in fact confined to their beds and they sent him on they didn't know where else he should go other than the wide open spaces of Texas I gather all of this that I'm giving you this information from what he has told us and he probably came as a hobo on a train I doubt if he had the fare to come down here I think he said he had as much as five dollars on him and I have an idea that this was gathered by the aunt and uncle in New York and their few relatives and sent him on his way.
He went directly to Barnum for no good reason. It's just a place to go. I may be ahead of myself because he at one time was in East Texas around Tyler, Longview, Nacogdoches. In fact he got his citizenship papers through a very good friend of Mr. Zeeb, an old family living in Nacogdoches, saw that he got his citizenship papers So I take it that he did some traveling some peddling let say that footwork around East Texas with a pack on his back and with that five dollars he tells us that he bought matches shoelaces and hairpins what he could get for five dollars from that he went from door to door of farmhouse many a time they let him spend the night with them and he would in exchange give them shoelaces, a package of pins.
And from this little start, this little beginning, he gravitated and I'll say he got to Bonham. Ginger, forgive me for going back and forth, but this is a life that I'm talking extemporaneously, and I'm not coherent, I guess, with some of it. I'm just jumping around at random. But in his peddling days, he told us about Harry Lipschitz and the Wadell family of Tyler. And he did know the old Lenz brothers. They all peddled with either their jewelry or whatever. They had finer merchandise, if we can call it that, than he did by far. but these were old cronies and they were roughing it so to speak and forgive me Ginger if I go back and forth but this is a part of my tale, my life as I remember it now I've heard my father tell this because I wasn't born until he was married and living in Bonham, Texas for a year after his marriage of a year I was born and my mother tells me that it was one of the worst storms that Bonham ever experienced how the doctor ever reached their little hut, their little home and I have to call it a hut because I think it was of that nature I was born in this situation My father after my birth for two years remained in Bonham He bought a, established a little dry goods store.
Several of his friends from his peddling days in East Texas stood good for him for sums of money, small sums, and he would buy materials and merchandise for his dry goods store. He did this by mail until he got a little bit further along in his business world and established himself a bit. He would go to St. Louis, which was then the center for marketing. and he wasn't evidently too successful in that business because the next time here he went into a bakery business he and his father-in-law Mr. Goldman and they knew as much about baking as a novice of the first waters and that didn't go too well.
I think my mother might have played a role, they had a little restaurant in connection with the bakery and several of his Jewish contemporaries there would trade with him, eat at their little establishment, and And one morning I've been told that his baker failed to show up. He got on a drunken spree and didn't show. My father knew nothing about baking, so the place was closed. That was the beginning of the end for the bakery business. The next I'm told that we moved to Garrison about 40 miles distant. In those days, 40 miles was traveling. Quite far. They rented a room in Garrison, Texas, where all the traveling men, they weren't called traveling salesmen in those days.
There were drummers, and the drummers would come to town and stay at the old Wiley Hotel. It was a rooming house and a hotel. My family, consisting my mother and father and myself, I was then about two years old, lived at Miss Wiley's until my father could earn enough peddling again and in exchange he would bring her produce that is butter and eggs and chicken whatever the farmers would trade with him in exchange for his merchandise, whatever it was and they lived with Mrs. Wiley for several months before they were able to pay her for their rent or their board and keep and from there he was able to rent a little cottage where we lived.
To tell you it was rugged is putting it mildly. My mother used boxes for tables to sit around and to eat on. They were buying chickens at that time for 25 cents a piece. Eggs were 10 cents a dozen. yet the times were very rough on them. We remained in Garrison. My father established a store and three stories built this brick building The largest building in the little square the largest building in the little square the little town of Garrison and I grew up in this community the only Jewish family that remained there for any length of time Jewish families would come and go. My father was very strong and against all odds, all humilities, he remained steadfast and established himself and came to Dallas with a great sum of money of perhaps $20,000, a lifetime accumulation.
Quite proud of this record that my father made of himself against all obstacles. And believe me when I tell you obstacles, he had a horse and buggy. and on several occasions, he found his horse many a time unloosen from its stall and turned loose to roam at large. Luckily if he found his horse he was a fortunate man. He had dogs and they would tie cans of High Life. The generation today have never heard of this but it was a strong medicinal substance put that dog to a quick gate and these are the obstacles that some of the ruffians who lived in that town played pranks on him keep in mind that I said we're the only Jewish people and these are the obstacles that he overcome Ku Klux Klan in a measure was rampant then too.
We didn't call it that, but we recognized today that that was a forerunner It made it rough on Negroes although there were a lot lived in the community in the farmlands Ginger, if I tell you that the only amusements one had in this little community, and we were so content, I in particular, because we would go on Sundays for a walk on the railroad tracks when we knew the one or two trains that came through a day. So we would walk, take long walks, we'd go hickory nutting, picking wild violets. And these were the amusements. We had what we called mulligan stews And the girls would bring the foodstuffs The boys would bring the crackers And we'd all meet around the bonfire And that was the fun in those days It came time for Hanukkah My family still tried to impress upon us Against the great odds of living in the community of Christians but we would I think back and if I got an orange or a couple of nuts and a nickel for Hanukkah I just was elated the Christian children would get a rag doll also an orange or an apple some nuts in their stocking and they were all happy.
So you can see the trend of thought in those early days. We didn't need what the children of today have to have for their pleasures. My father had a horse and buggy and I want to call it today a phaeton. That's the type of carriage that it was. He and my mother sat in this large seat. My brother who was born in Garrison and Levi Toplitz. My youngest sister was born there Mrs Ivy Rabinowitz We would go on occasions on Sundays We sat on the little seat facing our parents in this bayton. And was that a real treat to go out into the country and visit where my father did have some customers who traded with him.
and in turn paid him once a year with whatever they raised on their farms when they would sell their farm products such as sugar cane and those that raised cotton would sell it in the fall and when they got their money for their products they paid him what they had purchased for the year. and in turn he sold them whatever they needed for the following year all on credit. But he knew all of these old timers well. They were very honest, even the Negroes. And on Sunday, as I said, we would drive out and visit with these old folks. Now, can you, those of you hearing my voice, can you visualize we had no bathtubs in those days we had no we used wash pans and the farmers had a well on the outside of their home and they drew up the water as they called it then in a bucket that was always hanging over the well those of you who hear this today have seen pictures.
I lived it. They put their butter and their milk into this bucket and they kept it into the dip down into the well to keep it cool. They had their wash pan that they washed their hands and an old dirty towel hanging alongside on the outside porch. This is their methods of washing their hands. Sometimes an old comb hung on the chain on this outside building. I can't call it a building. It was, today you would call it a lean-to, a shack. In those days it was home, whether it was a colored family or a white family. And these were our recreations. On occasions when our parents weren't too tired, they would hitch up old Dobbin and off we went.
Now these are the pleasures, those of you hearing it today, hearing my voice, imagine if you can what we experienced and what we loved. Knew nothing else and we were thoroughly satisfied. We lived in an environment, keep this in mind, I'm sure there was what we call today anti-Semitism. I was called Juicy. I thought it was a cute little nickname for me, but today I know what it meant. His parents or the parents of the individual must have told him we were Jews and that remained with these kids. They called me Juicy. For those of you who are interested, there were no bakeries to speak of.
Everyone baked their breads. My mother baked bagel and made her holly and baked her breads. And whatever we had, she prepared. And I want you to know that when I spoke a little ago of not having a bathtub, the forerunner of the bathtub was a wash tub. And my mother heated water in this tub, and we children took our baths. And don't think for one moment that we each took a hot tub separately. Three of us bathed in the same water. And later on when they could get bathtubs, my father had a bathtub put into what we call a bathroom. and the water would run out through a hose out into the backyard.
These were the splendors that we might call of later times, a bathtub. The chick sale, as I like to refer to it, but was the two-holder, and I would like to call it a privy because we referred to the privy That was our toilet in those days and it was back of the house cold weather or summer We went out to the pretty when we had to go to the little girls or the little boys room That was scoured. That was one of my duties as I grew up, to scour that and to sprinkle lye into the place. And we used the toilet tissues was the old Sears Roebuck catalog or any sort of paper that we could find that was usable.
That hung up in the Tujola. About what year was this? What period of time was this? This is in 1905. This was just before you painted it down? Just before we moved to Dallas, two or three years prior to our moving to Dallas, we had a lovely home. I want to call it a home. It was the third floor of the business building. We had a mezzanine in this building. My father sold furniture, caskets, and the like. We lived on the upper floor. We had an eight-room home. and the entire downstairs, the first floor, was his store. He sold everything from sides of bacon and groceries.
In fact, anything that the farmer needed, he was able to get at my father's store. And while I'm talking to you, Ginger, one of my girlfriends, playmates in those days, lives in Dallas today. And we're happy to reminisce over the little town square where on Sundays the men would pitch dollars in front of the post office. And that was their diversion. That's an interesting game in case you want, if you've got the dollar now and want to pitch it. You don't know what it is. As I told you before, we came to Dallas in a February, a cold day cold month and we were right in the midst it was in 1907 and right in the midst of an Elks convention They had built the Elks Arch on Main and Ackerd, four corners of an arch.
a tremendous sight quite an innovation for Dallas then and the Elks at that time put on an exhibition like the Shriners do today we witnessed this might be of interest it has a little horror to it but this happened in Dallas we had a raping incident and this Negro was hanged from this arch. He was not even tried. He raped a little three-year-old child and he was strung up immediately. Now this is all happening when we first came to Dallas. We moved over in North Dallas in the midst of a Christian community for no reason. we were just able to rent a very nice cottage.
We lived on Thomas and State Street, all now a Negro neighborhood. At that time we were in the midst of aristocrats of Dallas, the Christian aristocrats of Dallas. Little did we know then but it was available it was the old TJ Britton home he had the drugstore the large drugstore in Dallas at that time was on Elm and Ackard Street and he moved into a larger home we rented his home I went to school at the William B. Travis School on McKinney Avenue, graduated from that school to, well I don't suppose we graduated, we just went from that to high school, from the public school to high school.
I went to school with Mady Dealey the Dealey family that puts out the Dallas News and Elizabeth Wagoner of the American Exchange Bill These are all forerunners of the aristocracy of Dallas. There was no discrimination as far as I saw it. I had the closest of friends amongst the Christian girls. And to this day I cherish some of those friendships. those of us that are alive reminisce on occasions. I graduated at old Dallas high school. First it was Bryan Street high school then changed to Dallas. We had no schools in Oak Cliff and the girls and boys would come across the viaduct. They had just built the viaduct which made it convenient for them to come to the old school on Brown Street.
Was that later Tech? That was today Tech High, Dallas Tech. The only high school in this community. This vicinity I should say. Hockaday was then in its infancy. Holly Hall was in its infancy and we had a couple of boys prep schools here. But most of us attended old Dallas High School. There was some two or three hundred that graduated in my class and And one of my contemporaries is Max Rosenfield, who doesn't live too far distant from me now. He was the valedictorian of my class, I venture to say. and we put on our senior play directed by Mrs. Woodrow the OD Woodrow School of Expression at the old Dallas Opera House on Maine and well what is that side Street now, Ginger, but it's where Tychers now stands.
St. Paul. St. Paul. My memory doesn't fail me. It was where Tychers is today or else it was on Commerce at that same area, in that same area. We had the old Raglan School of the Many of our boys and girls went to business school then and took up a business course at Metropolitan Business College, right near where we graduated. Not too many of us went to university. We stopped there, any number of us married, and in my case, I went to New York as a gift for my parents, graduation gift, and there I met my husband. to be. We were married three years later and I begun to get busy with organization work.
I really got my training when we first came to Dallas when I affiliated with a couple of spinsters on McKinney Avenue, which is today the Chateaubriand restaurant. Then it was a two-story old brick building and the home of these sisters. And I joined what is today called the King's Daughters, Catholic organization. And the work that the children did was down in deep north Dallas in what is today called the Mexican area, Alamo Street, Caroline. but there was any number of colored lived there, and some poor Christians. And we kids would, on May Day, would take little baskets of flowers and fruits sponsored by this organization called the King of the Church.
The Catholic Organization, I believe. Let me take you back to my Jewish education in Dallas. At that time we only had one Sunday school one at Temple Emanuel and the synagogue Sheriff Israel on Jackson Street They had no Sunday school there, so my parents enrolled me in the Temple Emanuel Sunday school. I was quite an old girl to be placed in the class of these youngsters. I couldn't take it. I was 12 years old, and these were youngsters about 10, 9 or 10, and that didn't please me one bit. My teacher in those days, if I remember correctly, was Party Pandas, was my first Sunday school teacher here.
I didn't stay at that temple Sunday school long, and it was some years later that the sheriff is built their new synagogue on Park Avenue in the City Park area. and I affiliated with that. I was then married, but after my children were born, I sent them, my oldest daughter went for a short time, let's say a year or two, to Temple Emanuel until we established a temple, a Sunday school at Sherrith Israel. And then I enrolled both daughters at Sherrith Israel. and Rabbi Texan was our first rabbi that I recall. I got very much interested in the sisterhood of Sherith Israel, worked with all of our early Dalasites, Mrs.
L.B. Rosenberg, the late Mrs. Pauline Yannick, Mrs. Philip Goroncic and many others I conducted many rummage sales in Dallas on Deep Elm all over the city in fact I cut my eye teeth I think in rummage sales raising extra monies for organizations I had quite a varied experience in organizations charitable and religious and all sorts I did a lot of work when we had the old Dallas Dispatch. I would take baskets on Thanksgiving to the poor. And these are things that I've always loved to do. And that has tied in with my religious background. I think this is my training even from early days when I was reared in a Christian environment that Jewishness crept out and I sought my people when we came to Dallas and affiliated.
All right, fine. You talked about your dad's store when he came here. Would you like to tell us something about it? My dad's first venture in business in Dallas was on what we call the Courthouse Square. That's where the old courthouse still stands. And this building is now raised. But at that time there were grocery stores and dry goods stores and quite a few Jewish merchants there about. He had bought this store from a Mr. Cannes who came from England and had had it two or three years. And he bought this store. And we were there until I graduated high school. I recall that. And my father sold the business.
and went into investments and real estate. What kind of business was it? Dry goods business. All, nothing in the way of grocers or the like. And he enjoyed quite a good business there. in that area. Farmers came to Dallas at that time across the old Trinity River and there were places where they left their horses and wagons, the old wagon stands I guess we can call it, and the families would come to trade just as they did in East Texas I think Ginger that will take me through my father early life I believe my mother has recorded that for you. And this will be quite repetitious.
Now, is there anything else you'd like me to dwell on? Yes. What was the Jewish community like? And then when your dad went into real estate, was there growth there? And what caused some of that growth? Yeah, Dallas, is that recorded? The Jewish life then, we had the Harmony Club and several clubs that the Jewish boys and girls would have dances at the old Masonic Temple. Leads me now, Turn for Ryan I believe was the German building and we would rent that, the boys and girls would have their annual dances. The Colombian club was then in its early life. It was situated then next to the temple on South Irvey Street.
They had many dances there. They had debut parties too. And there were many picture shows. Of course we had lots of diversion in Dallas in those days. My father bought us a little Shetland pony and a little carriage. and a little carriage, and we would take drives across the old Vodic, which was a treat in those days. And I had a horse, I did do some riding, and I was kept very busy. I loved Dallas, to me it was the metropolis of the world. Though I had been to St. Louis in New York, but to have lived in Dallas was one great treat for me.
And I have loved it ever since. It's been a pleasure to raise my children here. The Jewish environment has grown. And it's been great to have been able to send my children to both the temple and the synagogue. And they've both been confirmed. And I've been able to send my children I think there's a great light here today. As far as animosity, we'll find it always. It'll go along as history lasts, I think. It's from biblical times and we will have it. But you make the most of everything that you have. And if we Jews know our place, and we do know, the Jewish Federation has provided much for us, and Shep's Center is a delightful place, and we have all sorts of interests in the synagogues for our young children today.
So I think the Jewish training and the Jewish outlet here is marvelous. And I think our children are being trained in the right direction. And they'll get a very fine Jewish background. What do you think Temple was like? You talked earlier, or you talked or mentioned that there was a difference between Temple and Cher and Thurissel. What was the service like? What were the key backgrounds? Well, it's hard, Ginger, to make a comparison because the wealth at that time, as I see it, was with the temple goers, the membership of the temple, were the bankers and the more influential Jewish folk when we first came to Dallas.
Now, I don't know if, I think maybe we, Orthodox and the conservative, in fact, when we first came here, there was no conservative, it was Orthodox. And I think I might have felt that separateness. Might not have been, but I always felt very comfortable with my Orthodox fellowship. However, there was a feeling of Jewishness between the two, but I think there was a decided difference between the two or a feeling of there How did that feeling express itself I think maybe we could speak of it can we use the word click? I don't know if that's a good word but we're clickish, the Christians say we are and I believe we are and I think we are amongst ourselves and I think there's a decided feeling of Orthodoxy and Reformed.
However, it's getting less and less now and our children are really responding. A lot of them that had their complete background with an Orthodox training have gone to the Reformed element. reformed temples I should say but that's up to the individual and they like this rabbi better than that rabbi and doesn't matter which temple he belongs to they going where they want to be in his midst you talked about Hanukkah earlier would you like to tell us about how Jewish holidays were observed in your home as you were growing up? Ginger, we never, I don't recall a member of my family, even second to third generations, ever having a Christmas tree.
We always put our lights and we had our eight candles lit and I would exchange with my grandchildren that is I would give them a gift each night for the eight nights something I suppose was done years ago and I followed in this sort of way of thinking until they grew larger and they grew out of these gifts and waiting for it when they were youngsters they looked forward to it we have our Hanukkah celebrations at home we have the delicacies that in keeping with the holiday the latkes and so forth And my mother did this and my father in the little East Texas town.
So I saw this, even though I was in a completely Christian environment. And this remained with me all through the years. And I've tried to pass it on to my children. I haven't done this as much as I guess I should have, but they are thoroughly imbued with Hanukkah. They know the teachings of it. We've read them the stories. And it's something that we've observed. and I believe that almost all of the Jewish families in Dallas observed Hanukkah. What about Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur? Do you remember the service and what it was like and how it was when you came to Dallas? Well, I find, yes, I find that we're not as observant with the Yom Kippur as when I was first affiliated with Sheriff Israel on Park Avenue, the old synagogue.
We really fasted. All the children would come to the synagogue in the afternoon. It was really a gathering. And everybody fasted. It was one of those days that they observed the holiday to the fullest. I know that we as I remember Rabbi Gold was one of our later rabbis and he would say to the youngsters let them come in and out as they pleased though they were noisy at times these kids coming in all hours of the day the decorum wasn't as good as it should have been but he said this is a great family gathering and let these children come in and out and they did Now it's a hush hush and you only enter at certain times during the services.
The doors are closed and those stand at the door the ushers the ushers see that they don come in at the wrong time which should be done, because when the Torah is open, we do know that we have not to come in, up and down the aisles, but the children did have a lot more, it was real holiday, a joyous spirit with them even though with the elders it was a very very sober holiday I have always fasted because I knew that that was one of the things that my parents did I don't believe that many people many of our Jewish folk at other synagogues fast all day I know they do it I feel that they do at the congregations that are conservative and orthodox.
But at the Reformed Temple, I know they leave in the afternoon on Yom Kippur to, I suppose, to go home and have a repast and come back for services, finish up the day. But we don't have that at Shareth Israel, my synagogue. I come and stay all day, as did my parents. and this is sort of a tradition with me now if there's more to this ginger question me okay now was place up at the UHL Passover what type what was well Passover was observed I remember that we had two sets of dishes And cautious was observed as best we could do it in this little community because my mother would order anything that she had to have in the kosher line.
We didn't have kosher meats. she would order when she could get them from St. Louis was the nearest place that we could get anything shipped. And of course in the summer we couldn't get that delivered. There was no express trains there and there wasn't any airplanes and we just didn't have it. But my mother never brought ham into the home. And I wish that I could say I never tasted shellfish, but it's one of my delicacies. Today that I do enjoy, however, the things we could observe and carry out, we did. I know the Passover was, we had no bread in the home. We did order our matzah, and I believe Monteshevites in those days were manufacturing matzah, and we ordered it long in advance, and we had matzah in the home the entire eight days, and we had these sets of dishes and pots and pans and I can see the scouring and the cleaning and getting ready for the holidays in the kitchen and all over the house.
And I do observe Pesach in my home but I'm a little loose now with my carrying out as I used to be. However, my children know that it's a holiday and they know that they have the observances that they must follow through with or that they do of their own accord. It's no must. They have seen it done and they're doing it. But I'll often wonder what the great-grandchildren will do, and I hope that they too will know that it's a serious holiday that we should observe. When you came to Dallas, did that make a difference when you were able to get kosher meat? Yes, yes.
No, we did not keep kosher. And it's something that we didn't observe once we came here. Although we could get, there were kosher butchers, not many, but several. And my mother would get her chickens killed by the shoket. That she did do. and but otherwise we didn't we didn't keep kosher and year by year we don't use the two sets of dishes we're getting away we got away from that and that's one of our failings i'm sure shortcomings now okay uh what about other holidays where did you observe sukkah and Was there any service on it? No, we did not. I knew about a sukkah and I would partake of it at the synagogue but we never had a sukkah My mother told us all about these things and all about these observances and how they celebrated the holidays in Europe.
But we never had a sukkah, and I'm sure you would understand when I tell you that we were the only Jewish family and we didn't have a rabbi anywhere near us. We never observed the holidays only as my parents would observe them because we had no one within miles to get. I don't think there was, I don't know if there was a rabbi in Bonham. It could have been. My mother said she was married by the Justice of the Peace, and later on somewhere else she was married by a rabbi. But I don't think there was a rabbi either, even in the community of Bonham, and that was a large town.
in comparison to where we did live. When you came to Dallas, did you become more observant in the holidays? Did you go to Shire on the various holidays? Yes, I became very observant. I affiliated immediately with Shire at the Israel. In fact, my husband is a 50-year member there now. As soon as we were married, we both joined. and I became very much active in the workings of the synagogue, the sisterhood. And we were always very friendly with the rabbi and his wife and his family. And it was always on a secular or a social level. but we were right in the big middle as you might say of everything that went on at our synagogue and we participated.
As we get older I find myself slowly drawing within the confines of my home and I don't go like I should but under the circumstances I can't. You were very involved with Hadassah. which I believe you had to fill in the dates and how did you get involved with Hadassah? At the time, Hadassah was the only organization in the city of Dallas other than the sisterhoods The Zionist organization I think established a group with the late Mrs Zesma very active in but it never played any role when I grew up and when I affiliated myself with the synagogue. Hadassah came into being in my life I guess about I feel that without looking this up now, it must have been in the 30s, early 30s, that I joined Hadassah.
How old was the organization, did you say, when you joined? Do you know when it was founded? No, Ginger, I can't give you that offhand. It was a new organization, I'd say maybe four or five years old. Take a little, give a little. I just don't know exactly. but I know that we used to sow for Israel. At that time, we didn't have the hospitals that we have today. It was a forerunner of Mount Scopus Hospital that was destroyed and later rebuilt. But we had sowing circles. we would meet Sherith Israel and we had machines Hadassah owned three or four machines and some of our ladies could sew and we made layettes and we folded diapers we did all the we would send our linen shower for Hadassah was held every January and our ladies would bring towels and all sorts of linens for a hospital and the ladies that had sold all through the year would have accumulated quite a few layets and baby necessities.
So those were shipped once a year to Israel. Did this activity center around Sheriff Israel? That was our meeting place with Sheriff Israel and most of our members at that time were the Orthodox women. Very few of the Reform women affiliated with Hadassah It was a decided difference there Israel wasn foremost in the minds of anyone other than the Orthodox families What was the attitude of the Reform towards Israel at that time as opposed to the Orthodox? I think the feeling then was, as some still have the feeling, America first, and then if there's anything left over, then Israel can get it. But they don't feel as close, didn't feel as close.
They surely didn't feel as close to Israel as the Orthodox, let me put it that way. I don't think they thought too much of Israel. were just a far off country and let them forage for themselves. I hope you keep in mind, Ginger, that most of the background of Hadassah and Israel were foreigners from Russia and Poland and those countries. And there weren't too many German Jews, but thank God for men like Baron Rothschild and the Guggenheims that had the milk kitchens in New York for the poor. Thank God for those people because they saw Henrietta Zold in her first efforts towards Hedessa. And I think we felt that.
Now, it could have been through the Zionist movement. It was fostered in those days. and I think it was implanted in us. It was one of the things that was a part of us. It was a part of our life. Israel was ours, and we must do what we could for it, and our women worked wholeheartedly for it. We had quite a healthy organization. We raised nice monies, so I thought. We raised our quotas, and it was my privilege to serve. under, I was a local Hadassah president for one year and then I served under the late Ms. Lewis Sachs, Beckett to all of us, as her corresponding secretary.
And when she went in as the state president, I served her for three years as state corresponding secretary. And then I followed her and became the State President at that time Hadassah had three states, Oklahoma, Louisiana, and Texas were all under one supervision. And Mrs. at that time, Sam Roback, Lill, was my corresponding secretary. I served for three years, and they were glorious years, and I made many, many friends and cherished friends that have passed on. and I was thoroughly imbued because I went to three or four national conventions. Henrietta Zold was at one in Atlantic City, if my memory serves me right. And Irma Lindheim, who was a great worker and an iris in New York, gave all of her wealth to Israel and became a worker in the Falutes.
and these things imbued me just as Brandeis daughter Susan Brandeis was as plain a human being as one could know to be so great and so dedicated And Israel was uppermost in her mind. That came first. And I met her personally at a convention, a very nondescript looking person, but what a brain. And these are the things that imbued me and my associations have been great all the way through Hadassah. I have done very little in the last 15-20 years. I got very much interested in the City of Hope. And I can't do too much at once. I'm one of those individuals who have to do one thing at a time.
I couldn't take on two or three organizations and give them all justice. So when I served my purpose and my time, I thought, I gave of myself to Hadassah, then something else came to my attention and I affiliated with that and I sort of digressed I given my support for the last 24 years to Golden Acres in Dallas in one project and that the Purim Carnival And I'm about to close the book there because time is calling a halt. About how large was Hadassah? About 36th won the convention. Dosser, at that time I didn't know exactly what our membership, I think around 60,000 members. No, Dallas.
Oh, Dallas might have had maybe 150 members, 100 members, 150 members. Is that a good sized organization? We thought it was amongst the Orthodox people, and I guess it was our fault. We didn't seek the reform. they didn't offer there to join us because in later years any number of the reformed are now members and some of them are very good active members their feelings entirely different towards Israel today I think what were some of the civic and cultural organizations that you belong to what did i do ginger i worked with the mrs well her she was alice wyland wyland from the undertakers that was one of our greatest friends and i'd like to have that recorded he was one of the greatest friends that the jews had in dallas Ku Klux Klan tried to get into this city.
And Charlie Weiland, the late Charlie Weiland, fought them tooth and nail. And he was instrumental in keeping them out to a great extent. And the anti-Semitism was kept down, I feel, through the late Charlie Weiland. And he was the undertaker for all the Jews in Dallas at that time. he was a Christian and a very dedicated man as a Christian but loved all peoples and he was a very very dear friend of my father's and his family were friends of mine