Full Transcript
this is an oral history on January the 15th 2006 the interviewer is may Siebel good afternoon Lillian how are you good good we're very interested to hear about your family history and the first thing I like what you do is go as far back as you can knowing about your grandparents and great-grandparents where they came from and how you ended up in Dallas well my paternal grandparents lived in of debts of Russia and they lived in Odessa during the time of the czars they decided to immigrate to the United States after my father almost died in one of the bedrooms in Odessa luckily he was
able to find a vein a dead child who was wearing a cross and he removed the cross from his from their child's neck and put it on his own and he knew if he could reach a hospital it Odessa that the Cossacks would not kill him so he fled to the hospital and that night when he came home his father decided this was time to leave Russia and come to the United States well because my father and my uncle my father ate Ornish and his brother Lully Ornish had not served in the Russian army the Russians would not allow them to leave with my grandfather
and his daughters so my grandfather had a plan he was going to come to the United States and borrow the money and send it to a at least so the they could leave Russia illegally and his plan worked it didn't take him very long to secure the money once he arrived in Dallas and he sent it to the two boys and the two boys used the money to bribe guards who were guarding a frozen lake to allow them to escape and the guard said fine you can do this but we're going to fire over your heads and not knowing if the guards would keep their
side of the bargain Abe and Lily ran across this frozen like the end the guards first did keep their there their end of the deal and then the boys amazingly walked across Europe to Germany where they were able to secure transportation and a boat to come to the United States and they came to the United States through Galveston down my maternal grandparents lived in sawaki Poland which at that time was a very prominent Jewish center in public it was on the border of Poland and Russia my grandfather had studied to be a rabbi in Europe but he had so many children that he could not
afford to just be a rabbi he had to have other skills and he was able to acquire skills as a contractor and again because of anti-semitism in sawaki he wanted a better life for his children and so he fled suwalki and came to the United States it's not that time just he had just my mother and another daughter and a son and he took those three children and he and his wife came through down the stone and they were met by a number of his brothers and sisters who had already fled Europe and they had established dry goods stores all over Texas and he came
to Dallas and it was kind of interesting because my mother actually gave an oral history of what it was like when they first came to the United States she was 6 years old and at that time they were not allowed to bring any of their possessions their money and so forth from Europe so times were very bad for my grandfather when he first arrived well fortunately my grandmother's family had established several grocery stores so my grandfather started his business career of working in one of those grocery stores then as his children started coming along he thought it was time for him to start his own
business and he started a small construction business they and within a short time they were able to build a beautiful home in South Dallas he was also a founder of one of the Orthodox jewels in South Dallas which one was that it was a good assassin how did your parents meet they met at a dance and in Dallas and David they began dating and my mother was so impressed with my father because he was such a good dresser and they were married and they Hotel in Dallas what year well she was 25 when they married so that would have been about 1925 and so the
business that your dad was in at that time was the dry goods know at that time my my my father was a partner with his brother-in-law in a men's ready-to-wear store and in downtown Dallas and he decided that he wanted his own and so he did establish a dry goods store later on in Deep Ellum in Dallas what was the name of it it was a pawn shop it was eggs pawn shop and his his store was done as the Neiman Marcus of the pawn brokers because he was probably one if not the most successful of the pawn brokers on that stream and growing up
in the pawn shop was really quite educational because his customers came from all walks of life he had well he had not only those who are down on their luck and there were blue collar workers but he also had some very wealthy customers and it was interesting he was part psychologist and part business owner that came in most of his customers came in with stories of Allen why they needed money and it was everything from infidelities to losing a job so and his it was in because some of his one of his customers apparently was having an affair and he didn't want his wife to
find out about what he was doing and so he came in to my father to to buy some very expensive jewelry and then later in apparently he gave it to the monthly woman and his wife somehow found out he had not given it to the woman yet and his wife saw it and she thought oh this is just beautiful and so she wanted to know where he bought it so so he told her and so she insisted on meeting my father and of course my father said oh yes you're just a wonderful person and you must be a wonderful person because he spent so much
time with me trying to find the most perfect gift for you did you grow up in South Dallas yes I did tell me about your life there what was it like growing up well it was I grew up in South Dallas during World War Two and the people who grew up the Jewish people who grew up in our neighborhood were sheltered from the anti-semitism that existed during World War two and now that I think back on my life growing up it was because almost every single one of my neighbors was Jewish and it was interesting the heads of the households had fled Europe just as
my parents had and while they were in Europe they were limited as to their occupations well when they came the United States there was still any semitism in Dallas they could not they could not go to work for the big banks or the insurance companies so they had to start their own businesses or they had to go into the professions so all of our neighbors were either very successful businessmen or they were doctors or there were lawyers or they were dentist tell me how your your family observed the holidays and and what that was like well we were members of sheriff Israel exact at the
time of my father's death my parents had been members of sheriff Israel for 25 years the Ornish family was quite large at that time there were over a hundred members of the Ornish family in Dallas when I was growing up we always celebrated the big holidays like Passover at my grandfather's house he had this huge home that would accommodate all 100 of the members of the Ornish family it was I would say for the artists family was a true immigrant story when the boys first came to Dallas and my grandfather for that matter they were very poor so they had to work very very hard
to provide for their families and as a result because there were no restrictions on what they could do for a living they did extremely well and it was interesting what happened to the second generation my my brother first of all my father was very limited to where he could go to school in Russia so when he checked in the United States he could not go to school because by then he had to work and but education was very important to him so there was no question when my brother and I were growing up that we would go to college it was hidden care where we
went as long as we win this for immigrant produced a very successful orthodontist my brother's one of the most successful Arthur dynast in Dallas my Uncle Louie his brother had a similar thing his son was one of the most successful dentist in town and here's that Edwin and his doctor edwin washed and his grandson is the famous cardiologist dr. Dean Ornish and the same was true of the girls we all went to college I had my degree is from the University of Texas I have a degree in journalism and Edwin's other daughters also went to college and they had careers I had two careers my first as assistant editor of a company publication for south and life which at that time was one of the largest insurance companies in Dallas my second career came after my children started driving and for 20 years I was director of human resources for a large corporation so all the children of these two immigrants have fulfilled their parent's dream you're
a American success story living in South Dallas with all your Jewish neighbors tell me about their involvement your family's involvement in the community and community organizations well first of all all the boys went to Hebrew school and they're only two girls that went to Hebrew school they're me and another another young lady went to Hebrew school we were all members of Jewish youth groups really not there was not a BBG back then but there were Jewish and youth groups and we all all of our activities centered around the Jewish Community Center most of our neighbors went to share with Israel art affaire at Israel we
were close enough to walk to Temple emanu-el on South Boulevard we were also close enough to go to to fareth Israel we had to drive to sheriff Israel but I would say the majority of our neighbors belong to sheriff Israel when we went for the holidays I can remember the Ornish family had to complete roads in sheriff Israel and we managed we all managed to squeeze into the roads and when the RAM I remember was rabbi go began his sermon all of the teenagers left this biggest sanctuary and we went to the park and we discussed our social plans tell me about your children well
my son is an Indian graduate and he is a an IT profession he's a network engineer he works on these very very sophisticated Cisco networks for very large corporations like the Port Authority of New Jersey the bush library a lot of municipalities ESPN my daughter is a attorney she is a partner in a law firm she her specialty is corporate bankruptcy she's very active in Jewish organizations one being eight pack and how about your involvement and as an adult in Jewish organizations and at this time I am NOT in the past I was a volunteer at Jewish Family Service I was also a member of
the Council of Jewish women but primarily because of my careers I did not participate in more Jewish organizations I was very active in my community we live in Richardson and my husband and I served on the board of the Richardson Symphony for 25 years how tell me about the changes that you've seen in Dallas you grew up here you've lived here or your life basically what what changes have you seen the expansion of the cultural opportunities here yes we had we had a Symphony Orchestra we had the Opera I used to attend the symphony with my mother we had said we had seen tickets to
the Dallas Opera the Metropolitan Opera used to come here and of course does not longer don't love her tours here but there has been a tremendous expansion I think we're very blessed to have the Arts Center in downtown Dallas these wonderful buildings like the Meyerson the wind spar I see even in the community that I live in Richardson we we started a woman skilled so dead people who live in Richardson participate in the symphony and they also have a woman skill and the Dallas Symphony helped us establish that anything else you want to tell us I know you're working on something special tell us about
that at the current time I'm writing a book I actually have written a book and I am in the final editing stages of the book the title of my book is tales of a jewish-american princess and what it does is it traces what happened to me through having been born as a jewish-american princess to being able to have two very successful careers and my story is not too different from most of the Jewish women today to give you an idea of what it was like most of my neighbors and our Jewish friends had help in fact our stories were very much like those in the
movie the help we had a maid who worked for our family for over 50 years not only did she raise me and brother but she also raised my two children and then even though I started out as the Jewish American princess I was able to go to college and then have two careers this was almost unheard of when I was growing up most of the Jewish women worked today like my daughter they're very successful career women and so this book shows how I transitioned from an American princess to a career woman to give you an idea of how how much of an American princess I
was growing up I did not know how to make a bed I did not know how to cook and I did not know how to do my hair and my mother decided when I was 13 years old that it would be good if I went to camp so she sent me to tres Rios which would Steve why can't which is where a lot of the Jewish girls were going because there are a lot of these really fine camps that our kids have today we're not available to us back then and so my first day at camp now keep in mind I did not know how
to make a bed I did not know how to take care of myself so the first egg went fine the next morning we got up and the counselor said well these are our activities for the day but the first thing you need to do is make your bed and so in all innocence I turned to the camp counselor and I said my caromed what time did the mates come in so anyway my my stay at the camp needless to say was not very but anyway then when I went off to college things began to change and again you see the transition of how I became
in the book career woman and and then it's followed by the transition of my daughter becoming a very successful attorney that's wonderful thank you so much this has been excellent we appreciate your taking the time to give us your oral history thank you you
