May 3, 2013

Rosalee Cohen

Rosalee Cohen was born in Dallas in 1920, the older of two daughters. Her father came from Poland, from a town she remembered being connected to the Jethro family, where his family ran a butcher shop, and her mother came from the Ukraine in Russia. Her parents married in 1919, and her father, who had adopted the surname Cohen after being befriended by a rabbi during his journey, worked in the garment manufacturing business. He founded Cohen Garment Company, and one of his blouse lines was named Rosalie after her. Her younger sister Bernice, called Babe, was born 23 months later. When Rosalee was four, the family moved to New Braunfels so her father could open a factory, staying seven years before returning to Dallas.

Back in Dallas, the family settled in a warm South Dallas neighborhood near Colonial Hill Elementary, surrounded by other Jewish families. Rosalee attended Colonial Hill, then Forest Avenue High School, where she was a class officer, singer, and performer, graduating in January during the era of midterm graduations. She went on to the University of Texas, the University of Oklahoma, and finally Southern Methodist University, where she was active in a sorority and graduated in three and a half years. Originally an education major, she switched to social work after learning the school district would not readily hire her, and she began her career with city county welfare and later the Corps of Engineers during the war.

Rosalee married her childhood sweetheart, Cyril, in 1942 at the Melrose Hotel after he returned from military service; she had told a friend at age twelve that she would marry him. They built three homes over the years and raised three children, though their first child sadly passed away. She worked in synagogue offices, including as secretary to a rabbi, and served three years as president of the Sisterhood, once cooking for a large donor luncheon featuring Robert Strauss. Raised in a kosher home affiliated with Shearith Israel, she taught Sunday school at both Shearith Israel and Temple Emanu-El and reflected on the changing traditions of Dallas Jewish life. She spent 36 years in the Dallas school system as a school social worker and Spanish interpreter, and remained proud of her large and accomplished family.

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