Sanford “Tex” Fagadau
Sanford Fagadau was born in Pittsburgh on July 2, 1928, but grew up from the age of four weeks in Wichita Falls, Texas. His father came from Romania to study petroleum engineering at the University of Pittsburgh, the first such program in the world, after earning a civil engineering degree at Grenoble in France. Hired by a client, his father moved to Wichita Falls to manage a small oil company. His mother, also Romanian, had lived in Pittsburgh since the early 1900s and met his father at the Cosmopolitan Club at the University of Pittsburgh. Sanford grew up in Wichita Falls with an active childhood, becoming an Eagle Scout at age 13, and attended Sunday school there. He had a sister three years older than him.
Sanford left Wichita Falls in 1944 to attend Ohio State University, where he studied geology, lived in a fraternity house, and eventually earned his bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees. He married his wife, Jeanie, whom he had dated for two or three years, at the end of his master's studies. He went to work for what became Arco, the Atlantic Refining Company, with early assignments in Shreveport, Louisiana, and Roswell, New Mexico. He moved to Dallas in 1955, following his parents who had relocated there. His father, along with Morris Zale and others, had been very active in the Jewish community. Sanford loved the oil business and continued in it, drilling mostly in Texas, Oklahoma, and New Mexico.
In Dallas, Sanford and Jeanie raised three children, Chip, Leslie, and Tom, and enjoyed six grandchildren. He devoted himself to Jewish community work while Jeanie focused on the broader civic and arts community. He served as an officer of the American Jewish Committee, president of Jewish Family Service, president of the Jewish Home for the Aged, and later took a leading role at Temple Emanu-El. A memorable experience was traveling to New York to meet with Jewish Federation presidents about raising funds to resettle Soviet Jews, and he helped lead the community's effort. As Temple Emanu-El leader he oversaw building projects and the search that brought Rabbi David Stern to lead the congregation. He remained proud above all of his children and the good citizens they became.
Full Transcript
today is January 15th 2009 and I have the pleasure and privilege of interviewing Sanford ah today I'm delighted to see you thank you very much for beating with us today I have questions that I'd like to ask you and let's start at the beginning would you tell me a little bit about your your family background when I grew up I was not actually born in Wichita Falls Texas but I grew up there from the age of four weeks my father came from Romania government to study petroleum engineering in the United States and he went to the University of Pittsburgh which was the first school petroleum
engineering in the world and he stayed there two years and got his degree in between mention earrings before that he had graduated from the University of Grenoble and Grenoble France as a civil engineer and and he went finished you can't he after he graduated he went to work for a professor who was at the University of Pittsburgh and he was with that professor for about four or five years and then he was hired by one of their clients to move to Wichita Falls Texas and take over the management of a small oil company Wichita Falls call the vents of Wheeling Mexican oil company and I
always make this statement and I don't think they had any oil production either in Venezuela or Mexico but that was the name of the company anyway said you were born in Pittsburgh but I was born in Pittsburgh and my mother her mother didn't think that we're doctors and what's he talking for she was concerned so she thought it'd be better if I would be born there and then she care and take me which they loved what she did what was your exact birthday July 2nd 1928 and where was your mother from my mother's from Romania also but she lived in Pittsburgh from the early 1900s
and she met my father at the Cosmopolitan Club at the University of Pittsburgh so you grew up in Wichita Falls and you left in 1944 where did you go to college State University that was mainly because my father thought it would be better be a little better education maybe from if I went someplace out of Texas instead of staying in Texas so that's how what was it like growing up in Wichita Falls well it was interesting a lot of friends is basically a somewhat anti-semitic City most of the money in which cell phones came from oil and from cattle and there were not a lot
of Jewish people in I enjoyed it so that was fun during high school then I went off to school in 44 what was the Jewish community like in Wichita Falls well we got a nice community we got a nice temple I think temple had about a hundred families and it was nice and we had a nice nice group of people my father or your father my father so for you in Leo fields friends as children yes yes well we went to high we went to Sunday school together uh-huh and I want to think a year ahead of your father okay okay that's a wonderful story
to hear did you tell me a little bit about your interests when you were a child what did you enjoy doing well I was active in the Boy Scouts and I became an Eagle Scout at the age of 13 which was very young and so I enjoyed that and then from so you left to go to Ohio State and tell me a little bit about your college experiences lot of experiences I liked Ohio State it was a very good school and I knew what I was going to study geology it had a good department of geology not necessarily royalty ology but a good department for
general geology and I placed a fraternity at Ohio State when I got there in fact I never got out of a paternity house it was just a fun school it's a fun school so you lived in the fraternity house yes yes okay a couple years a couple years and what was the was there a large number of Jewish students in Omaha one or two students a lot of them came from Toledo Ohio so there were quite a few I think there were about four or five fraternities Jewish fraternities and what was it unusual at the time to go so far away from home for college
what other people did so I don't know whether it was or not but I enjoyed it so if you got your undergraduate degree in geology you know I'm staying and then I earned a master's degree and then a PhD and in 1952 you continued on primarily primarily because I'm later married we went together for two or three years and finally at the end of heard you in your year and when I got my master's degree we got married and where was gene from we stayed at Columbus I had two more years to go to finish and we stayed there two or three but she graduated
and then got a job teaching school then after that went to work for what became our Co which was the Atlantic refining company and our first assignment was a Shreveport Louisiana and when I graduated they shipped us to Shreveport Louisiana and we were there for about 11 months and then we had a funny story to tell in the house that because I kept saying to genius it don't worry Shreveport snow so bad it could be lost with New Mexico well the next assignment is Roswell New Mexico Mexico we lived there two years always knew I wanted to go and be in the oil business and
be by myself be by yourself was my father and with with your father's don't your father was still in Wichita he you know he had left to Wichita Falls or maybe I guess they moved to Dallas a couple years before I moved to Dallas okay and but he'd step in there tour and he was very active he and in Morris day Olin and several others were very active in the Jewish community thank you I realized I didn't ask you about your brothers and sisters I have a sister who is three years older than me and she went to she graduated Wichita Falls High School went
to the University of Texas here and then she ended up at Ohio State also okay her name is Jim what should I say Mona Jun Jin Ju any okay and and she's here in Dallas news also so do it so what year did you move to Dallas I moved to Dallas in nineteen fifty fifty-five and what was it like when you arrived in Dallas in 1955 very nice we we first thing that my mother told Dini was that ask her if she knew how to play bridge the genie said no I don't play bridge she said well you never have any friends if you don't
know how to play bridge so Jeannie and I there was a lady at the Dallas Athletic Club by the name of mrs. whales who taught bridge so Jenny and I took we just left lessons and I think after a period of time we thought we were pretty good so we invited some couple a couple over one night to play parades and they fought all night long that's a very cute story tell me what it was like living in Dallas in the 1950s well we had a nice we lived on Elderwood Street we had very nice neighbors there were one or two other Jewish couples on the street now the rest were gentlemen but we had good neighbors that were Gentiles Jewish neighbors and the kids grew up there
was a lot of young young people shall they all grew up had friends tell tell me about your children they have three children a chip is the oldest he's a doctor enough to mama just lets me it's a lawyer she's three years younger and then tom is the youngest he's three years younger than Leslie and what did you get involved with in the community well the first thing that I was really involved with how much involved with HACC for a number of years when Barbara Hearst was the director is that American Jewish Committee a Jewish committee with the first position that I held was the
office president of the Jewish Family Service the Jewish Home for the Aged 1988 manual my goodness oh do you went from one agency to the next serving a period of about 12 years I guess something like that and what were some of the issues can you can you recall some of the issues that you faced for example when you were a president of the Dallas of the Jewish Home for the Aged age what were some of the issues that you faced well we had a wonderful director herb Shore and actually even even though you're an officer you don't really do much because he did most
everything I think my most memorable time when I was president of these organizations was the when I went to New York to meet with presidents of Jewish Federations from all over the country when they first decided to let Russian Jews out to go to Israel we had to raise money for that and I came back to the Federation in giving a report we had some number of people that were concerned about that because they said that we can't raise that kind of money in Dallas we had just finished our general campaign and that was too much to ask the community and I sort of I
guess tears started coming to my eyes and I said we have to so there's no excuse do you remember what it was that you needed to raise no I don't this was in the 1980s this was the this was soon sometime in the latter part of the 80s or early 90s maybe and what do you recall about the numbers of Soviet Jews who came somewhere somewhere nice and fairly easy to work with some we're not challenging well you because they if they felt that they were entitled to to equipment that they needed to have computers and typewriters and things like that but generally later on
most of them got settled and it was the executive director of the Jewish Federation and so he went from the Federation and then your last major responsibility was the temple was the temple and that was temple Emmanuel and tell me well the work of the temple was primarily we were doing some building at the time we were adding space the Pullman Hall and various other things in the temple at that time so that was what it was most of it and with midway in my term of office Shelley took a job with the Hebrew Union College so he left here and so I was faced
with having to get a new vampire and we put out anyway form the search committee and of course people some of them very nice very nice everybody seemed to walk David and so that's who ended up being a rabbi tell me a little bit about for the record who David is David Stern is he was a young grab I graduated in Hebrew Union College from from New York I think and was a temporal manual for a number of years before this took place I think he had been with the temple manual maybe four or five years for six years so did you so he was
invited to serve as the head rabbi on your watch well that was a big accomplishment well in there was another interesting little story about that too because Jeannie and I went up to Aspen that summer I said you know David is up visiting his father and I said this would be a wonderful time for me to write him a short letter about how much we want him to be the rabbi of our temple well I had to two chairs okay so I told Carmen Michael what I had done that I had written David a short letter on a piece of yellow paper explaining giving him
reasons why I thought he should should accept our offer and she told me she says well she says if you had no business doing that without going to the whole committee ah and if he doesn't accept it you're gonna be get the blame for it when David's father saw that shortly the devotee said if you don't accept it I'm going to accept it that's a wonderful story that's just a wonderful story and so in addition then to taking the leadership roles in the Jewish community were you involved have you been involved in non-jewish civic organization not really not any great extent actually Jeanie and I
are sort of divided on that she does most of the community work and I did the Jewish community work and you did the Jewish people geojo big Jewish community work fellowship yes I look forward to hearing about that in just a little while tell me a little bit more about your your business well there are not many Jewish people in the oil business and especially in this part of the country there were a number of families in Houston and Oklahoma City it's an exciting business I've always loved it I still love it to this day that's it do you do your your oil drilling in
Texas mostly in Texas but also West Texas North Texas mostly in Oklahoma New Mexico were you traveling a lot or you were raising the children well only to the field only now to the oil too much you see here now if you were telling me that you have three children and do you have grandchildren you have six grandchildren tip has to two daughters one is married and the other one who now 26 28 27 this in New York she graduated from Cornell and she's working in New York my daughter has two sons one son is graduating from the University of Denver law school this spring
and the other one is a senior graduating from NYU and he by the way was the president of the Young Democrats at NYU this very fortunate in that I guess probably my sister helped us meet some people we did with course we didn't know anybody to speak of in Dallas and then we met a lot of people met you and your husband and a lot of people became friends with and it was a fun place to live and still is now that's there's still a great city and now so we still stay busy TV stay busier now in the in the Gentile community really more
than the Jewish community because Jeanne's active in a lot of Arctic art so when you say you stay busy and the Gentile community what do you mean socially you're you're active within the arts okay did your console you have a very busy social life it's wonderful before we stop the tape a minute ago you were telling me a little bit about your grandchildren Tommy's got two daughters gonna be a junior at NYU graduating Green Hill and fourth for the record Leslie's boys names are Matthew and Neil and their last name is Schecter sh e CH t yes okay Ashley Leslie has done very well Leslie
is now on the governor staff and has been for the past two years of the state of Tennessee she is in charge of finance and commerce for the state of Tennessee and she's a lawyer and of course of course and chip and Eddie's daughters names and she's married to I have to tell you about that one too Jason yeah she's married to a young man named Jason bender and Alyssa has a boyfriend who we think maybe end up being her husband but we can't say anything about that we won't say a word Jason bender would we lived in Shreveport which union our in Shreveport with
the 11 months we met Jack and Sophie bender and Sophie been there is with Kleinman's sister and they were living in Shreveport and we met them at a party and became friendly with them and it turned out that Jason is their grandson and when he asked you Florence hand in marriage he told me now bear in mind that you're your father and mother were friends of my grandmother and father for years before this sells out that we sell a few story that's a very cute story how do you think that Dallas has changed over the years when we just we're a larger community you know
we have so many more people I don't know how you would say it's changed particularly I think it still it was a nice City when we came here and still a nice city do you see differences in the Jewish Dallas Jewish community no I think the Dallas Jewish community is grown and I think they've been very responsive did you have role models as a young man or even even now okay what are some of the things that you were proud of of your as you reflect over raising your family in your career and your community involvement well I guess that be proud over the having
that I had the ability to to provide a good living for them do you see them all through school through their education they all grew up to be good citizens nice people I couldn't be more proud of anybody other than the three children that's it I guess well I think that's very special is there anything that you would like to add later I would look forward to hearing from you and this concludes our interview the reason they finally decided to move to Dallas ever having lived in Wichita Falls since twenty-eight thirty years something like that that my father was co-president of the Council for Christians
and Jews at Woodstock walls and a very good friend Gentile friend of his with the other co-chair and they started a Petroleum Club in which stove with the Dallas and Dallas Petroleum Club did not allow Jewish members and so he when he found when he heard that his co-president his good friend was going to be on the board of directors of the Petroleum Club in Wichita Falls he said how could you do that when they don't allow Jews and so forth and you're also co-president of the Council of presidents to do so he put the Council of Christians the Jews the two people that most
active in the Jewish community for so many years were more selling my father both at the temple and all the all the fundraising teacher parents continue a relationship with other immigrants from Romania was it were you aware as a child that that it was challenging for your parents coming from another country and settling in the United States that's a good question they seem to have adjusted beautifully my father couldn't speak English when he came here he could speak French and Romanian but he couldn't in Hebrew but he covered or Yiddish I guess you'd say when he couldn't speak English but he learned how to speak
English and he didn't have what's it would accident really he was very smart and my mother had been here already for since the early teens in Pittsburgh so I guess she would already could speak English not my father did the two families know one another coming back in Romania I'm sorry did the two families know of one another no so small towns but different talents not far apart as it turned out with their small towns but my father's family was very lucky in Romania because and I'm not sure his great-grandfather had fought in the war when Romania became a country and as a result of
that his family was given educational privileges so everybody and my father's family were had an education and he had one father was a doctor when mother was a lawyer was in business one sister was a pharmacist they all had college education his college education in France thank you for sharing this with us