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For a lot of years—say from before the turn of the century (the 20th) until the 1960s—there was a group of remarkable Jewish labor leaders leading what was known as the Jewish unions. (The same unions had a large Italian membership and Italian locals with able leaders like Luigi Antonini.) The most prominent were David Dubinsky of the ILGWU and Sidney Hillman of the ACWA. There were scores of others, and Dubinsky was followed by Stolberg and Chaikin, and Hillman by Potofsky and Sheinkman. The Hatters had Alex Rose, the Furriers had---etc. There had also been Jewish labor leaders who led unions that did not have a large Jewish membership, the best example being Samuel Gompers.
The fact is, that the “Jewish” unions stopped being Jewish during the 1940s. The old-timers were retiring, and they were being replaced by black and Hispanic workers in the large metropolitan areas—New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Los Angeles etc. And when the garment shops ran away from the Northern metropolitan areas to rural areas and the South, the workers were mostly WASPS, white and mostly Protestant, like Norma Rae.
Interestingly, the organizers who followed and attempted to organize those runaway shops were mostly Jewish. And the union officials in the large metropolitan areas were mostly Jewish. So for a while, the Jewish leadership and staff of the once Jewish unions, now consisting of urban minorities and rural whites, remained in place. As an aside, a Jewish staff member of the NAACP led the attack on the ILGWU claiming that its black members were denied leadership positions. Over the next decade, the garment factories which ran away from the metropolitan garment centers to rural America and the South, ran to Latin America and Asia, and the garment unions faded away.
But then there was a reemergence of Jewish labor leaders, among the teachers and public employees. Some of the children of Jewish workers, finished college and went to work for a wide variety of trade unions. I grew up aware of, and proud of, Dubinsky and Hillman. When I had the opportunity, I became one of those Jewish organizers, starting out trying to organize non-Jewish garment workers in Pennsylvania and Ohio. Then non-Jewish alteration workers and shipping clerks in New York. Yes, and all of the locals and districts for which I worked were headed by Jewish officials: Pennsylvania—Sol Greene; Ohio—Nicholas Kirtzman, Local 38—Isidore Sorkin, and Local 99--Shelley Appleton.
When I left the ILGWU in 1956, I went to work for the Jewish Labor Committee, getting to know hundreds of Jewish labor leaders. Many were the legendary pioneers who created powerful unions. Politically, they were socialists who received their early training and point of view in Eastern Europe from the Jewish Labor Bund, which they adapted to the American scene. I also had the pleasure of working with the next generation of Jewish labor leaders: Charles Cogen and Al Shanker of the Teachers (AFT), and Jerry Wurf of the Public Employees (AFSCME).
In 1962, I left the JLC to serve as the Education Director of the Amalgamated Laundry Workers Joint Board, headed by Louis Simon. He was Jewish, but had no connection with the Bundists. In fact, as far as I know, he had no connection with any Jewish organization. He became the manager of the Laundry Workers because he was a laundry driver, and a rank and file leader. Simon had a remarkable sense of self-preservation.
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"For a lot of years—say from before the turn of the century (the 20th) until the 1960s—there was a group of remarkable Jewish labor leaders leading what was known as the Jewish unions." (Fragment)
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For_a_lot_of_years—say_from_before_the_turn_of_the_century
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Jewish Identity
Jewish Labor Committee (JLC)
Labor Movement
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PESACH
I like Pesach. I like eating matzah. I like Seders. I like thinking about all the symbols, and the story of liberation, and how the Jews survived, and the importance of feeding the hungry, and being nice to strangers, and that good can triumph over evil.
What I don’t like is the craziness about dishes and non-kosher stuff. My mother didn’t have two sets of dishes for meat and milk, and she didn’t have two sets of dishes for Pesach and for the rest of the year. She explained that in biblical times they didn’t have china dishes; they had wooden dishes. Nor did they have the kind of silverware that we have today. I guess she would have said that eating implements in biblical times were also made of wood. You can’t really wash wood the way you wash china and metal flatware. Give today’s dishes a good washing and we can use the same dishes for meat and milk, and the same dishes for Pesach and the rest of the year.
If there were bread products, or food that was not Kosher for Passover, put them somewhere else; not in the kitchen. But don’t throw them out, or give them away. They will stay until after Pesach. During Pesach, I would certainly not eat bread. When I ate lunch in school, I made matzah sandwiches. When I stopped taking sandwiches, and ate lunch in restaurants, I would ask for matzah. Of course, most restaurants did not serve matzah as bread substitutes, so I did without. Except when I had soup. Then I rationalized that the crackers that were served were like matzah, and ate the crackers.
These days, and I suspect for all the years that Fran and I have been married, we have a difference of opinion about dishes and flatware. I am perfectly happy to use the same dishes and flatware that we have been using. (It is part of my tradition.) Fran has a different tradition. She has anointed some stuff as “Pesadik,” and she takes them out of their hiding place, puts them on the kitchen counter, and insists that we use them for Pesach. Then she takes out a lot of paper plates and plastic ware and insists that we use them as well. Sometimes I nodded, and did what I wanted. Sometimes I indulged her. Then I would remember “Sholem Bais” Peace in the Home, and now, I go along. It is only for eight days.
Another aspect of Pesach which bothers me is the craziness in getting ready for the seders. Thankfully, we don’t do seders any more. Instead, we either get invited, and if it is getting close and we haven’t been invited, we drop hints which usually results in an invitation. Nevertheless, there is the earlier craziness in getting the house ready for Pesach, and of course, in preparing whatever food Fran insists on bringing to the seder to which we are invited. Fran will never agree to just bringing some wine or a store-bought dish. She has to make something. And it is usually done just before we are to leave for the seder. I point out that it is getting late, and Fran tells me to leave her alone. Everything works out. Our hosts, who must have gone crazy getting ready for the seder, greet us warmly, thank us for whatever Fran made, and we have a great evening.
Even though I am a “guest,” I insist on doing the Four Questions (fir kashes) in Yiddish, telling everyone, I have been doing this since I was eight years old. The youngest can do it in Hebrew or English. I do it in Yiddish. And when the singing begins, I make sure to inject my ex-father-in-law’s version of Ki Lo Na’eh and Adir Hu, culminating in his version of Mu Adabru, which is in the Haggadah as Ehad Mi Yodeya (Who Knows One?) If David is at the seder, we sing them together, and since he can carry a tune, it sounds a lot better than me singing alone.
We are members of the Newton Centre Minyan, and for weeks before Pesach e–mails were going back and forth demonstrating the craziness of preparing for Pesach. Most of the members are very serious about observing everything that is required to prepare for Pesach. I sent them the story about the Jew in an anti-Semitic Eastern European town who couldn’t take it anymore and decided to convert. His wife said do what you think is best. After a while, he could not live with himself, and told his wife they will convert back to Judaism. His wife said fine, but do it after Pesach.
I hope that now that all the preparing has been done, everyone is having a happy Pesach.
4-5-15
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Pesach
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Jacob Schlitt
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"I like Pesach."
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PESACH
Childhood
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Jewish Identity
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Passover
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DAY OF REST
I have a bumper sticker on my car that reads: “The Labor Movement. The Folks who Brought you the Weekend.” Long before unions won first a six, and then a five day work week, the Jews came up with the concept of “A Day of Rest.” I assume, before the Ten Commandments, most people worked from dawn to dusk seven days a week. No day was different from any other. It took Moses (or some other very creative individual) to provide a rationale for a day off from back-breaking labor.
The Fourth Commandment states: “Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it, you shall not do any work…” Since God created the world in six days, and on the seventh day he rested, He therefore blessed it and made it holy. Therefore, we, and our children, and our servants, and our livestock should rest on the seventh day. Whatever explanation works for you. Observant Jews make rest on Saturday a must. I suspect there are more questions about what constitutes work on Shabbes than on any of the other Ten Commandments.
I have told the story over and over of my mother leaving her first job soon after she came to Toronto at the age of 16. She was a skilled sewer and had found work as an alteration tailor at Eaton’s Department Store. It was Friday and the foreman told her that she would have to come in the next day because they were very busy. She told him that she made it clear when she started that she does not work on Saturday. He said she would have to. She replied that she is leaving and wants her pay, and she quit.
Somewhere I heard that rather than “ Jews keep the Sabbath,” “Sabbath keeps the Jews.”
All the rituals, prohibitions, and traditions, that Jews observe, that makes them different, reinforce their identity. However, over the years, my observance has been diminishing, even though my identity as a Jew is as strong as ever.
To extend the parallel with which I started: It took a long time for organized labor to win a five day week. Many factories and stores worked a six day week. (Thank God that Christians picked up on the concept of “a day of rest.”) The norm became a five day, 40 hour week, with time and a half paid for overtime. When companies figured they can make more money working seven days a week (even paying overtime) they did it, and something happened to our society. There was no longer a difference between weekdays and the weekend. Which leads me to the point of this piece:
Since I have retired, every day has become a day of rest. And since I seldom go to shul on Saturday any more, the holiness of Saturday has diminished.
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Day of Rest
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Jacob Schlitt
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"I have a bumper sticker on my car that reads: 'The Labor Movement. The Folks who Brought you the Weekend'."
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DAY_OF_REST
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Judaism
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Autobiographical writing
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ACCENTS
Growing up, I was aware that different people spoke differently. My mother, and her friends who were born in Eastern Europe, and who spoke “Jewish,” spoke with a Jewish accent. Italians spoke with Italian accents. Irish spoke with Irish accent etc. Some had stronger accents than others. It may have depended on how long they were in the US, or how young they were when they came to the US, or how adept they were at losing their accent. Henry Kissinger and his brother came to the US at the same time. Henry has a heavy accent; his brother does not. When his brother was asked why, he replied, “I listened.”
A popular book in the late 1930’s by Leo Rosten (whose nom de plume was Leo Q. Ross) was “The Education of H*Y*M*A*N K*A*P*L*A*N.” It was about a night school English class. Whenever Mr. Kaplan spoke, (as well as some of the other students) it was with a Yiddish accent. The mispronunciation is apparently what made the book funny. First President George Washington was pronounced by Mr. Kaplan, “Foist Prazidant, Jawdge Vashington.” V’s become w’s, and vice versa. Th’s become d’s. Already is awreddy. Girl is goil. Fancy is fency. Letter is ladder.
To me, American-born grown-ups did not have an accent. My mother’s friends’ children and I, born here, did not have an accent. Many of us were embarrassed by our parents’ accents. Some of the black and Puerto Rican kids in my junior high and high school, did speak with black and Spanish accents. I assumed it was because they may have been born in the southern US or Puerto Rico, and they lived in predominantly black and Puerto Rican neighborhoods (called ghettos, for blacks, and barrios, for Puerto Ricans.) Many of New York’s Puerto Ricans, called Newyoricans, continued speaking Spanish, and would shuttle back and forth between New York and Puerto Rico. My Puerto Rican classmates, born here, spoke unaccented English, as did my friend, Frank Torres. His father was born in the US, and, in fact, was elected to the New York State Assembly from our neighborhood.
When I entered CCNY, and took “Public Speaking,” I was told that I spoke with an accent. Whaddiya know! It was evident to the instructor that I “dentalized” my t’s and d’s. I had no idea what he was talking about. He explained that students like myself (having grown up in a Yiddish speaking home) tended to place their tongues on their teeth, instead of their upper palate, when pronouncing t’s and d’s. That was wrong. I was told to change it, and like a good boy, I changed it. Non-New Yorkers insisted that New Yorkers spoke with a New York accent. We came from Noo Yawk, and would go to toidy-toid street. Just as Bostonians dropped their “r’s” (Pack youa ca in Havad Yad), New Yorkers emphasized and hardened their g’s. (Going gover Long Gisland), and tawked different with regard to sentence structure from WASPs and other “Real Americans.”
In the 1940’s, there was a radio program featuring a speech expert who could listen to a person and tell where he or she grew up, just from the way the person spoke. I was told that eventually, he would no longer be able to do that because we will all have radios, and it will wipe out regional speech. From listening to the radio, all native Americans will begin to speak like one another. In addition, with increased ease of travel, people will be moving around much more. The different regions will no longer be isolated, and regional accents will become lost or corrupted.
Hollywood both added to, and detracted from, this phenomenon. It spread American speech all across the country, but it also gave us movie stars who spoke wonderfully accented English: Charles Boyer, Akim Tamiroff, Hedy Lamarr, Marlene Dietrich, Ingrid Bergman, Greta Garbo, Katy Jurado, Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, as well as American born James Cagney, Will Rogers, John Wayne, Gary Cooper, Katharine Hepburn, John Garfield, Tallulah Bankhead etc.
A great play, which became a great movie, is “My Fair Lady,” from George Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion. It is all about accents, and the fact that speech reflects class, and socio-economic status, as well as ethnicity. Cockney speech in England is much like New Yawk speech in the US, but worse. And just like Public Speaking at CCNY, Henry Higgins undertook to get Eliza Doolittle to lose her cockney accent, to stop dropping h’s, and mispronouncing a’s. It was her newly acquired speech that transformed a flower girl into a lady.
In high school, we all had to learn a foreign language. Just as important as learning grammar and vocabulary, was learning how to pronounce the words, and how to speak with a proper accent. It was not easy. It required careful listening and repetition. It helped if you had an ear for languages. One of my all time favorite TV programs was Sid Ceasar’s “Your Show of Shows.” He frequently played a foreign character and appeared to be speaking French or Russian or German or Italian. He was actually speaking gibberish, but with a perfect accent. He had an ear for languages.
As I noted earlier, my friends and I grew up in Yiddish-speaking homes. (The homes did not speak Yiddish; the people who lived in them did.) Yiddish was our first language. Perhaps that is why when we went to college, we had to be taught how to speak and form words in English somewhat differently from the way we did when we were children. These days, when we speak Yiddish, even though we have forgotten words, and never knew grammar, we still speak with good pronunciation. We learned the language at our mother’s knee. It is referred to as “mamaloshn,” mother tongue.
There is a new generation who would like to learn Yiddish, but who did not have the same good fortune as my friends and myself. They did not hear native Yiddish speakers, and most of them have trouble pronouncing the words correctly. They are unable to make the proper guttural sounds, unable to roll the r’s. I suspect they will have to be taught to “dentalize” their t’s and d’s. (My son David is an exception.) My friend Bob has a good command of Yiddish, to such an extent, that he was once asked by a Russian born, native Yiddish speaker, “Vere vos you born?” He was astounded to learn that Bob was American born, an “Americaner goboiriner.”
I never know how to react when I am told that I do not have a New York accent. I tend to be annoyed. I certainly do not say thank you, or take it as a compliment. It is as if someone would say to me, “You don’t look Jewish.” I am a proud New Yorker (and a proud Jew). When anyone asks me these days where I am from, I respond: currently or originally. From my speech, it is clear that I am not a native Bostonian. But, thanks to my CCNY Public Speaking classes, I do not sound like a stereotypical New Yorker, whatever that is. I am pleased when a fellow New Yorker recognizes a connection. There are subtle differences across the city, but it is generally agreed that the best New York accent comes from Brooklyn. And to quote Lenny Bruce: If you are from New York and you’re Catholic, you are still Jewish.” We all have New York accents.
Just as we in America are aware of the different dialects across the country, it exists equally (or perhaps more so) among Yiddish speakers, the most prominent being the Galitzianers and the Litvaks, The academics describe three groupings: Western, which is where it all began—in Germany; Northern—Litvish, Lithuania (Litvaks); and Southern—Poland and Galicia (Galitzianers). The Litvaks say “kugel,” and the Galitzianers say “kigel.” They also have differences in taste.
Finally, speaking of taste, America was once called “the melting pot.” People came here from all over the world. They spoke different languages, and when they learned English, they spoke with different accents, and made different contributions. Eventually, they would all be melted down and be alike. Rather than melting pot, I like the designation I once heard: salad bowl. We are an American salad bowl. We maintain our identity, our different tastes, colors, origins. It is all right for each of us to have our own accent, dialect, or regional speech. I like that image. Don’t homogenize us. Whaddiya say?
2-3-15
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Accents
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Jacob Schlitt
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"Growing up, I was aware that different people spoke differently."
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2015-02-03
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ACCENTS
City College (CCNY)
Humor
Jewish Identity
New York City
Observations
Reading Out Loud (R.O.L.)
Yiddish
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Autobiographical writing
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MEMORY
As I write my story, it is clear that I am dependent on memory. I am not writing fiction. I am writing about my life, and trying to bring back the people and events that shaped my life. I used to think that the way my mind worked was to blot out of my mind the people and events that made me unhappy. It was only when I read old journals that they came back to me. And I then relive the pain. But I tended not to write about them.
Writing as I do, I am reliving a part of my life. Most of what I have written is descriptive, and drawn from memory. I try to transport myself back in time. From time to time, I have been able to draw upon material that has been filed away, mostly by me, but also papers that my mother kept.
Why am I doing this? Because I want my family to know about my life, about the world in which I lived, but to a large part, about my mother and her life, what little I know of it. Doing that, she remains alive. And after I am gone, and my children and grandchildren will have my story, I too will remain alive.
My mother was obsessed with books and authors. She used to say that writers are immortal. It was her belief that if you write a book, you will live forever. She even dreamed of me becoming a published author. Even suggested a pen name: Tsirelson. The immortality designation is certainly true for writers like Chaucer, Shakespeare, Dickens, and their equivalents in other cultures. Great writers tell great stories which appeal to a universal audience. Their works are translated in many languages and have the ability to move diverse readers. They have universal appeal, despite describing a single culture. What they do is preserve the life they describe. Their writings are the memory of their times. And their time lives on.
Jews are big on memory. Religious or secular, Jews are obsessed with their history. And the earliest part of that history is in the Bible. We are the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Our story moves on through Moses and the Exodus, David and Solomon, the destruction of the Temples, the Diaspora, the early Rabbis, the Talmud, the Inquisition, the move eastward, persecution, the shtetlach, Hasidism, the enlightenment, Yiddish literature, Zionism, the Holocaust. The recent Pew study, when it asked what being a Jew means in the U.S. today, 73% answered: remembering the Holocaust. Zachar, Gedenk. Remember.
There is a great deal of difference between a single memory and collective memory. Between the story of one person, or one family, and the story of a people. Oral histories have become very popular. Put them all together, they may spell collective memory. Grist for an historian’s mill. Just as my mother wanted to give her body to medical science, I want to give my story to my family and friends, and perhaps to a wider audience. I have been struggling with the contradiction in the concept that we are each unique, yet the story of tens of thousands of people like me are so similar. Still, it is not going to deter me from writing my story.
I started by writing about memory as the indispensible ingredient in writing ones story, ones memoirs. If you can’t remember, you can’t tell your story. The more you remember, the more you can pick and choose what you want to write about. And if you can remember those marvelous details—the colors and smells and tastes, what people and neighborhoods and houses and rooms looked like—how much more exciting your story will be. Feelings and thoughts are also a part of the story. Conversations. How can you recall them from years and years ago?
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Memory
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Jacob Schlitt
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"As I write my story, it is clear that I am dependent on memory."
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2014/2015
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MEMORY
Family
Fragment
Jewish Identity
Memory
Mother
Observations
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Autobiographical writing
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KHANIKE STORIES
I am pleased that my khaverim at the New England Jewish Labor Committee, the Yidisher Arbeter Comitet, are sharing Khanike stories on line. I have lots of Khanike stories, and have shared them over the years with my friends and family, and even with the Yiddish Book Center. When I participated in their oral history, I revealed that, during the depression, my mother and I did not have a menorah, and were too poor to buy one. Our solution: we took an empty Sanka coffee can, which was about six or seven inches in diameter, turned it upside down, and placed the candles around the outer rim, adding one each night. How is that for innovation? My mother made latkes, I said the prayers and sang the songs I learned in Hebrew school, Maoz Tsur, etc, and we had a freylikhe Khanike, a joyous Chanukah.
I have commented over the years about the different spellings of the holiday. I have recently taken to spelling it as it is pronounced in Yiddish, according to YIVO, but “Chanukah,” is also spelled “Hanukkah” and a few other ways. It really does not matter how you spell it. People will know what you mean. For as far back as I can remember, we always referred to the menorah as the menorah. Recently, I have been hearing it referred to as a Chanukiya (or Hanukkiah). Israeli influence? By the way, another Israeli influence is jelly donuts, or sufganiot. That’s really overdoing the oil business. First latkes and then donuts. How much can our arteries take?
When we lit the candles, it was usually on the dinner table, and we left it there. Jewish community leaders have been urging us to put the menorah in the window, so the world can see that we are proudly Jewish and we are celebrating our holiday. I suspect that they wanted us to compete with all the lights that are part of the Christmas celebration. In fact, when I saw several homes with one electric candle in the window, I thought it was a Jewish home making a modern statement.
In 1979, I moved to Boston from Washington DC, and became active with the Boston Jewish Community Relations Council. The Director, Phil Perlmutter, asked me to join him in a delicate matter: to speak to the head of Boston Chabad, to dissuade him from pressing the city of Boston to allow them to put up a big menorah on city property. Both Phil and I had been brought up believing in the separation of church and state. We fought against the manger and baby Jesus displays on public property. How could we support a Jewish religious symbol being placed there? The Chabad director dismissed our argument and said that the order has come down from the Lubavitcher Rebbe, and that there will eventually be giant menorahs on public places in cities across the country—even in Washington DC. And it has come to pass. And Chabad has even been able to con the mayors of the different cities to take part in the lighting. You win some and you lose some.
I should point out that over the years, my economic position changed, and not only was I able to purchase a menorah, my family and I purchased several menorahs, and were given others as gifts. And for a number of years, Fran, David and I each lit a different menorah. The house was filled with light. Fran made it clear that there is a custom that the woman of the house does not do any work while the candles are lit. Fortunately, they only burn for a half hour. There has been a change in the candles over the years, as well. When I was younger, the candles were orange and plain. Then, the candle manufacturers came out with multicolored and spiraled candles. They both were five inches long. I enjoyed mixing the colors. We might start with a white “shamas” and a blue first candle; then a red shamas and blue and white candles; then a yellow shamas and red, white and blue candles etc. (A knowledgeable friend kept pronouncing shamas as shamash. Who is right, or are we both right?
We usually bought our candles, first at the grocery store, and then the supermarket. For a while, a Jewish charity, Telshe Yeshiva, would mail us candles “made in Israel.” Clearly we were obligated to send them a small contribution. They have stopped sending us candles. Perhaps we did not send them a large enough contribution.
We have two Jewish book stores in the neighborhood and they sell much fancier Chanukah candles than the supermarket. They claim to be hand dipped by skilled artisans, and will burn bright and clean for more than one hour. Perhaps that is why Fran insists on buying them. One year, Fran bought a box of “45 Hanukkah Tapers 100% Beeswax Hand Dipped From Naturally Filtered Beeswax… Each taper will burn smokeless and dripless for 75 minutes.” That is even better! Fran places the fancy candles in her menorah. I use the old fashioned kind. These days, both the fancy candles and the old fashioned kind are made in China, and both call the candles bougies, and they can be found in drug stores as well.
I am sure that almost everyone has also progressed from home made latkes to store-bought. As a youngster, I helped my mother grate the potatoes, and then my mother did her magic. Sylvia and I married, we enjoyed her mother’s latkes, and then she made her own. When we separated, I made latkes and invited friends over. There can be no Chanukah without latkes. Moving to Boston from Washington, when Chanukah 1979 came around, I decided to have a latke party. I invited a bunch of people, Fran helped me fry and serve, and when we ran out, Fran jumped in and made some more. A lifesaver then; a lifesaver now. We are fortunate to have a wonderful Jewish food store in the neighborhood—the Butcherie—and they have fantastic “homemade” latkes. I assume families who do not shop at the Butcherie have to settle for frozen.
After the Chanukah meal, I insist that we play dreidl. I always have lots of pennies, and distribute the same number of pennies to every player, In the old days, we got down and dirty. Since I can’t get down these days, we spin the dreidl on the table. I sometimes have to explain the game: Put a penny in the pot; the four letters Gimel, Nun, Hay and Shin, besides standing for “a great miracle happened there,” mean Gimel wins the pot, Hay wins half, Nun wins nothing, and Shin puts in one. When I was a kid, we only had one dreidl, made of lead. Today I have a dozen or more, made of wood, plastic and even glass. After many years of dreidl spinning, I have become quite expert. Some of my spins last for 10 or 12 seconds. I heard somewhere that the record holder is 20 seconds. But it doesn’t matter how long the dreidl spins. It is the result that counts.
Gifts: Growing up, it was my mother’s custom to buy (or make) me an article of clothing for each holiday, including Chanukah. That was my gift. No Chanukah gelt, no toys or books. A pair of socks, or if I needed it, underwear, a pair of gloves or a scarf. These days, it seems that most Jewish families feel they have to compete with Christmas, and give their kids lavish gifts. And to outdo Christmas, they might even give their kids a gift each night for eight nights. I have to admit that I have been sending my grandchildren multiple gifts, but never anything lavish. The gifts have to be accompanied by a small packet of foil covered chocolate coins: Chanukah Gelt.
How many times have I heard that Chanukah is a “minor” holiday! That it has grown in importance because it had to compete with Christmas. The December dilemma. Deprived Jewish kids miss out on Santa Claus, and hanging stocking by the fireplace, and the beauty of Christmas trees. A few Jewish families have Christmas trees, which they refer to as a Chanukah bush. And all those lovely Christmas Carols. (Confession: I really did have second thoughts about naming my daughter Carol, but it was the one name that Sylvia and I agreed upon, that came closest to my mother’s name.)
So what is the holiday about? It is about the Maccabees standing up to Antiochus who opposed Jewish ritual and desecrated the Temple, and when the Maccabees won and wanted to light the Temple menorah, they found only enough oil to last one day, but it lasted eight days. A miracle! Creative rabbis and parents can turn this into a fight for religious freedom, and the conquest by light over darkness.
I had mentioned Chabad earlier. It has become the most effective promoter of Chanukah of any Jewish organization I know of. It sends out hundreds of thousands of booklets each year to Jewish homes: “Your Chanukah Guide,” and it tells you everything you want to know about the holiday. Much more than what I have written, above. In fact, if I looked at it before writing this, I would have realized I covered the same ground, and could have saved myself a lot of trouble. It explained Chanukah is from Kislev 25 to Tevet 2, and it described the Greeks and the Maccabees, the victory of the few over the many, and how a little candle pushes away the monster of darkness. “It can only be attributed to the great mercies of the One Above.” It also tells you how to make latkes, how to play dreidl, and how to kindle the menorah.
I also mentioned singing Chanukah songs. That is a big part of the holiday. The songs I learned in Hebrew school, besides Maoz Tsur, were Al Hanisim, Mi Yimalel, and S’vivon. We even learned a Yiddish song, O Chanukah, O Chanukah, A Yontev a Sheyner. Since many kids knew neither Hebrew nor Yiddish, several English Chanukah songs took over, including a few that were translated from Hebrew or Yiddish: I Have a Little Dreidl, Who Can Retell, Rock of Ages etc. Debbie Freidman came through with Not By Might, Not By Power, and Peter Yarrow with Light One Candle. A recent favorite is a Ladino song with a great melody: Ocho Kandelikas. And my all-time favorite: Tom Lehrer’s I’m Spending Chanukah in Santa Monica. If you don’t know it, here is the closing stanza. (If I am violating a copyright, let him sue me.)
“But in December there’s just one place for me.
Amid the California flora, I’ll be lighting my menorah.
Like a baby in its cradle, I’ll be playing with my dreidel.
Here’s to Judas Macabeus, boy if he could only see us,
Spending Chanukah, in Santa Monica by the sea!”
HAPPY CHANUKAH!
12-22-14
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Khanike Stories
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Jacob Schlitt
Description
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"I am pleased that my khaverim at the New England Jewish Labor Committee, the Yidisher Arbeter Comitet, are sharing Khanike stories on line."
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2014-12-22
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en
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KHANIKE_STORIES
Boston
Family
Hanukkah
Holidays
Jewish Identity
Jewish Labor Committee (JLC)
Washington DC
Yiddish
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Autobiographical writing
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DISCOVERING RELATIVES
What do you do when you discover foreign relatives you never knew you had? You get excited. You visit them. Then you write to them. Then you gradually stop writing to them, and they stop writing to you. And you are back to where you began.
This has happened twice. In 1973, I learned that I had a lot of family in Israel. Seems that my father had a brother who went to Palestine several years after my father left for the United States. I don’t know if my father corresponded with the family in Kishinev. I do know that he helped one of his brother’s sons come to America in the early 20s. His name was Henry Schlitt. My mother called him Chaim, so that is what I called him. His wife Dora called him Yefim, which must be Russian for Henry.
Chaim corresponded with the family in Kishinev. In June 1926, they had a son named Gabriel. In December 1927, I was born, and in July 1932, Henry and Dora had another son, Robert. They lived in the same apartment house in which my parents lived. Apparently, there was a serious disagreement between the two families, (most likely between the two men) because Chaim and his family moved out and found an apartment in Astoria. There was no more contact between the two families. Growing up, I did not know that they existed. However, when you discover relatives you never knew existed, and they live in New York, you get very excited, and hang on to them. What follows are three stories. The first is about my American cousins, next, about my Israeli cousins, and finally, my French cousins.
The first discovery: Thank God for Bar Mitzvahs. I am convinced that it was only because Gabie was to have his Bar Mitzvah, that Chaim decided to “let bygones be bygones” and invite his aunt, my mother, and her son, his closest relatives, to this important event. As I said, up to the moment that the invitation arrived, I did not know they existed. I have relived that moment dozens of times, when I removed the invitation from our mailbox, when I saw the return address: Henry Schlitt 3611 31st Avenue, Astoria, NY, and when I rushed upstairs, and handed the envelope to my mother.
Who is Henry Schlitt? Are there really people around with the same last name as us? My mother opened the envelope. It contained a printed invitation that read, “Mr, and Mrs, Henry Schlitt request the honor of your presence at the Bar Mitzvah of their son Gabriel…” I kept asking my mother who they were. She said that Henry was the son of a brother of my father’s. Nothing more. Why didn’t I know about them? She did not answer. There was a reply card. We filled it out and returned it, indicating that we would attend.
I asked my mother if my father had any other brothers and sisters. She said he did, but we had lost touch with them. I believe it was then that she said that my father had a brother who went to Palestine and lived on a kibbutz, but he was killed when Arabs attacked the kibbutz. (More about that later.)
We went to the Bar Mitzvah. It was my first meeting with my cousins. My cousins! It was also my first visit to Queens. The synagogue was as impressive as mine. There was a large congregation. Gabie was very handsome, and did a first rate job on his Haftorah, and his speech. Henry and Dora were very proud, and my kid cousin Bobby was very cute. Chaim looked like the pictures of my father, round-faced and serious. It was also the first time my mother had seen them since they moved away, almost ten years before.
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Discovering Relatives
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Jacob Schlitt
Description
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"What do you do when you discover foreign relatives you never knew you had?"
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2014
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DISCOVERING_RELATIVES
Cousins
Family
Fragment
Jewish Identity
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Autobiographical writing
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CHRONOLOGY AND THE JEWS
The Jews are an ancient people. If you date them back to Abraham, that’s over 3,800 years old. The Exodus was supposed to have taken place about 3,300 years ago. Then the land of Canaan, and Judges and Kings and Prophets and Temples, and finally the Diaspora in 70 CE. Fact or myth? God knows!
Which brings us to the next 2000 years. What did happen to the rest of the Jews after the Romans killed them and kicked them out of Judea? Did they go to the Arab peninsula, to North Arica, to southern Europe? And did some of them stay where they were? What happened after Constantine, after Mohammed? There was a period around the 8th and 9th centuries when the Jews and Muslims got along, but then everybody started persecuting the Jews again. Why the Crusades and the Inquisition? Was that why the Jews started moving east? Somewhere along the way, they created Yiddish, and around the 16-17 centuries, Polish Royalty invited them, so many moved further eastward. When we think about our forefathers, most of us imagine Eastern European Jews living in a hostile environment, but maintaining their identity as Jews, and maintaining the dream of “Meshiakh” and “Next year in Jerusalem.”
What prompted the above brief chronology was my sense of wonder with regard to two aspects of recent Jewish history: Yiddish literature and the Jewish state. The Jews have been around a long time. They came up with the idea of monotheism; they wrote the Bible and the Talmud; and they even had a nation for a while. Nothing much happened in the way of literature or nationalism, but then in a remarkably short time, one group of Jews created a literature, and another group of Jews created a state.
I was impressed when I heard someone say that Yiddish literature is less than 200 years old, starting with Mendele Mocher Sforim, though there must have been a few writers before him. By the mid 19th century to the mid 20th century there were thousands of Yiddish novelists, essayists, short story writers and poets, as many as England, France Italy, Germany, Russia etc. produced over a period of 400 plus years.
I was also impressed when I thought about the creation of nation states and the emergence of all those countries in Europe, and the founding of the United States, and after Imperialism, the creation of countries in Latin America, Asia and finally, Africa. When I was a kid, I shared the dream with my mother that some day there would be a Jewish state. I had heard about Theodore Herzl, and Chaim Weitzman, and Zionism, and that there were thousands of Jews settling on kibbutzim in “The Promised Land.” I raised money for the Jewish National Fund. Then came the Holocaust, and then the promise was fulfilled, and Israel came into being in 1948. And from 1948 until today, a period of less than 70 years, Israel has created an advanced economy, a democratic society, and a powerful nation.
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Chronology and the Jews
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Jacob Schlitt
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"The Jews are an ancient people."
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2014
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CHRONOLOGY_AND_THE_JEWS
Fragment
Jewish Identity
Judaism
Observations
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Why It Is OK To Go To A Ballgame On Shabbes If You Bring Nosherei
As far as I know, and I don’t know much about halachah, the real problem about violating shabbes is about riding and handling money. We are commanded to remember the Sabbath to keep it holy, and do all our work in six days. Thanks to unions and labor legislation, most of us do all our work in five days. Those of us who “remember the Sabbath” don’t do things like writing, answering the phone, driving, watching TV, lighting fires, tearing paper, manual labor or buying or selling.
When we were in Israel, we stayed at a hotel which had a shabbes elevator. But as far as I am concerned, if you can ride an elevator on shabbes, as long as you are not activating it by pushing a button, then you can take the T to a ballgame.
As far as handling money goes, if you bought the tickets beforehand, you are good to go. If you plan to buy your tickets at the ballpark on shabbes, that is definitely a no-no.
And to get to the ballpark, presuming you do not live within walking distance, you will ride the T and have a Charlie pass, which you bought beforehand. No handling money.
So, now you have gotten from your home to Fenway, and gotten into Fenway with your tickets that you bought beforehand. At no time has money changed hands.
And since it is almost impossible to sit through nine innings of a Red Sox game and not want to eat or drink something, and since it is also a violation of shabbes to carry anything, you will have to wear something with pockets in which can be placed, a plastic bottle of water and whatever it is you might want to munch on—peanuts, popcorn, crackerjacks, potato chips, cookies, maybe even a piece fruit.
And since it is shabbes and you no doubt went to shul, you will have to rush home after kiddush, have something more to eat, and change into appropriate Red Sox paraphernalia.
You may have thought you have had your share of standing up and sitting down in shul, but be prepared for more standing up and sitting down, especially toward the later innings when the Red Sox are threatening, and David Ortiz is at bat. Very likely, you will spend the entire second half of the ninth inning on your feet, praying.
8-2-14
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
application/msword
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Why It Is OK To Go To A Ballgame On Shabbes If You Bring Nosherei
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Jacob Schlitt
Description
An account of the resource
"As far as I know, and I don’t know much about halachah, the real problem about violating shabbes is about riding and handling money."
Date
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2014-08-02
Format
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application/pdf
Type
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text
Language
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en
Identifier
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Why_It_Is_OK_To_Go_To_A_Ballgame_On_Shabbes_If_You_Bring_Nosherei
Boston
Jewish Identity
Judaism
Observations
-
https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/71642/archive/files/c810f9e1a33c1c21d4d66ea9ee7811d7.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=T7rNE6rRr1dfBSYj1ooZ2m3fptW%7EqQEVS3Uhb8oM1x0drzMCF5G-EUZVTa8l%7EgBjLZ2G9EPBSU4-l%7EIMrD215%7E1uaGc1rVFLCDXVoxQrf9afMeWWJhOyjGPC5sMf6nRdz94tiubn9npQF40rZqcuFq4yMMr5BP1Tj8GqENXaeWftVPDdb8gPBayiR0z4JZbaP5xosotrB6-AusZoZUThmc%7EDLM-Dke2iu0UVtNSHBVus2rKWmQe-kLcQ7dFWOx4jeQ4JkaPNbUAlpnhdjBYKpslUfDEkIh7ex4yF7yYyB4QhmlMTv0x9AJ0f4kulyskVMdz25sDE8WpQaGlmjJSg4w__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
ac7ad951a31eaaece7eb35bf04b23896
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Autobiographical writing
Text
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Text
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THE BOSTON WORKMEN’S CIRCLE
1979-2015
I came to Boston from DC in 1979, when I was appointed Director of the NE Region of the US Civil Rights Commission. I had been a member of a NY branch of the WC since 1956, transferred to the DC branch in 1965, and then to Boston Branch 711. There were three or four branches—700, 711, 716 and 687 (?). The WC had moved from Blue Hill Av. to Beacon St. in 1962. The activists that I remember included Gladys Klitzman Heitin, Evelyn Bernstein, Israel Neiman, Jack Rottenberg and Ed Gutoff.
Staff included Esther Ritchie, office manager, and Herman Brown, half-time director. Through the 1980’s, the older members became less active, and Herman did his best to recruit new members. There was an ill-fated effort to create a Russian branch. The undertaking that revived the WC was the creation of branch 2001, a group of young people that wanted to be involved with “their” kind of Jewish organization—secular, progressive, culturally Yiddish. I switched my affiliation to 2001.
Most activities were branch-centered. There were WC events: lectures, Yiddish programs, musical programs, annual meetings. There was a Shule and adult Yiddish classes. Soon after I came to Boston, I took an intermediate Yiddish class with Hinda Gutoff as teacher. The Shule had fewer and fewer enrollees and was abandoned. However, with the growing activity of 2001, the Shule was revived, and membership increased. I played an active role, eventually becoming president, and did what I could to help the organization grow. We were involved in the Jewish Community Relations Council, worked with member Michal Goldman in the establishment of the Boston Jewish Film Festival, and with Hankus Netsky in the early days of the New England Klezmer Conservatory Band,
The day-to-day operation was in the hands of Herman Brown, the half-time director, who also was the half-time director of the Jewish Labor Committee. His salary was paid by National WC. The structure of the Boston Workmen’s Circle was divided (for tax or CJP purposes?) between the BWC and the I.L. Peretz Shule of the BWC. We followed the by-laws which had been in effect from before the BWC moved from Blue Hill Av.to Beacon Street in 1962.
With the coming of the 21st century, there were a great many changes. A new director: Lisa Gallatin, a new dues structure, the disappearance of the branches, with the exception of branch 716, the growth of both the Shule and the WC Yiddish chorus, A Besere Velt, and a more involved lay leadership, and a growing membershijp. The Boston Workmen’s Circle was one of the few districts that was active and growing.
I can’t remember how often I was greeted with surprise when I mentioned I was a member of the Workmen’s Circle. “Does the Workmen’s Circle still exist? My grandfather was a member.” (Barney Frank proudly told me his father was a member of the “Arbeiter Ring.) I would then be regaled with stories about the Workmen’s Circle doctor, the meetings at the Labor Lyceum addressed by Norman Thomas, the family’s subscription to the Forward and the Workmen’s Circle Call, the fundraising for Jewish refugees and survivors of the Holocaust. But that was then.
The Workmen’s Circle fulfilled a very important role for tens of thousands of first generation American Jewish workers.
Mutual help---medical care, life insurance, cemetery plot, extension and absorption of the role of “landsmanshaftn.”
Education---lectures, discussion groups, shules,
Jewish cultural identification---holiday celebrations
Political involvement---social democratic, anti-fascist, anti-communist
Today:
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
application/msword
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
The Boston Workmen's Circle
1979-2015
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Jacob Schlitt
Description
An account of the resource
"I came to Boston from DC in 1979, when I was appointed Director of the NE Region of the US Civil Rights Commission."
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2014/2015
Format
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application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
text
Language
A language of the resource
en
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1979/2015
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
THE_BOSTON_WORKMEN'S_CIRCLE
Activism
Boston
Fragment
Jewish Identity
Politics
Socialism
Worker's Circle
Yiddish