The Yiddish Book Center's

Wexler Oral History Project

A growing collection of in-depth interviews with people of all ages and backgrounds, whose stories about the legacy and changing nature of Yiddish language and culture offer a rich and complex chronicle of Jewish identity.

Childhood Neighborhood, Interactions with Neighbors

Watch now:

Arlene Cohen Stein, Writer, native of Utica, New York and retired music teacher, describes her childhood neighborhood in Utica and shares memories of playing with paper dolls with her friends and interacting with the sweet childless couple on the block.

This is an excerpt from an oral history with Arlene Cohen Stein.

This excerpt is in English.

Arlene Cohen Stein was born in Utica, New York in 1935.

Jump to map

Other video highlights from this oral history

We Were Poor, But I Was the Best Dressed

2 min 9 sec

My Family's Use of Yiddish

1 min 45 sec

"It Was Such a Big Event!": Election Day with my Family

2 min 9 sec

"Anything She Made was Good': My Mother's Cooking from Scratch

3 min 27 sec

Singing in the Synagogue Choir

2 min 32 sec

My Father's Store in Utica

3 min 24 sec

Keeping Kosher as an Exercise in Strength

2 min 9 sec

"To Tell About Life and How it Was": Writing the Jewish Immigrant Experience in The Olive Tree

2 min 12 sec

Shluging Kapores: A Ritual To Pass Down the Generations

2 min 31 sec

Grandmother's Struggle with English

1 min 10 sec

More information about this oral history excerpt

Themes: