CHANA SCHACHNER ORAL HISTORY

PAULINE KATZ: This is Pauline Katz and today is April 7th, 2011. I am here in Hicksville, New York with Dr. Chana Schachner and we are going to record an interview as part of the Wexler Oral History Project. Dr. Chana Schachner, do I have your permission to continue this interview?

CHANA SCHACHNER: Indeed, you do.

PK:Thank you very much. Can you tell me briefly where your family came from and how they came to the United States?

CS:My family hailed from a city called Będzin in Poland. It was a city, not a shtetl [small Eastern European town with a Jewish community]. They married in 1923 and both came here in 1923, right after the wedding. And interestingly 1:00enough, my father was a furrier, which is a luxury trade. So, the Depression hit very badly to the luxury trades. In 1930, the letters that were coming from Europe were, "Everything is fine here." The Depression actually hit Eastern Europe much later than the United States. So, my mother, who was pregnant with me, took my sister, who was about two, two-and-a-half years old, went back to Będzin and the understanding was if she thought it were the right thing to do, my father would follow her to Poland. My mother went back -- she lived next door to a lady who also had a toddler about the same age, a little girl. So, the mothers talked back and forth and this toddler wasn't doing very well, health-wise, so they took her to the doctor. And the day after the doctor visit, my mother said, "How -- Zisl, how did the little one make out?" And she said, 2:00"Well, the doctor said that she would need a quart of milk every day and an orange and her health would turn around." So, my mother said, "Zisl, that's wonderful. Your husband is a wholesale fruiter. Shouldn't be a problem." And Zisl says, "Well, a quart of milk a day and the wholesale fruitery notwithstanding, if we gave her that, that would eat up the entire profit." My mother came scooting back to the -- that wasn't the only thing, obviously. My mother came scooting back to the United States with my sister. I was born about six weeks later. If I had been born in Będzin -- Będzin was about fifty miles on the train to Auschwitz, which is where the entire family that was there perished. And ever since then, for the rest of her life, if you were critical of the United States of America and its government, you had a fight on your hands with my mother. So, that's where I hail from. My parents, of course, spoke a 3:00Polish Yiddish but once I started shule [secular Yiddish school], I spoke a Vilna Yiddish and we got along fine.

PK:When did you start shule?

CS:In 1936. I was six years old when I went into first grade. They signed me up at the nearest Yiddish school, which happened to be an Ordn Shul. I had excellent teachers but the politics were not very comfortable. They were communist, clearly communist. I went through elementar-shul [elementary school], I was ten when I graduated from elementar-shul. I went through mitlshul [high school]. I was fourteen when I graduated there. I was probably the youngest mitlshul grad in history. By the time I finished mitlshul, I was politically very uncomfortable despite the tender age, and started looking around and I finally found the Sholem Aleichem Shul movement, which I felt was home, and entered there and stayed there, really, for the rest of my life until the Sholem 4:00Aleichem Institute ceased to exist, at which time my husband and I went into the only Yiddish-speaking branch in the youth division of the Arbeter Ring. And there were Arbeter Ring graduates, Sholem Aleichem graduates there and as long as it lasted it was very, very nice.

PK:What kind of politics did your parents have?

CS:My father was a Bundist from der alter heym [the Old Country]. My mother was a Labor Zionist. And when my father came here as a Bundist, he became active in the trade union movement. And in fact, he held book number seven in the furriers' union, which he helped organize. And my mother, after the children got bigger, went back into Labor Zionist activities. So, they complemented each other. They didn't disagree that much.

PK:Do you remember anything in the home that was geared towards those things?

CS:Oh, we had loads of Yiddish books. We bought them from [Mikhus Fahren?], who 5:00came every month, I think. I read my first Ibsen play in Yiddish translation. Read Yiddish literature, of course, and I read a Yiddish newspaper every day the same way I read the "Times" at that -- used to be the "Tog," then it was the "Tog-morgen zhurnal," then it was the "Forverts" because the other newspapers died off, unfortunately. And the "Forverts" is now a weekly but I still read that. There were also a number of very fine Yiddish journals put out by various organizations. So, I read the "Yidishe kempfer," which was a Labor Zionist weekly. And I read the "Tsukunft," which was a wonderful monthly. And these things are no longer available, unfortunately. But as long as they were there, they were great.

PK:If you had to choose one word to describe your home, what would it be?

CS:You mean, when --

PK:Your childhood home --

CS:-- my parents? It was mixed. Culturally, it was excellent. I had a very good exposure, also, to the trade union that my father was active in. And I remember my mother getting involved in a Sholem Aleichem Shul and I used to accompany her to the oneg Shabbosim and to the picnics on Sunday during the summer, because they sang Yiddish songs. And I even performed for a time. I delivered a series of lectures, which -- the lectures were in English but I illustrated the lectures with Yiddish songs. And I still lecture. I am a lecturer in Jewish History in Yiddish. Mostly, I end up in temples and in Jewish centers. And the Y, I've been there, too.

PK:Did you feel that your parents were trying to pass something on to you by 7:00sending you to shule?

CS:Oh, yes, definitely.

PK:What was it?

CS:Yiddish and Yiddish culture, no question about that.

PK:Why do you think that was important to them?

CS:Well, they were both literate people. Not only literate. My mother, in particular, was not only an avid reader, she was a very bright lady. My mother actually introduced me, in addition to Yiddish literature, to world -- to European literature. My friends who were in public school did not know anything about European literature. Nobody ever read a novel that was a Nobel Prize, for example. But if it was a European, they just paid no attention. And European literature was interesting, too. But Yiddish, I loved, Yiddish lit-- I still love it. And my parents loved it, too, and that was very much in our involvement and activities. And my husband came from the Sholem Aleichem schools. That's 8:00where we met and that's where we courted and that's where we got married, basically. And that atmosphere was entirely ohevei Yiddish -- people who loved Yiddish and Yiddish culture, and that's been part of our lives all the time.

PK:How about in public school?

CS:Public school was fine. In elementary school, there were no activities of any kind. I got an excellent education in the New York City public schools. In those years, they were excellent. When I got to high school, I took Hebrew, which was offered in the public schools. So, I learned -- I started that there, I continued later on. And there were clubs of all kinds in the high school, selling -- there was a Hebrew culture club, so I was in that. There was even a religious club, just as there was a Newman Club for the Catholic kids. There was a Menorah Club for the Jewish kids. But we are both atheists. Religion is really 9:00not a part of our lives. But the Jewish people and Jewish history and Yiddish culture in particular and the Yiddish language are central to us. I remember when Yechiel was in the Army, my mother slept over at my house once and she told me the next morning that I had talked in my sleep in Yiddish. (laughs) So, I thought it was kind of interesting.

PK:Were your families religious?

CS:No. They were all atheists, and my husband's, too. We were all involved in Yiddish culture. None of us were temple people. None of us were synagogue people, none of us prayed, ever. And that really didn't impact -- we just had nothing to do with religion. The advantage of the Sholem Aleichem school movement was that unlike the left-wing and to some extent the Arbeter Ring, the Sholem Aleichem -- thanks to its chief ideologue, Leibush Lehrer -- managed to 10:00do all sorts of things that were not necessarily religious. Every Jewish holiday and important day was noted and celebrated and actively involved students and teachers without prayer. And this was -- we didn't realize it at the time, we just liked it. But this was an extraordinary achievement. Years later, when I was director of a Sholem Aleichem Sunday school -- it was a one-day school here on Long Island -- I had what was probably the first Rosh Hashanah assembly or secular Jewish assembly. And we had several hundred people attending. And there were eighty-some-odd kids in the school and it was clear that there was a desire -- I still believe there still is -- for Jews to celebrate their holidays 11:00without prayer, without necessarily involving a deity because the deity, beginning with Benedict Spinoza, has not really been part of a significant segment -- not a majority, but a significant segment of the Jewish people. And in the United States today, there are more Jews that are not synagogue-affiliated. A great many of them, I think -- not all, but a great many, I think, would very much like the kind of thing that the Sholem Aleichem schools and I put forth in the years when we were active. There is a small religious movement that was started by a rabbi called Sherwin Wine whose synagogue gave up on God and on prayer. And they were friendly to Yiddish culture but it was not as central to them, although they also did what Sholem Aleichem did: we celebrated holidays and followed the Jewish calendar --

PK:Can you tell me --

CS:-- without prayer. But we had the advantage of not only being able to do that, we had an enormously rich, wonderful culture of all kinds: music, song, dance, literature. Literature is an unbelievable well of wonderful stuff in Yiddish. And we were able to use that. We still enjoy it.

PK:Can you tell me --

CS:Unfortunately, organizationally, it's not really well-represented. I wish it were better. When I was younger, I did something about it. Now I can't do what I used to do.

PK:What would a, maybe, Passover seder look like in Sholem Aleichem?

CS:Oh, I can give you a copy of the hagode [the book of readings for the Passover seder] that we developed for our Sholem Aleichem Shul. You can take it with you. I think I once sent it to Aaron with the idea that they could publish it and sell it. I think it would be a money-maker. But that's his choice. But I'll give you a copy before you go.

PK:Okay, thank you.

CS:And that, by the way, is not all in Yiddish. It's in English with Yiddish pieces. When we were in the -- as I said, when we were in the only Yiddish-speaking branch of the Arbeter Ring's English-speaking youth division, we put together a marvelous hagode, all in Yiddish. I'll give you that, too. That's not going to sell but it's a wonderful one. I think it's the best hagode I've ever seen of any kind. When we were in Israel, the first time we happened to be there, Passover time, and we were at a seder in a kibbutz, which was very interesting, and I brought home their hagode. Their hagode in Hebrew also has no prayer. But it's like ours in Yiddish, except theirs is Hebrew in Hebrew literature. But I think, if you were to compare the two -- not that there's any reason to, except that I had both -- our hagode in Yiddish is superb.

PK:Who else was in the Yiddish branch?

CS:Oh, well, there was a committee of three that put together that hagode in Yiddish. One was a gal named Pesl Bekler Seml Stern. She's still active in Yiddish down in Florida. Another was a gal named Rita Switkes -- I know her last name from marriage, but it'll come to me. Pardon me. She's no longer alive. And there were also a couple of spots where I needed a transition and I was working at that time with Yosl Mlotek in the Arbeter Ring, who was a sensational guy. And he helped me with the transitions. He showed me where to go for those. So, that was for the Yiddish hagode. And the English hagode were -- for the school, was basically me. My second-in-command was Reva Mark, who was teaching at the school, and she's the daughter of Yudl Mark. And she made a couple of very good contributions. And then, one of the parents was a printer, so he printed it for 15:00us. And Tzippy Waletzky, whose name you should surely have heard, did the illustrations for me. So, they're in the hagode, too. It's a very nice hagode. It's in English with other things, too. But those two hagodes, as far as I'm concerned, can stand up to any hagode and come out on top.

PK:What is it about them that make them special?

CS:Well, for one thing, there is very little deity in there, other than if it's possibly traditional song, we really -- and if you think about it, the fir kashes [the Four Questions at the Passover seder] really doesn't have God in it, either. And that's in there. The other thing, it's accessible to people who don't, in the case of the English hagode, it's accessible and useful to people who don't have knowledge of Yiddish and Hebrew as languages. In the case of the 16:00hagode that we did as a Segalovich branch in the Arbeter Ring, that's exactly the opposite. That is a literary hagode and you have to know Yiddish well to use it. But the material is excellent. We had such wonderful stuff to draw on and were able to use it. So, they're two completely different, almost opposite kinds of things, but served -- the Yiddish hagode is a collector's item. There's nobody around today except maybe Yugntrufniks [members of Yugntruf] who would use it, and the Yugntrufniks won't use it because they're too busy being non-traditional.

PK:So, you went through Arbeter Ring --

CS:No, I went to lerer-semin-- lerer-seminar [teachers seminary] at that time was run -- it was founded by, run by the Farband Shuln, Jewish National Workers' Alliance. They were Labor Zionists and they had shuln in America, too. But their schools were very much oriented to Israel and aliyah. And the result was you got 17:00a very good education in Yiddish and some in Hebrew. But the upshot was if -- you were being trained to go to what was then Palestine, before it was Israel. And the schools virtually disappeared, not because they failed but because they succeeded. Their best students all made aliyah and went to Israel. They had some very good teachers, also. They founded the yidishe lerer-seminar. When we were youngsters, I told you before I taught in a Sholem Aleichem shabes forshul klas [Shabbos preschool class] that Esther Koder had founded and taught us. And the froyen-organizatsye [women's organization] -- there were four Sholem Aleichem Shul young teachers. We were all in our teens. The other three were in college. I was still in high school. And we taught this shabes forshul klas for three and four and five-year-olds. And Esther Koder would meet with us every couple of 18:00months to work out the programs for the forshul -- for the preschool classes and provide the songs and the stories and the materials so we were all doing pretty much the same thing. And the Sholem Aleichem froyen-organizatsye paid our tuition in yidishe lerer-seminar for the whole four years and we all graduated. We got diplomas as Yiddish teachers. Years later, the seminar united with Herzliya Institute and it received authorization from the New York Education Department to give a bachelor of Jewish literature. Now, I had taken all the Yiddish courses they had and Jewish -- not just Yiddish. It was Tanakh and Bible in Hebrew, also. I had taken all the Yiddish courses that they had, so all they wanted was general courses from a general college, which I was attending anyway. So, I got a bachelor of Jewish literature from them in -- I'd have to look, let's see. Date, I can't find the date. Oh, it's 1975. June 1975. I'm sorry, did 19:00I louse you up? [BREAK IN RECORDING] And unfortunately, even the Arbeter Ring Shuln, there are only a few, there are a few Ordn Shuln. They're not called Ordn Shuln but they're called independent shuln, but they're still around. The Arbeter Ring has a wonderfully successful shule here on Long Island. They have 120-some-odd kids. They meet twice a week, as I recall. And they have to rent a movie theater to celebrate Pesach and Rosh Hashanah because the shul building is too small to hold all the families that come. It's a wonderful, wonderful school.

PK:Now, you were talking about getting into education.

CS:Well, that was my daytime career. First, I worked -- I did a lot of things. I started young. I worked for about five years in a rehab center, which, at that time was one of the pioneers of rehabilitation where it hardly existed. This was back in the '60s. People used to come from all over the world to see what we were doing. Then, I eventually ended up spending five years in the county's department of drug and alcohol addiction. I spent seven years in the daytime classroom teaching disadvantaged adult students to prepare for the high school equivalency test. And I ended up being the administrator for the county of what was called the CETA program, Comprehensive Employment and Training Act. And that 21:00was a federally-funded, county-operated agency and I was the county manpower training coordinator. And depending on the year, I spent between eight and eighteen million dollars, which at that time was a lot of money, on occupational education for adults. And then, I was with the state education department in New York, where I supervised sixty-some-odd adult occupational schools. And then, we decided to go into the business ourselves. We opened an adult career school for office, computer, all kinds of office work and we did that for about fourteen years. We started with -- we bought a wonderful drafting and design school in New Jersey and we ran that for fourteen -- for ten years. And then, we had the school in New York, which was office occupations. And then, we retired.

PK:Do you think that your shule background and your Yiddish activism had 22:00anything to do with that?

CS:My shule background is a chunk of me. You can't separate it, really. I mean, you have to occupationally and professionally and I do. I have no difficulty separating it. One of the advantages, I suppose, is that Judaica was always a part-time thing, so that whatever I was doing during the day, if I did anything Jewish, I did it in the evening or on weekends. And that was good because -- it was bad because it wasn't full-time. But Judaica, unfortunately, in the United States and most of the world is a part-time occupation. And because it was part-time, I was able to do it at the same time, which was very, very helpful. Made it possible, in fact. And I remember when, at one point, I decided there was just too much and I said, I'm resigning the directorship of the Sunday 23:00school, the Shlolem Aleichem Sunday school, my children said, "Okay, mommy, don't. We want you to stay a director of the school. We'll help you, we'll do the dishes, but you stay on as director of the school." I didn't. It was really just too much. But they enjoyed it, too, because they were part of whatever went on at the school, even though they weren't students. My son went to Arbeter Ring elementar-shul and to a mitlshul, which is a combination at that time of Arbeter Ring and Sholem Aleichem and Farband. But Farband had no students anymore to send, so it was really Sholem Aleichem and Arbeter Ring. And I taught there for three of his four years. And my little one couldn't do very much. We lost her to cancer when she was not quite seven. So, Jewish education, really, other than in the house wasn't existent. We always ate in the dining room on Friday nights. We always lit candles. We always sang Shabbos songs. We never prayed, because it's 24:00not part of our culture. But Jewish life is -- and to this day, Yechiel, who is at the computer every day -- I go to the computer maybe once a week. Twice a week is a lot. The computer and I are not the best of friends, let's put it that way. But Yechiel is on every day and he gets Jewish news from Israel and from around the world and World Jewish Congress all the time. It's a household where -- not Judaism, Jewishness, Yiddishkayt is part of our lives. I mean, that's what we are. And the truth is, we're very lucky. Today in the United States, we are living in a golden epoch, really. A golden epoch. They usually refer to the time in Muslim Spain as the golden epoch in Jewish history, but this is much better than it ever was in Muslim Spain. I won't go into that because that's a 25:00whole history lecture, which you don't need. But Jewish life in the United States today is more fortunate, more free, more capable of a great many things than has been the case in Jewish history in I don't now how long.

PK:Do you think --

CS:Unfortunately, assimilation is a problem, not only for Jews. It's a problem for any group that has any identity, ethnically or religiously or what have you. And we don't necessarily win the battle. Sadly, Yiddish is one of the greatest victims because the United States notion of religion is very inclusive and the typical formula is Catholics, Catholicism, Protestantism, and Judaism. But Jews are different. There is no such thing as a Catholic love song. There is no such 26:00thing as a Protestant babysitter song. There is no such thing as a Muslim thieves' song or pickpockets' song. We have all those things in Yiddish. And there's no such thing as a secular literature for the other groups that are identified as religious groups. So, yes, we are a religion but we are also an ethnic group, we are also a people, which is not the case of the two comparative brother-sister religions in the United States and a lot of people don't understand that. Including Jews, by the way, don't understand that. I had a student in a Yiddish class that I taught here at the Plainview Jewish Center about a year ago who said to me, "If you don't pray, you're not a Jew." And I said to her, "Rita," I said, "are you taking away the Judaism of more than half of the Israeli population, not even talking about the American population? If 27:00you say you have to pray, you're discarding the majority of Jews!" "Oh." I don't know if she ever really accepted the idea. But we are unique. It is hard sometimes for somebody outside the Jewish world to understand that. But nobody in his right mind can deny that what we contribute to the world and have contributed to the world is sensational. And we'll go on doing it.

PK:What do you think will be the future of Yiddish?

CS:There's a guy named Jeffrey Shandler whose book I read, I never met him, who came up with what I think is a proper diagnosis and formula. He says that Yiddish is in its post -- what words are --

PK:Vernacular? Post-vernacular?

CS:Post-vernacular, thank you. It's in its post-vernacular stage and I think he's absolutely right. We are doing very well, really, academically. We have a lot of colleges and universities that are teaching Yiddish. We have spots around the world. There is unbelievably Yiddish activity in Berlin. I mean, you have to pinch yourself to see what goes on there. Paris' Medem Center has done wonders. And here in the United States, the Book Center itself is like a miracle. So, there is activity. There is stuff that goes on. I don't know how much creativity there is in it yet but it's too early in the stage to tell. But I think Shandler's diagnosis is accurate. I think we are in a post-vernacular stage. Yiddish is not being used in the daily life of Jews. It is not the language in which kids play. It is not the language, as you pointed out before, where people 29:00make love and -- no, Yechiel said it, Leibush Lehrer said it, it is not the language in which people make love and curse and it's not the language in which they work, which was the case in the earlier trade union movement in the United States, at least for those trades that were populated by Jews. And it is different. It may be better, it may be worse. It probably is worse in some ways. But on the whole, I think it's a possibility, and as what's his name, Isaac Bashevis Singer once said, "They have been predicting the death of Yiddish for a number of generations now. They're still predicting it and it still isn't dead." I don't think it's dead. I don't think it can be dead. I think there is an affection and a feeling for Yiddish, even among people who don't know it well, 30:00who have memories of grandparents, of parents, of childhood experiences. It used to be -- I remember friends who traveled before we did, when we were much younger, and fewer people traveled -- would come back and tell us, We visited Spain and we ran into a couple of Jews and we spoke Yiddish. Otherwise, we wouldn't have been able to talk to each other because with the hiltserne yidish [wooden Yiddish], we managed to communicate. But we were Americans and they were from kh'veys nisht fun vanen [I don't know where] and we managed. And it was a lingua franca of much of the Jewish people for many, many years. Hitler, of course, did us in. And the State of Israel, even before it was a state, made a big mistake. I think some of them now realize it. They threw the baby out with the bathwater. But interestingly enough, among my Hebrew class, among my fellow 31:00Hebrew students, they tell me that in Israel today, they say that Israelis curse in Russian, make love -- joke in Yiddish, and do business in Hebrew. So, even in Israel, there is -- I think there is some sort of rebirth of interest and properly so. There is a treasure of Yiddish knowledge and achievement and literature and whatnot that should not go wasted. Will it ever go back to where it was? Probably not. But very few things go back to where they were, not only Yiddish. We are not dead and thus, I think Bashevis Singer was right. They've been predicting it and predicting it and predicting it but we're still alive. It's a different life. It may not be as satisfying in some ways. It's more respectable and honored in other ways. And the final decision has not been made. 32:00We're still alive and kicking. (UNCLEAR) halevay vayter [let's hope that it lasts].

PK:Do you think that camps like Boiberik were a part of its continuance?

CS:Boiberik is gone, unfortunately. It was a wonderful, wonderful camp. Every camp in creation with the exception of Federation camps that did not have color war -- every other camp in creation of whatever denomination that you can think of ended the season with color war. Leibush Lehrer's Boiberik did not end the season with color war. Leibush Lehrer's Boiberik ended the season with something called the "felker yontef [holiday of nations, lit. "folks' holiday"]." And what the felker yontef was was the realization, the fulfilment of the vision of Isaiah, where all the countries live in peace, where the lion lies down with the lamb, where they make war no more. And, as a result, the camp was divided up 33:00into a variety of nationalities. Each two bunks had a nationality. They learned a song that the singing teacher got from the national treasurer of that country. They learned a dance of that country. They made huge field decorations for each of those countries. And along with all the various countries -- and they were not only countries on the map. There were countries that may have not been on the map. For example, I remember one year one of the countries was the Walloons. Well, the Walloons are the French-speaking Belgians. Another year, one of the countries was the Flemings, the Flemish. Again, a part of another country. So, he included not only the major countries. He found the minor countries that -- where there was a national feeling or motive. There was an Armenian nation one 34:00year. And in addition to all the various countries -- there were Spanish countries from South America -- there was also a folk, "yidn [Jews]," and this is well before there was a State of Israel. And there was a folk, which he created, called "Boiberikaner." And the host to this fulfilment of the vision of Isaiah was the folk Boiberikaner. And the second-in-command after the Boiberikaner to greet and host were the yidn. Eventually, when there was a State of Israel, Israel, of course, became one of the primary hosts. He was an absolute genius and the program, which included not only the various countries and the cultural things but portions of the Bible relevant to the vision of Isaiah and the decorations on the stage and in the field were relevant to the fulfilment of the vision of Isaiah. There was a lion lying down with a lamb, et cetera. It was the most inspiring and the most wonderful kind of end-of-camp 35:00season activity that I have ever seen in my life. And there was a point -- not a point, a time, a period when I was younger when I used to go around summertime and visit camps. I wanted to see what other camps were doing. So, I went to Zionist camps, I went to Federation camps, I went to khalutsim [pioneer] camps where they were only living on very meager stuff because they were getting ready to go to what was then Palestine. And nowhere did I see anything like the felker yontef in Boiberik. Every Friday night was Shabbos in Boiberik. Everybody dressed in white. There were traditional songs that were sung. There were no prayers. There were candles lit, but nobody said prayers. For us, who were not deists, who were not theistically-oriented, who weren't praying, who didn't believe in God, this was absolutely wonderful because it was Jewish, it was 36:00cultural, it was beautiful, musically and literarily. And when our children were little, we ate at the dining room table every Friday night. I lit candles. We sang Shabbos songs. Nobody said prayers. We were not a praying family. And I remember at one time, the kids were talking about God and my son said he didn't believe in God. And we said, That's okay, we don't believe in God, either. And my daughter said, "I believe in god! I believe in Kerry. Kerry is a good life-god!" Kerry was a son of friends of ours who was a lifeguard and she was four or five years old and she heard this talk about God and the only god she knew was Kerry, who was a lifeguard. So, God really had nothing to do in our house. The truth of the matter is, I am all for people doing and believing whatever they're comfortable with. As long as they don't hurt anybody else, I certainly don't care. And if it's Jewish, it's not bad for Jews either, because there's an old expression, says -- when our grandmothers and great-grandmothers 37:00used to hear some news in the world, the first question they would ask is, S'iz gut far yidn [Is it good for Jews]? And my attitude is also, If it's good for Jews, I'm for it, even if I don't support it directly. And that's how I feel about Jewish religion, too. But anybody who has lived through or knows of the Holocaust or anybody who, like us, lost a child -- not that I lost religion. We never had it, fortunately. One of the things we saw when my daughter was hospitalized once was a family where -- and I don't want to bore you with -- but it was a tragedy with a little five-year-old. And one of the things that happened in that family is that that father lost his faith because it was a terrible -- why would a five-year-old, or maybe it was a three-year-old, have this horrible thing happen? And we didn't have to lose any faith. We didn't have any faith, which made things easier. But that's, from the point of view -- I have a lot of friends who are religious, who pray. Not all of them, fortunately, 38:00'cause I'm comfortable with people who are not religious. But I don't understand how anybody who lived through or -- in this day and age. One of my believing friends said, "Why don't you believe?" I said, "Because every day you tell me and you tell the world that God is just and merciful and omnipotent and omniscient." And I said, "And look at the world. I mean, if he's omnipotent and omniscient and just and merciful, why is this world like this?" And so, she says, "Well, because of free will." I said, "Fine. But who is ultimately -- if only men are responsible, what do you need him for? I mean, if you need him and he makes you feel better, gezunterheyt [go in good health]." But to me, it makes no sense. But Sholem Aleichem fulfilled -- the Arbeter Ring does, too. The Ordn certainly did. The Farband did, too. The seder that we attended in the kibbutz 39:00in 1969 didn't have God in it and it was a beautiful seder. And it was peysekhdik [fit for Passover]. But the world that the Sholem Aleichem Shuln created was absolutely wonderful and perfect for us.

[BREAK IN RECORDING]

CS:I think that one of the things that's unfortunately true is that, given the American parameter of Catholic, Catholicism, Protestant, Judaism, and now Islam, people are uncomfortable saying that they don't believe even when they don't believe. I have a friend, the facilitator in this Hebrew class that I've been going to -- was a wonderful woman and she said -- she's religious and she said it bothers her that all these wonderful Jewish musicians, for example, the entire American musical theater stage -- with the exception of Cole Porter, they were all Jews. And it bothers her that none of these people ever embraced Judaism. And I said to her, "Eileen, the reason they didn't embrace Judaism was 40:00because you insisted on belief in God in what you offered. And these people were all free thinkers. Their parents, I mean, one was a rabbi, another was a cantor, but these people were free thinkers. They were not believers in God. If they had been offered a Judaism like the one that Sholem Aleichem offered us, I think you would have had a far greater degree of participation among some of the greatest achievers in American Jewish life." But this is an argument, it's a theory, nobody can prove anything, and I don't argue against it. But it seems -- it's like this student of mine, this lady who is not quite as old as I am, who said, If you don't pray, you're not Jewish. I mean, it's meshugas.

PK:Have you ever had a moment that you felt particularly Jewish?

CS:I always feel Jewish. There are times when I feel very proud of being Jewish. And on very rare occasion, I am -- not ashamed to be Jewish, but ashamed of some 41:00of my fellow Jews because they do things that are not nice. Fortunately, it's rare. And we're only human, we're only normal. We have our share of paskudnyakes [villains], too. We had a clerk in our school once who said to me, "Jews are so lucky. They're so smart. They're so successful." And this is an incipient anti-Semitism when they tell you that Jews are very smart and very successful. And she wasn't too bright. So, I said to her, "Julie," I said, "we're not smart and successful. I'll tell you what we are. We are family-oriented. We are education-oriented. We don't drink very much and we tend to be good family people. And if you do the same thing" -- there's a guy named Curtis Sliwa. I don't know if you know who he is. There's an organization called the -- Yechiel will remember. It's a group of young people that organized in New York City years ago to help people in trouble on the subways and elsewhere. They wear 42:00little red berets and they're very nice young people who are not very educated but who have taken on this very nice mission. And this Curtis Sliwa is the guy who founded it and was the head of this group of youngsters who do what we would say mitzvahs [good deeds]. And he's not Jewish. And he also was a TV news commentator for a while. And at some point or other, he was interviewed and they asked him all sorts of questions. And they asked him about his feelings about Jews. "The Jews are wonderful," he said. "I remember when I was in high school, there was a Jewish kid -- there weren't very many Jewish kids in my school, but there was this Jewish boy and we got kind of friendly. And he came over to my house and I went over to his house." And he said, "I was amazed." He said, "They only had a three-room apartment. They were crowded," he said. "But this kid had a desk of his own and a lamp and a bookcase and a place to do his homework." He said, "None of the people in my gang" -- at that time, he had been in a gang. Said, "None of our people ever had any such thing. Nobody did it for them." He 43:00said, "I never forgot it." He said, "So, as far as I'm concerned, that's the way to go." And this was completely, so to speak, unsolicited. He was being interviewed for all sorts of things, not really for his feelings toward Jews. But it was true. So, that's what I tell Julie. I told her the Curtis Sliwa story. I said, "And that's what makes Jews successful and anybody else can do it." Because if I let people think that Jews have some sort of secret for success, you're going to have a problem sooner or later. And she was not too bright, so it worked, I think. (laughs) But on the whole, there's much more to be proud of Jews than there is to be ashamed. But every once in a while -- we were on our trip fairly recently and at one point, there was a group of Jewish women that were sitting together and carrying on ridiculously. And lot of cursing, too. In English, not in Yiddish. And I was not too proud of them. But 44:00that's relatively rare. On the whole, I think if you look at the scores of debits and credits of the Jewish people, we come out pretty good. Now, I heard a very cute -- I assume it's true. Yechiel says he got an email from somebody who said -- there's a gal named Judy, I don't remember her last name, but she sends us a lot of emails. She's got all sorts of interesting stuff. She must have a million sources and she keeps transmitting them. He says, "She says that there is now a movement in South Korea for their parents to have their kids study Talmud." And they're buying Talmuds in South Korea because they said the Jews are smart and they figured out that the reason they're smart is because they exercise their brains studying Talmud. And there is now a movement in South Korea for the kids to study Talmud. I mean, it's hysterical but all sorts of things happen. The Chinese, for generations, in Asia, are called the Jews of 45:00Asia because they're successful and they're entrepreneurs. And forget -- I'm not talking about the political, the communism versus Taiwan. We were just in both places a month ago. We had a wonderful trip. And we have a reputation, and to a great extent, that reputation is deserved. I mean, if you look at a list of Nobel Prizes, if you look at a list of awards in a variety of fields, not everything but in a great variety of fields, you see an enormous amount of Jewish success and Jewish contribution in the sciences and medicine in particular. So, there are people who feel intimidated by this. I don't think you should be intimidated. I think you should try and do better yourself. But that's their choice. But I really -- very rare to be uncomfortable about my Jewishness. Most of the time, I'm very proud, very pleased.

PK:Who was it or what is it that makes you feel that way?

CS:Well, I'll give you an example. You read the news of the Haifa Technion. It's a little squib that comes in part of the World Jewish Congress bulletin that it puts out, I think, every month. Little tiny thing. It's about eight pages, half-size or a third the size. And the Technion developed a camera, a microscopic camera, because one of the problems you have with treating gastrointestinal disease is that it's very hard to get pictures of the upper intestine. The lower intestine, they do very well on. The upper intestine, not so easy. So, some Israeli at the Technion or a group developed a little camera which you swallow. And the camera takes pictures as it goes down and the pictures are picked up on something that you carry and it eventually is 47:00excreted. And it's microscopic. I mean, you can't see it or feel it. I was so impressed with this. I thought this was sensational. There are techniques that are being used in Israeli medicine which are extraordinary. If you look down the list -- I mean, we're two-tenths of one percent of the world's population and we're probably -- all right, the last figure I heard was six percent, twelve percent of Nobel laureates. It's unbelievable and it's wonderful. And I don't believe that it's a monopoly. I think that it is essentially hard work and the tradition that says these are the things that are important. And that's not only the Yiddish world. That's the whole Jewish world, except for the nutty Haredim.

PK:Who was it that taught you that, specifically? Who taught you these are the things that are important?

CS:I think my parents and the Sholem Aleichem leadership, beginning with Leibush Lehrer and even Yudl Mark, Esther Koder, definitely. These were all people who were a combination of Yiddishist and humanist. And it was a superb combination and they happen to have wonderful personalities and they were doers and achievers, not just talkers. So, I have a friend, [Livia Schaefer?]. I know she's a member of the Center. We've been friends since I was -- she's two years younger than I. We've been friends since I was fifteen, okay? So, sixty-some-odd years. And we talk very often. And she says the best thing we ever had was when we went to shule, the best teaching. We didn't learn world history and non-Jewish history until we got geshikhte [history] in Yiddish schools. Because 49:00in high school, what I learned as history was mensa mensa [Italian: so-so]. When I got to college, yes, college history was history. But through the end of high school, history was really a very -- on tender, tippy-toes, diffident and shy, not too secure and clear. In mitlshul and even in elementar-shul, we learned history. And when we learned Jewish history, we also learned world history. I knew what the kraytsungen, what the Crusades, were, before any of my Christian fellow students in school did because in elementary school, you never heard about the Crusades. You didn't hear about the Crusades till you got to high school. I knew about the Crusades long before I got to high school. And this was true across the board. The Muslims that are now carrying on because they want to 50:00go back to what they had in Spain when they were scientists and leaders, we knew about that when we were in elementary school. They're first learning it now. Their kids, I should say. And what we got, the teaching was superb. The education was marvelous. It was excellent in language. It was excellent in ideology. It was excellent in humanism. And this friend, [Livia?], Khaye-sore, heyst zi [is her name], say the best education we ever got was in the shuln. And she was Sholem Aleichemnik [member of the Sholem Aleichem Folk Institute] right from the beginning. So, I feel sorry in a way. In college, I remember there was one -- two or three semesters. There was a small Judaic studies department in Hofstra where I got a -- I'm the only person I know with two baccalaureates -- 51:00where I got my first baccalaureate. And in that small Judaica department, there was one guy, was a rabbi. His name was [Emanuel Green?]. He was wonderful. And I took his courses and in some cases I took credit by examination 'cause I was already a mother of children and I wanted to get out. And he was one of the very few teachers that I really connected with and it had something to do with the fact that he, even though he was a rabbi, he was a worldly Jew. I had a history professor named Rosenthal who was certainly not a Yiddishist. He was of German extraction. But somehow, we connected. I had a wonderful young history professor in Hofstra. His name was Henry Henry. His name was Hank Henry. Died, nebekh [poor guy], of AIDS, tragically, a number of years after I had him. He was a sheygets [non-Jewish man] and we connected. So, it sometimes happens regardless of whether the person is Jewish. But very often, not always, but very often, there is some commonality with fellow Jews. And sometimes, they just turn you 52:00off and you're completely at opposite ends. I mean, being Jewish is not enough to make you a mensch. You hope that the person will become a mensch. But if he's not a mensch, the fact that he's Jewish doesn't do a bit for you.

PK:Switching veins a little, I know you like to do crafts -- not like to do crafts. You're a craftsman.

CS:Well, Yechiel was an arts and crafts director in camp for several years. And I make most of my jewelry and I do some things in the house. And let's see, the embroidery over the sofa in the living room is mine. I've nothing in here. This is my workshop but I don't have anything in here. I love crafts and, as you can see, (laughs) I'm in the middle of things. That's the notice for the workshop that I'm giving the end of the month. Last year, I gave a workshop on pressed 53:00plant pictures and plaques, which was nice because then they also learned to use things from -- I make things out of jewelry that nobody makes things out of. I have jewelry that I make out -- I can show it to you if you're interested. I don't know if you are. You're entitled not to be. I make jewelry out of mulch. I make jewelry out of tree fungus. Very pretty, believe it or not. I make jewelry out of things that I pick up from the ground. Rocks, I love. I make loads of jewelry out of -- yeah, I'm wearing a slice of agate and --

PK:When did you start doing that?

CS:I don't know. (laughs) I remember when Malki came home from kindergarten with something called Dixie mesh. And they were using it, I think, to paint pictures on. It's a large-hole mesh. And I said, "This is wonderful, I can make big embroidery!" And we ended up going into business briefly. We made kits that 54:00people would make something called Jiffy point. It was like needlepoint but the stitches were five to the inch, much bigger. And for a while, we sold that and that was -- I designed the stuff and came up with it. And I can remember, in sixth grade, that I gave my teachers around Christmastime winter corsages that I made with little pine branches and little red berries that I picked in Bronx Park. Nobody called it crafts. I mean, calling it crafts is only recent years. But I always did this stuff and gave it away, by and large. But I even have a Jewish workshop, which I haven't had a customer for yet, but which I -- oh, am I disturbing your --

PK:No, yeah, the opposite of that. It's all good.

CS:I just made a few samples. You can take a look. If you're very good, I'll 55:00even give you one. They're pin pendants. The rocks are sliced agate. I have a gal -- this is genuine ivory. She has it from a grandmother and I can get some more when I need it, so far. It's fairly expensive, but where do you find ivory? Mogn-dovids [Stars of David] and khays [Hebrew letters representing the lucky number eighteen]. And I need a customer for the workshop. I haven't had it yet. I don't really work at it, so one of these days I'll probably do something. This is a khay. And these are all pins and pendants, both. In the case of the criss-cross, the chain goes through it, it hangs like this, with chain from both sides, not from the center because if I turn it sideways, the mogn-dovid stops 56:00being the right position. Anyway, that's the sort of stuff I piddle with.

PK:So, do you like to have a Jewish theme to your crafts?

CS:Sure. But I haven't had one yet -- I had had, the library and such, which -- I have this one coming up in the -- oh, what am I doing? Not your responsibility. (laughter) You have enough respons--

PK:We can put it back.

CS:No, I'll just stick it in, put it up there. The one the end of this month is of cameos and frames and pin pendant frames and the wooden box that they'll decorate. There's much more work in decorating -- designing and decorating the wooden box than assembling the cameo in its frame. But that's what's going to be happening the end of the month. Just flick it up on top. I'll put it away later. But I like it, what can I tell you? But, as I say, I make things out of jewelry 57:00that nobody else makes out of jewelry. If you want to see some of it, I'll show it to you later.

PK:That'd be wonderful. Is there, back to your interests, is there a particular piece of art, music, books that particularly inspired you or --

CS:Well, I have a collection of Yiddish songbooks and folk music. And in fact, I have to really decide where it's going to go because I'm eighty-one years old and somebody should get it. I don't know yet whether it should go to YIVO. Probably to YIVO. I really have to ask Chana Mlotek that question. Haven't spoken to her in a while but she's the one whose guidance I would take. And I know her long and well, also. I spoke to her son last week, Zalmen. He's director, Folksbiene. He was looking for ideas and I had a couple of ideas and he was looking for -- I mentioned a script of his father's and he said, "Yeah, 58:00but I don't have the original." I said, "Well, I do." And I sent him a copy of the original. And that's what happens. Things get lost. I threw away so much stuff. I don't think about it because it kills me when I do. I was a thrower-out. I was young and foolish. But that bottom drawer is full of (rolls chair over to filing cabinet) Jewish stuff, almost all Yiddish. (opens filing cabinet drawer)

PK:Wow.

CS:This is yidishe shprakh, yidishe literatur, khurbm, geto tog, yidish -- lernen yidish, yidish farsheydns, khanike, khurbm, peysekh, folklor, farsheydns [Yiddish language, Jewish literature, Holocaust, Ghetto Day, Yiddish -- Yiddish pedagogy, miscellaneous Yiddish, Hanukkah, Holocaust, Passover, folklore, miscellaneous] --

PK:These are songs, plays.

CS:Plays and songs. [Hebrew - 0:58:46] --

[BREAK IN RECORDING]

CS:Goldfadnyaner [Goldfaden works], a khasene in [a wedding in] -- you know, I forgot to send this to Zalmen. Libe in yidishn folklore [Love in Jewish folklore], plays. (closes filing cabinet drawer)

PK:And where did you get all these from?

CS:Various places and sources. I found, when I went to send Zalmen this stuff, I found a number of things that I got from [Bereze?] who was a teacher in the Arbeter Ring Shuln, and a wonderful teacher. And I don't even know how I got the stuff from [Bereze's] shule. But I have it. I found a script of Uriel Weinreich's "Love and Yiddish Folklore." I didn't even know I had it. And what I send Zalmen is copies. I kept the originals myself. But I have no idea where I got it from. Years ago, there was an organization called the yidishe yugnt fun poyln [Jewish youth from Poland] and the two Weinreich boys were in that. And [Amic Brumberg?] was in that -- olev-asholem [may he rest in peace], he also died not too long ago. And we were in the Sholem Aleichem yugnt gezelshaft [youth division] and we even tried to make a yidishe yugnt federatsye [Jewish youth federation] and we invited the linke [leftists] in. Yechiel referred before to Hershl Hartman. Hershl Hartman is a linker. Hershl Hartman and I 60:00graduated mitlshul together. We went to mitlshul for four years together. And he was the second youngest because he was exactly a year older than I. He's very capable by the way, and he also is a capable writer. I am not much of a writer. I mean, I can write when I need to but I have no desire to be a writer. He is a writer and he writes well, no question about it. In fact, there was a -- I think it was a ghetto evening, not long ago, where Theodore Bikel performed. And there were two translations of one of the songs he sings. One was a translation by Bikel and one was a translation by Hershl Hartman, and Hershl's was better by far. Politics notwithstanding, good is good. You can't make a mistake about that. We did a lot of -- Yechiel and I met through the Sholem Aleichem yugnt 61:00gezelshaft and then we courted in Boiberik. We were both counselors and then he became, after we married, he became the arts and crafts director and I was the culture director. And then, I went to Kinder Ring, also. And first, I started as a division head and then I became culture director. And when I was in the city committee, I had taught a class of city committee members who wanted to learn Yiddish. So, they'd come an hour early, before the city committee meeting, and we had a class. It was very -- would you believe, I threw out most of the stuff that I prepared for that class. I'm kicking myself ever since. But what can I do? Foolish youth. Now he's the thrower-outer and I'm the packrat. But when I was younger, I threw out what I shouldn't have thrown out. (laughs) Anyway, nothing I can do about -- any more questions?

PK:Yeah. (laughs) When you were at Kinder Ring, what did you do as the cultural director?

CS:Well, I wrote a script for every Friday night for -- Kinder Ring had shtile ovnt [quiet night]. It took them years before they finally called it Shabbos. Their old socialist heritage had -- very firm grip on them. And when I was in Hemshekh, I was culture director and Hemshekh has no Shabbos at all. And when I was in Hemshekh, also, I had Zalmen as a music director and Zalmen is a genius. He is a treasure. I cannot begin to tell you. I mean, I don't see him often. When we see, we kiss. But he is absolutely an unbelievable talent. Unbelievable. And his mother is the -- I would say she is the leading Yiddish ethnomusicologist of the entire Western Hemisphere. I don't know what's doing in Europe and Medem Center, so I don't know who there is there that might be her counterpart. But certainly, in the Western Hemisphere, there is nobody that 63:00knows what Chana knows about Yiddish folksong and folklore and literature. And she has the column in the "Forward," which -- she's superb. She's encyclopedic, she really is. And she's a very nice person, too, and I'm thankful that she's healthy.

PK:How many of the summer camps were you at?

CS:Pardon?

PK:The Yiddish summer camps.

CS:I was in Boiberik from '46 -- we were married in '49 and we were in Boiberik '50 and '51. So, from '46 to '51, I was in Boiberik. I was in Kinder Ring '52 and '53. And then, I went back in '69. And I was in Hemshekh in '68, and I 64:00remember it was '68 because there was an election coming up and Nixon was one of the candidates, eventually got elected, and a lot of the staff in Hemshekh was survivors, Holocaust survivors. And the gal in the office was a gal named Kovarsky. Her husband, Shloyme, was one of the leaders of the Jewish Fighters Organization in Vilna. And she was his wife and the election was running hot and heavy during the summer and Rokhl says to me, completely honestly, "Chana, vos vet zayn az nikson vet gevinen [what will happen if Nixon wins]?" And I said, "Rokhl, s'vet zayn a shvere tsayt ober s'vet ibergeyn [Rokhl, it'll be a tough time but it will pass]. Keyn aynshteyendike zakh vet nit geshen, dos land vet nit endern [nothing will come to a standstill, the world won't end]." She said, "Vi azoy kenstu zayn zikher [How can you be so sure of yourself]?" I said, "Kh'hob gelebt a gants lebn in amerike un ikh veys az afile az a shlekhter kandidat gevindt, vert dos land azoy nisht kalye az geshet epes vos vet nisht-- 65:00vos vet zikh nisht endikn un vos m'ken nisht farbesern. S'vert beser. [I've lived my whole life in America and I know that even if a bad candidate wins, the country doesn't get so damaged that something happens that can't-- that won't end and that we can't fix. It gets better.]" She said, "Fun vanen veystu? Vi kenstu zayn zikher? [How do you know? How can you be sure?]" I said, "Kh'hob es durkhgemakht [I've lived through it]." She said, "Ikh hob gelebt in lender vos zenen geven demokratsyes un plutsim iz gekumen an andere un m'hot ibergekert di velt un s'iz gevorn oys demokratsye [I've lived in countries that were democracies and all of a sudden someone comes and the world turns upside down and it's no longer a democracy]." And she's right. Her experience did show that. I said, "Rokhl, I understand you very well, but believe me, it ain't gonna happen here." But she had a hard time until the election was over.

F:Just going to close the door.

CS:You want to hear all this?

PK:Yo, take [Yes, really]. Can you talk about what was different at each of the camps?

CS:Sure. Kinder Ring, first of all, was twice the size of Boiberik. Kinder Ring had over five hundred children. Boiberik had about 250. Oh, I was also in 66:00Kinderwelt in 1952. Kinderwelt is a Labor Zionist camp. As a camp, it was the poorest of the Yiddish camps. It was about the size of Boiberik. It also suffered from the same thing that the whole Farband and the Farband Shuln suffered from: everything was oriented to Israel. At that point, there was already a State of Israel. The director, who had been a Hebrew teacher in the high schools for many, many years and who was the director -- who was a leader or the -- whatever you want to call him, of the Hebrew high school clubs' officials, of which I was a member -- the Jewish Education Committee had a standing person working with the leadership in the various Hebrew clubs in the high schools. And he was the director of Kinderwelt, also. And we got friendly, we knew each other very well. And he had hired me for Kinderwelt but that was the year he was -- he resigned, he retired as director. And the director was a 67:00young guy that they brought from Israel. Was a very nice guy. Didn't know anything about America or camping. No, he was originally an American but he had been raised in the movement and he was sort of out of touch. Very nice, very pleasant. Not much of a director. But all of Kinderwelt was dedicated to the Labor Zionist ideal of aliyah. Basically, that's what -- and everything was modeled on Israel. They had a marvelous music person. Superb. Shirley -- I can't remember her last name. One of the best music people I have ever seen. She had a chorus going with kids who were five and six years old, all the way through to counselors, not just campers. And they all worked together and she produced beautiful choral -- just superb, absolutely. That was their best, most successful activity. Arbeter Ring camp was much more typically American. There 68:00was less Yiddish culture there for a long while. By the time I came, they had turned the corner and there was more Yiddish culture. They still weren't calling Friday nights Shabbos. But it was shtile ovnt and everybody dressed in white, which for an old Bundist, socialist movement -- or at least that was their foundation -- was an enormous turn of a corner. Kinderland, which is the Ordn camp, I was in in 1944. I was graduating mitlshul and they gave me a job as relief counselor. It was a very interesting experience. Like left-wing undertakings, it was very spirited, very political and politically motivated. Not much Yiddish there, but lots of communism. In those days, there was also an undercurrent, maybe not so under, in the left movement of something they used to 69:00call free love. And it was not articulated publicly, but it was something that everybody talked about and most people did something about and it was not a healthy thing, which wasn't realized at the time, particularly. And then, by the end of the season, there was a -- it was very interesting, this communist administration, administrator, [Davidovich?], was his name. Was not a very nice person and not a good administrator, even though he gave me a job. And the counselors went on strike, which was an interesting thing to see. And eventually, it was settled but not to the counselors' satisfaction. But the Ordn camp was typical of the Ordn. It was big big-C communism, very small-J or very small-Y Yiddishkayt, but a decent camp. And they got people from all over the country. I remember there were people from Virginia. I mean, to me, somebody in 70:001944, somebody from Virginia was like a unicorn. And there were people from other parts, too, which was interesting. Farband, as I told you about, Sholem Aleichem Boiberik was wonderful, even though physically it was not as good as Arbeter Ring. Was not bad, but Arbeter Ring in some ways was better. Arbeter Ring did better by its staff people. The accommodations for staff were better and there was a -- I would say a more consideration of professionalism for staff. Boiberik was not -- Leibush was not that good about his staff. But the programming was superb. The care for the kids was wonderful. We also had kids from all over the country, which was interesting. And the other thing about Boiberik and about Farband and about Kinder Ring: those three camps all had an 71:00adult guest side, so that in addition to a children's camp, there was a guest side for adults, which ran not only a resort but also a Jewish cultural program, a hefty one. In the case of the Farband camp, it was hefty Labor Zionist. In the case of Arbeter Ring, it was hefty general. Arbeter Ring, the guy who led the Arbeter Ring band on the guest side was the timpanist at the Metropolitan Opera. There was a violinist, his name is David Goldstein, who was there all summer. He was a wonderful violinist -- so that, in terms of general culture and general activities, for the guest side, Arbeter Ring was better than all the others. In terms of Judaic stuff, there was very good stuff but it was not as frequent. So, there was a weekly lecture by a visitor who was an excellent lecturer. But 72:00during the week, there wasn't that much doing. In the case of Boiberik, there was a huge tree. One of the pictures in my living room that I painted under Tzippy Waletzky's tutelage is of that tree. It was called "untern boym [under the tree]." They had seats for lectures. And there was always something going on untern boym, not only on weekends but during the week. The most erudite, the most celebrated, the most well-known lecturers in Yiddish were untern boym. I met Israel Knox because he was there to lecture untern boym. I met Bashevis Singer for the first time because he was there to lecture untern boym. Every conceivable literary and cultural person that's in the Yiddish world was untern boym at some time or other during the summer in Boiberik. That had something to do -- it didn't have much to do with the children's camp. It had something to do in terms of the staff because the staff, when off in the evening, would go down 73:00to the guest side. And if there were Jewish things doing on the guest side, most of the staff would go. You used to have an occasional hour off during the day, the counseling staff. Well, if you were Judaically-oriented, you tried to arrange your hour off to be the time when there was something untern boym in Boiberik. So, you went and you heard whatever lecture or whatever performance was being given. Yiddish actors were present in all three places for the summer. So, in the early days, when they could afford it, you would even see Molly Picon. The family that did the "Megile," which family is it? Burstein -- the Bursteins, you would see in Boiberik, you would see them in Arbeter Ring. You see them less in Farband. Farband was smaller and Farband had less money that it 74:00expended on cultural activities. Farband had a bungalow colony near the camp where people owned their own bungalows. And by the way, that bungalow colony, as far as I know, is still in existence today. And Labor Zionists congregated there and they used to come over to the camp side for activities very often. But they never had the money to provide the kind of stuff that Arbeter Ring and Sholem Aleichem provided. And Sholem Aleichem, on the guest side, also, thanks to Leibush Lehrer, was permeated by Yiddish culture. So, the accommodations for guests had Yiddish names. There was a string of rooms in a place called "S'makht ir [Make yourself up]." There was a string of rooms in a place "Gut-yontev [Happy holidays]." There was a string of rooms in a place called "Gut-yor [May you have a good year]." I mean, nobody else had that and that was Leibush Lehrer. He was a genius. He was brilliant, he was inventive, he was logical, and 75:00he just did marvelous things. And Boiberik was really his work. Entirely his work. And it was another reason why everything about Boiberik was so attractive to us. I remember the first time my mother went to Boiberik as a guest before I ever went -- and she came back and she was tickled pink that you stayed in "S'makht ir fir [Make yourself up, four]." That was where they assigned her to sleep as a guest with her husband. So, there were things in Boiberik that you didn't see anywhere else. I remember in Kinder Ring, for example, Kinder Ring had color war at the end of the summer. Everybody has color war at the end of the summer. And you have to keep the date secret. There's a whole gesheft [business]. By the way, it is very much a creative e ndeavor among campers, also, but not necessarily Jewish. It is also very athletic competition. It's all kinds of competition. But there's really nothing Jewish in color war. However, in Boiberik's felker yontef, there's a great deal that's Jewish, as well as 76:00international. Boiberik was just an extraordinary place. I remember when they sold it, we were furious because they could have called a meeting or gotten together all the alte boiberikaner [Boiberik elders] and said, Listen, we have to save -- you want to save this place? Let's do such and so. They didn't do that. Afterwards, they called, they let everybody know what was already done, but nobody had a chance to prevent it. There was an institution in Boiberik called "goldene bukh [golden book]." At the end of the season, the staff got together at a meeting and decided which outstanding campers belonged in the golden book. There was a list. If you made the list, you were a very outstanding camper. If you were an extraordinary camper, you got a full page in the golden book. There were years when there was no full-page golden book candidate. There were years when there were two. When my son went to Boiberik, for the first time 77:00in the history of the golden book, they had -- the bungalow, the whole bunk got a full page in the goldene bukh.

[BREAK IN RECORDING]

CS:So, and this was an honor and something appreciated and talked about and counted upon or disappointed on. But, well, everybody who became an elste [eldest] -- the divisions in Kinder Ring and the divisions in Farband and Kinderwelt were young -- juniors, cubs, seniors, mid-whatever it was. In Boiberik, there were the yingste [young ones], the mitele [middle ones], and the elste. And in the yingste, there were three divisions: yingste-yingste [youngest young ones], mitele-yingste [middle young ones], and elste-yingste [eldest young ones]. And in the mitele, there were three divisions: yingste-mitele [youngest middle ones], mitele-mitele [middle middle ones], and elste-mitele [eldest middle ones]. And when you finally got to be a teenager, there were three divisions in the seniors. There were yingste-elste [youngest older ones], mitele-elste [middle older ones], and elste-elste [eldest older ones]. And the elste-elste were the prime goal of every camper who could think -- wanted to 78:00live to be an elste-elste. When my son talks about his elste-elste year, he is thrilled. And my son, I'm sorry to say his Yiddish education did not take very well on him. He's a very good humanist but his Jewish education is gants vakldik [pretty shaky]. I wish it weren't but that's the truth. I shlepped him from Long Island to Bayside, Queens to go to shule and -- where Mikhl Baran was a teacher and he was the best teacher around. And he went to a wonderful shul. When he was graduated from elementar-shul and he had to go to mitlshul, the same year Yosl Mlotek's son, also Moishe, was graduating. So, I spoke to Yosl and I said, "Yosl, gvald geshrig. Di lerer in mitlshul toygn nisht. Dayn zun -- dayn moyshe un mayn moyshe veln geyn kumendikn september in mitlshul. S'nisht gut. [Yosl, for God's sake. The high school teachers won't do. Your son -- your Moishe and my Moishe will go into high school this September. It's not good.]" He says, "Ver du a lererin [You become a teacher]." I said, "Are you kidding?" I said, "No! Du ver a --" so I did. I became a teacher in mitlshul. It worked out well. I was happy to do it. I know I'm a good teacher and et cetera, et cetera. But it 79:00didn't last beyond the time that I was there and the two Moishes were there, because I was not going to continue teaching mitlshul Sunday morning. But that Yiddish world and particularly the Sholem Aleichem Shuln and Boiberik were unique. There was nothing -- the others were very nice. Kinder Ring, we have friends who send their kids to Kinder Ring for years. In fact, they went through all the divisions and in one case, their two girls -- and both girls were lifeguards after they became too old to be campers. And one of them is getting married in June and she's marrying a boy from Kinder Ring, the shidekh [arranged marriage], the Kinder Ring shidekh. But, as good as it was, it wasn't Boiberik as far as Judaism and as far as Yiddishkayt was concerned. And Yiddish language and Yiddish culture were central and the propelling force, to the greatest extent in the Sholem Aleichem Shuln and in Boiberik. And we loved it. I mean, 80:00Leibush Lehrer was the eydes -- the witness -- at our khasene [wedding], and these were the people that influenced us to this day. I'll give you an example about Leibush Lehrer. Leibush Lehrer, like Yefroykin in Kinder Ring, twenty-four hours a day, was everywhere. Yefroykin in Kinder Ring was like that, too. But Yefroykin, who was an ideologue, didn't contribute the ideology and the Yiddishkayt that Lehrer contributed in Boiberik. At night, you were down at the guest side and you walked back in time to be in for curfew. So, you walked up the path to the girls' hill. There was a girls' hill and boys' hill at Boiberik. And Leibush was walking around with this flashlight and he walked part of the way with you and you talked, and had wonderful conversations with him. Plutslung, er vert mir nisht, er vert mir nisht [All of a sudden, he doesn't see me, he doesn't see me] -- he disappears. When he comes back, he's carrying two soda bottles. I say, "Khaver lerer, ir darf dos ufheybn [Comrade Lehrer, you have to pick up]? You have a staff of people to maintain this place. Zoln zey 81:00dos tun [They should do that]." He says to me, "Chana, tokhter [daughter]," he used to call me "tokhter." Not just me. All the gir-- "Tokhter," he said, "Boiberik iz mayn heym. Ikh shpatsir in mayn heym un es lign fleshlekh, zol ikh zey nisht ufheybn? [Boiberik is my home. I'm walking in my home and bottles are lying around, and I shouldn't pick them up?]" I mean, this stayed with me all my life. (starts to cry) This is a person that is just fantastic. But that was Leibush Lehrer. So, the Sholem Aleichem Shuln, as far as I was concerned, and my friend, [Livia?], who was product of Sholem -- says the same thing. She says that what we got in the shuln was more than just Yiddish and Yiddishkayt. And it is absolute-- we were lucky because nobody else had those things. It didn't exist anywhere else. The teaching in the Ordn Shuln was excellent. There were some wonderful models, really, of teachers. The teaching in the Arbeter Ring 82:00Shuln was superb. I knew those teachers when I worked in Yosl's office. I was there for, I think, four years. The Farband teachers, the ones that we had in Lehrer's seminar, and Gupkin were marvelous people and marvelous teachers. But that Leibush Lehrer was a yokhed-bemine [unique person], a yoytse min haklal [exception to the rule]. There was one Leibush Lehrer and nobody else. And that's what he was. And if you were exposed to him and if you knew him, it was something that was irreplaceable and that was just marvelous. And to this day, this is part of my life. There was a guy named Schatzki, Yankev Schatzki. He taught yidishe geshikhte fun mitl-alte, the history of Jews in the Middle Ages. His daytime position was, he was a psychology librarian at Columbia University. But at night, he taught in the yidishe lerer-seminar and his field was Middle Ages Jewish history. He used to -- there's a Yiddish expression, aroysshoklen 83:00fun an arbol, just shook it out of his sleeve, all sorts of ideas and witticisms and aphorisms. And I didn't write them down. I took my notes for geshikhte, but I didn't write them down, which was stupid but I didn't. But one thing I remember and we use it to this day in the house: Schatzki said, "Az s'iz a vikhuakh [If there's a dispute]," there's a dispute, "un az beyde tsdodim zenen umgerekht, s'iz a komedye. Az eyn tsad iz gerekht un di tsveyte iz umgerekht, iz a drame. Un az beyde stodim zenen gerekht, iz a tragedye. [and both sides are wrong, it's a comedy. If one side is right and the other is wrong, it's a drama. And if both sides are right, it's a tragedy.]" And to this day, Yechiel and I say to each other, something comes up in the news, Schatzki's tragedye. Both sides are in the right. And these were the things that we were exposed to and that were part of our daily life. I was in Lehrer's seminar four nights a week. Those years, you used to go to shul five days a week and sometimes on Sunday. In 84:00the Ordn Shuln, for example, they had a marvelous mandolin teacher, Bina Weinreich, Uriel's wife and widow and now passed away. Learned to play the mandolin in elementar-shul and in Ordn Shul, so she played it all her life. She loved it. There were all sorts of things that went on around the shuln. It is, when I think back -- we used to pay skhar-limed [tuition] -- skhar-limed was two dollars a month in 1936. I mean, the numbers were unbelievably different in those days. But that's what it was. But the most important thing was it was home, it was you. And it was an atmosphere in which not only were you made comfortable and richer but you were uplifted and you got things that you got nowhere else. Absolutely nowhere else. I look back on -- my friend, [Livia?], 85:00says the same thing -- Khaye-sore. She'll bring up something that Rabiner -- Rabiner was an elementar-shul teacher -- said and did, and it's wonderful.

PK:So, we're almost out of time.

CS:Am I damaging your whatcha-ma-hoozit?

F:No. (laughter)

PK:Just a couple more questions.

CS:Whatever you want.

PK:Well, is there anything else that you wanted to talk about?

CS:There's too much to talk about. I can't talk about all of it. It's just not possible.

PK:That is true.

CS:But it is the personalities and the knowledge and the exposures -- and I feel sorry for anybody who hasn't had it, I really do, because it is -- I don't think there's any place else in the world where it can be found.

PK:Yeah.

CS:If not for the, I assume, if not for the Depression, some of these people would not have been Yiddish teachers because goodness knows they didn't make 86:00much money and they didn't always get paid and it was certainly not a -- but they were devoted, they cared, they were -- we saw teachers outside of classroom. My elementar-shul teacher, I remember seeing -- to go on a trip somewhere. Menke Katz, Dovid Katz's father, wanted -- I did a lot of reciting and such and performing. And Menke Katz, I think, was in DC and he wanted me to perform for whatever, for his group. So, a couple of times, I went down, he met me at the station, took me to whatever, saw that I got paid, took me back to the station. They did everything and it was just unbelievable. And the ideation, I have to say inspiration. It was not just good teaching. It was not just good behavior. It was not just creativity. It was inspirational. To this day, as I 87:00say, Yechiel and I, to this day, will turn to each other after something on the news or something in the newspaper and say, Schatzki's tragedye. And it fits. Nobody else ever said these things. And in Schatzki's case, I am still kicking myself because I still have some of my notes from his -- the geshikhte class and I didn't keep any word on these things that he used to just shake out of his sleeve that you could repeat and quote. His aphorisms were marvelous. I don't remember any of it. The only story I remembered was the komedye, the drame, and the tragedye. So, that one I hold onto, but -- and Leibush Lehrer was also one of these guys who said things worth preserving. Yechiel remembers a couple. I don't even remember as many as he remembers. But extraordinary. It was just a superb -- in spite of the economic hardship, it was just a superb world to grow up in.

PK:We have one last question that we like to give. Hot ir a balibste yidisher vort [Do you have a favorite Yiddish word]?

CS:Antshuldik [Sorry]?

PK:A balibste yidishe vort, oder frazye, oder [A favorite Yiddish word, or phrase, or] --

CS:Ummeglekh [Impossible]. S'iz do azoy fil, ikh ken nisht oysklaybn eyne [There are so many, I can't choose one], but that's true in English, too.

PK:So true.

CS:People ask what is your favorite poem or what is your favorite movie or what is your favorite play and you can't pick one.

PK:(UNCLEAR)

CS:Or your favorite song. Not possible. There's just too much.

PK:In that case, what advice do you have? I mean, Leibush Lehrer teaches you all this stuff. How does that get transferred into the next generation?

CS:I would love to see some things written about these people. In the last year, in the "Forverts," somebody, I don't know if it was Shikl Fishman. Somebody 89:00wrote an article about Leibush and it was a good article. I think I have it.

[BREAK IN RECORDING]

CS:(reading from newspaper clipping) Leibush Lehrer. No, it's by Chana, by Chana Ml-- der fartrakhter director fun kemp boiberik un zayne lider [the pensive director of Camp Boiberik, and his poetry]. He was also a poet, and he wrote words to songs -- I didn't find out until I knew him 'cause he didn't use his own name. He wrote under the name of Alef Magister. When he got his master's degree, he called himself -- magister is master's in Yiddish and other languages, too. And he also wrote under the pseudonym Sol Kesman -- Sol Kesman. His wife's name was Salke. So, "Sol Kesman" was "Salkes man [Salke's husband]." It's a very good article about Leibush. There's an article about Kinder Ring, some stuff from the Call. Again, stuff that -- something that I pulled out of 90:00the "Forverts" that were good. And this is a Yudl Mark text. It wasn't mine, but it's an excellent Yiddish grammar text that was done for mitlshul that I kept. This is from Yugntruf and this is Naomi Kadar. That was the teacher whose name I was trying to think of. And she wrote some Yiddish lessons. I think they were published in the "Workmen's Circle Call." Yeah. So, I have those. And this was Leibush. This was Leibush. This is Pesakh Fiszman, who, when he was alive, had the reputation of being the best Yiddish teacher in the entire New York metropolitan area. He was a wonderful guy, too. And this is Yudl Mark, who was 91:00one of my gods. That's Yosl Mlotek. And this is Max Weinreich's class in UCLA in 1948. These are the pictures -- oh, this is the Arbeter Ring hekhere kursn [continued education, lit. "higher courses"]. It was the equivalent of the Lehrer seminar. This is the staff and this is Schatzki, Yankev Schatzki with the -- and this is Itzi's article about hundert yor yidishe folkshuln in amerike [hundred years of Jewish secular schools in America]. This is Yosl, who was an extraordinary person and who was mister Yiddish culture while he was alive. Marvelous human being. That was one of my -- I got very angry at Mordkhe Schaechter once when in his Yugntruf, he referred to Yosl Mlotek as "di 92:00azoy-gerufene gezelshaflekhe tuer [the so-called cultural activist]" and I wanted to choke him.

PK:So, what is this binder?

CS:Yiddish stuff.

PK:More Yiddish stuff.

CS:Yiddish stuff. And this is an old heft [notebook]. This is what the kids used to get to learn to write Yiddish. I have an Arbeter Ring one that's the only one I happened to find and keep. But I gave a lot of Yiddish books to the Center when we moved. So, somewhere in their spot. My biggest collection is in the living room because I have a lot of Yiddish songbooks and I have a couple of -- I have a Kipnis collection, which is from the nineteenth century. Superb collection of Yiddish songs, an early collector. I love folk music. I love American folk music, I love English folk music, I love Scottish and Irish folk music, in particular, and I love Yiddish folk music. And that I know. And as I 93:00say, I have treasures there. I have to ask Chana Mlotek to whom to give them because when I die, which is not going to be that far off -- when you hit your eighties, you're living on borrowed time, essentially. So, I want to make sure those go to good places. There is a foundation that Gella and Shikl Fishman set up. And they managed to set up a -- I don't know if it's a chair but it's some section of a department in California in -- can't think of the name. Names. I used to be very good at names. I'm not anymore. Famous university. Shikl was on the faculty there for a number of years. And they have a Yiddish archive, a Yiddish shul archive. And the last time I tried to access it, which was probably 94:00some months ago, the stuff wasn't even alphabetized, which is ridiculous. And I'm not a particular -- I like Shikl. Shikl is superb, by the way, and his Yiddish is superb. You could trust anything in Yiddish that Shikl Fishman says or writes. [BREAK IN RECORDING] Anything else I can do for you?

PK:Neyn, s'iz shoyn tsayt [No, it's time], there's no more memory on the card, so --

CS:Oh! (laughs)

PK:-- I guess we've got to end this. Thank you very much.

CS:Shmir zikh oys di shikh [Well done, lit. "shine your shoes"]. (laughter)

[END OF INTERVIEW]