JACK LEBEWOHL ORAL HISTORY

CHRISTA WHITNEY: This is Christa Whitney and today is April 7th, 2016. I'm here in New York City at the Museum of the City of New York with Jack Lebewohl. Is that how you pronounce it?

JACK LEBEWOHOL: Perfect.

CW:And we're going to record an interview as part of the Yiddish Book Center's Wexler Oral History Project. Do I have your permission to record?

JL:Of course.

CW:No spy-cams here. (laughs)

JL:No spy-cams.

CW:So, I'd like to know a little bit about your family background. What do you know about before your family came to this country?

JL:Okay. My family comes from a part of Europe known as Galicia. My father was born in a suburb of Lemberg, L'vov called Kulikov. My mother was born in another 1:00city called Zhovkva, which were neighboring towns, and they lived near each other.

CW:Do you have a sense of what those towns were like?

JL:Yes. Let me answer --

CW:Oh, sure.

JL:-- the first question.

CW:Go ahead, go ahead, sorry. (laughter)

JL:The rest of the family all started out somewheres in Lemberg. And I've met Lebewohls or Lebevohls, depending how you pronounce it, who come from -- and every Lebewohl comes from that area. Every Lebewohl that's Jewish comes from that area. I've met Lebewohls in Germany who have no relationship to us. And my father told us that in the early, mid-nineteenth century, there was one ancestor who had eight children. And all the Lebewohls came from him. A portion of the 2:00family came to the United States at the turn of the century and the rest of the Lebewohls remained in Europe. And, unfortunately, other than just a handful, were all killed in the Holocaust.

CW:So, life in these -- outside Lemberg or in the area?

JL:The suburb --

CW:What was it like?

JL:-- living, it was -- my father was lucky. He had a business and he was quite successful, which is probably how he survived the war. People forget the Russians attacked Poland from the east and the Germans attacked Poland from the west. So, the Russians came in, my father was arrested for being a capitalist, sentenced immediately for ten years' hard labor in Siberia. My mother and my brother were captured also by the Russians and they were sent to Kazakhstan, 3:00which at that time seemed like it was a death sentence for them, death sentence for my father. But that's how they survived the war. And the rest of the family was entirely killed. Other than one or two first cousins, my father had no other survivors.

CW:So, do you know -- well, first of all, what kind of business?

JL:It was a lumberyard, a mill, that type of business.

CW:And do you know about sort of Jewish life before the war, what it was like there?

JL:Yes. They had, both in Lemberg and in -- well, my father was in the small town. It was a very active Jewish life. From what my father told me, in Lemberg, was a modern, progressive city. So, the Jewish life ranged from people who were what you would call today ultra-Orthodox to people who were totally secular to people who were communist to people who were involved in the arts and sciences. 4:00In a way, it was very similar to today. You had a full range of Jews.

CW:And your family? Were they frum [pious]?

JL:Were they --

CW:Frum?

JL:Depends who. Some were and some weren't. My father was. Father was quite religious.

CW:And what about your grandparents? What do you know?

JL:I never met them, unfortunately. They were all killed. From what my parents told me, my father's father was what you would call a lapsed khosid [follower of Hasidism]. The whole family were Belz Hasidim. This was the part of Galicia, and you were basically -- it was mainly Belz Hasidim. And my grandfather started doubting the rabbi and he became what you call a misnaged, an anti-khosid. Very 5:00religious. Literally studied all day, though my grandmother on my father's side remained a loyal khosid. (laughs)

CW:What about your mom's side?

JL:My mom's side remained loyal Hasidim. In fact, my father told us an interesting and funny story. When he was about eighteen years old, he was going to be drafted in the army. My father was born in 1904. Now, his father fought in World War I. Had no choice. And he was about to be drafted in the army and he just -- how do you handle the army? Now remember, to a certain extent, going into the army, if you're religious, was almost a death sentence. And so, my grandmother, my father's mother -- not his father, 'cause he was anti-Hasid -- took him to the rebbe for a blessing. And my father describes the whole scene 6:00where the rebbe said to my grandmother, "Froyim" -- that was my father's name, Ephraim, they called him Froyim -- "Vet zayn opgehit." "He'll be watched." So, it's a very cryptic answer and my grandmother goes, "But Rebbe, "Vos tut men vegn armey?" "What do you do about the army?" And the rebbe answers again, "Froyim vet zayn opgehit." And that was it. They left. They get back to the town and the person who was supposed to conduct the physicals dies. Has a heart attack and dies. The person who -- the substitute for the army, you could bribe. He was bribed, and my father didn't go into the army. So, to this day or to the day he died, my father believed that he had a special blessing from the rebbe 7:00and that it worked.

CW:Whoa.

JL:Which is why he survived World War II together with his wife and son, because from the town that they came from, they were the only intact family unit that survived.

CW:So, did he talk about the gulag?

JL:Did he talk about Siberia? Somewhat. Talked about how hard it was. Physically, very grueling. How he was lucky that he didn't smoke, because what he did was he tore out the lining of his jacket and gave it to other prisoners so they could roll it to make cigarettes. And he traded that for food, which is how he survived. He was only in the gulag there for about two years, till Germany declared war on Russia and then Russia freed all Polish nationalists. But it was very, very hard. My father was able to join my mother and brother in 8:00Kazakhstan when he was freed. And my brother tells me how when he saw my father, he did not recognize him. And it was just about two years. That's all it was. He could not recognize him. My brother got -- there was a seventeen-year age difference between us, so my brother got married in 1958 and I saw the wedding pictures. I was a little boy at that time and I saw the wedding pictures. Then, when I got married, 1970, I saw the wedding pictures. Our wedding pictures. My father looked exactly the same in 1958 as he looked in 1970. The only difference was he was a much younger man. But he had aged so much in that time period and he stopped aging at that point.

CW:And how did they decide to come to the States?

JL:Interesting story. At the end of -- the conclusion of World War II, my mother, my father, and my brother escaped from the Soviet Union and they got to Western Poland. Then, they had pogroms in Western Poland and my mother said, "We got to get out of here." They had the Kielce Pogrom and others. And through Aliyah Bet, the Jewish Agency, it was smuggled across borders to Italy, which was a staging ground for illegal immigration to Palestine. And they were in a displaced persons camp in Italy. And actually, my parents and my brother were supposed to be on the Exodus, the ship. And at the last minute, my mother said, "We're not going." She goes, "We've lost everything. We have no family. We're 10:00the only ones left. If we go to Palestine," she goes to my father, "you'll be taken by the Haganah." My brother, who's a member of Betar, would have joined Begin in the Irgun, and she said, "We're not going. We're staying. We'll wait for the quota to America." My brother was very upset, and he wanted to go to Palestine and fight. And my father went to the Jewish Agency people, says, "What are you letting him go to Palestine? He's not joining you. He's joining Begin and the revisionists." And my brother wasn't permitted to go to Palestine. I was born in 1948 and we came to America in 1950.

CW:So, can you just describe the neighborhood, the home you grew up in?

JL:We came to this country, we were put into the HIAS, which was where the 11:00Public Theater is now. We were there for a short period of time. My parents were able to find an apartment in Williamsburg on South Third between Keap and Hooper. And to show you how bad that block is, it isn't even chic today. (laughter) We lived in the top floor of a walkup. And a few years later, we -- they made a few bucks, they moved down to the third floor. My father was quite religious. My mother, quite religious. My father refused to work on Saturdays, so he had trouble getting a good job. And basically, they struggled financially for a number of years. But they were able to make a go of it. I was never denied anything, and even though, looking back, we must have been very poor, but I never thought of ourselves as poor. It was -- we were like everybody else. My 12:00father, when I turned six, sent me to yeshiva. And on his own, he had taught me before then, so I already knew how to read and write, both in English and in Hebrew, but primarily in Yiddish. I was able to translate the khumesh [Pentateuch, Five Books of Moses] by five, four and a half. In fact, when I went to Yeshiva Torah Vodaas, they put me into the third grade in Hebrew because of my advanced knowledge. That was because my father had taught me. And I went to yeshiva. You spent, in the early grades, from nine to one in Hebrew, then till five o'clock in English subjects. And I forgot, I think the third or fourth grade, you basically went till six o'clock to English subjects. And then, at a certain point in time, the Hebrew went till three o'clock.

CW:And in der heym, velkhe shprakh hot ir geredt [at home, what language did you speak]?

JL:Only Yiddish. I did not speak a word of English till I started yeshiva. I actually couldn't even speak English until I started yeshiva. I picked it up literally that summer before I started yeshiva. And I remember there was people criticizing my father why they're teaching me in Yiddish and not permitting me to learn English, and my father said, "I want him to know Yiddish and he has plenty of time to learn English. He'll pick it up very fast." Which, of course, was the truth.

CW:What was the community like? Was it a lot of refugees?

JL:Where we lived in Williamsburg was all refugees. You had very few native Americans. You had some, of course, and the yeshiva class that I went to, I would say ninety percent of the class were the sons of greenhorns. And of that 14:00ninety percent who were the children of greenhorns, the majority -- two-thirds, three-quarters, I don't remember, were not even born in the United States.

CW:What was the relationship between the Americans and the refugees?

JL:In Williamsburg, some relationship, but not much. Everyone stuck to their own kind, so to speak. The only time I dealt with American-borns was in the yeshiva. But from what I remember, there was probably not even -- I shouldn't say not one. Just a handful of native-born Americans, kids who had parents who were born in America. You may have had kids whose parents came to America before World War II, but they weren't born in America. You maybe had a handful of kids whose parents were born in America.

CW:Were you exposed to secular Yiddish culture? The theaters and --

JL:No. My first contact with quote, unquote, secular Yiddish culture was going to the Yiddish theater, which was already -- it was way past its prime. And I remember going with my mother to the Anderson Theatre on Second Avenue. My father did not want to go to the Yiddish theater. Oh, I'm trying to think -- my father, though, did expose me to Yiddish culture, meaning he gave me certain books to read. So, I was able to read the translation of the khumesh in Yiddish, because my father made sure that I was able to read and write Yiddish. And it 16:00actually got me by school. That's how I cheated, because we were in class, we had to supply our own books, and Hebrew books. And you were not permitted to come in with English translation. But you were permitted to come in -- it was called -- at that time, it was the standard -- was the "Bais Yehuda," which was in Yiddish, because nobody could read the Yiddish and understand it. Maybe they could speak a little bit Yiddish to kids. And I kept it a secret that I knew how to read and write Yiddish. So, when they called on us to read from the Bible and translate the khumesh and Rashi, I mean, I was as fluent as you could be. Even when I didn't know it a hundred percent, I was able to read from the translation and no one knew what I was doing. (laughter)

CW:So, what shul did you go to growing up?

JL:In Williamsburg, there were a lot of shuls. My father went to a shul that was 17:00on Hooper and the corner of South Fifth Street, between Fourth and Fifth but right on the corner of Fifth. It was a shul primarily of old-timers. And as soon as I reached a certain age -- and I'm not sure, I would say it was about seven years old, maybe eight, but probably seven -- there was a more modern Orthodox shul on Broadway and Marcy Avenue. And I went there because friends from the yeshiva went to that shul. And they also had a junior congregation. So, I participated in the junior congregation where we led the services ourselves, read from the Torah, and did everything.

CW:What was Shabbos like in your home?

JL:Shabbos in the home? Friday night, my mother had made a traditional Shabbos 18:00-- what I considered traditional Friday night Shabbos meal. She made gefilte fish ninety-five percent of the time. Once in a while, she made something else as the appetizer. She made, again, ninety-five percent of the time chicken soup with matzo balls and farfel. And I have to tell you, it was not bought farfel. She made it herself. And she made the matzo balls herself. And the chicken, of course, she went to the live chicken market on Havemeyer Street, a few blocks away. The shoykhet [ritual slaughterer] would kill a chicken, literally in front of your eyes, and she brought it home, soaked and salted it, and made the chicken soup. She would buy some inexpensive cuts of meats, kalekhl [nontraditional pot roast cut], if we were lucky, flanken [flank], but that's if you were lucky, and also threw that into the soup. And you had applesauce for dessert. This was every Shabbos. Of course, there was Kiddush and so forth. Went 19:00to shul in the morning. For lunch, you had chopped liver instead of the gefilte fish. Again, the soup. During the summer, warmer months, she may have cut out the soup because she didn't want to keep the flame going all Shabbos, because it would have been too hot. Same type of meat, same type of dessert. And once in a while, she made a cholent and a kugel. (laughter)

CW:Was there nigunim [melodies] in the home? Did you do the --

JL:My father was not a big person when it came to zmires [Shabbos hymns sung at the table]. He did a small amount of zmires. He was just not that into it, and never discussed it with him. But the feeling I got -- that World War II had taken something out of him where he just didn't want to sing.

CW:So, what business did he get into here?

JL:My father didn't get into a business. He continued working in a factory, sort of -- remember, my father, when we came to America was forty-six years old. He had a newborn child. I was not even two, I wasn't even two yet. So, the pressure was on to make a living. And he was just nervous. He was somewhat broken, didn't want to go into business. He worked in the factory up until his retirement. He dabbled somewhat in real estate a little bit, inexpensive homes, and he made a couple of bucks that way. And saved and saved and saved. The only expense that he really had was me. I was the only expense.

CW:So, what was it like for you to grow up with survivor parents?

JL:I think I described it. You develop a certain attitude of, What will happen in America? And my father basically said to me, "You have to be ready to leave at a moment's notice. You don't know what's going to be." There was an emphasis on getting educated. But he also told me to make sure I should study accounting, because if you're a doctor or a lawyer, you can't take the license with you. "But numbers remain the same," he said. And become self-sufficient, but have a certain amount of liquid assets stored away so you can escape. I mean, that was the mentality. And what I found -- it was similar with all the other greenhorns. 22:00Everyone had that same attitude.

CW:So, can you tell me about the deli?

JL:Anyway, my brother came to America when he was -- have to see now for a minute. He was nineteen. There was a seventeen-year age gap between us. And my father wanted him to go to yeshiva to study and get an education. My brother wanted to start working and making money. And even though my brother was humongously successful, to the day he was shot, he regretted the fact that he did not receive an education. In fact, when I was going to Yeshiva University, I remember in my freshman year there was registration. He wanted to be there for the registration. Now, today, everything's done by computer so it's nothing. But in those days, you -- it was done -- you had to go from section to section, sign up for class, make sure you weren't closed out. And my brother was watching and 23:00he said, "This is wonderful. I missed out on all of this." And he tried to do different types of jobs, failed at almost everything. He was working for Coney Island as a soda jerk. Was watching the hot dog griddle. Learned how to do the hot dogs. Watching the sandwich guy. Learned how to make the sandwiches. One thing led to another, and that's how the Second Avenue Deli came to be opened.

CW:Before we get to that, did you hang out at Coney Island? What was it like back then?

JL:I was there a handful of times. For me, it was somewhat exciting 'cause I got to eat a hot dog. (laughter)

CW:So, just for someone who doesn't know what it is, how would you introduce the deli?

JL:Oh God, this is hard. I would introduce it as Jewish soul food. It's the only 24:00way I can introduce it. And you come on in, and what do you eat? The effect that the deli has on certain types of Jews, and it's really the older ones, you can't imagine. I still remember a person coming into the deli -- I would say about six, seven years ago -- walks inside, and goes, "Ah! I smell Judaism." Now, unfortunately that's all that's left to this person from his Judaism. They are reminded of the different foods they would eat at home. So, you could have the chopped liver, you can have the gefilte fish, you can have the chicken soup. You have the pastrami corned beef sandwiches, tongue sandwiches, the other soups, mushroom-barley or pea soup. The kasha varnishkes and the egg barley, flanken, 25:00stuffed cabbage. God, I'm getting hungry. (laughs) And other -- chicken fricassee. Now, to show you how things have changed, we have been forced to take off the menu flanken and chicken fricassee because nobody was ordering it. So, the younger generation doesn't order it, the older generation is disappearing.

CW:So, it's sort of -- how did he come up with this idea? I mean, you said he started making --

JL:He basically was working in Coney Island and he got the idea to open up a deli. Why work for somebody else? I'll open up a small deli. They found the location on Second Avenue and Tenth Street, which was a hole in the wall at that time. It was a former dairy restaurant called The Dirty Diaper. Sat about twelve or fourteen people. And to my brother, it was a big deal. Had his own business. 26:00And he told me how many times the person who was the chef for him took home more money than he did. It was touch-and-go for a while. But it was his business. And he was a personality. He got to know the people. And I still remember, as a little boy, Milton Berle did an off-Broadway show. My brother catered it. So, Milton Berle came to the deli. Eli Wallach and Anne Jackson had an off-Broadway show and my brother did the party. Fact, if you come into the deli today, I still have a picture of my brother with Eli Wallach hanging on the wall. And I can tell you this story even though -- I'm assuming you're not Jewish.

CW:No.

JL:Okay. But you speak nice Yiddish. So, they were at the party and Anne Jackson gets drunk. She's wasted. So, Eli Wallach goes to my brother, "What do you 27:00expect from a shiksa?" (laughter)

CW:So, I'm trying to figure this out. You were in yeshiva and your brother starts --

JL:Had the deli.

CW:-- a deli.

JL:Correct.

CW:So, what was that like for you, put the sort of two --

JL:My brother was not religious and the deli was open on Saturdays. I would come to the deli, but never on Shabbos, never on yontev. And I loved going to the deli. To me, it was exciting, being able to grab a hot dog whenever I wanted it or a sandwich. I mean, you can't imagine, for a little boy, how exciting that is, especially when you're dirt poor and you really don't have all these things at home. And the people who would go to eat in the deli on a regular basis had some money. So, even though I wasn't in that -- my family wasn't in that league 28:00economically, we took advantage of it.

CW:So, can you sort of describe the scene? Obviously, there are pictures, but what is the deli? What did the deli look like when it first opened?

JL:Just literally a hole in the wall, like a diner, a luncheonette. Handful of seats -- a couple of tables, a counter, that was it. The kitchen may not have been as big as our little room here right now. May not even have been that big. And it's really hard to imagine, but everything was made in that small facility. The basement was next to nothing and you managed. And my brother built up the deli, had a nice name. Was making a very nice living. Remodeled it, fixed it up. And then, about another ten years later, he enlarged it, took over a few other 29:00stores. And then, a couple years later, took over the next-door store, which was called the Molly Picon room. So, one thing led to another.

CW:And just to back up for a second, can you explain about Second Avenue? What --

JL:What it was like on the street there? You used to have the Yiddish theater there. There it was the Broadway of the Yiddish theater, that's all I can -- only way I can describe it. I'm not sure how many theaters that you had on Second Avenue. I was told you had a lot. Five, six theaters, whatever. Now you had the Anderson, which was on Second Avenue between Third and Fourth. Then, on Twelfth Street and Second Avenue on the west side, the corner of Twelfth and Second, you had a theater which today is a movie theater, chopped up into different rooms. And the main viewing room, if you look at the ceiling, has a beautiful, ornate mogn-doved [Star of David], to this day. And they restored it, 30:00looks beautiful. In the right-hand corner of the building, in the outside, in Hebrew letters, it says the year the theater was established. By the time the Second Avenue Deli opened, Yiddish theater was past its heyday. I think the only theater that was really left was the Anderson. So, Ann Corio was starring in "This Was Burlesque" on the Twelfth Street theater. And I know my brother would go in there -- if it was slow in the deli, would just walk into the theater. They knew him, so they -- he just walked in on his own. Sit in the back and doze off. And he did the catering for the "This Was Burlesque."

CW:So, did you get to meet any of the Yiddish actors through the --

JL:Yes.

CW:-- deli?

JL:Got to meet them. Now I have to start remembering all the -- Miriam Kressyn. I don't know if that name is familiar. Seymour Rexite, Yakob Rechtzeit. I'm 31:00trying to remember, one of them was her husband, one of them was her brother-in-law. Zvee Scooler. Molly Picon. Lillian Lux. I don't think I met Pesach Burstein because -- that's her husband -- I think he may have been dead by that point. Fyvush Finkel, of course. Oh, God, a handful more. The names just now slip my mind. And I met them all coming into the deli, and we would speak in Yiddish. The person who really made an impression on me was Zvee Scooler, 'cause I remember seeing him in a pair of shorts and he had such bony legs. And then, when I saw him on Broadway and in the movies as the rabbi, I said to my wife, "But I saw his legs." (laughter) And I met the others. I met the producers. God, if I had a list, I could tell you who I met and so forth.

[BREAK IN RECORDING]

CW:At what point did you -- I mean, so you were not in the business, obviously, because you were much younger.

JL:I was much younger, though, believe it or not, on days off, I worked the cash register. Summertime, I delivered orders. Thanksgiving, I always delivered orders. Right before New Year's, I always delivered orders. So, I always worked. And then, the funny thing is when I had my own kids, they would go on deliveries with us -- do the same thing right before Thanksgiving or holidays. We would deliver orders.

CW:And for you, personally, you -- what was most important about being Jewish when you were growing up?

JL:What was most important? Took it -- in a way, we almost took it for granted, though, deep down, we felt there could come a time when you couldn't be Jewish. I mean, there was a certain pride in being Jewish. And it was just a way of 33:00life. And I wasn't the only one. Was everyone I went to school with was Jewish.

CW:So, who would hang out in the deli?

JL:I met any and all people, really. I met people who were greenhorns, American Jews. Every once in a while, I would meet political personalities. I met Israeli personalities. So, for example, I got to meet Sharon, Ariel Sharon. He would love to come into the deli. In fact, when he was being sued by -- when he sued "Time" magazine in the federal courts, we would send over food every day for dinner. We delivered food. I met a number of Israeli politicians. I remember shortly after the Six-Day War, I met Uzi Narkiss, who was one of the main Israeli generals. I don't know if the name -- you recognize the name? And he was one of the generals who captured Jerusalem. And here, I met the guy.

CW:So, I imagine in a place like this there are some stories about, I don't know, the people that you remember that stick out in your mind. Who were the --

JL:Well, I'll tell you --

CW:-- characters?

JL:-- we had a counterman, his name is Moishe, who is a Holocaust survivor from Auschwitz. And I remember I was just a little boy and a man came in for a job. And my brother sat down, talked to him, and my brother saw Moishe's face drop. And my brother walked over to Moishe, he says, "Moishe, vos tit zikh, vos iz -- du filst nisht git [Moishe, what's going on, what's -- you don't feel well]?" He thought he was sick. And Moishe says, "Abie, du turst im nisht nemen [Abie, you 35:00shouldn't accept him]." And my brother goes, "Far vos nisht [Why not]?" He goes, "Er iz geven a kapo in der kamp [He was a kapo in the concentration camp]." And that was it. So, my brother gave the guy the interview, finished the interview, that was it. Of course, he didn't hire him. Now, that's an unusual story. We would meet people from the Jewish world. Seven Seventy Broadway was only a couple of blocks away, and if you remember, the Yiddish station broadcast out of 770. So, my brother knew a lot of the characters from the Yiddish theater, from the Yiddish radio show. Zvee Scooler at that time was on the radio. Herb -- what's the name -- Herb Elshtayn, I think? He was on there. And later on, what was the name? The fellow with the -- Raymond, Art Raymond was on. But that was 36:00later, that was already later on. And my brother got to meet all these people and I met 'em, too. So, for me, it was exciting meeting people whose names you normally would only see in the newspapers, and maybe on television. And I knew them, I recognized them, and they knew me and I could call some of them by their first names. (laughs)

CW:So, now, someone like Zvee Scooler, what did he look like?

JL:Oh, I knew him very skinny with a beard, long beard. Hair slicked back. Very articulate. He was, I mean, summertime he would just dress in a pair of shorts. Very leisurely. Very nice man. Very cultured man. I had the impression that he knew how to learn. He was an educated man and knew how to learn. Totally not religious, secular.

CW:So, what was your journey, personal Jewish journey in terms of --

JL:Okay. I went to yeshiva. Went to Yeshiva University for college. Went to law school. Worked with Arthur Andersen in their tax department. Became a lawyer in private practice. Did investments. How would I describe myself religiously today? Conservadox would be a great way, where I'm still observant. I keep kosher. My kids went to Ramaz. My one regret is that I couldn't teach my kids Yiddish. I wanted them to learn Yiddish. But their Hebrew -- they are fluent in Hebrew. My younger son served in the Israeli army. My older boy studied in the yeshiva in Israel. So, I guess I can say I'm ecstatic my kids are continuing.

CW:So, when you are at the deli, what do you like to eat?

JL:What do I like to eat? Let's see now, what do I like to eat or should I eat? (laughter) I can eat everything. If I let myself go, I'll have pastrami, corned beef. Sometimes I'll just take a big slice of bologna or salami with a sweet pepper. That's delicious. Sometimes I'll just have some soup. Stuffed cabbage every once in a while. Then, if they tell me I have to eat healthy, I'll take a piece of fish. Then I go back to eating the way I liked. (laughter) You don't look the way I look from eating fish. (laughter)

CW:So, I don't know how to ask this, but I'm curious to ask about your brother 39:00and the incident and --

JL:Okay, how do you ask? I saw my brother that morning. It was a Monday morning. I saw him early. There were a couple of -- the regulars were always in the deli before work, and they're all hanging around, joking, kibbitzing, telling off-color jokes. Was a great group of guys. I went to my office and I get to my office, my secretary's already at her desk and she says, "Jack, you better get to the hospital, Bellevue Hospital. Something happened to your brother. You better get there, fast." She wouldn't tell me what happened. I knew there was 40:00something wrong. I knew it was more -- he just didn't have a heart attack or anything like that. I run downstairs and I want to get a cab. I am hailing a cab, a cab pulls up, my wife gets out of the taxi. I said, "Terri, get back in." I get in and I say, "Bellevue Hospital." We go there. I come in, I know something is wrong because Antonio Pagán, the councilman, is there. So, what the hell is he doing there? I knew there's something wrong. He comes over and hugs me. As soon as they saw me, the hospital staff, all of a sudden, a nurse and a doctor come out just in case. And they were going to break the news to me, just -- and they wanted to make sure nothing happened to me. And they told me what happened. My sister-in-law came literally ten minutes later. And again, the same thing was repeated with the doctor and the nurse and everything. And, I 41:00mean, it was like my world just collapsed. Then, I wanted to know what was happening to his body, because the burden of really preparing for the funeral -- his kids were totally immobilized at that point. So, it fell on me and I went into the medical examiner's office, which is literally right around the corner -- bend over there -- and I wanted to make sure that they didn't do an autopsy. And I was told that they had to do a minimal autopsy. The person who was performing the autopsy was a member of the Brotherhood Synagogue. So, he assured me that he would only do the minimum that was required and he wouldn't do anything else. And there was someone from Hatzolah who stayed behind there with the body the entire time to make sure everything was done properly. And I 42:00remember the funeral the next day and sitting shivah [seven-day mourning period], and it's sort of surreal that you just floated for a week, not knowing what to do.

CW:And what did they tell you had happened?

JL:What they told us? Basically, there was a robbery. And I knew my brother wouldn't have resisted, so I don't know what happened exactly in there. He was shot several times and one of the bullets was fatal. And I can actually say -- I mean, I meet and speak with the police regularly. And they give me regular reports and they're on top of it. And I'm not at liberty, of course, to say certain things, but basically, I have the utmost and the highest respect for the 43:00New York City Police Department. They're probably the best in the world.

CW:So, at what point did you decide to reopen?

JL:Well, the deli was closed the day my brother was shot and then day of the funeral. Reopened. At the end of the shivah, I sat down with Eleanor, we decided to just reopen and keep the restaurant going. And we kept it going till January 1, 2006, till circumstances forced us to close the store. We reopened the deli, my two sons, in December of '07 and we opened up a second location in August of '11, uptown.

CW:And what do you think the role of a Jewish deli is in New York today?

JL:It's a combination. The way you would have a Greek diner, you have a Jewish -- this is -- deli is a Jewish diner. It's the only way I can describe it. And it becomes sort of more than just a restaurant. It becomes a cultural institution, where people go here to be reminded of the foods that they had when they were kids. And we have our own brand of customers. So, I have the guy who still comes in three, four, five days a week. I have the guy who comes in once a week, once every two weeks. Then I have guys who come in literally almost every day. There's a certain person -- comes into our store, he has a business on the corner, and he's literally in the store four, five days a week, really. And when we opened up uptown, and he lives on the Upper East Side, he told me -- he says, "Jack, by the way, if you run into me and I'm uptown and I'm with my wife, please don't mention to her that I had lunch in the deli." He says, "In the 45:00deli, I'll be eating corned beef and pastrami. Uptown, I'll be eating chicken and fish." (laughter)

CW:So, you have, I would imagine, an archive of amazing photographs of the stars who've come in.

JL:We have a number of pictures. Come to the deli. On the walls, you'll be amazed what pictures we have. And we have more pictures in the office, because the new restaurant is -- doesn't have the space of the old one. And we have a great number of pictures. So, for instance, we have -- oh, God, I'm getting old, I'm getting --

CW:We can look at them together sometime.

JL:Jerry Seinfeld with Paul Reiser. We have -- besides the Yiddish actors, I'm talking about regulars. We would have -- remember Roger Grimsby from Channel 7? You're too young. (laughter) And other people like that. Sam Levenson was a 46:00close friend of my brother's. Dustin Hoffman. Giuliani. George Steinbrenner. Muhammad Ali. I mean, I'm talking about -- Joe DiMaggio would come to the deli, though I don't have a picture with Joe DiMaggio. Apparently, he had signed a contract where he couldn't give autographs and pictures and he had to charge for it. So, you couldn't take -- do that. And we respected his wishes.

CW:Yeah. So, what do you think the -- where do you find Yiddish today?

JL:Yiddish today basically exists with a bunch of old-timers. And here's the funny thing is when people hear me speak Yiddish and that I can read and write Yiddish, they think I'm an oddity because I'm -- they consider me young for Yiddish. Basically, the Hasidim are the only ones who really speak Yiddish, 47:00though I find their Yiddish to be of a poor quality. And what I mean by that is, I remember that we had done a promotion where we rolled back our prices. And we were written up in all the papers and everything. And the next day, I'm in the store early, and one of the Hasidic guys that we buy products from says, "Oh, you should have read the article about you in our newspaper," which was "Der yid," which is the Satmar newspaper. So, I said to him, "Why didn't you bring it to me?" He goes, "D'kenst laynen [You can read]?" I said, "Ikh ken laynen un farshtey beser vi di [I can read and understand better than you]." And he brought me the paper the next day and I read the article. It was of such -- the writing quality was really so poor. So, if you took a newspaper, an old-time newspaper -- and at that time, the "Algemeyner Zshurnal" was still coming out in 48:00Yiddish. And if I read the "Algemeyner Zshurnal" in Yiddish, well-written style. And if I read it, I would have to read it very slowly because since I don't read it frequently, takes me longer to read now. The "Yid" was of such poor quality, it was like reading a piece of trash. Trashy novel. That's how fast the reading was.

CW:So, what do you think is the future for Yiddish?

JL:Of Yiddish? Basically, it'll be just the Hasidim. I remember I had gone to Paris in 1971. And I got by the Yiddish quarter entirely in Yiddish. Got by. Spoke with everyone in Yiddish. It was a pleasure. I went to Paris in 1990, there was no one to speak Yiddish with. There was not one person I could speak Yiddish with. When you go to Israel, everybody -- all the people from France -- 49:00are either Sephardic or, if they're French, all they speak is French or Hebrew. No one speaks Yiddish. In Israel, no one speaks Yiddish unless you go to the Haredi areas. And there, they find me as an oddball because I speak the language. The people in the street, Jews, religious Jews -- no one speaks Yiddish unless there's someone maybe my age or a little bit older from family, but that's really it. None of my contemporaries that I hang out with can read or write Yiddish. I'm the only one I know that can really do that.

CW:How do you feel about that?

JL:What, that I can?

CW:Well, that --

JL:I'm upset that I'm the onl-- I have no one to share it with. When I got married with -- my wife can understand Yiddish and she understands German. Her parents came from Vienna, so German was their first language, though they speak 50:00Yiddish. So, Terri could not speak Yiddish and when we had kids, I said to Terri, "I'd like my kids to learn Yiddish." But I was forced not to because my wife could not speak Yiddish or answer me. She understood every word but she couldn't speak the language. And I just gave up and then, I -- thank God, though, my kids can speak Hebrew fluently.

CW:So, I'm sure you have a lot, but any other favorite stories about the deli you want to share?

JL:Oh God, you're going to have to -- I wish I knew. God, my mind is now a blank. You have to ask questions, prompt me with those.

CW:That's okay. (laughter) Maybe next time we can meet in the deli and look at the photos together.

JL:Absolutely, absolutely.

CW:That would be fun.

JL:I mean, the people that come into the deli, even to this day, it's just amazing the number of people, the prominent people, from government officials -- 51:00for example, Al D'Amato used to come, and Koch. They used to come into the deli all the time. And I remember Koch would come into the deli and would be very careful with what he was eating. And then, I remember literally six months, nine months before he died, he's in the deli and he's eating grilled specials and beans. So, I said to my son, "He must be very sick." He goes, "Why?" "Why else are they letting him eat that? He's eating that, that means he can eat whatever he wants now and enjoy himself."

CW:Oh, yeah.

JL:"He doesn't have to worry about his health."

CW:Yeah.

JL:And that's what -- I mean, I was right, unfortunately. Governor Pataki came to the deli. I had a thrill. I met Menachem -- Benny Begin, Menachem Begin's son came to the deli to actually see us. (laughter) God, I'm trying to think who else.

CW:So, why is the Molly Picon room named that?

JL:My brother loved Molly Picon when he -- the room was built. He decided, Let's name it for Molly Picon. She was thrilled. You have no idea how happy she was. All those pictures from the Yiddish theater that I told you about, she gave it to us. And it's valuable. It's not -- those are worth a lot of money, actually. And she took pride. She was on the "Tonight Show" and she was on with Helen Hayes. And she turned to Helen Hayes and, "So, what's the big deal that you have a theater named after you. I have a room at the Second Avenue Deli named after me."

CW:(laughs) That's great. Well, a sheynem dank [thank you very much].

JL:A sheynem dank, it was my pleasure. I wish I could have been more helpful.

CW:Oh, no, it was great. And I think next time, we should meet in the deli and get a little --

JL:Absolutely.

CW:-- a tour.

JL:Now I have to ask you a question.

CW:Sure.

JL:Vi kimt a shikshe Christa Whitney (laughter) [Yiddish - 00:52:41 to 00:52:42] Yiddish? (laughter)

CW:[Yiddish - 00:52:44 to 00:52:56].

JL:Would you read Sholem Asch?

CW:Yeah. Well, (laughter) I mean, actually, I got -- the writer that really got me was Avrom Sutzkever. Do you know him? He's a poet.

JL:I'll tell you, I read Sholem Asch, which is unusual. My father wanted me to 53:00be familiar with the culture. So, my father was very modern for a religious man. So, I read Sholem Asch, I read Graetz, Jewish history by Graetz. And my father made me learn the Tanakh and all the novi [prophets]. He says, "You have to know it. They don't teach it in the yeshiva. You have to know it." So, for a religious man, culturally, he was very cultural and believed in that.

CW:Yeah.

JL:And my father had a saying, "S'iz nisht an avayre tsu zayn an apikoyres, s'iz an avayre tsu zayn an am-horets [It's not a sin to be a heretic, it's a sin to be ignorant]." Do you know what that means? And that was my father's sayings. He basically says, "Be knowledgeable. You're not going to be religious, don't be religious. But don't be ignorant."

CW:Yeah. (laughter) That's great. Great.

JL:Very good.

CW:Well, a dank [thank you].

[END OF INTERVIEW]