EARLY DAYS
It is generally accepted that to understand today it is necessary to understand yesterday.
With that in mind, I hope to pass on to my children and their children some of my thoughts, ideas and especially my experiences. In order that they should have some insight into who they are and where they come from.
I felt it was necessary to write my story. To say to my children, grandchildren, and, amazingly, for I never thought for one moment I would have the unbelievable joy of them, my great grandchildren. That despite the tears and because of the joys they have all given me, I am trying, in my limited way to say thank you.
I hope when they read this it will give them a sense of belonging, in the knowledge that they came from someone who cared and tried his best to put into effect the traditions and values that have been at the heart of everything I have tried to do.
I was born in 1922 into a family of Jewish immigrants. My Father was born in Tsarist Russia and Mother in Austria. Their parents brought them to England at the end of the 19th century to escape the anti-semitic pogroms that swept through Eastern Europe. That was a time when throughout Europe the people were in revolt and scapegoats were needed to be blamed for the sufferings of the poor and downtrodden masses. So the rulers of the day organised attacks on those in society who were so easily recognised, the Jews.
In Tsarist Russia, armed bands of Cossacks attacked the Jewish communities. Whole villages were wiped out, with mass killing an every day occurrence. As a result, thousands fled to those countries where it was believed the Jew would be left in peace. The United States of America and Great Britain were two of the most desirable countries to emigrate to.
I have lived through a period of war and deprivation, poverty and cruelty which I witnessed both at home and thousands of miles away on the other side of the world. And now, in spite of all the promises of "a land fit for heroes" and the "war to end wars", hunger, poverty, war and injustice still haunt the people of many lands.
My paternal grandfather was a cabinetmaker; he took a shop in Elizabeth Street, Hightown, and made a living making furniture. My Father followed in his father's footsteps and became a craftsman in working with wood. Whatever could be done with timber he would do: he carved it, polished it, made furniture, built shop-fronts and towards the end of his working life, cut short by asthma brought on by what nowadays would be called an industrial hazard, the dust created by the tools needed for his work, he built gliders for the army to use in the invasion of Normandy at the start of the second front in the Second World War, but that comes much later.
The other great love of his life, apart from his family, was his music. He was an accomplished violinist and also played the mandolin. He would fill the house with his music. I remember with great nostalgia the many evenings spent listening to him play and now when I hear some of his favourite pieces I am taken back to that small terraced house where I was born and spent the first fourteen years of my life.
I was the third child in a family of four children. Before me there was an elder brother, Leon, and a sister, Sadie. Leon was eight years older than I having been born in 1914, Sadie, born in 1917. After me came a younger brother, Conrad, born in 1928.
Conrad and I were both born in the house in Dudley Street, just across the boundary between Manchester and Salford, on the Salford side, 20 Dudley Street, Higher Broughton.
The house had one large bedroom at the front and two smaller ones at the back, and surprisingly for those days, a bathroom. Most housing in working-class areas at that time had no bathroom or hot water so we were very fortunate, although the lavatory was outside in the back yard.
Downstairs there was a parlour at the front, a living room in the centre and a stone-floored kitchen at the rear. From the kitchen a door led to the back yard with the brick built lavatory at the bottom of the yard and the space between the lavatory and the back wall of the kitchen was used to store coal for the only form of heating. There was a coal fire in the living room which had a kitchen range built in that Mother used to cook on. Later she was to get a gas stove fitted in the kitchen, but the range was her pride and joy and she would black-lead it till it shone.
The room at the front of the house served many purposes during our occupation. At one time Dad used it as a workshop where he built furniture when a customer ordered a piece. He tried to operate as a small business in furniture making but his skill was in working with wood not with figures so he was never successful in his attempts to improve our standard of living by working for himself. I remember him having problems getting paid for work he had done when the customer found he could not afford the piece and all sorts of excuses were found to avoid payment. Of course all the customers were suffering under the same system as Dad, out of work more often than not. The twenties and thirties were notorious for the high rate of unemployment.
A common sight was a group of men, with a placard round the neck saying "Ex-serviceman please help", walking in the gutter playing a trumpet or a banjo and appealing for a few coppers (pence).
Poverty was rampant and the diseases associated with poverty, rickets and tuberculosis were common. The National Health Service of course, was only established in 1948 so in the period I am describing health was in the hands of private doctors and hospitals were run by charities. Doctors were paid by the patient's family for every visit and medicines had to be bought at the chemist shop. The Hospitals relied entirely on charitable contributions. The hospital that played a large part in our lives at that time was the Manchester Victoria Memorial Jewish Hospital situated in Elizabeth Street in Hightown. Founded by the local Jewish community, as its name implies, as a token of support for the established system of society.
In the basement of the hospital building there was a large room that was used as a social club by the volunteers who collected money from the local community to help towards the cost of running the hospital. As a member of this group when I was about fourteen years old, I would go round the streets knocking on doors collecting tuppence a week (1p).
It is obvious that times were hard, and some of the customers who may be working one week and so ordered a desirable piece of furniture from Dad, suddenly found themselves "on the dole" (unemployed) and so could not afford to pay.
I remember one particular piece of furniture ordered by a customer, it was a huge sideboard made in mahogany, a very expensive timber. The piece was so big that it could not be built in the workroom and it was assembled in the long lobby that ran from the front door to the bottom of the stairs. When it was finished the person who ordered it refused to accept it. Dad had no way of getting his money for the work he had done and as the sideboard had been made to the customers specifications, another buyer could not be found, so Dad decided to alter it and under his skilful hands the sideboard became three separate pieces of furniture.
My sister had been trained as a ladies' hairdresser and before long the front room changed again into a Hairdressing Salon. Equipment was bought, a telephone installed, an unheard of luxury in those days, and she started work as her own boss.
The fact of a telephone being installed in the house caused quite a stir amongst the neighbours and we were inundated by people wanting to use the phone to call the landlord to see to some necessary repair or the local authority over some communal issue. So the house became a focus for people in the street. One old lady who always comes to mind when I think back to those days was a neighbour who lived a few doors away. She was Mrs Glassman, I don't know where she came from but her English left something to be desired. She would come to our house to ask if she could use the phone to report some complaint to the landlord's agent. Her end of the conversation went something like this, "Hello, I want to speak to the properly head man, the man on the bicycle." The reference to the "man on the bicycle" was meant to describe the rent collector who went round the landlord's property collecting the rent every week riding a bike.
I started school when I was three years old in the nursery class and well remember the long walk from home to the school some two to three miles away, quite a walk for a three year old, but more often than not we could not afford the tram-fare. Public transport was mainly by electric tram-car, strange to think that all those years ago we had a transport system destroyed in the name of efficiency and that is now being re-introduced as the answer to our traffic problems, (Metrolink).
My sister went to the same school and was given the job of taking me to and from school. A job she complained about, as her responsibility for me did not end at the school gate. She was often sent for by the nursery teacher as I would not go to sleep in the small cot provided, and Sadie would take me for a walk around the playground to try and tire me out.
The school was at the bottom of Waterloo Road in an area mainly populated by Jewish immigrant families and so the majority of pupils at the school came from a Jewish background. Close by, in Derby Street, there was a school entirely devoted to Jewish pupils. So that area of Manchester/Salford was identified with the Jewish faith.
The streets around Bury New Road and Strangeways housed the immigrant families whose forebears, coming from the two main railway stations, Victoria and Exchange, which are just a mile or so down the road, settled there. Before long the structure of a Jewish community was established with all that is necessary for a traditional Jewish way of life. Kosher butchers everywhere, with delicatessens and baker's shops round every corner, supplying the customary breads, the "Chola", used in the Sabbath meal on Friday night. And the now well-known and much loved bagel.
Everywhere small synagogues were established around groups of people who came from the same "shtetel" or village in the homeland, each with its own traditions and dialect. They vied with each other as to which "shool"(synagogue) had the best cantor to sing the liturgy and lead the choir.
So we grew up in an atmosphere which was very close to the way our parents and grandparents must have lived in the "haim"(the homeland). I went to a Hebrew school (cheder) to be taught to read Hebrew so that I would be able to take part in the religious ceremonies in the Synagogue. As Latin is used in the Catholic religion, as a language of prayer, so Hebrew was taught in the same way. We were not taught to use it as a living language that could be used in conversation.
The Hebrew school was about half a mile away from Waterloo Road school, and only a few yards from the Jewish school in Derby Street. After finishing at day school I would walk up Derby Street to the Cheder for lessons in Hebrew. This was from the age of about 11 years old to 13. The main purpose of this education was to prepare the young boy for his "Barmitzvah", or confirmation. Having reached the age of thirteen, he is accepted as an adult and is able to take part in the rituals of the religion. The first of these is the ceremony in the Synagogue to celebrate the coming of age of the "Barmitzvah Boy." On the Saturday closest to his birthday, the boy is called to take part in the reading of the Torah (the Scroll of Law kept in the Ark of the Synagogue) during the Saturday morning service. His education in the Hebrew language has been focused on this day. As the portion of the Law appropriate to his birthday is known, he is taught to recite it so that on the great day, when he becomes a man, he can take his place in the community. After the religious ceremony a party in celebration of the event takes place with all that one would expect of such an occasion.
The Hebrew school was of course supported financially by subscription. Parents paid what they could afford towards the cost of running the school and the wealthy members of the community were called on to make up any shortfall.
An incident that comes to mind whilst I think back to those days is one which may give the reader some insight into the economic situation at the time. The festival of Passover is the time when Jewish children are dressed in their best clothes, and so new clothes are bought for the holidays. Of course many families could not afford to buy new clothes and relied on the charitable organisations to help. There was a family who helped to provide some of the clothes. They had a clothing factory near the Hebrew school. Clothes made of "Shoddy" were produced and distributed to the needy. On this occasion my parents could not afford to buy me a new suit so I applied for a free suit. For some reason I was refused and sent home without the treasured new clothes. I cried all the way home. That humiliation has stayed with me and maybe played some part in my later development.
Jewish religious law does not allow anything that can be construed as work to be done on the Sabbath, starting at sunset on Friday night to sunset on Saturday night. So, in order to be able to have food for the period of the Sabbath, meals were prepared in advance that could be re-heated. A favourite then, and still is now, was a dish called a "Cholent", which consists of beef, the cheaper cuts are used both for economy and taste. The long period of cooking enhances the flavour of the beef, potatoes, butter beans covered with a dumpling. Water is added and the earthenware pot is placed in the oven on Friday evening, before the Sabbath, and allowed to cook overnight. The aroma that hits the nostrils the following morning is one that can never be forgotten, and to this day we often enjoy a "Cholent"
Even lighting a fire or switching on a light is considered to be work, so in most Jewish homes a person who was not of the Jewish faith was employed to come in and carry out these chores over the Sabbath. Often it would be a young boy or girl given the chance to earn a few shillings pocket money.
Our food was of course all Kosher. In other words all meat products had to be from animals killed by the official slaughterer who was trained to ensure that the strict rules laid down by the Rabbis was followed. Beef was killed in the abattoir but poultry was killed at a small local slaughterhouse. Mother used to buy the chickens live at a shop up the street from where we lived. The shop was owned by a family named Grumman and the old lady, Mrs Grumman, would sit in the shop plucking the dead birds that had been brought back from the slaughterer. So the shop was full of feathers. Mother would then take the bird home and singe it over the fire or the gas stove so that all the bits of feather that had been missed were burnt off.
The chicken was the meal for the eve of the Sabbath, Friday night. Dad went to the synagogue for the Friday evening service whilst Mum stayed home to prepare the meal of chicken soup with knaidelach, (dumplings), roast chicken, roast potatoes and vegetables.
On the arrival home of my Father the Sabbath ritual started and Mother, in the time honoured way would Bench Lecht (Bless the Lights). Two brass candlesticks stood on the table, which was resplendent in a gleaming white tablecloth, and she would light the candles and, covering her eyes, she would say the blessing. Then Dad took the special Sabbath bread Chola; a white plaited loaf, and tear it into pieces passing them round the table with salt to be eaten before the meal.
As a fairly religious family we attended the synagogue on all the festivals, especially those like the New Year (Rosh Ha Shona) and the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur).
The Day of Atonement is probably the most important day in the Jewish religion. The day when one atones for one's sins by fasting from sunset to sunset. No food or drink must be consumed during those hours and the day is spent in the synagogue in prayer.
To give some idea of the way of life in those mean little streets it must be remembered that there were no playing fields, the street was our playground. As very few people had cars the only danger was from horse drawn vehicles. The local greengrocer had a horse and cart that was used to deliver fresh produce from the market for sale in the shop. It was also used as a mobile shop taking fruit and vegetables round the district and delivering direct to the customers. I often went with the owner to the stable and was allowed to help groom and water this beautiful animal. It was the nearest I got to having a pet. The tradition of "Dressing" horses on May Day was something we looked forward to. Every horse in the neighbourhood was dressed with coloured ribbons and bells, the tail and mane plaited with straw and flowers. Altogether they made a beautiful sight, especially when they paraded in celebration of May Day.
As I remember, the only car in the street was owned by a family next-door-but-one to us at number 16. The car was a Baby Austin and caused quite a stir when it drew up outside the house. Cars were a rarity in those days as were aeroplanes. If one was heard flying over people rushed out to see this wondrous machine. How blasé we have become.
So the street was our playground where we played hopscotch, marbles, football and a game peculiar to the Jewish children. At the time of the Festival of Passover, for some reason I have never understood, hazelnuts were used in a game played in the street.