MULKE
(A Reminiscence)
SAMUEL FABAS
Of this Edition
The first 500 copies have been numbered and signed by the author of which
Phis 1s no: 2
My mother called me Mulke—pronounced Moolkeh.
My father, depending on his mood, called me Mulke or Shmulke, but when he was very angry with me, he called me Shmooell! with an exclamation point. That meant I was in fOr at:
I can see him now across the span of more than seven decades, advancing toward me with his hand outstretched. Palm down meant a glet, an affectionate pat on the head. Palm up meant I was going to get walloped. My father was a great believer in spare the rod and spoil the child, and he was a specialist. Palm up meant either a trask in fresser, a smack in the mouth, or a potch in punim, a slap in the face. We were very fond of each other.
Whichever gesture the outstretched hand delivered, it was good. “Do you know, my son,” he once said, ‘““why I punish you so. It is because I love you. You don’t see me punishing the boy across the street.” And I remember I replied, and he laughed so heartily whenI said it, “Papa, do mea favor, don’t love me so much and punish the boy across the street.”
I can see him now, and my home and the small Shtetel where I lived. Now that I am in my eighty-first year, my thoughts turn more and more often to the days of my beginning. It is not the introspection of old age that leads me to reminisce about my childhood—I am not yet so far gone that I cannot look to the future, even though less days lie before me than behind. My grandchildren are curious about the childhood of their Zeida. ‘They ask perceptive questions and I marvel at the wisdomof theyoung, and because I respect these budding young minds, I believe that they are entitled to know whence theycameandwhoweretheirforebears.
My sons, Charles and Daniel, over the years have questioned me closely about how it was for me when I wasa child. When they were quite young, these questions about my past came most often after I had meted out to them well-deserved punishment, and it amused me that their implied rebuke took the form of a question about the days of my youth and the strictnessofmyfather.
As I look back upon it, I can see that they felt a sense of security in the enormity of my wrath and in the warmth of my approval, even as I found security in the inevitability of my father’s disapproval when I earned it, and in the sureness ofhisloveforme.
So this book is for them, for my children and for my grandchildren, and for their children if they want to pass it on.
I dedicate this book to them in the hope that it will answer their questions, with a reverent prayer that they and their households and all those to come shall know peace and contentment and service to their fellow men.
Mulke, my parents called me, their affectionate diminutive of Schmuel, Samuel, after the Biblical Prophet. I was born on November 19, 1885, in the town of Zabludava, in the State of Grodno (Grodno Guberna), in White Russia. The nearest main City was Bialystok.
There was some doubt about the date of my birth. In my day in the old country, vital statistics and registration were not generally kept for the population of Russia, and certainly not for the Jews. We were later able to figure out the day I was born because it was two weeks after the Fall holiday, Sukkoth, and because my father remembered the Sabbath portion of the Torah the week I was born. So I can say that I was born on November 15, 1885.
My family consisted of my father, Lipka (Lepa); my mother, Itka (Ida); my grandfather, Zolman; and us six children—three boys and three girls. My grandmother's name on my father’s side was Chana; she had died shortly before I was born. I was the third child in line of birth, the first boy. My father’s father and my mother’s father were half brothers, so my father and mother were cousins. Both of them were tall, father being of light-reddish complexion, with a long red beard. My mother was dark complexioned and slim. My father was the only child of his family. In my mother’s family were two boys and two girls; one boy and girl were twins.
Our home consisted of two rooms with earthen floors, and contained a large brick and stone oven in the center of the house which was the divider between the two rooms. We burned wood in the oven. We had no sanitation facilities inside, only an out-house in the open in back of the house.
Water for drinking, cooking and other purposes was carried to our home in two wooden buckets hung from a wooden yoke which was carried over the shoulders. The well was about five blocks away.
My father and grandfather were Krabelniki, peddlers to the peasants in the country. They used a horse-drawn wagon for
transportation and earned their living trading various necessities to the moujiks in exchange for whatever the peasants could afford in the way of barter goods or money. We were poor—by today’s standards we could be considered to have been very poor —but we were not aware of it.
My mother’s father’s name was Moshe (Moses); her mother’s name was Mindel.
My mother’s father was a pachter; that is, he had a concession from the local puritz to take care of the dairy farm. ‘The puritz owned vast land holdings in the vicinity, and the pachter lived right on the premises and processed the dairy products.
My name then was Samuel Tabachnik. In the time of my great-grandfather a man was known by his name and the name of his father, but during my great-grandfather’s lifetime a law was enacted requiring each family to assume a family name which by edict had to be registered with City and State Governments. My great-grandfather had been in the tobacco business, and it is from this that our family name, Tabachnik—which means ‘Tobacconist’’—was derived. This I later shortened to ‘Tabas, when I came to the United States.
My earliest memory takes me back to the time when I was three years of age. I became ill, and it was necessary to take me to Bialystok to see the Doctor. I recall dimly that my mother carried me to and from the Doctor’s office in her arms.
This happened around the time that my brother, Abe, was born. I do not remember this event, but I do know my father and mother were very excited. Abe and I were much together in the years ofour manhood.
I can remember when my brother, Morris, was born. It was 1890 on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, and I was then five years of age. I remember it well, because the older folk were busy and I had the run of the house. With all the good things which had been prepared for after the Fast, and with no supervision, I was in full control. I had a feast all to myself. It was the custom in that time and place that when a
boy was born, ten neighborhood boys of about my age came with a Melamed (Hebrew teacher) to our house each day from the day of birth to the day of the Brith. They came before Sundown to say a prayer for the newborn boy. When the boys came to our house, I felt proud, and I was “King of the Roost’.
Thereligiousceremonyofcircumcision, “the Brith’, takes place on the eighth day after the birth of a male child. The rite is performed by a Mohel, and at that time the child receives his name.
The birth of this third son made my father so happy and excited that he decided to have a feast prepared with the best of everything.
So he went to the butcher and asked for the best cut of meat, only the best. The butcher told him, “I have fine meat which is as good as fat.” My father said, ‘Never mind, give me the best of the fat.’’ ‘‘Yes,”’ said the butcher, ‘I have fat which will render and be just as good as oil.” “Never mind,” replied my Dad and made his departure. Then he went toa store where they sold oil and asked for the best of oil. “We have oil which is just as clear as water,’ said the storekeeper. My Dad said, ‘Never mind.”” So he went home and put up a table including pitchers of water. When the guests arrived, my father was asked, “What does this mean?” And he explained his joke with great glee, saying, “This is the best to be gotten under the circumstances.” Everybody laughed and had a wonderful time.
I well remember the day of the Brith. When the guests came in and sat down at the table, several Melamdim were among them. They had come for a free meal and to bid for me to become their student.
On the table were lighted candles, together with bottles of whiskey and wine. I remember that one of the teachers reached for a bottle and his beard came in contact with the lighted candle and caught fire. Such excitement! I thought it great fun.
I started to go to school at the age of five. There were no public schools available except a few in the bigger cities, and few Jewish children dared try to go to them. My school was private and held in the home of the teacher. Since his home consisted of two rooms like my home, with the same type of earthen floor, and since his family lived there, we had to acquire our learning in rather crowded circumstances. In the class were ten boys who sat around the table with the teacher. The teaching was in Hebrew. Our school hours were from eight o'clock in the morning to nine o'clock at night. We went home for lunch at noontime and for supper at about five o'clock. We went to school all year long. ‘There were two school terms, but since we went to school all year, there didn’t seem to be much sense in dividing the school year into two terms.
In the Summer wewent barefoot. In the Winter we wore leatherbootsandheavyclothingandfurhats. Wewalked both ways, to and from school.
On Winter evenings we carried lanterns which we made ourselves from paper and cardboard, with a lighted candle in thecenter. Thetopandbottomofthelanternswerecardboard, and for the body of the lantern we useda piece of paper treated with oil to make it transparent so that the lighted candle would shine through. Winters were very long. The snow started to fall in October and lay on the ground until late in April.
Winter was fun-time for us, though, because we would make our own ice-skates of wood with wire underneath, and would slide along on one foot over the frozen surface of the creek and other places where there was ice. If one did not have a skate or was too lazy to make one, he would slide along on his shoes. We felt itwas fine sport.
Transportation in our area during the Winter was by horse-drawn sled; the horse was adorned with bells. Whenever we had a chance, we would latch on toa sled and slide along with i.
In the Summer, we would go bathing in the creek in the
nude. When the creek was muddy, we came out with more dirtonusthanwhenwewentin. Itwasalotoffunforuskids.
It was a happy time and the days were full for us. The best day of all was Friday. We waited all week for Friday and for Friday night.
This was our week: On Sunday morning my father and mother would go to Bialystok to buy and trade merchandise. We had Cheder all day as usual, but we did manage once in a while to run quite wild until my father and mother returned, despite the efforts of my grandfather.
Next morning my father would go off for the week to do his business. He was a krabelnick, a peddler, and he carried on his wagon everything from needle and thread to pots and pans. These he traded forrags orjunk or produce or eggs, chickens, wheat, potatoes, hay, oats, whatever the peasants had.
My day began very early because I had to be in Cheder by eight o’clock and I had to say my prayers before eating breakfast. My mother would say, “Now, son, put on the Tefillin (phylacteries) and let us see whether your head has swollen.” After this I was given breakfast, which each day consisted of krupnick (buckwheat groats) and bulbas (potatoes) anda slice of challa. Much of our food was flavored with fat rendered from beef and flavored with onions. Coming home for lunch from Cheder there would be for a change potato soup with fat for flavor. Then for supper around four or five o'clock, sometimes there would be a piece of herring with black bread, and sometimes a glass of tea with the meal. We could not well afford meat during the week because it cost about fifteen kopecks a pound. When I came home from Cheder around nine o'clock in the evening, I would have farfel with bulbas flavored with shmaltz.
Friday was the big day for us. In the morning when we arose, my mother already had her bread in the oven. She had mixed the dough the night before and after she had prepared the dough for eight challas, two for Sabbath and one for each
day of the week, she kept some aside and made for us special kuchen with onions—what we today call an onion pletzel—and the aroma of the bread cooking in the house was a delight to the nostrils. After laying Tefillin, we could €at our pletzel. How good it was! Friday was for us the day of happiness. We surely lived all week for Friday.
There was another reason why Friday was special. When I came home from Cheder we had potato hulnick, a kind of potato pudding for lunch, and the taste of that potato hulnick and the smells of Friday remain even today in my nostrils.
On Friday the house was cleaned and yellow sand was spread on the earthen floor to make the house Shabbasdick— ready for the Sabbath—different from any other day. Papa's boots were made ready for him; my mother shined them. Papa came home late in the afternoon and would immediately get hold of us kids and wipe our noses and see to it that our faces were clean. Mama was already cooking yoich (a soup with a small piece of meat) with luckshen (noodles) and gefulte fish and a tsimmes of pasternick (parsnips) with a small piece of meat. Two pounds of meat fed all the family on Friday and all day Saturday.
Out of the stir and bustle we went off to the Synagogue, and when we came home my mother blessed the candles, and we ate by the light of the candles and the kerosene lamp. In this a small light had burned all week, but it was turned up bright for the Sabbath. My grandfather made the kiddush, then my father, and later I made kiddush and then after I was older we all sang kiddush together. We made the Motzi (grace before the meal) and my father cut the challa. Then my mother brought in the soup and the fish and the meat which she divided for us on our plates, a small piece for each of us kids, and a bigger one for my father and grandfather. She ate what was left.
We lived—it was a time of great happiness. After the meal, we would bentch (say the grace after
meals) and then we would sing zmiroth (songs). Sometimes a neighbor would come in and we would sit around and eat dried pumpkin seeds and talk and sing.
We lived next door to Chaike the Bakerke. Every Saturday we had chulent, a kind of stew of meat and potatoes with onion for flavor—we had no vegetables—and sometimes we had a halke, which is a large dumpling of flour mixed with fat and placed in another pot alongside of the chulent in the oven to stay overnight. The oven was sealed with clay to keep the heat in from Friday evening to Saturday noon when we returned from Shul. For this service we paid one ditka (three kopecks). On Saturday morning, my mother in her own little oven had a kettle of tea to keep warm. We drank tea with milk which was a great treat for us. It was permitted that we drink hot water before going to Synagogue.
Sometimes there was coffee with chicory in the house. Coffee cost one gulden, which was fifteen kopecks, and chicory was only five kopecks, so the mixture was mostly chicory. I was never given any of this. I was almost a man before I tasted coffee.
After Shul we came home and ate chulent. Then, if we boys were able to sneak away, we ran about in the fields or any other place we could get away from the “old man”. On Shabbas afternoon we had to go back to Cheder.
On Saturday night and Sunday morning my father and mother would go to the market at Bialystok to dispose of the products which he had garnered during the week and to buy merchandise. Then the week started over again. It was always the same. Always good.
When I was about ten years old, life becamea little more complicated for me. That year I built my own sled, making it out of wood with iron straps underneath as runners for sliding. I picked up the wood and the iron straps from discarded packing boxes around the stalls at the market. Around this time also, I began once in a while to go out on the wagon with my
father to watch the wagon while he did his work. Shortly after this, my parents made a momentous decision.
It was just past my tenth birthday that my parents decided to move to Bialystok, about fifteen miles away. ‘hey had discussed the matter many times, and I was well aware of their intentions. One morning they began to prepare the horse and wagon to travel to Bialystok to look for living quarters. I knew they were not planning to take me along, but I wanted to go. Of course I did not dare protest to my father, so I sneaked out of the house earlier and began to walk in the direction of Bialystok. I walked as quickly as I could, getting well ahead of them, and when they got a goodly distance from Labludava;, they saw me on the road before them. Rather than turn back, they decided to take me along with them. My father pretended to be angry with me, but I could see the smile starting behind his red beard and my mother was smiling and I felt very good togoalongwiththem.
We found living quarters on the second floor of an apartment house. Our new apartment consisted of two rooms with wooden floors and three windows—it was really an attic made into living space. The house was made of brick and stone.
These living quarters were much smaller than our place in Zabludava. It was a different type of living. Our water was carried in buckets from a well in the yard and instead of an oven we hada stove in which we used peat for fuel. We dug up the peatfrom thesurroundingfields.
My schooling in Bialystok was different too. I went to the Talmud Torah, the Hebrew Parochial school, and instead of ten boys, we were about fifty boys to a class. One thing good about this school was that there was running water in the school building; all other facilities were outside.
We davened once in a while in the great Shul by Reb Yossele, the Rabbi, and our Chazan was named Bass. He admitted readily that he was a great Chazan because he had
My father and mother
sung for the Czar, and he lost no opportunity to remind us about this at every chance he got.
Once in a while I would go out with my father on the wagon, but it seemed more important for me to bring home some earnings to help the family, so I began to work part time. About a month before Passover I went to work in a place where they made Matzoh. My mother and my sisters worked there also. I would pour the water, my older sisters would pour the flour, and then my mother would roll the dough. ‘This work gave us an income to enable us to get Matzohs for the Passover season and to buy clothing for the holidays. I well remember how my mother always used to worry and ask my father how we would manage for the holidays, and how my father would answer, “God will help us.”
I was Bar Mitzvah in the small Beth Hamedrash in the Argentina Gass (Argentine Street). We did not have a big party. Asa matter of fact, nobody had parties for a Bar Mitzvah boy. One went to Shul, was called up to the Porah, and that was it. We did not make much of a fuss about this matter of becoming a man in Israel. We were already working and we already had responsibilities.
WhenI was thirteen years old I started to work full time. Like the fellow in the folk song, “The foggy, foggy dew, I learned the weaver’s trade. In those days there were no great automatic looms; it was all hand work. I lasted about six months on this job. Working with my father outside had given me a distaste for inside work, so I determined to leave the job and start in business for myself.
I took a lot of odd jobs, and earned a kopeck here and a kopeck there. I worked in a place that made rope, and I was paid 125 kopecks a week. I began to be a man and would go out with the other men to eat my lunch. A woman near our factory used to cook for us. I could eat a meal of lung and liver for three kopecks plus one kopeck for bread. The other men would spend eight or nine kopecks and eat calf meat or lamb
meat, but even in those days I was conservative and would not spend more than I had, and would try to save what I could.
You must know that a boy of thirteen in those years was a responsible person who assumed the duties and obligations which now devolve upon young people much later in life. I had decisions to make and I made them.
You must also understand that at that time in that place there were very few opportunities for a Jewish boy to better his lot. TThere were very few jobs. What jobs there were offered little opportunity. One could stagnate—one could makea living of sorts and get married and bring up a family, but there was little chance for betterment and I did not feel that I wanted to be satisfied with mediocrity on a treadmill. I did not want to spend a lifetime of working to stay in the same place. I had respect for work and recognized the dignity of labor—of working with one’s hands and one’s mind and one’s body—and I wanted to work to help my parents and my brothers and sisters, and so I began.
I made my decision. I put a bag on my back and started out to gather junk in the surrounding towns and villages. I gathered it all together in one spot, and then I would hire a horse and wagon and return to Bialystok where I graded it and sold it to the wholesalers. I was a hard worker. Before long I was able to buy my own horse and wagon for twenty rubles which I had saved kopeck by kopeck after working for a year on foot.
When I had the horse and wagon, my work methods changed. I would start out in the evening and drive all night to the next town so that I would be there early in the morning to begin the business of the day. If the town warranted it, I would stay for several days until I had acquired a load, and then I would drive all night back home. The next day I would grade the material and dispose of it to the wholesalers. I continued in this business until I was almost nineteen years of age. Once in a while my younger brother Abe would help me on
the horse and wagon. He was a good boy and anxious to be useful.
At about this time in my life I began to notice girls, but there was nothing special about them to bother me. One thing that did bother me was a prospect which troubled many thousands of young men such as I was at that time. This was the prospect of having to go into service in the Army at the age of twenty-one. I did not want to go. You must understand that there was no cowardice involved in this reluctance to serve my country. ‘The Russia of the Czars was not a pleasant place for Jews, and to go into the service of the Army was to place one’s self at the mercy of every soldier and officer who was not Jewish. In the years of my childhood and young manhood there had been many sporadic attacks upon Jews in Russia and in other places. In the Army if a Jewish soldier was attacked he did not dare fight back because his attacker could call upon the services of every other anti-semite in the barracks and he would be backed up by the non-commissioned officers right up to the highest officers. I could handle myself in a fight, but since there was no justice for Jews in the Army, I was again faced with a decision, and I made it. I decided to go to America.
There was another aspect to my life which helped me make that decision. Like any young man and young woman,I was in partial rebellion against life and wanted to make ours a better world to live in. Today the young people give expression to their revolutionary ideas by participating in human relations causes. In previous years their rebellion took other forms.
I had begun to go to meetings when I could spare the time and was attracted to the intellectual concept of socialism. I attended gatherings of the Fereinigte Bund of Russia, Lithuania and Poland. Such meetings were illegal and once in a while I got into scrapes with the police. I always managed to get away, but they had begun to notice me, or so I thought. This also helped shape my decision to go to America.
I have a confession to make. There was reason for the police to notice me. The Government of the Czar considered
any thought of freedom to be treason. Even to meet and talk about the concept of a better life was illegal. We were branded as revolutionaries and pursued relentlessly—when they could find us. We were not revolutionaries. The Bolsheviki were the revolutionaries. We were socialists who believed in the orderly evolutionofchangeasameanstobetterourlot.
We would meet in private homes when our district leader called us. We would discuss the bitter life which all of us led. Sometimes we would have a prosnick (a holiday). Iftheweather permitted, we would go to the woods, all of us coming from different directions, have some food and sometimesa glass of beer, and listen to a few speeches. We had to hide in this way because such gatherings were illegal. Once in a while someone would report that a gathering was taking place, and the police wouldtrytobreakitup. Theyrarelycaughtus.
Around 1902 or 1903 one of our top leaders died. His funeral procession took the form ofa march by the workers who walked behind the coffin. The red flagwasraised—in those days the red flag was a symbol of socialism and did not bear the stigmawhichtheCommunistshavegivenittoday.
The funeral proceeded along Washlikover Gass to the cemetery. The police decided to break up this march and rushed the procession wielding their nagaikes (whips). Several people were wounded and a number were killed. After this affair, the police started to follow us up more frequently. ‘The more they followed us, the more we tried to carry on the work.
I had become an underground courier, carrying literature to the various towns where we had membership. Since I was a junk man and had legitimate business and traveled often at night, the police did not yet suspect me. I would arrive in a town in the middle of the night and wake up my contact and turn over to him the messages and literature whichI carried. However, after the Washlikover Street affair, I began to believe that I was suspected by the police. One night my horse and wagonwerestuckon theroadin themud, andpeopleandpolice
began to gather. I had a load of illegal literature with me, and you can well imagine how relieved I was when finally my horse and wagon were dragged out of the mud and I was able to proceed. That was the last time for me. I made the decision to go.
I discussed matters with Benjamin Tolinsky, a friend of mine, who liked my idea very much and wanted to go to the United States with me. He had been courting my sister, Sadie, and they became engaged before we left. I sold my merchandise, gave the horse and wagon to my parents and bought passage to the States. Since Ben had no funds, I also bought passage for him. It happened that he had an uncle in Philadelphia,sowegavetheagentthenameandaddressofhisuncle, and it was to Philadelphia that we planned to go. In those days there were agents who specialized in arranging for immigrants to make this whole journey from door to door. Our contract was from Bialystok to Philadelphia and cost 100 rubles each.
We started our journey around the middle of July in 1904. We had no passports and certainly would not be issued any because we were nearly of army age, so we had to sneak out of Russia.
We left at night. All the family walked to the edge of the town with us, my mother crying bitter tears and praying for our welfare, and reminding me not to forget to write. When I arrived in America I did write, but that first letter of mine was never received.
My father and brothers, Abe and Morris, drove us to Grajwer (pronounced Gryver), a town in Poland which borders on Germany. After traveling for a day and a night to get to Grajwer, we left my father and brothers and crossed the border at night, walking about ten miles on foot. It was dangerous because the Russian patrols guarding the border were looking for people like us, and they would not hesitate to shoot us on sight. Next morning we arrived in the border city of Prosk, Germany. There we went toa sterilizer station and removed
our clothing and put it through a sterilizer because we had gathered quite a bit of “company” in our travels. Our bodies were sterilized in a steam room. After we were dried out we put on our clothes minus the “company” and we and our clothes traveleda little lighter.
That evening we boardeda train with our baggage, together with many other people. The car was a third class coach and was as comfortable as a box car. Many men and women were in the car with us and we hada fine time. As I look back upon it, it was an arduous journey, but we were going forward to a new and unknown future and there was a joy in us that somehow communicated itself to all those around us. The cars were shabby and the hard seats uncomfortable and none of the people in the car with us were in any better circumstance than we, but we had a good time. The journey took three days, and we traveled through Germany and Holland until finally we arrived in Antwerp, Belgium. In Antwerp we were sent to a boarding house. ‘Twelve of us men were assigned to one room, and we stayed there a week waiting to board the vessel assigned to take us to the United States.
Again, as I look back upon it, twelve men in a room was rather a crowded situation, but at that time it did not seem bad to us. During the waiting period, we were sent to a clinic for a health examination and a qualifying certificate which we were required to have before being permitted to board our ship. Finally, the timecame. We boardedourvessel, the “Kurland”, and we were on our way.
On the ship we traveled in steerage, four men to a cabin. Somewhere I had heard that it was better to have an upper bunk because of the sea-sickness, so I got an upper bunk, but I can tell you after that experience that when the ship wallowed in the waves, the upper bunk moved about as much as the lower one.
We spent most of the day on deck. Some of the first and second class passengers amused themselves by throwing oranges
and other fruit to us, and we would scramble about and climb over each other trying to catch the fruit because we did not have anything like that served to us in our steerage dining quarters. However, we did get solid wholesome food such as potatoes, noodles with meat, soups, and so on, which was served to us in tin pans.
Those of us who were more adventurous hada lot of fun. Again in retrospect I can see the humor and tragedy of our situation, but at that time it was fun. The girls were on the other side of the vessel and a young fellow like me wanted to see them. In order to do so, I had to sneak through the lower part of the ship where the garbage cans and the steam boilers were located, and also I had to sneak through the engine room, but I did it and we would talk and sing together and enjoy ourselves.
On the morning of August 19, 1904, we arrived in New York harbor and saw the Statue of Liberty for the first time.
To a Russian-Jewish immigrant boy, America was the “Goldene Medina’, the Golden Land. It was a land of milk and honey, and money lay in the streets waiting to be picked up. The Statue of Liberty was a symbol that the immigrant had become a ‘‘freie mentsch’, a free man. He no longer had to fear the Pogrom or the Cossacks, or the Nagaika, the whip and club which the Russian police gleefully wielded. This was the America to which I came, and in which for more than six decades I live and work, and I have never permitted myself to become disillusioned. The America to which I came is the America of my dreams and shall remain so.
It did not then seem that we were being herded like cattle. We landed at Ellis Island, passed through customs with our meager possessions, and were given a thorough clinical exam1ination, especially about the eyes.
For us it was push and rush and get in line, bend over, stand up, open your mouth, open your eyes, move over there. By the time we were through with that routine and our examinations, it was late in the afternoon and we were put ona ferry boat for the trip to New York City. When we landed on the pier in the big City they made us pay a quarter for a box lunch which contained pumpernickel bread, a box of sardines, and a piece of bologna. I was so hungry that before I had time to see what I was eating, I had swallowed it almost whole. From there we were sent to the Reading Railroad Ferry on Liberty Street in New York, and crossed the Hudson River to a pier in Jersey City. We were put aboarda train at about six o'clock in the evening, traveling third class, bound for Philadelphia. We arrived in Philadelphia about ten o'clock that evening on the street level at the old station at Ninth and Spring Garden Streets, where we awaited the arrival of Ben’s cousins. When they arrived, we got on an open trolley and rode to their home at No. 232 Christian Street. My life in America had begun.
At this time my friend Ben Tolinsky became Ben olin. I changed my name to Tabas and suggested he change his. This way he wouldn't be so “‘green”’.
The home of my boyfriend’s uncle was in an alley in the rear, a three story house with one room toa floor. The first floor was the kitchen, and was furnished with a cast iron stove, a table with an oilcloth cover, and several chairs. It served as a kitchen and dining room and living room and also as the bedroom of the parents. Ben’s two girl cousins slept on the second floor and his four boy cousins, together with Ben and me, making six of us, slept on the third floor. The hydrant for water was in the yard as were the other facilities, including the ‘“outhouse’”’.
Getting down to the yard from the third floor was not easy. The descent was made by way of a winding stairway and accidents could have happened before reaching the yard. The style for greeting ““Greenhorns’’ when they first arrived was to treat them to a drink of epsom salts, which as you can understand made haste down the stairs necessary.
We slept two in a bed. In the morning whenI arose and looked around I saw additional “company” in the bed. I had seen the little grey ones, but the ones I saw in my new America were large black ones.
When we came downstairs we were given breakfast of cereal, white bread and coffee. Then I went outside in front of the house and observed the goings-on in this new world of mine, and I thoughtaboutwhatthefuturewouldhold in store for me.
I had little money and it was necessary that I find work very quickly. I could not impose too long upon Ben’s family. They had not much interest in me, but occupied themselves taking Ben around and showing him the city.
On this first morning I noticed many dark skinned people such as I had never seen before. Also several times I saw men with bags on their backs, shouting, “Rags, Bones, Bottles” ina loud tone which was familiar to me, since that was what I had done in the old country. There were also men with pushcarts of fruit and vegetables, likewise shouting, which brought back pleasant memories to me.
One day as I was strolling the street and drinking in the sights of this new land, a man passed by looking for someone to do a job which he had to offer. Not knowing the language at the time, I was unable to understand him, so I enlisted the aid of a nearby grocery man who explained that the man wanted me to wash soda bottles, that the pay was $3.00 a week, and he asked whether I would like to take the job. Immediately and emphatically I said “Yes”. The man left me the address of his place with instructions to report for work at seven o'clock the
next morning. The place was about twenty blocks from where I lived, and the next morningI got up in time to walk there.
It was a soda-water bottling plant. There were many bottles in large tubs of hot and cold water, and plenty of soap powder. The man gave me an apron to put on and I began to work by shaking the bottles, first with the hot and then with the cold water. When I was about to finish the pile which I thought would be fine and I could rest, another load was brought in with more bottles. I continued to work this way until seven o'clock in the eveningfor three days.
On the fourth day, a man came in and saw me washing the bottles. This was the fellow who had previously had the job, and he immediately sought out the boss and asked, ‘That greenhorn, is he going to be your bottle-washer?’”’ It was evident to the boss that he wanted his old job back, and since he was experienced, the boss called me into the office and gave me $2.25 for the three days of my work. This was the first two dollars and a quarter that I earned in the United States of America.
I was now out of a job. I came back to the house and told Ben’s uncle and some of his friends that I was anxious to go to work. Among those people was a man next door, also a “greenhorn” but who had been in this country about a month, who told me that he went out every day looking for a job and that he knew where to look. I arranged to go out with him.
We started out at about five o’clock in the morning and walked to a sugar refinery about fifteen or twenty blocks from our house. We found a crowd of men standing around to get a job. That job paid $6.00 a week. Then the foreman came out and picked a few Polish and other foreign men, and also some colored men, all tall and strong.
My friend and I were left standing, and the gates were closed. We then looked around and stopped at many other places, but could not find work.
My brother, Abe, on the left. We posed shortly after he arrived in America.
While we were walking I kept my eyes open and observed the various businesses and the several markets which we passed. Most appealing to me were the men with the bags and the pushcart peddlers. By the end of the week I had made up my mind that I would get a pushcart and go out in the market to see if I too could purchase some fruit and vegetables to sell. I discovered a place to hire a pushcart for twenty-five cents a day and I made a deal with the man to hire one for $1.00 a week. I told my friend Ben about my plans and that if he wanted to join me on Monday morning we would have to get up about 4 A.M. He didn’t very much fancy that, but I persuaded him and woke him up and we rented the pushcart and brought it to the market on South Street where the farmers came from the countryside the evening before with their horses and wagons to wait for the morning market. By the time we arrived at 4th and South Streets, it was about six o'clock already and the market was pretty well sold out. I told Ben to stay with the pushcart while I looked around to see what I could do. As I walked along, I saw a farmer with twelve baskets of tomatoes which he had left over and I asked him how much he wanted for the tomatoes. He said he had been selling them for fifteen cents a basket, so I offered him a “‘ruble’’—I meant a dollar for the lot. He seemed to be amused at that and he and the other farmers laughed and said, “A greenhorn, he doesn’t know the difference between a dollar and a ruble.”” He happened to be a Jewish farmer. However, I persuaded him to let me have the lot for a dollar with the understanding that I would give him back the baskets after the tomatoes were sold.
I went back to get the pushcart, and was disappointed to find that Ben had left. Nevertheless, I took the pushcart to the place where I had bought the tomatoes, emptied the baskets and laid the tomatoes out in the pushcart. Then the farmer told me that I would have to have a quarter-peck and a half-peck measure, small wooden buckets, and that I would have to buy them. He told me where to go. Both measures were in one—one side for a quarter-peck, and the other side for a half-peck. This cost me twenty-five cents.
I started out with a full pushcart of tomatoes, and I went toward the residential section of the neighborhood, calling, “Three cents a quarter-peck and five cents a half-peck— Tomato-o-o.’’ My voice carried from one end of the block to the other. It took me a little time, but I soon become accustomed to the difference in money and could change a bill and knew the difference between dimes and quarters, etc., which had been so very new to me. About three o’clock in the afternoon I was all sold out. I returned the pushcart and went back to my quarters and told them that I had made over a dollar today. My friend and the people around there could not believe it. I continued to do that work for a couple of weeks, but soon grew tiredof it.
At about this time I moved out of Ben’s uncle’s house, and went to my own furnished room at No. 236 Christian Street. It was not the house on Christian Street, but a house in back ofthatonewhichwasreachedthroughanalley.
One thing about this America at that time, I was not surrounded by enemies. I did not have to be wary of the people around me, I did not have to fear attacks. What I wanted to do I could do, and I wanted to do and do and do. I wanted to make a living and to send money to my family and to bring them to join me in this free land. This land was a source of great wonder to me andI appreciated it. I still appreciate it. It is awonderfulland.
While I worked the pushcart, I kept my eyes open and saw that there were opportunities in my original business, which was rags and junk. I decided to do something about it, so one day I went to a place where these materials were handled and spoke to the owners about the procedures which I ought to follow. One of the owners happened to be a “‘landsman”’ of mine, that is, he came from the town where I lived, and had been in the United States for quite a few years. His name was Jacob Sall and he was in partnership with another man by the name of Kaplan. The firm name was Kaplan and Sall.
He gave me a bag and suggested that I go out among the neighbors and call out “Rags”. He advised me to get a hand scale, which I bought at the Ten Cent Store. It was a hand scale with a spring with a weighing capacity of up to fifty pounds. I went through the neighborhood which was largely Polish and Hungarian, shouting, “Rags, Rags, Rags.’’ Before long I had a bag full of rags weighing about 100 pounds. I brought it to Kaplan and Sall and made thirty cents profit at once. By the end of the day I had made better than a dollar.
I liked this business and continued it for some time. Then I decided it was time that I try to expanda little, so I hired a pushcart for a few weeks. This was successful so I went out and bought a pushcart for $5.00 from a man who had been in the same business and who had gone out of business. I went along fine for several months until the Winter came and snow piled up on the ground which made it difficult for me to push the pushcart. So I began to look for somethinga little different in the same field. I tried a new one. I went out among the grocery and cigar stores. In those days, tea came in boxes which were lined with sheet lead. Also, cigar stores sold chewing tobacco which came wrapped in tin foil. I managed to pick up a few pounds of these materials here and there and since sheet lead brought four to five cents a pound and the tin foil brought twenty to twenty-five cents a pound, I managed to make a couple of dollars a day, more or less, during the bad weather.
I was a prodigious worker. I am not ashamed to admit that I liked to work and I lked to earn a dollar. I had good reasons. I had a family in the old country who needed my help and I was working to bring them over here. I decided to expand my activities. At first I hired a horse and wagon for one dollar a day, then I made a deal with the stable man for a rate of $5.00 a week, then I decided to buy my own rig, which I did, together with a harness. It cost me $25.00.
I was saving as much as I could, and by that time I had saved enough so that I could send for my brother Abe. His real
name in the old country was “‘Itzel’’. I bought passage for him and he arrived in America around the first of Apu 1905. 1 took him to my new lodging place where I paid $3.00 a month plus $1.00 for the use of the basement for my merchandise. When Abe arrived I had to pay $1.00 a month extra for him because he shared my bed. It seemed to me unreasonable that I should have to pay the extra dollar because the bed was being usedanyway, but I couldafford itandI paid it.
Shortly after Abe arrived, I came across a deal involving printing machinery which the owner wanted to break up and sell to me for scrap. I arranged with him that I could break it up in his basement, weigh it and carry it to my wagon and load it after paying him twenty-five cents per hundred pounds. Since I sold it for forty cents per hundred pounds, I had a good deal going. I made five loads that day and made almost $20.00.
That evening when I came home and talked to the grocery man and some of our friends in the lodging house, they did not believe me. At that time, according to their ideas, there wasn’t that much money in the whole country. But I persuaded them that it was true. From then on I forged forward in my business and looked for and made better deals—and more deals.
In that year of 1905 I also decided to bring my entire familytoAmerica. I boughtpassage formyfatherandmother, for my sister Sadie and my brother Morris.
After I sent them the passages, I went out and found a house at 905 Poplar Street, which I rented for $25.00 a month. The house had no furniture, so I went to Freeman’s Auction, which was then at 12th and Walnut Streets. Old Samuel T. Freeman was then alive, and I remember him well, especially his whiskers. I bought enough second hand furniture to furnish the house adequately for my family andI also got carpets for the floors.
In December of that year they all arrived and I met them at Ellis Island and brought them to Philadelphia on a regular train. When they arrived here and found the house ready for
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Esther and I, courting days.
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Ben Tolin with his wife, my sister Sadie.
them they were very surprised, and my mother was most happy about her furnished home, but she was more happy to see my brother Abe and me.
I took my mother to the grocery store and magnanimously told her to buy anything she wanted and needed. She was overwhelmed with the many good things that were available.
One of my fondest memories about my mother dates back to that day. I remember that she picked out, among other things, a big fat chicken weighing nine pounds, which cost me about sixty cents. She then went home and made Friday night dinner for us with plenty of everything to eat and drink. Never before in our lives had we so plentiful a repast as appeared on our table that night. It was an unforgettable Shabbes, the best in our lives. We were all together again, and there was plenty to eat. Best of all, my mother could fill her plate. She did not have to eat what was left after we ate.
There is an interesting side-light to our visit to the grocery. This place where my mother bought her first chicken in America was owned by a couple who later became the grandparents of the as yet unborn young lady who thirty-seven years later would marry my son Charles.
The following Saturday evening I took the entire family to the Yiddish Theatre at Third and Green Streets, only about ten blocks from where we lived at 9th and Poplar Streets. We did this several times, and finally one evening my mother took me aside and asked me, “My dear son, how can you do all these things?” I was very happy that I could make things so good for my family.
I felt I was very well off. At this time I already owned my own horse and wagon which cost me more than a hundred dollars. I had the house and the store and place of business at 905 Poplar St. In the house was a dining room and kitchen in back of the store. On the second floor was our living room and two bedrooms and bath, and on the third floor, three bedrooms. It wasa palace to us.
The following year in the fall I decided to move to Atlantic City. I had been there several times during the preceding year, and it appealed to me, not only because of the recreational facilities available, but because of the business opportunity it presented. I rented a house with yard space and stables and warehouse for twenty-five dollars a month. This house lad: a living room, a sitting room, a dining room, a kitchen, back and front porches, and five bedrooms and bath on the second floor. The address was 2019 Arctic Avenue.
While I was getting set at Arctic Avenue, I also rented a yard and warehouse on Tennessee Avenue for $25.00 a month. Thus I had two places of business in Atlantic City. Later I bought the house at Arctic Avenue for $5,000 and then I bought the yard and warehouse on Tennessee Avenue for $2,000. ‘Thus the new Acorn Iron & Supply Company was firmly launched.
At the same time I decided to open a place of business in Philadelphia for which I had a special fondness since coming to this country. My new place of business in Philadelphia was located at 5th and Clearfield Streets. The building and yard occupied a half block of ground. I installed a wagon scale and a machine shear to cut scrap, which was in those days a very big venture. Nevertheless I had confidence in my ability to make a success, and with the whole family working together ran both the businesses in Atlantic City and in Philadelphia. During the 1907-1908 financial crisis I sweated it out. Then in 1912 I decided to buy the block on Tennessee and Mediterranean Avenues in order to build a place of business such as I had always had in mind. I bought the place and cleared the land and erected a three story warehouse with loading facilities and an elevator, a floor scale and a truck scale, a scrap cutting machine, a waste material-baling press, and a railroad siding as well as all the other buildings necessary to the line of waste such as scrap iron, machinery equipment, waste paper, bottles, bones and other cast-off objects characteristic of a small town like Atlantic City. We graded everything, and packed and shipped to consumers all over the country. ie!
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At that time our line of business had a trade paper called the “Waste Trade Journal” which wrote an article about my plant. People in my line of business whenever they had an opportunity to come to Atlantic City for a vacation or convention or whatever cause, made it a point to come to see my place of business and complimented me by saying that it looked like a department store. By making the acquaintance of these many men and talkingwith those who had been in business for many years in the big cities, I broadened my knowledge and contacts in the field. In later years when I traveled around the country and visited their various establishments, they received me cordially, and as a result of this I made additional good business contacts. My family worked togetherdiligently. My friend Ben had married my sister, and he and my father and my brothers Abe and Morris and I worked hard. I was the outside man, contacting people about buying and selling the merchandise wehandled.
I started to become active in the civiclife ofthe city, joined the Chamber of Commerce, and since I was at this time a rather substantial businessman, I became active philanthropically in the Jewish community. I became involved in the building of the Synagogue and began to participate in such Jewish Organizations as B’nai Brith and the Zionist Organization. I was amongthe first to organize B’nai B’rith Lodge No. 19. I participated in forming the Y.M.H.A. and became one of the contributors to the new building. In addition, I was one of the founders of the “Arbeiter Ring’, which is also known as the Workman’s Circle. A few ofus got together for this and put up a dollar each for the initial start. As a result of that dollar I was regarded as being practically a millionaire. A dollar was a very valuable piece ofpaper and could buya lot in those days.
I was still single, and by 1912 I began to think that perhaps I ought to do something about changing my status. I began to have romantic ideas and to think about marriage. | had known several young ladies, but none of them had impressed me specially. However, I kept my eyes open as usual and one day
as I came out of the Colonial Restaurant on 5th and Lombard Streets in Philadelphia, I noticed a certain young lady. Although I had never met her, I liked her looks, and as she was walking on 5th Street, I also walked in that direction. As she turned off on Pine Street to the left, going West, I followed in the hope that I could catch another glimpse of her and perhaps talk to her. I had never been very aggressive or forward in the matter of girls, so I simply continued walking behind her until she turned on Seventh Street and I saw her enter the second or third house from the corner.
The young lady remained constantly in my memory from then on and I was determined to meet her. I asked of my friends and acquaintances, and fortunately one day met a man, a Mr. Margolis who was active in Jewish intelligentsia circles in Philadelphia, and told him about my problem and also pointed out to him the house where the young lady had entered. He informed me that he was acquainted with the people who lived in that house and he recommended them highly. Thus, at last, I met the young lady, and before long, my aim was accomplished. Her name was Esther Chepinsky.
Her father was in the soda-water bottling business and he said that he remembered me from my home and business at 905 Poplar Street where he had served me soda water at the rate of fifteen cents a box. I had been taking two boxes at one time then, and he had felt that I was indulging myself and regarded that as being very extravagant. When I informed him that I could well afford to buy two boxes of soda water at one time, he was quite pleased that a man of my affluence was interested in his daughter.
In November, 1914, Esther and I were married in Philadelphia in a hall at Broad Street and Montgomery Avenue, which then was the most exclusive place in Philadelphia. Our friends and relatives, and our landsleit and the bride’s family were very critical of me for having such a lavish wedding and being so extravagant. Nevertheless, on my wedding dayI hired a limousine for our personal use, and took my bride to the
Bellevue Stratford Hotel for our honeymoon. This also was a very exclusive place. We then went to Washington, staying in the best hotels and dining in exclusive restaurants, and traveling about the city seeing the sights. I wanted our marriage to start out in style, and it did. By the time we returned from our honeymoon, I had a new house completely furnished at 120 So. Massachusetts Avenue in Atlantic City. When I brought my bride there, she was truly and honestly astonished at the magnificence of our home. She was very pleased and we started our life togetherinpleasantcircumstances.
Now came a very happy time for me. Before a year had passed, my wife presented me with my first son, Charles, born September 13, 1915. Charles is now Executive Director of our many enterprises. In due time there were also born to us two more children, Frances, born in 1919, and Daniel, born August IS, 1923.
Providing employment for the members of my family and makinga living for my own little brood began to occupy more and more of my time and moved me to expand my business ventures further. I was anxious to provide a good life for my family. I was a hard worker and I was ambitious to make good. I therefore expanded the establishment in Philadelphia and also opened a yard and warehouse in Chester, Penna.
During World War I, I was exempt from military service because my business was essential to the war effort. I furnished specific military materials to steel mills and foundries manufacturing steel for making munitions and ordnance. I became busier and busier, and after the War purchased a brass rod and tube extruding mill with about twenty acres of land and large buildings in Downingtown, Penna. ‘Then, together with associates, I purchased a large textile wool processing plant in Manayunk. We ran that business until about 1930. In this ventureweemployedseveralhundredpeople.
Soon after this I began to venture into the real estate market. The first big transaction in which I was involved was
the purchase of a seven story apartment building with stores at the corner of So. Carolina and Pacific Avenues in Atlantic City. Later I invested in another apartment house with stores at the corner of Atlantic and Georgia Avenues, and then expanded into several other real estate projects in Atlantic City.
Also at this time I started a structural steel business in conjunction with my regular business. I bought the latest structural steel fabricating machinery and erecting equipment. I began to erect buildings in Atlantic City, first on the boardwalk, and then later expanded my activities anywhere and everywhere from the inlet to the end of Longport, including Hackney’s Restaurant, the Breakers Hotel, the Madison, the Ambassador, and almost every hotel and apartment house small and large in and around Atlantic City and Atlantic County and in the State. I was willing to supply anything from a small angle-iron toa fifteen story building. We continued this activity at full force until 1930. And when 1930 and 1931 came along, these hotels owed me so much money that if they were to permit me and all my family to stay at no expense for the rest of our lives, this would still not cover the bills which they left unpaid.
Because of these circumstances, I acquired several hotel enterprises in Atlantic City, among them the Stratford Hotel at South Carolina and Pacific Avenues with over a hundred rooms, and later the Blackstone Hotel at Virginia and the Boardwalk, that had about 500 rooms. My son Charles, who was then about thirteen years old, was placed in charge of these ventures.
All of the above sounds glorious, and I was a very busy businessman with vast interests. However, none of it was as good as it sounds. From 1920 to 1930 there was much hardship and tragedy in our lives. My mother passed away, and then my sister Sadie. About 1926 my dear wife, Esther, passed away, leaving me with the three children. Charles was then ten years old; our little girl Frances was about seven years old; and Daniel was less than three years old. Then on October 13, 1933,
Our lovely little Frances.
My three little ones after their mother passed away.
my little girl, Frances, only fourteen years old, passed away, and a little light went out of my life. In 1935 my father passed away, and thus passed all of my ties with the old country.
After the crisis of 1930-1934, in the heart of the depression, I was pretty well cleaned out of my enterprises. We moved back to Philadelphia and located the Acorn Iron & Supply Company at Delaware Ave. and Poplar Street and started again from the ground up, where the business continues on, together with the general offices of the other enterprises. My son Charles and I were on the job from seven o'clock in the morning until late at night every day, including Sunday. I still go to the office daily and take an active part in our many business activities. We did the best we could to make things go with the limited amount of capital available, and sent Daniel to school. This continued until World War IJ came along and Daniel went into the Army. Charles and I worked as hard as we could under war regulations, and coped with priorities and shortages of manpower. This was a terrible job.
Our Daniel came back from the Army and took diligently to the business. He was a very aggressive and able young man and a great help. We purchased the property on Delaware Avenue and Poplar Street, where we are still located.
After thirteen years of being single and raising my children after Esther died, I remarried. This marriage lasted about ten years, but unfortunately did not work out well. I ventured again into the marital state with my present wife, Ida.
Many things shape the course of a man’s life. One day, as I was walking on Third Street between Market and Arch, I saw a building at No. 20 North Third Street with the name “Daniel Building”. I had a hunch, contacted the real estate broker, and bought that seven story commercial building with stores. We then purchased an 8-story commercial building with stores at 121-125 N. 8th Street. We named it the ‘Charles Building”. Later, we bought a large five-story commercial building and stores occupying a city block of 8th Street from Spring Garden
to Green Street, which was named the “Samuel Building”. I was so prodigiously busy that I did not have time to think about myself. So my sons thought about me and decided at this time that I should take a vacation. It was my aim to see our America before going anywhere else.
In the past, when I went somewhere, whether on business or for pleasure, I always arranged to include business. ‘This time was no exception. When we started our vacation, I made up my mind to see business people on the way. We traveled by automobile from Philadelphia as far as Tucson, Arizona, stopped in to see various people with whomI had done business and also made some new acquaintances. We went out by the northern route and we returned via the southern route. That trip paid for itself—and then some. We were away three months.
WhenI finally returned to the office I noticed that Daniel and our engineer were away a good deal of the time. I tried to find out where they were or what they were doing, but it appeared to be in the nature of a secret. Finally, I discovered that they were in Downingtown. At that time, Downingtown was a forgotten memory to me because of all the misfortunes I had had in business during the depression. ‘The Downingtown plant was one where everything had gone to ruin through the bad times and the crisis, and freak winds and storms which ruined the neglected buildings. Thus the effect it had on me was that I did not want to see it anymore, and as the phrase goes, I was willing to give it back to the Indians. However, I went to Downingtown to see what Daniel and our engineer were doing.
I found that they were demolishing the structures, and erecting new ones. They were very clever about it, quarrying stone for the buildings from the ground on which they were building. At first I did not approve of it because memories of past hardships were still vivid, but Daniel and Charles persisted, and since I was really proud of them and respected their ability, I withdrew my objections. The work continued, one
This is the Tabas Family Circle, Some are already gone,
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large building was built and we succeeded in obtaining a very good tenant, the well known Pepperidge Farm Bakery.
Then I decided that I had better get on the bandwagon, and we built another building and acquired another tenant from California, and then another and still another. The Pillsbury Mills came to us, and also a subsidiary of the Philip Morris Tobacco Company. We built more buildings and obtained another high grade tenant, the well known Beloit Corporation, maintaining offices for manufacturing papermaking machinery. Ground was bought on Boot Road and more buildings were built. The Pepperidge Farm plant expanded more and more and became one of the biggest and best tenants. More industrial buildings were constructed on these sites. Also on several blocks of ground nearby there were built homes and garden type apartments.
In 1952 the famous Downingtown Farmers Market was built on a tract of about 100 acres on Lincoln Highway on the outskirts of Downingtown. This was a building of some 50,000 square feet which was expanded to 100,000 square feet, with parking facilities for several thousand cars or more. Then about 1960 the Downingtown Motor Inn was built on 100 acres of land, and included in the structure is the former Ashbridge Mansion, which is still there in front, as part of the project, and it is now known as the 1796 House Restaurant. It started with less than 100 rooms, and now has 350 rooms, indoor and two outdoor swimming pools, tennis courts, and other recreational facilities, as well as one of the largest clear-span convention ballrooms in the East with seating capacity of 2500 for dinner. An 18 hole golf course adjacent to the Inn has been added, increasingtheareato400 acres.
Lately, other properties and several tracts of land have been acquired, with the intention of developing apartment sites and housing for the Golden Aged.
My time and efforts are spent mostly in philanthropic, communal and humanitarian endeavors for youth and the aged.
Philanthropic endeavors were nothing new to me. My mother and father had taught me that Mitzvoth were commanded of each Jew, and aside from the Mitzvah of visiting the sick or of doing a kind thing for somebody, the great Mitzvah laid upon us was the Mitzvah of Zdukah (charity).
In 1951, with my sons Charles and Daniel, I established the Samuel Tabas Family Foundation to be used for the assistance of charitable, religious, scientific, literary or educational institutions; to help the poor; for the care of the sick, aged and helpless; for the encouragement of science, literature and art; for providing scholarships to any recognized school, college or university, whether secular or religious. I felt that this land was good to me and I wanted to pay some of it back.
A few years later, I established the Samuel Tabas Trust, and I authorized the trustees to use any portion of the income or of the principal as needed for the educational requirements, for medical or surgical expenses, or for any other unusual needs or emergency requirements of any of my descendants, of my brothers’ or sister’s descendants or my mother’s brother’s descendants; in fact to help any relative, and I tried to impress upon my relatives that they had a right to derive benefit from this trust because they were of my blood.
I have one special philanthropic project that I have been working on for some time. It is to establish residence and convalescent homes for the Golden Aged on a parcel of ground of about fifty acres which I have endowed to the cause as well as a substantial sum of money. This project will become a community for the aged. My feelings are that this is a necessity. From my experiences in life, and from participating in charitable organizations from orphans’ homes to aged homes, I learned that the aged are the “forgotten” people in our modern day, and they need the security and understanding, the association and dignity to which they should be entitled. Even though they are aged, I want them to feel that they can look forward to the future. The establishment of this project is very dear to me, and
My youngest brother, Morris, in the center, with Abe and me in the early fifties.
my sons and their wives and children are helping me, for which I amgrateful.
Two of the most memorable experiences in my life were the marriage of my son Charles to Harriette Steelman on June 28, 1942, and the marriage of my son Daniel, on December 5, 1948, to Evelyn Rome, who is the daughter of a well known Brooklyn Rabbi. Both of my sons’ weddings were outstanding.
Up to now Charles and Harriette have presented me with three grandchildren, Andrew, Nancy and Richard, and Daniel and Evelyn have given me six grandchildren, Lee, Linda, JoAnn, Carol, Robert and Susan. They are all the joy of my life.
In 1950 we organized a cousins’ club, whose membership is the offspring of my brothers, my sister and myself. This is known as the ““Tabas Family Circle’. In the beginning we had some twenty-five people in the club, and now we have over fifty. Lately, in addition, I am bringing in my cousins, most of whom live in New York and other parts of the country, to integrate them into the family circle. It has given me great satisfaction to see all my kin together. Last year, about a hundred of us were in attendance at the yearly gathering which I sponsor, and which is becominga tradition among us. It is my hope that my sons will carry on the tradition.
What an America this is! Only here can a boy born in a log cabin become a President. Only here can the son of the Krabelnick talk on equal terms with Senators and Congressmen and Mayors and Governors and Judges and tycoons. It is only in this great America that the immigrant boy of humble beginnings can stand high and respected in his community and hobnob with the great.
Great events in my life started in Atlantic City when I established business there in 1906. I was in business only a short time when New Jersey State Senator Edward Wilson became interested in me. He was a prominent insurance man and active in the Chamber of Commerce, and he invited me to 5b
join the Chamber as his friend. We were together socially many, many times.
It was at the Chamber meetings that I met the elite from Atlantic City, the business and professional men of standing, which was very unusual for a young man of .my background, associating with people like this. There were many remarks among others of my friends that I may be stepping up too ageressively, and there was a feeling of envy.
I had the pleasure to meet with Governor Woodrow Wilson at one of these meetings, and we had quite a chat together. I saw this gentleman several times again, and was quite pleased that he remembered me well, and we became quite good friends. He later became President of the United States.
I was very active in the Chamber of Commerce, and I recall that it was at a yearly dinner of the Chamber at the Marlborough-Blenheim Hotel, attended by Governors, State Senators and U. S. Senators that I happened to sit at a table with Judge Josiah White who owned the hotel. He was Judge of the Superior Court. He became interested in talking with me, and whenI told him that I came to this country only a short time ago, it was very fascinating to him. I remember we were eating chicken, and he particularly noticed that I ate with a knife and fork. He explained to me that I could eat chicken with my hands as he did. The chicken tasted better after that.
Later on, his brother, Charles, became Mayor of Atlantic City. He also was fascinated with me as I used to walk on the boardwalk with him quite often, especially on Sunday mornings. In those days all the high muckity-mucks wore full dress morning attire, and any time he would see me, he would come over and take me by the arm and walk with me and tell me all about his affairs and his troubles in State politics, etc., etc. He felt that he could take me into his confidence.
These annual dinners of the Chamber became an important part of my life. It was at one of these that I had the
Ida and I talk with Mrs. Roosevelt at the home of Harriette and Charles.
HUBERT
H. HUMPHREY MINNESOTA
United Bhates Senate
WASHINGTON, D.C.
May 22, 1963
Mr. Samuel Tabas
Downingtown Motor Inn
Route 30 - Lancaster Pike
Downingtown, Pennsylvania
Dear Sam: It was grand to see you again. And some day I hope I can visit Downingtown Motor Inn. I know it is a marvelous place.
Sincerely ,
Se haetf Hubert H. fee
I’m telling Senator Ribicoff.
I’m telling Senator Pastore.
I’m telling Senator Prox
mire.
I’m telling Michael Comay, Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations.
pleasure of being introduced to Charles Schwab, who was the tycoon of the U. S. steel business, and later I was introduced to the gathering as the ‘Atlantic City Tycoon”’ of the steel business. This acquaintance went on for some time, especially during the first World War when he came to build the Amatol shell loading base in New Jersey near Atlantic City.
It was also at one of these dinners that we were told in confidence by a United States Senator, whose name I must not mention, that the then President Wilson was going to sign a Declaration of War against Germany. We knew that Declaration was to be signed before the public knew it.
I also had the pleasure of meeting a young man named David Sarnoff, who was associated with Marconi Wireless, who, in a very pleasant chat, informed me that he was a landsman of mine. Today he is General Sarnoff and Chairman of the Radio Corporation ofAmerica.
If I were to try to list all the people among my friends and acquaintances who have made their mark upon the life of our time, it would be too longa list to be read with enjoyment. In my later days, I became acquainted with many other dignitaries, such as the then Senator Hubert Humphrey, who is now the Vice-President of the United States, Senator Abraham Ribicoff with whom I have shared many pleasant hours, Senator John Pastore, and Governor George M. Leader of Pennsylvania.
One of the highlights of my lifetime was the pleasure of entertaining Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt at the home of Harriette and Charles. This very wonderful old lady had an enjoyable time with my grandchildren, Andy, Nancy and Richard, and in the spirit of the occasion she wrote her autograph on the wall. All of us consider this little spot a special shrine.
I have also had the pleasure of meeting and associating with men and women who have by their grit and determination helped establish the State of Israel. I have conversed with such men as David Ben-Gurion, Abba Eban, Golda Meir, Levi Esh-
kol, Michael Comay, the late Moshe Sharett, and many, many others.
Last year, on my 80th birthday, I was honored by the Jewish National Fund at a wonderful dinner-dance at the Sheraton Hotel in Philadelphia. My son, Charles, is President of the Jewish National Fund, and he was quite surprised when he was visited by a committee of officers of the Fund who asked him if he would not try to persuade “our family” to share my 80th birthday celebration with the community, and to help raise funds for J.N.F. Since all our affairs such as this were strictly family functions, we were quite reluctant, but we were persuaded that my birthday celebration could help further Jewish National Fund work in Israel, and of course we agreed.
It is hard to imagine the feeling it gave me as I was escorted by my two sons to the rostrum, and to look out at a vast crowd and to see among them my nine grandchildren, my two daughters-in-law, my wife, and such wonderful people as Senator William Proxmire, George M. Leader, the former Governor, and his wife, Mary Jane, old and valued friends, and many other prominent Philadelphians, among them bank presidents, industrialists, as well as other members of my family, and friends and associates of many years from different parts of the country. Also present was that great and distinguished philanthropist, Samuel H. Daroff, who is called “Mr. Philadelphia”, and I was very proud when he presented to me on behalf of the Jewish National Fund, a rare and coveted award, the ‘““Keter Shem Tov’, the Crown of a Good Name.
As this is written, I am in my eighty-first year. The brilliant light of morning has long given way to the fading afternoon, and dusk is beginning to fall. It is written, “Go, eat with joy thy bread, and drink with a merry heart thy wine, if God have already received thy works and favor.” (Ecclesiastes IX:VII). It is also written, “For if a man live many years, let him rejoice in them all; and let him remember the days of
Charles and Harriette and my grandchildren.
Daniel and Evelyn and my grandchildren.
This is my 80th birthday cake.
They
present me the Keter Shem Tov Award. Governor Leader on the left and Sam Daroff on the right, with Senator Proxmire and my sons.
dankwess . . (Hcclesiastcs X11) ‘1 remember them all, the good days and the bad. And I have taken with joy the bread upon my table and drunk merrily of my wine.
I remember well those who are gone and I look fondly upon those who are with me. I have always believed that a man has an obligation to himself and to his family and to his people and to his country and to the world. If I have not always met this obligation, it is not for lack of trying. I have tried.
As I look over these pages I am struck with wonderment that the essence of a man’s life can be reduced to so little paper and print. Yet I believe that what I have written here will answer the questions of those who want to know about my beginnings.
I am now as | was then, simply, Mulke.
