Lost in America: A Journey with My Father by Sherwin B. Nuland 2003

"Nuland brings the often-volcanic Nudelman vividly to life and makes it easy to see why this immigrant tailor (in Yiddish the family name means “needleman”) who worked in the city’s garment district had such a searing impact on his son’s life."
from a review by Bruce Fellman in the March 2003 Yale Alumni Magazine

Sherwin Nuland (1930- 2014) was a highly respected surgeon and writer – his 1995 book, How We Die: Reflections on Life’s Final Chapter, won the National Book Award. When he finally turned to writing this engaging memoir his aim was to examine his upbringing in the Bronx as the son of Jewish immigrants. He especially wanted to explore  his debilitating relationship with his father.

Sherwin Nuland’s parents were both born in Europe.  In the Bronx they and their two sons lived in a four room apartment along with the author’s maternal grandmother and his mother’s unmarried sister, Rose. If six people living in such close quarters wasn’t trying enough, adding to the tension were negative feelings his grandmother and Rose had toward Nuland’s father and the negative feelings he had for them. Nuland’s father had an explosive temper which cast a pall over the entire family. Nuland remembers his mother trying to negotiate between the two warring sides, trying to hold the family together.

Throughout the years they had to cope with more than their share of illness and death.  Nuland himself had a serious bout of diphtheria, and his mother died of colon cancer when the author was eleven. His father became more and more debilitated with a shuffling gate and stooped posture, and had such difficulty moving his limbs that he became increasingly dependent on his sons, especially his dutiful but resentful younger son Shepsel. (Sherwin’s Yiddish name.)

In this memoir the author examines and tries to come to terms with the difficult circumstances of his gloom-filled childhood.  A bright and ambitious student, Nuland notes how he was embarrassed by his father’s shtetl roots, his having never learned to write English, his heavily accented English - partly gibberish of his own invention, and his physical disabilities. His father barely made a living and the family relied on money Rose brought in as well as handouts from wealthier relatives.

As he grows older he observes the often large gulf between life in his Yiddish-speaking religiously-observant home and the kind of lives he is exposed to in the home of his friends and at college. Increasingly torn between his family’s needs and the wider world that beckons, the author tries to distance himself from his roots and to position himself for a successful life in America. He and his brother change their last name from Nudelman to Nuland and  the author chooses to attend Yale Medical School instead of staying in New York and going to medical school locally.

Age often begets wisdom. Nuland looks back at his father’s life with more understanding, if not forgiveness. He has painted a detailed and rich portrait of one Jewish immigrant family’s life in New York, both before and after World War II. Their story touches on many of the circumstances that confronted other immigrant parents who could not find their way in America but who were willing to sacrifice so that their children could have a measure of success in the new world.

To read an article about the quota of Jewish students admitted and Jewish teachers hired at medical schools, click here.
To watch a video of Sherwin Nuland discussing Lost in America click here.

Family
Peshe Lutsky
   Vitsche (Violet) Lutsky – daughter of Peshe; married Meyer Nudelman (original family name- Weinberg)
        Maishe Nudelman – son of Vitsche and Meyer
        Harvey Nudelman – son of Vitsche and Meyer
        Sherwin B. Nuland (Nudelman) – son of Vitsche and Meyer; second marriage to Sarah
            Drew Nuland – son of Sherwin
            Toria Nuland – daughter of Sherwin
           Will Nuland – son of Sherwin and Sarah
           Molly Nuland – daughter of Sherwin and Sarah
   Rose Lutsky – daughter of Peshe
   Beattie Lutsky – daughter of Peshe; married Emmanuel Ritter
       Arline Ritter – daughter of Beattie and Emmanuel

Sam (Shmuel Chaim) Simenowitz – nephew of Peshe
Noach Nudelman – father of Meyer (see above)
   Meyer Nudelman – son of Noach; married Vitsche Lutsky (see above)
   Avram Nudelman – son of Noach
Shoil Nudelman – brother of Noach
   Willie (Nuland) Nudelman – son of Shoil

Friends and Acquaintances
Ronald Eisenberg
Dudie Polishook
Jerry Kass
Yosel Asherovsky (Joe Astrove) – married Fanny
 Betty Astrove – daughter of Joe and Fanny
 George Astrove – son of Joe and Fanny
Ralph Astrove – brother of Joe
Leo Hochfeld
Ronald Chapnick
Moses Madonick
Julius Beckenstein
Liebush Lehrer
Ruth Isaacs
Stanley Cohen
Leonard Leibowitz
Frank Gartenberg

Places
Novaradugk, Lithuania
Novoselitz, Bessarabia
Bronx, NY
Buenos Aires, Argentina
Camp Boiberik, New York

Who She Was: My Search for My Mother’s Life, by Samuel Freedman 2005

"A son’s story, a Jewish story, an American story." from a review in Kirkus Reviews

The journalist Samuel Freedman (b. 1955) lost his mother to breast cancer when she was 50 during his sophomore year of college. He felt he never knew her very well, preoccupied as he was, first with his life as a teenager, then as a college student in Wisconsin, quite a distance from his home in New Jersey. He decided to do the research and write this memoir in an attempt to better understand her, by conducting extensive interviews with friends and family and by investigating other sources like letters, diaries, photos, and newspapers.

Through his research he recreates the Bronx of his mother’s youth, early adulthood, and young married life. He explores her home life, her Morris High School experiences, her work life and her social life. His skills as a journalist help him to place her life in historical context. He fleshes out the Jewish immigrant experience in the Bronx with the attendant tension between the immigrant parents and their American children. And he explores the social and economic impact of the Depression, World War II, and the post-war preoccupation with Communists in America. He also discusses what the cultural expectations were for a woman in his mother’s time and how those often unspoken restrictions played out in her life.

One of the most significant threads Freedman explores is the antagonistic relationship that existed between his mother and her mother which stemmed mostly from his grandmother’s insistence on the importance of living a traditional Jewish life. The author’s mother, a very bright student, spent much of her energy in rebellion. It is not surprising that the author, having delved as deeply as he could into their relationship and the circumstances surrounding it, develops a more nuanced understanding of both his mother and his grandmother.

But finally the author realizes that, despite having done a yeoman's job of recreating the past and having learned a great deal about his mother, he can never really know her completely. The fuller picture can never bring her to life, it can never completely fill the emotional gap created by her early death and his early loss.

To read an excerpt from this memoir, click here.
To read an article about the history of Jews in the Bronx, click here.

People
Author's mother's father's family
Sarah Hatkin
    Samuel Hatkin – son of Sarah
    Sol Hatkin – son of Sarah; married Rachel (Rose) Markiewicz
        Eleanor Hatkin – daughter of Sol and Rose; married Leonard Benjamin Schulman; second marriage to David Freedman
               Samuel Freedman - son of Eleanor and David; married Cynthia Sheps
                        Aaron and Sarah Freedman - children of Samuel and Cynthia
        Fannie Hatkin – daughter of Sol and Rose; married Danny Schlomkowitz (Stevens)
              Joel Schlomkowitz (Stevens) – son of Danny and Fannie
    Seymour Hatkin – son of Sol and Rose; married Evelyn
    Jacob Hatkin – son of Sarah; married Rachel Gartenberg, cousin of Rachel Markiewicz
    David Hatkin – son of Sarah

Mildred Schlomkowitz – sister to Danny (see above)
Jack and Hilda Schulman
     Leonard Schulman - son of Jack and Hilda (see above)
    Alan Schulman – son of Jack and Hilda
Leonard Hatkin – cousin of Eleanor; exact relationship unclear; married Thelma
Harry Schneer – cousin of Sol Hatkin; relationship unclear
Elaine Sheps - mother of Cynthia (see above)


Author's mother's mother's family
Yehuda Ariyeh Markiewicz – father of Rachel Markiewicz
 Rachel (Rose) Markiewicz – daughter of Yehuda Ariyeh; married Sol Hatkin (see above)
 Ester Dina Markiewicz – daughter of Yehuda Ariyeh; married Alter David Kaczkowicz
      Judis Kaczkowicz – daughter of Esther Dina and Alter David; married Jaime Prusky
      Julius Kaczkowicz– son of Ester Dina and Alter David; married Rebeca Kaganas
 Menuchi Markiewicz – daughter of Yehuda Ariyeh
 Avram Markiewicz – son of Yehuda Ariyeh
 Shifra Markiewicz – daughter of Yehuda Ariyeh

Shai Gartenberg – uncle of Rose Markiewicz – exact relationship not clear
Minnie and Morris Osder – Minnie is a cousin of Rose Markiewicz – exact relationship unclear
Rebeca and Guillermo Bronstein - relatives in Uruguay - exact relationship unclear
Dina Berlinblau - relative in Uruguay - exact relationship unclear
Pinhas Kaczkowicz – cousin of David Kaczkowicz (married to Ester Dina Markiewicz – see above)

Author's father's family
Samuel and Rose Freedman
    Ziggy Freedman – son of Samuel and Rose
    Clara Freedman – daughter of Samuel and Rose
    David Freedman – son of Samuel and Rose; married Eleanor Hatkin Schulman (see above)

Friends and Acquaintances
Regina and Monikou  Adler – sisters
Clare Abramowitz – married Hy Dickman
Leon Becker
Vicky Behar – married Dave Fried
Artie Bernfeld
Ralph Betstadt – married Lillian Golden
Miriam Beyman
Shirley Binenstock
Bruno (Bernie) Brenner – brother of Ignaz
Ignaz (Irving) Brenner – brother of Bruno; married Fannie Povodator
Florence Brodsky
Harry Ceitlin
Maxwell Cohen
Sid Cozin
Bern Dibner
Bernie Dunetz – married Anita Rosenhoch
 Sandy Dunetz – child of Bernie and Anita
Stanley Feldman – brother-in-law of Herman Keltz
Jerry Ferber
Bea Flesichman
Artie Fluger
Stanley Frank
Rudy Friedlander
Lou and Murray Glass – brothers; cousins of Vicky Behar
Al Glazer
Sol and Sidney Goldfarb – brothers
Mel Goodman
Howard Gropper
Dick Gumerov
Florence Herzog
Marion Herzog – daughter of Florence; married Saul Maidens
Max Kagan
Herman David Keltz
Mildred Keltz – sister of Herman
Rose Klekman
Hy Kraft
Abe Kronenfeld
Ruth Liebowitz
Morris Laitman
Joe Lempert
Leon Mandelbaum
Ted Millon
Bernie Murowitz
Harriss Pacter
Bernard Pacter – son of Harriss
Noach Pacter – brother to Harriss; married to Fannie
Sam Pacter – son of Noach and Fannie
  Ruth Pacter – daughter of Noach and Fannie; married Al Taylor
Estelle Pacter – daughter of Noach and Fannie
Simmy Plansky
Buddy Rashbaum
Neil Rosenberg
Bill Rosenhoch – sister of Anita; married Naomi Gruder
Pauline Rubenstein
Selma Rubenstein – daughter of Pauline
Hilda Saltzman Wachtenheim
George Slayton – cousin of Claire Abromowitz
Bernie Solomon
Jack Steinglass
Flo Zipkin

Places
Kolno, Poland
Bialystok, Poland
Morrisania, The Bronx, New York
Morris High School, The Bronx, New York
Brownsville, Brooklyn, New York
Montevideo, Uruguay
Stelton, New Jersey
Highland Park, New Jersey

Unfinished People: Eastern European Jews Encounter America by Ruth Gay 1996

Winner of the 1997 National Jewish Book Award

Ruth Gay uses the details of everyday living, such as food, furniture, and fashion to narrate the experiences of Eastern European Jewish immigrants adjusting to life in America. Drawing on her own life growing up with immigrant parents in the Bronx, and citing sources whose authors explore similar themes, she paints a picture of a community constantly evolving.

Gay starts with a chapter called “There” in which she discusses the conditions in Eastern Europe that precipitated the great wave of immigration during the decades at the end of the 19th century and those at the beginning of the 20th.  She discusses such topics as anti-Semitism and progroms, poverty, enforced military service, and the restrictions imposed by Orthodox Judaism. The main section of the memoir analyzes many aspects of the immigrant Jewish community in the Bronx during the period until World War II.  The last section of the book called “Here” serves as a conclusion, highlighting some of the major points in the main section.

The core of the book deals with two generations: the first generation – the immigrant parents, and the second generation – their children. Gay astutely uses domestic issues to illuminate the difficulties and accommodations that took place. Generally speaking, the immigrant generation started by holding on to their Old World customs. For example, when it came to food, they bought what they knew and prepared and served it according to custom. But little by little many abandoned the strictures of kashruth and varied their eating habits. Other religious traditions also were largely put aside. Mothers stopped shaving their heads and wearing wigs; fathers cut off their beards and forelocks. The custom of arranged marriages also became marginalized, mainly because many young immigrants had arrived without parents and had the freedom to make their own choices. 

Immigrant parents, no longer hermetically sealed in the shtetl, not comfortable with English, and  having adapted as much as they cared to, frequently did not want their children to move further away from family customs and traditions But their children’s assimilation proceeded whether they liked it or not. To illustrate these points Gay has an interesting discussion about how she and her friends looked to American movies and novels as well as magazine and newspaper articles for clues in how to look and behave like an American. 

This memoir provides a thoughtful investigation into the day-to-day lives of Eastern European immigrants in New York. The author quotes many interesting sources from early Yiddish and English memoirs, movies, theater, essays and fiction as well as contemporary magazine ads and Yiddish song lyrics that reveal what was on the minds of members of the community. She also frequently quotes and translates Yiddish words, phrases and sayings. A perfect example: when she skinned a knee as a child, her mother would say, “Es vet nisht shatn tsum khasene.” Her translation: “It won’t interfere with your getting married.”



This book includes a useful “A Note on Sources” where the author records the works she consulted.

To read the New York Times obituary of Ruth Gay who died in 2006 click here.

Click here for a link to a website dedicated to a historical accounting of synagogues in the Bronx.

The following list of family members and their relationships is brief and incomplete because the author seems to have deliberately left out family names out of respect for privacy. I have augmented the names she mentions in the body of the book as well as in her Acknowledgements with names mentioned in the NYTimes obituary cited above.

People
? – married ? Slotkin – author’s parents
    Ruth Slotkin – married Nathan Glazer (divorced) married Peter Gay
        Sarah Glazer Khedouri – daughter of Ruth and Nathan
        Sophie Glazer – daughter of Ruth and Nathan
        Elizabeth Glazer – daughter of Ruth and Nathan;  married to William Montgomery
    Shirley Slotkin Gorenstein – sister of Ruth
    Caroll Boltin – sister of Ruth
Asher (Harry)  – brother of author’s mother; married Feigele (Fanny)
Elke  – sister of author’s mother; married Moyshe -
Chana  - sister of author’s mother
Philip and Anna – uncle and aunt of Ruth – specific relationship not clear
Shloyme and Necha-Leah – uncle and aunt of Ruth – relationship not clear
Jake  and Lena – uncle and aunt of Ruth – relationship not clear
 Shayndel – aunt of Ruth – relationship not clear

Places
Rutki, Poland
New York City, NY
The Bronx, NY

Bronx Primitive: Portraits in a Childhood by Kate Simon 1982

 "The themes of her work—a young woman’s search for independence and selfhood, her discovery and attitudes toward sexuality, her loving and ironic stance toward the secular Jewish left, and her encounters with a wide array of 'places and pleasures'—make hers a unique voice among memoirists and Jewish immigrant writers." Michael Galchinsky in Jewish Women: A Comprehensive Encyclopedia


 In this classic memoir, the first of a trilogy, Kate Simon, who was born in 1912 in Warsaw, Poland, brings to life the multi-lingual, multi-ethnic immigrant Tremont area of the Bronx in New York City. Between World Wars I and II she grew up in a tenement surrounded by immigrants and their children. We watch as they eat: the memoir is famous for an early scene of a carp swimming in the tub which is soon to be made into gefilte fish. She describes how they sleep: two and three to a bed. She describes their playing games in the streets, their working in factories and at home (doing piece-work), and their two-week vacations in the summer- either enjoying the sea air on Coney Island or going on day trips by trolley to Orchard Beach.

It’s also a perceptive and frank story about her learning about the world around her, including her dawning knowledge about sex: she recounts what she remembers about her mother being pregnant with her youngest sister who was born at home; about her parents, especially her father, constantly admonishing her about how she should behave around members of the opposite sex, and her having to protect herself against the predatory sexual behavior of boarders and neighbors.

In Volume II, Wider World: Story of an Adolescence (1986) and Volume III, Etchings in an Hourglass (published posthumously in 1990) Simon discusses her life as it developed beyond her early adolescence.

To read the obituary of Kate Simon in the New York Times, click here.


People
Lonia Babicz – author’s mother; emigrated from Warsaw, Poland
Yukele Grobsmith – author’s father
   Kaila Grobsmith – author’s original name; changed to Caroline in the US. 
   Michael Grobsmith – the author’s brother
David, Rachel, Yentel, aunts and uncles of Yukele who lived on Avenue C
Surrele – Yukele’s sister
Fannie Herman, neighbor
Mr. Herman – owner of small kosher meat market
   Miriam Herman – their daughter
   Tobie Herman – their daughter

Places
Tvarda Gass in the Warsaw ghetto
The Bronx around Tremont Avenue near Crotona Park