Memoirs: Henry Mankin
Albert Hartstein birth certificate
Beth Hamedrash Hagodol
Cookbook: Marla Perlman
Calendar
Community News
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Memoirs:
Henry J. Mankin: "Memoirs of Crombie Street"
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Jewish Criterion, July 29, 1938 |
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Dr. Henry J. Mankin (1928-2018) was the iconic Chief of Orthopedic Surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital for many years. But before that he was a kid from Squirrel Hill. “Memoirs of Crombie Street” is a 20-page memoir he wrote in 1993, describing his young adulthood in the neighborhood during the final years of the Great Depression and the beginning of World War II. It was a forerunner to his 2016 book-length memoir, "Such a Joy for a Yiddish Boy."
Mankin chronicles national events through childhood experiences. He notices the national economic recovery when Specialty Clothing increases the price of suits. He learns about the plight of European Jewry when Jewish children from Germany and Austria start joining his class. He hears about the attack at Pearl Harbor while playing basketball at the Irene Kaufmann Settlement House.
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While the War takes up much of the memoir, Mankin also describes teen culture in Squirrel Hill in the 1940s.
He notes the main divides within the neighborhood: between Squirrel Hill and Greenfield, between middle class and working class, between north and south of Forbes, between Conservative and Orthodox Judaism.
He details his bar mitzvah preparations at Beth Shalom, his Victory AZA activities, and his summers at Camp Kadima. He even explains the dynamics of teenage love affairs (although, curiously, a page is missing from this part of our copy).
Allderdice High School is the stage upon which many of these scenes unfold. Mankin introduces several beloved figures from the the school, including legendary chemistry teacher Lon Colborn. (You can learn more about Colborn from Richard Rosenzweig's profile "Lon H. Colborn & the Century of Science.")
Colburn’s invitation-only qualitative analysis class—known as Qual—is credited with producing dozens of scientists, physicians, and researchers. “I guess he taught us to ask questions, doubt the answers, and where there were no answers seek them,” Mankin wrote.
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Handwritten list of students in Lon Colborn's "Qual" class, including Henry Mankin.
—William C. King Papers (2007.0156)
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Next week: A childhood in small-town Pennsylvania
All year, the Rauh Jewish Archives is highlighting memoirs of Jewish life in Western Pennsylvania. If you would like to donate a memoir, or just chat about the stories you've read, contact the archive or call 412-454-6406.
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New Collection:
Dr. Albert Hartstein Birth Certificate [2018.0231]
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Dr. Albert Hartstein certificate [2018.0231] |
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Leanne Heaton of Butler County donated the Dr. Albert Hartstein Birth Certificate [2018.0231] after discovering it among a pile of old stock certificates. It’s a transcript copied in 1904 from the birth register of the Jewish community in Szepes-Váraljai, in a corner of the Austro-Hungarian Empire that has since become part of Slovakia. It is a good example of Jewish communal record-keeping in Europe before World War I.
Hartstein became a prominent foot doctor in Pittsburgh. He was chiropodist and podiatrist for Frank & Seder Department Store and later for the Joseph Horne Company. He had a five-minute afternoon radio program about feet on WCAE in the 1920s.
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Jewish Encyclopedia of Western Pennsylvania:
Beth Hamedrash Hagodol Congregation
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Groundbreaking for Beth Hamedrash Hagodol synagogue, Colwell Street, with Civic Arena.
—Beth Hamedrash Hagodol Congregation Records [MSS 438]
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Beth Hamedrash Hagodol Congregation is the oldest Orthodox congregation in Western Pennsylvania. It was founded around 1870 by a group of Lithuanian Jews who had broken away from Tree of Life Congregation over emerging religious differences. Today, following a 1965 merger, it is known as Beth Hamedrash Hagodol-Beth Jacob Congregation, or “the downtown shul.”
Our entry for Beth Hamedrash Hagodol Congregation includes a listing of all its known meeting places, interior and exterior photographs of its two demolished synagogues, reproductions of its charters, and a selection of newspaper articles providing useful historical and membership information.
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The Jewish Encyclopedia of Western Pennsylvania brings together numerous online resources into a clearinghouse for conducting research about Jewish history in this region. As we migrate information to this new website, we’ll be announcing new entries and resources in this section of the newsletter. |
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Cookbook:
Cooking With Marla
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"Cooking With Marla," 2017 |
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The late Marla Perlman perfected the art of the easy elegant meal, the kind of meal that can feed a crowd of almost any size without much expense or much effort and even without much prior notice. For many years, she shared her kitchen tips in a popular OSHER course called “One Pot, One Bowl.” It was a cooking class for the many people "who love to eat but hate to cook.”
For her 80th birthday, in 2017, Marla’s family compiled her most beloved recipes into a cookbook. Our featured recipe is “Dump Beans,” a Marla Perlman original. It’s slow cooked baked beans, tweaked for “the busy homemaker trying to throw a quick meal together in 20 minutes for the family.”
“Cookbooks” was the theme of our 2020 collecting initiative. If you have a local Jewish cookbook to give the archive please email or call 412-454-6406.
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February 27
JGS Pittsburgh Presents: Laura Leibman
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An obsessive genealogist and descendent of one of the most prominent Jewish families since the American Revolution, Blanche Moses firmly believed her maternal ancestors were Sephardic grandees. Yet she found herself at a dead end when it came to understanding her grandmother’s maternal line.
In her talk "A Multiracial Jewish Family in Early America," Laura Leibman overturns the reclusive heiress’s assumptions about her family history to reveal that her grandmother and great-uncle, Sarah and Isaac Brandon, actually began their lives poor, Christian, and enslaved in Barbados. Leibman traces the siblings’ journey around the Atlantic world, using artifacts they left behind in Barbados, Suriname, London, Philadelphia, and, finally, New York. While their affluence made them unusual, their story mirrors that of the largely forgotten people of mixed African and Jewish ancestry who constituted as much as 10 percent of the Jewish communities in which the siblings lived.
This is a virtual program. It will be recorded, and the recording will be made available for JGS-Pittsburgh members who are current on their dues.
This program is possible through the support of the William M. Lowenstein Genealogical Research Endowment Fund of the Jewish Community Foundation.
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Laura Arnold Leibman is Professor of English and Humanities at Reed College, VP of Publications (AJS), and the author of The Art of the Jewish Family: A History of Women in Early New York in Five Objects (Bard Graduate Center, 2020) which won three National Jewish Book Awards. She held visiting positions at Bard Graduate Center, Oxford University, University of Utrecht, University of Panama. Her latest book Once We Were Slaves (Oxford UP, 2021) is about an early multiracial Jewish family who began their lives enslaved in the Caribbean and became some of the wealthiest Jews in New York.
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Dor Hadash calling for Bat Mitzvah photographs |
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Congregation Dor Hadash is asking the community for photographs of bat mitzvah celebrations past and present. The materials will be used as part of an upcoming celebration of the 100th anniversary of the first bat mitzvah in 1922.
The centennial weekend on March 19-20 will include speakers, workshops, and chances for people to share their personal experiences. To contribute or to learn more, contact the congregation at batmitzvah100@dorhadash.net.
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Pittsburgh Jewish Newspaper Project |
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The home page of the new Pittsburgh Jewish Newspaper Project website, hosted by Carnegie Mellon University Libraries. The redesigned website is launching this month. |
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By now, you're probably expertly zipping around the new Pittsburgh Jewish Newspaper Project platform. But if you still need a little help navigating the features and tools of the website, the Rauh Jewish Archives recently contributed a brief explanatory article to the Jewish Chronicle. It provides some basic tips and techniques for conducting research using the new site.
We plan to provide a live virtual training workshop in the near future to review the website and its functionalities. Until then, we are here to help you troubleshoot problems. You can contact the archive or call 412-454-6406.
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[IMAGE: Marian Schreiber and employees at the Schreiber Trucking Company, c.1943—from Schreiber Family Papers and Photographs, MSS 846.]
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The Rauh Jewish Archives was founded on November 1, 1988 to collect, preserve, and make accessible the documentary history of Jews and Jewish communities of Western Pennsylvania. You can help the RJHPA continue its work by making a donation that will directly support the work being done in Western Pa. |
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Plan a Visit
Senator John Heinz History Center
1212 Smallman Street
Pittsburgh, Pa. 15222
412-454-6000
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A proud affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution, the Senator John Heinz History Center is the largest history museum in Pennsylvania and presents American history with a Western Pennsylvania connection.
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