Read the Interview

Interview with Leo Habel
Recorded May 3, 2008 · Colorado
Interviewer: Ed Goldman

OPENING REMARKS

We're getting together this evening to express a few thoughts about my youngest grandchild, Yaniv, who carries the name of my father, Yosef Meir.

I do believe that names are a very significant part.

They're not random, and what you are named at birth has meaning for your destiny.

I would like to say a few words about the person for whom Yaniv Yosef is named, which is my father.

At one point, Yaniv is going to ask some questions about the person whom he is named after.

What kind of person was he, and why should I be proud or not proud to bear his name?

Well, I go back in history, and there was a time around 1914, 1915, when there were huge waves of immigration from Eastern Europe to the United States, many of them being Jewish immigrants.

They found conditions very difficult and very hard to transplant from the European culture developed over many centuries to adapt to a new culture of the Americas, where enterprise, reliance, secularism, and modernism are the triumphs of the day.

Conditions for these immigrants were poor, their housing was overcrowded, subject to fires, ventilation was poor, and their life was rather harsh.

They were less fully accepted by the other communities of previous immigrants, who were there somewhat longer than they were.

And so conditions had to be faced, and some action had to be taken by the Jewish community to survive.

To do this, the Jewish immigrants organized into what they called mutual benevolent societies, that is self-help organizations, based upon the town or village from their European origins.

My father's society consisted of about 450 people, and my father became active in fulfilling the needs of this community, which was similar to practically all Jewish communities from Eastern Europe.

This was a turning point of watershed in the destiny of the Jewish people, because what had been practiced and revered over many centuries was going to be altered, somehow.

How they were altered, and in what direction they were going to take, was the responsibility, was thrust upon this generation that I call the interface generation of immigrants who came to this country from Europe, who were part of two worlds.

They were born into a world of religion, they were born into a part of smallness, they were born into a world of mutual respect, not competition, but more cooperation.

And they moved into a world where the dollar was a very important thing in their lives, and they had to make many adjustments.

The direction of these adjustments depended upon the success of this transplantation of the Eastern European culture through the fields of the United States.

Which values of the old world were to survive?

Which were to be discarded?

What connection were the Jews in taking this country and therefore around the world?

These were unknown.

In this country they had to build organizations to provide health services, there were no hospitals very dehumanizing, there were no Jewish cemeteries, very few Jewish cemeteries, a few burial societies, people who had to work long hours being exploited by employers by their own labor unions, and some, the success had to be at the kind of organization, dependent on the kind of organization that these Jewish people were able to organize into.

My father was a financial secretary of this town called, the residents are from the town called Kittif [place name uncertain], they called it the Kittif [place name uncertain] [organization name unclear], and many a night we got calls that so-and-so was sick and they had to see a doctor and my father had to arrange for medical care, so-and-so had died, my father had to arrange for Jewish burial service, he had to make arrangements with cemeteries that they have a good kosher burial.

This meant that sometimes they'd leave up all night making phone calls and making connections and I as a son and my brother were witnesses to this activity which kept us awake all night at times.

As many immigrants did, my father came to this country in the mid-1910s for the purpose of getting together some money to go into business in Europe, back intending to return to Europe where he left his wife and my older brother Seymour in the town of Kittif [place name uncertain], located near the Carpathian Mountains and what was once Austria-Poland and later became Poland.

What year was he born?

My father must have been born around 1910, around there.

So he was about, you'd say about 20 years old when he came to the city?

No, he must have been born before 1910, but he must have been born maybe in the 1900s.

Okay.

And he came to...

Came to the United States when he was around 20, I would guess.

A young man had just married my mother and he came to this country to seek his fortune, but with the intention of many other immigrants to ultimately return.

My mother was home taking care of my brother.

However, destiny interfered and there was such a thing called World War I and it was impossible for my father and many other Jewish Eastern European immigrants to return home to do what they thought they would do and it became clear that instead of returning to their homes, it would be better to bring their families to Ellis Island where they all were processed and to make a new life in the United States for my mother and for my brother Seymour.

Did he miss anything about his life in Austria?

Was he running away from Austria or was there something that...

From what I understand, the purpose was primarily economic.

He did talk about the environment, about the beauty of the trees and the fruit, and apparently he had a happy youth.

So somebody, at the time of this interface generation, education had to be modified.

They had to introduce educational institutions.

Yeshivas had to be brought over here and organized, synagogues had to be formed.

My father was active in formation of synagogues.

He was active in meeting the burial and cemetery needs of the community as well as getting them health care on a mutual insurance basis.

They had a doctor who worked for the society and it was through that raise that they got medical care, whatever that consisted of at the time.

All this was without knowing the language here?

Somehow or other, the immigrants in those days did not pick up the languages nearly as well as maybe other immigrant groups did.

Maybe they didn't because they didn't have to, they were self-sufficient, and they were maybe less trusting of the outside world.

They settled, I'm sorry, in New York?

Well, at first, most of them settled in the Lower East Side, where they've been in these tenements.

Relationships were close.

The other ethnic groups at the time consisted of Italians and Polish immigrants, and they formed a fairly friendly community.

Tenements you mean?

I mean, high walk-ups, no central heating, toilets in the hall, no bathrooms, you took a shower and the tub was usually in the kitchen, but the neighbors were very friendly and there were nice things about those years.

So my father's main contribution was his seeing to the economic needs of the destitute at times that they needed it, to look after the burial needs, as well as the cemetery requirements of his community, and the funding and the gathering together of a minyan.

And he was far more offering of himself than I was to the community.

He gave of his time, and he was liked by his contemporaries.

Anybody, any grandchild or child that I would meet of these old members, they would speak very well of my father.

He was one of the boys, he never aspired to be above them, but they formed a rather good, close community, and they helped each other.

So this interface generation survived, and now we see developed into a thriving Jewish community.

We see less of an achievement, we see successful Jewish business people, the children of these immigrants became doctors and lawyers and business people and successful.

But had it been for a different direction, the Jewish community may have not survived as the Jewish community.

The elements of the Jewish community and the secular community that would talk of modernism, you've got to be modern, as though anybody who believed in Torah or any of the values of the old world were, quote, old-fashioned.

That was a terrible thing to be called, you're old-fashioned, you don't hear that so much anymore.

So I think this interface generation performed valuable service in setting the direction of the Jewish people to accommodate the demands of the secular world and representing Jewish interests both in Israel and in Europe, and they became a political force.

And I say again, the direction came from uneducated but dedicated people who, with some sacrifice to themselves, contributed to the furtherance of the destiny of the Jewish people.

And sometimes this represented demands on the children, children like mom's parents and my father.

Very often that was, spent enormous amounts of time acting in behalf of the community and maybe sometimes at the expense of family needs, and often families were resentful of this.

However, my brother and I and my sister realized that the times demanded this sort of thing.

And there are times that [unclear] for family, but there are times that family needs have to succumb to community needs.

It depends on what the demands of the times are.

So I look forward, I think that Yaniv Yosef should be proud to carry the name, because community service and being a friendly, happy person is a kind of character, and he was also intellectual, my father compared to his cohorts, was knowledgeable in Hebrew studies as well.

So Yaniv Yosef, I wish that he carried this name with pride, and that as it says in the prayers, that they will be rewarded with good health, good fortune, because of God's recognition of the goodness.

And there will be a day, just as shortly before I started to talk, Yaniv [name uncertain] was asking me about the one he's named after, what kind of person was he, and [unclear] was relating some of the things to make Yaniv [name uncertain] proud of the one he's named after.

And so, as I said, I think names are very important, and the name Yosef is something that I hope will be carried with pride, and it will be a source of inspiration, a good mazel for Yaniv, and that he emulates the quality of service to the community and concern for the community as a Jew.

And so I'm going to terminate this little talk by thanking my daughter and son-in-law for having me here for Pesach and giving me such a wonderful time and such inspiration and the meaning of the wonderful family that I have, and it gave my heart pride and pleasure to do this, and I wish my [unclear] brother here good fortune, long life, good health, and the best of everything.

Thank you.

Amen.

INTERVIEW

Now, question and answer?

Question and answer?

Okay.

Question and answer.

Did you hear?

Yes.

Let's just take a – I can edit this.

I would like to know some of – I understand that your father was very active in the community and did a lot for the community, but I would still like to know if there are any stories that you can – personal stories that you can tell about him as a father and as a husband.

Well, he was very gentle as a father.

His bark was far more frightening than his bite.

He never hit, and his anger was usually mock anger, controlled anger.

He tried to – he did his best for his family.

He worked – hours didn't mean anything.

He worked as a presser, 14, 15 hours a day.

Anytime he had the opportunity to earn for his family, he would do so, and never – hardly thinking about himself.

He was a dedicated father and kind father and a good husband.

In those days, the husband-wife relationship was not as democratic as they are now, but for the times, it was – he was a good father and a good husband.

So you grew up – I mean, your father – you talked about your father being a hard worker.

I mean, he really worked during a very challenging time in America as well, especially during the Depression.

And how did he manage with that, and how did that affect, you know, outlook and home life and, you know, that kind of thing?

Well, very often we didn't know until the stated package came.

I remember that every Pesach, there would be questions, what's going to happen?

Until the last minute, we didn't know that there would be a Pesach as far as food is concerned.

But he always managed.

He always had a nice Pesach.

And I remember that every Seder was something that I could think back with a lot of pride and joy.

We had the game of stealing the afikomen.

Whatever suits I would get for the whole year, whatever clothing would be for Pesach.

And he was sort of easy to get along with.

Living – he lived through – he was in America during the Holocaust.

Yes, he was in America during the Holocaust, and he did – was took strong action, as many of his – as many of the other immigrants did, on behalf of their brethren overseas and in opposition to Hitler, and in trying to get Jews to the United States or to – to act on behalf of the – for the state of Israel.

I can only say that myself being of a generation born into a non-existent Israel and one where the likelihood of the development of such a thing as a nation of Israel was far, far fetched.

So to live through this from something unlikely to happen through a Holocaust, which is a devastating thing, and then to be – find that you have the State of Israel, it's this up-and-down swing that's tremendous.

Some people think that the Holocaust was the price we have to pay for Israel.

I don't know about that.

But every time I think of it, the fact that Israel exists is a miracle, to the extent that if you're born a generation or two later, it's very hard to imagine the nature of that miracle.

So the way I was lucky to be born in that generation having – starting out from and not having to a having is a great thrill.

Were you able to participate in your father's activities with regard to helping out?

Well, I was very – well, I did, for instance, address envelopes to – when there were meetings and so on, I dressed envelopes.

My sister – my brother's sister and I helped him in paperwork and giving him emotional support to do what he's doing, and recognizing the self-worth that made him have.

In other words, anybody who does something for the community feels a reward internally.

And my father felt good about doing these things.

He didn't feel he was sacrificing for anybody.

That's why he felt good doing it.

We also put great stress on education, and one of the reasons that my brother and I went to college at all was because we loved our father and we knew he gave him pleasure.

And so that was our inspiration.

We were not forced to go.

We also worked after school, and there's no such thing as – no, we're not working.

Everybody looks for every penny they can earn in those days.

And then there was army service, and I guess the world realized that the Jewish citizen of the United States was contributing to the same extent as non-Jews, and the Jews became accepted in this country.

So that helped to make the quality of life for Jewish people in this country better, because there's more acceptance by the non-Jewish world.

However, there are a lot of things – a lot of problems that we face today that my father's generation did not face.

Nobody would intermarry in those days, and it was just unheard of.

Nobody would not say Kaddish for a parent.

It just didn't – even the worst guys – certain things you just wouldn't do.

And the closeness and friendship that existed among these immigrants is hard to find among people nowadays.

They live far apart.

You don't know your neighbors.

In those days, neighbors knew each other, and they helped each other.

So it was just different times, and in many ways it's better now, but there's no way.

Something was lost along the way, too.

Certain values were discarded, because I guess they had to be discarded.

Do you know who he was named after?

I think he was named after his grandfather.

In other words, I was named after my father's father.

My father was named after his father – actually, his father's father.

So I think there's a few Yehuda, Ben-[unclear], as I go back a while.

I also recommend that you get a chance to read the book by this Israeli author.

I told him they mentioned him – Aharon Megged [name uncertain] – he wrote in Hebrew, but you shouldn't find it difficult to read, and maybe you see if the library has it.

It brings out the whole issue of name, what it means on a personal basis, and also has significance on a societal basis.

When Israel was formed, the image of the turn-your-cheek Jew had to be changed, and the Israeli generation did not accept a name like Baishi [name uncertain] or Rivki.

They wanted tough-sounding names.

You start up with me, I'll give it back to you.

Not Mendel.

But on the other hand, Mendel had a lot of good qualities, too, if you could look at it objectively.

It's not Mendel's fault.

It's not the victim's fault that anti-Semitism and the Holocaust happened.

It's not Mendel who should be ashamed.

It's the vicious person who should be ashamed, not the one who is a naive, good boy who wouldn't hurt the other kid.

As a matter of fact, there's one statement made by Golda Meir one time that really, I think, strikes at the essence of Judaism.

She said, I can forgive the Arabs for killing my boys, but I'll never forgive making my boys kill them.

That's the attitude that a lot of Jewish people have.

They haven't been given up, because you can't have that kind of attitude and exist in the real world.

And I guess it never did.

Historically, there were times that were probably close to previous Holocausts, too.

During the 12 tribes run over by Assyria, I'm learning now how vicious and violent the poor souls were treated in those days, and they were sold as slaves.

Really, it was a harsh world even then.

But do you know of anything of your family that was left in Austria or in the U.S.?

Well, I think Jeanette met my father's two sisters that we met after the war.

There's a son from one of the sisters, his son's name is Ari Schwarz, and they have children, and my aunt Esty, who had vague memories of my father.

The rest, I do remember sending a [unclear item] to Ari right after the war, and it came back.

The Russians wouldn't allow it to be delivered.

Were your father's sisters, I know that Esty, she was a survivor, I mean she was in the camps, were your father's sisters in the camps, or are you aware of that?

I think they just were refugees, I don't know of any reason to think they weren't camps, but I think they were probably running and hiding and just escaping.

I know Ann Esther was considered a Holocaust survivor.

Well, she was, but I don't know whether she was in camp or in Belsen, she never mentioned anything about that, but they were on the run.

I do want one thing to go back to the name Hebel, we're talking about names, often in your names represented occupations, or what the family did, right?

Or from where they came from.

H-O-B-E-L, Hebel, and in America you don't have the two dots, so it translated to Hopel without the dots, and then it was pronounced Hebel, so I survived it as Hebel.

Maybe it's the village or something.

Do you know if it was the village that they lived in, or what was the family's occupation?

The father owned an animal too, I suppose, that he raised and sold it for meat later on, and maybe milked some cows, he liked to call himself a kassa, which means a butcher.

So that must have been an adjustment also, he was working as a butcher in Austria, which was considered a fine position, fine status in Austria, and then coming to America and working as a presser, how was that, how did he adjust?

They derived the adjustments by the actions of the children, the children became substitute [unclear].

In other words, their children going to college gave them the status as though they had achieved, they lived through the children, you may have said this in the earlier when I was saying goodnight to the children, but what year did your father pass away?

1958.

And how old was he when he passed?

70.

World War II, sending off both his sons to war, far, far away, farther than I guess previous generations have ever had to send their boys to, must have been a very frightening, was he, was he, obviously it's very frightening, and or was he also very proud that his sons were serving in the American?

He was proud that all people were doing, isn't it?

You know, when everybody does something, you do get the right mutual support from each other, neighbors, and so on.

But he took pride in the fact that Seymour and I served in the service.

My mother was terrified, my father was terrified, but as any parents, they are terrified, but they have to go through this kind of a life.

Also, back then, you couldn't, I'm assuming, you couldn't just call and say, hey, I'm doing, I'm okay.

No, we had [unclear], we wrote fairly often, I mean, if I didn't, I wrote in the worst of conditions, at least two or three times a week with a bullet's fly, and I managed to write, not only [unclear], especially to mom.

In your home, maybe you covered this earlier, but what was the primary language in your household?

Was it Yiddish?

Was it English?

Yiddish.

Yiddish.

So I grew up knowing Yiddish fairly well, and I used that knowledge when I visited Jewish communities in Belgium, Holland, wherever I traveled.

I asked for a synagogue, I talked to people in Yiddish, it was a very convenient way to communicate.

Would you say that, for you, is Yiddish your first language?

I mean, do you think more in Yiddish than in English?

No, I think in English, I don't think in Yiddish.

Two things, first, I know you talked about the school that you went to as a child, L'chaide, and playing baseball on the street.

I went to Yeshiva that, I didn't realize myself at the time, but it had a fairly good reputation.

I meet a lot of people now and then, and when I mentioned Yeshiva I went to, it turns out we had mutual friends, and I missed those days as poor as things were economically, they had a warm feeling of friendliness towards the other Yeshiva kids.

I'd give anything to have a reunion of the class at a certain time, it's just not possible, nobody knows where anybody is anymore.

Talking about holidays, you talked a bit about Pesach, about Passover, I remember something you talking about having the gefilte fish in the bathtub, and having the chicken swung over your head.

Can you talk a little bit more about family life in the home [unclear]?

Well, the custom of the people from my father's area, every Rosh Hashanah, before Rosh Hashanah, to seek the forgiveness of their sins by, I forget the Hebrew name of the...

Kapparot.

During kapparot, by waving the chicken over your head, and I guess a boy had a rooster and a girl had a hen, and they would seek forgiveness and then bring the chicken, they scared the daylights out of the poor chicken and out of the poor child, and then they'd bring the chicken over to the shochet, located under Delancey Street under the bridge, and he would slaughter the chicken.

If you're wealthy enough, you give the chicken for charity, if you're not a wealthy person, then you just have to see a meal yourself.

The fish in the bathtub, you want the fresh fish, they meant fresh fish.

They didn't have freezers, and usually there was called ice boxes, where they had a man deliver ice to the house, a cube of ice, so that in order to avoid getting sick, in order to have fresh food, you had to slaughter the fish right then and there and cut them up.

It was a frightening thing, because the fish would fly around the carp, I remember, but they were sweet days, I guess we're finished in this.

There was, I have one more question, yeah, one more question also, just, we talked about, you know, the other night, about antisemitism in the army, but in New York, it sounds like the different communities actually did get along very well together.

So at one point, there was plenty of anti-Semitism, if you go to the [unclear], as a child, the kids would throw stones and they'd start fights.

I think antisemitism was pretty strong until World War II, I'm not saying it disappeared entirely, but things changed, people got to know each other, and there's a lot less of it as a result of World War II, but antisemitism exists, has existed, and unfortunately is likely to exist in the same circumstances.

Okay.

So, just, you know, getting back to your father, I mean, if, you know, this may sound cliché, but what would be the one or two words that you would most associate with him?

You talked about his generosity, you talked about his gentleness, you talked about his commitment to his community, you know, is there one or two words that you would put a stamp on, you know, on a description of who he is and who he was?

And what he stood for?

What he stood for was the pride of being Jewish.

His Jewishness meant a lot to him, not that he was out-fussed or super-religious, but he had a commitment to the Jewish values and to the Jewish people, and as old Jews did at the time, he did what they could do to fight Hitler.

And I remember, not only him, but every sentence that they would end would be, [Yiddish phrase unclear; automatic transcript: “Messiah is a cuman and Hitler is a humamapolo”], Messiah didn't come.

And so the state of Israel ought to be formed without the Messiah, maybe next time it will help in another way.

And I, just to wrap it up, just to confirm, are there any funny stories, anything your father particularly liked, and any, you know, any other memoirs that you want?

Well, he tried to be interested in topics that were interesting.

He learned baseball, he couldn't pronounce the players' names, but he knew that when the [unclear] would never say that the [unclear] had lost.

He encouraged me to play sports, he did not force me into any religious mold, he would never criticize me for doing anything religiously wrong, he was very tolerant, he gave me my, I chose my path, maybe Seymour chose his path, they're not drastically different, but they're somewhat different.

And I think of it that destiny has its ways, because if World War I had not happened, a lot of the Jewish immigrants who actually thrived in this country would have returned to their Polish home, then Hitler would have taken over, and look what would have happened.

So like when we were in Shul, in Rabbi Bornstein Shul recently, and we were saying a prayer for the souls of the Holocaust victims, could well have been that somebody was saying a prayer for me.

I could have been in a different situation, it was only in that skill of my part, or anything, it was sheer God's will that this is the way He wanted it, and not that I feel I deserved it.

So sometimes destiny has its way of doing good things.

Does your father have any favorite food, or anything that he looks forward to eating?

Well, he didn't like healthy foods, he liked the usual Jewish behavior, he liked the once in a while going to Ratner’s, there was a lot of good Jewish delis in those days on the Lower East Side, like in every other block you had around, and he would enjoy meeting friends, and having a beer or two with friends, neighbors, and so in a sense he was one of the boys to more of an extent than I am.

He would play a game of pinochle with his buddies, I wouldn't, or give a poker, I share a shot away from there, I don't know why, but he was more of a mix.

Interesting.

Okay, did you want to wrap up?

You know, and you can also, I mean we'll edit all of what we're just saying, I can edit it all out, if you think of things we can also bring you back on tomorrow or whatever.

Well, he did have a very nice wrap up before we started the questions.

Okay.

Anything else?

I was just going to say, you know, we say every Pesach, that in every generation we should think that we were led out of, that God took us out of Egypt personally, not only our ancestors, but us, and that way I like to think of myself as a survivor of the Holocaust personally.

I wasn't, but I could have been, when you were too young, so you couldn't have been, but anybody my age could have been, and it was just God's goodness to us that it didn't happen to us, but you have to recognize it could have happened, and somebody's going to think about things.

Yeah.

Okay.

Stop.