THE JEWISH NEWS
Friday, July 13, 1951
John Manning Reminisces
About Jewish Leaders and
A Quiet Little Widow
By JOHN MANNING
Largely because of my trade it
She was friendly but possessed
has been my privilege to o,bserve of an innate dignity that repell-
at close hand the achievements ed any prying into her affairs.
She was the bUsiest woman
I ever saw. She must have
worked daily from dawn until
bed time. Her boys were de-
cently dressed like the other
neighborhood boys and her
little girls were always starch-
ed and ruffled and shinning
clean. God knows how she
must have scrim p ed and
schemed and mended and
washed and ironed to keep up
appearances.
The older boys had jobs after
school but she insisted every one
of them had to go through grade
school and high school. We
moved apart and lost touch lat-
er but I believe a couple of the
children went also through col-
lege.
* * *
The family was strictly Ortho-
dox. My particular pals were the
two youngest boys, twins. I sup-
pose through my association
with them I got in the habit of
preparing the kindling and
lighting the fires in that tidy
house at each Sabbath. As a
consequence the mother began
to treat me as though I were one
JOHN MANNING
of her own children.
My mother was a splendid
housekeeper. She told me our
widow neighbor was by all odds
the most competent and immac-
ulate housekeeper of her entire
acquaintanCe:
Her friendship with my
mother started when she
brought some soup over as my
mother was wrestling with a
tedious illness. My mother con-
tended it was that soup that
made her well. •She said it was
nectar out of a kettle. She prid-,
ed herself on her cooking_ and
the little widow gladly gave her
the recipe but my mother never
could attain quite the flavor
that the widow gave it.
One day. (I was maybe 12) I
came home from school and
found my mother with traces of
tears. My father had been sick
for several months and I dare
say we were hard up as most
white collar families were a good
deal of the time in those days.
I asked what the matter was
and my mother told me. The
widow had come over, diffi-
dently and with considerable
hemming and hawing.. She
had a little roll of bills, per-
haps fifty or sixty dollars. She
explained hesitantly to my
mother that she knew how dif-
ficult it was when illness
struck the bread winner of a
family.
This was just a little pin mon-•
ey of which she had no imme-
diate need. She would deem it
a favor if we would accept it as
a loan to tide things over.
My mother almost wept again
telling me.
"The poor, dear saint," she
said. "That money might very
well have been her entire sav-
ings. She needs that and a lot
more for herself. She is work-
ing herself to death. She
should have a long rest. And
all she thinks about is helping
her neighbors."
The little.widow . has been dead
35 . years at least. I know she
rests in peace because she was
a true daughter of God.
*
I had forgotten her but I am
glad she re-entered my thoughts
at this time. If she dreamed I
would think of her as one who
had contributed greatly to the
betterment of our city, I fear
she would arise from her grave
and box my ears as she did more
than once when I was a kid.
I am confident though that
the distinguished friends I men-
tioned at the beginning of this
piece would agree with me.
It was my little widow and the
likes of her—the harassed, toil-
ing, m anaging, uncomplaining
and cheerful mothers—that laid
the groundwork for modern. De-
troit. They were the ones who
worked their lives away happily,
grooming and training their
sons to become community lead-,
ers.
Ff #rTe':
our extraordinary assets as a
great community today and it
will enable us to look to the
future and to plan with confi-
dence for a greater and better
city for generations to come.
15
Detroit Awaits
Greater Future
Jos. Jones New Legion
District Commander
Managing Editor, Detroit Times
of many of Detroit's eminent
Jewish sons. •
I was fortunate enough to
know some of them on a basis of
warm friendship.
There was, for instance,
Max Ballin, ate crochety little
healer with wizardry in his
hands, who trod the halls of
Harper Hospital like a despot,
scolding internes and patients
alike, while he brought count-
less sufferers back to health
• and drilled knowledge into the
skulls of an impressive list of
young surgeons.
There- was Rabbi Leo M.
Franklin, good and kind and un-
derstanding. More than a few
times I have sat in his study on
Edison Avenue and come away
enriched and humbled by his
erudition and his modest virtue.
There was Albert Kahn, the
architectural dreamer whose
dreams came true in towering
brick and stone and steel which
stand today all over Detroit.
There was Ossip Gabrilo-
witsch, scholar, artist, gentle-
man of the world, under whose
baton symphonic music in De-
troit reached its peak.
There was Harry Keidan, who
was a stripling assistant prose-
cutor when I was a blundering
cub reporter. My little occasion-
al journalistic successes delight-
ed him as though I had been his
brother and his brilliant suc-
cesses as lawyer and judge made
me proud as Punch.
* * *
These men were but a few of
our generation who contributed
heavily and selflessly to the cul-
tural and moral and physical
development of Detroit. They
come naturally to mind- because
I knew them personally.
Lots of other fine names come
to mind; names of Jews whose
love of their city was next to
their love of their family.
Oddly enough these were not
the first - who came to mind
when I was invited by Phil
Slomovitz to write an item on
the Jewish community's share in
the building of -our city.
The first person I thought of,
was not a person of distinction
at all in the ordinary, worldly
sense.
She was a quiet little widow,
so recently arrived in America
when I met her, that she spoke
still with a thick Russian ac-
cent.
I was a small boy, probably
nine or ten years old. The late
D. W. Simons had built a ter-
race next to my house on East
Warren avenue. This widow and
her six children moved into one
of the terrace houses.
As I look back to that dim
period I realize she must have
been bitterly hard pressed fi-
nancially to fend for her grow-
ing boys and girls'but the neigh-
bors never knew it.
;•
•••
-
Joseph Jones, charter member
of the Lawrence Jones Post of
the Jewish War Veterans, is the
second Jew elected to the post of
Detroit District Commander of
the American Legion. comprised
of 114 Legion
Posts, num-
bering 20,000
Le g i onaires in
the Detroit
area.
Mr. Jones also
is an active
part icipant in
American J e w-
ish affairs,
including mem-
bership in the
Zionist organi-
zation of Amer-
ica and for 25
Jos. Jones years a member
of Pisgah Lodge of Bnai Brith.
Dr. R. Goldstone was the first
Jew to be chosen American Le-
gion District Commander.
Lawrence Jones Post of the
Jewish War Veterans is named
after Mr. Jones' late brother,
who died in action in the last
war.
A World War I veteran of the
77th Liberty Division of New
York, Jones entered the Ameri-
can Legion in / Tilwaukee, Wis.,
shortly after the conclusion of
the war. In 1921 he moved to
Detroit where he became affili-
ated with the Charles A. Learn-
ed Post No. 1, which at the time
had a membership close to 5,000.
Since joining Learned Post,
Jones has served in every office
and has never been defeated in
a Legion election. He served as
Commander of Learned Post in
1947.
The newly elected commander
celebrated his 62nd birthday
July 8. He will be installed in
his new office in September.
By SELDEN B. DAUME
President, Detroit's 250th
Birthday Festival
D e t roit 's 250th Birthday
should remind this community
that ours is the oldest major
city in the United. States west
of the eastern cradle of o u r
country, and that many genera-
tions and many people have con-
tributed to our • progress and
our culture. More importantly,
however, it will provide us with
an opportunity to take stock of
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