12 THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS Friday, July 24, 1981 Record Budget for City of Hope LOS ANGELES — A re- ord operating budget of $62 illion for the year begin- ning Oct. 1 was approved by he delegates attending the CASH FOR YOUR ommonos L PRECIOUS JEWELS 'Iakt dale 5041. 755 W. Big Beaver Rd. (16 Mile at 1-75) Troy, Michigan Phone: 313-362-4500 City of Hope's 1981 national biennial convention at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. Delegates unanimously re-elected M.E. Hersch to his fourth two-year term as president of the free, non- sectarian medical and re- search center located in Duarte, Calif. NCSY Parley NEW YORK — More than 100 teenagers from the United States and Canada are scheduled to participate in the Southern Region Summer Encampment of the National Conference of Synagogue Youth, Aug. 10 19 in Millington, Tenn. - See "THE LEADER" Today Morris Buick IS THE GUY IS THE BUY OPEN MON. & THURS. 9 P.M. WHERE EVERY DAY IS SALE DAY W 7 Mile At Lodge X-Way 342-7100 Author Me yer Levin Fondly Remembered By VICTOR M. BIENSTOCK Special to the Jewish News Bob Casey, one of the great American news- papermen of all time, once wrote a book, "Such In- teresting People," in which he talked about many of the great and not-so-great in the profession he loved. One of his episodes dealt with Meyer Levin whose recent death in Jerusalem was such a great loss to Ameri- can and Jewish letters and to all who knew him. The Casey book, I'm afraid, is long out of print and I have to paraphrase from mem- ory. Mr. Levin started his news career on the Chicago Daily News back in the early 1920s, a youngster newly out of the University of Chicago, trying to figure out what set him apart, as a Jew, from the great major- ity about him. The Chicago Daily News was, in those days, and still is one of America's great newspapers and young Levin was soon regarded by its editors as one of its most promising young recruits, Casey reported. It came as a surprise, therefore, when Levin strode in one day and submitted his resignation. He was, he explained, going to pre-Israel Palestine to ock's CloLhes of West Bloomfield AFTER INVENTORY 1/2 OFF SAL E ON A SELECTED GROUP OF SUITS, SPORTCOATS, SLACKS, SHOES AND A LARGE SELECTION OF FURNISHINGS FEATURING SUCH FAMOUS NAMES AS: • Lanvin • Givenchy • le Baron • Rubin Bros. • Bally • Adolfo • San Remo • Oleg Cassini • Corneliani • Jean-Paul Germain • Society Brand *Alterations at Cost live and work on a kibutz. which Levin promptly con- spread that he was a dif- Few of his colleagues fiscated. The War Depart- ficult man to deal with be- • on the paper had been ment, in turn, confiscated cause he had a persecution aware of the depth of his the paintings just as the complex and would sue at absorption in the Jewish ONA had completed ar- the drop of a hat. He was a man of great - condition and of his rangements for their syndi- enthusiasm. At one stage he commitment to Zionism. cation. Levin was obsessed by the became interested in It was a lifelong commit- fate of the Jews and grilled marionettes and spent al- ment. His editors made the ex- me time after time about most all his time in the the- pected efforts to dissuade the Jewish survivors I had ater. After that, he was in- him from going and not to run across in Italy and in volved in puppets and once abandon the career the southern and western dragged me down to Green- paper offered him. But France. An old Paris hand, wich Village to watch a Levin went off to live the life he had already made con- puppet show. Films were of a kibutznik and as he did tact with Jewish survivors another powerful interest with all his enthusiasms, in the French capital and but here, at least, he wrote lived it to the hilt. When the reported on their tribula- whatever scripts were re- Arab riots broke out in tions. quired. He was among the first Despite these distrac- 1929, the Chicago Daily News editors cabled him, if not the first American tions, his literary output expecting that he would correspondent to get into was remarkable for its ex- cover the breaking news for the Nazi concentration tent — novels, magazine ar- the paper. It took a few days camps and what he saw tides, a syndicated column before they heard from there affected him so that in which he was encouraged Levin and then it was a he spent years after the by Philip Hochstein, then of war in aiding the Aliya, the Newhouse Newspapers, terse cable, "I am well." Torn between his desire Bet or illegal immigration and film criticism. to go back to reporting and of the survivors into pre- For a good many years the duty he felt he owed to Israel Palestine. And he divided his time be- the Yagur kibutz in its time with Tereska Torres, the tween a unique home on of danger, he felt he had to French novelist who be- the Israeli coast and New stay with the kibutz. But came his wife, he made York. His books were vir- the elders of Yagur agreed his famous films of the tually all devoted to his that he would accomplish survivors' struggle to primary interests — the more for the Yishuv as a re- reach pre-Israel Pales - American Jew's struggle porter and he went back to tine- to come to terms with his In his journeying around Jewishness, his role in reporting. Our paths crossed inter- Europe seeking out the the non-Jewish world mittently over the years — Jewish remnant, Levin and the rebuilding of a newspapermen are always found Otto Frank and Jewish homeland. running into old colleagues through him the Anne Although many of his in unlikely places. We met Frank diary which he books were well received in Paris in 1944. Levin, who brought back to New York and warmly praised, Levin had been with the Office of and dramatized. That re- never received the recogni- War Information, went over suited in one of the bitterest tion as a novelist and in- to Paris as war correspon- chapters of his life and the terpreter of the soul of the a dent for the Overseas News anger and frustration that American Jew that he de- Agency and the Jewish it caused remained with served. And this, I believe, him for years along with the Telegraphic Agency. was in good part due to his Levin was a driven conviction that he had been refusal to conform to the us- man; he was the first out victimized by a conspiracy ages and practices of an of our billets at the Scribe of the left. Levin signed a contract elite group in the New York Hotel in the morning and literary establishment that the last one in at night. with a New York producer was powerful enough to con- in which, apparently, - he The New York office ca- fer a reputation overnight. bled me to make Levin ceded most of his rights. The I treasure a yellowing producer had a new reduce the length of his cables. I read his cables dramatization prepared by copy of his autobiography, and I couldn't cut them Frances and Albert Hackett "In Search," published in and wouldn't. Then the and it was their version Paris in 1950 and inscribed to me "with best wishes top sergeant at the which won world acclaim. Levin complained that from a comrade in the same SHAEF motor pool came • business." It is a after me. "That guy's got the Hackett version de- tough tough business, journalism, a death wish," he corn- stroyed the essential Jewish plained. "He's wrecking character of the Anne but as Bob Casey pointed story, thus depriving out, it attracts such in- every Jeep I've got. You it of so much of its signifi- teresting people. gotta make him get a gotta cance. He never forgave the driver." I didn't even producer, the Hacketts, Lil- want to try. Levin was fighting his lian Hellman and other Orthodox Halt own war. It was an in- leftwing New York literati City of David Dig tense one and it covered a whom he held responsible JERUSALEM (JTA) — what he considered the lot of territory as well. for mutilation of the Anne - Pressure by the ultra- Above and beyond his Orthodox community of assigned task of report- Frank story. Jerusalem halted the ar- Under the contract he ing the war, Levin felt a cheological work at the City personal obligation to had signed with the pro- of David which is considered find Jewish officers and ducer, Levin could not the most important ar- GIs in battle and to tell even publish his own cheological site in the coun- their story so that the dramatization of the try. The work at the site was world would know that Anne Frank diary nor to have begun last week. the Jews were doing their produce it even privately The ultra-Orthodox Jews share in fighting to de- and it wasn't until an Is- staged protests at the site, raeli group produced it stroy Hitlerism. protesting that the excava- The Overseas News about a year ago that it tions were to be carried out ever reached the boards. Agency cable address was in i an ancient Jewish cemet- "Supernews" and Will Lang Litigation over the case ery. Work was suspended continued for over a de- of Life who frequently went pending a resolution of the on news forays with Levin, cadeuntil Levin, conflict. thoroughly frustrated nicknamed him "Superjew" The site includes a — a soubriquet of which and convinced that he pyramid-like structure ap- would never get justice, Levin was proud. parently dating from King Levin was probably the accepted a monetary set Solomon's time. There is only accredited Allied war dement: correspondent ever to take The litigation hurt him speculation whether the the formal surrender of a financially — he was not in structure was connected Nazi general. The general a high income bracket — with the citadel of the an- was carrying a large and it hurt him profession- cient city, or served as royal portfolio of war paintings ally since the word was tombs of the House of David. - In the Orchard Mall on Orchard Lake Road, just 1/2 block north of Maple Road • 851-9080 STORE HOURS: MON., TUES., WED.. and SAT. 10-6 pm THURS. and FRI. 10-9 pm SUN. 12-5 pm