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132

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 1989

San Francisco Old-Timers
Recall Other Earthquakes

PEGGY ISAAK GLUCK

Special to The Jewish News

A

t 95, some of Helen
Scozzafava's
memories have faded,
but one of them has stayed
intact: what happened to
her, her brothers and her
sisters on April 18, 1906.
That memory rolled back
Oct. 17 as San Francisco was
hit by another major earth-
quake.
In 1906, when the 8.3
quake occurred, Scozzafava
was 5 years old.
"We were living on Fulton
Street," recalled the current
resident of the Jewish Home
for the Aged in San Fran-
cisco, noting that her family,
including six brothers and
sisters, resided behind a fur-
niture store.
During the early morning
rumble, her mother "was go-
ihg from the kitchen to the
store." She was killed in-
stantly. Her father, Adolph
Kornfield, was injured seri-
ously and taken to a local
hospital, where he remained
for quite some time.
Care of the children was
taken over by a bachelor
uncle who took Scozzafava,
her sister Rose, and her
three brothers (Harry, Sam
and Martin, "who slept
through the whole thing") to
their aunt's house.
"My sister put us in a shirt
— that's all we had. Then we
went by horse and buggy to
my aunt's," recalled the spry
nonagenarian.
Her great-aunt and uncle
were unable to care for the
five children, so, within a
day, they were taken to the
Pacific Hebrew Orphan
Asylum, the Jewish or-
phanage in San Francisco.
Although the agency's
building was damaged in the
1906 quake, it still took in
scores of children.
Scozzafava's father sur-
vived and returned to being
a junk dealer, but it wasn't
until years later that he was
able to care for his children
again. He visited them fre-
quently, however.
Scozzafava spent 11 years
at the orphanage, attending
services at Congregation
Beth Israel on Geary
Boulevard. Eventually, she
married and had a son, then
worked at various jobs.
Tuesday, Scozzafava was
at dinner when the 7.1 ear-

Peggy Isaak Gluck is a staff
writer for the Northern
California Jewish Bulletin.

thquake struck at 5:04. "I
felt a great shake, and the
lights went out. I thought,
`Oh boy, another earth-
quake.'
Scozzafava wasn't the only
resident of the Home to re-
member other quakes.
Edith Weigert was also at
dinner Tuesday evening
when the tremor hit, but her
memories took her back to a
different earthquake, one in
the early 1940s.
It was just as big, contend-
ed the 90-year-old widow.
After she and her husband
had fled Nazi Germany for
La Paz, Bolivia, Weigert
became principal of a school,
many of whose students
were children of Jewish
refugees from Central
Europe.
She was sitting at the
school's sandbox with the
children, she recalled. "I told
them, 'Don't move the box,
I'm getting seasick.' "

What she was feeling
wasn't the children's antics
but what she called a ter-
ramoto ("earthquake" in
Spanish).
Stanley Grant reminisced
about 1945, when he was liv-
ing in Montpelier in
southern France.
It was 2 p.m., he re-
membered, when he fell
from the couch to the floor as
a quake rocked the region
and knocked dishes out of
kitchen cabinets.
Grant will always re-
member the date of last
week's quake, because he
wasn't just eating dinner
with other Home residents,
but was celebrating his 80th
birthday.
"I felt the table shake. I
held onto the table," he said.
He knew what was happen-
ing, he added, so he held on
real tight, not wanting to
fall again, 44 years after his
first tumble. ❑

Quake Survivor Fell
Into Collapsed Bridge

ELLEN BERNSTEIN

Special to The Jewish News

anice Freiburger of
Marin County, Calif.,
heard the explosion
and then the San Francisco-
Oakland Bay Bridge "ripped
in front of my face."
The property manager was
commuting across the top
level of the bridge to San
Francisco with co-worker
Bruce Stephen just after 5
p.m. Oct. 17 when a powerful
earthquake jolted the Bay
area. She felt Stephen's gray
Mazda "suck down," as if a
tire blew out. He slowed the
vehicle, but not before it
plunged headlong like a
roller coaster into a collaps-
ed section of the bridge.
When the blinding smoke
and dust settled, Frieberger
and Stephen were upside
down facing the churning
waters of the bay below.
"We thought we were go-
ing to go all the way to the
water," said Frieberger,
whose car was suspended
seven feet below the bottom
level of the snapped bridge.
"Bruce said we were going to
die. I was hoping the wind-
shield would break when we
hit the water and we could
swim free."
Caught between slabs of
concrete, the two managed
to crawl out the driver's

j

window and hoist them-
selves up steel girders and
concrete to safety. Despite
great pain from fractures,
Frieberger walked with her
uninjured companion and
scores of other stranded pas-
sengers a mile and a half to
the east side of the bridge
before medical help arrived.
Soon dramatic video
footage of the collapse of the
Bay Bridge, where one mo-
torist died, would be broad-
cast all over the world.
In her hospital bed in
Marin County, Frieberger
learned that her friend's
demolished gray Mazda,
wedged between the broken
sections of the bridge and a
dangling red Chevy Sprint,
had made the cover of

Newsweek.
Freiberger, a single
mother who belongs to Con-
gregation Rodef Sholom,
said she's received much
support from her 12-year-old
daughter, friends, her rabbi
and members of her temple.
The pain medication may
fog some of the shocking
memories for now, but, she
said: "I realized at one point
in the hospital how scared
I'd been. I'm a very lucky
person."

Freiberger credits a
seatbelt with saving her life.
"I still have my health; my
home is intact. ❑

•