Photo by Krista Husa

Harvey L. Katchan: "Somehow, I
didn't go to the regular Hebrew
school with my
brothers and sis-
ter. It fell to me
to learn' and
prepare for my
bar mitzvah
three times a
Week with Rabbi
Kosins in his
home above
Grant's Appetizer
store on 12th
Street. I shall
never forget
learning the
Hebrew alphabet
and learning to
prepare a letter
in Yiddish to my
mother.
"When I read
from the holy
books, the rabbi
listened and
often nodded to Harvey Katchan's Hebrew teacher was
killed.
sleep as I read
on. After I raised
my voice and
tapped the table to awaken him,
his wife would appear with rasp-
berry jam and a steaming
Standard Oil glass of tea,
and the rabbi would
wake.
"I had just begun
to learn my Torah
portion for my bar
mitzvah and was in
the Duffield Branch
of the public library
when one of the
Grant children
approached and told
me the rabbi had been
killed in a car accident
on 12th Street while
leaving his friends in the
Knoppow paint and wallpa-
per store.
"Another teacher and another
class was found for me above a dif-
ferent store on 12th Street, but it
Cindy Penn Klein: "I went to sev-
was not the same.
eral Hebrew schools during the
"Some wondered at the young boy
course of my Jewish education in
dabbing tears on his face at the
Detroit in the 1960s. I first attend-
funeral service at the shul on 12th
ed Chaim Greenberg Hebrew
Street and Blaine, where I would
Yiddish School, located on Schaefer
later celebrate my bar mitzvah. After
and Seven Mile in the old Labor
the bar mitzvah, wine and herring
Zionist building. I loved the old-
and kichel were served. But how
fashioned telephone switchboard
much more I would have enjoyed
and the fact that the secretary,
sharing raspberry jam and a glass of
Tessie Klein (whose nephew I
tea with my beloved rabbi and
would later marry!), had to ring an
teacher." El

1/30
1998

38

old school bell by hand to signal
the start and end of classes.
"I then transferred to the Esther
Berman Branch of United Hebrew
Schools. Since they didn't provide
snacks (although there were milk
and ice cream machines, and you
could buy bagels from the secre-
tary), I often went across the street
to Greene's hamburgers to get
something to eat before class. I
once became bold and actually

brought my Greene's: hamburger
into the Hebrew school to eat. The
principal, Israel Elpern, sent me
outside to finish my burger
(because it wasn't kosher), and told
me never to bring another ham-
burger into the building again if I
wanted to attend that school. I
complied with his wishes, but guess
who I saw in Greene's the next
week eating a treife burger? You
guessed it! Mr. Elpern."