paper lanterns for a block dance. Across the street hung a big war
poster with famous sayings penned underneath.
As if lit by a huge flying glow-worm, the torch of the Lady of Liberty
in bronze pointed to the flitting stars. Dark-eyed men and women
returned home, to the Orient from the Occident. Night was coming.
A few men on the street, facing the setting sun, bowed very low as they
said their short prayers to Allah, who is here, there and everywhere.
BECAUSE COHEN COULD NEITHER READ NOR WRITE
Isaac Cohen came from Russia ten years ago. He left there his wife and
two children and came here, where he had a rich uncle who was in the
real estate business.
His uncle took him to his home, had him rest up, bought him a new suit
of clothes and began to Americanize the nephew by telling him that he
would have to make a living.
"Did you believe, uncle, that I have come here to watch my beard grow?
I, who have a wife and children to support," Cohen answered.
The answer pleased his uncle very much, because he knew how easily some
forget their duties when at a distance.
"Isaac, I shall try my best to get you something. Let's call in your
aunt and ask her advice."
Aunt Sarah came into the room, and folding her bejewelled hands, she
began to think.
"The best would be, my husband, if your nephew would tell us at what he
would like to work," she finally said.
"Well, Isaac, what do you say?"
Isaac Cohen's face lit up. He had his dreams, like all mortals. His
greatest desire was to be a beadle in a synagogue.
"Nothing easier," the uncle explained. "In the synagogue of our own
congregation such a position is now vacant."
And the uncle phoned up to the President of the congregation, who was
delighted to immediately receive the applicant at his home.
Was Isaac Cohen happy? Was there ever a happier man than he was as he
walked with his uncle from Second Avenue to Rivington Street?
During the whole voyage he had dreamed of getting a position as a
beadle--and now, suddenly, it was being realized. The silken blouses he
saw spread out between bunches of radishes and beets on the pushcarts
of Orchard Street were now almost within his grasp. He would buy one for
his wife with the first money he earned. On another pushcart were toys,
leftovers, seconds from last Christmas. He would buy a horse for his
little son. All those luxurious things he saw in the windows of the
stores were to be for him also. And a three-room flat, with water from
faucets, a dumb-waiter, and other new world wonders.
A beadle! Was there ever a higher position in life?
"Isaac," his uncle suddenly cut in on his dreams, "if Mr. Rosen, the
President, asks you how much you want, you should answer that you will
be satisfied with the same amount as the former beadle received." And
before Cohen had time to say a word the uncle continued--"and here we
are--second floor front. Let's hope for the best."
"Amen," said Cohen.
Mr. Rosen, the President of the Odessa Synagogue, was a very fine old
gentleman. He had come to New York twenty years before Cohen, and
prospered in the insurance business. He was a member of at least twenty
societies. Half of his income was paid in dues to the organizations to
which he belonged. Half of the Jewish population were his "brothers." Of
course they were all insured through him.
Brother Rosen received Cohen very nicely, and Isaac Cohen made a very
good impression on him.
"A nephew of yours is certainly a very desirable asset to our community,
I am sure, brother Cohen. The position of beadle in our synagogue is a
very honorable one."
The President then turned his attention to the applicant who was
nonplussed by the riches of the house. Velvet on every chair. Big brass
chandeliers and a world of photographs depicting the host in all his
glory as President of twenty lodges. Rosen watched the effect on the
newcomer, then he spoke.
"You could enter upon your duties even to-day. I am sure you know all
about them. The beadle about to leave us will instruct you and show you
all the details of the work. He is a very good man, old Reb Baruch, Mr.
Cohen, only we always had trouble with him on account of his
handwriting. You know he has to enter in the book names and dates of
births, marriages and deaths. Well, nobody can read his handwriting, not
even himself; and on account of this we had a lot of trouble."
Isaac Cohen paled. He almost fainted there.
"What is the trouble?" the two men asked.
"I can't--write--never learned--to write," Isaac stammered.
And so the dream of being the beadle of the Odessa Synagogue or any
other synagogue was shattered.
On returning to his uncle's home he was given a lecture by his aunt. He
had to make a living. The long and short of it was that they gave him a
twenty-dollar bill and told him to go and shift for himself.
A week later Isaac Cohen was peddling matches, garters and suspenders on
Hester Street. A month later he was the owner of a pushcart on which he
sold stockings, combs and toothbrushes. At night he learned knee-pants
making. A year later he had a little shop and two machines were working
for him.
His family was brought over here, and the wife helped what she could in
the shop, living in the rear of the store. It was not as easy as it
sounds when read, but two years later ten machines were grinding out
knickerbockers in Isaac Cohen's factory. Ten years after his arrival in
New York the firm of Cohen & Co. was known as the biggest of its kind.
Two factories in Brownsville, one in New York, four hundred machines in
all and twenty travelling salesmen selling his wares.
But he had never forgiven his uncle and aunt for having so abruptly
turned him out of their house, for not having helped him realize his
dream over here, and assisted him until he learned how to write.
One day old Mr. Rosen suddenly remembered to ask Brother Cohen about the
nephew.
"Why, Mr. Rosen, don't you know? He is the firm Isaac Cohen & Co."
"He, the same fellow?" Rosen asked astounded.
Cohen did not care to say much about him, and old Rosen understood
something was wrong between the two.
Early next morning Mr. Rosen went to see Isaac Cohen at his office. The
rich manufacturer recognized him immediately. Before long he agreed to
take a policy of $25,000 from Mr. Rosen's insurance company. But when
the old man gave him the application to sign Isaac Cohen said:
"What is that?"
"An application, Mr. Cohen--just write down your name--you know--here at
the bottom----"
"But, Mr. Rosen, if I had ever learned to write I would be a beadle in a
synagogue to-day."
THE MARRIAGE BROKER'S DAUGHTER
If you don't know Mr. Leib Aaronson, permit me to introduce him. Leib
Aaronson is the marriage broker of Harlem. He was in the "Schatchen"
business in Harlem when there were only two synagogues for the whole
community and both of them were half empty even on holidays. They were
built on speculation with an eye to the future development of the
section. Such ancient residenceship in Harlem cannot be boasted by many,
and it is therefore regarded with great respect. It is Mayflowery, so to
speak.
Leib Aaronson's couples have grandchildren now, and he keeps track of
all of them as future prospects. In his notebook he has three
divisions--Men, Women and Widows. A three-days-old boy is entered in the
section Men, with date of birth and fortune of parents; and when one of
his couples, the Abrahams, invite him to the christening of their
daughter, he enters the little child in the section Women. Near each
name are figures which Mr. Aaronson changes frequently in the course of
years. If the figures are near a name in the Men section, it means a
dowry he is worthy of. Figures near the name of a woman mean what dowry
her father is able to give. A line across the whole stands for death,
marriage or--and for this last act Mr. Aaronson is always very
angry--love-marriage for which no fee was delivered.
Should Mr. Aaronson hear that Mr. Goldberg made a pile of money on some
real estate transaction, the figures near Miss Sady Goldberg are raised
accordingly. When Baruch Levinsohn was bankrupt the ten thousand dollars
dowry marked for his daughter on the marriage broker's notebook dwindled
to almost nothing--just enough for a tailor, or lucky if she could get
anything with it.
That little notebook of Leib Aaronson contains the history of all the
Harlem fortunes; and the lines drawn across--as they occurred more
frequently in the last few years, and Aaronson is not yet a rich man
from brokerage fees--stand for only one thing; the modernization of
Harlem; the love matches Mr. Aaronson is so much against.
Now that I have acquainted you with the marriage broker and his methods,
I will tell you the story of his daughter.
A more beautiful girl than Leah Aaronson was never seen in Harlem. Even
while a child the neighborhood called her "Beautiful Leah"; "two eyes
like big prunes, lips like cherries, and cheeks like a red apple," was
the verdict of the fruit man on the corner.
And a more dutiful daughter never lived. She almost never attended any
of the parties. Her mother was an invalid, so she attended to everything
about the apartment. It was always spick and span. Her father invited
people to his home to talk business, and just to make them feel at home
that old-time samovar was set on the table. And did the brass shine? Did
it? Why, the whole house was kept so clean one could pass a white
handkerchief over the floor and not find a speck of dust on it.
Her own dress, her mother's old black silk gown and her father's
clothes, were always like just brought home from the tailor. It was all
Leah's work.
But all that did not help Leah to get a husband. She was nowhere on her
father's book. She was already sixteen, and her father had never given a
thought to her future. Why should he? There was no fee in it.
Then something happened.
Leib Aaronson had invited Abraham Goldberg to his home for tea and
arranged that Mrs. Fahler should casually come in to see Mrs. Aaronson!
Mrs. Fahler had inherited an insurance policy and two houses from her
dead husband.
But when Abraham Goldberg saw Leah it almost spoiled the match with the
widow. It took three months to get the deal through, and then only when
Goldberg was on the verge of bankruptcy.
"When Goldberg comes to see me, I don't want you to be much around,
Leah, or you will spoil the deal. It's four hundred dollars, you
understand!"
Leah understood. Four hundred dollars was a great fortune.
But when was she to get married? The invalid mother thought of that many
a time, and spoke about it to her husband.
"In about two years from now, Dora Summer will be ready; she is fifteen
now. By that time Rabinowitz's son will just come out of college and
will need money to establish himself--so it will be a sure deal. My fee
will be about two thousand dollars. Summer, the butcher, is making money
so fast he can't count it. Then, I will not forget my daughter," Leib
Aaronson explained.
"Yes, Leib, but suppose----"
"That can't be, woman. Dora Summer will not make a love match; she's
cross-eyed."
"I did not mean that. But suppose Rabinowitz gets on his feet
himself--you know yourself what good family he comes from--will he then
let his own son marry a butcher's daughter?"
"Suppose nothing! A butcher in America is as good as a rabbi if he has
money. Believe me, Summer will give all he has for a doctor as a husband
for his cross-eyed daughter."
It was all so certain, as Mrs. Aaronson later on explained to Leah, that
the girl began to look at Dora Summer as her benefactress. Dora was a
walking dowry for her. The whole Aaronson household was interested in
Dora's welfare and in her fast growing fortune.
Aaronson made some money, a small fee here and there, while waiting for
the big deal to get ripe--but that time was not to be.
Cross-eyed Dora met a cousin from Philadelphia and married him just when
Rabinowitz's son obtained his degree. And to spoil every other plan,
this young fool actually married a Christian girl he had known in
college.
Leah was eighteen. She decided to look out for herself.
There was a young bookkeeper, a brother of her only girl friend, Fanny
Shuman. He was nice to look at. He was also very ambitious. After she
had met him at the Shumans' house he fairly invited himself for a Sunday
evening at the Aaronsons'. Fanny Shuman whispered in Leah's ear "catch
him. I hate Gussy Schwartz."
Things went on pretty well but slowly. Leah arranged and timed the
visits of the young man in such a way that he should come when her
father was absent. Yet on the third week Leib Aaronson met the visitor.
"Hello, Isaac Shuman! Look what a big man he is! How old are you, now?"
"Twenty-four, Mr. Aaronson."
"Twenty-four! Wait--I think you are older." And out he took that fatal
little notebook. "You will be twenty-six, my boy, next month."
After a few minutes' silence, Leib Aaronson, the marriage broker, said
to his daughter. "Make the samovar and leave us alone, please. I have
something to talk to Mr. Shuman."
Leah trembled and cried as she went to the kitchen. When she returned to
the front room she heard her father say to the young man:
"Fanny is nearly twenty-five. She has to marry. Without a dowry--it's a
sin unto Israel. She is your sister!"
Leah cried. But Leib Aaronson could not lose a double fee. Besides the
dire need, Aaronson was also urged by professional pride to turn such a
clever deal and make the same money pay a double fee.
Gussy Schwartz's dowry was four thousand dollars. Out of this money
Isaac Shuman gave one thousand toward his sister's dowry, who was
married through Aaronson to a newly established paper box manufacturer.
Both marriages took place on the same day. This was some inducement to
the young manufacturer of paper boxes travelling on thin ice at his
bank. It cut the wedding expenses in half.
The few hundred dollars Aaronson got as fees from that deal just put the
family over the holy days.
Midwinter found Leah acquainted with a nice young fellow who studied
dentistry in the day time and worked as a waiter at night. He was not
from the district, consequently nowhere in her father's notebook. He had
already gone so far as to kiss Leah's hand, although she said "Please
don't," when Aaronson got hold of him quite accidentally at Shuman's
house. Aaronson always visited his couples frequently the first year of
their marriage. Back of his mind he had a notion that he guaranteed his
sales for a year, as are some dollar watches.
In two weeks the future D. D. S. was convinced by the marriage broker
that marriage was a more honorable profession than night work in a
restaurant, and the deal was clinched. For a year's board and lodging
and a promise of one thousand dollars when the young man should finish
his studies, Schwartz bought a doctor for his second daughter. There was
some argument as to the fee. Aaronson claimed that a year's board was
worth $1,000, consequently they owed him brokerage on $2,000. But it was
all settled amiably.
The Schatchen had to buy a new coat for himself. Rent was also overdue
and he had no cash.
Leah was twenty-one. Leah was twenty-two, and Leah was twenty-three. And
the best husbands of the district were given away by her father to other
girls; one for two months' rent, one for a winter coat, one for a long
overdue bill at the grocers'.
Leah's cheeks were now a little pale, her lips a little drawn. As the
shoemaker's children walk barefooted, so was Leah left without a husband
because her father was a marriage broker. There was not much hope for a
dowry. The best matches fizzled out because of that modern
institution--love. It was Aaronson's greatest enemy. No matter how much
he combatted it by saying that all love matches were failures, love
matches multiplied daily.
A new element invaded old Harlem. Men without reverence for old customs.
People whose antecedents nobody knew. They lit no candles on Friday
night and rode in cars on Saturday. Girls and young men walked
arm-in-arm on the street and laughed aloud immodestly.
Aaronson complained bitterly. His time-honored profession was no longer
needed.
"Leib, what about our daughter?"
"Bother with your daughter! There are no Jewish nunneries. With God's
help she too will marry."
He had an eye on a certain young widow with a little money, and a young
man who needed money. He invited the young man for tea and Mrs. Adler
was to come in casually on a visit to Mrs. Aaronson. That old samovar
was to do duty again.
Leah was watching. She was wise now. That young man was to be hers.
She placed her chair facing the young man and sat near the widow to give
him a chance to compare between them. The young man was very bashful, so
the widow also simulated bashfulness. But Leah was in her best mood, and
actually sang as she poured tea for the company. She made Mrs. Adler
look twenty years older by comparison, and angered the young widow so
much that she left the table with tears trembling on her eyelashes.
The deal with the widow fell through. He did not like her. She was too
old.
Two months later Leah married the young fellow. She swept him off his
feet behind her father's back.
Aaronson was studying his little notebook for a suitable match for the
man, when the young couple came into the room and announced that they
were just married by the Alderman of the district.
The marriage broker could not forgive his daughter. Not only had she
robbed him of a possible fee, but she had completed the ruin of his
business. People will point at him and say:
"A marriage broker, and his daughter made a love match!"
THE NEW SECRETARY OF THE PRETZEL-PAINTERS' UNION
The Pretzel-Painters' Union had emerged victoriously from their last
strike. The Pretzel eating population of the city had refused to eat
Pretzels that were not glazed by the expert hand of a capable expert in
the art of pretzel painting--the beer-drinking population refused to
drink beer in saloons where dull pretzels were offered and capital had
to yield to labor. Organized labor was triumphant. The pretzel painters
who had worked fourteen hours a day for ten dollars a week before the
strike, won a ten-hour day, an increase of two dollars a week, as well
as official recognition of their Union.
The Union consisted of twenty members, all of whom, except one, were
officials of the organization. The officials numbered a president, two
vice presidents, a recording secretary and a financial secretary, a
treasurer, three controllers, a house committee of five, an organizer
and three trustees. The total income of the Union from dues never
amounted to more than three dollars a week, but this was supplemented by
the income from the yearly Pretzel-Painters' concert and ball every
winter, and from the picnic every summer.
After the strike was won the members felt the necessity of solidarity
more than ever. This feeling brought them together twice every week to
discuss Union matters and matters of private concern. But after a while,
when they had exhausted all possible subjects and the Union was running
smoothly, the organizer had difficulty getting even the legal quorum
together once every second week. The organizer knew from experience what
such negligence caused.
The collection of dues had already diminished perceptibly. Some of the
members were in arrears with five and six weeks. Fifteen cents a week
is comparatively easy to pay, but when the sum is over a dollar and the
pay is twelve dollars a week--it's a different story! The
Pretzel-Painters' Local was in great danger.
The organizer began to feel that non-union pretzel-painters were shining
the beer drinkers' delicacy. He called meeting after meeting and
described passionately to the four or five old men present the great
fight between Labor and Capital in general and the battle their own
Union had won; the high price paid for what they already had gained
through solid organization, but it was all in vain; the others did not
come. They owed too much for dues and fines.
Finally the organizer hit upon a great idea. "The Pretzel-Painters'
Union has to be reorganized," he wrote to all the members.
It was a new thing, that word "reorganized." It was something worth
while finding out about. "We must reorganize or our organization goes to
pieces," he wrote to them. That Wednesday evening was a gala evening.
The financial secretary had never taken in so much money at once;
twenty-six dollars in one evening! They all paid up to the minute;
because it was explained in the letter that only members with paid-up
dues had a vote in the reorganization of the mighty Pretzel-Painters'
Union.
The Pretzel-Painters' Union was not without its inner dissensions. There
was a group of Galician Jews and a group of Russian Jews always fighting
one another; and both groups fought whatever the group of Roumanian Jews
proposed. There were also two old Portuguese Jews; and whatever they
wanted carried through was sure to be defeated by the above-mentioned
three groups.
But the Russian group was always the deciding factor. By themselves
alone they were the majority of the organization.
After the secretary had announced that everybody was present and paid up
to the minute, the chairman, Mr. Bindzel, opened the meeting and asked
the organizer to explain the cry of distress.
"Mr. Chairman and brothers," the organizer began, "we must reorganize or
we go to pieces. Already the Hinshel Company employs two non-union
pretzel painters. If we don't reorganize they will break our Union. We
must uphold the rights of labor or the heel of capitalism will crush
us----"
He spoke well into the night and urged them with tears in his eyes and a
proper catch in the voice to stand by the flag of their class.
The silence was very impressive when the organizer finished and sat down
to wipe his perspiring face. No one spoke a word. The chairman did not
want to break the silence. He felt the greatness of the moment.
Finally brother Kessler said:
"Mr. Chairman!"
"Brother Kessler has the floor."
Brother Kessler, of the Galician group, seldom took the floor. So
everybody was astonished that he of all others should want to speak.
"Mr. Chairman and Brothers.... Mr. Chairman. Of course, we want to
reorganize, but we don't know how to do it."
"Well said! Go ahead Brother Kessler!" several voices were heard at
once.
Kessler took heart.
"We are Pretzel Painters. We are proud of our Union, are strong for our
Union, and we want to protect it. Let Brother Kirshen, our organizer,
tell us how."
"Sure, Kessler is right. Let Brother Kirshen tell us how," came voices
from everywhere.
"Order, please!" the chairman called. "This is an important meeting. On
it depends the battle between Labor and Capital. Order, please. Brother
Kirshen has the floor."
Brother Kirshen, aglow from his recent triumph, took the centre of the
platform.
"The first thing to do to reorganize our Union is to elect new officers.
I make therefore a motion that we elect new officers."
"Mr. Chairman, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Chairman," several called out.
"That's a political trick," called out the Roumanian group in one voice.
"Order, please!" yelled the chairman. The heavy gavel came down upon the
table.
Everybody was soon seated.
"I make an amendment to the motion," Kessler said.
"Sit down, Brother Kessler, we must proceed regularly. The
Pretzel-Painters' Union has a constitution. We will proceed according to
its constitution. The constitution of the Pretzel-Painters' Union says
that when a motion is put before the house, it is first voted upon
before any amendments are discussed. Does anybody want to speak on the
motion?"
"Then, I propose that the motion be voted upon without debates because
it is late and they will soon put out the lights in the house," said
Kessler.
"Politics, politics," the Portuguese group cried. "Traitor, traitor,"
came from another group. But when Kessler's proposal was voted upon he
had a majority. The Russian group voted with him. And so it happened
that the nineteen officers of the Pretzel-Painters' Union were shifted
around.
The chairman became the treasurer and so forth. But when it came to vote
upon the secretaryship, Kessler, who had hitherto been the twentieth of
the Union, the only member who had been without an office, was elected
Secretary of the Pretzel-Painters' Union, because he was backed by the
Russian group.