Jerome Newman

Prahl: I’m excited to be doing this interview with you because I know a little bit about you and I’m about to learn a lot more.
NEWMAN: OK.

Prahl: Would you start please by telling us your name and where and when you were born?
NEWMAN: My name is Jerome Harold Newman. I go by Jerry. I was born in Portland, Oregon, at Wilcox Memorial Hospital. That is part of Good Sam. I was born August 15, 1934.

Prahl: Tell me first about the family you were born into. Who made up that household? Who did you live with as a child?
NEWMAN: I lived with my mother and father and brother.

Prahl: Whose names were . . .?
NEWMAN: My mother’s name is Jennie [spells out] Newman. She had no middle name. My father’s name is Alex [spells out], no middle name, Newman. 

Prahl: And your brother?
NEWMAN: Simon [spells out] Z. Newman.

Prahl: And he was older than you?
NEWMAN: He was four years older.

Prahl: And what kind of a family was it? Was it a religiously observant family?
NEWMAN: Not really. We were always with the grandparents. My wife took over and did the cooking and knew all of the things that she learned from her mother. As she got older, my niece, Rosanne Levi, and my wife made the Jewish food, and my mother would be the taster.

Prahl: Did your mother make that Jewish food, also, when you were growing up?
NEWMAN: Yes. Gefilte fish and matzo ball soup and . . .

Prahl: Were your parents immigrants to the United States, or were they born here?
NEWMAN: My father was born in Lublin, Poland. He came here after his bar mitzvah. And my mother came west with her family from Russia. They stopped in Philadelphia, and my mother was born in Philadelphia.

Prahl: And how old was she when she got here?
NEWMAN: She was maybe ten, 11.

Prahl: Do you know where your parents met?
NEWMAN: No.

Prahl: Did they meet in Portland? They both went to school here.
NEWMAN: Yes. They met here in Portland. My grandfather on my mother’s side was a shoemaker in South Portland.

Prahl: What was his name?
NEWMAN: His name was Simon Zohn [spells out]. And my father’s father was a tailor.

Prahl: And he was a Newman?
NEWMAN: He was a Newman. The parents kind of put this thing together like a little shidduch [arranged match].

Prahl: So you’re families got along?
NEWMAN: Oh, yes.

Prahl: Did they both go to synagogue here at Shaarie Torah?
NEWMAN: The First Street Shul, which was Shaarie Torah. They all went there.

Prahl: So you grew up in the Shaarie Torah synagogue?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: I’d like to get some memories of that from you when we’re done with family.
NEWMAN: My bar mitzvah was at the First Street, Shaarie Torah, that I remember. And I remember coming in to visit my grandparents, who were sitting upstairs. There was seating all around, and only the men sat downstairs. I would always go up to see my grandmothers. In that shul, the bema [podium or dais] was right in the middle, kind of like we’re doing here, but it was . . .

Prahl: Even more in the middle.
NEWMAN: Yes, and I guess they’re coming back to this style.

Prahl: And the children could go upstairs with the mothers or downstairs with the fathers?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: Do you remember any of your friends from those early days?
NEWMAN: I remember Phil Cohen. Devorah Glantz — she’s now Devorah Weinstein — her father was our hazzan, cantor, for 32 years.

Prahl: And his name was? Someone Glantz?
NEWMAN: Yonie [spells out] Glantz.

Prahl: What was your religious education like? Was there a Sunday school that you went to, and did you do Hebrew school after school?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: Did you do Hebrew school at the synagogue or at Neighborhood House?
NEWMAN: No.

Prahl: Neither?
NEWMAN: The Hebrew school was on the east side of town, Northeast 15th off of Knott Street, and my teacher was Mr. Robbins.

Prahl: Really? Did you live on the East Side?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: Where was that?
NEWMAN: We lived way out; it’s not way out now. We lived off of 82nd Street — it was 83rd and Hassalo — in the Montavilla area.

Prahl: So what school did you go to?
NEWMAN: John L. Vestal grade school. My brother and I, we both went there, and we went to Washington High School.

Prahl: That was a long way from synagogue. Did your parents drive on Shabbat? Did they drive to synagogue?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: And that wasn’t a problem for the congregation? Were there other people that also drove to synagogue?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: Do you remember at Shaarie Torah when women started to sit with the men?
NEWMAN: That was after — Rabbi Geller, I believe, got that in. 

Prahl: Yes.
NEWMAN: Yes. I always was in favor of it; the women weren’t allowed to go to the bema. They weren’t allowed to touch a Torah.

Prahl: So were there parts of the congregation who were upset by the change?
NEWMAN: Yes, some of the older people. I was always for it because — I’ve always said I get on a soapbox here. I’ve always said that women should be paid the same as men, and in the synagogue they should be up there with the men — or above the men —  and not second citizens, because the women at home keep the children going to Sunday school, and they keep all of the holidays. They do everything. And I thought it was terrible that they couldn’t do anything in the synagogue.

Prahl: Very modern opinion.
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: So tell me more about your Jewish education. You started to tell me about the Hebrew School on the East Side. And that was every day?
NEWMAN: I think it was three days a week.

Prahl: How did you get there?
NEWMAN: Took a bus.

Prahl: Your brother too?
NEWMAN: No. My brother, like I said, was four years older. He went from way out in [Yemensvelt?]. He would take the bus and go to the Neighborhood House.

Prahl: A very long way.
NEWMAN: And he did high school after his bar mitzvah. He was a great student.

Prahl: Did you stop your religious studies after your bar mitzvah then?
NEWMAN: Yes, because I’m dyslexic. I could read a page and not remember what it — and during Passover, when we would be with my brother and his family and our parents, and we’d read around, I’d sit next to my brother and my father on the other side. I’d start reading, and he’d nudge me and say, “Where do you see that?” I’d just make up my own story and turn things around. I still have a tough time with reading.

Prahl: That makes it much harder. And you had the same problem in secular school, too, right?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: That’s tough. A little bit more, maybe, about celebrating the holidays with your family. Did you go to grandparents for seders, or did you have them at your own home? Thinking about elementary school now.
NEWMAN: We went to our parents’. 

Prahl: Did your grandparents come and join you at your parents’ house?
NEWMAN: No, because they were gone. 

Prahl: Oh!
NEWMAN: Yes. Every Friday night my brother and his wife and Dora and I would go to my folks for Shabbat dinner.

Prahl: I’m trying to think of what happened when you were a child, though, before you were married. What was your upbringing like as a child?
NEWMAN: Want to pause?

[Recording is paused and then resumes]

Prahl: All right. So we’re going to keep it as far back as we can and talk about, as a kid, what Jewish institutions were part of your life besides the synagogue? Did you take classes at Neighborhood House or do anything there? You said your brother went to Hebrew School there. How about the JCC? Did you go to things there?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: Tell me what your experiences were there.
NEWMAN: At JCC — it was on this side of town, 13th and Montgomery — we were there to have a good time and play basketball and all that.

Prahl: Were you the only Jew in many of your classes in school? Or did you have Jewish friends while you were growing up?
NEWMAN: In elementary school, my brother and I were the only Jews, but when we got to high school, there were a few more Jews.

Prahl: Can you name any of them? Do you remember who they were?
NEWMAN: Yes. Bob Mendelssohn, the pediatrician, he went to Washington High, and his sister, and Danny Gold. Did you know Danny Gold?

Prahl: I know his name.
NEWMAN: Yes. A very bright young man. After high school, he went to Stanford. Then he went to law school. He was with Senator Neuberger. He was in Washington DC and did a lot; he started C-Span. I keep in touch with him. He’s my age. Another fellow that I call every once in a while is a non-Jewish kid. The three of us lockered together, and we were all about the same size, the same hair, and so the teachers would always get us mixed up.

Prahl: What was his name?
NEWMAN: Rodney Bullock.

Prahl: What were your activities in high school? Did you belong to clubs?
NEWMAN: No, I did not. Some of the clubs that I wanted to join didn’t allow Jews.

Prahl: What kind of clubs were they? Social clubs?
NEWMAN: Social clubs, yes.

Prahl: And was there an equivalent club for Jewish boys?
NEWMAN: No.

Prahl: So your social activity then was at the JCC?
NEWMAN: Right. AZA [Aleph Zadik Aleph, B’nai B’rith youth group for boys].

Prahl: And did you go to dances? What were the activities that you did?
NEWMAN: We went to conventions on a bus . . .

Prahl: With kids from other cities?
NEWMAN: Yes, from here and from other cities. We had a good time. 

Prahl: I bet.
NEWMAN: We tore up a hotel room a couple of times.

Prahl: [Laughter] It must have been a good . . .
NEWMAN: I think I took the fire hose in some of the rooms.

Prahl: Did you play any sports at the JCC?
NEWMAN: Basketball.

Prahl: On a team or just for fun?
NEWMAN: On a team. Some of the fellows on the team were my brother, Sammy Arnstein, Stan Litt, Howard Kraft. Let’s see, who else? There were a couple of others. 

Prahl: Sure. Are those people that you have stayed friends with throughout your life, or were they just childhood friends?
NEWMAN: No, I’ve stayed friends with them. I talk to Sammy Arnstein. He lives in Arizona. He’s blind. I call him and tell him what’s going on and see how he’s doing.

Prahl: Did most of your friends come from the Shaarie Torah circle, or were they from all different synagogues?
NEWMAN: All different synagogues.

Prahl: And was there any animosity or competition between the boys from different synagogues?
NEWMAN: No. When we got to the Center and AZA, we were AZA. Yes.

Prahl: Nice. Were you friends with kids from Beth Israel too?
NEWMAN: Not really.

Prahl: They didn’t come to the Center so much?
NEWMAN: No, they always kind of stood off. But Neveh Zedek or Ahavai Sholom, we all got together. Yes.

Prahl: Let’s talk about your parents a little bit more. What work did your dad do? Was that why you lived on the East Side, because of his work?
NEWMAN: No. He was a barber. His barbershop for 55 years was across the street. It was 518 SW Taylor, across the street from the Greyhound Bus Station. Now it’s a Hilton high rise. There were five barbers in his shop.

Prahl: Was it called Newman’s?
NEWMAN: No. It was called “Public Service Barbershop.” It was in the Public Service Building.

Prahl: Did he want you to follow in his footsteps and be a barber too?
NEWMAN: No.

Prahl: What were his expectations for you?
NEWMAN: Anything but a barber [laughter].

Prahl: How about your brother? Did he want him to be a barber?
NEWMAN: No.

Prahl: So did your parents expect that the two of you would go off to college after high school, or did they have . . .?
NEWMAN: My brother started at Vanport. There was a college in Vanport. Then he was drafted into the Army, so that was the end of his college. Then he got married. When I was graduating Washington High, he said, “You don’t want to go in the Army.” He had a good job; he was a radio operator. But he said, “I know you can’t do that,” and he said, “Go in the Air Force.” So I joined the Air Force out of high school.

Prahl: That wasn’t war time, though, was it? It was after Korea?
NEWMAN: No, it was during Korea, but Korea was settled while I was in. I didn’t see any action. I went to Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, for my boot camp. Then they give you the aptitude test, and I went to aviation medical school. It was to lecture to jet pilots and then take them down to the hangar and give them a ride in the ejection seat. That, and then we would put them in an altitude chamber, take them up, and take their oxygen off so that they could see what to do and when it was coming, and . . .

Prahl: It sounds like an exciting job.
NEWMAN: It was. I was in the medics, so I had a kind of a dorm room by the hospital and would eat the meals in the hospital. One day a fellow came in and he said, “Anybody want to go to the West Coast?” I said, “Sure.” He said, “Get a pass, and meet me at the flight line on a certain day in the evening.” I thought he was blowing smoke, but I did all that and I got on the plane with him, and it was a four-star general’s airplane. We flew to Seattle and then Los Angeles. He cooked the meals, and the general had a compartment and it had bunks. It was fixed up.

Prahl: What was your job with them?
NEWMAN: I was just going for a ride. I kept going through the general’s compartment to take food and coffee and stuff up to the pilots. One time through, the general stopped me and asked me who I was, and I told him. He said, “We’re going to get another airplane. Would you like to fly with us?” And I said, “Yes, I would.” He said, “Go and tell the pilot, Colonel Laneer, to take care of everything. You’re going to be on our crew.” So I went and told the commander of the hospital wing, a Jewish young man, a captain, and he said, “I’m not releasing you.” We were Air Materiel Command, Dayton, Ohio. We bought everything. And it was like a little White House.

Prahl: Everything like supplies that were needed?
NEWMAN: Airplanes, computers, whatever. So I went up to see the colonel there, and I said, “They’re not going to release me.” He said, “Don’t worry. You’re going to get released.” I got released, and that captain got shipped out someplace else. I flew with them for four years on the plane, took care of preparing the food, and I knew every general. There were 32 generals on the base, and I knew every general’s likes and dislikes with booze and snacks and all that. I would fix breakfast and lunches on the plane — it had a stainless steel galley and everything — and when we’d land at an air force base, I always had a staff car. The crew had their car, and I had my own car. I would go to the in-flight kitchen, and I would tell them, “I’ve got General Rawlings on the plane, and there’s going to be six of us plus the crew, and we’d like to have this, this, and this.” They would prepare it.

Prahl: Did these generals fly every day, or was this once a week? How often were you going up?
NEWMAN: We never knew. One trip we flew to Wiesbaden, Germany, and we took a bunch of — I forgot what the heck they called them, but they were auditors — and they would go visit and do the books, and we could be there — one time we were there for three weeks. So the pilot came and got the crew and said, “Where do you want to go? I’m tired of being here.” So we flew to Munich, and we flew to other places.

Prahl: So you never knew what to pack?
NEWMAN: They had certain uniforms and things that you had to have, yes.

Prahl: Did you consider staying with the military for your whole career?
NEWMAN: I was thinking about it. I asked our pilot, P. H. Young. The general that liked me the most was William F. McKee; he was a two-star major general. So I asked Pete. I said, “Pete, he wants me to stay. He’ll promote me. He’ll do this. He’ll do that.” And he said to me — I was the youngest on the crew, so everybody called me Junior — so he said, “Junior, McKee is a two-star. He’s not going to go anywhere. He’s not a rated pilot. So if I were you, I’d think about getting out if you know that you want to get out, and go back home.” So I did. And General McKee got four stars. He was vice-deputy commander of the Air Force and moved to Washington DC. He took his crew. He took his driver. He took everybody. So that was . . .

Prahl: Maybe the wrong decision?
NEWMAN: No. I’m glad because I met my wife after I got out of the service.

Prahl: So let’s talk about that period. After you left the Air Force, you came back to Portland.
NEWMAN: Came back to Portland, and my sister-in-law said, “There’s a toy company in Portland, and it’s “Lou Bachwach, Herb Boden, and Herb Shapiro. They’re all Jewish, and they’ll take care of the Jewish people.”

Prahl: What was the name of the toy company?
NEWMAN: Northern Specialty Sales. Mr. Jordan Schnitzer purchased it after. In 1980 I had a heart attack, and Lou Bachwach had a heart attack and didn’t survive, and he was really the brains. So after a couple of years, Jordan bought the company. And I hate saying this . . .

Prahl: So tell me a little bit about Northern Specialty Sales. What was your specific job there?
NEWMAN: I was in the import division, and I would purchase merchandise that you would see in the grocery stores on pegs. I had people that sold for me. I had reps. So I would go and I would listen to the reps, what the customers wanted and dah dah, dah dah, dah dah. We would go to the Orient. I spent a lot of time in Hong Kong in traders’ offices. If you were interested in the harmonica, three people would come in with shopping bags full of harmonicas. You could go through them and . . .

Prahl: Let me make sure I understand. This company didn’t manufacture any toys; you were distributors of toys that somebody else was making.
NEWMAN: Right. Like Mattel and Tonka and all that. Big distributor. Our biggest customer was Payless Drug when it was Payless Drug, before Rite-Aid bought them. I would go over and see what was there and knew what I wanted, and I would design some things. I’d see this, and the cup was in it, and I said, “I want that.” “Well, you can’t because that’s so and so.” So I said, “That’s their artwork?” “Yes.” I said, “OK. So reverse the artwork.” And they could do it. There were a lot of ways of doing things.

Prahl: We would love at the museum to have any memorabilia from the business: photographs of the people working, or letterhead, or anything. Do you have anything left from the business?
NEWMAN: I have a little spiral book that the customers would use as a “want list.” I still have that.

Prahl: Well, that’s something to think about. If you were wanting to donate it, that would be something we would like to have.
NEWMAN: Who can I donate it to? I wonder who [Prahl laughs].

Prahl: Was that the last position that you had? After you had your heart attack, did you work anywhere else after you left there?
NEWMAN: No. They let me work part-time and whatever. They were very, very good to me. So when the business was over there, one of my reps that sold my product called me and said, “We’re reps and we have other lines. Why don’t you and Dora come down?” We spent a week there in his home.

Prahl: Where?
NEWMAN: San Francisco. I was his rep and calling on people in Oregon, Washington, and Idaho. I never went there. Then I retired from there and then just had a couple lines on my own, and that’s what I’m doing.

Prahl: Repping toys?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: Wonderful. We seemed to have skipped right over the part where you got back from the Air Force to Portland and how you fit back into civilian life again. You got this job . . .
NEWMAN: I got the job, and my sister-in-law, Marilyn Feist — her first husband was Eddie [Thies?] . . .

Prahl: This is Simon’s wife? No. Who is Marilyn?
NEWMAN: Marilyn is Dora’s adopted sister.

Prahl: I see. Sister-in-law that way.
NEWMAN: Anyway, Dora was living with them, so she told Dora, “There’s a cute little Jewish boy that came home, and he’s got a lot of black, curly hair” — which I did. So she came to a ball game. Her husband Eddie was the catcher, and my brother played first base, and Jerry Bardy was a pitcher. Jerry Leviton played. It was all Jewish guys.

Prahl: What was the name of the team?
NEWMAN: The Ramblers. Because there was a social club called “The Ramblers,” and it was all of the guys. So I joined The Ramblers, and that’s how I met my wife. When I was in Germany, everybody was buying Rolex watches, so I bought a Rolex watch. I didn’t know why. I paid $87.50 for this Rolex watch. So come to the game, I took the watch off and I would give it to Marilyn to hold, and she gave it to Dora. Well, I didn’t get the watch back, so I went over to Marilyn’s house, and we got acquainted.

Prahl: Very clever [laughs].
NEWMAN: Yes. So Northern Specialty Sales was on 15th and Pettygrove under one of those arch-things now. Dora worked on 19th and Raleigh. She worked for Lane-Miles-Standish Printers, and I think they’re still there.

Prahl: Was she a Portland girl too?
NEWMAN: No.

Prahl: Where was she from?
NEWMAN: She was born in Paris, France. I would walk up, and we would go to lunch every day. Do you want to know about Dora in Paris?

Prahl: No, she can tell me that when I interview her. I want to know about going out to lunch with her.
NEWMAN: I don’t know if you can get her to interview. She went back with her sisters. There were three sisters and three brothers. She went back, and I told her, “Take a book and write everything down.” So she did. And when she came back, I read it. We lived around the block from Carol Danish, and Carol saw it and said, “I’m going to get LaNita Anderson” — do you know that name? She’s gone now. She was with the paper — “She’ll write an article and be in the paper.” And Dora said, “No, I don’t want that. I just want to keep it . . .”

Prahl: She’s a private person?
NEWMAN: Yes. 

Prahl: You went out for lunch with her when she was at work.
NEWMAN: I’m trying to figure anything after that. Dora and I both went to a dentist that was in that area. His name was  — he’s passed away — Dr. Milt Hasson. Do you know the name?

Prahl: Sure.
NEWMAN: Gina, I think, is still alive at the Home. She’s probably this big. Yes. Sweet people. So he tried to hook us up because he was our dentist.

Prahl: And you weren’t dating yet?
NEWMAN: No. So then after we started dating, he would go to the same little restaurant for lunch. He would walk up there. It was sweet. There is a little restaurant up there in the same building. It’s part of a house. Of course, they changed the name. I told Dora and I said, “We’re going to go there for lunch one day.”

Prahl: What are the streets?
NEWMAN: He was probably on 24th.

Prahl: On Overton? That area?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: I think there’s a little place there.
Prahl: What were your living situations like as young, single people? Did she live with her parents and you lived with your parents, or did you have apartments? How did you live?
NEWMAN: She lived with her parents, and I lived with my parents.

Prahl: And your parents were still on the East Side?
NEWMAN: Yes. Dora lived with Marilyn, and Marilyn was adopted by Dora’s aunt Pauline, went back and forth with the kids. That’s another story. That’s how they’re sisters or whatever. Then when we started going out . . .

Prahl: I want to ask you about Lou and Sylvia Buchwach. Did they also own a restaurant, a diner of some kind on the East Side?
NEWMAN: No, it was on Broadway.

Prahl: And were you involved in that at all?
NEWMAN: No.

Prahl: The Broadway Snackbar.
NEWMAN: How’d you hear about that?

Prahl: Doing research.
NEWMAN: There’s a story about that.

Prahl: Tell me.
NEWMAN: Herb Bodner, his wife Molly, and Sylvia and Lou had this little diner, and they would fix sandwiches and things.

Prahl: In what decade? When was it?
NEWMAN: It had to be in the 70s, 80s. No, it was back farther than that. They had roast beef, and they made roast beef sandwich spread or whatever. They had it in the window, and the sun beat in on it, and the people were getting sick.

Prahl: Oh, no!
NEWMAN: A Jewish guy was driving to Salem, Benny Harris. He pulled over to the side of the road and just brought up everything.

Prahl: Oh, terrible!
NEWMAN: And Sylvia Buchwach was sick. So people would call in, “Did anybody get sick from anything in your restaurant?” “No” [laughter].

Prahl: So was it not a successful restaurant?
NEWMAN: No. 

Prahl: Tell me, being the only Jewish kid in your elementary school and one of a very few in high school and also in the military, did you ever experience any antisemitism in any of those places?
NEWMAN: No.

Prahl: That’s nice. 
NEWMAN: When I was in basic training, the sergeant that was over our barracks knew I was Jewish, and when it was a Jewish holiday, he pulled me aside and said, “Do you want to go to synagogue? Do whatever you want to do. Do you want to just stay here?” So I was very lucky. I’ve been lucky all my life, yes. So that’s the story of Dora.

Prahl: Did you and Dora have any children?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: What are their names, and when were they born?
NEWMAN: Francine Renee Arron [spells out Arron] was born in 1960. Sherry Ann Newman —did you want their birth names or their names now?

Prahl: I assume that Francine married somebody named Arron?
NEWMAN: Yes. Benjamin Arron. Sherry Ann Jones. She married a non-Jewish boy, John Jones, and I think he’s more Jewish than she is.

Prahl: He never converted?
NEWMAN: No. He doesn’t have any religion. He celebrates our holidays.

Prahl: What year was Sherry born?
NEWMAN: Sherry was born two years later, 1962.

Prahl: Just two?
NEWMAN: Three. Joel Neil Newman was born in 1967. 

Prahl: Where did you raise them? Where did you live when you had them?
NEWMAN: We lived Northeast. When Francine was born, we lived across the street from the Providence Hospital on Glisan in units called Nagel’s Colonial Gardens. My brother and his wife started their life there, and her brother and his wife started their life there.

Prahl: It’s the starter apartments.
NEWMAN: Yes. The heat was not regulated, and Francine caught a cold, so we bought a house, 10335 SE Sherman St., a block off of 103rd and Division. Cherry Blossom Park, a nice little area. We bought that house for like $10,000, and we lived there a few years and we sold it for $30,000.

Prahl: Well done!
NEWMAN: When my daughter-in-law and my son were here, she wanted to see where they grew up. We stopped there. The guy had remodeled the house, and he was offered over $300,000 for it.

Prahl: Did they start school out there?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: And where did they finish school?
NEWMAN: Then we moved to this side of town. What the hell is the name of the area? Cedar Park, right off of [OR Route] 217. We lived there before 217 was a dream. They went to Cedar Park School, and they went to Sunset High School, and Francine and Sherry both went to University of Oregon. They were Pi Phis [Pi Beta Phi sorority]. Joel went to Washington University in St. Louis for engineering. He joined the Sammy [Sigma Alpha Mu fraternity] house, and he helped the Coors Beer rep; he just did too many things, and he came home. I picked him up at the airport. He had a sad face. I didn’t say a word. He fooled around. He was a hell of a student. The first year, he got the top. He said, “It’s like high school.” I said, “No, it’s not, not engineering.” So anyway, he came home and finished his engineering degree at Portland State. He has a degree in mechanical engineering. He lives in Seattle, and he’s in the insurance business. He has about 12 people that work for him.

Prahl: So he didn’t do anything with engineering? Nice to finish, though. And the girls?
NEWMAN: Francine graduated with psychology, and she uses it all the time. Sherry graduated in film and some kind of study, and she didn’t do any of that.

Prahl: I want you to think for a minute about raising your kids and about how your children’s Jewish upbringing differed from yours.
NEWMAN: Oh, an awful lot. My kids were involved with BBYO, BBG, and all the after parties were at our house. There were kids all over the place, but we loved it. They all knew they could come to our house.

Prahl: This was your house in Beaverton?
NEWMAN: In Beaverton. It was a party house. I still see people and they say, “You’re still around! I remember parties at your house!”

Prahl: Did you light Friday night candles as a family?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: Did you do that as a child with your mother?
NEWMAN: No. My mother did, but I wasn’t part of it.

Prahl: Was Friday night dinner a special thing for you and your children?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: And did you raise them at Shaarie Torah?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: Did the girls have bat mitzvahs?
NEWMAN: Francine had a bat mitzvah.

Prahl: Can you tell me a little bit about that? That was early for bat mitzvahs, wasn’t it?
NEWMAN: I think it was . . .

Prahl: Kind of in the middle.
NEWMAN: One of the first or second, or up there in the first five. She studied under Cantor Sam Greenbaum. Then I think Mr. Resnick took over. Yes.

Prahl: Did she read from the Torah, or did she read Haftorah?
NEWMAN: Sure, whatever you like.

Prahl: You don’t remember?
NEWMAN: No.

Prahl: OK. I think at the beginning of bat mitzvahs, girls were bat mitzvahed but they didn’t actually take out the Torah and read. That’s why I’m curious.
NEWMAN: I don’t think so.

Prahl: And Sherry didn’t want to do it?
NEWMAN: No.

Prahl: How about Joel, was he bar mitzvahed?
NEWMAN: He was bar mitzvahed here.
Prahl: And do they have Jewish families themselves?
NEWMAN: Yes. Francine and Ben have two children. The oldest is the light of my life. Her name is Alexa. She was named after my father. Her middle name is Zoe, named after Ben’s grandfather, who came to their wedding from Israel. He could not speak because he smoked and he didn’t have any vocal cords, but he had notes pinned on him. He came from Israel, and he got sent to Detroit. On his way, he got back to Seattle. Let’s see what else. Alexa had a bat mitzvah in Seattle. Alexa is 25, and Zach is 23. Joel married his sweetheart from college. 

Prahl: What’s her name?
NEWMAN: Her name is Dawn [spells out], and her middle name is Brenner. That was her birth name. 

Prahl: Do they have kids?
NEWMAN: She was married before. They separated after school. She’s a bicycle rider. She and a girlfriend rode their bikes up the West Coast, landed in Portland. They were having dinner with John — his father’s an attorney, Barry . . .

Prahl: It will come to you.
NEWMAN: I’ll get back to the name. So John calls Joel and says, “You’ll never guess who I’m having dinner with.” “No.” “Having dinner with Dawn Brenner.” Joel said some fancy words to him. “Why didn’t you tell me? I would have come down.” So anyway, they talked for several hours, and it went back and forth. He would go to Atlanta where she lived, and she would come to Seattle. Four or five years ago, they got married in Atlanta.

Prahl: That’s nice.
NEWMAN: You know Michael Allen Harrison?

Prahl: Yes.
NEWMAN: Michael came to Atlanta and played for the wedding.

Prahl: How lovely. That’s nice. All right, I’m going back to the early days again. Tell me about political leanings in your parents’ household. Did they talk about politics at all? Did they vote?
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: But they weren’t politically active people?
NEWMAN: No.

Prahl: Were they Zionists?
NEWMAN: I think so.

Prahl: Do you remember 1948 when Israel became a state? What’s your memory of the Jewish community at that time?
NEWMAN: It was bedlam.

Prahl: Where were you in your life in 1948? Were you in the service still then? 
NEWMAN: No. I was still in high school.

Prahl: Yes, you were still in high school.
NEWMAN: Graduated in ’53.

Prahl: I’m trying to think of other political things that you might — they just didn’t talk about politics.
NEWMAN:  No, not like people do today.

Prahl: Have you and Dora been politically active people in your lives?
NEWMAN: Not really that I can think of. No. I think that we did something, and I don’t remember what. It was working in a place with leaflets and all this kind of stuff for my cardiologist. My first cardiologist was Dan Oseran. You know the Oseran family?

Prahl: I do.
NEWMAN: His sister was married to Ron Wyden. Oseran was quite involved, and so we did little things, but not much.

Prahl: What has been your involvement in the Jewish community as an adult? Have you been active? I know you’ve been active at the synagogue.
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: What other things have you done?
NEWMAN: I don’t like to be the spokesman. Yes.

Prahl: You’re a worker bee?
NEWMAN: Yes. I’m on the cemetery committee, but Steph [inaudible]. He wants me to take it over, and I said it’ll fall apart. I’ll do anything, and I do everything . . .

Prahl: What are the activities of the cemetery committee? What are you involved in?
NEWMAN: We just put up new gates all around. We had the buildings painted, put new garage doors that were falling apart. There was in the circle where the . . .

Prahl: The cars?
NEWMAN: No, the body.

Prahl: Yes, the hearse.
NEWMAN: The hearse comes in and goes around. We had — it was about this high, the shape of a star with some flowers in it.

Prahl: How nice.
NEWMAN: I didn’t like it.

Prahl: Oh, sorry.
NEWMAN: So we took it out, and the [Neipaum?] family donated to put up the fountain that we have there. It was 80-some thousand dollars. I was involved in pushing for that.

Prahl: Sort of a beautification committee.
NEWMAN: Yes. And in the chapel we’re going to redo the bathrooms, and we’re cleaning some of the headstones, and — what the heck else? I’m always on the phone or out there.

Prahl: It’s a long way from Beaverton.
NEWMAN: Yes. 

Prahl: Think back on your life in Portland. You’ve been around the block. What changes have you noticed in the Jewish community?
NEWMAN: The Robison Home and everything out there.

Prahl: Cedar Sinai?
NEWMAN: Yes. I donate, too, and Dora’s a member of the Sisterhood and all this kind of stuff. There’s too many people that are way above me in stature and in wisdom and everything, so I’m not on any committees. I know a lot of people that are on the committees — the Blauers, the Easterns — but that’s not my cup of tea. If they want me to do something, I’ll do it, but I don’t want my name — let’s see. I was involved as a kid with — I think I was married then — with Hillel Academy that was in the basement here.

Prahl: Oh.
NEWMAN: If it hadn’t been for Harry Niemer and Marvin Schnitzer, there would be no Oregon Jewish Academy.

Prahl: Tell me how that transition happened.
NEWMAN: Harry Niemer always wanted a Jewish day school, and he did anything and everything to get the school started. We had spaghetti dinners. We had auctions. Ed Potter was the auctioneer.

Prahl: Can you tell me when this was? Was this the ’60s? Or later?
NEWMAN: It was probably the ’60s, yes. Because I was married in ’59. He’d hold an auction, and Ron Litt, who’s gone, he and I would bring the items up. They had a list of the items and the numbers and locations, and Harry would say, “I want this.” I says, “But that’s number 52.” He says, “I want that.” So we’d bring it up and they’d auction it off, and after the auction, we’d have another spaghetti dinner. I didn’t get home until like 1:00 AM in the morning. I said to Harry, “Why did you go out of [inaudible word]?” He says, “I know my buyers. I knew that they had looked at this, that they were interested. That’s why I wanted it at that time.” And he sold it and got good money for it.

Prahl: Good salesman.
NEWMAN: Yes. Harry Niemer was like my second father.

Prahl: Nice.
NEWMAN: He would go to the [Kornos?] and the grocery places and buy stuff by the case in his car, and he’d drop off stuff for each of his kids and for me. He was just a wonderful person. He was very involved here, and if somebody went out and bought lights and everything, he’d be so pissed because he could get them for nothing because he was with Platt Electric. He did all of the buying for Platt.

Prahl: Wouldn’t they just ask him first?
NEWMAN: Because people didn’t want to ask him for these things.

Prahl: So go back to Hillel Academy. You were raising money for a day school.
NEWMAN: Yes.

Prahl: How did it come about?
NEWMAN: We kept getting more people involved and getting more money, and Harry knew who to go to for money. And Harry, always in his pocket, if you’d see him someplace, he had tickets to buy. He kept raising money, and they got more people to go to the school. He wanted my children to go, and they didn’t want to go. They wanted to be with their friends and whatever. There was no athletics, and my kids were involved in that.

Prahl: So the children who were enrolled at Hillel School when it became PJA, they all just became PJA students?
NEWMAN: Yes. Linda Niemer.

Prahl: Sure.
NEWMAN: Yes. She was president of this shul.

Prahl: I think I knew that. We’ve interviewed her too.
NEWMAN: She’s something else.

Prahl: So looking at your list of things, was there any story that you wanted to tell us about that we haven’t gotten to?
NEWMAN: No.

Prahl: You sort of skirted the question about changes in the Jewish community. Did you want to think about that again?
NEWMAN: There’s so many changes.

Prahl: Which are the ones that have affected you?
NEWMAN: Well, there’s so much involvement.

Prahl: Yes.
NEWMAN: Everybody has an auction. Everybody’s raising money. 99 out of 100 times we go to the Home functions, the dinners, and they bring in the entertainers and all that. And we donate, put up the “mitzvah moment” and all that. That’s about all that we do. Or I’m the feet. If they need something, I’ll do it.

Prahl: Yes.
NEWMAN: But everything has changed because everybody’s got — there’s PJA, there’s the Home, and there’s this, just everything. I remember the Home when I was a kid. My grandmother lived on Second and Hall, and she would say to my mother and to my aunt in Yiddish, “There’s a greenah [greenhorn] over here. Go see what you can do to help them out.”

Prahl: What’s a greenah?
NEWMAN: Somebody that just came over, didn’t know from nothing. And it turned out to be Margie and Jack Winkler, Jim Winkler’s mother and father. My mother potty-trained Jimmy.

Prahl: Did your Zohn grandparents live in South Portland?
NEWMAN: My grandmother did because my grandfather died . . .

Prahl: Oh, right. Before you were born.
NEWMAN: He died when my mother was 15 years old. And all of his children — there was, I guess, seven kids — he wanted all of them to have music lessons, and every one of them played. They had an orchestra, and they played different — they all moved to California except my mother and her sister.

Prahl: How did your grandmother get along after he died? Did she work?
NEWMAN: No. She just kept the household. She had seven kids.

Prahl: And no income.
NEWMAN: I don’t think my grandfather had insurance or anything in those days, but the kids all worked and chipped in. They sold papers. My mother worked. When she got out of high school — she graduated from Commerce; now it’s Cleveland — she got a job. She had a Remington-Rand deal [typewriter]. She was this, that, and the other. So she went to look for a job, and they say, “What experience do you have?” “I don’t have any experience.” “Well, we can’t use you.” Then she’d go to somebody else, “What’s your experience?” She says, “None.” “We can’t use you.” And she said to them, “If I get experience, I’ll do a job for you, but can you hire me and I’ll get the experience here the way you want it?” So she got a job and she worked. My father used to meet her downtown — he was a dapper guy — and take her to lunch. Like me. 

Prahl: Yes.
NEWMAN:  I was dapper. My mother said that it just killed my father because when I’d come home from work, I’d give him the money because I knew he needed it. She said he had a tear in his eye, and she said he was so wonderful. And that’s how my grandmother survived.

Prahl: Wow. Do you have memories of being in her house as a child?
NEWMAN: Yes. She lived in an apartment on First Street in the old South Portland.

Prahl: I know you’ve given us some of her cooking things for the museum. Do you remember her food? Was she a good cook?
NEWMAN: I don’t know because I don’t remember her food. Honestly.

Prahl: You gave us, I think it’s chopped liver-making tools.
NEWMAN: Oh, yes. The grinder.

Prahl: Yes.
NEWMAN: In Yiddish, they call it a milkhl.

Prahl: [Laughs]
NEWMAN: And a hakmeser.

Prahl: Hakmeser?
NEWMAN: It’s the chopper [similar to a mezzaluna].

Prahl: I think we have covered everything that I wanted to hear from you. Unless you have more stories, more memories that you want to share with us.
NEWMAN: Before we moved to the East Side — now it’s Portland State — we lived on Sixth and Harrison.

Prahl: In a house or an apartment?
NEWMAN: In an apartment. In those days they called them flats. We lived on the top floor. The Menashes owned the flats.

Prahl: Which Menashes?
NEWMAN: There’s too many. I don’t know. My grandmother used to make pletz. Do you know what a pletz is? It’s like a pizza, only it’s got onions and sesame seeds, and she’d bake it. My grandfather would deliver it to us; we would just devour it.

Prahl: These are the Newman grandparents?
NEWMAN: The Newman grandparents, yes. The house on Second Street was a big house. My grandfather, when he came over with an uncle, they went to work as tailors, saved their money. They bought this house, a four- or five-bedroom house, a big place. She had a screened porch; I guess everybody did in those days. And she would make borscht there, a cold beet borscht with sour cream in it.

Prahl: Oh, sure.
NEWMAN: She must have had it in tubs or something out there. Because my father and a couple of his brothers, they’d go out there and they would just drink this stuff and eat the beets. God, I remember that. Yes. I guess that’s about it.

Prahl: That’s a pretty great memory. I thank you very much for sitting with us and doing this, and if you think of more, we can always record more.
NEWMAN: OK.