From Nazi Germany to Hammond Indiana

This is in Jewish history, a podcast of Indiana Jewish history. My name is Mike Brown and today I'm joined by Peter Blotke, who's here to discuss how his family came to America and his life growing up in Hammond, Indiana, as the son of a rabbi who escaped from Nazi Germany. Hi and welcome to the Indiana Jewish History podcast. I'm here with Peter. Welcome to the podcast. Thank you. And Peter is going to share with us a little bit today his experiences about his father and their family coming to America and about his experiences growing up in Hammond, Indiana, being at Indiana University. So Peter, please let me know. Tell me a bit about your fascinating history behind your father's time as a rabbi. Okay, when would you like me to start? What time? Let's start early on. Let's start early into his early into his career as a rabbi in Germany. Okay. My dad was a rabbi. He had two congregations in Germany, unfortunately, in the late 1930s. After he graduated from the seminary, he was posted to a small town in eastern Germany called Lundspirke, on Nevada, at Slansburg, where I was born and was there for body here? And then he went to another also very small community, Shytah Mule. And was there for, I would say, under two years. 1938, though, was the turning point as we know German history. He was in danger of being arrested by the Gestapo. He had to make a decision. He made a decision. He basically moved back to Berlin, where the family is from, and was there for a short while. And then obtained a temporary visa to the United States, which allowed three months' residence in the United States if he could find any response when he came over. But he had to find a job in the United States within three months, which of course was impossible. So Franklin D. Roosevelt exported him, deported him. He went to Cuba, where there were many German Jewish refugees, and my dad lived there for about a year and a half. My mother and I were still in Germany at that time. He then was able finally, at the beginning of 1940, to obtain a position in the small town in Pennsylvania, Phillipsburg, PA, that's near Altoona. And he was able to send for us, and my mom and I came over on the last ship out of Italy for when it was worth the Rex, which later was sunk in the harbor. And we joined him in Phillipsburg. Should I go through his other communities? Sure. If you'd like to talk a little bit about what was it like, coming, do you have any memories? Is it a very small child for America? Yeah, I remember the ship ride. My mom was seasick, and I wasn't, and I had never been seasick, and I was also in the US, and I've been at some point in my life. I got her cold oranges, and she hadn't seen oranges in Germany for years, because it was a food shortage already in the 1930s. And I remember coming down the gang plank in New York Harbor, not on Ellis Island, but actually New York. And there was my dad, and I was very happy to see him, obviously, and he was happy to see me and to see my mother. We unfortunately left the entire rest of the family behind in Germany, and they all perished in some way or other. After, and then, I was a little kid, I was only just turning four years old, so I don't have much memory of Phillipsburg, but it was a nice little town. My dad then found another position in Camden, New Jersey, that's across the Delaware River from Philadelphia, with a much larger congregation. And we were there for a couple of years also, and then he took another position in New Bedford, Massachusetts. That's in the southern part of Massachusetts, Fall River, and New Bedford being like twins, Twin Cities. And that's the way I'm in capital of America from the source. And from there, after a couple of years, we went to Kingston, New York. That's up on the Hudson River, 92 miles north of New York City. And I was born in Bedford there. In 1949, he took a position in Hammond, Indiana, and we took great car ride across America, including a ferry boat across the Lake Erie. And went up in Hammond, 1949. And what was the city like there in 1949 for you? There was a pretty dynamic city. We moved into a nice apartment building right on the state line across the street, most of us got in the city Illinois. And it was a real city. It was obviously not Chicago or New York, but it was a real city with real streets and real stores. And so that's about what I can say. I went, I was enrolled in a junior high school at eight grade, and then I went to Hammond High School. My dad continued to drop by there into the 1970s. So it's quite a long time. Yeah. This city, Hammond City, Indiana was a good experience. Though I've been actually gone from IU for, or from Indiana for 50 odd years, I still consider myself a houcher. So it's right now I'm working on, I'm working on old IU sweatshirts right now. It's pathetic. Well, that must be hard living in Wolverine country and being a houcher, right? I don't care about the Wolverine. One of my daughters went there. All my daughters went to different schools in India in Michigan. And what would you say growing up in Hammond, what were the majority of the Jews involved in doing where most of them still running small small small family stores, things like that? Yeah, yeah, it was mostly merchants. And quite a few professionals were quite a few lawyers and doctors. It was a typical Jewish community of a middle-sized town, as far as the demographics and the occupations and things like that. As you know from that picture you sent out of that store, the biggest store in downtown Hammond was Goldblatt Brothers, which was a Chicago company. And it was kind of like the center of downtown. Have you been to Hammond? I have been, but not for some time, not for a long time. So it might look a little bit different. I know they've taken some things down. I mean, talking about the community, what would you say the observance levels were like? The synagogue was conservative, correct? It was. It tended more towards Orthodox when my dad got there. But that pretty much changed, you know, not too long a period. So it was conservative, conservative congregation, my dad being conservative rabbi. That's how we got that position there. And there was a very, it was an outstanding reform temple in Ham and two. And your father, you know, comparing, you know, observance levels and traditions from what he had seen in Germany was the community on a similar observance level of the communities, the experience in Germany or a little more observant or less observant. I really couldn't comment because I was a little kid. I was just, you know, turning four years old so I can't say what the level was. We observed everything at home. It was like, you know, a very traditional Jewish upbringing, much closer to Orthodox than to reform. And how many people still walk to shoole versus drive back then? Quite a few because basically the Jewish congregation first to when my dad got there was on Cibli Street, which was more in downtown Ham and which was no longer Jewish area. But then they built much better in synagogue on home in Avenue, which is the main drag in Ham and. And the more the end of town were a lot of the Jews lived. So there were quite a few walkers. They really were. And who, I mean, which community would you say was bigger the conservative or reform communities? We were much bigger. And that typically speaking in most Midwestern cities is not the norm corrected. It's normally the reform congregations are really bigger than the conservative or was it different back then? I don't I didn't understand the questions. Yeah. So it tended to be in most most cities in Indiana, tended to be the reverse at the reform temple was larger than the conservative synagogue. Would you say that's the result that because many of the members of your father synagogue were second generation congregants or when did they arrived? Second or third second and even third. Most of the I can't really comment on on on the temple's membership, but we had a lot of, you know, pretty outstanding people and well connected people. So it was already because some of our older journals that we have about Ham and have stories from the first generation people who came and worked in the factories and worked in some steel wells. And so this is already the second generation from that. A lot of a lot of our people were still not working. You know, I had a couple years with the standard oil and I had, you know, I worked at inland steel one summer. That was kind of the tradition in that area. You know, we we've worked. Wow. And what was the relationship because inland steel is so so famous and had such a big impact on the Jewish population there? I mean, what was it like working one summer in inland steel? You know, you know, the inland steel was owned by the block family. It was a Jewish owned steel mill. I enjoyed it. Like almost everything in my life. I enjoyed it. It was a very nice experience. One of the one of the underrules in that area is if you needed a job, you had to join a union. So I joined the steel workers. One summer I dug ditches for one of the utilities. I had to join the mine workers. That's that's life in northwest Indiana. It was very heavy union country. Interesting. And so I mean, what was what was the Jewish community's relationship with with unions with labor? Would you say where there's still a lot of people involved in unions and labor there? No, I don't think so. I think it's just just part of being there. I don't think that anybody was active, you know, or I don't remember any of our people being active politically even in other words, too, is holding office. I don't remember any of that. But again, I left ham at age, whatever 29. So I don't know. And looking back and reflecting on it at bed, I mean, we're, I mean, did most of the households tend to keep kosher back then? Did you have a kosher butcher in town? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It was a run of kosher butchers there. Sometimes we had two of them. Wow. So there was a demand for it. We had a fairly large community. And a lot of other sandwich bases, you know, like in my high school, there were only a handful of Jewish kids graduating with me. And that's just a percentage thing. We're not the majority there. But it was probably a huge school and population wise. Hammond was a pretty large city. Hammond High now. Yeah. Hammond High was a big school. Remember they won the state basketball tournament a few times and beat self-bent centrally. You didn't go to central civil mention that. And what do you mean? Sorry, go ahead. No, it was a very good school. Hammond High and good faculty and good fellowship and everything. Almost everybody wound up going to college. And if they didn't go to college, Hammond had a very peculiar education system. There were two high school or three high schools counting Bishop Noel, which was the Catholic High School. We had Hammond High and Hammond Tech and Morton, which was on the other side of town. Hammond High was for the kids who were aiming to go to college. Tech was for those who were aiming to work to become, you know, work in industry or work in the trade. And the schools were about equal population, both quite large. Interesting. And was it a fairly integrated city at the time? As far as African Americans were saying? Correct, yes. There was a very small African community population in Hammond. They lived on basically one neighborhood near the high school, right in the heart of town. I don't recall any segregation or any incidents or anything bad, you know. I went to school with them. Did you encounter any anti-Semitism growing up in Hammond at all when you were younger? In Hammond? No. Earlier in Kingston, New York places like that, yes. But in Hammond, no, I don't recall anything ever. And I mean, would you say it's partially because Hammond was such a multi-ethnic place at the time. I mean, it's not not necessarily integrated yet, but because there were so many different groups that were there. Could that have played a role in it or what would you say would make Hammond a more tolerant, less anti-Semitic environment? Yeah, I'd recall anti-Semitism at all, but it may have been, but I just don't recall it ever happening. And it was multi-ethnic. Most of the Eastern countries were very well represented there. And also, you know, fairly large southern population people came up to work in the in the mills and things like that. It was a very typical, that I don't want to say, Grant Wood kind of community, but it was a good place to be. And would you say growing up, you know, people were more committed to going to Minyan, to go, you know, coming for Shabbat, they're growing up. And, you know, how did people kind of look at their own Judaism in Hammond? I don't know if I can comment because again, I mean, I was a kid. [BLANK_AUDIO] And there was always good attendance at services. And like that never had a problem racing a million. And that's it. So it was good. It was a good, a bit lively congregation. - Well, I guess a better way of saying this is how many, how many bar mitzvists did you have per month? Maybe that would be a better way of phrasing it. I don't know if there was that many per month, but there were quite a few. There were quite a few. - There's some people that I hear, stories from the 60s where they have like, the synagogues are so full, they have a bar mitzvist like almost every week. - We have a temple here in Michigan where they have three or four bar and bar mitzvists on a Shabbat. It's a reformation, but they have a huge membership. And it's, you know, they have different halls. - Wow, that's quite big. And I mean, what would you say would be trying to think in terms of of how people perceive themselves from different parts of India. So when you went to Indiana University, you obviously met Jews from other parts of Indiana and other parts of the state. How did they perceive the region versus the rest of the state when you were in the-- - And you're calling it the region, which is good. - I've tried to use terminology. - Use terminology of our rather unusual, area. - Yeah. - I had different roommates. I'm trying to think, you know, one from Karmic city and then one from Gary. I don't know if there was a big rivalry. You know, between us and the people from Indianapolis, which we call Naphtown, I'd like, and South Bend, and Evansville, et cetera. We also integrated in our dormitories and our fraternities and sororities. So I don't think there was much rivalry. This is as far as our geographical locations. - And you were one of the found-- When was A-Pi founded at IU? - At IU in '57, I believe it was. - And you were part of one of the founding classes there? Is that correct? - Yeah, it was one of the founders. - And I mean, how did-- - We didn't want to be-- We didn't want to be semi-sacrificities. - They were already established, but IU long before-- - You stood in A-Pi? - Very large and very established. We were very small fraternity at that time. The handful you saw, you were nice enough to find that clipping. It was a handful of us, and not all the people lived in the house. Some of them still lived in the dorms. - And so did you go to the Hillelhouse at all growing up? I mean, I'm sorry, I'm not growing up along college, I should say. Occasionally, occasionally. - Did they say, oh, a rabbi son? Okay, now we have someone who can land for us. (laughing) - No, that never happened. I was extremely integrated. There was no problem with that. - And I was in college at the same time as Tommy's story, where I told him about him and he's the son of the reform rabbi from him. - Well, that's fascinating. You're both the same age, and you both tie you the same time. - And he was born in Germany like I was, and. - Incredible. Well, I mean, it would be amazing if we could all get together, if you would feel comfortable doing it to do a live Zoom video about, so he could share his experiences too, and discuss what that's like, because it's such a unique experience. - Right. - I don't know if Tommy's even around anymore, I haven't talked with him in 50 years, give or take. - Wow. - And. - But I'm still in contact with a number of people from Hammond, and it's the beauty of the internet. - Yeah, certainly. Certainly, it really is the beauty of the internet. What would you say. Going from town to town, did you really feel like you had a really good feel for America by the time you got to Hammond, going, what was it like going from all these different towns growing up? - I was extremely American for the very beginning. I rejected the German language immediately, and I had to relearn it. Actually, I've not my folks spoke it occasionally, but not that much. And I had to relearn it in high school and college, to the point where, if I go to Germany, or went to Germany a few times, I could understand and I could sort of speak. Was that an answer to your question? - Yeah, yeah. Did you go back there before the end of the Cold War, because you said that he was in the Eastern part of Germany? - Yeah, I went behind the curtain on my own. It was my right as an American citizen to do that, and I did. - Wow, and what was it like in Eastern Germany? - It's one of my favorite stories. I went through Czech Republic Charlie, are you aware of that? Czech Republic Charlie? - Yes, yes. - The only passage between Eastern West Berlin, I told the US soldiers, hey guys, if I'm not backed by five o'clock sending troops, I think it had, I didn't get back. So seven, and they never came for me. (laughing) - And when I was in East Berlin, it was a May day, so it was a big celebration, the communist rollout, who's stepping in the streets as Germans would. And I was followed by, four-possibly entire time, folks pull it side, the police were always walking somewhere near me or behind me the whole time I was there. And if I were to tell my parents I was gonna do something like that, they would have gone out of their minds, but I had a sense of adventure. - Wow, so I mean, did you ever check out the sea if the Stasi was actually following you because they have those, you can see the files there? - No, I didn't see any of that stuff, but I know there were four pull behind me, wherever I was, it was like absolutely amazing. And once I was on the other side of the wall, I never looked at the wall because I knew that's something you don't do. And by East Berlin versus West Berlin, East Berlin was impoverished. It was just, it was very sad. - I found a place to have a coffee and that was about it. - Wow, and I mean, just, could you just see the damage in the city and the east that hadn't been repaired and hadn't been built over? - It was mostly repaired. It was just, there was just no real life in the area. Our family cemetery was in East Berlin, so that was a reason to go there. - They didn't tend to take care of things. The East Germans left things get run down as opposed to West Berlin, where everything was bouncing already. But we're talking, you know, a long, long time ago. - Yeah. - But also 15 to the war. So we're almost 15 years. - That's fascinating. I mean, it's also a very scary experience because, you know, hearing, - I could have been arrested. - Yeah, for sure. - I could have gone to Siberia, who knows? - Yes. But they, I mean, they didn't ask you like what your reason for coming and visiting there. - Oh, yes. - Yeah, they do, of course. Yeah, when I told them, just a tourist, I'll wanna look around. I just gotten out of the Navy and I'm still a hero. And I did stuff like that. Wow. I went to Franco's page and I went to Yugoslavia when I was still Tito world. And that's stuff I did, you know. Fascinating. That's such a different world, Europe's, you know. It's much so much. Much easier now. Yeah. Well, after I mean, pre or post COVID, now it's it'll be easier to travel all those places closed down for temporary. They're gone. They're gone. They won't let American tourists in any way and we wouldn't travel. So yeah, that's too bad. Yeah, I mean, I visited Berlin once and so I kind of got to, you know, recognize the different neighborhoods and I wonder what did Alexander plots look like back back then? Well, that's that's where the where the checkpoint trolley was. Yeah. It cuts through Alexander plots. Now it's a very lively and nice place. And then it was just kind of a wide open area, but the you know, the streets were paved, everything worked good. There wasn't the activity back then. And pot stomach plots was just a huge minefield, right? Basically now it's this huge build up mall area, right? Yeah. You're you're a good tourist. You want to go there? Or places usually bad areas that that are now they kind of revive. It's interesting and going to the, you know, where the where the Jewish neighborhood roughly was in Berlin was interested in the middle neighborhood. And Mita. Yeah, that was that was fascinating and seeing the huge huge. Did you did you recall seeing the new synagogue in on Oranian Strasse? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. Amazing building. Very very impressive. How they rebuilt it in the in the same form in the version of us. And how it survived the war is just a mirror. Oh, it didn't really. No, it didn't really. They kind of rebuilt it. That's true. You're talking about the Iranian correct. Correct. Yeah. I mean, it didn't survive exactly the same way, but the entire building didn't collapse though. No, unfortunately, we bombed the hell out of the Germans and they had to rebuild. These are these are fascinating neighborhoods. And I mean, did you go to anywhere outside of outside of East Berlin and to East Germany, you know, on your trip? No, you didn't want to risk that. No, like where I was born in places like that. And I've never been over that. Where I was born and both East Towns, Schneidermühl and and Lonsburg are now in Poland. As his term, he was re-bought, was divided there after the war. No, no, called Gorsal and Pihuah. So they they've vanished from the from the map. Wow. And I'm not comfortable in much of the rest of Germany. You know, again, the first time I went in, I went in with my cousins who live in Switzerland and I had trouble breathing. You know, oh my god, kind of thing. Yeah. I went in one time and there were all these old gentlemen. And again, I didn't like it at all because these were the old Nazis. So yeah, it's a bit stress and do say. And Berlin. Yeah, Berlin has less of that. It was a cost of a Paul in the city and it's very cost of a Paul. And if you noticed as a tourist there, how I don't know, follow submit, or what I'm doing on the call, how much Jewish stuff is in that city? How much I remember of stuff is everywhere. Certainly. Yeah. Including on the sidewalks and building, separate buildings. And that's it. They've worked hard to to a tone. Yeah, you get reminded about it almost everywhere you go there. And almost every single neighborhood, even even in the far, you know, eastern neighborhoods that we saw, you still see parts that memorialize the Holocaust. So I mean, and that and that sense and I mean, it's just a very, it's to me, I don't know. It seems like kind of like going to Chicago, but everyone is speaking German. I don't know how to how to put it. It's very causing balls and plays. You're saying Berlin is a very cosmopolitan city. It's got it's got a lot of life to it and a lot of an awful lot of history. A lot of an awful history. But were you able to see the Cemetery? Is it East Berlin? A little bit. We actually I mean, it's a memorial. Right. Right. In front. Yeah. Yeah, it's sir. I mean, it's really that those parts are very sad. As you know, and it's those, those are, but I think it's really a worthwhile city to go because there's so much Jewish history there. You know, most of them. Oh, I'm so many things happen there. There were so many, there were so many great rabbis were there that I think even even with the great, you know, evil that happened there. There was so much for me to see what's good before. So. Right. Right. Right. It had an enormous Jewish population, Berlin. It was and now with the Russian Jews who lived there, they have another enormous population. Right. And you have Israelis who live there now. Yeah. There are large numbers. Which is really, did you see the Israeli shops and yeah, yeah, you can get you can get Israeli humus there, of course. And some other some other different. Very strange. Yeah. Even this Yemenite dish that's really popular in Israel, you can get that there. All sorts of things. So. But best to come and food via this Turkish. I don't know. A doughnut, a doughnut, a bob or a, if you, I can't, I can't do that. I didn't want to tip. German. German food is just not, I don't like it. Polish something about these things. I don't like. Well, I mean, caspets, lows was was pretty good. That's the one thing that I do like, but most of it's, you know, great. It's kind of lots of lots of sausages and stuff like that. That's my, that's the main ingredient. That's not good. That's, that's not too great if you're Jewish on the menu. That's what you have to throw. Kind of leaves a lot of. But now you have, I mean, you just have everything that you choose for. Although it was great. There was great fienderschnitzel in Berlin. I remember that. Oh, well, I mean, well, that must have been quite an experience going to an Easterman restaurant. Oh, yeah. I think what's on the menu? What do they have in an Easterman restaurant on the menu? I'm wondering. Like I said, not much. I didn't get much beyond the course. I might have been on other streets. I mean, it was a fixed city. But you know, wherever I was looking and it was lunchtime and I was hungry. So there. Wow. Well, and I heard towards the end of the GDR, they were trying to recruit rabbis to go to East Berlin. And believe it or not, one American rabbi actually went to East Berlin because they wanted to sort of, they wanted to gain, you know, diplomatic acceptance because the Soviet Union was falling apart. And they, they, they, they were going to fall apart. So they were trying the last minute to do this PR buzz by bringing an American rabbi there. And that's an interest. Rebuilt trying to rebuild their, you know, they, I read that East Germany only built one synagogue in its entire history that only started one congregation. And I can't remember where that's at. Someone told me about that. And I can't even imagine how many Jews are still behind the iron curtain there. Do you, do you know, did you ever look at opera? I don't think there was that many. I mean, there were the major cities, you know, life-saving, dressed and I mean, there were major cities beyond down in Curtin. So there were bound to be some Jewish people there. Leftovers from the war basically. And also there were probably quite a few Jews who were members of the communist leadership, which unfortunately is part of our history. There was, it's interesting that one of the, I don't know if he, both his parents were Jewish, but one of the writers of the East German national anthem, I think it definitely is father of Jewish, came back and wrote it after living in the United States for some time. And then there's a couple of different writers that later on became critics of the regime there and fell out of favor. The author of Jacob Delayer that became a movie with John Williams, not John Williams. I'll think of it a second. That's, that's, I know why you're talking about it. Yeah, yeah. So I mean, did you, I mean, did you, did your family continue to, I don't know, be interested in, did they kind of just make a total pass with, you know, German philosophy and art and things like that or did they still, I don't know, there, it depends on the family really. I don't think we had a sense of Germanness. I don't, I, my father was, it was a class, among other things, he was a classical musician. So obviously we liked the classical music that came out of Germany and the great art that came out of Germany, but not a sense of being German. Yeah, that's, I think that's probably the consensus among most, most Jews who came from German speaking communities. They sort of had this, it's interesting because my, my wife's family, they're, they're from an Oberlander background that speaks German and comes from Hungary and parts of Romania and, you know, interestingly enough, you know, they still, you know, use different German recipes and listen to classical music. You know, and, and, and do Opopa Ryder with, you know, my, my grandma, my, the great, you know, my, my mother-in-law with, with my son, they do Opopa Ryder, you know, that's you know, the, the, these, these small interesting things, you know, um, yeah, that just even in Israel, some of these, some of these things still, still play into the culture. I had a lot of, I don't go ahead. The largest tourist group in Israel or Germans. Right. More than America. I mean, that's, that's astounding. Right, right. I had, I had an interesting experience during the war, art not during the war during, when I was in the Navy. I was in, I think we're C. F. A. Brazil or somewhere, and I'm, I'm walking down the street with a couple of my buddies and we're in uniform. And I get into a conversation with a couple of young men and they're speaking German. I'm speaking German. I, we get invited to the German consul for, uh, basically a party, you know, a bunch of young 20, 20 somethings for a party. And we went there and while everybody got pretty drunk or close to drunk and the German one or two of the German guys actually broke into tears. They felt so guilty for what their parents and grandparents had done. And they did not know any of us were Jewish. I was the only Jew, but, you know, I think it's, it's in the German soul. And it goes on and on and on. What years were you in the Navy? I was just a couple of years. I volunteered. I was going to be drafted. I didn't want to be drafted. So I joined the Navy. I didn't want to go to go to Vietnam straight from, oh, I just, I just missed the, and, uh, also the Navy is a college graduate and a graduate journalist. I didn't, you know, get any tough feelings. It was all, all very nice. And tell me a little bit about your, your career as a journalist. Well, I was, uh, my, my degree from you was in journalism. Back then it was such a thing as journalism. There is none anymore. Uh, I, I, my first job was in landing Illinois, which is, and I was a sports writer and then editor of the small town paper. And I had a, a number of small town, uh, journalistic assignments. I went into PR because there was no real future in journalism. I tried going to two of your Indianapolis papers to Detroit and Chicago. And they just weren't hiring. So I switched into PR. And that's my career. I was a sports career mostly. Uh, I got to the press box and take my dates there and stuff like that, which was very fun. Met a lot of famous athletes. Interesting. And, uh, who, who would you say is the most famous athlete you met? Do you, do you know the name Frank Bradovich who, for Indiana, who's the center? Yeah. Yeah. On the desk. Uh, Frank, Frank was sort of a friend of mine. He was from him and high and he was at IU at the same time. Uh, he was drafted by the Warriors. And, uh, as a writer, I was out on, uh, I think Chicago Stadium. And the, the Chicago team was playing the Warriors and, uh, he invites me out on the court and, uh, introduces me to Wil Chamberlain, which is a highlight of my life. Wow. Stuff like that. Stuff like that. Life can be fun. That's incredible. Getting to meet Wilta Stelke. Um, yeah, Wilta Stelke. There's my friend Frank Bradovich, but I thought he's tall. He was only like, you know, six, seven or six eight or, he's still six and eight. Um, so are you a bulls fan or a piston sin? On the court. On the court. I mean, not, not somewhere else. You know, on the desk. It's, so who would you say that you root for more of the pistons or the, uh, bulls? I've, it was very strange. I had a transition in, in baseball. I was sitting in bed for a mess at the time. I became a tiger fan back then because they had Hank Greenberg. And I figured that's my kind of team. And that's why I became a Detroit tiger fan. And then eventually, you know, I, although not living in Detroit or the area at all, I was still living in Indiana. I was a fan of the lions, the red wings of the pistons, not the pistons. I've got, they, they didn't exist back then. Oh, they had the fort wing. They didn't expect them. Right. So it didn't matter until until he moved them. So you're always a Detroit fan, even before you moved on. Yeah, even though I was nowhere near Detroit, I'd never been to Detroit. But as a Jewish kid, you know, I'm finding a team that had Hank Greenberg on it. My God, they must be my team. All right. Yeah. Yeah. It's such a, such an amazing person to look up such a great role model for kids back then. Yeah. Yeah. And to play on Russia. Right. He wouldn't, he wouldn't, he wouldn't play on either. It was, uh, I mean, everyone knows about Sandy co-facts and not wanting to do, uh, co-facts for, right. But they don't know that, that, that, that, that Hank Greenberg didn't want to do it on, on Russia's Seani either. Right. Right. Right. And it was a lot tougher back then. I mean, you, you know, you read the biographies, you know, it was tough. The anti-Semitism was very hard at that time. And, you know, it was a great, not one, you know, at the job with the police. England, Indians, and at a good life. - What would you say you would want people to remember the most about the Jewish community they're in Hammond? - I think how vibrant it was. How much was always going on? How people were involved, not just in the synagogue, but in the town itself. And also like we alluded to earlier, didn't seem to have prejudices. It seemed to be a nice American community. It just was a good place to live, which might be true for most of the major cities in Indiana. - Interesting. I mean, comparing your experience to others. Wow. And probably vibrant brotherhood and sisterhoods and probably had a naprith chapter there, right? In town. - Oh yeah, all of us were in the ACA. I mean, remember the ACA? - Yeah, yeah. Tell us a little bit about what it was like being in BVIO and ACA. - You know, like it was 40, 50, 70. I don't know how many of us there are. I've got still got a picture of the RACA group. - Oh awesome. - And you could scan that and send it to me. That would be amazing. And we'll just see that. - Yeah. Yeah, I'm great. - A few of the guys are still around. You know, we're talking about a thousand years ago, roughly. - No, I will. I'll email it to you. - I'd be great. And did you go to Jewish summer camp? - Yeah. Henry Horner. Avodah. Those were my two Jewish camps. Yeah. My folks always left the country during the summer. My dad had like all rabbis had summer off. And so they went to Europe every year and put the other camp. (laughing) - To Europe for Europe. - And mostly Michigan or Camp O'Va-Dal was there. - No, Camp O'Va-Dal was in. I think that was in Michigan. Oh yeah, Avodah, yeah. It was part of the Jewish Federation of Chicago or whatever it was called in Chicago. And it was divided into two parts. It was a religious part of the camp. We're basically the kids were doing religious for all the time. It was the other camp, Avodah was called Work. That's a translation of what we were farm workers in addition to being campers. You know, a lot of days we would grow out and pick berries and stuff like that. And it was not real farm work, but it was the idea of farm work. - Interesting. And Camp Henry Horner was, it's still around, right? - I'm pretty sure it is. - I think so. Yeah, and I was a counselor at Henry Horner's farm, as far as I remember. They're familiar with the name, that's good. - Yeah, I've heard it before. I just don't know where it's located. West Contents. I don't know where it was. I'm not, I can't really remember where it was. Avodah was in Buchanan, Michigan. Okay, there I've got to. - Oh, okay. - Yeah, that's really close to me. That's really, really, I'm. - Buchanan's the whole area of Ben Harbor, that's. - Yeah, yeah, that's really, really close to me. - In South Ben, yeah. - Most famous thing there, obviously, is South Ben. - Yes, South Ben had a lot of Jewish camps, for sure. - Yeah. - It was the Jewish cats' homes. - And the West. - They don't, very few Jews there anymore. And I've worked there a couple of summers to Yashanovsky's, and it's one of the elder row. - Wow. - Mendelssohn's. - Wow, what was that like? - It was a very good experience, a good summer experience. Both summers I was there. I'm very enjoyable. A lot of kids my age from all over the country work in there, but you had no people to get jobs. They were the guy who stood up for my wedding, who became my best friend, was my roommate at one of these camps. And it was just very nice. - That's a whole fascinating world. I mean, there's still a few Jewish camps in your Kalamazoo, and I think there's an Orthodox camp in South, and in that area of Michigan. - You went to Ramallah, right? - Well, one summer, but not here in the Poconos, and out east. (laughing) Mountains are beautiful. - Are beautiful. Well, Wisconsin's pretty too. I must say, and for what I hear, one of the founders of Camp Ramallah, and Wisconsin was from Northwest Indiana, is that correct? From what I hear. - I give me a name, I have to look up the name. But yeah, so from what I've heard, a lot of the kids from Northwest Indiana tend to go to Camp Ramallah and Wisconsin. - Oh yeah. Well, both Hammond and Gary had vibrant communities. They were both very alive, and East Chicago was an Indiana harbor, had almost a majority of Jews, and there were a lot of Jews living in that area. - Wow, yeah, that's so many different communities. Widing East Chicago, Indiana Harbor. And I mean, were the other congregations pretty similar to your fathers in terms of observance? Do you remember? - Yeah, my friend, one in downtown Gary, very, very, very similar, and I'm still in touch with the son of the rabbi, who's now a retired professor, not the rabbi, but the son. And they were very much like ours. And the one in Gary's other congregation was reform, and it was in the Miller neighborhood, and their rabbi was also named rabbi Miller. There were two rabbi millers in Gary at the same time. And both congregations were revital. Gary, of course, is pretty much wiped off the map now, but. - Do you recall that period? And the late, I wanna say, late, turbulent period in the early 70s with the white flight, and what happened there? - No, because we were already living here in Michigan in '66. - Already abandoned, didn't you? - So that happened not long after you left, because what I had read, and this astounded me, was that it's an article about rabbi Irving Miller that he had grown the congregation from 200 families when he started to 500 families in 1963. And so by the time he left, and I believe it was 1974, it was no families, it was closed. So to go from 500 families to the congregation, closing and merging. - No, second. In a gorgeous neighborhood, a terrific community, and he had a voice in the Canadian Columbia, it was a great, great rabbi hospital at the same time. I don't know if he was a hospital hospital, but he was a great singer. - Nice family, a really, really nice family. - And so I mean, did your family kind of know all the rabbis in the neighborhood, I guess, in the Northwest of Vienna? - Yeah, probably. You want me to put you in touch with his son? - That would be fantastic. I would love to speak with him. - Okay. Art can talk a lot more than I can talk, so that would sound pretty good. - No, it would be fantastic to speak to him because it's kind of a world that's disappearing. I mean, even though they're still a temple and-- - There's no ham. - The ham and juice, the ham and juice all about in Munster, and they're dying, they're in dire and sheriff, ill-miracle, et cetera. And he's a great, Chicago, Whiting, and the first towns are not ghost towns, but they're not vibrant. They've all merged. I mean, Whiting still has, I guess, the Parogi fast. And they have, they actually have something that's kind of cute. They have the Sports mascot museum, or the Sports mascot Hall of Fame there, because they produce the Sports mascot costumes. So you can see all the different mascots from all the different universities and their costumes there. And white Indiana. So that's something to go to Indiana for, I guess. It's a good reason to go to Whiting, I guess. And I do not work for the Indiana tourism board, okay? Just FYI. But, you know, it's been great speaking with you, Peter. Thank you for joining us with us and sharing so many different personal reflections from your past. And just really, you know, seeing all these different layers of a Jewish community that was there. I mean, you really have a tour to fourth story that shows how vibrant a Jewish community was in Hammond. And I really feel that a lot of people should hear this story and know about what was there in Hammond. And so I thank you for sharing your story with us. Well, were you in, are you in touch with other people from Hammond or people who used to be because I sort of posted the IU thing. And then I had a couple of guys respond in a way where it seemed like they're members of the Indiana Historical Group. Is that possible? Or it's possible. Maybe some of them are. I'd have to check. But, you know, I would love for them, you know, if they feel comfortable, some people are kind of hesitant to, you know, being recorded and sharing their stories and I get that. These are all line Hammond families. These were multi-generational families, unlike mine, which was only like one and a half generations. And they would probably have a whole lot more to say. I mean, one of them, when I, that picture that you had at the store, he commented back to you on it, you know, it was not really that name at that time was some other name already. And it was, it came cold, black brothers and. And his family probably worked there for generations, right? Yeah, yeah. The second generation. People will please, you know, let them know if they want to, you know, be recorded. I'd love to speak with them. And, you know, so we can get these stories down. It's, it's important for, for people to go ahead and do something very good here. Thank you. Thank you. I really, I really appreciate that and appreciate you saying that. And I apologize for a little bit of the lag on the Zoom. I don't know what's going on over today. It's not like we're so far away. Like, like, like, like, we're on the other side of the world. You're missing them. And in the end, I was in the back today. My Zoom with you is perfect. We're speaking like we're in the same room. Good. Good. I'm glad you can hear me. Good. Yeah. Very good. Is there, is there anything, you know, in closing that you'd like to, that you'd like to share about your professional experiences or your time in Indiana that we didn't, that we didn't get to talk about? No, I think it was all a very nice experience. I was very happy to, you went to IU, too, didn't you? Yeah. Yeah, I did. So I'm also a pusher. Yes. Yeah. It's wonderful going to IU and meeting guys and girls, you know, from other parts of the state and from other states. But once I was married, you know, professionally, you know, I wound up moving out of the area. I was with, I think, as a post script, I was with Standard Oil and at headquarters in Chicago and they offered me the opportunity to head the PR effort in Texas City, Texas, which meant that I immediately ran to the Wall Street Journal to see if I could find a better job. And I went to Michigan. Wow. Not everybody wants to be in Texas City, Texas. Because this young Jewish, his young Jewish wife and baby, it's not a place to be. Yeah. Imagine so. So, well, you know, at least you're close to the Tigers and, yeah, unfortunately, I don't call any games of any team. They're all boring in fact. I feel sorry for the Lions. I still watch them. By the way, my father's family are Michiganters. So I get the whole Tigers thing. I grew up as a Tigers fan like you. Mickey Mantle was like a hero in my household. Yeah. You know, was the 68 or 69 time rights were held allies. One of my prize possessions I, when I was a kid, I was like in my early teens, I would write to the ball players in their communities. And they would send me, you know, autographed postcards or pictures or whatever from Mickey Mantle sent me one. And I've been offered several thousand dollars for that. Yeah. Well, yeah. It's worth a lot. Definitely. So it was great speaking. If you do, they Peter, let's, let's stay in touch and. And be great. And I'll try to put you in touch with a couple of Northwest Indiana people. How's it? Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Much appreciated. And all the best to you and your family in this challenging time. And I wish you a, a Ziesen Pesock, you know, same to you, and a co-heter one as well. Oh, dear. It will be a family gathering, but all the, you know, the two of us will enjoy it. Right. Same for us. Okay. All the. You're, you're still a family at home. If you're wife and, yeah, yeah, just just the wife and the son and that's that's that just us together. So, we'll be traveling. You can play to two then. But, you know, next year in Jerusalem, hopefully, right? Can't we say? You're open. Okay. All right. Take care. All the best Peter. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for listening to the N Jewish History podcast, a project of the Indiana Jewish Historical Society. Look us up on the web at ijhs.org.