Jewish
The
hisTorical
souTh
carolina
of
socieTy
Fall 2014
Volume XiX ~ number 2
Jewish Roots, Aiken Branches
Register now for fall meeting
in
Aiken, SC
November 15-16
2
PAGE JEWISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
FALL 2014
VOLUME XIX ~ NUMBER 2
PAGE
3
e JHSSC newsleer is
published twice a year.
Current and back issues
can be found at
jhssc.org
Dale Rosengarten
editor
Alyssa Neely
assistant editor
and designer
In this issue Leer from the President
David Draisen
From White Russia to Aiken County ~ Jerey Kaplan ~ A small but tight-knit group of Jewish
immigrants made the transition from the Old Country to the New World and from Orthodoxy to
Conservative Judaism in the hospitable city of Aiken. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Aiken’s First Jewish Wedding ~ Nelson Arthur Danish ~ Harris Louis Polier hosted Aiken’s rst
Jewish wedding, described in the May 31, 1896 issue of the Aiken Journal & Review. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7
Suraskys and Poliers ~ Stephen K. Surasky ~ Old World Jewish traditions mixed easily with
Aiken’s southern culture according to this baby-boomer, who remembers that a visit from Santa
was a regular part of the winter holiday season. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
“Mr. Persky” and His Clan ~ Mordecai Persky ~ Son of Esther Surasky and Nathan Persky, the
author grew up in a world populated by bubbehs, daddys, and a crowd of cousins. “Eighty years
of baking in American sunshine” distanced him from the Judaism of his father, and le him
wrestling with the angels and demons of his past. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Jewish Roots, Aiken Branches ~ JHSSC Meets in Aiken, November 15–16, 2014. . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Efron Family History ~ Marvin Efron ~ Hailing from Knyszyn and Minsk, Ida Surasky and
Morris Efron seled rst in St. Louis, where they raised six children. Aer Morris’s death in 1918,
Ida decamped for Aiken, and her ospring soon followed. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Recollections of Growing Up in Aiken ~ Sondra Shanker Katzenstein ~ A great-granddaughter
of Ida and Morris Efron recalls her childhood among Christian neighbors and friends, and the
Jewish education she received at Camp Tel Yehuda and Camp Blue Star. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Reections of a Southern Jew ~ Samuel Wolf Ellis ~ Jacob Wolf’s great-grandson remembers
Adath Yeshurun Synagogue as the heart of Aiken’s Jewish community, where ancient traditions
and philosophies were passed from generation to generation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Apples of Gold ~ Irene Krugman Rudnick ~ e rst Jewish woman elected to South Carolina’s
General Assembly, a Columbia native who made Aiken her home, reects on lessons from a life
fully lived. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
e Poliakos of Aiken ~ Stuart Fine ~ Tracing his grandparents J. S. Poliako and Rebecca
Vigodsky from Minsk in Belarus to Aiken, South Carolina, inspired the author to organize a 2013
family reunion, with plans for a second gathering later this year. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
e Baumgarten Family ~ Linda Baumgarten, Sharon Mills, Ann Traylor, and Doris L.
Baumgarten ~ Delaware transplants, the Baumgartens arrived in Aiken in the late 1970s and
discovered that the small southern city and its synagogue oered abundant opportunities to get
involved. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
History Is the Tie that Binds Us ~ Martin Perlmuer ~ To continue connecting generations by
exploring and teaching our shared history, the Society needs to expand its membership and add
to its roster of Pillars. Your support will help JHSSC aain its ambitious goals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
F
or those of us who aended
JHSSC’s 20
th
Anniversary
Celebration on May 17–18, all I can
say is WOW! I am so proud to be
associated with this great organization.
Events like this do not just happen.
ey come about because of the hard
work of not just one person, but the
work of many individuals. I am going
to aempt to name them, and please
forgive me if I leave anyone out.
Susan Altman, with the help of the anniversary planning
commieeAnn Hellman, Marty Perlmuer, Enid Idelshohn,
Rachel Barne, Sandra Conradi, Dale Rosengarten, and Mark
Sw ickorchestrated
a wonderful evening
of food, fellowship,
and festivities. On
Sunday morning,
keynoter Stuart
Rocko took a hard
look at “the changing
face of the Jewish
South,” an exercise
we all need to do
to see where we are
now and plan our
direction for the
coming years.
I especially
want to thank
the Society’s past
presidents for the
insightful panel
they presented before the gala on Saturday, and for their
willingness to serve on a long-range planning
commiee.
Chaired by Rachel Barne and facilitated by David J. Cohen,
the commiee met twice over the summer, analyzing the
Society’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats
to its future. To help chart our course over the next decade,
they have designed a survey directed toward all members and
friends of JHSSC. If you have not yet lled one out, please
access the survey at jhssc.org and tell us your thoughts.
Let me take a moment to acknowledge the sad reality
that, with the death of Bernard Warshaw last February and
Klyde Robinson in March, we lost two past presidents in the
space of 60 days. I am all the more grateful to my predecessors
who, perhaps in response to these losses, have stepped up to
the plate and renewed their commitment to the Society.
ank you, Ann, for your tireless work on our web page,
cemetery and memorial plaque program, and your help when
I just need to talk.
Barry Draisen and Ernie Marcus, VPs in charge of Archives
and Historical Sites, are doing a great job, recently adding
Greenville to the Society’s online database of cemeteries and
memorial plaques, and beginning to explore new territory
Orangeburgas a potential location for an historical marker.
Plans for the fall meeting in Aiken are coming together
nicely, with a dialogue Sunday morning, November 16, between
Richard Gergel and Robert Rosen (popularly known as the
“Gergel and Rosen
Road Show”), a
panel of old-timers
and newcomers
following lunch,
and the public
dedication of Adath
Yeshurun’s historical
marker at 2:00 ..
Aiken is a special
place for me, as many
of my ancestors
seled there when
they came to the
United States from
Russia, and many of
the Poliako branch
of the family are
buried in the Sons of
Israel Cemetery.
Lastly, please take the time to ll out the survey and
consider how you would like to get involved. e Society
needs your participation and help!
Past presidents Jerey Rosenblum, Robert N. Rosen, Belinda F. Gergel, Richard Gergel,
Edward Poliako, and Ann Meddin Hellman at the Spring 2014 meeting in Charleston.
Not shown: Rachel Gordin Barne. Photo: Jeri Perlmuer.
Cover: Addie R. Polier
and Abe Cohen, the first
Jewish couple married in
Aiken, SC, 1896. Courtesy
of Nelson A. Danish.
We need your ideas! Please go to jhssc.org and
complete the online survey. Your responses will
help us evaluate past programs and determine
our direction for the future.
4
PAGE JEWISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
FALL 2014
VOLUME XIX ~ NUMBER 2
PAGE
5
From White Russia to Aiken County: e Kaplan Family’s Story
by Jerey Kaplan
Le to right: Raymond Kaplan, his mother, Ida Kameno Kaplan, and her good iend
Sophie Rudnick return om the races, Aiken, circa 1937. Courtesy of Jerey Kaplan.
Sam Kaplan, the author’s grandfather, manned the cash register at Kap’s
Restaurant on Laurens Street, owned by his son Isadore “Itch” Kaplan,
circa 1952. Courtesy of Ruth Kirshtein Kaplan.
M
y family’s story begins in the 1880s in that part
of the Russian empire known as White Russia:
Byelorussia as it was called. Today it is called Belarus. Both
of my paternal grandparents were born in that decade. My
grandfather, Sam Kaplan, came to America in 1903, and
my grandmother, Ida Kamenoff Kaplan, arrived in 1905.
My grandfather was born in Minsk, the capital of White
Russia. e original
family name was
Tarant, not Kaplan.
My grandmother
was born in Lepel,
in the province of
Vitebsk. I should
note that the name
Kameno is derived
from a village called
Kamen, in the
vicinity of Lepel.
The Poliakoffs,
another early
Jewish family in
Aiken, originated
in Kamen, so it is
likely that these two
families knew each
other in the Old
Country.
My grandparents met in New York City and married there
in 1908. ey came to the Aiken area in 1908 or 1909, more
than a hundred years agowell before the founding of Adath
Yeshurun, Aiken’s synagogue. What brought them to Aiken,
undoubtedly, was the fact that my grandmother’s brother-in-
law and sister, Jacob and Julia Kameno Wolf, were already
living there. e rst place in South Carolina that they called
home was not the town of Aiken, but rather the village of
Wagener, about 25 miles from Aiken itself. My grandfather,
like so many Jews before and aer him, opened a country store.
ere had been no stores in Wagener before my grandparents
arrived, so I have been told, and they were also the rst Jews to
sele in the town. According to Uncle Ben, my father’s oldest
brother, there was no more anti-Semitism in Wagener than
one would nd in Tel Aviv. My grandparents were the object
of curiosity, but not hostility.
My father, Raymond, was the youngest of four brothers.
Born in Wagener in 1927, he was three years old when the
family moved to Aiken, where my grandfather ran a business
hauling fruit between South Carolina and Florida. Sam and
Ida died within six weeks of each other when I was just over
a year old, so I have no memories of them. However, Sam was
described to me as a sweet man who was well liked.
One story that my father passed on to me about my
grandfather is an excellent example of the contradictions of
living in the South,
particularly in an
earlier era. One of
Sam’s close friends
was active in the Ku
Klux Klan in Aiken.
As a Klansman, he
disliked Jews in
principle, but he
loved Mr. Sam, as
my grandfather was
known.
As to my
grandmother, my
mother tells a
revealing story she
undoubtedly heard
from my father.
My grandmother
and her best friend,
Sophie Rudnick
(mother-in-law of the Hon. Irene K. Rudnick and grandmother
of Morris Rudnick, Esq.), liked to sit on one of the park
benches lining Laurens Street, Aiken’s main thoroughfare, and
read the Yiddish paper aloud and talk to each other in Yiddish.
My father and his friend Harold Rudnick (Sophie’s son) would
shrink in embarrassment while this was going on.
Sophie Rudnick’s husband, Morris, was as close a friend
to my grandfather as his wife was to my grandmother. He was
a man of great physical strength. Aer my grandfather became
paralyzed on one side of his body, the result of a stroke, Morris
would literally pick him up and put him in his car, and the two
men would go for a ride.
In the early 20
th
century, Aiken’s Jews held religious
services intermiently above stores and in places such as the
Aiken Masonic hall. However, they did not formally organize
as a religious community until 1921, when Congregation
Adath Yeshurun obtained a charter of incorporation from the
state of South Carolina.
e lile Jewish community of Aiken opened the
synagogue in time for Rosh Hashanah in 1925. I remember the
late Mandle Surasky, who for years was the congregation’s lay
leader, telling me how he, Meyer Harris, and a couple of others
rushed to get the synagogue ready for High Holy Day services
that year. e beautiful lile synagogue of Adath Yeshurun still
stands and is still in use. I
recall my mother telling me
that a handful of Jews built
that synagogue.
I can thank my late
fatherand my mother
as wellfor glimpses of
Jewish life in Aiken before
I was born or old enough to
remember. Some of these
early Jews were people of
great piety. Jacob Wolf’s
father, I was told, always
wore a yarmulke and liked
to say his daily prayers
outside at dawn with his
tallis over his head, in
keeping with Orthodox
custom. at certainly
must have aracted a lot of
aention.
Services at Adath
Yeshurun in the early years
reected the Orthodoxy of
its founders. e sanctuary has a single center aisle, and my
mother says that when she married my father and moved to
Aiken in 1951, men sat on one side of the aisle and women
sat on the other side, although there was no formal mechitza
separating the seating for men and women. Most of the women
had their own prayer books that they brought to shul. (I still
have my grandmother’s.) My father said that the synagogue
was packed when he was growing up. ere was no rabbi in
Aiken, but the baal telah (the lay hazzan), was a man named
Zushke Poliako, who wore a beard, a bowler hat, and a long
tallis. My uncles found his reading of the prayers, which he
apparently did with great speed, a source of mirth. Since none
of my uncles knew Hebrew, what they told me should perhaps
be taken with a grain of salt.
Of the many stories I’ve been told, one stands out in my
mind concerning Mrs. B. M. Surasky, an outstanding gure in
Aiken’s Jewish community in days gone by, who, my mother
recalls, took upon herself responsibility for collecting funds
for various Jewish causes from Jewish businesses in town. As
an elderly woman, she was driven around Aiken by an African-
American man who had worked for the Surasky family for
years. Everyone called him Eb; no one can remember his last
name. Eb would go into
each business to collect
funds for Mrs. Surasky
while she sat in the car.
He would come out of
one store aer the other
and show Mrs. Surasky
how much money he had
been given. If she was not
satised, she would tell
him to go back inside and
let the proprietor know
that he had to give a larger
sum, at least as much as
he had donated the year
before.
Eb was a wonderful
man. Aer my grandfather’s
stroke, Eb came to his
house every morning and
helped him bathe.
As a child, I remember
Eb as caretaker of the
synagogue. On a typical
Friday night, about two dozen people would aend services,
but my mother remembers that on the High Holy Days
Adath Yeshurun drew from towns smaller than Aiken, such
as Barnwell, Williston, Edgeeld, Johnston, Ninety-Six, and
Saluda, and the sanctuary would ll with worshippers.
My parents met in Charleston, where my mother, Ruth
Kirshtein Kaplan, was born and grew up. Before they were
married my mother told my father that she wanted them
to have a kosher household. My father agreed to this. My
grandparents had tried to keep kosher when they seled in
Wagener in the rst decade of the last century, but they gave up
the aempt. By the time they got back to Wagener with kosher
meat, it was spoiled.
My supposition is that most of the rst Jewish families in
Aiken maintained kosher households. By the time my parents
set up housekeeping, however, the only other family my mother
6
PAGE JEWISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
FALL 2014
VOLUME XIX ~ NUMBER 2
PAGE
7
by Nelson Arthur Danish
“T
he citizens of Aiken enjoyed the novelty of witnessing
a Jewish wedding on Sunday aernoon in the Lyceum
Hall. e contracting parties were Miss Addie R. Polier, a
daughter of Mr. H. L. Polier, and Mr. Abe Cohen, a merchant
of Augusta.”
So began the story of the rst Jewish marriage in Aiken,
South Carolina, celebrated on May 31, 1896, as reported in the
weekly Aiken Journal & Review. H. L. Polier was Harris Louis,
the rst Jewish man to reside in Aiken,
having lived there for ten years when
his daughter’s wedding took place. As
there was no synagogue at the time
118 years agothe ceremony was
held on the stage of the Lyceum Hall
on Laurens Street. No photograph of
the building, long since gone, exists.
Lile is known of H. L., as most
called him, but from his tombstone
in Sons of Israel Cemetery, Aiken,
where he was buried in 1921, this:
“born Grodno, Russia.” H. L. had
two siblings, Morris S. and Sarah
Anna, who became the second wife of
Benedict Morris Surasky.
H. L.’s rst wife (the mother of
Addie Rebecca) was Anna Sutker, of
whom nothing is known; curiously,
she was not mentioned by name in
the wedding story. Addie was their
only child. H. L.’s second marriage
was to his son-in-law’s sisterno
blood relationshipFannie Cohen,
and they had four children: Isadore
(later, legally, Shad), David Solomon, Belle, and Esther. Shad
and David became aorneys. All the siblings married: Shad to
Justine Wise Tulin (her second marriage), daughter of Rabbi
Stephen Wise of Temple Emanu-El, New York City; David
to Ruth Sneider (who lived to 104, buried in the Jewish
cemetery in Lancaster, PA); Belle to Harold Mile; and
Esther to Ben Engel.
Following the ceremony and reception “for about 150
guests . . . where an hour or so was spent around the tables in
pleasant conversation . . . the happy couple accompanied by
a number of their friends boarded the 10 .. train and went
over to Augusta [about 17 miles away], which is to be the
future home of the bride.”
Abe and Addie had six children: Benjamin Phillip, married
to Sarah Bradley, born in Switzerland, with sons Sheldon
Bradley, now of Atlanta, and the late Adrian (Bunny) Maurice;
Hyman (Hymie) Isidore, married to Rose Lee of Moultrie,
GA, no children; Rose, married to Henry Antopolsky, with
son Jules Norman (who went by his middle name); Pearl
Polier, unmarried; Maurice, who died in a childhood accident;
and Minnie, married to Josef Pierre Danish, with sons, yours
truly, Nelson Arthur, unmarried (now
of North Augusta, SC) and Michael
Barry, now living in Aberdeen, MD.
His wife is Beye A. Rabinowitz of
Beaufort, SC, the daughter of Ethel
Lipsitz and Henry Rabinowitz.
On May 28, 1981, the Aiken
County Rambler, no longer published,
reprised the story about Aiken’s
rst Jewish wedding, marking what
would have been Addie and Abe’s
85
th
anniversary, providing this
information: Addie Polier was from
Kiev in the Ukraine and was brought
to Aiken by her father in 1890 when
she was 16. e bride was 22 and Abe
was 31 when they married. Again,
from the Aiken Journal story: “Rabbi
A. Poliko, of Augusta, performed
the ceremony which was according
to orthordox [sic] Jewish custom. He
was aired in a black suit and wore a
tall silk hat which he never removed.”
Several weeks aer the 1981
anniversary story appeared, I received
a phone call: “My name is Steve [Stephen Kent] Surasky [of
Aiken] and I saw the story of your grandparents’ wedding.
My mother is a Polier.” A lile Jewish Geography later,
we realized our relationshipthird cousins. His great-
grandfather was M. S.; mine, H. L.the Aiken brothers.
Aer Abe Cohen died in 1930 (he is buried in Magnolia
Cemetery in Augusta), Grandmother Addie lived in Augusta with
her daughters Pearl Polier and Minnie Danish, and son-in-law Joe
Danish. She died in 1944 and is buried next to her husband.
Only two things are le from this Aiken rst: the couple’s
portrait and my grandmother’s simple gold wedding band,
engraved inside: “Abe to Addie May 31
th
1896,” which I wear,
24/7, on my right hand.
Aiken’s First Jewish Wedding
Addie R. Polier Cohen and her children,
counterclockwise om upper le: Minnie Margaret
(the author’s mother), Pearl Polier, Hyman
Isidore, Maurice, Rose (Pearl’s aternal twin), and
Benjamin Philip. Courtesy of Nelson A. Danish.
Left to right: Jeffrey, Laura, and Sam Kaplan celebrate Simhat Torah at
Adath Yeshurun, circa 1962. Courtesy of Jeffrey Kaplan.
knows for sure was keeping kosher was that of my great-aunt
Julia Kameno Wolf. I remember her as Tanteh Goldie.
My mother’s uncle Rev. Alter Kirshtein was the shohet in
Charleston and had a butcher shop at the time. He would cut
up and package a side of kosher meat for my mother and send
it to her on the Greyhound bus. Aer my great-uncle gave up
his butcher shop and retired, we got our meat from Shapiro’s,
the kosher butcher in nearby Augusta. In the early years of my
parents’ marriage, rabbinical students who came to Aiken to
conduct services for the High Holy Days would eat at their
house because my mother kept kosher.
By the early 1960s, Adath Yeshurun had undergone some
changes. Men and women now sat together and read from a
Conservative prayer book. e congregation was shrinking,
including arition in our own family, with the death of my
grandparents and the
departure of two of their
older sons, Uncle Isadore
(Itch) and Uncle Abe,
and their families. I don’t
remember the synagogue
being crowded with the
exception of Simhat
Torah, when my brother
Sam, sister Laura, and
I would march around
the synagogue with
the other children. e
procession was led by
Mr. Nathan Persky, who
would then gather us all
on the bimah under a
large tallis, held up at the
corners by four men.
Nathan Persky was
the religious leader of Aiken’s Jewish community, hugely
respected, and I was privileged to have a special relationship
with him. Although it wasn’t widely known or appreciated,
he was an outstanding Hebraist of national repute, as well
as an expert on Jewish rituals and customs. My Orthodox
grandparents in Charleston, Abe and Edith Kirshtein, were
terribly worried that I would grow up in Aiken completely
ignorant of Judaism, so Grandfather Abe arranged for Mr.
Persky to tutor me. I vividly recall Mr. Persky closing his
store and meeting me for lessons several times a week.
As a result, I learned not only prayers but conversational
Hebrew, and was even exposed to modern Hebrew poetry.
Another precious memory I have is of my grandparents
driving to Aiken from Charleston, and my grandfather
sitting in on my lessons.
Nathan and Neie Franzblau lived directly in back of us.
Nathan had served in World War I and been gassed in France. It
was said the Franzblaus seled in Aiken because they thought
the climate would be good for his health. Mr. Franzblau led
services in the synagogue, particularly aer Mr. Persky died,
and to quiet the hubbub in the sanctuary, he would slam his
hand down on the reading desk a couple of times. at did get
everybody’s aention, at least for a lile while.
Several of Aiken’s Jewish families, including my own,
also belonged to Augusta’s Orthodox synagogue (it’s now
Conservative), and the children would carpool in the aernoon
to Hebrew school there. is gave us the opportunity to meet
more Jewish kids and to aend bar mitzvah dances in Augusta.
My bar mitzvah took place at Augusta’s Adath Yeshurun in
January 1967, and one year later we moved to Charleston.
While I did not
encounter a lot of anti-
Semitism growing up,
I do remember kids
occasionally making
disparaging remarks.
Certainly I was aware of
belonging to a very small
groupa slim minority
of the population. At
the same time, we had
good friends who were
not Jewish, and living
in Aiken was a positive
experience for me. I
also would note that
Aiken’s tiny Jewish
community enjoyed a
prole well beyond its
numbers. At least three
Jews have served on Aiken’s City Council: Mandle Surasky,
Steve Surasky (the current president of Adath Yeshurun),
and my father, Raymond Kaplan. Irene K. Rudnick has had
a distinguished career in the South Carolina legislature and
as an educator. She is pictured in an exhibit on prominent
women at the Aiken Museum, which also features a
photograph of my great-aunt Julia Wolf, whose elegant dress
shop was a well-known Aiken landmark.
I feel very close to Aiken and am proud to be a member
of Adath Yeshurun, as were my parents and grandparents
before me. It’s remarkable how Aiken retains the affection
of people who lived there, or whose families lived there.
The number of people who came back to Aiken three
years ago for Adath Yeshurun’s 90
th
anniversary eloquently
speaks to that.
8
PAGE JEWISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
FALL 2014
VOLUME XIX ~ NUMBER 2
PAGE
9
Suraskys and Poliers: e Old World Meets the New
by Stephen K. Surasky
I
am 67 years old and was born and raised in Aiken, as were
both my parents, Harry Surasky and Evelyn Goodman
Surasky, and my mother’s mother, Rebecca Polier Goodman.
Her father, Morris S. Polier, had come to the town in the late
1800s or early 1900s to join his older brother, Harris Louis
Polier, commonly known as H. L.
H. L. had immigrated to the United States from Knyszyn,
a small town near Bialystok, in the region of Grodno, Russia
(now Poland), around 1880. He seled rst in Philadelphia
where, according to family lore, he contracted tuberculosis or
another respiratory condition that sent him
eeing to Aiken around 1888. At the time,
the town was well known as a health resort,
boasted several sanitoriums, and aracted
tuberculin patients from across the country.
H. L. owned a department store and
M. S. opened and operated a barber shop,
both downtown. ere is lile information
on the religious life of Aiken’s rst Jewish
families; however, I am told that the Poliers,
while not particularly observant of Jewish
law, were deeply proud of their Jewish
heritage, helping to raise money for a Jewish
cemetery (1913) and Adath Yeshurun
Synagogue (1925). M. S. was learned in
theology and Jewish history and
loved to visit and have lengthy
discussions and debates with
Christian ministers in Aiken,
whom he counted as his friends.
I am fortunate to have inherited
several of my great-grandfather’s
books and treatises, including a
multi-volume History of the Jews
by Heinrich Graetz.
Around 1886, H. L.’s sister,
Sarah Anna Polier Surasky, and
her husband, Benedict Morris
(B. M.) Surasky, arrived in Aiken
from Knyszyn. B. M. was the oldest
of ve brothers, one of whom,
Solomon Surasky, was my paternal
grandfather. One by one the
brothers and one sister, Ida Surasky
Efron, immigrated to Aiken. e
brothers traveled the countryside
as peddlers, selling their wares to rural folk who would normally
have to travel long distances into town to shop for goods.
Eventually all brothers but one were able to open stores
on Laurens Street. e tragic exception was Abraham Surasky,
the youngest of the Surasky brothers. He was working his route
about 15 miles from Aiken in July 1903 when a young man, Lee
Green, arrived home to nd Abraham helping Lee’s wife carry
some goods from her wagon into the house. Abraham, who was
a widower with two young children, was gruesomely murdered
by gun and axe and his body le in his buggy in the woods. e
primary witness as to motive was a teenage black
girl, Mary Drayton, who was hired by Green
and his wife to come to the scene and clean up
the evidence while Green found someone to
help hide Abraham’s body.
According to Mary’s sworn adavit,
Green held a long-standing grudge against
Jewish peddlers and had admied to her that
he shot at another peddler, Levy, three weeks
prior, “only to make him drop his bundle.”
Green had told her that he intended to kill
Surasky.
1
He and his wife, Dora, disclosed to
Mary the gruesome details: how Green shot
Abraham with his shotgun, and as Abraham
begged for his life, oering to give him “all
I have got,” Green exclaimed,
“Stand back, you son of a bitch,
don’t come on me,” and shot him
again. Abraham dropped to his
elbows and knees and was then
shot and axed twice in the head.
2
Another witness testied
that Green “was going to kill
ever [sic] Jew peddler that came
around and get shed of them.”
3
According to Drayton, Green and
Dora decided to tell authorities
that Green had arrived home
to nd Surasky making a pass at
his wife, and he was thus merely
defending his wife’s honor, as
any southern gentleman would
do. Green was acquied of the
murder at trial. One must assume
that in 1903 the testimony of a
black teenager could not match
Dora Green’s claim that her husband was merely protecting
her virtue from the assault of a Jewish peddler.
Like many small townsnot only southern but elsewhere
as wellby the 1920s downtown Aiken was populated by
numerous Jewish-owned businesses, including H. L. Polier
Dept. Store, B. M. Surasky’s Department Store, and Surasky
Bros. Department Store. M. S.’s wife, Augusta Polier, my great-
grandmother, owned a millinery shop next to her husband’s
barber shop, and in 1922 Ida Surasky Efron’s oldest son, Jake,
opened a combination dry goods and grocery store.
It is said that the arrival of B. M. and his wife, Sarah Anna,
was instrumental in starting regular religious services in Aiken.
For years people convened for Sabbath prayer and holidays in
the local Masonic hall, which was at the time above one of the
Laurens Street stores. B. M. acted as both rabbi and cantor and,
until his death in the 1930s, was the lay leader of the Jewish
community. His wifeAuntie B. M. as she was knownis said
to have introduced kashrut to Aiken, traveling to Augusta, about
17 miles away, to bring back chickens and kosher beef.
I grew up in a synagogue populated by a substantial
congregation; almost all the members were my cousins,
descendants of the Poliers and Suraskys. Other prominent
original Jewish families were the Wolfs, whose progenitor
Jacob Wolf was one of our synagogue’s founders; the Efrons,
who arrived in Aiken as a result of the marriage of the one
Surasky sister, Ida, to an Efron; and the Rudnicks, who were
active in the congregation and in Aiken’s business community.
In my youth, Adath Yeshurun was not aliated but would
have been considered Orthodox. e women sat on one side
of the aisle and men on the other. No women were called to
the Torah and none played a part in the services. Aiken did
have, however, an active Hadassah/Sisterhood, and the ladies
ran the Sunday school. Very few would have been considered
especially religious or observant, but the older members were
the children of Eastern European immigrants and continued
to follow Old World traditions. Nathan Persky, son-in-law of
one of the Surasky brothers, had inherited B. M. Surasky’s
duties as the community’s religious leader and Hebrew teacher
and occupied that unocial post until his death in the 1960s.
We held services in the synagogue only when a member had
a yahrtzeit, at which time the men would receive calls that a
minyan was needed and would go to the shul to say kaddish.
Other than that, regular services were held only on the Jewish
holidays of Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Sukkot, Purim, and
Simhat Torah, with Mr. Persky leading the services.
In 1950s and ’60s Aiken’s downtown remained crowded
with Jewish businesses: Surasky Bros. Liquor Stores, owned by
my father, Harry, and his brother, Ben, who was also an aorney
with oces above the store; Nathan and Esther Persky’s
Department Store; Efron’s Red & White Supermarket, owned
and operated by Jake Efron and his wife, Helen; Sam and
Minnie Shanker ran another grocery store, Sam’s Supermarket;
Efron’s Garage and Taxi Co., operated by Isadore Efron. Ida
Wolf owned and operated Aiken’s nest women’s store, Julia’s
Abraham Surasky was killed in July
1903 at the age of 30, near Aiken,
SC. Courtesy of Jerry Cohen.
Surasky Bros. Store, Laurens Street, Aiken, SC, circa 1914. Interior: left to right, Ernestine Murrah, clerk; Solomon Surasky;
H. C. Surasky; John Henry Holmes, employee; Sam Surasky; Mandle Surasky. Courtesy of Stephen K. Surasky. Exterior: B. M.
Surasky, Sam Surasky, H. C. Surasky. Esther Persky albums. Special Collections, College of Charleston.
Some 20 years ago while researching the case I learned
that Lee Green had been convicted of killing another
person some years later. I called one of his grandchildren,
then an elderly woman, to see if she would meet with me
and provide information on Green’s life. She refused to
discuss the case or her grandfather except to tell me that
he lived out his life as a good Christian man and was now
with the Lord. I declined to ask her where she thought
my great-uncle was. Around that same time, I also located
Abraham’s unmarked grave at the Magnolia Cemetery
in Augusta, GA. It is a mystery as to why there was no
gravestone. Abraham’s two young daughters, Dorothy
and Mildred, were raised by their uncle Sam Surasky
and his wife, Mary. Sam moved the family to North
Carolina and Dorothy’s son, Mel Cohen, is the long-
serving mayor of Morganton. Mel’s daughter, Stacy, then
a high school student, was also researching the history
of her great-grandfather’s murder and in 1993 organized
a reunion in Aiken of Abraham’s living descendants. On
the Saturday morning of the reunion we gathered at
Abraham’s gravesite for an unveiling of his tombstone,
90 years aer his death. Beer late than never.
10
PAGE JEWISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
FALL 2014
VOLUME XIX ~ NUMBER 2
PAGE
11
“Mr. Persky” and His Clan
by Mordecai Persky
Dress Shop, and Mandle Surasky and his partner, Manning
Owen, operated Owen-Surasky, Aiken nest men’s shop; Abe
Wolf’s Famous Brand Shoes was just down the street, and
only a few blocks away was Laurel’s Hardware owned by Lazar
Laurel, and its next door neighbor, Franzblau’s Hardware,
owned and operated by Nathan and
Neie Franzblau. Harold Rudnick
sold furniture out of Rudnick’s Barn,
which doubled as his wife Irene’s law
oce and campaign headquarters.
On the Columbia highway was
Marvin’s Drive-In, owned by Marvin
Riin and his wife, Mollie Efron
Riin, a favorite hangout of Aiken’s
teens. Aiken’s only movie theaters,
the Patricia and the Rosemary,
were named aer owner Bert Ram’s
daughters.
Not only were Aiken’s Jews
leaders in the city’s business
community, they were also actively
involved in Aiken’s political and
civic life. M. S. Polier was Grand
Master of the Masonic lodge, B. M.
Surasky, and later, his son Mandle,
served on the city council and as
mayor pro tem. Mr. Nathan Persky
was instrumental in bringing
the Boy Scouts to Aiken and was
voted as Citizen of the Year by the
Chamber of Commerce. Irene
Krugman Rudnick, past president of our synagogue and now
president emeritus, served in the South Carolina legislature
for many years.
I am the last Surasky in Aiken and, from the Polier family,
only one other remains a member of our Jewish community
Nelson Danish, great-grandson of H. L. Polier. Julie Wolf Ellis
and her kin are the last remaining descendants of the Wolf
family in Aiken. Among the Rudnicks only Irene and her son,
Morris, are congregants. e rest of the original families are
now gone, most buried in Aiken’s Sons of Israel Cemetery,
and their children and grandchildren scaered worldwide.
ere remains not one Jewish-owned retail business in
Aiken, although we are well represented in the legal, medical,
and other professions. e University of South Carolina at
Aiken, as well as the Savannah River nuclear facility, have
aracted new Jewish families, and our synagogue continues
to thrive as the center of Jewish life in Aiken, now populated
mostly by newcomers from the North who have retired to
the area to enjoy the weather, golf, and equestrian events.
Ida Surasky Efron sitting in front of her
store on Laurens Street, Aiken. Courtesy of
Sondra Shanker Katzenstein.
Growing up as the only Jewish boy in my schools and
among my peer group did not seem at all odd to me. I knew that
in the realm of religion I was “dierent,” but I never perceived
any antagonism or anti-Semitism, at least among my friends and
acquaintances. I believe you would hear the same sentiments
from other Jews who have made Aiken
their home. My family, although
intensely proud of its heritage, was fully
integrated into the majority southern
culture. I might aend a Purim service
one day and aend a “Young Life”
meeting at the Presbyterian Church
with my girlfriend the next. I thought
there was nothing unusual about my
saying ha-motzi and kiddush on Friday
night and on Monday morning reciting
the Lord’s Prayer in homeroom. I
thought it was the ocial school prayer,
not a Christian rite.
While we did not celebrate
Christmas as a religious holiday and
would never have had a tree in our
home, my parents, not wanting, I
suppose, for my sisters and me to feel
deprived, always invited Santa to
visit us on Christmas morning. My
friends were envious that I would
receive gifts for the eight nights of
Hanukkah and rack up again on their
holiday. I believe the following true
story illustrates the point. One of my
father’s favorite traditions during the Christmas holidays
was to call the homes of his gentile friends and, as Santa,
speak to their children. One year he called our own home
and asked for my little sister, Anne, then about six. “HO,
HO, HO,” Santa bellowed. “What’s your name, little girl?”
“Anne Surasky.” “Have you been a good girl this year?” “Oh,
yes, Sir!” “Good. What would you like Santa to bring you
tomorrow morning?” Anne then ran off a long list. “Do
have any brothers or sisters?” “Yes. I have an older brother,
Stephen, and an older sister, Brenna.” “What do you think
they might want Santa to bring them?” “Oh, you don’t have
to worry about them—they’re Jewish.”
N
1. Patrick Q. Mason, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry Mob: Violence
against Religious Outsiders in the U.S. South, 1865–1910” (Ph.D.
diss., University of Notre Dame, 1975), 201.
2. Ibid, 200, citing Drayton adavit.
3. Ibid, 201, citing Parker adavit.
M
y cousin Beatrice Efron was one of the Surasky
kinfolks I found very special when I was a youngster in
Aiken. She was smart as a whip, and had a there-in-her-eyes
kindness that I remember well a good 60 years aer I last laid
eyes on her, for she le us a lile past age 20 to marry Morris
Mink down in Louisville, Georgia, at about the same time I
went o to Carolina.
Bea and I never got much beyond hello talking to each
other, but I heard the sensitivity in her words and
saw it in her eyes when she spoke to our mamas. I
was usually in her presence because my mama,
Esther, had asked if I wanted to go with her
to Bea’s mama eresa’s house on Fauburg
Street, a few short blocks away, but in Aiken
that was far enough to keep people apart.
I had two sets of young Aiken
cousinsthree Paye siblings and two
Efrons, all older than I, all ve possessing
exceptional humor and intelligence. e
Payes were Kivy, Mandel, and Sophie,
who with Daddy Yeshuah and Mama Dora
traipsed over to our house every Sunday
from Chestereld Street. A few years and
a world war later, Grandma invited them to
live in an apartment at her house, for the place
where we lived belonged to her.
I felt close to Beatrice and her big brother,
Julius, who shared Kivy’s gi for show-o
comedy; I enjoyed that gi as it took wing in
Kivy and Julius, and envied it just as much.
But why did I have such comical cousins?
Was it because they were Jewish, like so many
comedians of that radio ageJack Benny,
Eddie Cantor, Groucho Marx, Milton Berle?
Julius and Kivy were eight years older than
I, Bea and Mandel four or ve years older. It
was fun to be around them, but I had no reason
to suppose I’d be welcome company for them.
I knew a nine-year-old could only get so much
aention from 14- or 17-year-olds. Mandel’s
friend Harold Rudnick once oered to shut
my mouth for me if I interrupted them again.
Harold was bigger and I shut up.
I was born into a house where it was
pre-ordained that I would be a student of
Yiddishkeit (Jewishness) under the tutelage
of my parents, Nathan and Esther Persky, and a student of
frumkeit (observant religiousness) under both Daddy and
Grandma Freydl Surasky. Maybe it was my early exposure to
frumkeit that makes me rebel against the automatic disbelief
that’s been going around for decades now.
Even at Jewishly-famous Valozhyner Yeshiva in Belarus
my daddy had been no ordinary student, as the picture of his
fur-haed rebbe atop Mama’s piano testied. His yeshiva
years had so steeped him in the art of synagoguery
that even Adath Yeshurun’s older members
seemed grateful to have him lead their
services. I think they saw how good he was
at doing it, and how modest. I saw how well
he did it by aending shul later in a couple
of big cities, where no rabbi made me feel
as warm inside my tallis as Daddy did, so
that skipping shul then became my habit.
But the tongue that gilded Daddy’s
Torah readings could turn around on
his family and hurt. For when he felt
misused at home, his mouth often found
a way to disgorge angry words loudly, in
a mood I later thought was born decades
earlier in Europe, though it was true his
anger occasionally found real fuel in Aiken.
His mother and wife withstood the pain; so
did I and my half-sister, Eve, product of his
first marriage to a Jewish Mary he found in his
first port of New York. Eve would visit us in the
summer, but she grew up in the vastnesses
of the great Metropolis.
We loved him through thick and thin.
Every shouting incident ended with his swi
departure, and we saw how ashamed he was
when he came back home hours later in
agonized silence.
But there were more and beer Nathans
inside him: 1) the warm, humorous man who
would do anything for those he loved; 2) the
man who charmed Aikenites of all faiths
when he spoke at Rotary, Masonic, Eastern
Star, and Boy Scouts meetings; and 3) the
Nathan of that moment in the synagogue that
was his and mine, as wonderful to me as Bea’s
smile, Kivy’s wit, Spencer Tracy’s movies, and
the home runs of Hankis-Pankis Greenberg.
Above: Nathan and Esther
Surasky Persky. Below:
George and Mandel Paye.
12
PAGE JEWISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
FALL 2014
VOLUME XIX ~ NUMBER 2
PAGE
13
e moment came unpredictably in shul when he called
me for an aliyah. He’d look my way, take a step toward me,
and end his preamble in an outow of father-love that brought
our names together, “Mordechai b’reb Nechemyeh,” he said:
Mordecai son of Nehemiah was called to Torah. I turned
and read from the open scrolls, feeling like a prince honored
by a king, forgetful of the troubled boy who had entered
that synagogue. Only in my aliyahs did
he retrieve “Nehemiah” from the
Ellis Island clerk who renamed
him Nathan in 1909. He was 21
and “right o the boat” from
Bremerhaven.
ere was also the Nathan
Persky who, knowing that stores
must close on the Sabbath,
ignored the rules in favor of
making a living. But may I add
to this report that when a good
customer heaped up a stack
of clothes for his family at the
register, there was a Nathan who
oen added enough gis to cut
his prots below zero. When the
man Nathan died in 1965, his
legend said that every minister
in town eulogized him, and some
even rang church bells.
But only I was there to hear
the love and forgiveness in the
eulogy of his wife, Esther, in his
hospital room a night before he
died. I sat there as Mama held his
head and called him, ever so soly,
“Mein feygaleh, mein feygaleh,”
my lile bird, my lile bird.
Today you won’t nd me in
shul unless something personal is
happening there, and maybe not
then either. In 1954 I le Aiken
for good, seing South Carolina
aside until my last visit, still to come.
As a little boy I was putty in Grandma’s hands, and
she made a game of keeping Sophie and me “legal” Friday
night and Saturday, when coloring, snipping, and writing
violated the Sabbath. Then at Saturday twilight, Grandma,
Sophie, and I walked down Richland Avenue looking
for the first star. We usually spotted the Lord’s sign that
Shabbos was over high in the sky over Hitchcock Clinic.
Sophie and I went home to crayons and scissors again, and
Grandma loved our company. We understood each other,
she told us, because we were in our first childhoods and
she was in her second.
It was only much later that I became a skeptical Jew to my
marrow, proud to withstand the anger of Jews who believe
going to shul or loving Israel makes them more Jewish. Yes,
some think fealty to our nation-state makes them upright,
even when Israel un-Jewishly claims a God-
given right to eject, harass, libel, and make
war against people it has turned into our
own “others from Hell,” forgeing
that’s just who we so recently
were ourselves.
e Holocaust le us with
a choice we chose not to see
Hitler’s new lesson or Rabbi
Hillel’s ancient one. We could
learn from Hitler the dubious
privileges bestowed by brute
strength (once we saw that
such strength could be Jewish),
or remember Hillel’s simple
“reduction” of Jewish law into a
sentence: “Do not treat others in
a way hateful to you.”
After 80 years of baking in
American sunshine, I became
a different, not necessarily
improved or worsened brand
of Jew than Mama, Daddy, and
Grandma, or you, my softly
wise Bubbeh Leah, mother of
Nathan the scholar, who was
so proud of bringing you to
join him in America, telling
all who’d listen that when the
immigration fellow asked why
he wanted you here, he said,
“Because she is my mother.”
Oh my Bubbeh, I felt and
learned from your kind and
silent wisdom till age six, when you died in the big house’s
darkest room. As a little boy, I knew much of your language,
Yiddish, which you never spoke to Yiddish speakers
elsewhere in the house because you never left your rocker
by the window overlooking the great yard and its giant
magnolia trees. I learned more from your quiet nature
than I did from the louder voices around me. Your feelings
about life and love reached me by ear and observation.
Meanwhile, your son soon found in the mother he brought
to America the one he left in Belarus—a faulty one who
was a handy target for his anger.
Bubbeh, I saw no prayer booksno siddur or mahzor
like Grandma’snear your rocker. at part of my studies
you le to your son, who taught them in a way unlike
Grandma, his mother-in-law. When you le us, Bubbeh, they
kept me two rooms away from your bed, where I hung on the
door nearest you and heard Daddy’s terrible sobs
from behind the front-hall mirrora sad and
scary sound I never heard again. I knew I’d
come too close to the visitor Death, who
outwits us all at least once.
Yes, I am your grandson too,
Grandpas Chaim Surasky and Mordecai
Persky, zeydehs I never knewNathan’s
father Mordecai dead in Valozhyn years
before his son’s bar mitzvah, but why?
Zeydeh Mordecai, I bore your rst name
to places where it was a “kick-me” sign,
and years later wondered if it was ever a
burden to you. Back then, I hated being
“Mordecai,” which some now assure me
is a beautiful name. I want to answer, but
not out loud, “You didn’t wear it to Aiken rst
grade in 1937.”
Grandpa Mordecai, had you lived to join
your son in America, would you and I have
shared corned-beef-on-rye sandwiches and laice-
top apple pie, the reigning meycholim (taste thrills)
at Furst’s Bakery in Augusta, Georgia?
As for you, my other zeydeh Chaim, who died a half-year
into 1932, the year Mama, Daddy, and I le Daddy’s grocery
store with the upstairs apartment I was born into eight months
earlier, you were the reason we were leaving. For you had le
us your dry goods store in Aiken. Alas, Grandpa, I never knew
your sister Chayeh Rachel Efron, or your brothers Boruch
(B. M.), Solomon, or Abraham. I only half-believed the story
that my grandma, your wife Freydl, had pursued Solomon and
never stopped loving him. But I knew Grandma asked me to
bring her Bing Crosby’s record of “Danny Boy” because she
loved you. And I knew that in her beautiful Yiddish poem you
were the sun being told how hard it was for the le-behind
moon (herself, “der levonneh”) to keep shining on her own.
I remember Great-uncle Solomon’s face in shul, stamping
itself in my memory as the face of a Hebrew prophet. Me so
young watching him so old, seated across the aisle with his
wife where no other men sathis own man, without a doubt.
But Zeydeh, your brother Shaiyeh (Sam to his Carolina
friends) came to see us again and again, always in a good humor,
though he’d driven 212 long miles to our house from Morganton’s
Above: e author’s grandmother Leah Persky, likely
photographed with family or iends back in Belarus. Below:
the H. C. Surasky house om the rear, 825 Florence Street.
Hiram Charles Surasky,
known as H. C. or Chaim.
North Carolina foothills with prey, white-haired Aunt Mary.
I loved his asking me, only a few steps out of his car, if I’d had
today’s lokshen (noodle) soup yet. Aer which he asked to see
my “muscle,” then tapped my elbow, pronounced it harder than
a muscle has any right to be, and said it gave me super-human
strengthat which his face subsided into a kindly grin.
In North Carolina, he must have put a similar brand on the
muscular elbow of adopted grandson Jerry
Cohen, the Long Island–dwelling cousin
I didn’t know till we lived a medium
driving distance from each other. I met
Jerry and his Lubah 18 years ago, so I
dialed their number while writing this,
and found they had not only survived,
but done so in ner fele than I,
owing to being six years younger. And
incidentally, Jerry’s brother, Melvin, the
only Jew in Morganton (pop. 18,000), has
been re-elected its mayor without fail for the
last 29 years. His 30
th
is just beginning.
Shaiyeh and Mary adopted the two
daughters of his and Grandpa’s brother
Abrahamone daughter was Jerry and
Melvin’s mom, Dorothyand did so shortly
aer Abraham, brand new to America, was
killed by gun and axe while out peddling, a long-
shrouded Aiken horror tale recently recalled
to life in Bella, a shiny new Aiken magazine.
ankfully, the ”Jew-peddler” bigotry that proved
fatal to Abraham is now a much less essential part of the South’s
psychic furniture, though drawers remain open as they did while
sharing my childhood with Adolf’s death machine an ocean away.
Do Jews in the year 2014 still fear the unforgoen Jewish
drumroll of death, waiting for us we never knew where, when,
or why? And must the neighbors of the Israelites suer always
for living in the only land Jews feel is truly ours? (Answers now
unknown in New York, Aiken, Gaza, and Jerusalem.)
Our thanks to Bella Magazine publisher Kathy Urban Hu,
sta writer Anna Boylston Dangereld, and layout editor
Jim Staord, who provided digital copies of their stories and
images of Aiken’s Jewish families. For a look at past issues, go
to: hp://www.aikenbellamagazine.com/archives/, especially
Dangereld’s proles of the Wolfs (Oct. 2011), Rudnicks
(Nov. 2011), Poliakos (April 2012), Efrons (Summer 2012),
and Suraskys (Sept. 2012).
All images in this article are om the Esther Libby Surasky Persky
scrapbook and photo albums (1912–1925), Mss. 1106, gi of
Mordecai Persky. Special Collections, College of Charleston.
14
PAGE JEWISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
FALL 2014
VOLUME XIX ~ NUMBER 2
PAGE
15
Efron Family History
by Marvin Eon
T
he earliest Efron from our line that we have traced
was Leizor (sometimes called Eleaser) Efron,
born between 1830 and 1840. His first wife’s name was
Guillermina. They lived in both Knyszyn and Minsk, the
present capital of Belarus. They had two sons: Morris,
born in Knyszyn in 1869, and Ari Joel, born in Minsk.
Morris worked as a saddle maker in Minsk, while Ari
Joel studied to be a rabbi. Morris married Ida Surasky
from Knyszyn. An
unusual situation
occurred because
Ida’s mother’s second
husband was Leizor
Efron, Morris’s father.
is made Morris
and Ida not only
husband and wife,
but also step-brother
and step-sister.
Because of
economic conditions,
religious persecution
and the threat of war,
the Efrons decided to
leave Russia. Some
family and friends had
le earlier and wrote
that the Americas
oered a beer life.
Morris and his
family decided to
move to the United
States, while Ari
Joel and his family decided to immigrate to Argentina.
In 1998, at age 100, my father told us about his family in
Argentina. My wife, Sara, and I were in Buenos Aires for a
medical convention and I was surprised to discover three
pages of Efrons in the phone book there. A friend of mine
who is bilingual called one of the Efrons at random and the
recipient was excited to hear from one of the North American
Efrons. He knew he had relatives here.
Morris le for the United States soon aer my father
Harry’s birth in 1898. He le from Roerdam, in the
Netherlands, and landed at Ellis Island on September 19
under the name of Moische Efrom. He stopped rst in New
York City with a cousin, Sore Kaplan, and then proceeded
to St. Louis, Missouri, where another cousin, a member of
the Berger family, owned a pickle factory. Morris soon found
employment as a presser. He was joined two years later by
his wife, Ida, his three sons (Jacob, age six, Max, age ve,
and Harry, age two), and his mother-in-law, who was now
divorced from his father.
e newcomers arrived with Yiddish names but soon
changed them to American-sounding names. ey seled
in St. Louis and
all lived together.
Morris went into the
recycling business.
He collected burlap
bags, renovated them,
and sold them back
to manufacturers and
distributors.
In 1903, Ida’s
mother, whose
American name was
Sophia Rosa, was
married for the third
time to Hyman Levy.
e family integrated
into American culture
quickly. ey learned
the language, found
work, and made
friends in their new
homeland. Morris
and other members
of the family soon
became naturalized
citizens. Aer Ida arrived in the United States, she and Morris
had four more children, Isadore, Annie, Dena, and Lillian.
All of the children aended school, but Isadore was the rst
to graduate from high school.
Everything went well until in 1918, when Morris died
suddenly, apparently of typhoid fever. Shortly after his
death, Ida decided to move to Aiken, South Carolina, where
her brothers had settled and were operating successful
retail clothing businesses. She had five brothers, but one,
Abram, had been murdered in 1903. When Morris died,
his three oldest sons were married and his youngest child,
Lillian, was only four years old. After Ida settled in Aiken,
each of her children followed her. The family prospered
The Efron family, circa 1911. Seated left to right are Sophia Rose Surasky (Ida’s
mother), Ida, and Morris. Dena is in front of Morris. Standing: Annie, Harry, Jake,
Jake’s wife, Helen, Max, and Isadore. Missing is Lillian, who wasn’t born until 1914.
Courtesy of Marvin Efron.
Jewish Roots, Aiken Branches:
From Shtetl to Small-Town South
November 15–16, 2014
Aiken, South Carolina
Saturday, November 15
3:00 .. Optional tour of Aiken and sites of Jewish interest
Dinner on your own
Sunday, November 16
9:30 .. Annual meeting: Strategic plan will be presented – everyone is invited to aend!
11:00 e Hon. Richard Gergel and Robert Rosen, Esq.:
e Remarkable Story of the Early Jews of South Carolina
12:00 Lunch
12:30 .. Panel discussion: Aiken Pioneers, en and Now
Moderator: Dale Rosengarten
Panelists: Doris L. Baumgarten, Nelson A. Danish, Marvin Efron, Samuel Wolf Ellis,
Judith Evans, Jerey Kaplan, Sondra S. Katzenstein, Ernie Levinson,
Irene K. Rudnick, and Stephen K. Surasky
2:00 Dedication of historical marker, followed by reception
Hotel reservations:
Towneplace Suites
1008 Monterey Drive
Aiken, SC 29803
Phone 803.641.7373
Fax 803.641.7391
Registration form
Meeting location: Congregation Adath Yeshurun, 154 Greenville Street, NW, Aiken
NAME(S) _______________________________
______________________________________
ADDRESS _______________________________
_______________________________________
PHONE ________________________________
EMAIL _________________________________
e cost for this weekend is $18 per person, not including
hotel accomodations.
If you are not a current member of the JHSSC, please add
$36 for your membership.
Total Amount Enclosed: $_________
Return form to:
JHSSC/Jewish Studies Program
96 Wentworth Street
Charleston, SC 29424
Register online at jhssc.org
Ask for special JHSSC rate
for Saturday, November 15:
$119 plus tax.
Deadline for registration:
November 7, 2014.
16
PAGE JEWISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
FALL 2014
VOLUME XIX ~ NUMBER 2
PAGE
17
eggnog party or go with them to midnight mass at the
Catholic church. I remember spending the night with a
friend on Easter eve so the Easter bunny could give me a
basket. I am sure that my mother helped my friend’s mother
with the goodies.
When my parents sent me to Camp Tel Yehuda one
summer, I didn’t like it at rst. I felt that I had been dropped
in the middle of Israel! Everything was said in Hebrew. At
meal time, we had to remember the words for the food to
get served. We had to work in the garden, etc. We had
Hebrew every day but Shabbat. At the
beginning of the month’s stay I knew
nothing, but I certainly learned a lot.
Most of the campers were not from
the South.
The next year, I went to Camp
Blue Star and LOVED it! I didn’t
want to come home. My parents
borrowed the money to keep me
there for two months. They knew
that I had a boyfriend in Aiken and
they were keeping me away from him.
I feel that I got most of my
Jewish education from camp. Going
to synagogue in Aiken was not a
good experience. Not having had
any Hebrew, women siing on one
side and men on the other side, with
virtually no English in the service, was
really boring. Girls were not taught
Hebrew then. Only my brothers
Marriage of Sondra Shanker and Charles Katzenstein,
February 1, 1959, conducted by Rabbi Norman
Goldberg. Courtesy of Sondra S. Katzenstein.
studied with Mr. Nathan Persky for their bar mitzvah.
My cousin Rahlene Rifkin Linder and I were made to
go to Augusta to the Young Judaea group. We did not feel
accepted there. A few times we went to the conventions.
To me, it was my camping experiences that gave me a good
feeling about being Jewish.
I aended the University of Georgia for one year. e
school was way too big for me. I did pledge SDT and joined
the sorority. e boys at Georgia were party animals. is
was not the scene for me.
I met my husband on a blind date.
He was at the navy supply school in
Athens when I was a freshman. The
date was arranged by a customer
and friend of my parents. He was
the Episcopal minister in Aiken who
shopped at my parents’ grocery store.
His wife was a physical therapist. She
asked me to help her teach adaptive
swimming to handicapped children
one summer.
Many years later, I went back
to school at Central Piedmont
Community College to become a
physical therapist assistant. I had three
dierent children in three dierent
schools then and I was going to college
in Charloe. I am really proud to say
that all three of my children have had
their bar or bat mitzvah and all four
grandchildren have too.
Above: Isadore Efron’s garage, Aiken, SC. Courtesy of Anne Thomasson. Right: Isadore
Efron. Esther Persky albums. Special Collections, College of Charleston.
Recollections of Growing Up in Aiken
by Sondra Shanker Katzenstein
M
y parents, Minnie and Sam Shanker, both were born
in St. Louis, Missouri, and in the mid-1930s came to
Aiken where my grandparents Jake and Helen Efron had a
grocery store. My parents opened their own grocery store
and worked long hours seven days a week. ey closed the
store for church hours on Sundaythe only day we, as a
family, ate our midday meal together. We had a “colored” lady
who took care of me and my two younger
brothers during the day, and her mother
stayed with us until my parents came home
from the store at night. May and then Ethel
walked to our home early in the morning to
cook our breakfast and got us up for school.
Mother usually drove us to school. en she
would go to the store to help my father.
e small neighborhood store was in
a predominantly black area on Highway 1.
Customers who lived in the housing
developments nearby would stop to shop
and oen buy their groceries for the week.
ere were few supermarkets as we know of
today. Our shop sold gasoline and kerosene
as well as foodstus.
I oen helped out working as a cashier or puing away
merchandise. e store was not air conditioned but was cooled
with fans on the ceilings. We had very nice black customers
to whom my parents extended credit when needed. We were
taught at an early age that they were our “bread and buer.” I
there and multiplied. Jacob (Jake) had married
Helen Kaback from St. Louis and they had
three children, Mollie, Minnie, and Martin.
In Aiken he opened a supermarket.
Max had married Theresa Wise from
Holland, Michigan, and they had two
children, Julius and Bea. He operated
a trucking line. Harry had married
Mary Fadem from St. Louis and they
had five children, Sylvia, Joe, Lyn,
Marvin, and Evelyn. Isadore operated
a taxi service and married three times,
first to Dena Srago, then Fannie Leven,
and finally Herta. Isadore and Dena had
one daughter, Joann. Annie was a nurse
and never married. Sister Dena assisted
her mother in retail clothing and married
Lou Lusher from Canada. They had no children.
Lillian married Sol Passink from Savannah,
Georgia, and they had two daughters,
Phyllis and Nanci.
As the family moved to the next
generation, it grew in both numbers
and diversity, boasting an extensive
variety of professions and occupations.
Unfortunately, the only Efrons left in
Aiken are in the Sons of Israel section
of Bethany Cemetery. Members of
the family live in many states and in
Israel and China, but 55 of them came
together in Charleston, South Carolina,
in July 2012, for a family reunion.
never ever thought of them as anything other than people with
a dierent color skin. In fact, I saw May or Ethel more than I
did my own mother.
I can remember having some of the lile black children
come to our home to play school in the mornings. (Oddly, I
never considered becoming a teacher, even though I thought
this was a worthwhile thing to do.) I remember seeing the
Ku Klux Klan marching down the street in
front of my grandparents’ grocery store on
Park Avenue. My mother explained to me
that they not only hated blacks but hated
Jews as well. When I was going to Aiken
Elementary School, not far from where I
lived, I was chased home one day by some
boys a lile older than I was. ey were
yelling at me: “You killed Jesus!” I was so
afraid and cried back, “I wasn’t even around
then.” Aer that incident, my mother picked
me up from school.
Another unpleasant encounter
occurred when I was handing out samples
of Sealtest coage cheese at one of the
grocery stores. A customer said to me, “You
act just like a Jew.” I had enough chutzpah to say back to her,
“at is funnyI am Jewish and I’m proud of it!” ose were
the only two episodes of anti-Semitism I can remember.
All of my friends were Christians and often invited
me to help decorate their Christmas tree or come to their
Helen, Mollie, and Jake Eon. Esther Persky albums.
Special Collections, College of Charleston.
Sondra Shanker, circa 1942.
18
PAGE JEWISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
FALL 2014
VOLUME XIX ~ NUMBER 2
PAGE
19
by Samuel Wolf Ellis
so long. Sunday school was much the same,
except that it was taught by the wonderful
Mrs. Irene Rudnick, whom I admired as
our synagogue president. I admired her
for her unique sense of humor and for her
friendship with my grandmother Evelyn
Wolf. I cannot recall every Bible story told
to me during Sunday school, but I can
recall with pride the traits she bestowed
upon me by example: kindness, fairness,
and compassion. Irene’s impact cannot
be understated, as she tirelessly worked
to keep Adath Yeshurun strong.
Although I was too young to
fully appreciate the intricacies
of Jewish faith and philosophy, I
was intensely aware that something
profound was being passed from
generation to generation. It began
with my great-grandfather, was passed
to my grandmother and Mrs. Rudnick,
to my mother, and finally, to me. My mother and father were married
in Adath Yeshurun. My bar mitzvah was held there. Our humble temple
and the Jewish faith were intertwined in a complex relationship that was
beyond words or reason. Mrs. Rudnick and my mother did a wonderful
job instilling this in me, as I did not know my grandfather or great-
grandparents, and my Mimi passed away when I was very young.
I wish that I had something more profound to say about Jewish philosophy
based on my experiences growing up at Adath Yeshurun, but I have to be
honest. e things that stick out in my mind the
most are the simple joys, celebrating holidays with
a small but tight-knit congregation. Simhat Torah,
in particular, was my favorite; parading around
the sanctuary with Torah in hand, singing our
hearts out, reveling in the joyous stomping
that you get when a congregation is marching
on hundred-year-old oorboards with an
entire Sunday school in tow. Perhaps that is
the ultimate testament to Jewish philosophy,
this continuation of Old World pragmatism
coupled with a zest for life.
Reections of a Southern Jew
B
eing a Jew in the South is not quite Faulknerian, but there is a certain amount of
quirk that goes with the territory. Siing in Shabbat services, one is reminded of this
every time the Greyhound bus pulls into the station next door, shaking the building’s
foundation, its engine drowning out the Hebrew song and reading of Torah.
For the Jewish people, it is oen dicult to distinguish where heritage ends and
faith begins. Nowhere is this more evident than in the American South, where Jews
are essentially a minority of a minority. Simple survival requires a real commitment to
the Jewish faith and way of life. The synagogue where I grew up, Adath Yeshurun
in Aiken, South Carolina, sits as a reminder of an age that has long passed; an age
where Jewish immigrants fought to make their way while refusing to shed their Jewish
roots. My roots are in this synagogue; my great-grandfather Jacob Wolf was one of its
founding members, along with members of the Polier, Surasky, and Poliakoff families.
Like these other families, the Wolfs came here circa 1900.
I was born in 1983 and I’m not much of a historian,
so my ability to tell my family history is limited. My
favorite anecdote about Jacob Wolf recounts that
when he struck up a correspondence with his future
wife, Julia Kameno, who was still in Russia at the
time, he sent her pictures of a much more handsome
man in order to entice her to come to Aiken. Imagine
her surprise when she arrived and he met her at
the train! Despite the innocent deception, they did in fact get married. Out of their
union came my family, and two historic Aiken institutions, Julia’s Dress Shop and the
aforementioned Adath Yeshurun Synagogue.
Adath Yeshurun is a prey building but not exactly beautiful by modern standards.
What my synagogue lacks in grandiosity is made up for in sheer heart, the same type of
character found in many surviving old buildings in the South. e humble two-story,
two-room sanctuary resonates with the character of the men and women who scraped
together what lile money they had to build their own
place of worship, moving from the aic above the Masonic
Temple where services were originally held. To illustrate
what it was like to live as a practicing Jew in the South,
there were many occasions when the Jewish businessmen
who owned the clothing and shoe stores on Laurens
Street, Aiken’s main thoroughfare, would close up shop
during business hours to make minyan.
Growing up at Adath Yeshurun, I was no dierent
from any other child. I would dread the arrival of the
High Holy Days, less because of the intensity of the
liturgy and more because I could sit patiently for only
Above: Members pose on the steps of Adath
Yeshurun during the congregation’s 75
th
anniversary
celebration, 1996. Photo: Todd Lista. Left: Julia and
Jacob Wolf on their wedding day; Julia Kamenoff
Wolf and six of her seven children: Rebecca
(1903), Ann (1908), Ida (1913), Abe (1916),
Sam (1914), and Sonny (1906). Courtesy of
Rosalee Berger Rinehart.
Right: Wedding of Julia Wolf and Michael
Ellis, 1980; Irene Rudnick teaching Sunday
school, circa 1997; Wolf grandchildren
at the 90
th
anniversary of the synagogue,
2011—all at Adath Yeshurun. Courtesy of
Samuel Wolf Ellis.
20
PAGE JEWISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
FALL 2014
VOLUME XIX ~ NUMBER 2
PAGE
21
law rm, I opened my own oce. To pay my rent, I tutored
students in English.
Aer practicing law for two years, in November 1954 I
married Harold Rudnick from Aiken, South Carolina, who
was introduced to me by his sister, Rose. She was married to
Hyman Rubin, who served for many years as a senator from
Richland County.
We moved directly to Aiken and joined Adath Yeshurun
Synagogue, where Harold had grown up. Mr. Nathan Persky
conducted services and Mandle Surasky was the president.
As my children grew older, I became more active in the
Sisterhood, supervised the Sunday school, and was a Sunday
school teacher. I served as president and maintenance director
of the synagogue for over 20 years. When Morris and Helen
became of bar and bat mitzvah age, we traveled to Augusta,
Georgia, where they were able to complete their Jewish
education with Rabbi Maynard Hyman. I also taught Sunday
school in Augusta.
Aer my marriage, I practiced law in Aiken. I shared an
oce over the Farmers and Merchants Bank with Benjamin
Surasky. As my husband, who was the owner and operator of
Rudnick Furniture, needed me in his store, I moved my oce
to that location. Since 1983, I have
practiced law in partnership with my
son under the rm name of Rudnick
& Rudnick.
I began teaching commercial law at
USC Aiken in 1961 and aer 50 years
was awarded an honorary Doctorate
of Education by USC President Harris
Pastides. My teaching has been a most
rewarding experience, and I am still in
the classroom.
Harold and I succeeded in
instilling in our children a belief in
the value of education. Our daughter,
Helen Rudnick Rapoport, graduated
from USC magna cum laude with
both a bachelor’s degree in journalism and a master’s degree
in mass communications. She also graduated from USC law
school with a juris doctorate and now teaches full time as a
college professor. My son, Morris, also graduated from USC
with a bachelor of science in business and a juris doctorate from
USC law school. I have been blessed with six grandchildren
Whitney, Jared, and Joshua Rapoport, Charles and Laura Jean
Rudnick, and Kathleen Tokar and her children (my great-
grands), Michael and Ashleywho have brought me great joy
and happiness.
My political career began as superintendent of education
for Aiken County. (e legislative delegation later abolished the
position and the superintendent of education is now appointed
by the Aiken County School Board.) My job entailed that I
investigate and report on the physical conditions of the entire
Aiken County school system. I traveled to 38 schools during
the year, reported at the public meetings of the Aiken County
School Board, and submied legal descriptions of
all the school properties. While
serving in this position, I brought
to light many issues. For example,
aer reading the state’s re marshal
reports I saw to it that sprinkler
systems were installed in schools.
I was elected for the rst time in 1973 to the South
Carolina House of Representatives from District 81, in Aiken,
where I served for 14 years. I was the rst Jewish woman elected
to the General Assembly and worked tirelessly on behalf of my
constituents, priding myself on being available, accountable,
and responsive to their needs. Major concerns to me were
environmental safeguards, family law issues, as well as funding
for public education and myriad safety issues. I addressed
problems associated with highway safety, trac lights, and cross
bars and warning signals at railroad crossings. I regularly held
public meetings where voters in my
district could voice their questions and
concerns. I saw that the journals of the
House and Senate were made available
in the library and introduced hundreds
of bills while in the legislature; I was
intellectually honest and sincere about
reforming government.
As a Democrat in a highly
Republican district, my campaigns
were hard fought. Without a supportive
network of friends and family,
including my husband, an unapologetic
cheerleader who helped me steer a
steady course when campaigns became
intense, our children, and many loyal
constituents, I could not have been elected. My mother oen
came with me to the General Assembly where she enjoyed the
wonderful people and easy camaraderie of my associates. Aer
the redistricting of my district, I lost my seat.
Today I still teach at USC Aiken, practice law, audit
college classes, and am active in civic organizations. Time
and again, I have learned that all of our experiences teach
us resilience and patience. e most important thing that I
have learned, though, is the power of a word ingly spoken.
As the novelist Henry James so aptly said: “ree things in
human life are important: the rst is to be kind; the second is
to be kind; and the third is to be kind.”
Law partners Irene Rudnick and her son Morris.
Courtesy of Irene K. Rudnick.
Apples of Gold: My Life and Times
by Irene Krugman Rudnick
I
t is only at twilight that we can see the beauty of the day.
As I have grown older and look back on my life, I realize
how good G-d has been to me. My tombstone will read,
“Wife, Mother, Teacher, and Legislator,” and underneath
these words will be my favorite biblical expression: “A word
ingly spoken is as apples of gold in seings of silver.” And
then the added line, “Please forgive me for not geing up.”
(As was said on Seinfeld,
“It’s our sense of humor
that sustained us as a
people for 3,000 years.”)
Born in December
1929 to Jack and Jean
Krugman, I was raised
on Hampton Street in
Columbia, South Carolina,
where we lived with my
grandfather, Harry Geer,
who was a restaurateur.
My mother was an
only child and came
to America alone aer
World War I from
Chzortkow, Poland, to
join my grandfather.
My father, who had
a small dry goods store on Assembly Street in Columbia,
entertained policeman on the beat with coee and doughnuts.
ey oen asked him where he was born, and he would
retort, “Zabludova, New Jersey.” Zabludova lies 20 miles
outside of Bialystok and is located near the border of Poland
and Russia. His father was killed in 1905 at the Wailing Wall
in Israel by terrorists.
My father’s mother, Ida Krugman, came to this country
from Russia with her four children and lived in New York.
When her cousin, Chaim Baker, came to New York on a
buying trip, he asked if he could take my father to the South
with him, and she consented. Chaim Baker had ten children
and my father, who was 14 or 15 when he arrived in South
Carolina, worked for members of the family in three towns:
Elloree, Estill, and Columbia. He was given work in exchange
for shelter, food, and a small stipend, and was considered
part of the Baker family. My father opened, as he called it, his
“hole in the wall” on Assembly Street.
As time went by his business expanded and his
store continued to prosper. My mother and father
were married on January 29, 1929. She was his star
saleswoman. From both of them I learned that hard work
means amassing sweat equity. The virtues and values
they praised were printed on the backs of their business
cards: “Square Deal Jack.” By dint of their persistence
and incredible work ethic, they were able to send all
three of their children to college. My brother, Stanley
Krugman, was King of
the BBGs [B’nai B’rith
Girls] and presently
practices dentistry
in Miami, Florida. I
introduced my sister,
Dorothy Krugman, to
her future husband, a
native Charlestonian
named Jack Goldstein,
who had graduated
from West Point and
was an army lieutenant
stationed at the
Savannah River Site
Radar Unit in Aiken.
Dorothy subsequently
became a teacher and
homemaker and now
lives outside of Washington, DC.
In Columbia we were members of Beth Shalom
Synagogue where my father served on the board of trustees,
and we aended services and Hebrew school regularly. e
Sunday school was conducted by the Reform congregation
Tree of Life. My love of Judaism was inuenced by my
conrmation class teacher, Mrs. Helen Kohn Hennig, who
wrote books on South Carolina and was in charge of the
Sunday school. Her enthusiasm, intelligence, and teaching
ability made a lasting impression on me.
In elementary school my teachers would ask me to go
from class to class telling stories, and this skill has served me
well in many capacities. In junior high school, I was president
of the student body and a member of the honor society, and I
was valedictorian of my senior class at Columbia High School.
I graduated from the University of South Carolina cum
laude with a double major in political science and English.
Aer graduation from USC law school, where I was one of
only two or three women, I was briey employed by Dean
Samuel L. Prince as his secretary. Unable to nd a job in a
Harold Rudnick (leaning on truck, ont le) in Germany while serving under
General Paon during World War II. Courtesy of Irene K. Rudnick.
22
PAGE JEWISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
FALL 2014
VOLUME XIX ~ NUMBER 2
PAGE
23
e Poliakos of Aiken
by Stuart Fine
J
. S. Poliako was born in Minsk, Belarus, in 1867. He
immigrated to the United States as a teenager, no doubt
to avoid being conscripted into the tsar’s army and to escape
the pogroms that were prevalent. Many times I have imagined
how intolerable life must have been for a youngster to leave his
parents, knowing that he probably
would not see them again, and for
parents to encourage that migration.
I discussed those very points with my
13-year-old grandson, Henry Fine of
Newton, MA, who wrote about his
great-great-grandfather for a sixth-
grade genealogy project last year.
J. S. seled in Aiken likely
because there were relatives in the
area who were willing to provide
shelter and food until he could
establish himself. I suppose he
peddled for a while, as did most
new immigrants, until he was able
to open his store on Laurens Street.
J. S. married Rebecca Vigodsky,
also from Belarus, although I don’t
know whether they met in Aiken
or in the Old Country. While my
mother, Gussie, J. S.’s and Rebecca’s
fourth child, spoke often about the
endearing personal characteristics
of her parents, to whom she was
devoted, she spoke little to me
about their lives in Belarus. I can
only imagine that life there was so
unpleasant that they rarely talked
of it aer seling in America, the land of opportunity.
Growing up in Aiken, all the Poliako children aended
the Aiken Institute, as the local school was known. As I
recall, the school ended with the tenth or eleventh grade. e
Institute became a library some years ago and is still located
across the street from e Willcox Hotel. My mother recalled
socializing with the children of other Jewish families in
Aikenthe Suraskys, Poliers, Wolfs, Rudnicks, and others.
A gregarious person, my mother also made friends with non-
Jewish classmates with whom she would walk home at the
end of the school day. She made a point of telling me that
they did not regularly visit in each other’s houses. She never
mentioned overt discrimination.
While J. S. kept the store on Laurens Street and
participated in the activities of the small Jewish community,
Grandmother Rebecca tended to the family. During a family
gathering in 1928, Rebecca died suddenly and unexpectedly
aer consuming a large meal. “Acute indigestion,” my mother
called it. Most likely, the cause of
death was a massive heart aack.
Photos document that she was a
large woman, who (I speculate)
probably ate lots of fay foods,
didn’t exercise much, and surely was
not treated for high blood pressure
or high cholesterol.
Aer her mother’s passing,
my mother remained in Aiken and
helped J. S. manage the store until
he retired in 1937, at which time
they moved to Baltimore. Southern
Jewish merchants were familiar
with Baltimore because Jacob
Epstein, owner of the Baltimore
Bargain House, sent them “free”
railroad tickets several times a
year and provided “free” overnight
accommodations at the Lord
Baltimore Hotel. In exchange, he
expected the merchants to stock
their inventories with purchases
made at his store. It was a successful
business strategy!
Shortly after relocating to
Baltimore, J. S. took a boat from
Baltimore to Newport News, VA,
to visit his daughter Sadie. The boat caught fire and all
passengers and crew were ordered to jump overboard into
the river. J. S. was the only casualty. My mother alleged that
he knew how to swim. Age 70 at the time, it’s possible he
suffered a heart attack; no autopsy was performed.
I visited Aiken for the first time in 1952 at age 10,
stopping en route to Augusta, GA, for a family wedding.
We stayed overnight at the now defunct Hotel Henderson.
I have very few memories of that trip. Fifty years passed
before I visited Aiken again, this time with my wife, Ellie.
But before that visit, I was fortunate to make contact with
Doris Baumgarten, the unofficial historian and archivist
of Jewish Aiken. Practically everything I know about my
grandfather’s contributions to the Jewish community in
Aiken derives from information provided by Doris.
To wit: J. S. was one of a small group of merchants who
provided funds to build Adath Yeshurun and to purchase
two acres for a Jewish burial ground, Sons of Israel Cemetery.
Whenever I walk through that cemetery, I feel like I am visiting
my mother’s friends and relatives, about whom I heard her
speak so oen. ere are the cousins Jean and Anne Poliako,
my mother’s very good friend Dorothy Sarat (née Surasky)
Scheinfeld, the Poliers, the Suraskys, the Wolfs (most of whom
I met either during my 1952 visit to Aiken or when they visited
us in Baltimore), and, of course, the grandparents I never met,
Rebecca and J. S. Poliako, who had six children, born between
approximately 1893 and 1908, proled below.
Aer several visits to Aiken, one with our granddaughter
Sarah Praniko, Ellie and I decided to organize a Poliako/
Poliko
* family reunion. In December 2013, about 30
family members gathered in Aiken for two days. It was truly
wonderful watching the great-grandchildren and the great-
great-grandchildren of J. S. and Rebecca called to the bimah
for an aliyah. J. S. and Rebecca would have loved it!
At the conclusion of the service, the synagogue hosted a
magnicent oneg for the family and all the congregants in the
lower level social hall. Many
of the delicacies were home-
made. Adath Yeshurun leaders
expressed their delight at
welcoming descendants of one of
the founders of the congregation
some 90-plus years later, while
family members explained how
special it was to be walking in the
footsteps of the patriarch about
whom they had heard so much
but never met.
Aer the oneg, we visited
the Poliako section of the Sons of Israel Cemetery and the
ancestral home on Pendleton Street, a beautiful, two-story
brick house built in 1912 and now the Johnson Law Oces.
We hiked in Hitchcock Woods with Dr. Harry Shealy, a retired
professor of biology and former president of the Hitchcock
Foundation, and enjoyed meeting new relatives and sharing
several delicious meals at e Willcox. e event, reported in
the Aiken Standard, was so successful that another group of 40
to 45 Poliakos will convene in Aiken in December 2014. (I
was pleased to be recognized in the Aiken Standard article as
Descendants of J. S. and Rebecca Poliako
LOUIS was a doughboy in World War I, though I don’t know that
he ever saw action. He started his career as a traveling salesman
working out of Baltimore and eventually operated his own business,
the Berkshire Sweater Company. In later years, he managed a family-
owned development, Bristol Terrace Homes, near Leviown, NJ.
Louis married Naomi Rombro of Baltimore. Marvin, born in 1921
and now deceased, was a practicing aorney in Baltimore who was
active in the Civil Rights Movement during the 1950s and ’60s. He
married Shirley Globus; their sons are Judson Casey and Adam
Spence. Louis and Naomi’s son Alan, born in 1929, was in the textile
business. He married Dana, who worked in the fashion industry, and
sired two sons: Lee, a pediatrician, and Mitchell, in the investment
business. Both boys are married;
Lee and his wife have one son.
LILLIE married her cousin,
Milton Shapiro. ey opened
a store in Bamberg, SC, which
they operated until Milton died
in 1955. Lillie then relocated
to Baltimore where she lived
until about age 90. Daughter
Geraldine (Gerry) married
Sidney (Bud) Kalin of Sioux City,
Iowa, where they reared three
children, Steve, Janet, and Bruce.
Gerry and Bud lived to about 90. Steve is a prominent insurance
executive in Minneapolis, active in the Jewish community, and the
father of three daughters, Lindsey, Jessie, and Alana. Janet married
Richard Yulman, a prominent businessman also active in the Jewish
community in Miami. Janet, now deceased, and Richard’s children
are Katy and Bre. Bruce remained in Sioux City where he still runs
the family’s heating and air conditioning business. He and his wife
Linda, a pediatric emergency department toxicology nurse, have
four children: Michael, Jenna, Jacqui, and J. B. Shirley, the Shapiros’
younger daughter, married Irving (Hershey) Schwartzman, a
Baltimore aorney, and reared Marc. All three Schwartzmans are
now deceased. Both Gerry and Shirley graduated from the University
of South Carolina.
BENET was reputed to be the scholar of the family. Aer graduating
from the University of South Carolina School of Law, he practiced in
Jacob (J. S.) Poliako, a founder of Sons of Israel
Cemetery and Adath Yeshurun Synagogue. Courtesy
of Doris L. Baumgarten.
Sam Praniko’s grandfather!) Hats o to Doris Baumgarten,
Gary Poliako of Spartanburg, Irene Krugman Rudnick,
Peppy and Stephen Surasky, and their many helpers, without
whose eorts the reunion could not have occurred.
e grand, great-grand, and great-great-grandchildren of
J. S. and Rebecca are proud of what the Poliakos and their
friends did for the Aiken Jewish community more than 100
years ago. I’d like to believe that J. S. and Rebecca would be
proud of them as well.
*Most Poliakos include an “a.” According to Gussie, when her
brother Benet aended the University of South Carolina, he dropped
the “a” and became Poliko. Subsequently, his siblings followed suit.
Poliako section of the Sons of Israel Cemetery, 1996. Photo:
Dale Rosengarten.
24
PAGE JEWISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
FALL 2014
VOLUME XIX ~ NUMBER 2
PAGE
25
e Baumgarten Family
by Linda Baumgarten, Sharon Mills, Ann Traylor, and Doris L. Baumgarten
D
oris and Pete Baumgarten and their youngest daughter
transferred from Wilmington, Delaware, to Aiken, South
Carolina, in August 1977, just in time to enroll Sharon for her
junior year of high school. eir oldest daughter, Linda, remained
in Philadelphia to nish college, and their middle daughter, Ann,
transferred to the
University of Georgia
the following year.
Peter, a DuPont
chemical engineer,
had been active in
Temple Beth Emeth
in Wilmington,
serving as secretary
and vice president
of the congregation.
He also served as
president of the
Men’s Club. Pete
taught religious
school to teenagers
for four years.
In Wilmington,
Doris was active
in the Sisterhood,
serving as vice president. She chaired dinners and hospitality
for the Temple Youth Group multiple times. All three daughters
were active in the Youth Group and aended programs at
Kutz Camp in Warwick, New York. (Two of Pete and Doris’s
grandsons now aend the same camp.)
Aer belonging to such a strong
Jewish community, Doris and Pete
were concerned about what Jewish
life would be like in this small
southern town. Remember that the
World Wide Web and Google had
yet to be invented.
Fortunately for the Baumgartens,
a Jewish family had transferred from
Aiken to Wilmington six months before the move, and they
reported that Aiken indeed had a congregation of 40 families,
including numerous Jewish teenagers. Doris was pleased to nd
out that there was no discrimination in buying a house or joining
a country club in Aiken. She and Pete were delighted to see that
this small congregation had a beautiful sanctuary, three Torah
scrolls, and a student rabbi brought in for High Holy Day services.
Shortly aer arriving in Aiken, Pete began to help conduct
Shabbat and holiday services at Adath Yeshurun. Soon he was
elected to the board of directors as secretary and treasurer, and
subsequently served six years as president. Doris immediately
became involved in the synagogue, including arranging
hospitality schedules
for student rabbis, and
serving as treasurer
and president of
the Sisterhood. For
years, she has been
the rst point of
phone contact for the
congregation, elding
random inquiries
regarding Jewish life
in Aiken.
What inspired
Doris and Pete to
continue their Jewish
involvement in their
new community?
Doris was born into
a Conservative
Jewish family in
Allentown, Pennsylvania. The family moved several times
before settling in Newport News, Virginia, where Doris
attended religious school and was confirmed in 1945,
as World War II ended. Doris remembers being very
disappointed that her brothers weren’t able to attend
her confirmation a month after
VE-Day, because they were both
serving in the military, one in
Germany and the other in Italy.
Doris attended William and Mary
College, where she was secretary
of Hillel for more than three years,
and then went to graduate school
at the University of Delaware,
where she found her “nice Jewish boy,” Peter Baumgarten.
Peter, who was rescued by the Kindertransport in
1939, cherished the American religious, educational,
and political freedoms denied him during his childhood
in Berlin, Germany. From Berlin, his family moved to
Vienna, and then he and his brother were evacuated by
the Kindertransport to Bournemouth, England. Since
Le to right: Doris Baumgarten, Sharon Mills, Ann Traylor, Linda Baumgarten, and
Peter Baumgarten, March 2000. Courtesy of Doris L. Baumgarten.
Winston-Salem, NC. Married to Margaret New of Shaker Heights,
OH, they had two children, Peggy and Benet Jr. In the 1930s, Benet
was retained to represent Libby Holman, a nationally prominent
torch singer who was accused of murdering her husband, Z. Smith
Reynolds, the son of R. J. Reynolds. My mother said that all over
the country people listened nightly to their radios to hear news of
the trial. (It reminded me of our country’s fascination with the O. J.
Simpson trial in the 1990s.) Libby was acquied. e judge set my
uncle Benet’s fee at one million dollars, quite a tidy sum in those days!
As I heard the story, Libby persuaded Benet to relocate to New York
and promised to introduce him to her friends in the entertainment
world, some of whom might become his clients. Accordingly, Benet
and family moved to Manhaan and spent their lives and careers
there. Peggy married Bud Bradt and had two sons. Benet Jr. married
Jean Loeb and had three children.
GUSSIE, my mother, relocated to Baltimore in 1937. For three
years, she worked in a ladies’ dress shop as a salesperson; then, in
1940, she married my father, P. Edward Fine, a practicing aorney.
She quickly persuaded him to give up his practice and join her
in business. ey operated a men’s and boys’ shop in suburban
Baltimore from 1940 until retiring in 1968. I was born in 1942,
married Ellen (Ellie) Himelfarb in 1964, and completed medical
school in 1966. Ellie, a gied school teacher, and I have two
children, Karen and Andy. Karen is director of admissions for the
Triad School in Winston-Salem, NC. Her husband, Tom Praniko,
is chief of pediatric surgery at Wake Forest Medical Center. eir
children are Sam, born 1994, and Sarah, born 1997. Andy practices
pediatric emergency medicine at Boston Children’s Hospital and is
on the faculty of Harvard Medical School. His wife, Laura, who was
his classmate at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine,
is an ophthalmic surgeon in Boston. eir children are Henry, born
2001, and Hannah, born 2004. I have spent my career in academic
ophthalmology. From 1972 to ’91, I was a full-time faculty member
at the Wilmer Ophthalmological Institute at Johns Hopkins; from
1991 to 2010, I served as professor and chair of ophthalmology and
director of the Scheie Eye Institute at the University of Pennsylvania.
Aer I retired from Penn at the end of 2010, Ellie and I moved to
our vacation home in the Colorado mountains, near Carbondale.
I am still engaged in research and education in ophthalmology
and maintain a part-time faculty appointment at the University of
Colorado’s Anschutz Medical Center.
SADIE married Milton Levy who spent his career with the
Department of the Navy in Washington, DC. ey lived in Silver
Spring, MD, where they reared their children, Jay Stanley, born in
1938, and Roslyn, born in 1940. Jay, a graduate of the University
of Maryland School of Engineering, married Jean; they have one
daughter, Sarah, and one granddaughter. Roslyn married Lewis
Godfrey and lives in Silver Spring.
BELLE, J. S. and Rebecca’s baby, was born in 1908. She married
Nathaniel (Ned) Badaines, a physician, and lived with him and their
three children in Syracuse, NY. eir eldest child, Roberta (Bobbi,
now deceased), graduated from Syracuse University, married Aaron
King of Syracuse, an otolaryngologist, and had ten children. ey
lived in Binghamton, NY. Belle and Ned’s second daughter, Eleanor
(Ellie), also a graduate of Syracuse, married Gerald Schwartzberg,
a physician, and moved to Phoenix, AZ, where he was in private
practice and where they reared their daughters, Beth and Janet. e
Badaines’ son, Joel, also a Syracuse graduate, obtained a Ph.D. in
psychology and eventually relocated (alone) to Sydney, Australia,
where he practices psychodrama. His former wife, Leslie, lives in
Knoxville, TN, where their daughters, Debbie and Becki, were reared.
Aiken is a wonderful place to live. e
town provides so many opportunities
to participate in interesting activities,
stimulate your mind, keep active, and
be of service to others.
– Doris Lerner Baumgarten
“Surrender!” Photo gi of Gerald Meyerson.
Special Collections, College of Charleston.
The Jewish Heritage Collection at the College’s Addlestone
Library will mount an exhibition to coincide with the meeting,
and the program committee is planning a session in which
participants will share their photographs and read first-
person accounts of the war.
If you have photos, letters, memoirs, or other documents
pertaining to World War II, please contact Dale Rosengarten:
rosengart[email protected] or 843.953.8028.
May 2–3, 2015
JHSSC’s Spring Meeting
to Commemorate
the 70
th
Anniversary of VE-Day
Save the Date!
26
PAGE JEWISH HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
FALL 2014
VOLUME XIX ~ NUMBER 2
PAGE
27
Yes, I/we want to become a Pillar of the JHSSC.
Name(s):_______________________________________
Address: _______________________________________
City:__________ ________ State: _____ Zip: _________
Phone:____________ Email: ______________________
Check enclosed $ ________(includes annual membership)
Mail this form and your check to the address on the back
cover or go to jhssc.org and click on Membership.
by Martin Perlmuer
E
ach year during the Passover Seder, Jews recite these
words, reminding them of the obligation to consider
the Jewish exodus from Egypt as though it were a personal
journey, not just one embarked upon by our ancestors. We
are months away from Passover, yet my thoughts turn to this
iconic passage from the Hagaddah when I consider JHSSC’s
mission of connecting one generation to the next through our
shared history as Jews, and more specically, as Jewish South
Carolinians.
Whether rabbinic or academic, via conversation, a page
of Talmud, or a scholarly tome, the goal of transmiing
this communal narrative remains the same. For 20 years,
the Society has collected, publicized, and celebrated South
Carolina’s Jewish history. We’ve done so by organizing
biannual meetings featuring stimulating speakers and panel
discussions, sponsoring historic markers, gathering cemetery
records, promoting the landmark exhibition, A Portion of the
People, and its companion video, Land of Promise, building a
bountiful website, and, not least, producing this newsleer.
The work performed by the JHSSC is incredibly
gratifying to those of us who do it—professional and
lay leaders alike—and we hope that is also true for our
members and friends. Our activities are not without
financial cost, however. We are sustained, to be sure, by
our annual membership dues, but at the end of the day 36
dollars goes only so far. We look to our Pillars to help us
aain our most ambitious goals. With deep respect for those
who support our mission, I invite you to become a Pillar
today by pledging a thousand dollars a year for the next five
years. Your gift will enable us to continue documenting our
stories and the experiences of those who came before, so
that our history may be preserved for those yet to come.
Peter turned 13 during this uprooting, he missed the
opportunity to have a bar mitzvah. The boys’ next journey
was to Springfield, Massachusetts, where the entire family
was reunited. The Baumgartens then moved to Atlanta.
Peter attended Georgia Tech, entered the military, and
attended University
of Delaware for his
masters and doctoral
degrees, where he
found his “nice Jewish
girl,” Doris Lerner.
In 1989, about the
time of Hurricane Hugo,
Pete and Doris joined
the Southern Jewish
Historical Society. When
the Jewish Historical
Society of South Carolina
was founded in the mid-
1990s, they joined JHSSC
and began aending
meetings. Doris served
on JHSSC’s board of
directors from 2004 to
2011. Networking with
other members, Doris
found the resources to
locate a sofer to restore
two synagogue Torahs.
And aer Pete’s initial
Sons of Israel Cemetery
inventory for the Aiken-
Barnwell Genealogical
Society’s survey, Doris,
Nelson Danish, and
others completed an
inventory of burials for
JHSSC’s website.
Besides serving
Aiken’s Jewish
community, Pete felt
it was important to
contribute to the community at large. He worked to
protect land and water resources as a member of the boards of
the Aiken Conservation Land Trust and other conservation
agencies in South Carolina, while Doris continues to serve
as a docent at the Aiken County Historical Museum and as a
tour guide at the synagogue.
Congregation Adath Yeshurun celebrated its 75
th
Bechol dor vador chayav adam lirot et atzmo keilu hu
yatza mimitzvrayim . . . .
Above: Peter Baumgarten leads Congregation Adath Yeshurun in singing a
rendition of “Belz,” his tribute to Aiken, on the occasion of the 75
th
anniversary
of the synagogue in 1996. Photo: Lowell Greenbaum. Below: an excerpt from
Pete’s copy of “Little Shtetl of Aiken.” Courtesy of Doris L. Baumgarten.
anniversary in 1996, with Pete leading a rousing rendition of
the “Lile Shtetl of Aiken,” based on the traditional Yiddish
song “Belz.” More than a hundred former and current
synagogue members aended the event. e 90
th
anniversary
was celebrated in 2011 with community tours and large
gatherings of early
synagogue families,
such as the Wolfs and
the Efrons. Doris has
also organized visits
from several large
Jewish and Christian
groups, including a
tour during the city of
Aiken’s 175
th
birthday
when a thousand people
visited Adath Yeshurun
in one day. Whew!
Being Jewish in
Aiken hasn’t always
been easy. When the
Baumgartens arrived,
Sharon experienced the
diculty of explaining
Jewish holidays to
teachers and obtaining
permission to aend
synagogue rather than
marching with the high
school band on Yom
Kippur. Adath Yeshurun
doesn’t have a rabbi
or sta of teachers or
administrative support.
It is up to the members
to answer questions,
maintain the building,
conduct services, and
hire student rabbis. Yet
this synagogue with 60
members fullls the
same functions as much
larger congregations, holding holiday and Shabbat services,
comforting the sick, and supporting grieving families.
What is the future of the small congregation? As long
as there are volunteers to carry out its mission, Adath
Yeshurun will continue to serve the Jewish community
and the Aiken community at large. That is our belief and
our hope.
History Is the Tie
that Binds Us
Pillars
Susan and Charles Altman, Charleston, SC
Ellen Arnovitz, Atlanta, GA
Doris L. Baumgarten, Aiken, SC
Eric and Candace Bergelson, Greer, SC
Betty Brody, Coral Gables, FL
Harold Brody, Atlanta, GA
Alex and Dyan Cohen, Darlington, SC
Barry and Ellen Draisen, Anderson, SC
David and Andrea Draisen, Anderson, SC
Lowell and Barbara Epstein, Charleton, SC
Harold I. Fox, Charleston, SC
Phillip and Patricia Greenberg, Florence, SC
Ann and Max Hellman, Charleston, SC
Alan and Charlotte Kahn, Columbia, SC
Sue and Jerry Kline, Columbia, SC
Michael S. Kogan, Charleston, SC
Ronald Krancer, Bryn Mawr, PA
Allan and Jeanne Lieberman, Charleston, SC
Susan R. Lourie, Columbia, SC
Susan Pearlstine, Charleston, SC
Edward and Sandra Poliakoff, Columbia, SC
Debra C. Ritter, Columbia, SC
Benedict and Brenda Rosen, Myrtle Beach, SC
Robert and Susan Rosen, Charleston, SC
Sandra Lee Rosenblum, Charleston, SC
Joseph and Edie Rubin, Charleston, SC
Jeff and Walton Selig, Columbia, SC
Sandra G. Shapiro, Wilsonville, OR
Lois and Raphael Wolpert, Tampa, FL
Anita Zucker, Charleston, SC
Foundational Pillar
Henry and Sylvia Yaschik Foundation, Charleston, SC
Founding Patrons
Anonymous, Charleston, SC
Raymond Lifchez, Berkeley, CA
Marlene and Stuart Schooler, Bethesda, MD
O.B.M.
Carolee Rosen Fox
Ruth Brody Greenberg
Anne Oxler Krancer
Raymond Rosenblum
Raymond and Florence Stern
Jerry Zucker
JHSSC Pillars contribute $1,000 a year for ve years.
Foundational Pillars are institutions or foundations that
commit $2,000 a year for ve years. All contributions are
tax deductible.
NON-PROFIT
U.S. POSTAGE
P - A - I - D
CHARLESTON, SC
PERMIT No. 485
Join the Jewish Historical Society of South Carolina
Name: _______________________________________________________
Address: _____________________________________________________
City: _____________________________ State: ___ Zip: ______________
Phone: ___________________________ Fax: ______________________
E-mail Address: _______________________________________________
ANNUAL DUES FOR 2015 (JANUARY – DECEMBER)
_____ Individual/Family Membership $36
_____ Friend $200
_____ Sponsor $350
_____ Patron $750
_____ Founding patron $1,000
_____ Pillar ($1,000 per year for ve years) $5,000
_____ Foundational Pillar ($2,000 per year for ve years) $10,000
Join or renew online at jhssc.org.
Enroll your friends and relatives for an additional $36 each.
Send us their information and we will inform them of your gi.
Make checks payable to JHSSC
and mail to the return address above.
Register now for the November 15–16, 2014 meeting in Aiken.
See page 14 for more information.
Jewish Historical Society of South Carolina
96 Wentworth Street
College of Charleston
Charleston, SC 29424
Phone: 843.953.3918
Email: jhssc@cofc.edu
T h e
J e w i s h
h i s T o r i c a l
S o c i e t y
of
souTh
carolina
jhssc.org
officers
David Draisen, President
Susan D. Altman, Vice-President
Alexander Cohen, Vice-President
Barry Draisen, Vice-President
Ernie Marcus, Vice-President
David J. Cohen, Treasurer
Garry Baum, Secretary
Steve Savitz, Archivist
PasT PresidenTs
Isadore Lourie, o.b.m., Founding President
Klyde Robinson, o.b.m.
Richard Gergel
Jeffrey Rosenblum
Robert Rosen
Bernard Warshaw, o.b.m.
Belinda Gergel
Edward Poliakoff
Ann Meddin Hellman
Rachel Gordin Barnett
board of direcTors
Moss Blachman, Columbia
H. J. Brand, Greenville
Susan Brill, Columbia
Leah Chase, Charleston
Sandra Conradi, Charleston
Barbara Ellison, Charleston
Fred Glickman, Lake Wylie
Phillip Greenberg, Florence
Alan Kahn, Columbia
Billy Keyserling, Beaufort
Michael S. Kogan, Charleston
Harold Kornblut, Latta
Mike Krupsaw, Anderson
Gail Lieb, Columbia
Rhetta Mendelsohn, Charleston
Eli Poliakoff, Charleston
Alan Reyner, Columbia
Anita Moïse Rosenberg, Charleston
Mickey Rosenblum, Charleston
Sandra Lee Rosenblum, Charleston
College of Charleston
Charleston, SC 29424
843.953.3918 fax 843.953.7624
Martin Perlmutter, Executive Director
Enid R. Idelsohn, Administrator
