Louie Balin
When my nephew Norb Berlowitz was drafted into the army,
Norb’s younger brother Seymour enrolled at the University of
Wisconsin. That was in 1943.
If there was no father in the home, the government at that time
wasn’t drafting two brothers from the same family. There was
no father in Norb and Seymour’s home. My sister Lenore was
the boys’ mother. Lenore and I raised Norb and Seymour after
Lenore’s husband, Moe Berlowitz, abruptly disappeared. Moe
happened to be a professional magician so there was a bit of
humor in his disappearance.
We lived in an apartment on Douglas Boulevard with my other
sister, Bess Turk – her husband also disappeared – and Grandma
Minnie, the bubbe. Grandpa Victor had long since passed away
By the end of the war the bubbe too had passed away, Seymour
had joined a fraternity at the University of Wisconsin and Norb
was back from Europe after getting badly wounded fighting the
Nazis. I was doing well at the Harrison Wholesale Company with
my partner Albert Arenberg. The summer was hot so we sold lots
of fans.
Early in 1946 my secretary Evelyn Modeen caught the flu and she
decided to stop working. This was a shock. I took her out to lunch
and said, “I don’t know what I’ll do without you.”
She said, “Oh, you’ll manage just fine.”
I put an ad in the Tribune for a private secretary. I knew I would hire
the first person who came in. I just wanted to get it over with. The last
time I ran an ad in the Tribune Evelyn Modeen was the first person who
came in and she was at Harrison Wholesale for ten years.
A woman named Leah Esken came in. She didn’t call, she just came in
. Evelyn Modeen talked with her for a minute and then brought her over
to me.
I don’t have a private office, just a desk among all the other desks. There’s
a little wooden fence with a gate around my desk so I stood up when she
came through the gate.
She was an attractive woman. Without even thinking about it I remarked
that she looked like the actress Barbara Stanwyck.
‘Oh, from Double Indemnity. Thank you, that’s so flattering.’
Then she added, “You look a little like Edward G. Robinson!”
“Not Fred MacMurray?” We both laughed.
“Barbara Stanwyck was an orphan,” I said. “Maybe that’s why I’ve always
liked her. I was an orphan too.’
Why was I talking about Barbara Stanwyck and being an orphan? Leah
already seemed like an old friend or a member of the family.
She asked, “Were you in an orphanage?”
“Yes, in Cleveland. The Jewish Orphan’s Home.”
“Did you ever think of running away?”
“Never. It was a wonderful place. We played baseball every day. In the
winter we played inside.”
I showed Leah around the Harrison Wholesale building. Almost anything
you could imagine was there. “Customers come in with catalogs and give
their orders to the order pickers,” I said. “The order pickers find the items
and bring them down to the customers. It looks messy but that’s the whole
idea. This isn’t Marshall Fields on State Street. It’s supposed to be a secret
place, like a speakeasy.”
“Your wife must like this place. She can get anything she wants, right?”
‘Oh, I’m not married.’
Leah looked hesitant. Maybe she thought my wife had died.
I said, “I’ve just never been married.” I wanted to sound reassuring. Back
at my desk I thanked Leah for coming in and gave the latest Harrison
Wholesale catalog
She said, “Thanks but we already have a catalog. My brother-in-law
Irving was here the other day and bought some tire chains. I live with
Irving and my sister Dorothy.’
That was all. I walked her to the door.
“It was nice to meet you, Mr. Balin,” she said.
“Well, you’ve got the job.”
Leah Esken
Dorothy and Irving got married in 1939. Nate, who is younger
than Dorothy and I, got married to Ina Kirsch in 1938. He was
just eighteen years old and Ina was seventeen. If they’d had
children before the war started, Nate would not have gotten
drafted. But it was only after Nate returned from Texas and
started Same Day Cleaners that Ann gave birth to Shula and
Myrna, the twin girls.
During the war years Dorothy and I worked at the torpedo factory
in Forest Park. That’s where she met Irving, who was not drafted
because he worked at the torpedo factory. Thousands of people
worked there but not too many Jews. I had a few boyfriends but I
could never be serious about a non-Jew.
I shared an apartment in Douglas Park with Dorothy, Irving, and
Nate’s wife Ina. It was only a few blocks from where Louie lived
with his sisters but of course I didn’t know that at the time. Dorothy
got pregnant when the war still had a year to go but as soon as it
was over Dorothy, Irving, and I moved to an apartment at Cornelia
and Halsted on the North Side. Dorothy’s baby Victor was only about
six months old. Then Nate returned from Texas and also moved to the
North Side with Ina. He started Same Day Cleaners.
Nate thought Irving was not good enough for Dorothy. He said Dorothy
had settled for Irving. He told me not to make the same mistake. He
said I was smarter and better looking than Dorothy and I shouldn’t
settle for some nudnik.
Meanwhile Nate had twin girls, Dorothy had a husband and a baby who was
almost a year old, and I had nothing even though I was the oldest. I was
waitressing at the Walnut Room in Marshall Fields and helping Dorothy with Victor.
When I saw the want-ad for Harrison Wholesale I thought I would give it a try.
Why not? I knew nothing about being a secretary but I was a good student at
Austin High School. I could certainly read and write.
When I met Louie at the interview I was surprised that he wasn’t wearing a
wedding ring. But Jewish men don’t always wear one.
I was more surprised when he said he had never been married.
I was also surprised that he didn’t have a private office. He didn’t need an office
but he needed a private secretary.
I wasn’t surprised when he told me I had the job. I was glad to hear it though.
I saw a new world opening for me in the interview at Harrison Wholesale.
I didn’t see every little detail yet, but so what? It was more like a dream that
you remember the next morning and you know it will come true.
Rabbi Frankenstein
I first met Louie Balin when I was invited to Chicago to audition
for the office of associate rabbi at the old Washington Boulevard
Temple. I conducted High Holy Day services and I met some
prominent members of the congregation, including Louie. Well,
I passed the test. My family and I were soon on our way to the
Windy City.
Although I’d had my own pulpit in New Orleans, I was intrigued
by the possibilities in the North. Chicago’s Jewish community –
second largest in the United States – was in transition both
physically and financially. In the first years of the twentieth century,
large numbers of Jews who had been born in the Maxwell Street
ghetto migrated northwest to the West Side area around Douglas
Boulevard and Roosevelt Road. For several decades all was well
and good. During the 1940s and 1950’s, however, owing to racial
and economic changes on the West Side, a new, two-pronged
migration began. Middle class Jews, financially stable but not
necessarily wealthy, recreated the West Side in Rogers Park, or
they became pioneers in suburban Skokie and Lincolnwood.
Those who could afford it, meanwhile, moved close to the lakefront,
forming a high net-worth Jewish population along North Lake Shore
Drive and Sheridan Road.
While all this was taking place, the Washington Boulevard Temple
had found a new location and a revised identity as the Oak Park Temple,
moving decisively in the discretion of Reform Judaism. I wholeheartedly
endorsed this trend.
Suddenly the position of senior rabbi at Temple Sholom became available.
This was a once in a lifetime opportunity. Temple Sholom, on North Lake
Shore Drive, was and remains one of the premier Reform Jewish
congregations in America, comparable to Temple Emanu-el in New York
City. Furthermore, as well-to-do Jews from the West Side were relocating
to the lakefront, there was a chance to greatly enlarge Temple Sholom’s
membership and financial base. In the eyes of Temple Sholom’s Board
of Directors, this should be a top priority for a new Senior Rabbi. I promised
the Board that I shared this goal and I also described exactly how I would
achieve it.
Once again, thank God I passed the test. Departing the Oak Park Temple
was painful, but like Abraham in the Book of Genesis I felt called to leave
where I was and go to the place that was shown to me.
I immediately made changes at Temple Sholom to attract the affluent new
arrivals from the West Side. I replaced the traditional siddur with the Reform
Jewish Union Prayer Book. I replaced Friday night services with Sunday
morning worship, although I did retain Shabbat observance for those few
who wished to take part. I entirely dispensed with aliyot. I incorporated
orchestral and vocal accompaniment into the Sunday services and very
fully into the High Holidays. Bar Mitzvah and Bat Mitzvah remained
available, but group confirmation for fifteen year olds became the preferred
choice.
Louie Balin had been an early arrival on the lakefront, having left the West
Side right after his marriage to Leah in late 1946. I’d had the merit of performing
their ceremony at the Oak Park Temple, and when Louie mentioned his plans
to relocate I assumed we were parting ways for good. But when I scanned the
membership rolls at Temple Sholom, I was happy to see Louie’s name. I called
immediately and invited him to come in for a chat.
To make a long story short, Louie wound up commissioning a new Torah scroll
for the Temple as well as a beautiful stained glass window with a scene from the
Book of Ruth. Louie also assured me that his son Irwin, less than a year old at
the time, would in due course enroll in our Sunday school with an intention of
continuing all the way through confirmation. Last but not least, Louie paid
membership dues for his sisters Bess Turk and Lenore Berlowitz, who were now
also living in our neighborhood, as well for Louie’s nephews Norb and Seymour Berlowitz.
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Author: Mitch Sisskind
