Chapter Four:
The Hungarian-Polish Merger
One evening in 1948, my father and his friend Bob Saks went to an inter-city Jewish convention at the Jewish Community Centre in Hamilton. There a young woman named Bella Zucker caught my father’s eye. He immediately announced to Bob that he was going to marry her. My father asked her out.
My parents Bella and Henry ended up married to each other for sixty-four years. To say it was a mismatch is only a bit of a stretch. Bella was a star high-school student and intellectual who intended on going to medical school and becoming a doctor. Nonetheless, Bella and Henry started dating. He only had a small pickup truck with one seat in the front. So he put a kitchen chair next to the driver’s seat for her to ride on. One time on a curve, the door opened and Bella fell out. But she was okay.
Henry and Bella dated for three years and were going to get married in 1951. However, their wedding was delayed when my father’s sister Alice became very ill with Hodgkin’s Disease. At that time, there was no treatment. She died on May 12, 1952.
My parents finally did get married on December 28, 1952, at the Royal Connaught Hotel in Hamilton.
Bella’s parents, Yechiel and Gittel Zucker, were Yiddish-speaking immigrants from Poland. Seeing them at the wedding with Nandor and Magda, Hungarian speaking, was like seeing oil and water. They had no common language with which to converse, let alone trying to figure out what to talk about. For the Zuckers, the language was called Jewish, not Yiddish. Thus, they had a hard time understanding that there could even be Jews who did not speak Yiddish.
My Mother’s Family: The Zuckers
My mother’s father, Yechiel (Julius) Zucker, was born on October 5, 1899 and died of cancer on Yom Kippur day in 1957. He died four years before I was born; thus, I never met him. My grandmother, Gittel Zucker, born Gittel Lederman, lived until 1973, when I was twelve years old. She lived at 20 Flatt Avenue in Hamilton. It was at the bottom of a steep hill.
Gittel was born in Warsaw. In 1916, when Gittel was sixteen years old, her parents moved from Warsaw to Lublin. Gittel met Julius in Lublin when they were sixteen years old. In 1919, Julius was drafted into the Polish army. Yisroel (Israel) Zucker, Julius’ brother, known as Srulke, had come to Canada previously and settled in Hamilton. Julius, knowing how badly Jews were treated in the Polish army, wrote to Israel and begged Israel to get Schiffskarten for him and his girlfriend Gittel to come to Canada.
Julius wanted to marry Gittel before they left Poland, but his parents would not let them get married. Julius’ mother in particular did not want Julius to marry Gittel because she felt that Gittel’s family was not yichusdik – prestigious – enough.
Israel brought Julius and Gittel to Canada and Julius and Gittel got married in Hamilton on the day they arrived.
Israel had a jewelry store in Hamilton, and he set up his brother Julius in a jewelry store as well. However, Julius could not make a go of the store and could not afford to pay rent for a home. A man named Herschel Waxman offered to let Julius and Gittel live on the top floor of his home, and they lived there at 161 Cannon Street West for eight years! After that, Julius bought a house on Murray Street next door to his brother Israel.
Many illustrious scions emerged from this branch of the family, the most newsworthy probably being Leonard Rosenberg.