From the Editor
There has been a
magnificent response to our inaugural Newsletter. Inside, you will
find just a small selection from the many letters we have
received; if yours is not amongst them, please be patient – we’ll
publish more in the next issue.
We are still waiting to
hear from the rest of you, with your memories, articles, news,
further names and addresses.
The first issue has now
gone out to almost 200 people throughout the world. In fact, its
success has taken us somewhat by surprise. As you can imagine, the
costs of producing and mailing 200 Newsletters 4 times a year will
be considerable.
We do not propose to make
any charge for being on our mailing list, but we would very much
welcome donations and contributions towards these costs.
Letters
We, the Levy brothers—Mark,
Harold and me Fred (Freddy in those days)—were born and brought
up at 82 Ayresome Street. Round the corner, beyond the Football
Ground in Ayresome Park Road, lived our maternal grandma, Hannah
Cohen and her family.
In Sept ’39 Harold and
I were evacuated with M’bro High School boys to Scarborough.
Mark had already become a medical student at Liverpool University.
I returned to Middlesbrough early in 1940 and sat the School
certificate that spring, before a second spell of evacuation in
Teesdale. At first, Terry Greenberg and I were billeted together
at Romaldkirk. I came back home later that year to do biology for
the Higher School certificate and during this time, until I
entered Durham University at Newcastle, in 1942, I was for a time
Rosh Gedud of M’bro Habonim.
My memories of the M’bro
community are mainly of pre-war events and, in particular, of the
hiatus between the closing down of Brentnall Street shul and the
opening of the new shul. During this time, I had my Barmitzvah
(April 1938) and shul services were being held in 2 rooms of
premises in Linthorpe Road, not far from St Barnabus Road. I had a
boys’ party at home and that was it. None of today’s high
jinks. During this time, cheder classes were held at a school in
the area.
About this time
Kindertransport children were arriving and we boys soon took to
fraternising with them in Albert Park.
My closest friend pre-Barmitzvah
was Alan Miller, Rabbi Miller’s eldest son. Every Chol Hamoed
Pesach, we would tramp out Ormesby way, light a fire and
"roast" potatoes. This was beyond the Lunatic Asylum, as
we then called it. I can’t recall any contact with him after
1939.
After I qualified in July
1947, I worked at the North Riding Infirmary as Casualty Officer
for 6 months, before doing National service, but I don’t recall
any communal contacts during that time. I did 2 years service in
the Suez Canal Zone at TEK and remember hearing the distant roar
of guns from Palestine following dissolution of the mandate.
My parents left M’bro
for Southport while I was abroad and I have only been back once
since. My uncles Myer and Walter Cohen lived and died there and
their children, including my cousin Ruth Hurwitz, grew up there.
Fred Levy
Liverpool,
England
I was born in M’bro in
1937. My parents were Mick and Blumah Solomon and my grandfather
was Gedalia Solomon. My mother’s family were the Smollans.
We left Middlesbrough for
South Africa in 1948 to settle in a new country. We lived at first
in Port Elizabeth, then Johannesburg, but my parents were homesick
and we returned to M’bro in 1950. My elder sister now lives in
London; she married a South African and they lived in J’burg for
35 years before returning to the UK, because of the violence in
that country. My younger brother now lives in Salisbury, Wilts.
In 1950 we stayed in M’bro
only a short while before moving to Newcastle upon Tyne, where my
parents were in business. In 1956 I married my husband, a marine
engineer on passenger liners running to Australia and New Zealand.
We were married at Ravensworth shul; Rev Kersh officiated at the
chuppa. We lived in Newcastle until 1962, when we emigrated to New
Zealand. Both our children were born in the UK, but were 3 and 4
when we came here. I was very reluctant to come to New Zealand,
but my husband said it was a wonderful country and, after 37 years
here, I will agree he was correct.
On arrival in Wellington
we were met by Rabbi Gotshall and were accepted into the community
with open arms. My engineer husband was off to sea in 2 days, but
on a local service. However, the Jewish community rallied round
us, found us accommodation and generally accepted us as their own.
When I look back on these
events I am always somewhat amazed that we landed in Wellington
with 2 young children and £7 sterling in our pocket; but my
husband had a good job and the community attended to our immediate
needs until we found our feet. The children were taken to cheder;
we had no car then, but that was no problem. This is but a small
example of the Wellington Jewish community as it was and, to a
large degree, still is.
It goes without saying
that we have been fully involved with this community ever since
and served on all sorts of committees, helping others who, like
us, knew no one on day one in this country. I am now President of
the National Council of Jewish Women.
Anne Benda
Lower Hutt,
New Zealand
I left M’bro at the age
of 13 in 1968 and went to Carmel College until 1974. I was then in
Jerusalem for 6 months followed by a Kibbutz. I then spent 2½
years in the Israeli army. I got married in 1983 to Rosalind, and
we have 3 children – Hannah, Rachel and Miriam.
Philip
Breckner
Pinner,
England
Two Doctors Renew an
Acquaintanceship – a Billingham Story
During the 1950's, 2
doctors, one from Cork, Ireland, Dr Joe Medalia and the other of
Czech origin, Dr John Abels, end up in a suburb of Middlesbrough
called Billingham. Neither of these doctors mix with the Jewish
community. Joe and Vera have 2 daughters and a son; John and
Claire have 2 daughters. Both families live in a completely
assimilated atmosphere and in Billingham they hardly know each
other, despite being of the same profession and religion. Of
course they never joined the Middlesbrough shul.
Joe and Vera come to
Jerusalem in the 1960's where he was in charge of the Casualty
Department at Hadassah Ein Karem; Vera and daughter Susan ran an
English speaking Gan. Lottie is a doctor in Ra’anana and Simon
works on a Kibbutz.
John and Claire live in
Billingham to this day; one of their daughters Frances lives in
Toronto; the other daughter Jane is married to an Israeli—they
live in Haifa and have 2 sons and a daughter.
The connection between
these 2 families was that the Medalias had always said that the
only Jewish people they remembered from the North-East were the
Abels. This came to light in a sports article in a recent edition
of The Jerusalem Post written by Ofer Abels-Ronen, about the
Middlesbrough football team that had arrived in Israel. Susan (Medalia)
Torfstein located Ofer and his brother Eyal, who turned out to be
the grandsons of John and Claire Abels and live in Tel Aviv, but
they seemed to know very little of their Teesside heritage. They
were given the telephone number of Joe Medalia in Jerusalem. You
can imagine the excitement that he felt when he received a
telephone call from John Abels, whom he had not spoken to for
nearly 50 years.
Jane (Abels) Ronen's
story could make a book. At the age of 17 years old, when her
sister was 10, she discovered that she was Jewish, when she
confronted her grandfather’s gravestone in Prague, where she was
taken by her father’s sister. Then she saw the numbers tatooed
on her aunt’s arm. Her world changed from that day.
Jane started meeting
Jewish people whilst studying dentistry at Guys Hospital in London
and from then on it was straightforward: an IUJF trip to Israel in
1963; Professor Mann of Hadassah advises her to complete her
studies and specialisation in England; meeting and marrying Rafi
Ronen and living and working in Haifa. In a way she was perhaps
putting into action the longings of her father, who before the War
took a gold medal in swimming at the Maccabiah and who came to
Israel as a volunteer during the Six Day War.
John and Claire are due
to visit their daughter and grandchildren in September. Is anyone
interested in meeting them and Joe Medalia to find out why
Middlesbrough plus assimilation equals Aliya?
