Isidore Mortem

This chapter chronicles how the Kaufmans landed in a five-story brick tenement on Division Street with sixteen other families. It looks at the early lives of Tzvi Hersch bar Schloma, his wife Ruchel, and their three more children: Rebecca in 1904, Abraham in 1906, and Isidore on June 24, 1910. Like most newcomers, the Kaufmans sought out the familiar and joined the Landsmanschaft for new arrivals from Jagielnica. As the chapter highlights, these benevolent societies provided everything from help during hard times to cemetery plots to comfort in cafés frequented by members. As Galitzianers, the Kaufmans hugged the bottom of their new home's totem pole, which placed even Russians and other Poles higher. The chapter also discusses how some Jews abandoned their faith altogether, choosing new creeds like socialism or anarchism, while others more quietly and gradually shed the shtetl rituals. The Kaufmans seem to have epitomized this evolution, with the older children hewing close to orthodoxy while the younger siblings born in America adopted a “revolving door” Judaism—synagogue attendance twice a year on high holidays. The chapter recounts how Kaufman began racing through the public schools of New York City, finished his educational race, and reached the tape in June 1931. The end of school warranted another change, too. He decided during his third year to become Irving rather than Isidore. Now he ditched Isidore and became Irving Robert Kaufman, IRK.