Title: Oral History Interview with Aaron Scher
Inclusive Dates: 1977 May 27

Creator:

• Scher, Aaron, 1903-

Call Number: Audio 653A

Quantity: 2 tape recordings (65 minutes)

Repository:

Wisconsin Historical Society, Division of Library, Archives, and Museum Collections

Archival Locations:

COLLECTION MAY BE STORED OFF-SITE: see catalog entry to request materials and for additional information.

Wisconsin Historical Society (Map)

Abstract:

Tape-recorded interview conducted May 27, 1977, by Peter Gordy and Jean Loeb Lettofsky, members of the Historical Society staff, with Aaron Scher for the Wisconsin Jewish Archives; concerning his youth in Kobrin, Russia, the effects of World War I, experiences after the Bolshevik Revolution, his immigration to Argentina and life there, coming to New York in 1923 and employment there in different mercantile positions, and his 1928 move to Madison, Wisconsin.

Note:

Forms part of the Wisconsin Jewish Archives.

Note:

Language: English

URL to cite for this finding aid: http://digital.library.wisc.edu/1711.dl/wiarchives.uw-whs-audi00653a

 ↑ Bookmark this ↑

 ↑ Bookmark this ↑

Abstract to the Interview

The tapes for this interview have two tracks; a voice track containing the discussion and a time track containing time announcements at intervals of approximately five seconds. The abstract below lists, in order of discussion, the topics covered on each tape, and indicates the time-marking at which point the beginning of the particular discussion appears.

Thus, the researcher by using a tape recorder's fast-forward button may find expeditiously and listen to discrete segments without listening to all of the taped discussion. For instance, the user who wishes to listen to the topic on “EFFECTS OF WORLD WAR I” should locate the place on the second track of tape one, side one, where the voice announces the 6:25 time-marking (the voice says at this point, “six minutes, twenty-five seconds”) and at this point switch to the first track to hear the discussion. The discussion on “EFFECTS OF WORLD WAR I” continues until approximately 9:00 at which point discussion of the next topic (“WORLD WAR I DESTROYS KOBRIN”) begins.

Notice that in most cases sentences beneath each headline explain more about the contents of the topic. For example the sentences underneath “EFFECTS OF WORLD WAR I” give further details on what appears on the tape between 6:25 and 9:00.

The abstract is designed to provide only a brief outline of the content of the tapes and cannot serve as a substitute for listening to them. However the abstract when used will help the researcher easily locate distinct topics and discussions among the many minutes of commentary.

Processing Information

Finding aid prepared by Peter Gordy, Jean Loeb Lettofsky, and Sara Leuchter, December, 1978.

Audio 653A Tape/Side   1/1 Time   00:40	BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION Scope and Content Note: Born on July 4, 1903, in Kobrin, Russia, near the Polish border. One sister, several years younger, who lives in Baraboo, Wisconsin. His father was a harness-maker.
Tape/Side   1/1 Time   1:50	HARNESS-MAKING BUSINESS Scope and Content Note: Father's harness-making business was a large one, serving mostly non-Jews.
Tape/Side   1/1 Time   2:10	KOBRIN Scope and Content Note: More than 17,000 Jews lived in Kobrin. The majority of the town was Jewish. There were more than twenty synagogues in Kobrin.
Tape/Side   1/1 Time   3:05	CHEDER (JEWISH SCHOOL) Scope and Content Note: Spent several years in Cheder, until its forced closing at the beginning of World War I. Rabbi of the Cheder refused to let Scher re-enter the school after the war's end.
Tape/Side   1/1 Time   4:30	PUBLIC SCHOOL Scope and Content Note: Went to public school after closing of Cheder. School run jointly by Germans and Russians.
Tape/Side   1/1 Time   5:05	WORK AS A YOUTH Scope and Content Note: Worked in the fields after his Bar Mitzvah and had to dig potatoes so the family would not starve. Difficult to find work, and the family suffered because the father was serving at the front.
Tape/Side   1/1 Time   6:25	EFFECTS OF WORLD WAR I Scope and Content Note: The father was drafted on the same day that World War I was declared, during Tisha B'Av services in the synagogue. Recounts the places the father fought and the length of time between visits. The movement of the front closer to Kobrin caused problems, and more than three hundred civilians were killed during an assault on the village.
Tape/Side   1/1 Time   9:00	WORLD WAR I DESTROYS KOBRIN Scope and Content Note: The family dog saved them from remaining in the house during an assault, and they fled to a nearby church for cover. Their house was destroyed by bullets, and the grandfather helped bury the dead through his membership in the Chevra Kadisha, the Jewish burial society.
Tape/Side   1/1 Time   11:00	GERMAN OCCUPATION OF KOBRIN Scope and Content Note: There was a cholera epidemic, and the peasants suffered from hunger because the Germans rationed flour every week. There was a lack of correspondence from the father at the front until after the Revolution.
Tape/Side   1/1 Time   12:00	FATHER LEAVES RUSSIA - Scope and Content Note: Father settled briefly in the United States after running away from the Russian Army during the Russo-Japanese War. Had a successful harness-making business in New York City, but returned to Russia four years later because his wife refused to settle in New York.
Tape/Side   1/1 Time   13:50	POST REVOLUTION ATROCITIES Scope and Content Note: Father returned from the front and witnessed a recurrence of the pogroms. Government gangs harassed the people. After the Polish occupation of the villages, the Jews were forced to leave, and those who stayed were treated harshly by the Polish. In 1919, the Russians routed the Polish from the occupied villages.
Tape/Side   1/1 Time   15:35	WORK FOR THE GOVERNMENT Scope and Content Note: The Bolsheviks offered jobs to Scher's friends, and got him a job in City Hall. He was the person who informed others of their selection for forced labor and contacted those who would be shot within twenty-four hours if they did not report for work. He also informed those selected for the draft, and was blamed for doing his job.
Tape/Side   1/1 Time   17:45	ARRESTS BY THE GOVERNMENT Scope and Content Note: Citizens were arrested daily for no apparent reasons. He tells several short stories concerning the arrests of neighbors and the harsh ways in which they were treated. He arranged the escape of a friend by persuading a guard to look the other way.
Tape/Side   1/1 Time   23:30	THE RED ARMY Scope and Content Note: He was forced to join the Red Army at the front even though he lacked proper training. The front moved close to Kobrin, destroying people and property. He was also called before a military tribunal, but was pardoned.
Tape/Side   1/1 Time   32:00	END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 1
Tape/Side   1/2 Time   00:30	THE RED ARMY, continued Scope and Content Note: An order given to Scher prompted his escape to his parents' apartment in Kobrin. He destroyed his uniform and gun, and his new boots were taken by a Polish officer.
Tape/Side   1/2 Time   3:25	DECISION TO LEAVE RUSSIA Scope and Content Note: Following a near-fatal meeting with an old enemy, Scher decided to leave Russia. Had difficulties in acquiring a visa to the United States and emigrated instead to Argentina. Recounts his flight from Europe via Amsterdam and the thirty-day voyage by ship to Argentina.
Tape/Side   1/2 Time   5:40	ARRIVAL IN ARGENTINA Scope and Content Note: Arrived in Buenos Aires after Pesach, and had to sneak into the Argentinian immigration office. He was helped by Russian friends already in the city and boarded with an old Jewish family there.
Tape/Side   1/2 Time   7:45	FIRST EMPLOYMENT Scope and Content Note: He found work with a Jewish man from Odessa who made novelty tables, and his efforts on the job led to increased salary. He moved into a boarding house run by an English woman.
Tape/Side   1/2 Time   10:55	GOVERNMENT EMPLOYMENT Scope and Content Note: He got a job as an inspector with the government through a connection of the landlady's lover. As a checker of army paints and chemicals, he learned Spanish from the foreman. Recounted his working hours and his steady raises in salary.
Tape/Side   1/2 Time   16:10	ANTI-SEMITISM Scope and Content Note: An anti-Semitic twenty-year-old boy arrived at the factory and provoked a fight with Scher, in which both were slightly injured. An encounter with the youth later that evening resulted in their friendship, which was encouraged by the foreman.
Tape/Side   1/2 Time   21:05	DEPARTURE FROM ARGENTINA Scope and Content Note: His father arrived alone in New York and refused to travel to Argentina to be with Scher. As a result, Scher left his good life in Argentina to be with his family in the United States, and arrived in New York on October 1, 1923.
Tape/Side   1/2 Time   23:00	NEW YORK Scope and Content Note: He hated New York City because of the filth and the lack of pretty girls. Although he had trouble with the English language, he landed a job as a helper in a grocery store for twelve dollars a week.
Tape/Side   1/2 Time   24:25	END OF TAPE 1, SIDE 2
Tape/Side   2/1 Time   00:30	EMPLOYMENT IN NEW YORK Scope and Content Note: He worked at odd jobs until he became a salesman in the Bronx for fifteen dollars a week. After leaving that job, he became a clerk by lying about his experience, was promoted to manager, opened three new stores, and received a salary increase to ninety dollars a week. He continued to save money due to lack of taxes, and quit his job after a new manager was hired.
Tape/Side   2/1 Time   4:50	BEGINS OWN BUSINESS Scope and Content Note: He established his own business and worked only four days a week while making more than one hundred dollars a week.
Tape/Side   2/1 Time   6:05	HIS WIFE Scope and Content Note: He was introduced to his future wife, whom he married in February, 1928, at the New York wedding of her brother. They became engaged in New York and she asked him to return with her to Madison, Wisconsin, to meet her parents.
Tape/Side   2/1 Time   6:40	HIS FAMILY Scope and Content Note: His family included a son, now a lawyer, and a daughter who works for the Emporium in Madison.
Tape/Side   2/1 Time   7:05	CHEVRA KADISHA IN MADISON Scope and Content Note: He is now involved with the Jewish burial society, Chevra Kadisha, because of his grandfather's involvement in it in Russia. Although it has problems, the Chevra Kadisha lifts great burdens from the bereaving families.
Tape/Side   2/1 Time   8:50	END OF INTERVIEW