WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.399 Hello everyone. My name is frieda basel and in New 2 00:00:02.480 --> 00:00:04.839 York City, Brooklyn based Jewsh YouTuber with an interest in 3 00:00:04.879 --> 00:00:08.400 all things Jewish, subcultures, religion, New York City, and human 4 00:00:08.439 --> 00:00:11.320 interest stories. Today we are going to talk about the 5 00:00:11.400 --> 00:00:16.359 National Desertion Bureau. Popular stereotypes about Jewsh husbands are usually positive. 6 00:00:16.839 --> 00:00:20.320 They're loyal, they're good providers, they don't drink to excess, 7 00:00:20.760 --> 00:00:23.440 and they are in violent. It's no wonder that most 8 00:00:23.440 --> 00:00:26.399 people have never heard of the National Desertion Bureau, an 9 00:00:26.399 --> 00:00:30.079 agency created in New York in nineteen eleven to track 10 00:00:30.160 --> 00:00:34.640 down runaway Jewish husbands and bring them to justice. Turns 11 00:00:34.640 --> 00:00:37.359 out that the era of Jewish mass migration from Eastern 12 00:00:37.399 --> 00:00:41.240 Europe to North America was accompanied by terrible cultural and 13 00:00:41.280 --> 00:00:45.039 social upheaval, poverty, and failure. One sad feature of his 14 00:00:45.119 --> 00:00:48.399 era was the phenomenon of broken families, which occurred on 15 00:00:48.439 --> 00:00:51.679 a mass scale. The problem of Jewish men abandoning their 16 00:00:51.679 --> 00:00:55.240 families was so severe that, along with the National Desertion Bureau, 17 00:00:55.320 --> 00:00:59.359 Yiddish newspapers like the Farvards, with a daily readership in 18 00:00:59.399 --> 00:01:02.719 the hundreds of thousands, published a popular column called the 19 00:01:02.799 --> 00:01:07.439 Gallery of Missing Husbands, which featured mugshots and descriptions of 20 00:01:07.519 --> 00:01:10.400 men who had left their wives and families in the lurch. 21 00:01:10.840 --> 00:01:13.079 There were even local psychics on the Lower East Side 22 00:01:13.079 --> 00:01:16.799 who specialized in tracking down missing husbands, addressing a true 23 00:01:16.799 --> 00:01:20.640 social epidemic in the Jewish community. The National Desertion Bureau 24 00:01:20.760 --> 00:01:24.239 worked with a multiplicity of governmental and private organizations to 25 00:01:24.280 --> 00:01:27.359 find these men and force them to pay alimony, child support, 26 00:01:27.560 --> 00:01:30.560 and serve jail time if they didn't. From nineteen oh 27 00:01:30.640 --> 00:01:33.599 five through the nineteen sixties, the Bureau attracted more than 28 00:01:33.680 --> 00:01:37.040 eighteen thousand cases. Its files are rich in details and 29 00:01:37.079 --> 00:01:40.599 are often short novellas onto themselves, with details on the 30 00:01:40.640 --> 00:01:45.200 tragedy of maritaled solution, abandoned children, and financial ruin. The 31 00:01:45.239 --> 00:01:50.400 Evil Archive houses approximately seventeen thousand National Assertion Bureau case 32 00:01:50.439 --> 00:01:53.519 files that were generated between nineteen oh five and the 33 00:01:53.599 --> 00:01:57.719 nineteen fifties. EVO put together an exhibition on this called 34 00:01:57.840 --> 00:02:02.040 Runaway Husbands Desperate Families The Story of the National Desertion Bureau, 35 00:02:02.280 --> 00:02:05.040 which traces the history of the National Assertion Bureau and 36 00:02:05.079 --> 00:02:09.039 includes never before seeing records, documents, and photographs from the 37 00:02:09.159 --> 00:02:14.240 organization's luminous archives. This was a project curated by Eddie 38 00:02:14.240 --> 00:02:17.840 Portnoy from Yevo. I've had the great pleasure of having 39 00:02:18.000 --> 00:02:21.240 Eddie on my program before when we discussed the Yiddish language, 40 00:02:21.280 --> 00:02:23.919 and today Eddie will share with us in depth story 41 00:02:23.960 --> 00:02:27.400 of this dark episode. Before we begin, I want to 42 00:02:27.439 --> 00:02:29.520 take just a moment to thank those of you who 43 00:02:29.560 --> 00:02:32.240 are members of this channel. Members of this channel helped 44 00:02:32.319 --> 00:02:35.479 make this work possible. It's very time consuming work. I 45 00:02:35.479 --> 00:02:38.599 published videos early for members, so I get to interact 46 00:02:38.639 --> 00:02:41.159 early with those of you who are in person. I 47 00:02:41.159 --> 00:02:43.879 thank you so very much. And now Eddie, thank you 48 00:02:44.080 --> 00:02:44.639 so very. 49 00:02:44.639 --> 00:02:46.520 Much for being here, Thanks for having me for you 50 00:02:46.560 --> 00:02:50.159 that it's a pleasure to be invited back. 51 00:02:50.439 --> 00:02:53.560 Yeah, I'm happy you're back. It's been too long. That 52 00:02:53.719 --> 00:02:57.199 conversation about Yiddish. People loved it. People were absolutely fascinated 53 00:02:57.280 --> 00:02:57.599 by it. 54 00:02:57.759 --> 00:03:00.879 That's great. Yeah, yeah, I mean looks interesting. 55 00:03:00.639 --> 00:03:04.439 Yiddish, is it? I mean we're biased, but I think so, Yeah. 56 00:03:04.240 --> 00:03:07.759 I guess we are biased. You know, language I think 57 00:03:07.800 --> 00:03:10.479 is interesting as a whole, and so you know, Yiddish 58 00:03:10.520 --> 00:03:13.599 because it's it's something close to home. It's it's even 59 00:03:13.599 --> 00:03:15.599 more interesting, it's even more interesting. 60 00:03:15.960 --> 00:03:21.000 So let's talk about this project of the National Desertion Bureau, 61 00:03:21.039 --> 00:03:24.000 which is mind blowing. And did you write that the 62 00:03:24.039 --> 00:03:26.960 whole description I lifted off of the exhibition. 63 00:03:27.479 --> 00:03:30.719 Yeah, I plagiarism. I wrote something, and then the woman 64 00:03:30.759 --> 00:03:35.000 who handles the website and social media probably worked on it. 65 00:03:35.120 --> 00:03:37.479 But that's yeah, I wrote. I wrote most of that. 66 00:03:38.080 --> 00:03:39.280 I was very interesting. 67 00:03:39.919 --> 00:03:44.840 It's it's a fascinating organization and the phenomenon is also interesting, 68 00:03:44.879 --> 00:03:47.919 and it's not something that people are terribly familiar with. 69 00:03:48.560 --> 00:03:51.319 I think that when people talk about, you know, the 70 00:03:52.080 --> 00:03:55.919 great mass migration of Jews to the United States from 71 00:03:55.960 --> 00:03:59.479 Eastern Europe, and this is begins, you know, before the 72 00:03:59.479 --> 00:04:02.039 eighteen eighty you know, when they talk about mass migration, 73 00:04:02.120 --> 00:04:04.639 it's from really from eighteen eighty one to nineteen twenty four, 74 00:04:05.039 --> 00:04:08.680 and it's a period where approximately two million Jews came 75 00:04:08.719 --> 00:04:11.919 to North America from Eastern Europe and that's an enormous number. 76 00:04:12.439 --> 00:04:15.560 The vast majority of them settled in around New York 77 00:04:15.719 --> 00:04:18.439 and that migration created places like the Lower East Side, 78 00:04:18.480 --> 00:04:21.519 which for many people was the Plymouth Rock. It was 79 00:04:21.519 --> 00:04:25.959 sort of the first location of residents for many Jews. 80 00:04:26.040 --> 00:04:28.639 And you know, I think by the nineteen twenties, there 81 00:04:28.639 --> 00:04:32.199 was something like half a million Jews living just on 82 00:04:32.240 --> 00:04:35.639 the Lower east Side. You know, this doesn't include Brooklyn, Harlem, 83 00:04:35.720 --> 00:04:39.199 other places in the Bronx, other places in and around 84 00:04:39.199 --> 00:04:41.680 New York City. And so the Lower East Side was 85 00:04:41.720 --> 00:04:46.480 this roiling urban ghetto that was mostly populated by Jews. 86 00:04:46.519 --> 00:04:49.399 And at the time, Jews made up about twenty percent 87 00:04:49.439 --> 00:04:51.800 of New York City's population, which is a lot. 88 00:04:53.120 --> 00:04:54.240 What is the percent now? 89 00:04:54.319 --> 00:04:57.120 The percent is lower, and I want to say it's 90 00:04:57.160 --> 00:04:59.480 like ten twelve percent now, which is still a lot, 91 00:04:59.560 --> 00:05:01.920 considering the Jew in the world are a tiny minority. 92 00:05:02.079 --> 00:05:05.360 But in the in the twenties, in the interwar period, 93 00:05:05.360 --> 00:05:07.680 between the two World Wars, this was the time when 94 00:05:07.680 --> 00:05:11.279 you had like a Yiddish mass media. You had five 95 00:05:11.439 --> 00:05:14.480 daily newspapers in Yiddish, and obviously print media is the 96 00:05:14.519 --> 00:05:16.959 only media. Now there's like a zillion different kinds of 97 00:05:16.959 --> 00:05:20.920 media and it's all very confusing. But you had Yiddish theaters, 98 00:05:21.000 --> 00:05:26.240 you had synagogues and steembles of all different sorts. Every 99 00:05:26.319 --> 00:05:29.879 block had I mean, it was just a totally different world. 100 00:05:30.040 --> 00:05:32.319 Is like, you know, Yeden's don't even an eingepack in 101 00:05:32.920 --> 00:05:35.560 ain Geg. You know, Jews were like really crammed into 102 00:05:35.759 --> 00:05:39.399 one little area and it created its own kind of 103 00:05:39.519 --> 00:05:40.199 unique culture. 104 00:05:40.240 --> 00:05:40.399 You know. 105 00:05:40.399 --> 00:05:42.399 In addition to that, they were very poor. Well that's 106 00:05:42.439 --> 00:05:44.439 one of the funny things, ort of the odd things 107 00:05:44.439 --> 00:05:47.720 about this, this mass migration in Eastern Europe, they were 108 00:05:47.759 --> 00:05:50.399 also very poor, and to a large degree that's why 109 00:05:50.759 --> 00:05:53.720 they came to the United States. You know, certainly they 110 00:05:53.720 --> 00:05:57.079 were pushed along by the fact that they were oppressed 111 00:05:57.319 --> 00:06:02.240 and botally ostracized. They didn't have civil rights in many places. 112 00:06:02.480 --> 00:06:04.720 They had for many years that had pay special taxes 113 00:06:04.759 --> 00:06:07.839 on certain things, on meat and candles. Wow, what kind 114 00:06:07.839 --> 00:06:10.759 of you know, they treated very much as a separate 115 00:06:10.800 --> 00:06:14.920 minority in Eastern Europe, especially under Russian rule. And so 116 00:06:15.519 --> 00:06:18.399 when it became a parent that America was accepting large 117 00:06:18.480 --> 00:06:20.839 numbers of immigrants, the Jews took them up on that. 118 00:06:21.240 --> 00:06:23.759 You know, so many many came. And what's interesting about 119 00:06:23.759 --> 00:06:27.680 this immigration is when most people think about it, it's 120 00:06:27.720 --> 00:06:32.199 considered something very successful. And what that means is Jewish 121 00:06:32.199 --> 00:06:36.240 immigrants came here, they sent their kids to school, their 122 00:06:36.480 --> 00:06:40.480 kids went to college, large swaths of them became professionals, 123 00:06:40.519 --> 00:06:46.199 meeting doctors, dentists, lawyers, accounts, whatever, And within one to 124 00:06:46.279 --> 00:06:50.160 two generations Jews who had come here, who worked in sweatshops, 125 00:06:50.160 --> 00:06:52.800 who worked in the garment industry, who were peddlers on 126 00:06:52.839 --> 00:06:55.839 the street, and still very poor. That immigrant generation was very, 127 00:06:55.879 --> 00:07:00.560 very poor. They succeeded in launching their children to the 128 00:07:00.639 --> 00:07:04.519 American middle class, and so as a result, it's considered 129 00:07:04.600 --> 00:07:07.519 a very, very successful immigration, and I think that it's 130 00:07:07.519 --> 00:07:10.680 accurate to say that. But along the way there were 131 00:07:10.720 --> 00:07:14.839 certain things that transpire in which Jews encountered Jewish immigrants 132 00:07:14.839 --> 00:07:17.319 and American born Jews as well, who were born in 133 00:07:17.720 --> 00:07:22.480 immigrant neighborhoods, they encountered difficulties. There were crime was a 134 00:07:22.519 --> 00:07:25.399 big problem in neighborhoods like the Lower East Side. There 135 00:07:25.399 --> 00:07:28.199 were lots of Jewish gangs and gangsters and criminals. I 136 00:07:28.240 --> 00:07:30.959 talked about percentages. New York City was about twenty percent 137 00:07:31.040 --> 00:07:34.720 Jewish nineteen twenties, So as a result, sing Sing Prison 138 00:07:35.199 --> 00:07:38.360 was also about twenty percent Jewish at the time. So 139 00:07:38.560 --> 00:07:40.519 when you're successful and you make to the middle class, 140 00:07:40.800 --> 00:07:44.279 there are certain things you forget historically because they're embarrassing. 141 00:07:44.519 --> 00:07:46.720 You don't really want to know about them. It's not 142 00:07:46.759 --> 00:07:48.639 something you want to dwell on because it's sort of 143 00:07:48.639 --> 00:07:54.040 a blip and what's ultimately a really nice success story. 144 00:07:54.720 --> 00:07:58.399 But these these blips they interest me as a historian. 145 00:07:59.439 --> 00:08:02.079 Yeah, they're part of what happened. 146 00:08:01.839 --> 00:08:04.360 Right, Yeah, no exactly. And so you know, there's been 147 00:08:04.360 --> 00:08:06.480 a tendency to kind of I mean certainly, you know, 148 00:08:06.600 --> 00:08:09.079 there have been books written on you know, Jewish criminals 149 00:08:09.079 --> 00:08:12.759 and gangsters in mafia and things like that. My own 150 00:08:12.839 --> 00:08:16.480 personal interest is in the people who were, even like 151 00:08:16.519 --> 00:08:20.000 at a lower level. And so the only the only 152 00:08:20.040 --> 00:08:25.040 real record of those activities is the Yiddish press, which 153 00:08:25.199 --> 00:08:28.839 is full of all kinds of stories of Jews running 154 00:08:28.879 --> 00:08:31.600 into problems, whether it's crime or whether it's a broken 155 00:08:31.920 --> 00:08:35.840 broken marriage or broken home or business failure. The Yiddish 156 00:08:35.840 --> 00:08:40.120 press is the sounding board for this kind of activity historically. 157 00:08:40.120 --> 00:08:43.720 It's just really fascinating. And so the National Desertion Bureau 158 00:08:44.399 --> 00:08:48.240 is a great example of this kind of phenomenon. Just generally, 159 00:08:48.399 --> 00:08:51.879 it's not an unknown organization among historians. I think that 160 00:08:52.120 --> 00:08:55.559 for people Jews who may know a bit about history, 161 00:08:55.639 --> 00:08:57.879 or even a fair amount about history, may not have 162 00:08:57.919 --> 00:09:00.000 ever heard of it, and they may not have known 163 00:09:00.159 --> 00:09:03.919 that there was a problem with this immigrant generation, mostly 164 00:09:04.039 --> 00:09:06.759 men who were abandoning their wives and families, that it 165 00:09:06.919 --> 00:09:10.879 was a fairly severe social problem that affected the Jewish 166 00:09:11.080 --> 00:09:14.559 immigrant community. And I should also add that this affected 167 00:09:14.759 --> 00:09:18.360 every community. The difference is that it was treated differently, 168 00:09:18.639 --> 00:09:21.679 and so at the time there were lots of Irish 169 00:09:21.720 --> 00:09:26.159 and Italian immigrants in New York City. They had problems 170 00:09:26.279 --> 00:09:30.559 at a similar level, but they viewed family abandonment as 171 00:09:30.879 --> 00:09:33.600 a moral issue that the church had to deal with, 172 00:09:33.759 --> 00:09:37.440 and the National Assertion Bureau sought differently. They sought as 173 00:09:37.440 --> 00:09:40.639 a social issue, a social problem that could be dealt 174 00:09:40.639 --> 00:09:45.919 with by social workers and lawyers, administrative professionals, which is 175 00:09:45.960 --> 00:09:49.720 just a different way to view it. Go backward a 176 00:09:49.720 --> 00:09:53.759 bit the way this happened. The National Board of Jewish Charities, 177 00:09:53.960 --> 00:09:57.639 which was a large umbrella organization for all kinds of 178 00:09:57.679 --> 00:10:02.000 different Jewish charities, they noted in sort of internal documents 179 00:10:02.039 --> 00:10:05.279 in nineteen oh two that this issue was becoming a 180 00:10:05.320 --> 00:10:07.840 problem in the Jewish community. Women and children were being 181 00:10:07.840 --> 00:10:11.200 abandoned by men who were running off to different cities, 182 00:10:11.240 --> 00:10:14.679 different states, sometimes just different neighborhoods. So it was on 183 00:10:14.720 --> 00:10:18.559 their radar. One interesting note is that one of the 184 00:10:18.559 --> 00:10:20.840 ways that I found out about this was I was 185 00:10:20.879 --> 00:10:23.960 doing research on a particular psychic, a very well known 186 00:10:24.039 --> 00:10:26.679 Jewish psychic by the name of Abraham Hackman, who live 187 00:10:26.720 --> 00:10:29.519 on the Lower East Side. And he, I mean, he 188 00:10:29.600 --> 00:10:32.320 was a fortune teller and a huge amount of his 189 00:10:32.440 --> 00:10:36.919 business was based on his claim that he was a 190 00:10:36.960 --> 00:10:41.240 master at finding runaway husbands. And so there were newspapers 191 00:10:41.279 --> 00:10:44.240 of articles about him in the Yiddish press and even 192 00:10:44.240 --> 00:10:46.399 in the English press as well, because it was a 193 00:10:46.440 --> 00:10:50.840 fascinating human interest story. They write about how there would 194 00:10:50.840 --> 00:10:54.759 be women lined up outside of his stoop on Rivington 195 00:10:54.799 --> 00:10:58.440 Street in the morning waiting to hear where their husbands 196 00:10:58.519 --> 00:11:02.639 might be. And he loved getting publicity and love being 197 00:11:02.679 --> 00:11:06.279 written about in the papers, and so there are all 198 00:11:06.279 --> 00:11:09.039 these interesting articles. So there's a nineteen oh two article, 199 00:11:09.639 --> 00:11:11.480 I think it's like maybe could be nineteen oh three, 200 00:11:12.039 --> 00:11:15.120 in which a woman appears in his salon or in 201 00:11:15.159 --> 00:11:18.240 his office on Rivington Street and is looking for her husband, 202 00:11:18.399 --> 00:11:21.399 and he reads her fortune and he tells her that 203 00:11:21.480 --> 00:11:24.240 her husband will be at the corner of Pitt and 204 00:11:24.360 --> 00:11:29.639 Graham Streets at ten pm that night, and he tells her. 205 00:11:29.679 --> 00:11:31.840 He says, if he's not there, I will pay you 206 00:11:31.960 --> 00:11:34.600 fifty dollars, which like in nineteen oh two, ninety yo three, 207 00:11:34.600 --> 00:11:36.960 that's that's a lot of money change, that's a lot 208 00:11:36.960 --> 00:11:40.360 of money. So she goes to the local police station 209 00:11:40.759 --> 00:11:43.279 and finds a police officer and tells him this. He 210 00:11:43.399 --> 00:11:45.960 may have gone just out of curiosity. She explains that, 211 00:11:46.000 --> 00:11:48.279 you know, she's been abandoned by her husband, and she's 212 00:11:48.320 --> 00:11:50.440 been left destitute, and she has children that she has 213 00:11:50.440 --> 00:11:52.519 to take care of and she has no funding for them. 214 00:11:52.600 --> 00:11:54.759 And so she brings this police officer to pit in 215 00:11:54.840 --> 00:11:57.120 Grant at ten pm, and in fact, her husband is 216 00:11:57.279 --> 00:12:02.759 there like leaning against lampposts, and the police officer arrests him, 217 00:12:02.879 --> 00:12:05.799 and that brings him to court, and the judge says 218 00:12:05.879 --> 00:12:09.039 that he's got to pay a certain amount weekly in 219 00:12:09.200 --> 00:12:13.120 alimony or in child support rather. And it's this interesting 220 00:12:13.240 --> 00:12:15.399 and someone odd story that appears in the paper. 221 00:12:15.559 --> 00:12:17.159 What's the logical explanation? 222 00:12:17.639 --> 00:12:21.559 So Abraham Hawkman pulled other kind of similar stunts. There 223 00:12:21.600 --> 00:12:24.799 was another episode where there was a group of Jewish 224 00:12:24.840 --> 00:12:28.519 kids from the neighborhood had gotten arrested for burglary and 225 00:12:28.600 --> 00:12:32.120 they were in court being arraigned, and Hawkman walks into 226 00:12:32.159 --> 00:12:35.240 the courtroom and yells out, I'm paying bail for these kids. 227 00:12:35.440 --> 00:12:37.200 And the judge looks at me and says, who are you? 228 00:12:37.720 --> 00:12:41.279 And he says, I'm a clairvoyant and I know that 229 00:12:41.639 --> 00:12:46.679 tomorrow you will set them free. And the judge says, okay, 230 00:12:46.840 --> 00:12:48.759 if you want to pay bail, you could pay bail. 231 00:12:48.840 --> 00:12:51.519 So he pays their bail. The next day he comes 232 00:12:51.600 --> 00:12:55.720 back and the judge sets them free. And I don't 233 00:12:55.759 --> 00:12:58.080 know if he had gotten word that they didn't actually 234 00:12:58.120 --> 00:13:03.679 do it, Like, who knows? Yeah, okay, I see, or 235 00:13:03.720 --> 00:13:05.360 maybe he had you know, special town he had. 236 00:13:05.320 --> 00:13:09.600 Special I tend to I tend on the most suspicious 237 00:13:09.639 --> 00:13:10.399 side of things. 238 00:13:10.519 --> 00:13:13.159 Yeah, I also I tend to be skeptical of these 239 00:13:13.159 --> 00:13:15.919 things as well. But but it makes for a good story. 240 00:13:16.519 --> 00:13:16.799 Yeah. 241 00:13:17.000 --> 00:13:20.039 Oh, and he's like he's a really he's a fascinating character. 242 00:13:20.240 --> 00:13:23.559 In addition to being a fortune teller, he owned a 243 00:13:23.600 --> 00:13:27.559 wedding hall. He had his own katubas printed up that 244 00:13:27.639 --> 00:13:30.759 he sold at the wedding hall. He also also published 245 00:13:30.759 --> 00:13:34.399 his own hagada called Like the Fortune Teller's Hagada. It's 246 00:13:34.440 --> 00:13:38.039 so funny because there are advertisements in the Hagada for 247 00:13:38.279 --> 00:13:40.840 people in the neighborhood. For I also think I suspected 248 00:13:40.879 --> 00:13:43.039 the owned owned a decent amount of real estate on 249 00:13:43.120 --> 00:13:45.120 his street, and so a lot of the people, the 250 00:13:45.120 --> 00:13:47.440 business people on his street were paying him rent and 251 00:13:47.480 --> 00:13:51.039 he got them to advertise in in the Hagata. There's 252 00:13:51.080 --> 00:13:53.279 you know, a local photographer whose ad is in there. 253 00:13:53.480 --> 00:13:57.240 There's also and this is actually perfect for for Pesach, 254 00:13:57.639 --> 00:14:00.279 there's a there's a doctor down the block from him 255 00:14:00.519 --> 00:14:04.480 that specializes and cures for constipation, which which like to 256 00:14:04.519 --> 00:14:07.080 put that right in the Hagata is what you need 257 00:14:07.120 --> 00:14:10.480 for this particular holiday. So it's really you know, he's 258 00:14:10.480 --> 00:14:12.480 a great character. He's really he's really funny. But his 259 00:14:12.720 --> 00:14:15.360 like I said, his specialty was finding missing husbands. And 260 00:14:15.399 --> 00:14:18.240 so this appears in the papers, and I know, I 261 00:14:18.279 --> 00:14:21.840 think that this is just a fascinating, fascinating topic. And 262 00:14:21.919 --> 00:14:24.399 so at the time, like I mentioned that the National 263 00:14:24.440 --> 00:14:28.399 Board of Jewish Charities, they discover that around that same time, 264 00:14:28.440 --> 00:14:30.320 few years after the turn of the twentieth century, that 265 00:14:30.360 --> 00:14:33.200 this is a problem with the immigrant Jewish community, And 266 00:14:33.240 --> 00:14:35.960 in fact, in nineteen oh five, the National Board of 267 00:14:36.000 --> 00:14:39.399 Jewish Charities creates an organization called I'm going to get 268 00:14:39.440 --> 00:14:41.879 it wrong, but it's something like a Society for the 269 00:14:41.919 --> 00:14:46.000 Protection of Abandoned Women and Children or Deserted Women and Children, 270 00:14:46.080 --> 00:14:50.080 something like that. And this was a charitable organization that 271 00:14:50.559 --> 00:14:55.000 women with families could go to and get funds to 272 00:14:55.200 --> 00:14:59.519 live on. After a few years of doing that, the 273 00:14:59.600 --> 00:15:04.399 National Jewish Charities realizes that it's not a good system 274 00:15:05.000 --> 00:15:09.960 because what's happening is that they're giving money to families 275 00:15:10.000 --> 00:15:15.919 whose fathers and husbands have left them, and as a result, 276 00:15:15.960 --> 00:15:20.039 they become dependent on the charity because the husbands, if 277 00:15:20.039 --> 00:15:23.879 they become aware that their families are being funded, they 278 00:15:23.879 --> 00:15:29.080 don't bother yeah sending them money or giving them anything 279 00:15:29.080 --> 00:15:30.960 in any way. So they realized that they had to 280 00:15:31.000 --> 00:15:36.360 take a different tack, and so it doesn't happen until 281 00:15:36.360 --> 00:15:39.679 about five six years later. But in the meantime it 282 00:15:39.799 --> 00:15:43.159 becomes such a problem that it becomes very common to 283 00:15:43.200 --> 00:15:47.759 see in Yiddish papers advertisements from abandoned families saying, our 284 00:15:47.879 --> 00:15:50.679 husband Sloimish laputnik whatever you know. I don't want to 285 00:15:50.679 --> 00:15:52.200 give a real name because it could be someone's name. 286 00:15:52.360 --> 00:15:55.559 Explain that our husband father has left us where destitute, 287 00:15:55.600 --> 00:15:58.039 we have no way to make a living. He is 288 00:15:58.080 --> 00:16:00.919 originally from such and such a place. We think he 289 00:16:01.000 --> 00:16:05.759 may have gone to Cleveland or Saint Louis or Los 290 00:16:05.799 --> 00:16:09.600 Angeles or wherever. And they want people to find them 291 00:16:09.679 --> 00:16:11.879 and so they could get supported in some way. They 292 00:16:11.879 --> 00:16:14.759 wanted support. And so what happens is is the the 293 00:16:15.240 --> 00:16:18.600 Yiddish Forvarts, which at the time had become the largest 294 00:16:18.639 --> 00:16:21.919 and most successful and important Yiddish paper. They in nineteen 295 00:16:21.960 --> 00:16:25.919 oh eight they start a it's not daily when it starts, 296 00:16:25.919 --> 00:16:29.279 but it becomes very regular, very quickly. They start a 297 00:16:29.679 --> 00:16:35.399 column called the Galleria funfoch Fundenmene the Gallery of Missing Men. 298 00:16:35.559 --> 00:16:40.519 And what they do is they put in mugshots of 299 00:16:40.919 --> 00:16:44.240 the men. Obviously women are setting in mugshots or they're 300 00:16:44.240 --> 00:16:47.399 setting in photographs the force. They're putting these like little pictures, 301 00:16:47.399 --> 00:16:49.000 and there's usually they usually set them up as like 302 00:16:49.039 --> 00:16:52.399 six people in a row, and below them are descriptions 303 00:16:52.440 --> 00:16:55.080 of them, what town in Europe they're from, what their 304 00:16:55.159 --> 00:16:57.759 jobs are, you know, where they think they went. They 305 00:16:57.840 --> 00:17:01.080 mentioned the families that they left. And the idea was 306 00:17:01.120 --> 00:17:03.600 that the public it was it was really kind of 307 00:17:03.600 --> 00:17:07.319 a way of crowdsourcing in which the idea was to 308 00:17:08.680 --> 00:17:11.920 turn these guys in, bring them to justice. They you know, 309 00:17:12.000 --> 00:17:16.079 they you know, they had done something terrible. They abandoned 310 00:17:16.079 --> 00:17:19.880 their wives and families. And the forwards starts this column. 311 00:17:20.000 --> 00:17:23.400 And what's interesting is it becomes very popular. It's like 312 00:17:23.480 --> 00:17:26.079 the page that the people first turn to because they 313 00:17:26.079 --> 00:17:29.720 want to see if their neighbors, friends and relatives are 314 00:17:29.799 --> 00:17:31.839 like in the galleria, when freshmen in the manor, if 315 00:17:31.839 --> 00:17:35.680 they're in this, if they're in these mugshots and so 316 00:17:35.680 --> 00:17:40.400 so it becomes popular and you know, Yiddish humor magazines 317 00:17:40.440 --> 00:17:43.720 do parodies of it. And then in nineteen eleven, the 318 00:17:43.799 --> 00:17:47.559 National Desertion Bureau creates the I'm Sorry in the Jewish 319 00:17:47.559 --> 00:17:50.519 Board of Charities. National Jewish Board of Charities creates the 320 00:17:50.599 --> 00:17:53.319 National Desertion Bureau and the purpose of it is to 321 00:17:53.680 --> 00:17:58.240 find missing husbands have gone who knows where. And it's 322 00:17:58.319 --> 00:18:02.440 run by two attorneys, Sounzara and Monroe Goldstein, and it's 323 00:18:02.480 --> 00:18:06.160 staffed by social workers. And they opened up offices on 324 00:18:06.240 --> 00:18:08.880 Second Avenue in the Lower East Side, and they're written 325 00:18:08.880 --> 00:18:10.799 about in the paper and they put an advertisement in 326 00:18:10.839 --> 00:18:13.160 the paper explaining what they do, and they say that 327 00:18:13.240 --> 00:18:16.880 women can come to them and their purpose, their mandate 328 00:18:17.000 --> 00:18:21.119 is to find these missing men and bring them to 329 00:18:21.319 --> 00:18:23.559 justice and to fund these women. But it worked is 330 00:18:23.640 --> 00:18:26.240 like a woman. If a woman was abandoned, she would 331 00:18:26.279 --> 00:18:29.880 go into the office and fill out an application. And 332 00:18:29.920 --> 00:18:33.119 it was sort of small, four column application and it 333 00:18:33.200 --> 00:18:37.559 had basic information, names, addresses, names of children, where people 334 00:18:37.599 --> 00:18:40.359 are from, why, why they think the man abandoned. 335 00:18:39.920 --> 00:18:43.920 Them, what kind of answers would they give. 336 00:18:44.839 --> 00:18:48.720 So this was actually a really interesting part of the exhibit. 337 00:18:48.839 --> 00:18:53.359 So within the exhibit itself, we had there are two large, 338 00:18:53.480 --> 00:18:56.400 i want to say, eighteen inch wide columns in the 339 00:18:57.000 --> 00:19:00.599 exhibit space, and so we took those and we from 340 00:19:00.640 --> 00:19:05.160 florid to ceiling, we put like thousands of reasons as 341 00:19:05.200 --> 00:19:09.039 to why they left. So the National Desertion Bureau was 342 00:19:09.279 --> 00:19:12.160 created by the National Board of Jewish Charities, which is 343 00:19:12.200 --> 00:19:14.359 now something called the Jewish Board, and in fact the 344 00:19:14.400 --> 00:19:18.079 Jewish Board which still is a Jewish charitable organization. They 345 00:19:18.519 --> 00:19:21.279 sponsored the exhibit and one of the things that they 346 00:19:21.319 --> 00:19:24.599 did was they extracted all of these reasons out of 347 00:19:24.640 --> 00:19:27.039 the applications just because I think they thought it was 348 00:19:27.079 --> 00:19:29.759 interesting and I could I have a list of them 349 00:19:29.759 --> 00:19:31.640 here and I could read you some of them. 350 00:19:31.839 --> 00:19:35.920 Yeah, let's hear some of them. That sounds so interesting, Yeah. 351 00:19:35.720 --> 00:19:38.119 They're really there's some of them were really fat, fascinating 352 00:19:38.200 --> 00:19:42.519 So infidelity. One woman wrote, cannot account for desertion. Another 353 00:19:42.559 --> 00:19:45.839 wrote man threatened to kill her. Another man suffers from 354 00:19:45.880 --> 00:19:50.880 hallucinations regarding the applicant's morality. Man claims his wife is disagreeable. 355 00:19:50.960 --> 00:19:53.839 Man is a gentile. Man absconded when his wife learned 356 00:19:53.880 --> 00:19:55.759 that he was Jewish. So you have both sides of 357 00:19:55.759 --> 00:19:58.400 that story. Man stole money and jewelry, fear to rest, 358 00:19:58.480 --> 00:20:03.920 absconded money and left. Man annoying children after divorce obtained 359 00:20:04.440 --> 00:20:07.839 to nineteen fifteen man's polygamous nature? What does that mean? 360 00:20:07.960 --> 00:20:14.319 Cheating man's nature? It's a man who got married multiple times. 361 00:20:16.559 --> 00:20:20.119 There are also some cases where women abandoned men, although 362 00:20:20.160 --> 00:20:22.039 the vast majority of them are men who abandoned women. 363 00:20:22.200 --> 00:20:27.400 Let's see, here's one. Husband was young and irresponsible. Oh, 364 00:20:28.359 --> 00:20:31.279 the woman ousted him from her home. Wanted to escape 365 00:20:31.279 --> 00:20:36.079 military service, extreme jealousy on the husband's part, sexual incompatibility. 366 00:20:36.240 --> 00:20:39.519 The wife refused to keep borders. Man rakes over a 367 00:20:39.559 --> 00:20:42.119 woman's past. I mean, they're like there was one one 368 00:20:42.119 --> 00:20:46.960 of my favorites was women didn't like Baltimore. Moved to Baltimore, 369 00:20:47.000 --> 00:20:49.480 she didn't like it. And that's what so interesting about 370 00:20:49.599 --> 00:20:54.640 this particular archive and these applications is that they give 371 00:20:54.680 --> 00:20:59.720 you insight into the family and marital problems of common people. 372 00:20:59.799 --> 00:21:03.759 And as a historian, that's interesting because you don't typically 373 00:21:03.839 --> 00:21:07.319 get details about common people unless it's in the newspapers 374 00:21:07.599 --> 00:21:10.400 or you know, the cases. The cases are unique, like 375 00:21:10.519 --> 00:21:15.319 history is typically written about, you know, humanity's great people, 376 00:21:15.400 --> 00:21:21.640 most successful people, business people, doctors, artists, writers, politicians. Those 377 00:21:21.640 --> 00:21:24.400 are the people who make history, you know, as opposed 378 00:21:24.400 --> 00:21:27.480 to just your average person who works a job, as 379 00:21:27.519 --> 00:21:31.680 a family, lives a life, doesn't produce anything of note. 380 00:21:31.960 --> 00:21:34.799 And that's really the vast majority of people. Obviously, because 381 00:21:34.799 --> 00:21:39.559 of the Internet, everyone is visible weird. But prior to this, 382 00:21:39.839 --> 00:21:42.000 nobody knew from these people, and it's just such a 383 00:21:42.039 --> 00:21:46.319 fascinating look into their lives. Sometimes the files give you 384 00:21:46.519 --> 00:21:51.079 very granular detail about these stories and how they played out, 385 00:21:51.119 --> 00:21:53.400 and you also learn all kinds of things about these people. 386 00:21:53.480 --> 00:21:57.920 One fascinating side note is these files are a gold 387 00:21:58.000 --> 00:22:02.480 mine for people working in genialogy, anyone who's researching family history. 388 00:22:02.559 --> 00:22:05.599 If you have a family, if you have an ancestor 389 00:22:06.000 --> 00:22:09.279 that is in these files. 390 00:22:08.839 --> 00:22:09.960 You have a ton of information. 391 00:22:10.079 --> 00:22:11.720 You could really find out a lot. You could find 392 00:22:11.759 --> 00:22:14.000 out what they worked in. First of all, all of 393 00:22:14.039 --> 00:22:18.440 the standard immigration information that you can find in other places, 394 00:22:18.480 --> 00:22:22.200 but it's all focused here. But it's also what languages 395 00:22:22.279 --> 00:22:25.920 they spoke, if they went to school preter yeshiva, what 396 00:22:26.079 --> 00:22:28.759 towns they were from. The level of detail is really 397 00:22:29.039 --> 00:22:31.839 is really pretty fascinating. I could give you one example 398 00:22:32.519 --> 00:22:36.400 of which it's one of the stories that we that 399 00:22:36.480 --> 00:22:39.920 we featured in the exhibit. It was the gold Farms. 400 00:22:39.920 --> 00:22:41.319 It was a family by the name of Nathan and 401 00:22:41.400 --> 00:22:46.519