Page 161 - The Legacy of Abraham Rothstein - text

Early days in Los Angeles

out the day, and one could not get his money back on what he paid
for the lot. Ben quit me and got a job driving a horse and buggy for a
Jewish butcher, delivering meat to housewives. I was paying twelve
dollars a month rent for five rooms and a barn and I could not make
a go of it, so we moved to Twenty-second Street and San Pedro:
eight dollars a month for four rooms.
At that time, my wife took sick, and having no friend or neighbor
to talk to, she took the last few pennies and went to see a doctor. She
came home as calm and serene as a woman of fifty, and said, “Abe,
you have to make more money. A baby is coming.” I will never
forget how foolish and helpless I felt. Other people get great
happiness from such news. To me it was a shock. Tears were
streaming from my eyes, and I lay down on the bed and sobbed.
How could I support my wife and baby when I was without hope of
ever being able to support myself? Everything looked dark to me.
But Fannie had faith in me, and understood life better than I did.
She who had to suffer the pain and danger of childbirth consoled me,
taking it as a matter that had to be.
How fortunate it is when one has a baby: he knows then that he
has a responsibility and has to struggle and hope to provide. In those
stressful days, I used to go on Sundays to Zionist meetings in the
Beth El synagogue on Olive Street. There I got acquainted with
Harry Fram and the late Mr. Bloom, who was a watchmaker and had
a shop on Fifth Street. My economic circumstances were in very
desperate condition. It meant either charity or suicide; nothing else
could help us. One day I passed by Mr. Bloom’s store, and stopped
in to talk about Zionism. In conversing with him, he inquired about
my occupation and finances. Forgetting my pride, I opened my heart
to him. He was a very nice man, with a large family; understanding
my despair, he told me to see him the same evening at the Hebrew
Loan Association, of which he was a member. I went there, and he
asked another member, Mr. Goldberg, who was a kind of landsman
because he had a relative in Pelcovizna, to endorse a loan of fifty
dollars from the association. I got that money the same evening, to
pay back at a dollar a week.

157