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Our Forefathers and Foremothers 49
PROHIBITION
Prohibition hit the Levine family
hard. Elia, who lived above his store,
was talked into selling wine to a
Yiddish-speaking man claiming he
wanted the wine for his son’s Bar
Mitzvah. However, he was actually
an undercover federal agent. The
man came back with other feds and,
using axes, they destroyed Elia’s entire business. Elia was horrified that one Jew would turn on another. The old man’s heart was broken, so he packed up and moved to California.
GOODBYE “NIGGER” MIKE
Prohibition also had a terrible effect my own parents’ lives. My father, Mike Salter, was forced to shut down the Pelham Café, and when he died in 1922, my mother was left penniless. We tried to hold on to our beautiful Brighton Beach home, at 3013 Fifth Street, but it was not possible. My father died of heart and kidney problems at the age of 54 and was buried in the Washington Cemetery in New York, leaving my mother a widow with five children.
Of the many questions I wish I had been able to ask my father, one was, “What is the real family name?” I know when my grandparents, Israel and Rachel, came to Ellis Island with their exotic, unpronounceable Russian surname, the intake bureaucrat most likely said, “That name is terrible. This is a good name — Salter!” So, a family of Russian Jews from the shtetls was “christened” with a very, very proper English name.
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Above
U.S. Marshal Matheus directs the destruction of some $300,000 worth of imported liquors and wines seized from a wholesale warehouse in Philadelphia. Similar scenes took place across the country.
Opposite
Brass laver brought from Russia by Lena Levine. Lavers like this one were traditionally used to wash hands before mealtime.
The painted, Russian, wooden icon depicting Moses delivering the Ten Commandments was a gift from Janet’s Uncle Abe Freeman.
Salter collection.