Document text
Accession no.
1 d.)94
Date received
10/10/40
Consignment no.
1
Shipped from
Wash. Office
Label
Amount
Bp
WPA L. C. PROJECT UNIT
Porm-3
E.Q1klArfL_Collection (or Type)
Title:Wet Jacob Sereseort worked
ilIALractihcp neer timilAftsegt
Place of origin Cilittfkg.Q tnoi, Date JA4.7,1PL.._._
(7.D.C•)
Project worker Hilda Pala° het*
Project editor
Remarks
-1
DUST.
Hilda Polacheek.
American Folk Stuff.
0 7/7
7
Jacob Saranoff worked in a rag -shop near Hull -House. He
had come to Chicago from Russia in 1902, bringing his wife and
two children with him. The family was met at the train by a
relative who helped to find a home for them. They rented four
rooms in a rear tenement on Halsted Street. After visiting
several second hand furniture stores, the Saranoffs bought two
second hand beds, a kitchen stove, a kitchen table and four
chairs. They unpacked the bedding that they had brought with
them from Russia and spent their first night in their first
American home.
The next morning the children were enrolled in the public
school. The first great ambition of Jacob and Sarah Saranoff
had been realized. Their children were in school.
After paying a month's rent and the price of the furniture
and the most necessary household utensils, Jacob had two dollars
left. It was necessary for Jacob to take the first job that he
could find. The job was sorting rags. His wages were eight
dollars a week. The rent was six dollars a month. Jacob and
Sarah decided that they could get along.
The rag -shop was located in an abandoned barn. There was
a small window in the rear of this barn which had been opened
when the horses were housed in it. But since it had become a
rag -shop, the window had been nailed up to keep out any possible
thieves. Ventilation was not considered.
The floor of the rag -shop was never swept. The dust was
allowed to gather day after day, week after week. But Jacob
W3694
Hilda Pblacheck,
American Folk Stuff.
Dust.
paid no attention to the dust, His children were in school. They
could not have gone to school in Russia. There were no schools
for Jewish children in the village where he had lived. So why
pay attention to dust?
Solomon, or Solly, as he was called, the older of the two
children, wanted to learn to play the piano. But how does one
get piano lessons and buy a piano on which to prrctice on eight
dollars a week?
"Some day I will learn to play," Solly said. "All sorts of
miracles happen in America. Maybe something will happen so that
I can learn."
Solly was eight years old. His sister, Rosie, was six. They
were learning American games. They now played hide and seek, run
sheep -run and peg, with the American born children. These Ameri-
can born children took Solly and Rosie to Hull -House.
The children ran up the .stairs to a play -room in which
there was a piano. It was the first time that Solly had been
near a piano. He struck a note and was thrilled with the sound.
He looked around, and no one seemed to mind his touching the
piano. So he struck a few more notes. This was indeed a miracle:
Such miracles could only happen in America, thought Solly.
Then the play director entered to organize some games for
the children. Patrick Ryan. who lived across the hall from the
Saranoff family,took Solly to her.
"This is Solly," said Patrick "Hels daffy about piano."
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Duet.
Hilda Polacheck,
American Folk Stuff.
"Would you like to learn to play?" asked the director.
"Oh, yes: Could I?" Solly asked eagerly.
So Solly started to tale piano lessons and he was allowed to
come to Hull -House to practice.
Jacob had now been sorting rags for three years. He had
been inhaling the dust for the same length of time. He would
have liked to find other work. Something more interesting
something that would pay a little more money. He began to dream
of the possibility of buying a piano for Sony. But he was afraid
to take a day off to look for a better job. He was afraid he
might lose the one he had. He could not risk having the family
go without food. And there were shoes to buy. And the rent had
to be paid. So he continued to sort rags, paying, no attention
to the dust on the floor. It was bad when the bales of rags were
dumped on the floor and the dust rose and filled the room. The
men who were sorting rags would get coughing spells when that
happened. But the dust was soon settled, and the men went on
sorting rags.
The Saranoff children were bringing good report -from school.
Solly could now play the piano well. He was told at school that
he would be allowed to play a solo when he graduated.
Solly found out that fathers and mothers could go to lectures
and concerts at Hull -House. So on Sunday afternoon or evening,
the Saranoffslistened to lectures they did not understand and to
concerts that they did understand and loved. They found out that
they could learn 77nlish, so they hurried through with the supper
-4-
7ilda Polacheck,
American Folk Stuff.
'dishes and
rs. Ryan,
party. At
"Miss
Dust.
became members of the English class. One evening,
their neighbor, took Jacob and Sarah to a Hull -House
this party they met Jane Addams.
Addams," said Jacob oTie night while he was at Hull
House, "do you know that I have never heard Solly play the piano."
"Well, that is too bad," said Jane Addams. "I must see that
you hear him soon."
A week later Solly brought home a card announcing a piano
recital to be given by Solomon Saranoff, at the Hull -House Music
School.
There were about fifty people present at Solly's first re-
cital. mhe Ryans were there. Sarah Saranoff had invited Mrs.
Schultz, her German neighbor who lived on the floor above. The
Molinari family, whose son was learning to play the violin at
Hull -House, were there. Just before the recital started, Jane
Addams came into the room and sat down next to Jacob Saranoff.
Solly played with a delicacy and warmth that made him a part
of the piano. When the first piece was finished, the tears were
rolling down Jacob's cheeks. Solly played and Jacob's heart-
beats accompanied him. He was thanking God for America —for
Hull -House-- for Jane Addams.
"For the last number," the piano teacher announced, "Solly
will play a piece that he wrote. I am very proud of Solly, for
it is not often that a child of his age can compose music. I
think Solly will be a great musician."
Solly played his composition. It was a haunting little
-5
Hilda Polacheck,
American Folk Stuff.
Dust.
melody. There was a little of the Russian persecution in it.
There was a little of the joy of Hull -House. There was a little
of the dust of the rag -shop.
The concert was over. The entire audience surrounded the
Saranoff family. Jane Addans invited everybody into the coffee-
house for refreshments.
The dream of buying a piano now became an obsession with
Jacob. He had heard one of the men who worked in the rag -shop,
say that his two brothers were coming from Russia and that they
would be looking for a place to live. The idea came to Jacob
that he could rent one of the bedrooms to these two men. He
broached the subject to Sarah. She thought it would be a good
Ides. Sarah had heard that pianos oould be bought on easy pay-
ments. Perhaps she could get enough from the men to make the
payments on a piano.
The boarders moved into one of the two bedrooms. A shiny
new piano was moved into the bare parlor. A relative gave the
family a discarded cot which was put into the parlor. On this
Solly slept. Rosie was moved into the bedroom where her parents
slept. Her bed was made up of the four chairs.
Solly practiced every minute that he could spare from his
school work. He had graduated from grammAr school and had
entered high school.
Jacob went on sorting rags. But the sorting was now accom-
panied by the tunes that Solly played. Jacob noticed that he
-6
Hilda Polacheok,
American Folk Stuff.
Dust.
would get very tired, long before the day was over. He coughed
a good deal when the bales of rags were dumped on the floor. He
would sweat during the night, even when the bedroom was very cold.
But he said nothing to his wife.
Solly was ready to graduate from high school. He was to play
one of his own compisitions at the graduation exercises. This
graduation was another event in the life of the Saranoff family.
Jacob was proud of his tall, dark haired son, who was loudly
applauded by the audience. Solly bowed again and again. Jacob
thought; if only the cough did not bother him; he would be the
happiest man in the world. But the cough did bother him.
Jacob would have liked to stay in bed the morning after the
graduation. But a man had been fired the week before for staying
home one day. So he dragged himself out of the bed and went to
the rag -shop. Several hours later he was brought home by two men.
They said that Jacob had started to cough and had spit large chunks
of blood.
"Yes, the dust in the rag -shop is bad," said one of the men.
Sarah was panic stricken. The neighbors called a doctor
from the health department. A week later, Jacob was dead.
The realtives and neighbors collected money for the funeral.
Solly did not quite realize what had happened. He sat between
his mother and Jane Addams. He heard the Rabbi say:
"Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was:"
But the day after the funeral, Solly knew that he was now
Hilda Polacheck,
American Folk Stuff,
Dust.
the head of the family. The owner of the rag -shop offered him a
job as bookkeeper and solly took it. He earned more money than
his father had earned. But the dust was on the floor of the office.
Solly continued to take lessons at Hull -House in the evening,
when he was not too tired. He had very little time to practice,
now. After nine hours in the dirty office, weighing bales of rags,
keeping books, haling with the people who were selling the rags,
he was too tired to practice.
Sarah was sorry that he could not go on with his music,
but the rent had to be paid, food had to be bought, shoes did wear
out.
Cile morning Solly noticed several people from Hull -House
walk into the rag -shop. They spoke to one of' the men in the shop;
they gathered some of the dust from the floor into small white
papers, and left.
That night Solly went to Hull -House. He found Jane Addams
and asked about the dust that had been gathered.
"We are trying to find out whether the dust contains any
tuberculoisis germs," Jane Addans tolh him.
"Dust tubercullis," said Solly in a bewildered tone.
"Pvery other house on the block has some one sick with tuberculo-
sis. I heard an old woman say that a dybblik1 has attacked the
neighborhood. Perhaps it is a dybbukl Perhaps there_14 a dybbuk
in the dust that my father breathed into his lungs.
I have
been breathing into my lungs. The dybblik always kills the person
it attacks:"
1 An evil spirit.
-8
Hilda Polacheck.
American Folk Stuff.
Dust.
Solly was hysterical: He was taken to a room and a doctor
was
called. The doctor looke very grave. Sony! temperature w
quite high. The docor was sure he had tuberculo sig. He had been
working too hard. He had been inhaling the dust from the rag -shop.
Sarah was like atone triage when she was told.
"Thank God you will take care of him," she said to Jane
Addams. "Rosie will now have to go to work. I wanted her to finish
high school."
Solly was well cared for in a sanitarium which Jane Addams
had helped to create. As he lay on his cot on the sun -porch, he,
maa Putting notes together that he would fashion into songs, when
he gotimell.
At Hull -House a fight WBS going on to bring air into dark
homes. Shorter working hours-- less fatigue --less tubercuasis.
'lourt proceedings were started to have the barn that housed the
rag -shop, condemned. It took months to accomplish this. But the
rag -shop was condemned'.
Jane Adders travelled all the way to the sanitarium to tell
Solly the news. But he was too ill to be told that the dust had at
last been removed. He had become a part of the dust.