Growing up White in Racist America - Chapter 1; Beginnings

Chapter 1

Beginnings

 I was born in the Chicago suburb of Oak Park Illinois, on December 10, 1947. My father; Donald, was a Christian of Irish and German decent. His family roots in America date back to at least the Civil War period and they lived in the north. I had a Great Grandmother named O’Neil, a tiny woman from Ireland who owned a boarding house in Evanston during the Depression years. Someone from his family had served in the Union Army as I was told, most likely on my paternal Grandfather’s side. 

 My mother, Marilyn, was a second generation American. Her mother was born in London and her father was from Bucharest Romania. Both of them came to America as children and both of Jewish decent. Both families settled in the small blue-collar, very white town of Forest Park, Illinois west of Chicago. My father’s family was originally Catholic. He was raised by his grandparents, and they were religiously indifferent and didn’t actually care about where he went to church as long as he went somewhere.  All of his friends were Lutheran and he simply went where they went. And so, he was now a Lutheran. 

My mother, while being born into a Jewish family did something unheard of.  As a young girl around the age of 12, she converted to Christianity. This obviously didn’t go over well in the family, but she was adamant about it and remained a devout Christian for the remainder of her life. 

 As they were growing up in this small town, my mother had her group of friends, and my father had his. Both groups knew each other and began dating in high school. They finished high school in 1940 and the boys married the girls and went off to fight in World War II. After the war, they returned to their lives in Forest Park and started their families. The town was all white and stayed that way for many years. 

This is where the confusion began, and my entire life has been spent living in the middle of two very separate worlds.  My mother’s parents refused to recognize the marriage of their daughter to a non-Jew and couldn’t accept my father. Neither of my parents cared, and assumed correctly that time would have a way of solving the divide.  When first my brother, and then I arrived on the scene, my grandparents had found a way to see through the problem of their own prejudice.  The innocence of a baby has a way of cutting through bigotry. 

As a very young child, we lived in a two-flat building owned by my maternal grandparents. They lived on the top floor, and we lived on the first floor. I spent almost every day upstairs with my grandmother who secretly introduced me to coffee. It smelled so good, and she would always prepare a glass of milk with coffee and sugar in it and tell me not to tell my mother. It was our secret, and I was thrilled to have a secret with my grandma.  

My first awareness that something was different was at family gatherings. I was only about 4 years old at the time, but this was a time when I was introduced to my cousins and we would play together at every opportunity, which for the most part would take place at Thanksgiving. We would generally have these gatherings at my grandparents place upstairs. I loved all my relatives on my mother’s side, and they would always pay special attention to me and my older brother, but I noticed certain customs that I was unfamiliar with.  At this time, I was walking up the alley which was very safe and only one block, to the church where I would attend Sunday school and where my mother sang in the choir. My father was not very religious and when he went to church, he generally slept through the service, sometimes even snoring to the embarrassment of my mother who sat with the choir. I would spend those mornings in

Sunday school learning about David and Goliath, King Solomon, and the story of Jesus.  At Christmas we learned the little hymns and at Easter we’d learn some more.  But during our family gatherings, my uncles and cousins and even my brother and I had to wear the Yarmulke and stand with the men and listen to prayers in a language that I didn’t understand.  

I was unaware of what being Jewish was, but I knew there was something different going on. My own family never adopted any of the rituals that seemed so important to my mother’s relatives. We were invited into that world and we would be respectful of it. The only thing I really learned was Oi Veh which was a “catch all” phrase, and that chicken soup cured the common cold.   

At Christmas, an entirely different set of traditions was in place. We would get together with my father’s family, and they were all Lutherans. We always had a Christmas tree, and celebrated that special day with a great dinner and gifts under a tree. My other cousins celebrated something called Hanukah and lit candles.  

   So here I was, at the age of 5 with two entirely different sets of rituals and traditions and in some cases even languages. But I loved both sets of relatives and knew they were integral to who I was. My identity was embraced by both groups.  These were my people, and I was loyal to my people. One group, I could trace back to the civil war. The other…went back to the time of Moses.