NoteTitle supplied by cataloger. Original document digitized in November 2019 as a JPEG. Donated for capture by Sally. Only first name given. Collected through the Brooklyn Jewish History Project of Brooklyn Public Library. This project is funded by the David Berg Foundation.
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TitleA Syrian Jewish family. Three sailors sitting around a fountain.
Biographical NoteThe family of Isaac and his younger sister Sally is from Aleppo, Syria. Their father, Jacob, arrived in the United States in 1914, and first lived in the Bronx. He married Mollie and moved to the Lower East Side. They eventually settled in Bensonhurst in a small Syrian Jewish Community from Aleppo. Jacob and Mollie raised three daughters and three sons. Their children went to public school and attended Hebrew after school. The neighborhood was a mix of Italian and Jewish. In 1945 Isaac, the third child, joined the United States army and was sent to the Pacific. When Isaac and Claire married they moved to Ocean Parkway then Midwood where their four daughters attended public school. Isaac says: They became more American than Syrian. Nevetheless, the family preserved their Syrian heritage and traditions through religious practices and food. Sally, the youngest, stayed in Brooklyn where she raised her son and daughter. Sabbath observers, the family has perserved their 100-year-old Syrian traditions.