“I gave a speech of welcome, thanks and some context to my Jewish journey over the decades.”
Because my speech was given off the cuff – from memory- this is a slightly reformulated version following a request that I write something down;
”Firstly, I want to thank Student Rabbi Richard Greene* leading the service in a very thoughtful way (and making a very gracious sermon). But I must also correct him on one point: Klezmer was not my first music passion. As a young teenager I spent hours listening to Andalus music from Morocco and later crooners from Cairo.
Secondly, as always, I must thank Penny for help in organising the service here at Tapton Hall.
I am truly honoured that so many of you have accepted my invitation to come here today,
I welcome all cousins and friends from far and wide and both my families for all their support and encouraging me to have this celebration. But really this morning service and lunch is not just about me but a way to say thank you to Seven Hills Shul and our committee, past and present. And of my friends here today who have stood by me even when I was the best of company.
Seven Hils Shul has been instrumental to my well being.
But first, I must ask your patience, because I want to give some context to my Jewish journey.
I was born in 1946 and as a post war boy I lived with my Sephardi grandma Dolly Israel, and three of her four daughters in a ground floor flat in Finchley. As my parents were bombed out in June 1940 from their house in Finsbury Park, I shared a bedroom with them.
My paternal grandfather, lived in Forest Hill. He had changed his name from the Hebrew, Haskel to Hayes when he came to England from Eastern Europe via Holland and showed no interest in Judaism apart from sending my father and a sister to the nearby Jewish Norwood orphanage when my father was 8 years old following the death of his mother. His assimilation “Project” almost succeeded.
My Israel family had returned to England from Belem. Para, Brazil, following the collapse of their trading in rubber. They were Sephardim, who had fled to Northern Morocco following the 1492/3 expulsion. They became British subjects after Gibraltar became British in 1713.
Living in Finchley I attended the Orthodox Kinloss Gardens synagogue where I had my bar mitzvah. Not an easy experience in front of a large congregation.
Council Flat
When I was 8, my parents obtained a council flat on a low level council estate about 2 miles away. I had a bedroom of my own. But we were one of of only two Jewish families on the estate. It was Ok until one day when I was around 13 we received an election leaflet. I thought it made refreshing sense so as instructed I pasted it on our window. But after 3 days of nagging by my mother I removed it. Our neighbour had told our mother it was typical of Jews who all rich, to support Conservatives. The leaflet was from Margaret Thatcher who became MP and later Prime Minister. Around 15 years old, after encouragement by my English teacher. I became an avid reader of the (Manchester) Guardian at the local library. I also my form teacher to us one day that it was unfortunate that not everyone in Britain was Christian. It made be feel very unwanted. I don’t know what the 4 Jewish boys in my class of 33, thought.
First College
When I left school at 16, I was enrolled on a Telecommunications Telephony course in Lewisham, South East London. I was one of 12 boys most of whom were local. For Science and Maths core subjects we were joined by older overseas students from East and West Africa and the Gulf States including Aden. I liked talking to them, but 8 of the boys were dominated by a one who encouraged them to harass the foreign students and increasingly became very racists. When I objected they started to bully me, especially because I was Jewish. Eventually I had to learn to fight back until they left me alone.
Kibbutz
After I finished by course, fed up with the racism and anti-Semitism, I visited the London Jewish Agency and was given a free air ticket to join an Ulpan- a work study 6 month programme on a kibbutz, But my Jewish journey was interrupted. The Kibbutz was entirely secular and the only festival celebrated was the Soviet October Revolution. I never visited Jerusalem, instead when I could, I would hitchhike to Eilat to get warm and tanned. It was a very cold and wet winter on Ein Hashofet,
Second College
Seven months later, I joined my parents who moved to Southend on Sea, worked as an assistant to a project engineer and joined the nominally Zionist, Weizman Society. For the first time in my life I made lots of friends and helped organise social events
University
With 3 good A Levels from a local college I went to the University of Kent at Canterbury. It was meant to be an Electronics degree with an Integrated Natural Science first year. It was actually mostly Chemistry and after a rebellion it was amended the following year.
But I became very distracted: my mother had to be moved back to London to be loving cared for my her sister Cordelia, She died from cervical concert on her birthday 29 January at 6pm. My father died on same date at the same time 19 years later.
I was also very distracted by the rising time of protests against the Vietnam War. In my second year after becoming Chair of the Keynes Junior College Committee, I spent most of my time touring left wing bookshops to buy and sell books and magazine – socialist, revolutionary, underground, like the notorious Oz and Black Dwarf. But also US magazine, Science for the People. I was often involved with conflicts with the Keynes College Master. In that year in 1970 I met Rohan’s mother Debi. She was suffering from the trauma of her parents in the USA having a divorce and maybe as a result of an unsettled childhood being the daughter of a roving diplomat and me because of repressed bereavement, becoming parents seemed good replacement therapy…I took a sabbatical year to help with the forthcoming pregnancy. But it never occurred to ask the Professor for permission. So the Senate retrospectively made me sit an entrance exam for myself and another Electronics student who was a favourite of the Professor. But I passed and he failed.
Rohan was born in 1971
Her mother and I both graduated as planned at the same time.
1972 The USA Tour and the Yeshiva
With Rohan and Debbie visiting her family in Washington DC, I used that as base and then I visited several cities to meet radical scientists who were members of Science for the People. To get myself to San Francisco, I ended up taking an agency car from Colorado to Los Angeles. I stupidly agreed to take a 6 seater automatic Cadillac in about 3 days. After 2 days without sleep I stopped at Albuquerque to get sleep before I crossed Death Valley to LA.
But I was flagged down by a frenzied guy. He insisted that I took him to LA immediately as he had to be in his Yeshiva in LA by the morning to prepare for Yom Kippur. As he promised a bed for the night I agreed. It turned out he was Fishface/ Fishman from my London primary school Hampstead Garden Suburb, Well, as promised, on arrival I was given a bed in a cell. But after maybe a couple of hours sleep, there was banging on my door by a guy who insisted that I eat fish before Kol Nidre/ beginning of Yom Kippur. Furious about being woken up, I fled and vowed to keep away from crazy Jews. I spent the day the driving around the LA freeways.
After a dispute with the car agency boss in LA, I decided to only hitch hike for the rest of my time in the USA, Using some white cardboard I drew a Union Jack and space below to slot my destination. As 1972 was a good year to be a Brit – Beatlemania etc- it made for easy hitch hiking.
In San Francisco I was taken to an amazing converted warehouse which included Resource One, which demonstrated uses of computing to communities using a freely given mainframe computer and nearby I was shown an early form of a personal computer that a friend used for architectural design. It was only 1972. But I was also invited to meet a British doctor in New York, who was working with coal miners in West Virginia on dealing with their health hazards. That meeting set my direction for many years. 1972 was the year of the Occupational Health and Safety Act followed by a similar act in the UK Health and Safety at Work Act in 1974. This gave workers the right to have free training on health hazards.
Sheffield – First Stay
On returning to England I answered an advert for an Urban Kibbutz in Sheffield. As a social engineering project it was a failure but out of it came Kelham Island Museum, the first Professor of Midwifery, the first solar heated housing development on the edge of Gleadless Valley and later the Rebuild Housing project on the Manor estate using locally trained labour. plus Heeley City Farm still going after 40 plus years. Later still, through Alan Deadman, the Ju Ju club and world music.
I set up a Science for the People group which initially focused on monitoring red dust pollution in North Sheffield. Later, with several others, it became a Hazards at Work group focusing on working with local trade unions. Four of the seven members were Jews but we never discussed our origins or beliefs. I did set up an Environmental Hazards evening class course in Chesterfield. One student was a safety officer from a nearby factory in Staverly, He was also a member of the CIA – Chemical Industries Association. He lobbied Sheffield University to close me down. He failed. Later he left the course. His factory Coalite burnt down, causing contamination of surrounding farms with dioxin.
Manchester – My Jewish Journey resumes
Dissatisfied, with my lack of chemical knowledge and teaching skills,I took a PGCE and then I moved to Manchester to teach telephone students at a local college. It was the era of Ban the Bomb. I became Chair of TUCND, But one day a friend invited me to an evening event. As there was food and I was a hungry bachelor I agreed. I think it was a dimly lit room with many people eating away. But I felt suddenly at home, I became an active member of Manchester Jewish Socialists and formed a lifelong friendship with David Ehrlich,
Its Funny You Don’t Look Antisemitic
The brilliant left wing barrister and specialist on immigration law, the late Steve Cohen, was a member of the Manchester JSG, eventually he published his booklet that described the history of antisemitism in the Labour Movement. I was part of the editorial sub committee and was heavily lobbied by the London Jewish Socialists to stop the publication. Those core members are still friends of Labour leader and MP Jeremy Corbyn. A revised version is still available and used by some pro-Zionists groups…
When my daughter Rohan, aged 11, demonstrated computer techniques to Tony Benn and Margaret Thatcher at the House of Commons, I decided I had to upgrade myself and obtain day release to do a part-time Masters in Microelectronics (study of internal workings of computer chips). After 5 years at a Manchester college I was desperate to get promotion elsewhere as with British Telecom about to be privatised, the core technician training cohorts of my department might disappear. So I took up a post in Rotherham, with a brief to shake up the electrical mining based department. This meant I could return to Sheffield. My former department was closed down within two years.
Return to Sheffield – My Jewish Journey gains momentum
I answered an advert in a left wing bookshop in Broomhill, Sheffield, to join a group of secular Jews. Within months I was involved with several others, especially Tricia and Jeremy Hamm in organising the Anne Frank in World Exhibition, which included a month of activities and a member getting a secondment to create teaching packs for school students. I learnt a lot on how to organise events,
Klezmer activity begins
I was given £500 by the Sheffield Council of Christians and Jews, to spend on Jewish music about which I knew nothing. But I did set up a Yiddish song workshop attended by friends from Leeds – JoNah – Jews Against Nuclear Arms, So I discovered Klezmer and soon began a 40 year friendship with Ray Cohn, who being a brilliant music teacher, led to the first UK Klezmer Festival in Leeds and many other events. Later I left College and began designing simple websites and later setup the shul domain shef-ref.co.uk and a basic website.
Thanks to a suggestion from Dave, I set up the Klezmer on Line listings website which I ran for 10 years. It was useful in promoting Klezmer concerts which I did with the help of Linda Rosen in Leeds. In fact Linda, Ray and Sue Cooper used to meet at my house to discuss ways of promoting klezmer music in the North. After intense lobbying we did get £1000 from the JMI – Jewish Music Institute and then National Lottery. Yorkshire Arts funded a klezmer dancing course by a Budapest teacher, but I have doubts about her teachings. Ray organised the first European Klezmer Band Competition, But of course as it was in Sheffield I was ignored by the London based Jewish Chronicle..
Seven Hills Shul
Being tired of just being a secular I found myself wanting to be part of a more stable Jewish structure. So one Friday evening, with great trepidation, I walked into an Erev Shabbat service at Ranmoor. I was immediately made very welcome by Tony and Penny Kay. But living in S8 rather S10 and sensing my politics ( I was a Labour Party councillor) was more on the left and I was single, I was not entirely comfortable, especially as most members were married or widowed, But my life was soon to dramatically change again.
Pennine Wayfarers and Janet
Thanks to Dave Ehrlich I was also persuaded to join this mainly Jewish walking group in North Manchester. So eventually on a foggy Sunday morning on some Northern moor I met this woman who spent most of the walk arguing with me about God. Of course, I thought I could outsmart her, as I was already on my Jewish journey having been to some of the wonderful alt Christmas Limmud week of study streams. Within a year we were married at Sinai Reform Synagogue by Rabbi Walter Rothchild who founded Seven Hills Shul.
Janet moved to Sheffield and soon was a member of Ecclesall Amateur Orchestra as flutist, and then a member of the first Sheffield Klezmer Band which included Ray Cohn, Alan Zinober and the late Jeremy Loeb, the Children’s Hospital Finance Director, who became the Seven Hills Shul Treasurer.
Other Activities
Apart from klezmer, being a college lecturer and a Heeley ward Councillor I became involved in the UK Brazil Network and was a local co-organiser of the first International conference on the destruction of the Amazon.* I made the first of three visits to Brazil including one to see cousins in Belem , Para. But that is another story. I was also a co-chair of Sheffield Green Party but again that is another story. I also became active in my local Amateur Radio club.
I want to conclude where I began: Seven Hills Shul.
I want to thank Tony and Penny as founders of our Shul with decades of service for us. To John Speyer, a former Chair, who began the process of encouraging outreach to the wider community, to Jon Colman, who as Omer bulletin editor, began to broaden it with more contributions from members, to Howard Saffer, who as Chair and with the help of Pam Davis and Michele Saffer as Treasurer, began the process of hiring the first of three community development workers, with Maya the latest worker, who with her musical skills, enriches our community as well as extending the outreach work so that we have more members, including young people and children than maybe ever before. Plus Pam, Andrew and Marylyn who set up the welcoming Kulanu sub group which produced the Shabbat Guide used today.
And Patsy: tirelessly involved in Interfaith work, a great listener, Progressive University Chaplain and with another great friend of our Shul friend, Bashir Khan, recently organised a brilliant but simple Jewish- Muslim Dialogue evening at the Town Hall and attended by over 70 participants, Both have been working behind the scenes, and maybe at great personal risk, to maintain dialogue even when nearly all the doors were closed -especially last year.
I also want to thank Erika our new editor of Omer for taking over from me, so now we will now have at last a real journalist!
And our current Chair Jane: Jane to be a Chair of any synagogue is hard enough but over the past two years especially challenging. Thank you so much.
Everyone please join me in a vote of thanks to them and their spouses.
I now want to thank this community and members like Howard, who stood by me when Janet suddenly became ill with a terminal brain tumour. But also the help afterwards. I must also thank my daughter Rohan who again stood by me as when my father had a serious stroke here which led to his death two years later on the same date and time but 19 years after my mother. Rohan and Steve, with my grand children, Richard, Matt and and Sammy, and Howard, helped me during the last difficult days of Janet’s illness.
Bea
I finally want to thank my wife Bea. Unknown to anyone else here, when I organised the large commemoration weekend for Janet**, I already had Bea helping me in the preparations and bringing some order into the chaos of my post bereavement life. Not only did she help me but against all odds she succeeded in re-uniting here. with her three lovely children, Britney, Barbie and Clarke, who as British citizens will also soon be making their contribution to our wider society.
Thank you again.
Prepare for Grace after meals led by Rabbi Margaret Jacobi.
ps Mazeltov to Grandson Matt on his engagement to Stacey and to Britney on her recent marriage to her longtime friend Jun-rieve. And well to Great Grandsons Hunter and Mateo for being so well behaved during the service and in fact throughout the day.
**
https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2012/sep/09/janet-altman-obituary
* Based on Sheffield Friends of the Earth records, a conference focusing on the Amazon was held in Sheffield on
10 September 1989.
- Details: The meeting, part of the “Tropical Rainforest Campaign Autumn 1989,” featured workshops and was addressed by several Brazilian speakers.
- Context: This event took place during a period of intense UK political and public concern regarding deforestation in the Amazon, with parliamentary debates on the issue occurring in March and April 1989.
- Significance: 1989 was a key year for increasing awareness of the impacts of Amazonian deforestation on global climate, with researchers arguing for urgent measures to slow the destruction.
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