Preserving Jewish Heritage in Texas Texas Jewish Est. 1980 Historical Society July 2014 News Magazine Keeping Tabs on Temple’s Tablets by Ken Herman Reprinted with permission from Austin American Statesman, October 16, 2013 Congregation Agudas Achim I’ll do my best to translate the (of which I am a member) has had Yiddish. three buildings since its founding “I’d gone to that shul when I 99 years ago. The first was built lived in Lampasas when I was a in 1931 at San Jacinto Boulevard teenager. We used to come into and East 10th Street, where a fed- Austin for the High Holy days,” eral building now stands. Shapiro said of the downtown In 1963, the congregation synagogue. moved to a new building on Bull Fast forward to the early Creek Road, since replaced by the 1990s when its demolition was current Agudas Achim building on imminent. Shapiro recalled being the Dell Jewish Community Cam- at his desk in Austin Metal and pus in Northwest Austin. The old Iron, founded by his father-in-law downtown building was demol- Congregation Agudas Achim’s downtown building, in 1913, on East Fourth Street. ished, including the 2,300-pound which was demolished in the early 1960s. The Ten “I was sitting there think- Ten Commandments tablets that Commandments tablets that were atop the building ing about it and I was thinking, sat atop the building over the are now in the courtyard of the synagogue in North- ‘Is there anything out of that old entrance. west Austin. building that we want to save?’ Or at least that’s what everybody thought was the and I couldn’t think of anything”, he said. “Then it fate of the tablets. The truth was revealed last year at an dawned on me. I remembered when you went up to the event honoring the late Jim Novy, a major figure in Austin front entrance to the place there a real nice long flight of Jewish history. Among the attendees was Morris Shapiro, steps.…and you’d look up and here were these beautiful Novy’s son-in-law, and he had something to report when Ten Commandments (made) out of stone. And I thought, folks looked I wonder if anybody told them to save those”, he said. at photos of “So I got out and got to my car and drove there and, sure the long-gone enough, they were about ready to wreck the front part of downtown the building, and I told Pee Wee, I said, ‘Pee Wee, I want synagogue. those Ten Commandments there’. He said, ‘What are you Because he going to do with them?’ I said, ‘We’re going to have a is such a new synagogue somewhere and when we do, we’ll use good story- those.’” teller, let’s let Pee Wee (Pee Wee Franks, a demolition specialist and Shapiro, 88, Austin Metal and Iron customer) complied and Shapiro tell the story, became the keeper of the Ten Commandments. But after which he deciding the old tablets would not mesh with the modern did as we sat design of the new building on Bull Creek Road, he had in his home them taken to a warehouse at his business. And there they In October, 2013, the tablets were installed at near Westlake sat for a half-century. Congregation Agudas Achim on Hart Lane. High School. continued on page 11 Texas Jewish Historical Society - July 2014 Page 1 Message from the President by Debra Winegarten What a warm day morning, we that was the site of the original Zale’s welcome TJHS climbed aboard a Jewelry Store, which is undergoing a received from the trolley and visited renovation. We boarded the trolley to people at House of the Jewish sec- take the “Oil Barons Tour” to view the Jacob in Wichita tion of Rosemont magnificent mansions in the old part Falls when we were Cemetery, where of town. The Saturday night program there in June. I instituted a new was a personal view of the commu- Almost forty of tradition of saying nity, with remarks by House of Jacob us descended on Kaddish when we President, W.B. Marks, and long-time this small, dusty visit these sacred resident, Joan Schwartz. Gordon town. Sally Drayer sites. We dedi- Cizon also shared some of his memo- and Samylu Rubin cated the prayer in ries living in Wichita Falls and work- worked tirelessly memory of Mitzi ing with the Zale family. Vickie Vogel over the past several Chafetz’s mother, then enchanted us with a slide show of months to ensure since this was her the recent TJHS trip to Cuba. the meeting went smoothly and the Yahrtzeit. I want to thank the Board for its local arrangements were in place. I We then descended on the Museum cooperation as I presided over my entrusted Sally and she did an amaz- of North Texas, where the county archi- first Board meeting Sunday morning. ing job. Friday night, we joined in a vist gave a talk on some of the Jewish Vickie Vogel received a grant in the Kabbalat Shabbat service at the shul, citizens of Wichita Falls. After looking amount of $250 for the printing and followed by a kosher brisket dinner, around at the many collections the mu- distribution of a book for the cemetery prepared by the congregation. Satur- seum had, we walked to the building in Hallettsville, Texas. A grant of $25,000 was awarded to help with the moving and restoration of Brenham’s The Texas Jewish Historical Society B’nai Abraham synagogue building to July 2014 Austin. B’nai Abraham is the oldest Orthodox shul in Texas and will have a Quarterly News Magazine new life again. I am proud that we are The Texas Jewish Historical Society News Magazine is published a part of this worthwhile endeavor. four times annually. Stories about Texas Jewish history, oral histories, If you have not joined us for a and requests for assistance with research are welcome, as are photographs meeting, or even if you have, you and historical documents. Please provide color photocopies or scans at MUST do everything in your power to 300 dpi or greater in .gif, .tif, or .jpg format, and send electronically to As- come to Austin October 23-25. TJHS is co-hosting a meeting with the South- sistant Editor Davie Lou Solka at [email protected] or by mail to 3808 Woodbrook Circle, Austin, TX 78759, 512-527-3799. Be sure to include continued on page 11 your name and contact information. The News Magazine of the Publisher-Editor Alexa Kirk Texas Jewish Historical Society Assistant Editor Davie Lou Solka (USPS) is published four times Photographers Sally Drayer, Marvin Rich, Davie Lou Solka a year by the Texas Jewish His- Marc Wormser torical Society, P. O. Box 10193, Note: The Texas Jewish Historical Society is Austin, Texas 78766-0193, Travis unable to guarantee the safe receipt and/or return County. Periodical postage paid at of documents or photographs. It is strongly recom- Houston, Texas. Postmaster: send mended that you provide color photocopies of both address changes to the Texas Jew- color and black & white documents. We welcome ish Historical Society, P. O. Box your comments and suggestions. 10193, Austin, Texas 78766-0193. Visit us on the web at www.txjhs.org. www.txjhs.org. Page 2 Texas Jewish Historical Society - July 2014 Lyndon Johnson was Scheduled to Visit my Austin Shul the Day After Kennedy Died by Cathy Schechter Article is copyrighted by Cathy Schechter, 2013. First printed November 18, 2013, by Tablet Magazine. Reprinted with permission from the author. Some editing has been done. On November 22, was almost too famil- 1963, the women of iar; Milton Simons, Congregation Agudas who was Agudas Achim Sisterhood in Achim’s president in Austin, Texas, were the autumn of 1963, working in their new recalled that some of kosher kitchen, mix- the congregants knew ing potato salad for the the vice president so several hundred people well they refused to pay expected to turn up at to hear him speak at the the dedication of their synagogue dedication. new synagogue the next The assassination day—a group that was changed that: When to include Vice President the dedication was re- Lyndon B. Johnson. scheduled, a gully wash The women didn’t have of people from all over enough mixing bowls, so Jim Novy introduces President Lyndon Johnson at the dedication of Con- the country wanted in, they wound up using the gregation Agudas Achim’s new building on December 28, 1963. Johnson offering what Simons synagogue’s brand-new and Lady Bird are seated to the left of the dais. From the dedication pro- described as “enough plastic trashcans to pre- gram. (Courtesy of Congregation Agudas Achim Archives.) money to pay the mort- pare the potato salad, a highly probable that no American gage,” just to come to detail their honored guest would never president has ever been as intimately Austin to hear the new President talk need to know. involved in the construction of a Shul to the Jews. In the end, it was Novy Of course, Johnson never made it as Johnson was in this one. In Octo- who kept the strangers out. As far as to Austin. Instead of holding a joyous ber 1963, as vice-president, he loaned he was concerned, Austin Jews were celebration, the congregants gathered his Lincoln Continental convertible to LBJ’s Jews, and even “the people to mourn the death of President John congregant Morris Shapiro, who drove too cheap to buy tickets,” in Simons’ F.