..inte:

Celia Bellman

..intr:

Arlene Lurie

..da:

1974

..cp:

1993.007.011 
Celia Bellman in cotton field, Safford, Arizona, 1967

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..ftxt:



An Interview

with

Celia Bellman

July 31, 1974

Transcriptionist: Carol Ruttan 

Interviewer: Arlene Lurie

Log for

Lamar and Celia Bellman

Page

1 Six sisters Celia Libbish

Joe Bromberg

2 Changed name to Levy Herbert Goodman

Lived in Sheldena, Lithuania Sam Byner

3 Came to U.S. in 1910 at age 15

4 Life in Lithuania Memo River

Buy flax and berries Black Forest

Yulbury

5 Government did not allow much land to Jews Dorsha Fatha

6 Jewish life in Shevena

7-8 Food preparation

8-9 Clothing, bedding handmade

10 Flax seeds

11 School life; friends

12 Preparing for Shabbos

13-15 Trip to El Paso Ida Hisch

Pauline Feldman

Goodmans

Bolin

16 Got job at Boston Store Stoleroff

17 Worked at White House

Got married

18-19 Trip to El Paso


		Celia Bellman Interview

LURIE: Today is July 31, 1974. I'm sitting in the living room of the home
of Mr.and Mrs. Lamar Bellman of Safford. I should explain the relationship. 
Mrs. Bellman is my paternal great aunt, right?

CELIA: Yes. I'm your mother's aunt.

LURIE: No. You're my father's aunt, right?

CELIA: I'm your father's aunt, right.

LURIE: You are the sister of my grandmother, Esther Libbish. You were both
Libbish girls, right?

CELIA: Yes.

LURIE: She was the oldest?

CELIA: No, youngest. Shana was the oldest. But both of them were married
and had families. Your grandmother was already married when I was just a
baby.

LURIE: There were six Libbish sisters. Can you name them?

CELIA: There were seven. There was Shana and Esther and Beulah and Rae and
Gertie and Sheila and Ethel.

LURIE: Rae Libbish married who?

CELIA: Married Joe Bromberg.

LURIE: Joe Bromberg and lived in El Paso, right?

CELIA: Right.

LURIE: And her children still live there.

CELIA: Yes.

LURIE: Gertrude Libbish married Herbert Goodman.

CELIA: Yes, and they live in El Paso.

LURIE: And Ethel adopted the name of Levy when she came to this country.
Isn't that right?

CELIA: Well, we changed our name to Levy.

LURIE: After you got to this country or still in Europe?

CELIA: When we got to this country, our name was Libbish, but we changed to
Levy. I had an uncle Levy in El Paso, my father's brother, who had quite a
family in El Paso. They had changed their name from Libbish to Levy, and
that's why we went Levy.

LURIE: Okay. And she married Sam Byner, who subsequently passed away, but
she still lives in El Paso, too.

CELIA: Yes. She still lives in El Paso.

LURIE: Okay. Now, some of the sisters began coming to the United States,
right?

CELIA: Yes.

LURIE: The first one to come was Rae.

CELIA: Yes.

LURIE: And then Gertrude?

CELIA: Yes.

LURIE: And then?

CELIA: Then I came.

LURIE: Where did you live in Europe?

CELIA: I lived in Europe in Sheldena, a little town.

LURIE: In the country of Lithuania.

CELIA: Yes, Lithuania.

LURIE: When you lived there, was it Lithuania or was it another country?

CELIA: Well, they used to change it to Lithuania from Poland. They would
change it, you know. For many years it was Lithuania, and then Russia used 
to take it over, and it was called Poland. But, when I lived there, it was
Lithuania.

LURIE: When was it that you left Europe?

CELIA: In 1910, in -when was it?

LAMAR: You came in September.

CELIA: I came in September.

LURIE: How old were you?

CELIA: 15 years old. We got on a boat to Galveston. We were not allowed to
leave the ship until someone old enough would pick us up. At that time they
had white slavery, you know, and they had to be very careful. So, a young man
came who had charge of the immigrants, especially the young girls, and he
told us that there was no word from El Paso that anyone was responsible for
us and we'd have to stay and may even go back.

LURIE: Now, wait just a minute. I want to backtrack just a little bit. Tell
me a little bit about what life was like in Lithuania. How did your family
 live? How did they make their living? What kind of house did you have?

CELIA: We were very poor.

LURIE: Wait a minute. Were you poor by standards in Europe or by standards
in the United States?

CELIA: By standards in the United States.

LURIE: What about standards in Europe?

CELIA: In Europe, we were middle class. We wouldn't be poor, we wouldn't be
rich. In Europe they have rich and poor, but we were in the middle. We
weren't real poor, and we weren't rich.

LURIE: What did your family do?

CELIA: My father used to buy flax that they make linen in the fall of the
year. In the summer he used to buy all kinds of cherries and all kinds of
berries in the Black Forest. They would ship the foods to Germany and also
some to Russia. That was our living. That was what we depended on for
living. It was a little town, but it was very beautiful. It was right on
the Memo that emptied out in the ocean.

LURIE: The Memo River.

CELIA: Yes. And we were right where the Black Forest starts. In the
summertime the young girls used to go with all the women to pick all kinds 
of berries blueberries, red berries, strawberries, all kinds of wild berries.

LURIE: Gooseberries?

CELIA: Yes. All of those berries, and that used to be shipped away to the
factories, or the canneries. The country was just beautiful. In the
wintertime it would freeze up, and we were right across from a city that
was called Yulbury. It was a big city of about 125,000 population. and in
the wintertime it would freeze up solid, and it would be just like one
city. It would be beautiful, but it was very cold.

LURIE: How did you get back and forth from city to city?

CELIA: Well, in the summertime we used to go by boat, small boat. In the
wintertime we used to go with sleigh, or we could even walk across. It was
that close.

LURIE: Did your family, in addition, own property in the form of land?

CELIA: They had a little land, yes. We had big orchards, but not much land.
They didn't let you have too much land.

LURIE: Who didn't let you have too much land?

CELIA: The government.

LURIE: Why? Because you were Jewish?

CELIA: Yes. But, we did have a little land. Dorsha Fatha, which was my
brother, he had quite a little bit of land. But, we made our living that way 
and we were very comfortable. I can say we weren't real poor, and we weren't 
rich. We just lived.

LURIE: What did the house look like?

CELIA: The houses were small, but they had a strong roof that was built
with logs and the inside was nicely finished with cement and plaster.

LURIE: Were they hard floors or were they hard-packed dirt floors?

CELIA: It was floors, but it wasn't dirt, no. It was floors.

LURIE: It had an actual floor.

CELIA: Yes, but not dirt.

LURIE: And whitewash outside?

CELIA: Yes. And, if there was ever a fire, it was just too bad.

LURIE: That was it.

CELIA: Yes. And it was real cute as it could be. It was like a forest in
the back the whole little town was surrounded by beautiful trees and lakes
and water. In the back came like a waterfall, just water would come over.
Now, where that water came from, don't ask me I really don't know. Then, we
had the priest who lived there. The priest, of course, lived like a king.
They had everything.

LURIE: The rest of the population was generally Catholic, then?

CELIA: Yes, mostly Catholic.

LURIE: How many Jewish families altogether?

CELIA: Well, I think there were about 50, not just 26. There were quite a
few Jewish families living there.

LURIE: And a lot of them were sort of interrelated through marriages?

CELIA: Yes, quite a bit related. Then we had a little town like Shudach. If
somebody passed away or something, they had to take them to Shudach.

LURIE: You had your own synagogue in your little town, Shevena?

CELIA: Oh, yes. We had a synagogue.

LURIE: You had your own rabbi, too?

CELIA: Oh, yes. We had a rabbi, we had a synagogue, sure. We had a nice
cool house. But, in the wintertime, half of the kids could not get up to
the school, because the school was on a hill. When it snowed, it would
freeze over, so you couldn't make it over to the schoolhouse. Or half of
the time when you got to school you couldn't stay in school because it was
so cold. We didn't have any heating.

LURIE: No heating.

CELIA: No.

LURIE: And no heating in the house, either?

CELIA: We used to have an oven, stove, there. Yes, we did,

LURIE: But no electricity in the house. All with candles and lamps.

CELIA: Yes.

LURIE: There are lots of questions I want to ask now. Was the
school just like a cheder, for just Jewish children?

CELIA: No, no. It was a public school, but they had a cheder, too.

LURIE: Boys and girls both went to public school?

CELIA: Yes.

LURIE: Was a lot of your time spent with obtaining food and preparing food
and always getting ready for meals, as far as the women were concerned?

CELIA: Not exactly. They had better things to do, you know.

LURIE: But you did spend a lot of time as far as, you know, making your own
bread...

CELIA: Well, sure. All of that. You didn't go to the store and find
prepared food, especially when you had babies. You used to cook everything
for the babies sterilize the milk and do everything. You don't do it like
they do now.

LURIE: You had your own cows and milked your cows?

CELIA: Yes. We used to have our own cows. We used to make our butter and
cheese and everything. In the wintertime, in the ____________here, we used
to have a lot of sheep and they would smoke them and they would make a lot
of sausage. They did a lot of work to prepare food over there, which we
don't do here. They used to make sausage and they used to have a lot of
geese, and they used to smoke geese. That was really our main food in the
wintertime. That's the only kind of meat we had. In the summertime we used
to have a lot of fish, because the Memo had beautiful fish and they used to
have all kinds of -

LAMAR: Sturgeon.

LURIE: Sturgeon. That's where caviar comes from.

CELIA: And we used to have mushrooms in that forest. They used to have the
finest little yellow mushrooms that they used to bring in baskets - the
women. A lot of it was shipped to the _________, and a lot remained in town. 
In the summertime they had every kind of vegetable that they can raise over 
there. So, really, the living wasn't bad. We didn't have any luxuries and,
actually, in summer we all went barefooted because who would have shoes. In
the wintertime, we wore shoes because it was too cold.

LURIE: Was most of your clothing made by you?

CELIA: Yes.

LURIE: Very little was store purchased, right?

CELIA: Yes. It was mostly made.

LURIE: My mother has told me stories about the goose feathers that you used
to make the pillows.

CELIA: My mother used to have a little home set up, and it had all ladies.
She'd pay them and give them lunch and pay them a quarter a day and they
would pick the goose feathers up on a stand. About 15 old ladies would be
in that little room, and they world pick the feathers, you see.

LURIE: And the mattresses were also ...

CELIA: The mattresses were made ... (tape interrupted) ... but the pillows
were made out of fabric and also the down that you cover yourself with.

LURIE: The down quilt?

CELIA: Down quilts were made out of feathers. So, you were plenty
comfortable and warm. They would have a lot of cucumbers, and they would
pickle a lot of stuff, and they'd put up a lot of preserves. We ate very
well there. The food was very good. We used to make a lot of cabbage. My
husband right now would like to get some of that food - 60 years later. You
can't get the food like you used to. So, we really didn't suffer with
anything. We were very comfortable in our way. Not luxuries, but
___________.

LURIE: My mother always used to tease my father, because he lived in
Germany. Any time he wanted anything good to eat __________, because the 
people had plenty of meat and more food to eat than he did.

CELIA: Yes. Well, I'll tell you - my sister, Esther, was more of a business
lady. She wasn't like your aunt and my sister, Shana. She was the
housekeeper for the whole family.

LURIE: Shana was?

CELIA: Yes.

LURIE: Whose mother was she?

CELIA: You met Rachel.

LURIE: She's Rachel's mother?

CELIA: She's Rachel's mother. You didn't meet any of their sons because
they were all in Israel.

LURIE: Right. And Alter's mother and ________ mother?

CELIA: Yes. So, she was the housekeeper. She always came - in the
wintertime - I've got to tell you that - this sister of mine had a basement 
that was twice as big as this room and the basement was dug out maybe, I 
don't know, how many feet deep. They would come to the ice in the river 
___________ and the _____ was twice as big as this chair _________ and it 
would fill that basement with those blocks of ice and then they would ______ 
over like the stuff that comes out of the flax. You can't imagine what flax 
looks like . It looks more like...

LAMAR: A ______.

CELIA: Like a______; like a _________. By the time all of that stuff comes
out it's just like a fine silk.

LURIE: Long fibers.

CELIA: Yes, long fibers that they make the finest linen and everything.
That's what they raise over there, instead of like raising cotton here. They 
raise flax over there. They used to have seeds that came off the flax - they 
call them flax seeds - and that would make the finest kind of ________ , from
the flax seed. They would take that straw, that fine stuff, and spread it 
over the ice and they would pull water out on the ice and it would become one 
solid piece of ice that would last all summer long. Everybody in town could 
get ice from that cellar and everybody -- milk and all kinds of stuff was set
out there because that was the only ice we had.

LURIE: That lasted for the entire summer?CELIA: The whole summer.

LURIE: In the winter you went back and replaced it with more ice.

CELIA: Then the next winter, when the ice was real thick, solid, that's
when they filled it up.

LURIE: Did you have a smokehouse, too, where you kept ...

CELIA: Yes. We had a big smokehouse. We smoked all geese and lamb and made
sausage and all kinds of stuff.

LURIE: And every family had their own, or was it a community type project?

CELIA: One of them was a community, but we always had our own, just our
family. Also, my sister, Shana, she was _______.

LURIE: You went to school, actually yourself, in Sheldena?

CELIA: Yes, in Sheldena. Then, half the time you couldn't go in the
wintertime because you couldn't climb up the hill. It was just a solid piece 
of ice. They didn't do nothing about it. Some of the kids couldn't get up 
there. If you got there the teacher used to send you home because you 
couldn't stand the cold. They don't do things like they do in this country,

LURIE: What about, as a child growing up, was your life mostly associated
with your own family? Did you play with the gentile kids in town?

CELIA: Yes. Oh, yes. We had a lot of gentile friends.

LURIE: Do you remember any bad experiences as far as your being Jewish and
their not being Jewish?

CELIA: Well, the only thing was, when they got mad at us, they would say
that the Jews killed Christ. That was the only thing we used to have fights 
about.

LURIE: Around Passover time was the worst time, wasn't it?

CELIA: No, just anytime. The kids would get mad at you, and they'd say that
you killed Christ. But the kids were very nice, we used to play, go to dances
and have a real nice time with them.

LURIE: But there was always that distinction made.

CELIA: Yes.

LURIE: What about your family? Was a lot of your time spent on Friday
getting ready for Shabbos?

CELIA: Oh, yes, sure.

LUREE: What kinds of special things were done? What do you mean? Was
special bread made?

CELIA: Well, we had bread, we had challa, we had liver, we had chicken,
everything. Various things, like you cook here, you know.

LURIE: Did you come from a real Orthodox home where everything had to be
finished absolutely before sundown?

CELIA: Yes. Everybody lived that way, honey. You don't cook on Saturdays,
honey. We used to have a cholent that we prepared Friday and that's what we
ate Saturday.

LURIE: And somebody would light the candles?

CELIA: Yes. That's _______. _________ you can do that, but in my time
they ________.

LURIE: Sure. I think that's interesting because it's something you wouldn't
ordinarily know about unless you know somebody who was raised in Europe.
When did you first get the idea of coming to the United States?

CELIA: When my sister sent me $50. They sent me $50. With the $50 1 left
Shelvena, went to Hamburg _________ and they put me on the boat in
Hamburg.

LURIE: I understood that Lithuania had no quota for immigrants to come
over.

CELIA: Lithuania had it more than anybody else. In Germany __________

LURIE: Oh, I see. Oh, that's right. So, you had no problem getting papers
or anything to come to the United States.

CELIA: No. When I was coming, there wasn't that many people that tried to
get in.

LURIE: And you came when?

CELIA: 1910, late.

LURIE: Late in 1910.

CELIA: Yes, in September.

LURIE: And who came with you?

CELIA: Well, Pauline and Ida.

LURIE: Ida -- what was her name, Hisch?

CELIA: _________.

LURIE: And Pauline?

CELIA: Pauline Feldman.

LURIE: How was it that you managed to get passage on that particular boat?
Who made the arrangements for you?

CELIA: Well, my brother made arrangements. My folks made arrangements. What
was the name of the boat, the Hanover?

LAMAR: It was -

CELIA: Hanover. Yes, we came over on the Hanover the same week. There was
more than one boat, you know. We came to Galveston - so did you come to
Galveston? Didn't you come to Galveston, or did you come to New York? To
Galveston?

LAMAR: Yes.

CELIA: In Galveston you have to get a train to come to El Paso.

LURIE: How come all the people from Sheldena all came to the El Paso area?
Why to El Paso? Why not to New York, or Chicago?

CELIA: Because they already had somebody there from that little town. In
the first place, they were related - let's put it that way. The Goodmans
and the _____ and all the others, the Levys, they were all related. They
all went there. My mother's folks and my father's folks never got along in
_______, because my mother's folks were supposed to be the somebody, you 
know, and my father's folks were just the regular one of the _______. They 
were good people. So, all of my mother's folks did not come to El Paso. 
They were in Detroit and New York. They're mostly all in Detroit.

LURIE: That's why we have _______ in Detroit.

CELIA: Yes. It's my mother's brother's children that are all in Detroit.

LURIE: What was their family name?

CELIA: Their name is Bolin.

LURIE: Was that your mother's maiden name?

CELIA: No_______ But, in Detroit they're Bolins. This uncle of mine that
went over there, my mother's brother, had four daughters and four sons.
They are all living in Detroit, although one died. They are all very
wealthy and very fine people.

LURIE: And that was your mother's -

CELIA: My mother's brother's children. My father's family all congregated
in El Paso. They didn't go any other place.

LURIE: Why? I've always wondered why.

CELIA: I don't know. Well, because I think it was easier for them to go
where they already had family. At that time, so many, many years ago, the
country - listen, my father was here in 1904 or 1903. He came to New York
and spent a whole year -- that was before I was born - and thought maybe he
would move to this country. He fooled around for nine months, a year, and
came back home and decided to stay home.

LURIE: I remember hearing that story from my dad. "If he had come and
stayed, ah ha, wouldn't we all be wealthy because he came so much ahead of 
everybody else. But he didn't like it."

CELIA: It wasn't what he thought it would be.

LURIE: No. He didn't see anything he liked here, so he went back.

CELIA: Then, a year later I was born.

LURIE: In 1910 you finally did come, and you came to Galveston. Then your
family made the arrangements for you to take the train from Galveston to El
Paso.

CELIA: Yes. And that's how we came to El Paso.

LURIE: Then when you came to El Paso where did you live?

CELIA: Then I _________. I was a greenhorn, I didn't speak the language,
and I stayed first with my sister, Gertie, and that didn't work out. So, I
went and stayed with my sister, Rae, and_________ . She had two youngsters
and expected another one. She had boarders and roomers. I was too young to
work, so I didn't know where to go and get a job. So, finally, after I was
there about a year, I got a job in the Boston Store. _______ they all had a
place in the Boston Store.

LURIE: Who ran the Boston Store?

CELIA: Well, there were people by the name of Stoleroff.

LURIE: Stoleroff?

CELIA: Yes. They always gave a job to the greenhorns. After I was living
with my sister, you know, I couldn't talk English. I tried to talk, and I 
had quite a hard time. For about six months I couldn't turn my tongue over 
to say something in English. Finally, I tried, and I said, "Whatever I say 
I'm going to say." I'll forget how to_______ talk. There was no one to talk
to and I couldn't talk English, so I started learning. Finally, I got this 
job and I worked there for I don't know how many years. I got the basement 
and all _______ and they paid me $4 a week to be there at 7:00 in the 
morning and sometimes on Saturday nights be there till I 1:00; an hour for 
lunch, for $4 a week - not an hour, but a week. Of course, after I stayed 
there for about a year and a half in the basement ___________. Then I would 
stay every Saturday night until 12:00 and Mr. and Mrs. _________ would bring 
me home, because I was already a cashier. I worked myself up.

LURIE: So, by this time you already knew English then.

CELIA: Yes, I knew English.

LURIE: Or Spanish.

CELIA: I never knew Spanish.

LURIE: No?

CELIA: And I was with Mexican people - I don't know how ... Anyway, I
stayed there for I don't know how long, and then I got a job at the White 
House, and that was really something. At the White House job I was like a 
queen. I never knew I could get that much money. And I never had to see the
merchandise. All I saw were the tickets and the money. I worked myself up
like that.

LUREE: That's great.

CELIA: So, then I got married to this guy, and that was it.

LURIE: You two met in El Paso?

CELIA: Yes. We met in El Paso, while the war was going on.

LURIE: Let's backtrack a little bit again. I always wonder, you know, being
from a nice Jewish family - you don't leave home when you're 15.

CELIA: Yes, well, I did.

LURIE: I know, but what were the thoughts that were going ...

CELIA: Well, I cried all the time almost out of __________.

LURIE: But, I mean, everybody seemed to leave without even thinking about
it very much.

CELIA: I wasn't thinking, honey, I was so anxious to get away from there,
and then, when I got away from there, I found out what a beautiful little
place we did live.

LURIE: Then it seemed better to you?

CELIA: Yes. So, I cried all the time.

LURIE: And Aunt Ida and Aunt Pauline, too, all three of you were...

CELIA: No, no. In Galveston, when we got there - and we got there early,
about two in the morning - and by eight nobody was doing anything about it,
and ten, nothing, so, finally, a guy came up to us and asked us our names
and we told him. He says, "Well, if we haven't heard anything from your
relatives or anything, you can't get off of the boat." So, we had to stay
overnight.

LURIE: On the boat?

CELIA: Yes. So, Ida was going to jump in the ocean. She wasn't going to go
back. And I wished that I could go back. I wanted to go back so bad, you have
no idea.

LURIE: What about your parents? They didn't seem to have as many qualms
then as parents do today, or in my time, about letting a girl go off to a ...

CELIA: Well, they knew that I had two sisters and that they'll take care of
me, you know what I mean. It wasn't like I was going to just go away in a 
place where nobody knew me. They were expecting me, so they took care of me.

LURIE: Everybody sort of did this, didn't they? I mean, one would come
across and sort of get established and have a little bit of savings and send 
money back, right?

CELIA: That's right.

LURIE: After you left, then who came after you?

CELIA: Well, Ethel.

LURIE: Then Ethel came, didn't she?

CELIA: Yes.

LURIE: She didn't come until quite a bit later, did she?

CELIA: Ethel came very much later. Ethel came with Carl.

LURIE: In what, 1929?

CELIA: 1929, they came.

LURIE: Okay, so, now we're at the point of time that you're in El Paso and
you've already met Uncle Lamar. Do you remember when you first met Uncle
Lamar?

CELIA: Oh. We met in a shul _______ . . . Saturday night you were coming
to eat ______ Gertie and Herbert invited you __________ for your
keeper or something

LAMAR: So I ate and I was...

LURIE: And that was in a shul in El Paso?

CELIA: __________ -- the way he came to this country.

LURIE: Well, that's Uncle Lamar's story. So, we'll let him tell his story,
okay?

CELIA: Tell when you came and nobody met you. Go ahead.

LURIE: Uncle Lamar, I'd like a little background from you, too, as far as
where did you live? Where were you born and raised in Europe in
relationship to Sheldena?

LAMAR: I raised myself I was five years old when my dad passed away at the
age of 33. From then on, there were eight of us Luckily, we had some _____

(Rest of tape unintelligible)


		[end of transcript]