..inte: Sol Mallin ..intr: Dorothy Pickelner ..da: 1984 ..cp: 1995.019.001 Sam, Max and Sol Mallin, Prescott, Arizona 1939 ..ca: ..ftxt: An Interview with Sol Mallin September 9, 1984 Transcriptionist: Carol Ruttan Interviewer: Dorothy Pickelner Arizona Jewish Historical Society LOG FOR SOL MALLIN INTERVIEW Pages 1 Why and when he came to Prescott. 1- 3 Discusses other Jewish families there at the time. Describes services and who came. 4 How the Mallin brothers, Sam, Sol and Max, established a scrap metal business in Prescott. 5 Closing of the gold mines and other mines and how they helped the Mallin brothers. 6- 7 Discusses his marriage to Sylvia who came from New York to Prescott in 1936, and her activities for the Jewish community, i.e., Hadassah, Sunday School, holidays. 7- 9 Attitude of the community to this Jewish family; integration into Prescott life; their honorable reputation. 10-11 War activities: Inclusion in U.J.A. efforts; visits to Jewish group by Dr. Joe Bank, Harvey Rosensweig and others for help in the Welfare Fund; contributions from non-Jews. 12-14 Discusses the foundry business in Prescott; purchased from Ralph Herbst. 14 Discusses the Mallin parents, their visits to Prescott, making borscht. 15-16 Other characters: Mr. Silverman (Crown King Mine); Al Pessin (engineer - Iron King mine). Discusses lead and zinc mines in Humboldt. 17 Talks about children, Bruce and Judy, their growing up in Prescott, school experience. 17-18 Reasons for leaving Prescott in 1951 to move to Phoenix were economic reasons and Bruce had to prepare for Bar Mitzvah. 18-19 What happened to the Prescott business. 19-21 Discusses overall Prescott experience. Sol Mallin Interview This is Dorothy Pickelner in an interview with Mr. Sol Mallin for the Arizona Jewish Historical Society. The date is September 9th of 1984. We are at Mr. Sol Mallin's home in Phoenix, Arizona and we're hoping this morning to talk about old Prescott since this was his territory for a long time. PICKELNER: Good morning, Mr. Mallin. MALLIN: Good morning, Dorothy. PICKELNER: We are very much interested in the fact that there was a Jewish immigration so to speak to Prescott at such and early time. Would you please fill us in on the details of when you came to Prescott and why you came to Prescott. MALLIN: Thank you, Dorothy. I shall be very glad to do that. Before I do I would like to say this. I am very appreciative that they asked you to interview me. You have a certain spell over me. With you present I find it very easy and comfortable to participate in conversation. You seem to have that capacity I know with everybody else and especially with me. PICKELNER: Thank you. MALLIN: The truth comes very easy. The history of the Jewish people in Prescott as far as I'm concerned begins with me in 1936. My brothers and I, when we came to Prescott in '36, we found quite a few Jewish families but they were on the verge of being lost and integrated and there was considerable intermarriage. There's one party I remember very well, Mr. Julius Jacoby, who was the barber in the old St. Michael Hotel on the corner of Whiskey Row and Gurley. Rumor had it he had been in the barber shop 50 years prior to our arrival, so he wasn't too young a gentleman when we got there. And there were the Dreyer brothers; the older one was Sam Dreyer. He was a very interesting gentleman; he had a long, flowing curly white mustache and he was the shortest of the three brothers. Then came Frank Dreyer and his brother Bob, the youngest. They were all in the grocery business and I don't know to what extent they competed but at the end of the day, 5:30 or 6:00 every day you could see them marching down somewhat hand in hand down Whiskey Row and get into the favorite bar and they would set up three drinks for them and I think they drank straight whiskey. I joined them at one time and it's really not my favorite drink but participated. They were willing to participate. Their families were more involved in Yiddish Keit; they had some relations here in Phoenix. I just can't recall their name but in conversation I think it will come back and if I blurt out a name you'll know what reference it has. We didn't start the community. It was somewhat in evidence but not too active. There was the Scheminowski family, also two brothers who had a general store in Whipple, which is the Veterans Administration adjoining Prescott, Veterans Hospital. We found quite a few Jewish patients who were in the first World War; some were quite old and abandoned, so to speak. When we became acquainted around town we searched these out; they came to Jewish holidays, we made an effort to bring into the Services those who wanted to come and we persuaded most of them for more reasons than just to be together with Jewish people. We needed help for a minyan; so everybody counted. on several occasions even Mr. Morris Goldwater, who was Barry's uncle, dropped in to our services. We held our services in the Monday club. All the churches and active groups in Prescott, whom we got to know, were willing to cooperate, they were very friendly, outgoing. As a family, my wife and I, we were invited to many occasions, whether it was for the purpose to inoculate us with the Christian theology, but we went and on occasions we were in every church for services. We participated in our own way. When the time came for them to kneel we maintained an honorable position without kneeling. Such was the case in our experience in Prescott with our neighbors. PICKELNER: That's most interesting. I'm glad you introduced us to the people who were there before you. I'm most interested of course in hearing that Mr. Morris Goldwater occasionally met with you, which is an interesting fact. Now, how in the world did you and your brothers ever find Prescott, Arizona in 1936? Where did you come from? MALLIN: That's easily explained. The youngest of the three brothers, Max and Sam, I was going to school in New York City, City College, and along came a young lady whose name I wanted to change from Rubinowitz to Mallin and so we got to know each other in school. Before I made a definite decision about changing that name, I thought I would establish myself in a better capacity. I had this bit of introduction to accounting in City College, a subject I dearly disliked. During that time my brother Sam, the oldest of us here, left New York and he went out, took a mattress on top of his four cylinder Chevy, across 66 with the rest of the gentlemen from Grapes of Wrath and he found his way into Los Angeles. There he became acquainted with people in the scrap business, the Berg family for whom he traveled in the southwestern part of the country; New Mexico into Gallup into most of Arizona; a little bit of Southern California. This job was pretty good in those days. They were paid $35 or $45 a week and had the use of a company car, so when I came out I went along with him as his guest to see the country which I liked very much. Being born in Europe in a very small community, starting with a background of farm life, it wasn't difficult for us to accommodate our life to areas of this nature in small communities, although I lived in New York from the age of 6 to 20 in New York City. But the change wasn't at all difficult. We traveled most of Arizona several times and we sort of liked Prescott. We began to talk about opening a business there and why did we pick Prescott? I think that was one of your questions. Because money was a very scarce article and to start a business of that nature in the big city, competition was difficult to buck and the money needed for machinery and equipment was not available. Here we could start it on a sous, so to speak. PICKELNER: Where did you find material; where did you find metals for your business? MALLIN: Actually, I knew very little and it was really the first time I was ever in a truck in my life when we started in Prescott. My brothers borrowed some money from the bank and his insurance policy in the figure of some $750, half of which was our working capital; for the other part we bought a new truck and we went to work. The metal that you asked about, much of it comes in from local automobile wrecking yards and some households. But the bulk of it came from the mines around Prescott. At that time copper mining was going pretty good; Phelps Dodge was in Jerome and they employed 2,500 to 3,000 people. It was a big industry. Also, the gold mines around Prescott were in the phase of closing out. Gold was eliminated from the profitable mining because of the price. I wish we could buy it now for $35 an ounce like President Roosevelt, who I believe, set the price. So we searched the mines; we checked them out through the recording offices. From what mines there were we bought metal from the owners who were distributed all over the United States; we communicated with them. When we developed a following many came to us to sell, because we worked in a very diligent and businesslike manner. We indicated what was there, what material we needed for our business. When they were paid, they were paid and nothing else but that which we indicated was bought and removed; nothing of any consequence was disturbed. Some people in our business, I hate to say, did not enjoy a reputation of that type and we didn't want to be embarrassed or cause any embarrassment. PICKELNER By the way, when did Sylvia come with you - as soon as you were married? MALLIN: Yes, poor girl. I took her out of the heart of New York City and transported her to this Wild West and it was pretty wild at that time. It really was. We were married in June of 1936 and in August or September we were in Prescott. She hasn't been talking to me ever since, but we make up once in a while. She herself lent a lot to the life of Jewish existence in Prescott. She started the first and the smallest Hadassah chapter in Prescott. By special dispensation from the New York office Prescott was given a charter. Of course, she had to conscript the help of some girls who were interested in the Jewish faith or had married Jews, and they reawakened a certain spirit and joined, and she was given credit for membership. That's why she had a Hadassah chapter. They met their quotas; they used to have sales and activities. All the churches invited them to participate and gave them their facilities to hold their activities. I remember they had some signs for a Hadassah bingo game. They had a sign up in the Valley National Bank building on the corner and it said Hadassah bingo game. I was listening to a couple of native sweet old ladies and one says, "Hadassah, Hadassah" they called it in their own manner and the other one says, "That must be some Indian tribe that moved in here from up north." So the Indians were the Jewish Hadassah girls who did their share. Then she started a little school for the Jewish children that were in our area. When the war started we had an influx of quite a few Jewish people. Jewish doctors and their families came in from the west coast. They were moving in, patients and such, because of fear of war. There were a few Jewish miners in the mines near Prescott engineers. There were about five or six children eligible for some Jewish education, and Sylvia taught them. It developed into a beginning, a nucleus of some Jewish active life. PICKELNER: That is most interesting. We certainly are interested that Sylvia did all that. Can you tell us whether you were comfortable in Prescott; whether you were well received? You've told us something about it. But did you feel anti-Semitism, or were the natives willing to cooperate? MALLIN: Dorothy, that's a good question. I don't know to what degree the Jewish people are ever received with open arms. Much depends, I guess, on our activity, our behavior. I'm not ashamed to tell you that many hesitated -- they avoided us. I've heard some very disparaging remarks about Jews; for example, I was a volunteer in the Prescott Fire Department for many years. I think it was the first time many of the volunteers had words with a Jew, or had seen a Jew. One gentleman in particular used to call me by only one name, "Hey, Jew". It was not a very comfortable way for me to respond to a call of that nature. Finally, I think I established myself and I had some conversations with him - it was maybe almost more than conversation - but I established myself and he changed that. I indicated to him that I'm very proud of the name that he's given me but I also have a given name and it was Sol. At dinners and affairs we had I never participated in non-Kosher food, pig meat, so the hostesses and the hotels knew about that and I would always be served fish; something of a non-meat product. Some of it was usually a heck of a lot better than the big slimy fat pork chops that would be served. Many of the boys in jest would say, "Hey, when I come to dinner I want to sit next to Sol and be a Jew. He seems to get choice food." But that was a small portion of my Jewish experience there. As I told you before, we dealt in a very honorable way. I say that because it's true, and it is true. We have brought no shame on anybody who was affiliated with us. It got to a point where everybody came to us with their hand extended for help; we always participated; we always gave; we never sent anybody away without something in response to their plea. Word, I guess, spread and we became accepted. We were invited by every denomination to join their church as members and as Christians. One particular case I remember I asked this very fine gentleman, "Why do you want me and my brothers?" "Well, you're a very honest guy, you've got a nice reputation in town and you deal honorably and we'd like you very much for a member in my church." I said, "I'm sure you have members in church who are very honorable people. There are some people around town who are not so honorable. Why don't you go after them and see if you can help them with their problems?" Well, he sort of leaned back on his haunches, and he said, "You've got a point there, Sol." He never bothered me anymore. But it wasn't a bother. I didn't feel hurt that they invited me. Otherwise, I know what it is to get out to a strange place, in a mine, and the watchman would come out and utter a few words. In one particular mine way out of town, desolate place, I said, "Excuse me a minute," and he came out of his cabin, his little shack, with a rifle and he says, "Okay, Jew, you just turn around and get off this property before I blow your brains out." It wasn't a very pleasant reception, I can tell you that. So that was one of the ugliest indications of how we were received, but it's of no consequence. PICKELNER: How did your brothers manage, were they married when they came or were they married in Prescott? MALLIN: Well, none of them were married at that time. PICKELNER: What were their names again? MALLIN: Sam was the oldest, and Max. None of them was married then. In fact, one of them is still not married. Max is still the single bachelor. Sam was married after he came out of the Navy. He lived in Prescott with us for many years and now he's in Phoenix, retired from all our hard work. He moved down to Phoenix in 1951. PICKELNER: 1951? MALLIN: Yes, we opened a branch in Phoenix so to speak. PICKELNER: Now, what were your activities in Prescott? How did you, as families, live and participate? Were there more Jewish people moving in and making a stronger community? MALLIN: Yes, Dorothy. During the war years and maybe for about a year or so before that, and then for about five years, I call it the Golden Age of the Jewish life in Prescott. We had perhaps about 15 or 18 families and there was quite a bit of Jewish activity. We were beginning to talk about building a synagogue. We went after the Dreyers; they owned a lot of property. They were just on the verge of giving Sam especially, the oldest one, title to some property. But we waited a little too long and one of his brothers came in and put the nix on it so to speak. It was a difficult thing to accomplish something like that, but we participated in Jewish activity quite heavily. We had a United Jewish Appeal. It was started and many people from Phoenix, Dr. Joseph Bank and I think Harry Rosensweig came up a couple of times. We would get some literature, and they put us on demand for more active participation with UJA. I was asked to serve as chairman, which I did for a number of years. I recall with great pleasure that for maybe three or four or five years I would go out in the streets so to speak, in the offices, people we knew, whatever business they were in, in bars up and down Whiskey Row. For three or four years I always managed to get between $2,500 to $3,500 every year from the non-Jewish people. The response was very flattering, really. PICKELNER: It really was, because I'm sure they weren't really aware of what they were giving for, or were they? MALLIN: Good thinking there, dear. They didn't know too much about Jewish life in general and the atrocities of the war were not so well known, but they knew about Israel and going to Palestine at that time, you know how it was. We tried to explain so each one was a teaching experience for these people. In that respect actually I learned much about them and they learned I think quite a bit about us. PICKELNER: It certainly sounds as though you had a great influence in that community and I know that your name is still well known and good among them. From the time you came to the time you left there must have been a considerable change in the complexion of Prescott, or did it remain the same small community? MALLIN: Yes, there was a group that didn't want Prescott to expand and grow. God forbid if someone thought about a smokestack or some heavy industry, noise and such; which is understandable. Prescott was a retirement city really. There was quite a bit of wealth there. But the years of accomplishment was not for these people to reckon with. There were bankers and there were people retired from different parts of the world who lived there and they surely did not want any heavy development in Prescott. It's interesting. We bought a foundry in Prescott. That was our beginning in the foundry business. Ralph Herbst was a lovely gentleman, a Christian gentlemen, who owned the foundry. We used to sell him a certain product. Time went by and he was slow in paying and it came to the point where he owed us $5,000 or $6,000. Our fortune was worth more than our business. I came to see Ralph and I asked him about the chances of getting some money. Well, he was very nice, he was an honest man, but he did not have it. Business was poor, and the mines were closing up, he wasn't making much in that field. But he said to me, "Why don't you and your brothers, you're a bunch of young punks with a lot of vinegar, why don't you buy this foundry." I didn't know what he was talking about. I surely thought the man was out of his mind. I was never inside of the foundry and didn't know what it was all about. I knew very little about anything anyhow at that time. So I put my head in the office and saw the smoke there and dirt. Ralph says, "Look, I'll give you a figure and that's the way you'll get your money quick." So I called my brother Sam, who was more experienced and he came down. It didn't take us much, we walked through and looked at his books and such. The very next morning we were in the bank and we bought the foundry, the property, the accounts, the work in progress, on the condition that Ralph Herbst would stay with us. PICKELNER: How did you spell his name? MALLIN: Ralph is his first name. Herbst, H-e-r-b-s-t. A very fine gentleman. We really enjoyed knowing him. He stayed with us about a year, year and a half until we learned a little bit about it. But we went out for more business. We used to operate the foundry maybe one or two days a week. That was big doings, and I reached out in the Phoenix area. In the City of Phoenix I got some pretty good orders on bid. I was afraid on many occasions that if I got the order, my God, how are we going to deliver? But we got some good sized orders from the City of Phoenix, and we brought them back to Prescott to manufacture. We melted the iron, and we had the patterns, and the finished product was ready to be delivered. Smoke began to come out of the chimney almost every day in Prescott. That foundry in that area came to life. When we bought it, they had about two or three people that he would call back from where ever they were to help. But when we took over, in due time we had about 15 or 18 people working for us. PICKELNER: You became an important employer in the life of the city? MALLIN: Very much so. And the smoke was the more important thing, and people didn't like that. But still it was far away from the era of the EPA, so nobody bothered. But then we opened a branch in '51 in Phoenix. I came down to open it, and I established myself here. I really got on the bidding lists of the bigger cities and bigger companies - mining companies. I went for bids and got a lot of business, and we couldn't produce out of Prescott. PICKELNER Sol, where were your parents all this time that you were living in Prescott? Were they still in New York? MALLIN: They left New York and they came to live in Los Angeles. In about '41 or '42 they moved to Los Angeles. We used to visit back and forth. We used to go in for business very often to Los Angeles; in fact, that's where we did all our business, in Prescott and Los Angeles. I'll never forget. Our parents used to come in sometimes for a week or so, and we'd drive them back. My mother especially liked the environment out in the open spaces and such. We used to go picnicking quite a bit, and she participated. My daddy too. He used to become active around the place. He was in pretty good health at that time. One particular period they spent in Prescott for about ten months or a year. It was very interesting to have them there. They had their little apartment. In fact, they had the apartment above the business that you might remember, I think you were there at one time. It was right across the creek from where there was the nearest market. Mr. Jones had the market there. I'll never forget Mr. Jones. He used to say he'd never sold so many beets in his life since he's in business. Mother used to go there for marketing, and she would buy beets by the truckload. She would specialize in making borscht. There was a lot of borscht sold by my mother. They loved it. I remember Mr. Silverman who was a mining engineer. He was a very colorful figure, and he sort of appeared on the scene during the war. There were many people who tried to develop mining because the government was very ready and willing to subsidize, and he was one of them. I remember he tried to develop and reopen the old Crown King Mine. If you've never been to the Crown King area, it's still inhabited. It's got a camp there; a lot of people live there; a lot of cattle are being raised there. It's a point between Prescott and I don't know what else, but you can get there if you travel the Black Canyon Highway and you see a sign on the road that says "Crown King". If you're brave enough and you have good tires and are not worried about making some very sharp turns, steep hills and that, I would advise you to take it. Get your camera loaded with film, and you will enjoy the scenes. We visited up there a couple of times, and I'll never forget the old hotel. It is really a relic. I understand it's still in business. There was a gentleman there who ran the hotel; he must have been about seven foot tall. He was a monstrous looking man with the head of curly grayish hair, and he never seemed to smile or never had a good word for anybody. We thought we would have a drink or something in his hotel. It was open for some hard drinks and such. So we came in and stumbled over some dirt on the floor. It was a cowhide or something. I forget his name, but I think it was Tukesberry or something like that. So we said, "There's quite a bit of dirt here on the floor." Well, he didn't hesitate and he points to the corner and says, "Well, there's a broom over in that corner. You go ahead and sweep it off." And that was some of the reception we got, but they were harmless people. Mr. Silverman, who was involved in that mine for several years, was an interesting character. He seemed to be a citified man; he would appear in Prescott at the Hassayampa Hotel for dinner with his entourage of assistants and whoever. But then he disappeared. I hope he's well. Then we had Mr. Al Pessin. He's, I guess, known in Prescott yet. He was the engineer for the Iron King Mine. It was owned by the Jersey Ledge Company, and they were mining lead and zinc out of Humboldt. We got to know him. He lived in Humboldt for awhile when we first met him. Ruth, his wife, and Jimmy and his daughter -- I don't remember her name but she's married to one of the Zendel boys here in Phoenix. He's an attorney with the government, procurement or intelligence. It's interesting how Bruce and Jimmy were very good friends in Prescott, the only two Jewish kids of some consequence. They helped each other fight with the other boys and such. They'd go fishing and get into scraps. Bruce was in Vietnam and on the way home one time when he was on a trip to Tokyo, I think it was, for rest and recreation. So he stopped to see his friend Jimmy in Okinawa. So this friendship has continued in different parts of the world. Al Pessin finally got a different appointment with a mine in the Philippines, and he was gone for about 12, 15 years. We used to correspond. He retired a couple of years ago. PICKELNER: You mentioned your son Bruce, and of course we all know Dr. Bruce Mallin. But what was it like for Bruce and Judy to be born and grow up in this little town? Did they get a good education? MALLIN: Yes, they seemed to be very happy there. Education, I guess you refer to Jewish education? PICKELNER: Not necessarily. General education. MALLIN: Well, their secular education was very complete, and they enjoyed going to school there. Everybody was on very close terms. You know, everybody knew the teacher and the family and such. One of the teachers lived up the street from us, and the kids would run along and walk to school They had a full life in that of course, Sylvia helped them out with their Jewish education. She taught them to read and write Hebrew. They finally graduated from that when we moved to Phoenix in '51. PICKELNER: Why did you leave Prescott? It must be quite a story, and it must have been quite a wrench. MALLIN: Well, yes. After 14 or so years in Prescott we found that the community was not yielding enough to our needs economically and socially as far as being Jewish is concerned. It was Bar Mitzvah time for Bruce, and we were anxious for him to get some more learning than he had gotten from Sylvia, so Sylvia and the kids moved to Los Angeles for about a year and a half or so. They got some training, and the Bar Mitzvah was held in Phoenix at the Beth El. Rabbi Schechtman was the rabbi here at that time. We moved from there at about the same time, in '51, when we opened a branch of our business in Phoenix, because we wanted to expand. We were growing, and this was the nucleus of the state, and we saw the future, and we're glad we moved out. PICKELNER: What happened to your business in Prescott? Did you sell it? MALLIN: It was maintained for about a year and a half or so afterwards. My brother Sam stayed with it. Then we needed him in Phoenix; it was more important, because the demand was much greater for help in our own family. So we phased that business out in Prescott. We leased some of it for awhile there to some very fine brothers from Globe, Arizona, and they stayed for about a year. There was some situation that developed in the family, and they had to give it up. So we left it vacant, more or less abandoned, and then we finally sold it. On both sides of the street, if you remember in Prescott there were signs. PICKELNER: Mallin Brothers, Mallin Brothers Foundry. MALLIN: Yes, well, the foundry was located in another area, but on the highway also was our yard on both sides of the street by the creek, Granite Creek. It's on U.S. 89. Part of it we sold to Ford Motor Company, and the other side we sold to people who are engaged in business there yet, in the leasing of equipment and stuff like that. PICKELNER: How would you judge your Prescott experience for a new family coming to an untried area from the metropolis of New York or Los Angeles? How would you as a whole judge your experience there? MALLIN: At certain times of our lives I guess we don't weigh and measure our moves as much as we should have. In retrospect now I don't know, but it wasn't a matter of pioneering. It was more or less a necessity. Other people in our position without capital had gone through the same experience, and they weren't so scared. They made the attempts, and they started in bigger cities where the involvement was such that none of them really suffered to any extent. Perhaps we were attracted by the life there. We thought that, if children could be raised in a smaller community, it was worthwhile. I don't know that I would want to recommend it, but our life in Prescott, I myself and Sylvia who has shared it with me, we felt as if we had done something by introducing ourselves to a community that had never been involved in Jewish life. My brothers and I lived an exemplary life. We with the people; we involved ourselves in the community service; we gave to charity; we were invited, and we participated in the service clubs, the Masonic Lodge, the Elks Lodge. We lived like any other human being, which was such an eye opener to many of the people who had never been exposed to what a Jew reacts to, what he does and how he lives and how he talks to other people. They thought we had horns and two heads. I feel that was one part of the compensation. Besides, I think we made friends, very wonderful friends to this day. PICKELNER: Well, it sounds like a wonderful experience. I don't remember whether we discussed if you were able to hold services, and did you try to have services on Saturdays or just on the high holidays? MALLIN: Mostly on high holidays. On high holidays only, I should say. Very seldom did we have weekday services so to speak, Shabbat and such. But we did participate in holidays as far as ceremonial holidays. We had our parties, we had our seders, we had our Hanukkah parties and such. But we kept our finger on it at all times. It was an involvement; the community all participated. There are pictures and movies to this day of the fun we had with the children and with the adults and with each other. PICKELNER: I think you have given us a very interesting insight into an unusual Jewish experience, and I thank you, Sol. MALLIN: Dorothy, it's been my pleasure, and I hope you've understood what I've had to tell you. Again, I say I owe much to the community. There it was mostly a non-Jewish community, and here in Phoenix the reception I've gotten from the beautiful people I will always cherish. PICKELNER: Thank you. [end of transcript]