Instant Access To 100,000+ Essays!

Neither my farther nor any of our family ever took part in the Jewish community…. I never got used to being singled out in that way…. I’m proud of my ancestors and heritage. I’ve never practiced the Jewish faith or seen myself or our family as primarily of the Jewish culture. In the jargon of today’s sociologists we’ve been assimilated. We’re Americans. -Barry Goldwater We American Jews have prided ourselves on being the people who went from Poland to polo in three generations. - Egon Mayer Someone a long time ago told me that opening a paper with a story drew the reader’s attention better then anything. So let me tell you a story, my story. My story begins over a hundred years ago when in 1897 my great-grandfather Jacob Silverstein came over from Lithuania and in 1901 when my great-grandmother Leah came over from Russia. Both came here to escape the oppression and persecution that they were experiencing because they were Jews. They grew up in New York City, met, married and had four children. One of these children was my grandmother Harriet Julia Silverstein. She grew up in a home and neighborhood full of Jewish culture and religion; and in a society full of Jewish hate. Years later