Lawrence and Sylvia Polan Weintraub provide background about their parents and grandparents, primarily their activities after they arrived in the United States from Eastern Europe. Sylvia was born and raised in Mullins, South Carolina. Her father had moved to Mullins from Baltimore to manage a store. Her mother, a Levin of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, joined him after they married. Sylvia describes how the family kept kosher in a small southern town, where she and her sister endured antisemitic taunts from schoolmates. Her family traveled to Dillon, South Carolina, for services and Sunday school lessons. Larry was born and raised in Brooklyn where his father and uncle manufactured ladies’ blouses. After serving in the army during World War II, Larry moved to Walterboro to join his maternal uncle, Harry Zahl, who ran a wholesale business. Larry worked for Harry as a traveling salesman, and it was on his route through Mullins that he met Sylvia, working in her father’s store. The couple married in 1947 and lived briefly in Petersburg, Virginia, before returning to South Carolina. They raised their two children in Timmonsville and were members of Temple Beth Israel in Florence.
Marion Hornik discusses his family history and growing up in Charleston, South Carolina. His father, Morris, born in 1863, left his hometown of Jaroslaw, Austria-Hungary, now Poland, when he was fourteen years old. He worked in London, England, and New York City before moving to Bonneau, South Carolina, where, at eighteen, he took a job in Mr. Nagel’s country store. Eventually he moved to Charleston, married his first wife, Julia Dessauer, and, in 1886, opened a clothing store on King Street. In 1893 Morris switched to selling wholesale goods from his new business on Meeting Street, Hornik’s Bargain House (later he changed the name to M. Hornik & Company). Julia died five years later, leaving Morris with three children. He remarried after a few years, this time to Rebecca Klein of Walterboro, South Carolina. Tragedy struck again in 1915 when Rebecca died. Morris brought his sister Rosa to the United States to help him with John and Marion, his two young sons by Rebecca. The Horniks were members of the Reform temple Kahal Kadosh Beth Elohim (KKBE). Marion attended Porter Military Academy and graduated from the College of Charleston in 1929. He worked on oil tankers during summer breaks and, after college, he worked for an Atlanta company as a traveling salesman. In 1934 his father requested he return to Charleston to help with the family’s wholesale business. When Morris died three years later, Marion and John became partners in the business. Marion recalls his mother’s father and brother who ran Klein’s Drugstore in Walterboro, and discusses the tendency, in recent years, toward more traditional services at KKBE. Note: the transcript contains additions and corrections made by Marion’s wife, Ruth, during proofing. For related material, see HF5429 .H67 1907 and Mss. 1034-097 in Special Collections, Addlestone Library, College of Charleston.