Jewish Heritage Collection: Oral History Interview with Conie Spigel Ferguson
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- Title:
- Jewish Heritage Collection: Oral History Interview with Conie Spigel Ferguson
- Date:
- 1995
- Interviewee:
- Ferguson, Conie Spigel, 1951-2012
- Description:
- Conie Spigel Ferguson was born and raised in Spartanburg, South Carolina, the daughter of Geneva Fulk and Julian Spigel. She talks about her great-uncle Joel Spigel and her grandfather David Manuel Spigel of Prussia, who immigrated to the United States in the late 1800s. The brothers, who were jewelers, lived for a time in the Newberry-Columbia area, where David met and married Theresa “Daisy” Mittle. The Spigels, Joel included, moved to Spartanburg in 1903, where they opened a jewelry store. Conie’s father, Julian Spigel, was pushed to go to medical school by his parents. He met Geneva at a hospital in North Carolina where she was working as a nurse. Geneva came from a family of Moravians and was expected to leave school before completing her education to work on the family farm. However, she left home, took a job and a room with another family, graduated from high school, and earned a nursing degree. She married Julian in 1941, and they moved to Texas where Julian, an M.D., worked at a hospital before being called home to Spartanburg by his father in 1947, shortly after Conie’s brother, Joel David, was born. Julian helped out with the family jewelry business and took over after David Spigel’s death in 1949. He did not work again in medicine. Although Geneva did not convert to Judaism, she raised Joel and Conie in a Jewish household, insofar as they observed all the holidays. The children attended Sunday school, and Geneva was active in the B’nai Israel Sisterhood and B’nai B’rith. As the daughter of a gentile mother, Conie discusses how she was received by the rabbi and members of the temple. She recalls Rabbi Max Stauber who was hired in 1955 and served the congregation for nearly 30 years, noting that he was “like a second father” to her. The interviewee describes her devotion to Jewish religious observance and what she values in a rabbi. She relates incidences of antisemitism she experienced while in secondary school and at Spartanburg Junior College (now Spartanburg Methodist College). Conie responds to questions about race relations in Spartanburg, and reports that she never witnessed any conflicts between black and white students in her high school.
- Collection Title:
- Jewish Heritage Collection Oral Histories
- Contributing Institution:
- College of Charleston Libraries
- Media Type:
- Oral Histories
- Preferred Citation:
- Conie Spigel Ferguson, audio interview by Dale Rosengarten and Klyde Robinson, 10 January 1995, Mss 1035-002, Special Collections, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA.
- Personal or Corporate Subject:
- Temple B’nai Israel (Spartanburg, S.C.)
- Topical Subject:
- Jews--Spartanburg--South Carolina--Interviews, Jewish merchants--Spartanburg--South Carolina--History, Jews--Spartanburg--South Carolina--Religious life, Antisemitism--Spartanburg--South Carolina--History, Race relations--Spartanburg--South Carolina, Moravian women--North Carolina
- Geographic Subject:
- South Carolina
- S.C. County:
- Spartanburg County (S.C.)
- Language:
- English
- Shelving Locator:
- Mss 1035-002
- Date Digital:
- 2015-12-23
- Digitization Specifications:
- Mp3 derivative audio created with Audacity software. Archival masters are wav files.
- Internet Media Type:
- audio/mpeg
- Copyright Status Statement:
- Copyright © Jewish Heritage Collection
- Access Statement:
- All rights reserved.
- Access Information:
- For more information, contact Special Collections, College of Charleston Libraries, 66 George Street, Charleston SC 29424.
- Admin ID:
- 220839
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