In the fall of 1978, a group of students in LING560 began a study of the Jewish community in South Philadelphia. This was not the stable neighborhood of the Irish, Italian or Polish communities, where three or four generations lived side by side. Most of the second or third generation Jews had moved out to the northeast or to Philadelphia suburbs, and the results of the study were focused on first-generation Jews whose first language was Yiddish. The interviews were strongly focused on the vibrant past of this community, and the period when every part of daily life was immersed in Jewish institutions and Jewish culture. One member of the group, Rakhmiel Peltz, went on to publish an ethnographic study of the South Philadelphia Jewish community (From Immigrant to Ethnic Culture: American Yiddish in South Philadelphia, 1998), which may provide us with background information for the epic narrative of this chapter.

In October of 1978, Ruth Sella interviewed Rose Norman, 69 years old, in her South Philadelphia home. Rose was eager to talk about the history of the neighborhood and its prominent families. One of these was the Bernstein family. An excerpt from her description will give an idea of the epic sweep of her didactic style, establishing names and places of the leading personnel to educate her audience on the most important facts.