Felice Lauterstein Driesen

[Note: There is no audio associated with this interview]

Semler: Felice, you are part of an illustrious family, will you tell us about them?
DRIESEN:  First of all, Ruth, it should be very definitely noted that I am speaking now in terms of my mothers’ family; this has nothing to do with Daddy’s family. We are just going to talk about Mother’s family. My mother’s father, who was Rabbi Henry Nathan Heller, died about four to six years before I was born, so whatever I know of Grandpa Heller is to me hear-say. I was just a little girl when grandma died; I was only six. So, these are all things which I have either overheard or that I have come across. There are a few little pieces of evidence that seem to have discrepancies in them. Here is a copy, and I am going to give you the original to look at, of the article that appeared in the morning Oregonian on 1907, announcing the fact that Dr. Heller, Oakland Rabbi, has been named the new pastor of Congregation Neveh Zedek Talmud Torah. Here is this article and you can read this. It gives a history of Dr. Heller’s background and I am noting a few discrepancies in this. For instance, it says Dr. Heller was born in Pressburg, Austria-Hungary in 1862. That date has got to be wrong. I imagine that Grandma Heller was hedging on her own age when she must have given this information to somebody, because he would have had to be older than that, else it would have made him 14 at my mother’s birth. I think he wasn’t 14 then! So, we must guess that that was a wrong date. She has said here, or whoever was the one who gave this information, that for 15 or 16 generations back his forefathers have been of the rabbinical order. Well, I don’t know how many of us can trace 15 or 16 generations, but that was an interesting concept that they had anyway.

Semler: But anyway, his family had a rabbinical history.
DRIESEN: Apparently, a long line of rabbinical history. Now Rabbi Heller himself was really a highly trained musician. It goes on to say in this article that he later attended a conservatory of music in Copenhagen, Denmark, under the direction of Niels W. Gardener, and this training brought out the superb qualities of his fine tenor voice. After this he attended the University of Berlin in Germany where he graduated. He occupied the pulpit at Prague, Austria-Hungary, at Berlin and at Copenhagen. Now, it’s an interesting sidelight. I don’t know how much it means to anybody else, but my mother used to say, “Papa was an Oberkantor.” In the prestigious synagogues of Europe in those days, the Oberkantor was above the rabbi, because the rabbi would read the ordinary, mundane portions of the services, I understand, but if they had a cantor with a magnificently trained voice, he selected for himself the portions that were important, and those he sang. So, an Oberkantor was a more prestigious person to be than merely a rabbi. However, grandma didn’t like it in Copenhagen where mother was born. He was at the musical academy and rabbi- this was 100 ago, or 80, 90 years ago, which I find interesting – and so they left Denmark, and they went back to Grandma’s area, which was Austro-Hungary. She always claimed, grandmother Heller, that she was born in Vienna, that she was a Viennese. There, there were pogroms, so they decided to come to America and join my father’s brothers who were established in Philadelphia, and some of his family and their oldest son, Herman Heller, who was already a musician and living in this country, a successful musician. I’ll get to uncle Herman again later, but I think this is kind of a fun picture to have of the young Rabbi Heller and his wife, her name was Regina Fink, and that was their two-year-old baby son Herman. This picture must have been taken in 1862. Mother was born in 1888, and uncle Herman was 12 years old, that is the minimum. I am not very good at figures. 

Semler: They really are beautiful people, aren’t they!
DRIESEN:  This is hardly the Tevye, the dairyman, that one visualizes. Grandma was dripping with her clothes, and he with his beautiful silk hat which was obviously his trademark. You can see that they were people of education. Grandmother was a poetess; she spoke only German, pure German. Yiddish was never spoken in our home, although she spoke English too. She wrote magnificent poetry in German, prided herself in this. And she had a vast library of German poetry books. She adored Heinrich Heine, and these she kept with her all her life. And here is a picture that I think you might get a kick out of – of the family as they grew a little older. Here is the rabbi again, and here is the rabbi’s wife and my mother and they youngest son, and the older daughter; this is a boyfriend. That would be my uncle Richard Heller, who died many years ago. So, this is Paula and Elfriede and Richard, and this was Herman, the eldest son. He was already in America at this time. You can see that he was a great deal older than mother. He was already established here as a musician. 

Semler: And Elfriede came between your mother and Herman? 
DRIESEN: Now we’ll go on with that. This is in Sussac, I looked it up, that is in Austro-Hungary. This was their last stop, there were pogroms there, and since it was a rabbinical family, they decided they better move on to America, since grandma did not like Denmark at all. She hated it.

Semler: Why?
DRIESEN: She didn’t want to learn their terrible language, and she was cold there, and they didn’t have Viennese pastry. And they hated Germans. Grandma spoke only Deutsch. These were all highly trained musicians. Mother was a concert pianist. Elfriede was a soprano; she pursued her career all of life in music and uncle Herman pursued a career all of his life in music. Mother married later, but she still always played the piano. They look beautiful in their little velvet outfits with the pearl buttons; they were hardly refugees. They were rather nicely coiffured.

Semler: How old do you think your mother was?
DRIESEN: Mother was about 11 or 12 when she came to Philadelphia.

Semler: She was really beautiful.
DRIESEN: Wasn’t she gorgeous?

Semler: And he is darling.
DRIESEN: I can just see the face; that is a Heller face. Wasn’t she a doll, mother!

Semler: She was really beautiful.
DRIESEN: Now here is the Rabbi Dr. Nathan Heller, at the time when he came to the Congregation Neveh Zedek Talmud Torah in Portland, Oregon. He was already an older man then, that was in 1907 or 1908, when he came. After they left Europe they went to Philadelphia. I think they had a couple of little congregations in the East, Richmond, VA, I think. Then they came out to Oakland, California, and at the time of the fire in San Francisco, they came up to Portland on behalf of this congregation down there, and they hired him away. So, then they moved right after the fire up to Portland, and I think he served only for a few years. He died in 1914, I think, and I think he came here in 1907. But I have come across many people who remembered him when he was the rabbi, elderly men and sometimes elderly women would come up to me and they remembered the fact that music was very important. “I was a member of your grandfather’s choir when I was a little kid” from some old man. And this is what they remember the most about him, it was the music in the temple.

That was his life, really, his music, and was his first interest. He was the rabbi; he had his choir and as I understand he was quite a disciplinarian with his choir children. 
This is Grandma and Grandpa in later years – that grandmother of mine was a “grande dame” from the day she was born to the day she died. This is a picture of Grandma; this is the way she looked. She wasn’t dressed for the picture; this is how she dressed every day. These were her house clothes. Always much jewelry, and she changed the jewelry. She didn’t wear the same jewelry every day.

Semler: And the beading on the dress.
DRIESEN: Oh yes, all hand done, yes. There is a cute picture of Daddy. This is the house on I believe 11th and Mill, that the Rabbi Henry Nathan Heller and his wife and daughter Paula lived in this home until mother was married and grandpa died. My sister seems to remember that, I was somewhere in that area, SW 11th and Mill.

Semler:  Look at the beautiful lace curtains at the window. 
DRIESEN: That’s Mother and Dad and Grandma…the rabbi was out watering the lawn.

Semler: That’s your mother and father?
DRIESEN: Here is something that I thought was kind of interesting. In 1907 there was an Independence Day celebration with literary exercises at the Marquam Grand Theater in Portland, Oregon. The committee is all listed here, and there are some very interesting names here, like Phil Rogoway, Julius Meier, Sol Blumauer, and many other men—George Baker, Mr. Dosch from Dosch Rd. They had quite a literary exercise at the Marquam Theater, and the reason that I found this interesting is, that among the program was a solo: Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean, sung by Elfriede Heller and accompanied by his orchestra. I only have this one program, but apparently Mother and Elfriede and Uncle Herman often concertized and sometimes also with Grandpa. Mother would accompany him on the piano. Uncle Herman played the violin, Elfriede was a soprano, and Grandpa was a tenor. The four of them did some concerts. I am sorry I don’t have any kind of program or anything like that, but I did come across this in 1907, when there was a citywide celebration, and there Elfriede sang.

Semler: Did Herman Heller later leave the city?
DRIESEN: Yes, Uncle Herman moved on. I’ll just go briefly to him. He went on to San Francisco where he was the Paul Weidman of his day. Every Sunday morning at the California Theatre they had a Sunday morning concern and many old San Franciscans still remember them, Sunday morning concerns with Herman Heller conducting. 50 artists, and as I see by this program which I have here, Miss Elfriede Win, lyric soprano, was one of his artists who performed for him with an orchestra, doing a scene from Verdi’s Masked Ball I think. Uncle Herman also was the original musical director of the Warner Bros Studio at the time they began to produce sound pictures. Then he had a fight with Jack Warner, was blackballed from the industry and that’s another story altogether. Then, he was the original discoverer of magnetic recording on a steel tape. We have Uncle Herman Heller to thank for what we are doing right now.

Semler: Isn’t that interesting?
DRIESEN: When I was a youngster (I am 56) ten, or maybe even eight, my uncle used to demonstrate this to us as children. We would go down to Los Angeles and he would say, “Come on, I’ll show you what I am doing.” On a steel tape, eight band recording in those days. He was the original discoverer; he lost all his basic patents. Very interesting man. So, that’s the eldest brother. 

Then Elfriede moved also to California to pursue her career. She ended up with the Immaculate Heart Academy of Los Angeles; she was the voice director of their school, College and High School, for over 20 years. She taught the sisters their Gregorian chant, and she became almost as much a Catholic as she was a rabbi’s daughter and lived a very interesting life. She did their nativity shows at Christmas time, and their Easter shows, but this was a rabbi’s daughter. 

Semler: Now this is your sister Elfriede?
DRIESEN: That’s mother’s sister Elfriede, you see. Uncle Herman, the oldest brother, was the conductor, then came Elfriede who was the lyric soprano.

Semler: And she called herself Elfrieda Win professionally.
DRIESEN: Yes, because she married the Weinstein family. There was Eddie Weinstein, and Moe and Arthur Weinstein. We’ll stumble across them in our research with other families. She immediately changed Uncle Weinstein’s’ name to Win for theater purposes, that was the Elfriede who was here.

Semler:  It is an unusual name and I thought that probably there was that relationship.
DRIESEN: Now that was the original beginnings in the history of Rabbi Heller, his wife and his children. Uncle Dick, the youngest brother, did not pursue a career in music. He just was a nice sweet guy and he died very early in life. This is I think a part of the history of the city that might have been forgotten, and I think this article would be fun to have in the archives. I don’t know if you would like to have the copy or the original, and whether you would like any of these pictures of him in his youth or a picture of him and his wife. I hate to give them up because….

Semler: I’ll have them copied and returned to you. You said earlier that your grandfather came up here on some sort of an errand for his synagogue in Oakland. What was he going to do? 
DRIESEN: Since the earthquake and fire his flock had opened in a formerly occupied the church on 5th and Harrison and he was endeavoring to raise funds for the erection of a new church and because in the old district it was now overrun by Chinese. So, he came to this city with the purpose of raising money, intending to return to Oakland. But the congregation at Neveh Zedek Talmud Torah liked him so well that they voted to invite him to remain as its pastor. This Dr. Heller has consented to do. So, he came back here fundraising and he stayed on.

Semler: He found a spot.
DRIESEN: That’s really essentially the history of Rabbi Henry Nathan Heller, and I always felt it was too bad to have that lost. He was a rabbi here for seven years or so. And to go on to Mother, of course, she was eighteen years old when she came up here. She was adorable. She walked into that door of Jacob Lauterstein, who owned a men’s clothing store on 4th and Washington (I believe at that time the store already was in Portland), and she sat down on a counter and she swung her feet. She was soliciting funds for Israel, Palestine in those days, of course.

He fell in love with her and so they were subsequently married. He was about 9 or 10 years older than she. They had a very beautiful and happy marriage and together they made great contributions to this community because of their natural interest in Palestine, the Jewish People, the ethics and the classical dream of Zionism. They were classical Zionists and they believed many, many long years before Hitler was ever dreamed of. They were ardent Zionists and that, I think, was rather very much the bond that they shared. Mother was always very active; she was charter member of Hadassah and its first president for, as I recall, 12 years.

Semler: That’s a long time.
DRIESEN: After that she was its guiding light, you know, until they finally got rid of her. She was on the National Board for many years and represented them at World Zionist Congresses in Basel, Switzerland twice. Daddy was equally community-minded as well. He always served on the B’nai B’rith Board, usually in the capacity of treasurer. Daddy was always very trustworthy with the funds. He had a fine and honorable reputation. He was a very honest man, and a very generous man, and he felt that he owed the community, and it was a great commitment to him. Although he had a nice prosperous business, he also contributed financially as well as of himself to the community, which is what other men of his means did do. We were always proud of him. It was his nature; he couldn’t help himself. Here is a picture of the old Bradford Clothes Shop, from the days when he finally moved from Fourth and Washington. 

Semler:  Bradford Clothes shop was your father’s store? 
DRIESEN:  One day as a young man he opened a little store on First and Washington, and as it prospered they moved to Second and Washington, and then he went to Fourth and Washington. He kept with him over the years all the men that ever started with them – they died in his service or carried on after his death. He had the original tailor and the original salesman, always Mr. Metzky and Mr. Schmidt. Daddy then later, after serving always on the B’nai B’rith board and the Jewish community center board, was on the board of Temple Beth Israel until the time of his death.
 
As I remember my mother and father through my youth, they were never home. They came home for dinner, had dinner with their children, and then they were off to a board meeting every night of their lives. Once in a while they played bridge on Saturdays. They had many social events, but they devoted their lives, both of them, to community work. They both sat on many boards. If Daddy was on the B’nai B’rith board, then mother was on the auxiliary board. 

Semler: I really think they were civic leaders.
DRIESEN: Mostly in the Jewish community. However, mother’s interest in music led her to take leadership with the Junior Symphony. When Jacques Gershkowitz first came to Portland, he was introduced to Mother. Mother was the one who got him his chance. She tried to get him into Portland Symphony and couldn’t do it. So, she got him his chance with this little orchestra over there at Irvington School, and this Mr. Gershkowitz built into our Junior Symphony. 

Semler: Do you have some idea what year that was?
DRIESEN: We could get those records. When William Christianson came to Portland, a ballet man, mother got Bill Christianson together with Jacques Gershkowitz and there were some wonderful, wonderful years of ballet/concert things that were done for the Rose Festival every year, for the Junior Symphony orchestra, and Mr. Christianson’s ballet company. They did some very fine things – Coppelia – and what other musical things mother was interested in? She remained a fine classical pianist until the day of her death, and also she used to work on the election board, and she used to work on the PTA. They were very civically minded. She never was home during the day, and in those days – thank God we had servants – I never saw my mother wash a dish or iron a shirt in my life – I question seriously if she could do it. But she knew how it should be done; that’s what counted. Mother would leave that house at 10:00 every morning and come back at dinner time with Daddy at 6:00. They were very community minded people and participated and enjoyed their community. Gosh, how much they are missed.

Semler: Tell me, was Hadassah your mother’s major community interest?
DRIESEN: It really was, because she was a charter member. I forget who it was – I tried to get this information from Aunt Carrie Hervin the other day, and her memory of this is not accurate, so I won’t quote her. There should be somebody who would remember who that was that came to Portland and took 12 women –they were the charter members of the Hadassah here in Portland. Gosh, heaven only knows what year that was, and Mother remained active in Hadassah all those years. 

However, Mother was first vice president of the Beth Israel Sisterhood under Mrs. Roscoe Nelson Sr., Becky Nelson. I think Becky was president of the Sisterhood for – oh, I don’t know, I don’t remember – maybe these records are gone now too. There may be some women that still remember. Anyway, she was president for many years, and mother was her first vice president and always expected to go on and become president if ever Becky would retire. But no one had the nerve to ask her to retire, and if they did they were turned down, obviously. 

One day there seemed to have been a revolt in the Sisterhood’s ranks. They decided they were going to have a nominating committee and wipeout the whole past regime—mother, the first vice president included. They put in a whole new slate of officers, and I believe at that time it was Hilde Weinstein, Mrs. Edward Weinstein, who was the first president after Becky Nelson. I think there were some hard feelings, but then Mother remained devoted to Beth Israel Sisterhood for the rest of her life. She served in many, many capacities. 

She was 18 or 19 when she came here. At that time my father’s stepfather, Israel Bromberg, was a member of the Neveh Zedek Talmud Torah, of which Grandpa Heller was the Rabbi, and Mother and Dad were members there. My father remained a member of the Neveh Zedek Talmud Torah until the day he died. He retained his membership there always, and always on the High Holidays as long as I lived we went on …Yom Kippur and paid a call to the Temple Neveh Zedek and sat with our grandfather for a while. But it must have been after Grandfather and Grandmother both died that Mother and Dad then joined Temple Beth Israel because I believe as long as Grandmother was alive….No we were members while Grandmother Heller was still alive because Celine was confirmed there and Celine is only eight years older than I am. Oh yes, we were members while Grandmother Heller was still alive. In those days, we had Rabbi Henry Berkowitz and Mother and Dad were devoted and beloved friends of Henry’s. In fact, we were members before Henry came. There was Rabbi Stephen Wise, and there was Rabbi Jonah B. Wise. You asked me…

Semler: About your family.
DRIESEN: So, Mother and Dad were married in, I would say, 1908. They had four children – Celine Lauterstein Lowenson, born in 1910, Herbert Lauterstein, who was born in 1914, and Natalie Lauterstein Miller was born in 1915, and Felice Lauterstein Driesen was born in 1919. That was the family, the four of us. This is a picture of Mother and her four children after Daddy passed away. I think this is one that was even more fun – Mother with all the children and all the in-laws and all the grandchildren.

Semler: I certainly recognize Debbie. What a wonderful picture!
DRIESEN: It’s a nice picture because nobody was born into that generation after that. This is the whole batch except for my father. After that there is nothing but third generation. 

Semler: Your two sisters resemble each other tremendously!
DRIESEN: What seemed most important to me was Mothers’ family, because they are all gone. And he was, after all, the rabbi here at one time. I just felt they should somehow have been noted and I think they have. Daddy came to Portland much earlier than Mother; he came here in the late 1800s. They came as a colony, a large group of them as Gene Nudelman has represented, and they were homesteading in North Dakota.

Semler: They were part of that colony Wechsler. That seemed to be a different Wechsler. He was Reverend Wechsler and he seemed to have been their religious leader.
DRIESEN: I had to get that thing out and I’m not sure where it is now. It was a big colony and they were brought over here, and as the story goes, there was a Kelah Nudelman who had married Hirsch Lauterstein in Europe. It was Kelah’s family, the Nudelman family, who came. Hirsch Lauterstein…. Apparently they were going from one farm to another for Passover and they were caught in a blizzard and Grandpa covered his wife and his four little children up and left them there in the buggy and he went to get help to direct them in the blizzard. He caught pneumonia and died. So then she married another member of the colony; it was I. Bromberg. He had a son by a previous marriage and she had four children by a previous marriage. Together they had five or six more so it was a big family. That was then the Bromberg family – there was Carrie Bromberg, Pearl Green, and Dora who has moved away and two young brothers. They were struggling along and when Daddy got to be a young man he opened this little store, a men’s clothing store, and as I say he prospered from a one-man store, and at the time of his death he had moved into a nice location on Fourth and Washington and ran a business that was fondly remembered by many people who will come up to me today and say, “I got my first suit of clothes at Bradford Clothes.” You must hear that a lot, too, about the Semler family.

Semler: Bradford’s was in business actually in some form until the ‘50s, wasn’t it?
DRIESEN: After dad died in 1943, my brother carried on the business until he went out of that business.

Semler: I understand that your grandfather Bromberg was really a very religious man?
DRIESEN: I refuse to make comments on Rabbi Bromberg because he has children who are still alive. My father was a stepchild. My father was a loyal and devoted son to him and cared for him. There wasn’t a Sunday in my life as a child that we didn’t go to call on Grandpa, always. He was a devoted son, but I would not like to make any further comments on I. Bromberg. I think there are others who would remember him better and I think it would be fairer to let them comment on it.

Semler: Would you like to talk about yourself and growing up in Portland in the Jewish community as you remember?
DRIESEN: The only thing that really comes to my mind in my growing up years, as I am sure it will to all the rest of us who had the joy of growing up in my era, was our wonderful relationship with our Temple, due in great part to our beloved Rabbi Berkowitz. He was a character who was a very enormous part of our youth and maybe because mother was so very close to Rabbi, we use to call him “The Rab.” Everybody did. And I think this is something that has kept our generation close to Temple. My mother taught Sunday School for 23 years and she played piano for the Assembly. I can still here that piano banging. What was that song? Oh gosh, that should be recorded for posterity. I have to think about that; we’ll have to come back to that. It was written by William Boon, our musical director and Rabbi Berkowitz together for the children to sing at the assemblies, a rally song. Then as we grew older, Rabbi Berkowitz grew older with us and held onto us from Sunday school to high school, and then into our young adult lives. He held onto us through the Octagonal Club. Were you part of any of that?

Semler: Yes, I was confirmed by Rabbi Berkowitz.
DRIESEN: Did you have the Octagonal Club?

Semler: Yes, this was after his service. He was really a very sick man when he confirmed us, but we loved him.
DRIESEN: Yes, he still tried. I remember when I came back, and Ralph and I would serve as chaperones at a party or what have you, but I think that those are really the most important memories of my youth in Portland with our connection with our Temple, because Mother and Dad’s lives really revolved around the Temple. That was the hub. Friday night dinners were inviolate in our family. Absolutely never, never was there any question. Friday night dinner all children ate at home at our home. It was a formal Friday night Shabbos dinner. I never knew it to be any other way, and Mother usually had more help because it was always a very formal dinner Friday. And then we went to Temple. It was never, “Shall we go?” or, “Who’s talking tonight?” We went to Temple every Friday night and we went with joy. And then very often as we became young adults, Rabbi Berkowitz would rush down the aisle after the services and would grab all the kids and would say, “Come up to the house.” We would all go to his house and play games. My early memories in Portland revolved absolutely around Temple Beth Israel because in the public schools in those days were not welcome in many of the activities as the kids are today…

Semler: Where did you go to school?
DRIESEN: I went to Grant and two years to Lincoln.

Semler: You moved? 
DRIESEN: No, I changed because we were taking ballet lessons with Bill Christianson, and I could get to my ballet lessons easier from a downtown school. But they revolved around the Temple and the musical events. Mother was interested in our ballet dancing, and used to say, “I also danced.” Those were the dominating things in our lives. 

Semler: Did you have any involvement at all with the Jewish Community Center?
DRIESEN: No, we did not at all, absolutely none. It was an interesting phenomenon. Rabbi Berkowitz was very definitely opposed.

Semler: Why, do you remember?
DRIESEN: My mother and father were active at the Jewish Community Center. Daddy was always on the board and Mother was a little active. Rabbi Berkowitz was very profoundly determined and proud of Reform Judaism and he said, “My children are Reform Jews and I want them to be raised as Reform Jews. I want them to be proud and to understand and to live their lives as Reform Jews and I don’t want it dissipated.” He not only definitely discouraged, but often prohibited it. When we had an Octagonal Party, we members of Temple Beth Israel used we to say, “Rabbi, I have a date with Johnny Shmul from Temple Neveh Zedek, can I bring him to the party?” “No.” He said, “You date somebody from Temple Beth Israel. This is where you belong.” And it wasn’t until after Berkowitz left the community, that we began to have contacts between the temples because we didn’t approve of it at all.

Semler: Were the other synagogues opposed to it?
DRIESEN: I can’t tell you. I only know that he would no more have allowed our Confirmation Class to meet with their Confirmation Class than he would have allowed us all to…we were Reform Jews, and if they wanted to become Reform Jews, they could come and join us. That’s fine, but he didn’t want to confuse our values. 

Semler: That’s very interesting.
DRIESEN: The same as he didn’t want us to go with gentiles. You couldn’t bring a Christian date, god forbid, to an Octagonal party. By the same token, you couldn’t bring somebody from the Ahavai Shalom either. It was a very interesting phenomenon and, I think, misunderstood. He was very proud and my mother, though she was an Orthodox rabbi’s daughter, was a devoted Reform Jewess, since she believed in Reform Judaism for what it was, not because it was as step up in the social hierarchy, but because of what it was – a way of observing your religion in a way that could be meaningful to your children because it was spoken in the language of their native tongue. And it could fit into our lives as members of an American community. Mother was vastly proud of being an American, and she always used to say that we were very lucky to be born as Americans. I think that’s why Reform Judaism was so important to her, because we could observe our Reform Judaism without it being in conflict with our Americanism. It didn’t have to be a conflict between religion and state. That was the reason. Perhaps after having pogroms in other countries, it did seem more important to be able to observe your religion while not interfering with your patriotism of the land in which you were living comfortably. 

Semler: Was your mother born in Philadelphia?
DRIESEN: No, mother was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, while my grandfather was still the rabbi there. Mother was born there and the elder sister remembers the house; she remembers the street, remembers everything. Twice mother and Elfriede went back and visited. Everybody else in the family has been there but me.

Semler: And her brother Richard?
DRIESEN: He was born in Sussex, Austria. He was, because see how much difference there was in age there. She was about three or four years older. She was about two when they went back to Austria. Grandma was very unhappy in Denmark. 

Semler: She was probably around 12 when they left Austria and came to the United States.
DRIESEN: I would say mother was about 11 or 12 years old and she spoke English. Up and to that point she spoke only German and she, and so did my dad, they spoke English with no accent whatsoever, which is highly unusual. Mother spoke perfect English and she wrote beautifully. I went to look at one of her old schoolbooks, copybooks. How beautifully, exquisitely she wrote even in those days.

Semler: Your grandmother was a poetess. Your mother was a musician, but she had no literary bent?
DRIESEN: Mother always used to write little jingles, everything was always in rhyme, when she gave a party. She used to enjoy rhyming. But grandmother considered herself a poetess.

Semler: Did your grandmother speak German in the home?
DRIESEN: Grandmother spoke “Hochdeutsch” but she also spoke English. German was her native tongue. She was in her late 20s when she came to America, so she spoke English, but she did speak a lot of German.

Semler: I was wondering if she preferred to speak German.
DRIESEN: I wonder. I was only six when she died. All I remember is hearing my grandmother saying, “Lass das kind in ruh,” (quit picking on her). I was the baby and she was my champion.

Semler: Do you have any other particular memories? Was your mother ever involved with Council or with any of the Americanization programs?
DRIESEN: No, I don’t think that mother was ever particularly programs in Council or active. No, I don’t know. I don’t believe she was. As I said, she was on the election board, she was very active in the Junior Symphony and other community things, but not Council. She never missed a Sisterhood meeting ever and she served also on the Board of Trustees of the Temple. After Daddy’s death, mother served a term or two on the Board of Trustees.

Semler: Was that unusual at that time?
DRIESEN: Yes, they were just beginning to have women on the board. No, not council. I was trying to think what other civic organization she was interested in. Mostly it revolved around her interest in the creation of the State of Israel, in the creation of a homeland for the Jews, but after the creation of the State of Israel, after it was established and on its feet, in her very last years, mother used to say that they also had to make it on their own. She was older then, of course, and tired, and couldn’t be as active as she was before. She certainly discouraged all of her children from visiting Israel, because she was scared, I think, that we would not come back. I would say, “Oh mother, I would love to go to Israel.” “No, you are an American, you belong here.” 

Semler: Did you mother visit Palestine before it became Israel?
DRIESEN: Oh, yes, Mother went immediately after the Second World War. She went to the World Zionist Congress in Basel, Switzerland, and this was just right after the war, months, maybe, when peace was already declared finally. She went by herself to Basel, Switzerland. She met Ben Gurion and all the leaders. Golda Meir was there (she was still Golda Meyerson from American then), and all of these people. And then she took a boat. She got herself down to Marseilles; it was very difficult then. We had been in a war, you know. And she took a freighter. That was the only boat she could get. She went by boat to Palestine. And she said that after the boat set out to sea, all of the illegals began to come out of the woodwork. She said it was a terrible trip. 

She stayed as long as she could in Palestine, and then she came home. I have pictures that would maybe be interesting of that first original visit before it was the State of Israel. She went to the different kibbutzes, and the children’s villages, where they were taking them in; she had her picture taken there. She was quite an honored guest because she was a member of the World Zionist Congress. Then she went back again to Israel, and she had always kind of hoped to find a little mission that she could do there and stay for several months, but by that time she was ill and really couldn’t. 

Semler: Do you have any idea what year that was?
DRIESEN: The first trip was, I think, when the war was over. I think she went in 1946 or 1947, just as soon as things began to calm down. And then she went again around 1955 maybe, something like that. She went with Beth Brill. Beth died there and they had her buried there. That was old lady Robison’s daughter, from the Robison Home. 

Semler: Did your mother say anything about her feelings about Israel at that point?
DRIESEN: Oh, yes, she lectured with her slides and her pictures. She gave many lectures. As I say, if she did not have children here, I think she would have loved to do what Golda Meyerson- Meir did, and would love to have gone here. After all, she had her children here and she contained herself.

Semler: It is interesting that she wanted it for herself but not for you.
DRIESEN: You better believe it. Yes, she was thrilled, you know, when she used to come home and say, “In this picture that is an Israeli orange. That little tiny thing over there is an Arab orange.” Yes, she had great pride and worked always very, very hard. What was the year? Let me think – Hadassah Hospital was her first interest and she worked very hard for Hadassah, and of course, while it set up there on Mt. Scopus and was unused for years. I don’t know how many of those records were made either, those Hadassah records. 

Semler: You mean from the local organization? I don’t know. We have not really researched Hadassah. Actually, the organization records have been more available than the institutional records.
DRIESEN: Then I just wanted to make mention of the fact that when my father died in 1943, he had been so many ears a member of the board of trustees and was so respected throughout the entire community that it was felt that the only place that his funeral service could be held was in the Temple itself. We had the singular honor of my father’s funeral service being conducted in the Temple. The Temple was filled. And then many years later, 14 years later, when mother passed away, the same thing was found to be true. The only place that would be large enough to hold the many people they knew would be coming was the Temple. Both Mother and Dad were buried from the Temple. Mother had a favorite seat that she always sat on in a certain row, and her family would sit down on the aisle. I remember I saw everything from an oblique angle, because I was the baby, you see. It wasn’t until after mother passed away that I could see straight down. At her funeral, Rabbi Nodel came from the pulpit, picked up a wreath, walked down the aisle, and placed it on mother’s seat, and everyone know that that was Paula’s seat because she sat there year in and year out. They had made an enormous contribution because of their true love for their religion. 

I would have to say it would be their first love. They truly loved their religion. And then they loved their Temple. And then they loved this community, they really did. There was nothing else and no other place for them. Mother was so proud of Oregon; she adored this whole state. And she adored that Columbia River Highway drive. She must have driven it a thousand times in her lifetime, because anyone and everyone who came to Oregon to visit, Mother found a way or a time to take them up the Columbia River Highway. That was for her the greatest treat she could bestow on anyone.

Weinstein: Felice, I would like to start at the beginning. Can you tell me something about how your family came to Oregon?
DRIESEN: There were two families – the Heller family, who were my mother’s family, and the Lauterstein family, who were my father’s family. Do you want both?

Weinstein: Yes, but let’s take them one at a time. We will get to both eventually.
DRIESEN: Okay. In about 1882, in Russia, in the Ukraine, there was a group of Jewish people, the Nudelman family, that decided to come to America. They decided together, this big group of people. That is how my father came. His father was named Hirsch Lauterstein. He was a young man and a well-educated one. He could read and write in English and was very helpful in helping the people here get started. They came to America and found their way to North Dakota. They were going to farm there. The first year they were there, there was a big blizzard, and Hirsch died of pneumonia and left a wife with four little children – three daughters and my father, Jacob Lauterstein. He [her grandfather] encouraged her [her grandmother], while he was dying, to marry Mr. Bromberg, which she did. She became a Bromberg and she had five more children with him. Are you following this? They couldn’t make it in North Dakota. Her sister Rose Heller had moved with Mr. Barde to Portland. Portland already had a little synagogue. That was the reason they came here. They came very shortly after arriving in America. They lived right down here on Sixth and Lincoln. It is gone now. That is when they came. By 1912, I think, Dad already had his citizenship.

Now, Mother’s family went to Denmark from Russia. He was in Russia and Grandma Heller was in Vienna. They were a very musical family. They all attended the musical conservatory – The Danish Academy of Music. He was a cantor, what they called an ubercantor – an “over cantor.” He was a cantor and a rabbi. Mother was born in Copenhagen. Grandma soon felt that she didn’t like the cold weather there. She was Viennese, you know. They went to Yugoslavia, to Zagreb. There was a beautiful congregation there in Zagreb. My mother learned to speak Croatian. Then from there, they came to America. Dr. Chodoroff, if I remember the name, sponsored them. Herman Heller, the oldest son, got to be eighteen and earned some money in a musical business. Then the family all came into the musical business. He has an interesting history, too.

The family moved to San Francisco at the time of the big earthquake. After the earthquake, Grandpa Heller came up here to raise funds. The synagogue had been destroyed. Instead, they hired him here. That was about… 1912, I don’t know. So they came up to Portland to solicit some money and then stayed on at the synagogue. It was Neveh Zedek, I think. That is how they all got here.

Weinstein: And your father’s family got here with the Nudelman clan, so to speak. 
DRIESEN: Yes, they did come. But you see, then it was a different life for them, because she married this man Bromberg and she sort of shifted into the Bromberg family.

Weinstein: Do you know much about the Bromberg family?
DRIESEN: Only that they were very active in Neveh Zedek. Grandpa Bromberg was. The Hermans would know more about that. Barbara Schwab would be the place to go for information about him.

Weinstein: I am finding out connections that I didn’t know existed. Did you know your grandparents?
DRIESEN: Yes, Grandma Heller. She was a grande dame. She was very elegant and very talented. I knew the Brombergs. Oh, and I knew Grandma Lauterstein, too, but I knew her as Grandma Bromberg because she had remarried. 

Weinstein: You referred to her as a grande dame. Was she educated at the Academy?
DRIESEN: No, she was the mother of the family. Her husband went and her children all went. They were the musicians. She was the matriarch. I will find you a picture so that you can see what she looked like in those days. Ah, here we are, here is the Heller family [shows photograph]. You can see she has jewelry on and her fancy clothes. This is Regina, my great grandmother. Here is my grandmother as a girl. This is Alfreda.

Weinstein: Felice, obviously being Jewish was a major component in your family.
DRIESEN: Absolutely, but these parents… I’m trying to say… when they got to Portland, they were at Neveh Zedek. But when he married mother, they were members of Beth Israel. They were all Jewish, but more Reform then. We didn’t know anything about more traditional then. We were raised by [Rabbi] Henry Berkowitz.

Weinstein: Was there a lot of ritual practiced in your home?
DRIESEN: Yes. We celebrated all the holidays. My mother and father made the rounds. They went and visited their sisters and brothers on the holidays and they got together. We had seders with 40 and 50 of us in the family. There was a melding at that time, raising the children and all, of Daddy’s family and all of his sisters.

Weinstein: What about the Sabbath?
DRIESEN: Every Friday night of our lives we were at the dinner table with stemmed glasses. We had a cook. We had a Sabbath dinner and then we went to Temple. Every Friday night. It was nice.

Weinstein: You say you had large gatherings; there were so many in the family. Tell me where those gatherings were held.
DRIESEN: They took turns, the aunties. Aunt Dora had a big enough house to accommodate but she wasn’t as well. Mother had a big enough house to accommodate. Some of the aunties didn’t, but I think we took turns at all of their houses.

Weinstein: So they were in houses big enough for family. And you said there was a cook, so that person could assist your mother in preparing the meal.
DRIESEN: Oh yes, although Mother was in it up to her elbows. You know how it is.

Weinstein: Tell me the names of your father’s sisters.
DRIESEN: There was Laura Klapper, then Aunt Annie Karo, and Pearl, and then Aunt Dora. Then there was Jacob. There were five children.

Weinstein: Tell me about what your grandfather did when they got to Portland.
DRIESEN: My grandfather was dead. He died before they got here. And my other grandfather died in 1914 so I don’t know much about my grandfathers.

Weinstein: So how did your father make a living?
DRIESEN: Daddy? He did all the things that a boy will do. The girls worked in the laundry downtown and Daddy looked after all of them. He was the youngest. He came to his mother one day and he said, “You know, there is a man down the street and he has a little store, a pants shop. I could buy it if I had $200 bucks. It would be really nice.” She said, “You have come every week and brought me the money that you earn. I have put away a little money for you.” So he went into the pants shop. I have a picture of it, on Fourth and… I’ll think of it. Downtown. He did very well. His business grew to a large company and went through the family to Herb, my brother, and then to my husband. But that is a different story.

Weinstein: What was the name of your father’s store?
DRIESEN: Bradford Clothes. There were a lot of men’s clothing store[s], but this was a nice corner store.

Weinstein: What about your mother’s father?
DRIESEN: He died before I was born.

Weinstein: So you don’t know much about what he did?
DRIESEN: He was a musician. Wasn’t he the musician? He was a cantor.

Weinstein: Was the family involved in general Jewish activities in the community? Were they involved in secular activities?
DRIESEN: Mainly in the Jewish community. Definitely they were involved. They were also in the secular community. Mother would go and work on the Election Board when there were elections and do things like that. She was kind to her neighbors. But their main occupation was in their Judaism.

Weinstein: Did they belong to organizations or was it through the Temple?
DRIESEN: For Mother it was Hadassah. Daddy was active at the Community Center with B’nai B’rith. They were both active there.

Weinstein: What part of town did you grow up in?
DRIESEN: We grew up in Irvington. Northeast 16th and Brazee.

Weinstein: What about your neighbors? Were there other Jewish people?
DRIESEN: Yes, there were. It was a new neighborhood and people were doing well and were able to buy a nice home. Other Jews were there so they could feel comfortable.

Weinstein: How did they get around town?
DRIESEN: Daddy took a streetcar every morning because Mama needed the car for all of her activities.

Weinstein: What years was all of this?
DRIESEN: Let’s see… I was born in 1919. 

Weinstein: Your mother was a very progressive woman. I would like to know more about her. Tell me, just freeform. Give me your memories of her.
DRIESEN: I was the youngest of four. I saw very little of my mother because she was busy with her activities. I remember crying at the front door, “Mama,” because she was out doing things.

Weinstein: Tell me the names of your siblings.
DRIESEN: Celine Lowenson, Herbert, Natalie Miller (Dan Miller), and Felice Driesen [herself]. So I don’t know where she [her mother] went in those years. She was interested in Natalie and her dancing, but that comes later.

Weinstein: Was creativity encouraged in your home?
DRIESEN: Oh, definitely.

Weinstein: Who were your parents friendly with?
DRIESEN: Oh, certainly the other people in Irvington area. That is hard for me. I was a kid. I didn’t pay too much attention. The Swetts… There are other families in the photo album. If I look at them, I will know who they are, but off the top of my head, I can’t say.

Weinstein: I am trying to get a sense of your family activities and how you related to the community. You’ve explained that pretty thoroughly. How did your family relate to the general community?
DRIESEN: Mostly it was the Jewish community, yes. Our next-door neighbors were all of a certain age and we knew all of them.

Weinstein: You have met them since you have moved here?
DRIESEN: Oh, they are from all over. That is then nicest part of being at Terwilliger Plaza. We visit with each other; sit around the home and talk. It is nice to have someone to talk to.

Weinstein: Would you mind telling us what kind of things you talk about?
DRIESEN: It is mostly Christian stuff. There is a large Christian Center here. That is interesting for me. I have never been a part of that before. They have accepted the Jews. We are all happy that everything is peaceful here. Right now I am on a committee about the new chapel. There is some discussion that we are not making it big enough. I have enjoyed being around people who are different. We don’t talk religion. That wouldn’t get anybody anyplace. I don’t know what we talk about. 

Weinstein: But you feel included here? You don’t feel marginalized.
DRIESEN: Oh, definitely. Any marginalization would be of our own making. The bus takes them to the churches on Sunday. We don’t ask for the bus to take us on Sunday, but I volunteered to answer the phone in our care center downstairs. They need me desperately on Sundays, because I am Jewish and I am there! It is nice to volunteer.

Weinstein: That is a nice carryover from your Red Cross involvement, too. It’s a thread that runs through your life – doing something as a volunteer. You said that your mom was involved in Hadassah?
DRIESEN: Oh my, yes. Mother was president of Hadassah. Who started Hadassah in Portland? Do either of you know? 

Weinstein: I don’t know. I could find out.
DRIESEN: Well, I could too. But she [the woman who started Hadassah] came here and had Mother gather up all the Jewish ladies from the Temple, and appointed Mother the chairman – the president – of the Portland Chapter here. She opened the chapter here. For 23 years, Mother was president of Hadassah and she never left Hadassah.

Weinstein: What years were those? The ‘20s? The ‘30s?
DRIESEN: I was born in 1919 and this was after I was born. So, yes, the ‘20s and ‘30s.

Weinstein: I am interested to know if you know what the focus of Hadassah was in those years.
DRIESEN: Hadassah Hospital was always their big focus. Mother always wanted it to be a homeland. She used to say to me, “You don’t need Israel. You are an American. But we must have Israel for those Jews who need to have a home.” Mother encouraged us to be Americans, but she worked her heart and soul to establish a country where Jews could live in peace.

Weinstein: So it was Palestine then.
DRIESEN: Yes. Then when the State of Israel came, it was wonderful. She was a part of all of that. She traveled to Israel several times. Hadassah Hospital was the focus for them. That was what her life was about.

Weinstein: Was your dad involved in that kind of activity?
DRIESEN: Yes. Not as involved, but always a part of it. He contributed and supported it.

Weinstein: So they were a real team.
DRIESEN: Oh, yes.

Weinstein: Tell me about some of these photos.
DRIESEN: [Displays photographs] This is Bromberg – that was Dad’s stepfather. Here is Grandma Bromberg, Daddy’s mother. Here is Kayla. Now I have a Kayla, my great-granddaughter.

Weinstein: There is a strong sense in your family that the young children now are named after the ancestors. 
DRIESEN: [Long pause as they look at photos] These are just old family pictures.

Weinstein: When did your parents pass away?
DRIESEN: Daddy died in 1943 at the age of 69. Mother died in 1953 at the age of 69. My sister died at 69 and my brother Herbert died at 69 and here I am at 85. Ralph died at about 75 or 76.

Weinstein: I remember seeing you and Ralph shopping and Kienow’s. Nice man.
DRIESEN: Oh yes, he was a nice guy.

Weinstein: I want to ask you something also about your summer activities when you were a girl.
DRIESEN: That is a good question. The early part of my life, they were still going to Seaside. Every summer Mother took a home with Daddy – they rented a house. Daddy used to call it “moving the circus.” Everyone would go to the summer home – Grandma Heller and everyone. We did that for several years. Then we had the mountains. From the day school was out until the day school started, we moved our whole family to the mountains.

Weinstein: The whole family?
DRIESEN: Mother and Dad and the kids and the maid. We stayed at Mount Hood. That is what we did in the summertime. 

Weinstein: So you spent your summers outdoors, it sounds like.
DRIESEN: Yes, that, and out of the city. Then we took a house on Lake Oswego when we were all teenagers. Daddy had three teenaged kids at that time – Celine was already married – and he didn’t want us running around the streets of Portland. He wanted us safe. So all of our Jewish friends would come and visit us at the lake and spend the day with us. We had about three or four years of that, and then the baby came and they were worried the baby might drown.

Weinstein: It is interesting to think of Lake Oswego as being a vacation destination.
DRIESEN: Yes, it was. We had several canoes out in front, and all of mother’s friends would come for lunch, and Celine’s friends. It was great. I think it was a five or six bedroom house.

Weinstein: It is very idyllic, thinking of children whose grandparents had come to this country not being able to speak the language, and progressing to that level of comfort. 
DRIESEN: They learned the language and made themselves Americans. They loved being here.

Weinstein: To what do you attribute that drive?
DRIESEN: Well, I sometimes wonder about it. One time, when I was 17 or 18, we were driving home from the beach – Mother and Dad and Aunt Annie, one of his sisters. We were coming up from a visit to the beach. I said to her, “Auntie, what was it like when you were a little girl? Tell me. I need to know. I want to hear.” She said, “We don’t talk about that. We don’t want you to know what we went through to get here.” That was all I got out of her.

Weinstein: That is not uncommon. I’ve run into that a lot.
DRIESEN: I hated that. 

Weinstein: It was frustrating for you and frustrating now, because you still want to know.
DRIESEN: From the time that I knew them all, they lived in nice homes. They lived right across the river here on Broadway and Sixth, near the Sixth Street Shul, so they could walk. They did well here because it was a big family and they could all go to work.

Weinstein: I didn’t even ask you earlier what schools you went to here in Portland.
DRIESEN: I went to Irvington and the Grant High School, and then to Lincoln and then to Reed.

Weinstein: What caused the move from Grant to Lincoln?
DRIESEN: I had my own excuse for it, but I think that what I really wanted was to be with Jewish kids. That’s why I shifted. But I never told that to anybody, including myself.

Weinstein: Now you are saying it right out loud.
DRIESEN: Yes, most of my Jewish girlfriends were there.

Weinstein: So there was a comfort level that you felt being with other Jews?
DRIESEN: Yes. There weren’t many other Jewish girls at Grant. The girls my age that grew up with me in Sunday School went to Lincoln.

Weinstein: Throughout your life you have mainly associated with Jewish people. What do you attribute that to?
DRIESEN: I think that is just the normal thing. 

Weinstein: Common interests and comfort.
DRIESEN: Yes, definitely.

Weinstein: Do you do a lot of reading?
DRIESEN: Here I do. My eyes have gotten a little bad, but we have a beautiful library downstairs. They bring us books from the main library once a month. We keep them for a month and then they come get them and we take some more. 

Weinstein: Do you want to talk to me about politics?
DRIESEN: Well, I am not a political person. Sometimes I feel embarrassed that I can’t keep up with it and I have to say, “What does that mean?” Politically, I think I am … I don’t know. What would you say?

Weinstein: Oh, I don’t know. There is no right or wrong answer. I was just wondering if you were active politically.
DRIESEN: No.

Weinstein: We have covered a lot of ground this morning. Have I tired you out? I would like to come back.
DRIESEN: Well, you tell me when! If you want me to go through some of this, just tell me. If you want me to answer something, you just call me and ask. Or you can take these things and look through them yourselves.

Weinstein: No, I would like you to go through it. Maybe Debbie can help you. Then I will call you and you can arrange the program of things that you would like to talk about.
DRIESEN: I really don’t know what I want to talk about. I had an enormous amount of respect for my mother and my father for the kind of Jewish home and atmosphere that I was raised in. It gave me a chance to have a life of dignity. I am thinking of this last piece here as learning about the rest of the world. I lived really in the Jewish world, but I was never a leader. That is not my forte at all.

Weinstein: But you definitely participated.
DRIESEN: Yes, I will participate. I will carry someone else’s [inaudible] and give them credit.

Weinstein: When you say, “This last piece,” you mean that living at Terwilliger Plaza has opened up your eyes to the larger world in general? Living among other kinds of people?
DRIESEN: I say, “God, you really wanted me to see this! That is okay.”

Weinstein: You are very aware of so many things. You really observe. You are so aware of what is happening around you.
DRIESEN: I try to be. I just “go with the flow.”

Weinstein: I would very much like to come back again.
DRIESEN: Please do, if you can bear it. But I want to know how your families are!

Interview Date:  September 2, 2004 at Terwilliger Plaza
Interview by:  Elaine Weinstein
Observing:  Felice’s daughter, Debbie Caldwell, who helps identify family members in photos

Weinstein: This is a continuation of an earlier interview and we will start by looking at some photos and artifacts from Felice’s family, identifying some of the people and gathering more information about these people.
 
We are looking at a photo of a group of women taken in the early 1930s, identified as the “Plum Pudding Ladies”, probably members of Hadassah. Felice, could you tell us what you know about this. Was this a seasonal thing? Was this at the Christmas Holiday time? How did they sell these plum puddings?
DRIESEN: In the late fall, I think, Mother gathered up her group. Aunt Annie and Aunt Laura, who were my father’s sisters, seemed to know how to make plum puddings. They made a group and baked plum puddings all through the late fall and early winter. They had them beautifully decorated. In the wintertime they would sell them for a dollar each. Mother would go out and get the ingredients donated so they made quite a lot of money.

Weinstein: Do you know where they sold them? Was there a downtown location?
DRIESEN: Well, we always had some in Daddy’s store, but I don’t remember. Maybe all the ladies took some and had to sell them. Hadassah members had to sell a quota, but I don’t really know that.

Weinstein: Do you know where this photo was taken?
DRIESEN: I think it was taken in somebody’s basement. They lent them that basement for all of their equipment.

Weinstein: It says here on the back of the photo that Paula bought all of the equipment.
DRIESEN: Well, she gathered it, but I don’t think they owned them all.

Weinstein: These look like pressure cookers here.
DRIESEN: Yes, there were pressure cookers and great, big mixing machines. Mother stood at the head and she was the one who put the ingredients into the mixer. No one else could touch that. Then they had, as it comes out of the mixer they had their coffee cans and put them in the pressure cookers. That was the organization of the task.

Weinstein: So your mom was in charge of making sure that the ingredients got in right. 
DRIESEN: She was the overseer of it all. It went on week after week.

Weinstein: A plum pudding is like a fruitcake, isn’t it? It improves with age. It didn’t have to be eaten right away.
DRIESEN: Yes, that is exactly why they did it. You don’t want to eat it until it is aged.

Weinstein: I would like to have a copy of this taken to the museum and see if anyone can identify the other women. There are about nine women in this picture. You have identified your mother and two of your aunts but there are more women in the photo.
DRIESEN: And that was only a few of the women who participated. There were many who didn’t happen to be there that day.

Weinstein: This woman looks like Peggy Swett. I wonder if that is her mother. 
DRIESEN: This one here is Sadie Shemanski.

Weinstein: Now we are looking at a photo of a group of people standing on a dirt hilltop. The men are all dressed in business suits with hats. The women are dressed formally in suits with hats. The caption on the photo says, “Grandma Paula Lauterstein planting trees in Israel in 1946 or 47. Accompanied by Besse Robison, who dropped dead the next morning and was buried.” Could you elaborate on that story?
DRIESEN: Yes. Mother wanted to go to Israel to plant these trees. I don’t know why. She was talking to the old lady, Mrs. Robison and the daughter Besse said, “Oh, I would love to go.” But she was ill. She wasn’t a well woman but she wanted to go to Israel and her mother wanted her to go so Mother said, “OK, I will take you.” I think her two brothers encouraged her to go and gave her the money to go to Israel. They went. And Besse seemed to be OK. Celine and I and Natalie were wondering. All of the sudden we had stopped getting letters from mother. We hadn’t heard from her in a few days and we said, “Something must be wrong. We usually hear from mother every day.” And, sure enough, shortly after that the phone call came that Besse had died and been buried in Israel. We got together; the three girls and we went to be with Mrs. Robison. And she was so happy. We were scared to go because she would be broken-hearted and instead she said, “Oh my Besse is lying in Israel. She is home.” And she was just utterly delighted.

Weinstein: And you say that she had been in poor health. Maybe they were anticipating that she wouldn’t live long. So she considered it a blessing that Besse had died in Israel. Tell me something else. Tell me about getting letters everyday to you from Israel. That is kind of a lost art. Did your mother write a lot of letters? Did she keep a journal?
DRIESEN: No, not a journal. She mostly took pictures when she traveled. She wasn’t much of a story-teller but she did love to let people know what was going on. That is different from telling a story.

Weinstein: She sounds like she was the kind of up-front, no-nonsense person that wanted you to know the facts. That would be consistent with what you just said. She didn’t weave tales but she told the facts. Now we are looking at a family photo, very Victorian in design. The parents are standing, the children are seated and looking in different directions. Would you identify the people and tell me something about this group. It says that it is about the 1890s.
DRIESEN: This was the Heller family. They had left Denmark and gone to Zagreb. There were two sons and two daughters. Herman and Richard, and Paula and Alfreda.

Weinstein: Aunt Alfreda was married to Sandy’s [Weinstein] uncle. I never met him but I always heard about how they wanted Aunt Alfreda to come and sing at our wedding. She lived in L.A. at the time. She wasn’t able to come but she is kind of a legend in our family.
DRIESEN: Fritzi. She used to call herself Fritzi. They were in a lovely synagogue in Zagreb. And from there they went to Pennsylvania for a short time and eventually came to San Francisco and then to Portland.

Weinstein: Yes, you told me earlier about how your grandfather came north to try to get aid from people here, to raise money for the synagogue after the earthquake but something convinced him to stay in Portland.
DRIESEN: They did! They offered him the job as cantor. Actually, the little house they lived in on the campus now of Portland State. Actually, their house was razed but the one next door is there. It is a little grey house on the campus. It is west, on Ione Plaza side.

Weinstein: It would be wonderful to identify that house. 
DRIESEN: Somewhere we have a photograph of Mother and Father at that house.

Weinstein: We have a new addition to our little group here. Felice’s daughter Debbie Caldwell has arrived and is helping us identify people in the photos.

[Recording pauses and resumes]

Weinstein: You mentioned that your mother was involved in the Portland Junior Symphony. Could you give us some background on that? What led to her interest?
DRIESEN: Mother always was a musician at heart. The Heller family were all musicians at heart. One day a Russian immigrant who had come through China and was finally able to get to Oregon with his wife. Mother was told about this man who was a conductor. They sent him to mother thinking that maybe she could help him find his way, which she did. She tried to get him a position in the symphony but she couldn’t do it. The older people wanted a different man. So she went to Mr. Hy Barr. He was the principal of Irvington School and told him about this musician. There was a lady named Mrs. Dodge who was the music director at Irvington School (I took lessons from her). She wanted to move back to Eastern Oregon and Mr. Barr said, “Why don’t we give that little orchestra to this man?”

Weinstein: What was his name?
DRIESEN: Jacque Gershkovitch. He was the Junior Symphony Orchestra. Mother got him that little orchestra.

Weinstein: So that little orchestra was the nucleus of the Junior Symphony…
DRIESEN: It became, under his tutelage the Junior Symphony Orchestra. Then Bill Christianson came to town and we now have an orchestra in the pit and he brought us the first ballet in the State of Oregon. We had real ballet, with Gershkovitch and his orchestra in the pit and Natalie [Felice’s sister] there.

Weinstein: So Gershkovitch was what we would call an impresario. He promoted…
DRIESEN: I would call Mother the impresario. She got them together.

Caldwell: There were three Christianson Brothers, 
DRIESEN: William, Harold and Lou.

Caldwell: So one of them left here and started with the School of Dance at Utah. He started that school. The other brother started the San Francisco ballet. And the third brother went back east to New York.
DRIESEN: Yes, they danced in New York, especially Lou. He danced in New York.

Caldwell: So they were “real” ballet.
Weinstein: Yes, classical ballet. I know a woman who went to Utah to go to that ballet school.
Caldwell: I was there and there is a big, bronze façade of him on the wall. 

Weinstein: So your mother worked with him to help develop this orchestra and to bring attractions to town.
DRIESEN: You bet. She put Mrs. Gershkovitch to work. Mother created the ballet for her children. [laughs] Who was the one you mentioned?

Weinstein: Oh her name is Yvonne Meekoms and her mother is someone you may have heard of, Chella Kryschek. She is very prominent as a Holocaust Survivor. She has been very public about her experiences in the Holocaust and does public appearances. Yvonne went to school in Utah to study ballet.

Weinstein: I would like to know, Felice, what your recollections are of the changing role of women during the past 60 or 70 years. How do you interpret that and what impact did it have on you?
DRIESEN: I think that the thing that touches me the most is that I have had the privilege to live to this age and see the change from my mother’s world, her way of accomplishing things and doing things and leading the family. Though I myself was never a leader, I have the joy of seeing my daughter grow to be a leader. “I want to go to Law School. I want to DO things.” This is a wonderful question. I see my mother in Debbie. Naturally, Debbie can’t see that. But I can see that drive and dignity and she can make it come true. It is a joy to see that. That is the only reason to get old!

I see a big difference in women of today who are always out there doing wonderful things. When Mother had four children in the house and her elderly mother, she was shackled. She wasn’t able to be what she wanted because there was so much responsibility on her. Then she died so young. She had a lot in her, but I think this generation uses its time better than hers was able to.

Weinstein: We are talking about the next generation of young people in this family and Felice is going to tell us about her grandchildren and how she sees them fulfilling and legacy from their great-grandmother.
DRIESEN: My grandchildren are both college graduates. The granddaughter has chosen to have a husband and children. She is a delightful mother, yet, being a warm, close and delightful mother to these girls, she still wants to express herself. She does that at the gym, helping women be healthy with their bodies. Judah is an orthodontist like his father, at a very high level. He is married to a lovely girl. Now he is waiting for the one opening to further his education. He is on the list to be accepted for that. He is a fine orthodontist. They are children to be very much admired, who know where they are going and they have a wonderful life.

Weinstein: Debbie is going to share some of her thoughts about continuity from one generation to another and instilling values and what may have been an explanation for how this happened.
Caldwell: Before Reform Judaism there was just Judaism. And the response to Reform Judaism was Orthodoxy. My grandparents obviously had obviously come from a traditional Jewish upbringing. What they gave to their children, by choice, was reform Judaism. In my generation I never thought there was a door that wasn’t open to me. At the same time I had a deep respect for the ethical and spiritual guidance that Judaism has. I was very much shaped by but not limited by that. I think that is the gift of Reform Judaism which later became not so much of a gift because when the grandparents finally went away, there was not so much depth to be passed. Now it is getting deeper again for kids. When my grandmother was there we had that depth. We knew we didn’t need to do all these ritual things to be decent, ethical people. 

Weinstein: And you regarded yourselves and good, Jewish, ethical people.
DRIESEN: Always. But that didn’t limit us in fitting in with gentile people.

Weinstein: Interesting. I am half a generation ahead of you and I still carry some of the vestiges of having been stigmatized for having been a Jew.
DRIESEN: I still have that. I think that is what this generation who embraced Reform Judaism as they came across the Atlantic, wanted to minimize for us. I still have stigma about being a Jew. Even if I thought the doors were open, they didn’t want to open the doors. I was just raised thinking that it was my choice, but the gentile world was still making choices for us. I didn’t want to go to the University of Washington because I was terrified. I didn’t want to be in AEPhi and I was sure that I would not get into a Christian house and I felt that, “Who am I?” It was a very confusing time. Mother really led us into Reform Judaism, in our home and lifestyle, but in her heart…

Weinstein: She was more traditional.
Caldwell:  Yes, she was a good Jew but she was a Reform Jew.

Weinstein: So it was a philosophical thing for her.
Caldwell: Definitely. She was very touched by ethics. 
DRIESEN: That was her real love. That is what she talked about the most. Social justice and the ethics of Judaism. We didn’t have a kosher home.

Caldwell: I think she dug out. Reform Judaism recognized that you can do the rituals and still not be a good person. So the nugget of what she believed in was that you have to be a good person and make a difference in the world. 
DRIESEN: I don’t think I could have understood my mother if I hadn’t had what I have in her [Debbie]. They were both deep thinking people, much more than I. I was in the middle of them. I got the one who got to take advantage of the opportunities.

Weinstein: I have to interject and disagree with you. Earlier in the interview you said that you were not a leader. My very first experience with you was as the president of Temple Sisterhood. You had a lot to contend with and you carried it off with such grace and dignity that I learned from you. Don’t belittle your accomplishments.
DRIESEN: That was the only time. Otherwise I was a nobody.

Caldwell:  No, now I have to take issue too. Grandma’s sense of being a good person and making a difference in the world is embodied in Mother. With her 58 years of working with the Red Cross she was always about “how do you help people?” She would help from the bottom pushing up whereas Grandma was at the top pulling. No, not on the bottom, but always on the one-to-one, personal level of “how can I help make a difference?” Even now she is working in the MRU in the hospital helping out the nurses. So I don’t know if you ever give yourself enough credit for what a decent, good person you are.

Weinstein: However you accomplish it, you are helping. Some people are aggressive leaders and other people are competent and willing to do what it takes to get the leader’s instructions done.
Caldwell: One thing that Mother always said was, when I would ask “Why do I always have to do the right thing?” She would always say, “If there is one star in the sky, it is not black.” I think that, in some ways is the essence of Judaism. I think that is where it came from.

Weinstein: Everyone has things to deal with in their lives, and it just depends on how you choose to deal with them. That is very beautifully put.
Caldwell: Daddy would always say, “Do the right thing and right things happen.” That again, is the essence of Judaism. I feel that I have that responsibility to be a good person.

Weinstein: I want to say thank you again for giving me the opportunity to talk to you and your daughter. It has been a wonderful experience.
DRIESEN: And I want to remind you of the wonderful things that you and I have had the opportunity to do together, that have reminded us of the things that are worthwhile. I hope that this will be of value.

Weinstein: It will be of great value, thank you.