Nadine Bricker Dunker

Prahl: I want you to start by telling me your full name and the place and date of your birth.
DUNKER: I went by Nadine Dunker, no I’m sorry, I went by Nadine Bricker added a middle name. None of us had a middle name. It was left open for our choice.

Prahl: What did you choose?
DUNKER: Elizabeth.

Prahl: Nice.
DUNKER: Yes, a very nice Jewish name. But anyway, born in Seattle, Washington on May 22 1938.

Prahl: Ah, wonderful.
DUNKER: Moved to Portland at age five.

Prahl: Tell me about the home you lived in. Who lived in your household growing up?
DUNKER: In Portland, my father, brother, mother and sister. I was the youngest.

Prahl: Lets have all their names.
DUNKER: Sue was the oldest and she is four years my senior. Then Monte is my brother and he is 18 months older; I was the surprise package.

Prahl: And Mother and Fathers’ names?
DUNKER: Barney and Frances. My mother was Frances Blanche Schnitzer Bricker.

Prahl: The language that was spoken in your household was always English?
DUNKER: Except if they didn’t want us to know what they were saying, then it was Yiddish. We learned enough Yiddish to know what they were saying.

Prahl: Were both of your parents born in America or were they immigrants?
DUNKER: My father immigrated to New York at age three.

Prahl: From?
DUNKER: Oh Gosh…Chernigov (now Ukraine). And he moved his whole family (meaning mother, father, sisters, and brothers) to California as a young adult when he could make enough money to get out of New York. They were in the tenements.

Prahl: And mother?
DUNKER: Mother was born here in Portland, Oregon.

Prahl: So how much was it a factor in your life growing up that your father was an immigrant? Were you aware of it growing up? Did it make you different or very much the same as your contemporaries?
DUNKER: We were so surrounded by the huge Schnitzer Family that it was nothing. The only thing odd was that he wasn’t a Schnitzer. And when he became ill and had to go to the hospital periodically in an emergency situation if I were at home or went with him for the very first time, I was helping him fill forms they said birthplace and I started to say Russia he said No, United States, he claimed.

Prahl: He didn’t admit to it? Do you know when he became a citizen? Do you know what his naturalization process was? 
DUNKER: His father became a citizen. I don’t know if they made him become one because he was three when he came here. Right? I don’t have the papers. He doesn’t have citizen papers that I know of. Where they are I have no idea; we can look them up. The only way he can prove that he was of an age to have Social Security (which he never collected) was that he served in the First World War.

Prahl: He served the US in the First World War?
DUNKER: Yes.

Prahl: So he must have had the papers to prove he was a citizen then?
DUNKER: I don’t know.

Prahl: Do you know what he did in the war?
DUNKER: Yes. I asked him that. He was in France and he worked security for the food supply for the Army. And I asked him what that entailed and he said, “Protecting it.”

Prahl: Protecting the food supply?
DUNKER: And then I asked, “Did you learn French when you were there?” And he said, “Enough.” Then he giggled.

Prahl: Was he good with languages? 
DUNKER: He probably was.

Prahl: Did he have an accent?
DUNKER: None! Except when he called his mother. His mother lived in Los Angeles he called her once a week and the minute he spoke to her he had a New York accent. She was living in California. The minute he hung up he was back to us.

Prahl: Isn’t that funny?
DUNKER: It was! He said, “bottle” differently and all sorts of things differently.

Prahl: Tell me how your parents met.
DUNKER: I have pictures. Mother had graduated from Cleveland [High School], which was then Commerce Secretary and Business School, and she went to work for a corset company. I think she did secretarial work. There is a picture in there. And Murott, her employer, only knew two Jewish people: my mother and my father. My father came through as a salesmen. He stayed at the same place that she lived. The same renting or boarding house. She decided that they should meet.

Prahl: So the non-Jewish employer introduced the only two Jewish people that she knew?
DUNKER: And they are 11 years difference, which my uncles thought was horrifically terrible.

Prahl: Do you know how your mother got the job?
DUNKER: Probably applied for it; nothing stopped her. If she thought she should do it she did it. Father was at the time, and probably the reason she loved him, he let her have wings, whatever she wanted – she did everything.

Prahl: What year did they marry?
DUNKER: Well my father said they would wait three years to start a family and my sister is 79, so it was probably four years before that.

Prahl: We’ll do the math later.
DUNKER: Monte hates it when people ask us questions because my mother and I would always say, “Well if I am 43 and Auntie (inaudible name) is three years younger….” So that’s how I knew.

Prahl: Did your mother continue to work after they married?
DUNKER: Father forbade it. Well the only time he allowed her to work was at holiday time in Uncle’s jewelry store.

Prahl: Which uncle was that?
DUNKER: It started with Bernard Schnitzer; it was called Bernard’s Jewelers and it was downtown Portland.

Prahl: Do you know where?
DUNKER: I can envision it. It was probably two blocks from Meier & Frank, and down the street from Lipman’s, all across the street from Woolworths, but I can’t tell you where…

Prahl: Close enough!
DUNKER: So he said yes, she can help during the holidays. Then, she was allowed to work, after much discussion after we went to college because she said you can continue support us as nicely and beautifully as you have but I can help the kids because they are all working to go through school and if you would let me help. He said that was fine as long as she would stop when we finished universities.

Prahl: She didn’t stop?
DUNKER: No, she was grateful because when he passed away she said that is what kept her alive. It was getting up every day and going to work.

Prahl: What kind of work did she do?
DUNKER: She did a number of things. At the time of Dad’s death she was working for the Girl Scouts. But she had worked for Pacific Lumber. She worked for a fruit and produce place.

Prahl: What she did was office work?
DUNKER: Always secretarial work. She did take dictation the old fashion way. She always worked, even if it wasn’t formal work. That woman never stopped going.

Prahl: Was she a club person? A volunteer? What sort of things did she join?
DUNKER: She was. Monte’s Cub Scouts–[she was] the leader for his little group. I think she was a Brownie leader for my group. She was the Girl Scout leader for my group. Probably my sisters. She was president of the PTA. And she was active in Hadassah. 

Prahl: Which school was that at?
DUNKER: Abernathy. The house we moved into when I was five was supposed to be temporary but we never moved out.

Prahl: Where was that house?
DUNKER: Ladd’s Addition, southeast Portland off of 20th and Hawthorne.

Prahl: There weren’t a lot of Jewish families in that neighborhood were there? Why did they choose that neighborhood?
DUNKER: There certainly were not. I think it was just because it was going to be temporary but sometimes temporary changes.

Prahl: Lets focus on that move and what that was for them and what that was for you. Was that closer to where your dad was working?
DUNKER: He left where he was working in Seattle, which was glass, brick, and mirrors and I remember he went to work for the Schnitzers. Then he decided that he didn’t want to work for the Schnitzers.

Prahl: Those were his in-laws? Are you talking about the Steel company was it Schnitzer Steel?
DUNKER: Yes, and at the time he went to work for them they had a rolling steel mill, which was later closed, and then they went into something else. He was the purchasing agent but he didn’t feel comfortable there. So he went to work for Rosenfelds at their metal. 

Prahl: That was CalBag?
DUNKER: Yes that was. And when he reached retirement age I said, “Are you going to retire?” He said, “No I think I’ll find another job, just because I’d like a change.” He went to work for Greenstein that had house [building] supplies. And he was the nuts and bolts fellow. 

Prahl: So it was a good move for them to go to Ladd’s Addition if they stayed for so long, or was there another reason?
DUNKER: The reason they thought they would move from there was because most of the Jewish kids were going to Grant High School or Lincoln. They really would have liked a school closer to them. But Grandma and Grandpa were across the Ross Island Bridge, which we could walk from to our home. And Grandpa walked across the bridge to our home. I remember Mother did not keep Kosher. She asked Pop if he wanted to because she had. He said he didn’t care. She kept a separate set of clear dishes for Grandma and Grandpa when they came.

Prahl: They would eat the food that she prepared but on separate dishes?
DUNKER: Yes, she was very aware of what she gave them. She went to school every Tuesday night at the Rabbi Stampfer’s classes.

Prahl: As a child or as an adult?
DUNKER: As an adult, until she couldn’t do it anymore.

Prahl: Tell me about these classes, what were they?
DUNKER: Torah studies.

Prahl: Rabbi Stampfer taught adult classes on Tuesday nights. And who went? People from Neveh Shalom?
DUNKER: They were from everywhere. They were Jews, non-Jews. And we went to that synagogue while we were in Sunday school and we would go to the high holidays at the First Street synagogue because our grandparents were there. Then when my grandfather died we just remained at First Street because Grandma was there.

Prahl: When you are talking about your grandparents you are talking about your Schnitzer grandparents right? Not the Bricker’s?
DUNKER: Yes, the Bricker’s were in Southern California. They came here rarely. We visited them rarely. I knew them and loved them but not like the Schnitzers.

Prahl: Lets go back, when Grandpa died you changed synagogues permanently?
DUNKER: [We went] from the Conservatives to the Orthodox. I have memories of First Street during the high holidays. Grandma and Mother were upstairs in the balcony at the very front at the end. I would spend some time with them. The children were free to go wherever they wanted. Then I would go down and sit between my father and my grandfather. In front of that pew were his brothers, my grandfather’s brothers. My grandfather’s brothers figured out I must get bored because I would play with my grandpa’s tallis. They would hand me their snuffboxes to play with, they were the most beautiful silver snuffboxes. Now Monte would go out and play outside part of the time and he would come back (and we must behave perfectly – decorum and what have you) and Monte would put crickets and grasshoppers down my back quietly. My father would say, “Why are you wiggling?” And it was always that way. And on High Holidays they would always have fund raising, which I thought was odd because it was the High Holy days but that’s when they had the biggest crowd. One person that would speak in English do the fundraising.

Prahl: What language were they usually speaking? 
DUNKER: The service was all Hebrew. The sermon would be in English except when there was fundraising there was English and there was this gentleman who probably came over from the old country because he would only speak Yiddish. He scared the living dickens out of me. He just had a forceful stern voice.

Prahl: Did you understand him? Do you know his name?
DUNKER: No, but Monte might or Sue might.

Prahl: Did you have little friends in the congregation or were you just there for your grandparents?
DUNKER: We were just there for our grandparents. All of our friends were from Hebrew School or the Jewish Community Center.

Prahl: What about your cousins? Were there cousins in the synagogue?
DUNKER: There were cousins but I really don’t associate them with Sunday school or synagogue. I think we were older so we weren’t there at the same time.

Prahl: All the memories of the First Street Shul were you being the child with all the grownups around you that you remember?
DUNKER: Yes, I really don’t remember others but when we played we must have played with other children. But we also were allowed, when we were teenagers, to walk to the Sephardic synagogue, which wasn’t far away and we kind of made the rounds to the synagogues on the High Holidays. We would visit our friends that way.

Prahl: Did your grandfather go to the First Street Shul every Saturday? Was he a regular?
DUNKER: Everyday.

Prahl: What kind of job did he do to be able to get away and pray every day?
DUNKER: He was a junkman and a ragman. He was his own boss. And when his brothers opened up a more sophisticated metal business, there are different opinions but my mother that said my grandfather refused [to join them] because they were going to be working on the Sabbath. And he said, “I am not.”

Prahl: Do you remember him working? How he carried the junk around?
DUNKER: I don’t remember. She told me, but I don’t remember. She said first it was horse and cart and then she said the boys bought him (or he bought) an old truck and he drove it exactly how he drove the horses–sitting up like this. He was small but his stature was as straight as a pin. He served in the Russia Army, forcibly. When he knew he was going to have to do that again, and the pogroms were going on, that’s when he decided it was time to get out. There was a cousin that served with him and I have his papers in the vault. I forgot to bring them but I will make copies. There was a family cousin who served with him, and then went back a second time. And each time he went he would come back they had slaughtered his families.

Prahl: His cousins families not your grandfathers?
DUNKER: Yes. And I do remember sending him packages during wartime and we would get notes. Then, we stopped getting notes and we think that he was no longer in existence.

Prahl: Do you remember that cousin’s name?
DUNKER: No.

Prahl: Was he a Schnitzer also?
DUNKER: Probably.
 
Prahl: So when your grandfather came… I know the story a little bit; he was with some of his family and went to other family, an older brother that was already here?
DUNKER: No, he came to Feder Fuchs [Uncle Fuchs]. How many people did that man bring? 

Prahl: Yes! I just loved that everyone called him Uncle. I And I know who he is related to. He is a Rosenfeld uncle.
DUNKER: Yes! That’s the only way we knew him. There was a connection between the Schnitzers literally and the Rosenfelds. Grandma was a Reiter. Monte worked for a fellow when he first went into…

Prahl: Grandma was a Reiter like Dorothy Reiter?
DUNKER: Well, Monte went to work for a Reiter when he was in Law and Mother asked if he was related and he said no.

Prahl: What was Grandma’s birth name?
DUNKER: Her first name was Bella.

Prahl: We will have to do some research to see if we can find her. She married a Schnitzer?
DUNKER: That is up there on your exhibition. Bertha but I called her Bella. I was named after my grandmother’s Hebrew name.

Prahl: So that is who we are talking about. Bertha who married Morris. So she was born a Reiter and married Moshe Schnitzer? It’s funny. Sue also told me her name was Bella and changed it.
DUNKER: That’s because my name is Bella Reisel and I’m named after the two grandmothers. No! I’m Chaya Geitel. Bella the other name was my daughter’s. I named her after Grandma and one of my father’s sisters who passed away Rose. And I lived in Portland so I thought Beautiful Rose would work. 

Prahl: And we’ll never get to your daughters if we don’t move along. Tell me about memories of the neighborhood. You remember walking synagogue to synagogue, what do you remember about the old neighborhood?
DUNKER: Mainly what I remember is the Neighborhood House. We went everyday there Monday through Thursday to Hebrew school. And in the summer we went to Hebrew school.

Prahl: So you would cross the Ross Island Bridge to do that every time?
DUNKER: Monte and I (Sue was already out of grade school by the time I was doing this) so Monte and I would catch a bus near Abernathy it would take us downtown Portland, we would catch another bus which would take us to Hebrew School.

Prahl: How long did you spend to get to the Neighborhood House every day?
DUNKER: Probably, a half hour. I could tell you exactly where they were because one place, the first stop you could look down the basement window and they were hand making cigars. So that is what we watched before the bus came. When we got downtown, whatever street it was, there was an automated doughnut machine that would drop the doughnuts. Then the bus would let us off close to the Neighborhood House. After class we would walk to my grandparents’ home. Then my father would pick us up on the way home from work. 

Prahl: What did you think about going to Hebrew school every day?
DUNKER: In our family everything was as it should be.

Prahl: You didn’t argue?
DUNKER: My parents didn’t argue with each other in my presence until I was about twelve, I think. I said something to her a few days later about, “Are you and Daddy getting a divorce?” And she said, “Good grief what would make you think that?” “Because you were arguing.” She said, “We usually do it in private. Obviously we should stop that because you have an unrealistic look at marriage. You have to know we argue. We love each other.” The other extreme was, when you talk about early memories, once they decided they could express themselves in front of us Mother and Father would argue quiet loudly. Mother would let loose and Daddy would quietly wait until she was through and he would be the final word. We were in the living room and they were near the front door. It was unusual because she was really unhappy and she was really expressing herself rather strongly. He didn’t say a word but he went over and he opened the front door. Although she was going a mile a minute, she stopped cold and asked, “Why did you open the door?” He said, “You have raised your voice to such a level that the neighbors can kind of hear but they really can’t understand. So why traumatize them? I’ll open it and share it.” And of course they started laughing and that was the end.

Prahl: Do you remember what kind of things they argued about? Where they political arguments?
DUNKER: They rarely argued and they would debate more than they would argue.

Prahl: Did they share political views?
DUNKER: Oh yes, and that’s another thing Mother would do. She was always there seated when it was time to vote at the center when you would cast your ballet. Part of the family was very political.

Prahl: Tell me how.
DUNKER: Silvia Schnitzer, the daughter of Joe Schnitzer, ran President Kennedy’s election for the state of Oregon. She said to him at the time, we have more than enough of our own skeletons in the closet and some of them may come out if you give me that position. I’m honored that you would ask but…. He said, “But that’s family; that’s not you. And I am hiring you.” She said, “But what will you do if some of it is publicized?” He said, “I’ll take care of it.” It wasn’t three weeks later that time magazine ran an article on someone in the family that had a little shady incident at one point and I thought, “Oh Lord.” John Kennedy stood up and said, “He’s a perfectly wonderful citizen and has been since the incident. And I didn’t hire him; I hired his daughter.” She was also involved in the symphony.

Prahl: Did she have a married name?
DUNKER: Twice she married. She married Norman Nemer and then he was killed in a fishing accident when her children were probably eleven and one a bit younger. Later on she married a non-Jewish fellow by the name of…

Prahl: It’s Davidson isn’t it?
DUNKER: Yes! I adore him. Well I did. He is gone now too. He had the most beautiful Seder of any that I’ve ever attended.

Prahl: Lets go back to your primary family first, we were talking about politics. Were they all pretty Liberal politics?
DUNKER: Yes they were all Democrats.

Prahl: Were there any Zionist’s among them? Do you remember when Israel became a state?
DUNKER: They didn’t push it. They really didn’t have any funds and any funds they could part with went to the synagogue. That is just the way it was.

Prahl: The synagogue that your parents would give to was Ahavai Sholom then Neveh Shalom?
DUNKER: Right, and then they made sure we knew the importance of the government and freedom. It was always in our face but nicely. We would have to say thank you and keep up on things. Dad was a Boy Scout volunteer to the point that he got the highest award given to a civilian that isn’t a Boy Scout leader. It was funny because Mother said, “Really you should get involved with Monte. I’m involved with all of them and I know you’re working, but….” Well he got so involved finally she said, “Do you mind considering slowing down so that we can see you?”

Prahl: Did Monte join the Boy Scouts because of it?
DUNKER: He had already joined the Boy Scouts but Mother thought…. And Monte got the first Jewish merit badge in Oregon. It was a fairly new badge. It was a religious badge and they had them for different religions.

Prahl: All three kids were pretty involved in scouting then?
DUNKER: Well I was probably the least. Sue was the first-born so of course she was.

Prahl: Do you know what attracted your parents to the scouting movement?
DUNKER: I don’t know. I think my mother and father’s strong belief was that children should be occupied constructively otherwise they get in trouble.

Prahl: Was your scout troop both Jewish and non-Jewish? Or was the group just Jewish kids?
DUNKER: We were the only Jewish kids in it.

Prahl: Was it a local neighborhood?
DUNKER: Yes, and that’s why we were active in the Jewish Community Center because Sue and Monte and I belonged to Jewish organizations. That’s where our socializing was done.

Prahl: Tell me about those organizations. What did you do there?
DUNKER: QEDs and Sub-Debs, which were high school sorority king of things. They sometimes met at the Jewish Community Center and sometimes met at homes. They weren’t really good deed things; they were strictly social. I remember having teas at our home. I remember B’nai B’rith Boys and Girls.

Prahl: Were there dances you went to?
DUNKER: Oh my gosh! We went to so many dances! It was Portland, Oregon and the era of long dresses. I don’t think I got through a dance without ruining the bottom of my dress. I remember my mother and father often would be there as chaperons. One young lady in her teenage years (I can’t tell you who it is now)… We have those full skirts with all the crinolines and hers dropped off in the middle of the dance floor and she was in such shock she just stood there. Mother just waltzed out there and picked it up took her arm and walked her into the ladies’ room and put her back together.

Prahl: [laughs] That’s is what a chaperone is there for right?
DUNKER: That is what amazed me about my parents. They worked so hard. You weren’t aware of it as a young person, they just… People said to me once, “Were you rich?” I said, “Define rich.” There was always food on the table. The house was overflowing in love. I had one pair of brown shoes a year I hated and maybe one dress pair for the high holidays, maybe. I wore my sister’s clothing and one of my cousin’s clothing, which never bothered me. Mother’s attitude was… well it bothered her but I never knew it until I was an adult. It never bothered me because she always said, “Wear what you would like, don’t wear what you don’t.” I was a tomboy anyway so it didn’t matter. They never made us feel, and because of that huge family, that went beyond her brothers to her cousins and the whole thing, there was this unspoken security. God forbid if anything happened, there would be people there. In fact Mother was ill one summer and they sent her away to Arizona to some friends to just rest and learn to say no. And one of the aunts came. She didn’t drive so her husband brought her every morning to take care of us then he would come and get us in the evening. The High Holidays most of the things were at our house. Mother was the only sister so we had about 35 for breakfast every Sunday morning.

Prahl: Every Sunday morning?
DUNKER: Yes, because we had her brothers, their wives, any of their children that wanted to come and anybody who wanted to see family.

Prahl: How did you seat those people? Was everyone just sitting around the living room?
DUNKER: You know, I think this is the reason my husband married me. Mother had a large dining room table that could be extended, which we set up Saturday afternoon. One of the uncles did the cooking and shopping. The other uncle helped finance it. The men were seated first. And when they were through the women and children sat.

Prahl: So you ate in shifts?
DUNKER: Yes, and if there were an open seat, because one uncle or another wasn’t there, the men chose which female whether it be a child or an adult would have that seat.

Prahl: Do you know what the uncles were doing while you were eating?
DUNKER: Well, I can remember our only unmarried uncle. Uncle Lou was a bachelor. He was an attorney and he was very proper. He would leave the table. He would sit down in another chair, which had a nice footstool, and he would read the Sunday paper. One of Monte’s sons was very young and he crawled up under the paper into Uncle’s lap, who had no children and he sat and looked at him. And Uncle looked at him and said, “I am reading the paper.” And his response was, “Good.” And he didn’t move. Now once uncle we called the Ice Cream Uncle because when we were through with breakfast and everyone was socializing he would take all the restless children. We would go to the nearest grocery store and he would buy us ice cream and walk. So instead of calling him his proper name he was always the Ice Cream Uncle.

Prahl: So I am trying to imagine your nuclear family lived across the bridge in Ladd’s Addition and the whole family came to you. Most of them drove?
DUNKER: Yes, and they did Passover at Mom’s house and there was always a stranger there. It was often someone who wasn’t Jewish sometimes a teacher or during the war it would be a serviceman. It was so much tradition that it was wonderful. A couple of the aunts, particularly Sylvia’s mother, Joe’s wife, and maybe one other aunt and they would be with my mother cooking for days in preparation of all the holidays. I know we had Hanukkah time at our house. We would have latkes and what have you. Then our uncles would line us up and they would give us a coin so we would have our Hanukkah gelt. Well there came a point when there were so many kids they had been much too generous that they had to cut it out or cut it down.

Prahl: Was it getting too expensive?
DUNKER: Oh my Lord,

Prahl: Tell me about our memories with your cousins. Were you a little pack of kids together? Were you close with them? 
DUNKER: Some of them. Sylvia we were close to more than anybody else. And Sylvia was 12 years younger than my Mom and 12 years older than my sister. So everyone though she was my aunt and I would say, “No, she’s my cousin.” She’s now 91. In fact I will see her as soon as I leave you today. I had dinner with her last night.

Prahl: Were you the youngest of the cousins?
DUNKER: No, I was the youngest in our family and actually Sylvia was probably the oldest. And then my sister and cousin Barbara, who was Barney Schnitzer’s daughter, came next. Then the rest of them were all younger. Most of them were over in Northeast Portland.

Prahl: What do you remember doing with them? What kind of games did you play? What did you do when the adults were gathering?
DUNKER: Usually got into trouble. No, depending on whether it was a holiday or regular day we just, Mother and Dad had a reasonable sized back yard and we just ran around terrorizing one another enjoying it. But, I think it was Passover, Mother would bring out a board plank and a bag of walnuts in the shells and all the kids would roll them down and whoever rolled it down and hit another walnut they got all of them. We would play that endlessly. We lived in a neat neighborhood and Ice Cream Uncle would take us out and we would go for a walk. Ladd’s addition is laid out, because it was Ladd’s Farm, has a central round area of bushes about two blocks away and then four directions with four different rose gardens. We would go down the two blocks and talk and walk around and one of my uncles and I would hide in the bushes sometimes to see if they noticed then we would come back. 

Then, most of them were gone by 12:00 or 1:00 and by that time the sisters-in-law would have helped wash dishes. Mother didn’t have a dishwasher. I don’t think she had it before we left our home. When Grandma passed away funds were left and all the brothers gave it to Mother and she redid kitchen. We were gone and she was all of 5’2” and she used to use us to get to the top shelves. Since she had the breakfast she put in the dishwasher she lowered all the cupboards so that she can function without us being there. I can remember her having those teas for those sororities. We had French doors off the dining room and the boys would try to sneak in and put alcohol in the punch. 

Prahl: The boys from the boys’ social clubs?
DUNKER: Yes, the Jewish boys, exactly. They knew where we were.

Prahl: In high school did you date Jewish boys exclusively or did you date boys in your high school?
DUNKER: I mainly dated Jewish boys.

Prahl: And they were mainly boys who you met through the JCC or you met through these clubs?
DUNKER: Absolutely, and my parents opened the home and Monte and I had parties regularly.

Prahl: Did you date Monte’s friends?
DUNKER: I did and at first he was horrified. He said, “You can’t go out with him he has a big mouth.” and I said, “I am going out with him anyway.” At thirteen I was such a tomboy I was playing football with them and he announced they could no longer play tackle football with me. He was very protective. He could give me grief but he was very protective. We were close. It was almost painful because we were only 18 months apart and it kind of left Sue out. I think we were just in her way until we became adults. We would harass her dates. We were just always in the way. She used Sylvia Schnitzer Nemer’s address to go to Lincoln High School because she figured it was the best high school.

Prahl: You and Monte went to…?
DUNKER: Washington High School, we walked. We were probably much more relaxed about life than she was. She was the first child and she still excels in everything that she does.

Prahl: Did you all three of you go to college after high school? Where?
DUNKER: There was no question. No one said, “Are we going to college?” We knew through our parents that education was the priority and we were going to college. Monte went to Princeton as an undergraduate. Sue went to Stanford and I was planning on going to the medical school so I went to the University of Oregon and then went onto the dental school. Monte went to Stanford Law School after he did service in between. He got a partial scholarship to Princeton. He is not a tall man but he’s not short either. But he was very slow in growing. Mother said, “We have to get you a new wardrobe. You are going to the east coast to go to college.” So it was quite an investment because he had to be properly dressed. He called me one day in his freshman year so excited and he said, “I’m growing!” And I said, “Stop! We can’t afford to do this again!” I also remember him calling once. Instead of fraternities they had eating houses. There was one eating house he wanted particularly to join. He called one day and he was utterly furious and he said, “I can’t join that eating house.” I said, “Why?” and he said, “Because I am Jewish.” And I asked, “Is that the first antisemitism you’ve run into?” And he said, “Yes.” So I said, “You are overdue. I’d seen it well before I left grade school. So just adjust!”

Prahl: What kind of antisemitism did you see in grade school? 
DUNKER: In grade school I had a gal in my class who was the Rose Festival Princess and the only female in her family and gorgeous and a spoiled brat. She used to refer to me as the girl who didn’t eat bacon. To me I thought that was ridiculous. She was very aware that I was not like everyone else. Nobody else paid any attention to what she said and we did fine.

Prahl: How about later on in your life?
DUNKER: Well not antisemitism but funny things like when I went to the University of Oregon the first year I lived in a dorm and you cannot join in fraternities or sororities. Well you can join them but you couldn’t live with them for a year. When they found out in the dormitory that I was Jewish, I think I was the only one. There was a Sammies fraternity there and the University of Washington Jewish Sorority called and asked if I would start a Jewish Sorority and I said, “No. I don’t want to have a ghetto. I’m just getting out into the….” So the school gave me special permission to have Passover meals at the fraternity.

Prahl: Were there any other girls there with you?
DUNKER: Nope. In fact I got turned in because I was coming out in the evening from dinner and someone called in and said, “I saw Nadine Bricker coming out of a fraternity.” They had housemothers for the dorms but not for the fraternities. They called me in and I said, “Look up your records. You gave me permission during Passover to eat there and that’s what I was doing there.” The dormitory said, “Oh my gosh. Does that mean you don’t have a Christmas tree?” I said, “Very much so.” They said, “Have you ever decorated one?” I said, “No.” They said, “It’s time you do.” They had a huge Christmas tree and they said, “You decorate it. We will come back later and see how you’re doing.”

Prahl: Alone?
DUNKER: Oh yes, we had such a good time and they would never hurt a fly. They didn’t leave me long alone and I was doing a horrifically bad job. It was the time that they had the icicles that were thin foil and I was holding it like this and it just melted it together. They said, “Nadine, no you have to hold it loosely.” And it was so lopsided. They said, “Obviously you need more education on this.” It wasn’t until I was in college and it was the end of the first semester…. Growing up in Portland while going to school let it be Abernathy or Washington High or wherever my brother and sister preceded me I would walk in the room on the first day and when they were going down the roll they’d say, “Nadine Bricker. Oh you’re a Bricker. You’ll do fine.” Because both Monte and Sue were very good scholastically and I was too. But I thought it was an assumption and not necessarily true. I was always referred to as, “Barney and Frances Brickers’ daughter” or “Monte and Sue’s little sister.” Rarely did they use my name. So when Monte chose to pick me up, he got home first from Princeton. He chose to pick me up from finals and drove from Eugene back to Portland. As I am walking in from my last final I hear my classmates saying, “This is Nadine Bricker’s brother Monte.” It was the first time. I said, “Oh my gosh I think I am becoming a little more independent.”

Prahl: So after college you said that you went on to the dental school?
DUNKER: I went to dental hygiene school. I really thought I was going into one of the other portions of medicine and when I found out I had to stick needles in children I said, “No. I can’t do that.”

Prahl: Where your parents supportive of your choice?
DUNKER: They were shocked but supportive. No one in the family did medical except one of the Schnitzer boys with the five brothers from Schnitzer Steel. One of them went to dental school. He graduated, went into the service, practiced dentistry in the service, came out and went to work with the family and never practiced dentistry again. I think it was Leonard but I’m not sure.

Prahl: Did you use your education and work as a hygienist? 
DUNKER: I did. I liked it because you could set hours and days and raise a family and be there when they were there.

Prahl: Tell me about meeting your husband, when was that?
DUNKER: Oh boy what a shocker. I had moved to San Francisco. I left here the minute I finished dental hygienic school. It was not for the lack of love for the family. It was not for lack of love; it was so overpowering to be a Schnitzer relative and that was all I knew.

Prahl: So you went to San Francisco?
DUNKER: I moved to San Francisco and at one point I lived with my roommates in Twin Peaks. We all had front doors that faced other front doors and they went down the hillside. One of the boys we knew said, “I am getting a new roommate.” and it was Mark Dunker. I looked at him and said, “Oh he would be great for my youngest roommate.” I tried to set them up and he introduced her to a friend of his that he thought would work out and they married two months before we did. 

Prahl: What was it about him that you thought would be so great?
DUNKER: He was lovely. He was… I can still see what he was wearing even though it has been 50 years. He was just a nice, clean-cut, good natured, intelligent, fun loving, respectful… everything you would want. But I just thought of him for her because he wasn’t Jewish. He said to me one day, “I am studying other religions because I don’t care to continue in the religion that I am in.” This was before we were going together.

Prahl: What was he born and raised?
DUNKER: Lutheran, and they threw him out of the church. I mean formally, after we were married, understandably. I didn’t know they did that but they did. And yet they were still kind and friendly but they did a formal disconnect. He said, “I haven’t studied Judaism yet.” I said, “If you really want to study Judaism I suggest you connect with Temple Emmanuel.” So he went there and one of the cantors…he went to class there and I think it was private classes and he asked, “Would you come with me?” I did. By the time the formal conversion was coming we had fallen in love.

Prahl: Why did you choose a Reform temple for him?
DUNKER: That’s where I went. It was really funny because one of the two rabbis were from Portland. His father was the rabbi for the most Orthodox synagogue in Portland, Oregon. It was teeny tiny, it was near the Neighborhood House. I can’t tell you the name of it.

Prahl: Was it Kesser Israel?
DUNKER: Probably, it was about this big and everybody was…

Prahl: Was it on Meade? It was right around the corner of Neighborhood House?
DUNKER: Yes, that was it. His father was rabbi there, which meant it was extremely…

Prahl: So his father was an Orthodox rabbi and he became a Reformed rabbi?
DUNKER: He was a friend of my uncle’s. I went to the synagogue on Friday nights my uncle said, “Go introduce yourself to the rabbi and tell them who you are because we were buddies growing up.” So I went and introduced myself and he said to me, “Aren’t you in the wrong synagogue?” They were more in the Orthodox vein. And I said, “Aren’t you?” He said, “Well that is, kind of, the proper answer.” And he was very political and did demonstrations. I thought, “That wouldn’t happen in Portland.”

Prahl: Were you very political too?
DUNKER: My husband is a Republican and was on the Republican Central Committee. Which was hysterical because we used to always say we would go to vote just to cancel out each other’s ballets. I remember being in Portland once with our daughter when she was very young and he called and he was very excited. It was at the time that the governor of California was Ronald Reagan. I was in Portland visiting with Grandma, with my mother and father but anyway, my husband calls and he was so excited you could just hear the excitement. He said, “You have no idea where I have been for the last two hours, riding around with Ronald Reagan in his car. And he has been trying to convince me that he wants to train me because is planning to go to Washington and he wants me to go with him.”

Prahl: As what?
DUNKER: Whatever he wanted him to do. I don’t know because it didn’t get that far. I’m sure Mark knew at the time and I am sure that Mark was on the Central Committee at that time. And Mark was a CPA. His family history was kind of interesting and political but I thought, “Oh Lord I do not want that to happen.” I do not want to insult my husband or deflate his joy. I said, “I will be home in two days can we discuss it then? And I was thrilled that it happened and I can tell it was a wonderful evening.” So I worked on it mentally and I worked on it and we got home I sat him down and I said, “Are you independently wealthy?” He said, “No.” I asked, “Can your business, your practice run without you?” and he said, “No.” I said, “If someone were to say or do something physically negative to myself or to our daughter what would you do?” He said, “I’d deck him.” I said, “I don’t think you are a good candidate for Washington.” He said, “You know I think you have a point.” And I thought, “All right!”

Prahl: So I have to ask, were your parents more upset that you were interested in a non-Jew or a Republican?
DUNKER: My grandfather taught my mother, and my father was this way too. They said, “As long as you do no harm, you live and let live.” By the time we became engaged Mark had already converted.

Prahl: So that wasn’t an issue?
DUNKER: Well, you would think so but it was. My mother said, “That’s very nice– that he had a Reformed conversion. But I think he should have an Orthodox conversion.” Mark was a gentleman and said, “Really?” And I said, “Mother I love you dearly but you are out of your mind.” Mark said, “My mother had some foresight; I was circumcised at birth by a Jewish doctor.” And I said, “Well that is very helpful.” He said, “Why do you want it, Mom? What is it?” She said, “I don’t want any question about the grandchildren.” I said, But I am Jewish so there is no question.” And she said, “But we keep changing our laws; we are an ever-changing evolution.” She said, “Who knows what they are going to do in Israel and the great leaders.” Years later it said that unless both of your parents are Jewish your kids aren’t going to get citizenship in Israel. Now I said, “Mother,” (she was gone by then but I said it anyway), “Mother how did you know that?” So Rabbi Geller sent us to an Orthodox rabbi in San Francisco. The one he knew well had retired. He knew nothing about the new one. We go in, and we told him what we were going to do and he said, “Well that is impossible. I’m not going to convert him to an Orthodox Jew. I think you are a horrible Jewess to even consider marrying him.” And I am getting redder and redder. He proudly told us a story about one of his congregants who wanted to marry a non-Jewish girl and he wouldn’t do the conversion. They were converted elsewhere and they came back attended that Orthodox synagogue. She kept kosher and she did everything that was right. She became pregnant and said, “Would you now do an Orthodox conversion?” He said, “No.” At that point I was so beet red and so angry that Mark looked at him and said, “Thank you for our time.” And he pulled me out of there because he knew I was so angry. Wicked, wicked, wicked man.

Prahl: I don’t think that is in keeping with any of the teachings.
DUNKER: No, in fact Mom and Dad didn’t generally go to Friday night services until my brother and sister were off to college and suddenly, late in life, Dad decided that it was a good idea. I was still home.

Prahl: Did they take you too?
DUNKER: It was a must. So my friends were going to the football game and I was going. Well I didn’t like the rabbi at that time; I said he just doesn’t ring true.

Prahl: Were you going to First Street?
DUNKER: First street. I said, “Can you drop me off at the Conservative synagogue and come pick me up on the way home?” And Dad said, “No you are coming with us.” So I said, “I don’t respect him.” He said, “You are coming.” My main job, I found later, was they were both so tired that they would go to sleep and they started to snore so I would go like this so they wouldn’t.

Prahl: So by that time men and women sitting together?
DUNKER: Yes.

Prahl: Do you remember when that changed?
DUNKER: I don’t but I just know it did. No I don’t know when it happened. We were all sitting together.

Prahl: Let’s go back to California, and tell me about the raising of your own children and how that is different from how you were raised.
DUNKER: Well, Lisa was an only child. We discussed before we were married that we wanted one religion in the household and Mark had chosen Judaism so that was no big deal. His parents were Lutheran and I said, “I do not want to deny them.” So we would have every Christian holiday at their home and every Jewish holiday at our home. When Lisa was probably three or four she was standing by me and someone said, “Does it not confuse this child?” I thought, “OK, how do I politely answer this?” She was going to Sunday school and she said, “What do you mean confuse me? I’ve got all. My friends are jealous. I have their holidays, my holidays, and everything in-between.” And I said, “There is the answer.” It never affected her.

Prahl: So she went to Sunday school all her life?
DUNKER: Yes, all that stuff.

Prahl: Had she grown up to have a Jewish home of her own?
DUNKER: No. Life does bring you great surprises.

Prahl: She married a Lutheran?
DUNKER: She not only married a Catholic, but a girl, a woman. When my daughter-in-law had a child, within a very short period of time we went to court and Lisa formally adopted our granddaughter. So that there is no questions no matter what life brings that she is the product of these two.

Prahl: So how are they raising her?
DUNKER: I asked them that and Lisa had discussed that with Shawn ahead of time and she said, “What do you want to do about this?” And Shawnie said, “I have every respect of your religion but I am a Catholic. I’m really not a practicing Catholic but I do retain in my head that after death I am going to go to heaven and see the family. And I am afraid if I leave it, that may not happen.” She said, “What about your religion?” She said, “We don’t know the answers because no one has come back to tell us. We all have our own feelings but the basic rule is if you live life properly here it will take care of itself.” So they didn’t, neither of them converted but Nina does go to holidays at the synagogue. She doesn’t go to Sunday school but she knows….

Prahl: How old is she now?
DUNKER: She’s ten, and lights the Friday night candles, I mean Mom does and she says the prayers in Hebrew and English. She always calls me and, in Hebrew, wishes us well on all the holidays. She is very at home wherever she is. 

Prahl: Well it seems to be working out.
DUNKER: Shawne’s mother lived with her since the time she was two until last January when her grandmother just passed away. It was great because she had an in-house grandma came in regularly and it was very symbiotic. We were very fortunate.

Prahl: Where do they live?
DUNKER: Seattle, which is odd because Monte, Sue and I were born there.

Prahl: It’s full circle.
DUNKER: It is, it absolutely is.

Prahl: So when you were raising Lisa were you working also?
DUNKER: No! Well, I shouldn’t say no. The first year I took off as long as I could. Then I missed talking to adults and practicing. So I would work two days a week. From the beginning of practice to the end was an overall of about fifteen years. Then Lisa got to an age that I recognized that if you are there to receive your child when they walk in the door and ask, “How is your day?” They will tell you if it was good, bad, and why. If you are 20 minutes later, it’s like zip. 

Prahl: Were you a club person like your mother? 
DUNKER: I was certainly active in the synagogue.

Prahl: Emmanuel?
DUNKER: There was only one. By then it was in Modesto California. We moved and lived in Marin County and that is where Lisa was born. Then moved to Modesto where Mark’s family is when Lisa was less than a year old. Which, to me, was a great shock. I told him that our wedding contract says we won’t move to Modesto. But he said, “But you still owe me a goat or a cow so we will just call it even.” So she was raised in Modesto. There was one synagogue and it covered all the east. Mark was raised there from the third grade on. So before we ever made the move we would visit the parents. I went on a Sunday to the synagogue to find out what it was all about and I liked what I found. It was a very active and wonderful synagogue at that time. Luckily when Lisa was being raised it was. We had one rabbi for 25 years that was a true scholar. He was good with the kids.

Prahl: I think we should go back to see if we missed anything about your Portland family that you had been hoping to tell me about.
DUNKER: I think we were lucky because my mother had so many brothers and they were all so family minded. Mother was the only girl; her sister had died several years before. Because it was a large family, and Mother and Dad were good about gathering them regularly, weekly, by the time that Monte, Sue and I grew to adulthood we loved each and every one of our uncles and their families in our own ways (some more than others). They were such a mix that life was not as big of a surprise. We saw so many different personalities. Mother and Dad were clear, good was good; bad was bad. With Dad there was no gray. With mother there was more flexibility but she was firm. Our life was very patterned; we knew in the summer there were certain Jewish families we would go on picnics with and go to certain places. We knew after Sunday school we would come home and have lunch and Daddy would have the symphony on the radio. They were present in our lives. We felt very lucky. I think that is why we have families we adore. I think our parents would be delighted that the three of us have a sibling gathering every year.

Prahl: That is what I was thinking, that is probably why you are so close with your siblings.
DUNKER: I was shocked because Sue and I remember most of our childhood. Monte remembers very little. I said, “You think you had a horrible childhood.” But he is always on to the next thing. It was his idea to have the sibling gathering. I said, “Aren’t you smart?” Everything was assumed in a way. You followed what your parents said. They were loving parents, firm but loving. We were lucky because there was a way of living and what was important to them was very healthy.

Prahl: I am curious about the uncles all being part of the business together but you said that Bernard had a Jewelry store.
DUNKER: All my mother’s brothers were in different businesses. Her father didn’t go with his brothers into the big Schnitzer business.

Prahl: So it was your great uncles who all had the business together but not their children?
DUNKER: They were my mother’s uncle’s that were in the business.

Prahl: But your mother’s brothers didn’t go into that business? Did any of them?
DUNKER: No, none of them. Because Grandpa didn’t join them to begin with. So they all went their own way. I think Uncle Joe, the oldest, may have quit school after the eighth grade and sold papers on the corner to help support family. So typical. And yet there was the other extreme were Manny graduated cum laude from the University of Oregon and Uncle Lou went to law school. And Uncle Lou, who was the bachelor, lived at my grandmother’s house I think until Grandmother died. He had long-term girlfriends and sometimes he didn’t come home. We don’t talk about those things. She [Mother] said that in his separate room, which was on the back porch, there was a window and half of his robe was bleached from sitting at the desk studying. 

Bernard started the Jewelry store, but Uncle Joe, the oldest, was a Jeweler but in the old way. He carried diamonds in his pockets on the streets like they did in New York in the jewelry district. And he would say, “OK, what do you want?” That’s when he got in trouble so that changed. Then it moved from Bernard to Monty and Bernard, then Uncle Monty, not my brother spelled differently, took it over. I asked him how he had any clientele at all. He was very gruff in his speech. He had a great following but he always sounded angry. You would say, “I would like that watch.” and he would say, “No that’s not good for you; you should have this one.” And yet he always had people who kept coming back. I asked him if I could get my birthstone in a ring, I’m his niece. He gave my daughter a diamond ring when she was this big. He wouldn’t let me have an emerald. I said, “Why not? I am willing to pay for it.” He said, “Because you are a klutz and it is very fragile. You’ll go bang and the whole stone will go into a million pieces.” Yet, I would go across to Woolworths when I was in grade school high school. They had this machine where the hotdogs rolled and I would get one with everything. It stunk to high heaven because it had onions on it. He would let me go down to the jewelry store and eat it there and I’m sure the aroma filled the entire store but he never complained.

Prahl: What was the jewelry store called?
DUNKER: Bernard’s.

Prahl: Even when Monty took it over?
DUNKER: Until it closed it was called that. It was in an era where they sold jewelry and silverware. I don’t know if they sold china or not. I remember when I was being married I sent a pamphlet to Mother that showed what we had picked out as are sterling because the family wanted to know. I marked the page but Mother looked at the front of the folder and they bought an incredible amount, bless their hearts, of place settings. I received the first one and I said, “Mom! Wrong one pattern.” She said, “You’ve got to be kidding.” I said, “No, did you ever open it?” She said, “No.” I said, “Open it.” And she said, “Oh my goodness!” So Uncle returned it all back and replaced it with what we wanted.

Prahl: Do you still have it?
DUNKER: Oh yes, and later in life my cousin … well Bernard’s daughter [Barbara] was an only child and her husband was in the furniture business and when he retired from that he went into estate sales. He called me rarely about it but he called me once and said, “I have so-and-so’s sterling and I thought you and Mark might want to buy it. It’s a beautiful set.” And he told us the pattern. He said, “The reason you might want it is because it was owned by so-and-so who were close friends of one of my uncles and aunts and they both had the same pattern so that if there were large gatherings they could borrower or share.

Prahl: Oh isn’t that lovely? What a neighborly thing to do.
DUNKER: Oh yes, so we bought it! And that’s why; otherwise we wouldn’t have bought it.

Prahl: Tell me about your wedding. Where did you get married?
DUNKER: We got married at Sylvia Davidson’s at that time Nemer’s, we were just discussing that last night. Sylvia’s youngest son just asked, not while Sylvia was in ear shot, if his dad was still alive when we got married in the house. I said, “You know I was wondering about that too. What year did your dad die?” He said, “‘64.”

Prahl: Is he still a Nemer or did he become a Davidson?
DUNKER: No, he remained a Nemer. The wedding was at Sylvia’s house because the tradition was to always get married at a family member’s house.

Prahl: So that makes it a smaller affair?
DUNKER: Oh well that was a joke altogether because when we were all being married I said to Mark, “Do you want the immediate family or the whole family?”

Prahl: [laughs] Did he know what that meant?
DUNKER: I said well let me explain the difference. The immediate family it is probably around one hundred. If it is the whole family it is closer to a thousand. He said, “We’ll probably stick to the immediate.” That is one of the reasons we were married at Sylvia’s. My mother and father were married at Sylvia’s parents’ home. Mother was married, I believe, in Uncle Joe’s home.

Prahl: The photograph that we identified you and Monte at was at your mother’s sister’s wedding? The one who died?
DUNKER: No. [My mother’s sister died at 21 years of age; we did not know her.]

Prahl: Do you know whose home that was in?
DUNKER: No but I almost bet it was the family home. I don’t know. Good question! We’ll have to ask Sue and if she doesn’t I bet Sylvia would know.

Prahl: That’s a great tradition.
DUNKER: Yes, there was this huge family but there was the small group that did this. Sue married of all things, on New Year’s Eve. I think she married in our home.

Prahl: In Ladd’s addition?
DUNKER: Yes. And then I married in Sylvia’s home. Then when Sylvia remarried Jebbie she married in Sue’s place in New York.

Prahl: How about Monte? Where did he get married?
DUNKER: He married a Fresno girl so they had a hotel wedding in Fresno, which was very foreign to us except some of our cousins did that. It wasn’t the intimate sort of thing.

Prahl: So it was a thing for the girls. Some of the girls got married in each other’s homes?
DUNKER: Yes, it was amazing. I remember, when you talk about our home, when Mark first met our family. He wanted to come up and there was a big gathering for my mom for one of her birthdays because we did that every fifth birthday. Everybody just showed up. We always saw one another but we made it a point to be together at those times. At this particular one was I believe in Portland and he said, “I want to come up.” We weren’t engaged at the time and there was no formality to it. Although we were going together. I said, “No.” That was paramount to announcing an engagement and we weren’t there yet. He said, “OK.” So he called and said, “Can I meet part of the family?” I said Uncle Joe and Aunt [?] were getting a little restaurant dinner, which was probably thirty people and you can come to that.” When he came there was no room in the house for him; all the beds were full. So he slept in a sleeping bag in the dining room in my parent’s home. And Sue’s children were there from New York and Sue was there. She said to her children who were very, very little, “There will be a man when you wake up and he will be sleeping in the floor in the dining room. You are not to disturb him.” Mark said one of his earliest memories of those niece and nephews was, you know when you have that feeling that someone is watching you? He wakes up his eyes aren’t open, and he just has a feeling. He opens his eyes and the boy’s on one side with his legs crossed and his hands in his lap and the niece is on the other side with her legs crossed. And they were just looking at him. 

Prahl: [laughs] and not disturbing him. Was this the early sixties that you started dating?
DUNKER: Yes we were married in ‘63 and Lisa was born in ‘66.

Prahl: Was there ever a question about moving back up to Portland?
DUNKER: Well there was actually. When we were living in Marin, and after Lisa was born, Mark decided he really wanted to get out of the Bay Area, which broke my heart because I loved it. But Mother said I would go wherever my husband went. But we ended up going back to Modesto because there was an offer but there was also an offer from the Schnitzer family up here. I thought, “Oh golly, I would really love to be back in Portland but I really don’t want him working for the family.”

Prahl: Too much baggage?
DUNKER: Well, I said, “Look you have a small family here. Some you see every five years whether you need to or not. I have a family that is all encompassing by the time you go to birthdays, wedding, anniversaries and all of that there is no social life beyond the Schnitzer family. If you want that,” (because he loved my family), “That’s okay. But if you don’t want that I don’t suggest we should move there.” So he chose to go back to Modesto though he adored my immediate family and thought they were great. When we were living in San Francisco Harold Schnitzer, who broke off of the brothers and didn’t want to be in the steel business but wanted to be in the real estate business. called my husband Mark, (he had met him), and said, “Would you like to work for me in San Francisco?” He had a lot of interests in the bay area. Mark said, “Well, what did you have in mind?” He said, “Well, would you manage 450 Sutter?” Which was a large medical building in downtown San Francisco. Mark said, “Well let’s meet and talk about it.” So we flew up here and Mark went to speak with Harold, who he became very close to in his own heart. Harold told him about the job and Mark said, “You know, I could do the accounting. I could do the mechanics of that but the fellow you’ve have for 30 or 40 years also helps redesign the offices when other doctors come in.” He said, “That’s not my forte. I would not do a good job for you.” That was that. But behind Harold in the office there was this big mural of just this nothing space; it was just this aired open country. He said, “Harold, what is this mural?” Harold said, “Well in my early investments in real estate I bought this humongous amount of property some state somewhere that was worth nothing, and never was worth anything and I purposely put this mural up in case I got to cocky I could remind myself I was quite capable of making bad choices.” He was lovely.

Prahl: He was your mother’s cousin?
DUNKER: Yes. The thing was we didn’t see them often. If there was a wedding or a 50th anniversary or something special they would all show up. Mother used to take me to visit their mother’s house, Harold and his brothers’ mother.

Prahl: Rose?
DUNKER: Yes, that was near Washington Park. Mother said her early memories of that home, with Rose in it, was that she had a third-floor ballroom and a servants’ quarters. That was the only home like that she’d ever seen at that stage. They would have dances up there on the third floor. She used to describe Rose as a very sweet woman and very hospitable. But [she was] “the woman with the milk and honey complexion.” It was the most translucent skin. And those boys, who could be very tough in business and life if they needed to be, were so gentle and respectful with her. It was beautiful.

Prahl: A loving family too. You come from good stock.
DUNKER: We were very fortunate.

Prahl: I think we should end here. Thank you very much. I’m really glad that you could do this.
DUNKER: Thank you for inviting me to.

[Recording ends – a second recording begins immediately]

Prahl: We are going to add one more story about food.
DUNKER: In the basement of our home every summer we would put up kosher dill pickles that was grandma’s recipe. It was a family activity and it was at least 130 jars. One person would stuff them; one person would put the different spices; and one would seal. My father would usually do the final seal because he was strong. We took them every place we went to dinner.

Prahl: Were they cooked? Were they on the stove or were they raw?
DUNKER: They were raw. True kosher– no vinegar– just salt and water and spices.

Prahl: Did you do it to sell them or just eat them all year?
DUNKER: Just to eat them. We would take them to family and to dinner wherever we went and the family would expect them. It was the same thing with jellies and jams.

Prahl: Did you know of any other families that were doing these things?
DUNKER: I don’t know. I was just involved in my own family I just don’t know. When I moved to Modesto, California I found one contemporary of my mother’s and she used the exactly same recipe and her family was also from Russia. The only difference was that in the valley in California it is wine country and so where Mother used to put in a piece of celery for crispness, she put in a wine leaf.

Prahl: Do you still have that recipe? Can I add it to this?
DUNKER: Oh sure, since then the next generation of the family down there asked for the recipe and my husband and I used to make pickles for their father and mother then for them because they got a little older and wanted them. They make them for us now. 

Frances Bricker’s Pickle Recipe
 
1 tsp. mixed pickling spices
1 dried red pepper
1 clove garlic, peeled
1 sprig of dill
1 piece of celery, about 1½ inch long
1 bay leaf
 
Fill jars with pickling cucumbers
Use carrot strips to fill the jar in open spaces
Combine 1cup Kosher salt with 20 cups water
Fill jars, seal tightly.
Leave in a cool, dark place for five days.
** Always use uniodized salt!