Elaine Trehub

Elaine Trehub

Yiddish Book Center (Emily)

1/20/12

Elaine Trehub was interviewed by Sara Israel on January 20, 2012 at the Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, MA. Elaine was born in Mattapan, Boston, in 1928. The Blue Hill Avenue neighborhood of Mattapan where she grew up was the heart of Bostonâs vibrant Jewish community from the 1920s to the 1950s. Elaine lived in one of the neighborhoodâs iconic triple-decker houses, surrounded by family. Her grandfather, who lived with them, was strictly observant, but her father was not. Her mother kept a kosher home, and Elaine says she absorbed Yiddish culture from her home and her neighborhood, though she was never given any formal Jewish education. Her parents did not speak to her in Yiddish because they wanted her to grow up as an American. In her interview, Elaine describes the sights, sounds, and smells of Blue Hill Avenue, or âthe Avenue,â as it was called. She remembers the colors of the lights and the storefronts; the rich smells of cheese, chicken, fish, pickles, and bakeries; the famous G&G Delicatessen; the sounds of streetcars and peopleâs excited voices; and the way the neighborhood closed down for shabbes, and went dark at Christmas. She says the neighborhood was like an extended family. Though she grew up in this close-knit Jewish community, Elaine had access to other parts of Boston as well. Their family owned a car because her father, a locksmith, relied on transportation for his work. Elaine explains that at Christmas, her father would take them to outlying suburbs like Needham and Dedham to visit his German and Italian friends, and at Passover, he would bring his friends matzoh and wine. In 1946, Elaine became the first person in her family to go to college. She went to Radcliffe College, the coordinate college for Harvard University. In the interview, she talks about the experience of traveling between Mattapan and Harvard Square every day and her determination not to be ashamed of where she came from. She says she considered her own background exotic and interesting, and she brought her friends from school home to her neighborhood. Elaine married after college and moved to Amherst with her husband, Arnold. She discusses the challenge of raising Jewish children in a town with a small Jewish community, without having had a formal Jewish education herself. She talks about taking part in the founding activities of the Jewish Community of Amherst, and about the difficulty of raising a child with special needs in a community where much importance was placed on childrenâs achievements. Elaine also talks about her work as the archivist at Mount Holyoke College. She explains that she chose to work for financial reasons and not feminist reasons, but came to realize the importance of having her own job. She talks about her love for her job and the self-respect it gave her, her interest in womenâs education, and the changes she saw at Mount Holyoke over time. She also describes the experience of being the only Jew in the college library, and the responsibility she felt to interpret Judaism correctly for others. To learn more about the Wexler Oral History Project, visit: http://www.yiddishbookcenter.org/tell-your-story To cite this interview: Elaine Trehub Oral History Interview, interviewed by Sara Israel , Yiddish Book Center’s Wexler Oral History Project, at the Yiddish Book Center, in Amherst, Massachusetts , January 20, 2012 . Video recording, [ https://archive.org/details/ ElaineTrehub20january2012YiddishBookCenter ] ([date accessed])

Advice

Favorite Yiddish word

Yiddish words

Family history

Stories about ancestors

Childhood

Jewish Identity

Yiddish language

Immigration

Migration

Career and Professional Life

Education

Religion and ritual

Family traditions

Jewish holidays

Feminism

Eastern Europe

United States

Yiddish Book Center

Food and culinary traditions

Transmission

Roots/heritage

Jewish community

Urban

Assimilation

Elaine

Trehub

Boston

Cambridge MA

Mattapan MA

Holyoke MA

Amherst MA

Jewish Community of Amherst

1940s

1950s

Zaslav

Vilnius

Vilna

Vilne

Blue Hill Avenue

Needham MA

Dedham MA

Radcliffe College

Mount Holyoke College

Simmons College

1930s

1970s

National Yiddish Book Center

Wexler Oral History Project

Nybc

Ybc

Yiddish

Jewish culture

Digital Commonwealth

moving image

https://www.yiddishbookcenter.org/collections/oral-histories/interviews/woh-fi-0000247