Max Fishman Part 1 Max Part 2 Part 3
PZM: You had asked to go there, right?
MF:
They took me to my uncle's house and that night, (it was on a Sunday) and that night we went to the wedding,
one of my uncles the youngest uncle, got married.
PZM: This was your father's brother-in-law?
MF:
Yea, father's brother. wedding. He got married and we went to the wedding.
PZM: Was it nice?
MF:
As far I knew it, I was a xx
PZM: Was it like in Russia?
MF:
No, not exactly, it was different ways, styles, different ways all together.
PZM: Was it religious?
MF:
Yes, it was religious.
PZM: Was it separate seating?
MF:
No, it wasn't separate seating, not even in Russia, xx
PZM: And where did you sleep?
MF:
We didn't sleep that night but the next day my uncle took me to one of his friends, he was in the grocery
business and he wanted to see if he could get me a job. He knew everybody and he got me a job in a luggage
factory and one of the bosses was a foreman on making up the luggage and one was a salesman and one was a
cutter. The oldest one was a cutter,
I didn't know anything about it, they didn't give me no instructor or nothing and I made (they were made out of
paper in them days and covered with oil cloth) the paper too wet and he come down and cut me up in English
and I didn't know what it was, I couldn't talk English. Finally when dinner time comes, there was a lot of Polish
Jews down there and they told me what he said. In the afternoon he come again and it was the same thing, he
didn't tell me how to do it and he didn't give me no instructor. When he called me the same names he was
standing on my left side and I hit him in the mouth and stretched him out on the floor. And I got fired. Then the
next day I went down on Madison Street in Chicago and started at the little factory until I got a job for not any
more money but harder work. But I was able to do hard work because I had done hard work all my life. And I
stayed until May 1st.
PZM: And what were you doing, exactly?
MF:
Cleaning the floor and doing this, and seeing the shipments
XX
The xx
was a German fellow and he felt sorry for me and his brother was the superintendent in xx
Illinois, in xx
Company in 1909. I was hired in April 1, 1909.
PZM: In America?
MF:
Yea, and I worked until May 1st in that factory when he gave me a letter and gave me 20 cents and told me I
had to go to Maywood and I went down there and there were 22 Polish people and I was the only Jew down
there and they had an agent and the agent pushed me out of the line because I didn't pay off and I wasn't there.
And then I walked back from Maywood to Chicago about 14 miles and I come back at night and the
superintendent was still in the factory. I went in down there and he asked me in German if I got a job and I told
him no because I didn't xx and he balled me out and he give me 10 more cents and told me tomorrow morning
xx catch the open cars and I went to Maywood to the Chicago line and then I took the Maywood line and went
to Maywood and stayed until everybody went~in and I turned the letter over to the gateman. And the gateman
took it into the office and they called me in and gave me a job. And them Polish fellows the one worked in there
they gave me all kinds of dirty work they did all they could to get me fired to get one of their men in. And under
the circumstances the superintendent called me in and asked me in German, what's going on and I told him in
Jewish and in German I ain't got no tools an I don't know how xx they want you to set up the presses xx then
they brought in an Irishman and put him right in the back of my machine - there was another machine like it
right in back and made him work on that machine and took this Polish fellow away from that machine and put
him down on the railroad car with metal. At 3:00 in the afternoon when I went to the washroom, they got busy
unscrewing the taps and the head and he got a hold of one of them that was doing it and took him out in the yard
and he beat him so bad he looked like a broken watermelon. And they threw him out the gate and locked the
gate and that's all there was of him. Then the old man took me in to help him and I helped the old man all
summer long doing the floors.
PZM: Tell me - you got 1.50 a week [?]
MF:
No at the Maywood I got $7.00 a week.
PZM: Tell me how you spent your money - you were describing about the 3 cents for donuts - how did you live?
MF:
3 cents worth of milk, 3 cents worth of donuts and 3 cents worth of apples - that's all I lived on. But at night I
used to eat a little bit of potato soup at my uncle's house. Because every week-end I used to bring in a 1/2 a
piece of potato for xx at my uncle's house and that cost 25 cents.
PZM: That means you spent 9 cents - six days a week you worked - you worked on Sunday too, right?
MF:
I didn't work on Sunday, six days a week, I worked Monday till Saturday night - 10 hours a day.
PZM: First for $1.50 and then you started to save a few pennies - did you have a savings account?
MF:
I didn't have no savings account, no.
PZM: You just carried it on you?
MF:
I carried it on me.
PZM: How long did you work in Maywood?
MF:
Five months.
PZM: What made you change your job from that?
MF:
They closed the plant down. It was a summer plant.
PZM: What did it make?
MF:
Tin cans for tomatoes.
PZM: And it only worked in the summer?
MF:
xx
PZM: xx
MF:
I went to Lafayette, Indiana.
PZM: Why did you do that?
MF:
I had a brother working in the junk yard down there.
PZM: Ok, which brother?
MF:
The older one - Jake.
PZM: Did he own the junk yard -
MF:
No he didn't own it. He worked for the other fellow.
PZM: And did he say he'd get you a job?
MF:
He didn't say anything - he didn't do nothing xx just as well as I was.
PZM: How long had he been there before you though?
MF:
About two years.
PZM: So you went down there and what happened?
MF:
I went down there and his boss took me down to the
xx
works right across the street and it happened on this occasion they got xx to make cases for the electric meter.
And that nobody wanted to touch it because they didn't know what to do with it. They were afraid that pieces of
glass would fly and cut them and I wasn't afraid of it because I worked all summer in the American can
company in Maywood. And I took the job and they give me a good pay for it.
PZM: How much did you get?
MF:
I got about $7.00 per week. That's pretty good.
PZM: Your other job was $1.50 per week, right?
MF:
$1.50 per week, now jumped to $7.00 per week. And there were different people to work for too. They didn't
use no Polaks there was no foreign labor, mostly students from the xx
University
PZM: So they were nicer to you, right?
MF:
They were nice, they were fine.
PZM: Did you live with your brother?
MF:
No I lived with my cousin.
PZM: Who was your cousin?
MF:
Dave Fishman.
PZM: I don't know who he is.
MF:
No, he's dead.
PZM: He was your father's brother's son?
MF:
Yes.
PZM: Was he married?
MF:
Yes.
PZM: Children?
MF:
Yes.
PZM: And you bothered with them, right?
MF:
Yes.
PZM: Was Jake married?
MF:
Jake wasn't married.
PZM: Where did he live?
MF:
He lived in another place with another fellow. I don't know the name.
PZM: How long did you work there?
MF:
I worked there all winter. Then in the spring my uncle and aunt come down and took me to Adamsville and
wanted me to work for them to learn to be a collector.
PZM: What kind of collector?
MF:
They used to sell blankets, clocks, xx and all that kind of stuff.
PZM: Did they go from door to door? A traveling salesman?
MF:
I wasn't a traveling salesman, I was a collector.
PZM: Oh you mean if they didn't pay their bills you went and collected?
MF:
They sold it on an installment plan and I used to go collect every week. Then they wanted me to wash the
wagons, clean the horses and clean the stable and xx and they sent me to tell my cousin they thought probably
I'll do better down there. When I went down there they wanted me to do the same thing. And I wouldn't do it
and I quit. And I had a few cents in my pocket and I went around on Main Street from one side to the other in
the business district and I found little store that was empty for a long time and I seen the sign where they were
located and it was a number and name of a street and I went down there and I asked them what they want rent
for it and they told me and I went to my cousin and borrowed the money and he thought I'm going to
take the money and go back to Adamsville. But I didn't do it, I went and paid the rent and I
xx
and I looked at that place and it was so darn busy inside and outside but xx upstairs, she give me a tub and a
bucket and there was a pump in the back and a broom and I washed the walls and the ceiling and the windows
and the doors with the broom and water and I made it plenty wet. It was September then and then it got too cold
and I went across the street, it was a saloon and I come in and I had to xx when I seen anything dirty I cleaned
up and on this big cannon stove was ashes and all that kind of stuff and I swept it up and it didn't have much
coal in it and I asked the fellow where to get the coal and he told me in German they were German people - and
I went and took the bucket and went and got the coal and got another bucket and brought in two buckets of coal
so they should have it for the night. And he give me a beef sandwich with a glass of beer for it then he asked
where I'm going to sleep and I told him I'll have to sleep in that place he said the way you look you're wet from
top to bottom how you going to sleep there? You can't sleep there, my father's got a cot in the back - his father
was an old man - about my age maybe a little older, he said you go look at that. And I went and looked at it,
they were no blankets, no nothing, and he said I'll get what you need down there and he went and called one of
the fellows up to go down to his girlfriend's house and he got a couple of blankets and a pillow and brought it
down for me to sleep and I slept there and about 5:00 in the morning - they used to open the saloons about 6:00
in the morning - so at 5:00 in the morning I got up and I washed the mirror and all the glasses and the counter
and everything else and swept up the place and fired up the furnace and cleaned everything up and he come in
and brought in almost a dozen donuts and he made coffee and he give me a cup of coffee with a donut and that's
what I had for breakfast and then he asked me what I'm going to do down there - I said I don't know and he
went and called up an Irishman by the name of xx and from the neighborhood down there, he was in the same
line of business, and they talked it over in English and I couldn't understand nothing. And he finally went and
ordered a load of coal and dumped it xx loaned me four or five baskets with a shovel and showed me how to fill
the baskets made me a sign to put up in the front door, two for 25 cents. People didn't have no money then and
they bought two bushels for 25 cents and I got 25 cents and I carried the baskets, one basket at a time on my
shoulders to their house. And when I sold enough coal when I had enough money to pay for the coal I took the
coal back to the man that paid for it. And that's the way I started up then he made me a sign "we buy furniture"
and he told me if anybody goes by and wants to sell you furniture and you don't know anything about how to
buy it, you let me know. And a woman come by with one child in her arm and the other by the skirt, and she
almost cried she said she got three rooms of furniture she wants to sell - she wants to go back to her husband.
Her husband used to steal tools from the Pennsylvania Railroad Company and they caught him doing it and he
had to leave and he left for the State of Illinois and the car shop and she wanted to go to him. I bought her
furniture xx and he learned with me and we looked at it and I bought it for $14.00. xx a little nursering rocker
for the time Mr. McKinley went with me to buy the furniture and Mr. McKinley furnished a wagon and the man
from the xx to go and get it. And I started fixing up and cleaning up and washing up and painting a little bit and
that's where I started.
PZM: And that's why you have a used furniture store?
MF:
A used furniture store and then I bought a few stores from the other dealers in town and fixed them up in the
morning and still worked in the saloon helping sell the little pool tables. They used to sell pool tables. They had
a back room down there with pool tables. He had a pool table agency and he used to sell pool tables and I used
to help him deliver the pool tables. The pool tables used to be real heavy because they had marble plates. But
we handled them we took - years ago they didn't have no automobiles, we used to have drays and the drays were
kind of smoothed down and we put blankets on there and put the marble on it and then but the xx on top of the
marble. And we used to deliver them and we used to go down at night and put them up, fix them all up and the
saloon keeper xx and the saloon keeper treated me nice for it. Anytime I needed money, he'd loan me the
money, xx
My cousin and my uncle loaned me the money, he loaned me the money and I paid them back just as soon as I
got enough money to pay them back if I sold $10.00 - $15.00 worth of stuff I paid them back and I give it back
to him. And he seen I'm an honest man and he trusted me and that's the way I lived by. Until I built up a good
business then my sister and my mother came to America and my brother - my brother went to work in a steel
mill and my sister was trying to be the housekeeper, my mother was old and I couldn't get along with her, I
never was able to get along with my older sister. She wasn't as old as I am but she was the oldest of the two
girls.
PZM: Which brother came?
MF:
Joe, the younger one. He worked in the steel mill, he used to bring a little pay down.
PZM: He worked in Gary?
MF:
No, there was a steel mill in Tiraspol. And whatever he brought down there would help to buy groceries and to
buy a little furniture and buy -
PZM: You all moved in together?
MF:
He lived upstairs - the goyem moved out and he took the room upstairs. You could rent it for $5.00 a month.
And under the circumstances, me and my sister wasn't able to get along and I decided to split up and I told her
what I'm going to do, I'm going to take two - three wagons of old furniture iron beds and all of that kind of stuff
and I went to Clinton and I rented a store for $14.00 a month and I didn't have the money to pay rent but the
landlady says you move in. An Italian woman, and she was a big help to me.
PZM: Why did you choose Clinton?
MF:
Because they were building a lot of coal mines down there. And a lot of Italian people come from Italy to work
in the mines and she wanted me to come there because it was all new stores and she was a - a woman goes
around and collects money from other women, you understand?
PZM: A fund raiser?
MF:
A charity fund raiser. That's what she was. And that's we here we went up and the Italian woman came down
and wanted to buy furniture and I couldn't talk Italian, she used to come and do the selling. Until I got married,
when I got married, my wife wanted to be kosher. I did too.
PZM: Where did you meet your wife?
MF:
xx
PZM: Before you moved?
MF:
After I moved.
PZM: Tell me how it happened.
MF:
She was a relative to the Dumes' and Mr. Kaplan was a xx in the shul and the Dumes' were Mr. Kaplan's
relatives and that's the way I met her. And my mother-in-law wanted to get rid of her - you understand? She had
one, two, three, three or four girls. One of them married Lieberman, and one married me, and one married
Shultz.
PZM: Becky became Becky Lieberman -
MF:
Yes, -
PZM: Who was Libby Gluck's mother?
MF:
xx
I don't think there were four I think there were three sisters.
There was Sarah,
PZM: Who was she?
MF:
She was Mrs. Kaplan, and Becky was Mrs. Lieberman, and Fanny was Mrs. Fishman and Mrs. Shultz was
Anna.
PZM: How did you meet Fanny Fishman?
MF:
They moved to Terre Haute.
PZM: Where did they move from?
MF:
I don't know where they moved from, but they moved to Terrahud.
PZM: How did you meet her?
MF:
I met her at the brother-in-law's house, Mr. Kaplan's house.
PZM: I thought you told me you met her at a Purim ball -
MF:
That may be so because they were living next to the shul.
PZM: Do you remember the Purim ball?
MF:
I don't remember the Purim ball, no.
PZM: For how long did you date?
MF:
About two, three, four or five months, I don't know.
PZM: Was it love at first sight?
MF:
Yes, it was love at first sight, because I couldn't find no Jewish girl around there who liked me. Because they
all
wanted a rich man, a rich boy.
PZM: So where did you get married?
MF:
I got married in the Shul in Terre Haute.
PZM: Was your mother there?
MF:
No, my mother was still in Europe.
PZM: She had gone back to Russia, right?
MF:
Yes, xx
PZM: Why did she go back to Russia?
MF:
Because my father was sick.
PZM: And he couldn't come by himself?
MF:
And he couldn't come by himself - and they took him to Odessa and operated on him and healed him up and
brought him down to America.
PZM: But your brother - which brothers were at your wedding?
MF:
My brother Jake was at the wedding, I don't know.
PZM: And then were did you move?
MF:
I moved to Clinton.
PZM: Right after your marriage?
MF:
I took the bride and moved to Clinton.
PZM: So what did you do there?
MF:
I opened the little furniture store.
PZM: Why did you pick Clinton?
MF:
Because I lived there and rented a store before I was married and I opened the store. Wait a minute I'm mixing it
up. My father was - my mother and father were at the wedding too.
PZM: They got back in time?
MF:
They got back in time. And I moved to Clinton. I moved the store I rented from that Italian woman. And I lived
in what they called little Italy down there. She was a very nice woman but I don't think you could find a better
person in your world.
PZM: You lived above -
MF:
No I lived next door to it. In a two room house. It was a house made four rooms out of it - two rooms a piece.
And I lived in two rooms. The first one I lived in another house and this time when it got to raining and the
water come in like you put a fire hose on it. I had to do xx the floors next to the store.
PZM: But why did you pick Clinton in the first place?
MF:
It was a mining town and it was in a boom and that's all the money I had.
PZM: And you sold used furniture?
MF:
I sold used furniture and then I got to selling new furniture down there and all of the kind of stuff.
PZM: Was Fanny working in the store?
MF:
Yes she worked in the store when she was able to.
PZM: Ben was born a year later?
MF:
Ben was born when I was at the furniture store a year later after I got married.
PZM: Fanny worked sometimes after that though?
MF:
A little bit, not much. Because her other child began to come and that was another thing.
PZM: Silvia was born a year after Bill. And then when did you get the junk business? Was mother born yet?
MF:
I think your mother was born, I think we were getting ready to go the California and we got as far as
Adamsville and I sold all of the furniture that I owned to one man, and I think your mother already had a little
baby. And we were packed to go to California and my aunt and my uncle and my sister and my brother-in-law
got after me and I shouldn't go to California. And they took me to Princeton and I bought a junk business. And I
got $2,200.00 for that xx
This was - besides paying the rent for goodwill and I bought it from a big crook. No he was not my brother-in-
law. And I built up what I could until finally Fanny got sick, my wife I took her to xx to take care of the
business. They told her absolutely not to have an operation. They told her and told me she should not have an
operation because her blood pressure was awful high.
PZM: She had worked in the junk business, right?
MF:
No, that was the furniture business.
PZM: She didn't work in the junk business?
MF:
Not at that time. She come back and the doctor talked her into having an operation and that was the end of her.
PZM: You mean the xx told her not to and she -
MF:
The doctor xx
of Minnesota told her not to have an operation, it was three of them together it was Meyer, Chuck and Anderson
I think, and they told her never to have an operation.
PZM: This was after Georgia was born -
MF:
No, no this was after xx was born.
PZM: You mean she was sick with it when Georgia was born?
MF:
Yes she was sick when Georgia was born. They didn't tell her she can't have no kids but they told her she should
never have operation. Well, she had operation after Georgia was born.
PZM: Oh, I see.
MF:
That's when the trouble started, she had an attack and later after that it was Sylvia went to college for about
three four years and then come home, she got married. xx
Bill didn't know what to take up Bill was
xx
a professor. But his brother-in-law died and they
xx
and he took it over but Bill got to be a - he didn't like his brother-in-law so it was not the right crack. And the
little stores with his father-in-law he used to sell and go out and pick up the money he had coming he couldn't
stand it, he wasn't used to that. And he just took the business and give it to his brother-in-law and he took the
vending machine and went into the vending machine business. That's what Bill did. And he finally was already
married and what ever it was and I don't know how he landed in Illinois, I couldn't tell you how he landed - well
he had a sister-in-law and brother-in-law down there xx in Illinois. But he had a partner, a gentile, if you would
have seen him accept the big shoes he would have had xx he didn't wear no big shoes - he wore little shoes. But
the little fellow looked just exactly like Chaplin, Charlie Chaplin. And he had a peanut vending machine
business in the xx and there was no profit in it and he sold the peanut machines and bought vending machines.
And they kept going until he took sick. The partner, and wanted to sell the business and it took a pile of money
to buy, it had built up nicely. And he didn't know what to do and I helped what I could and your mother was
already moved to xx and she lived down there on the corner xx and xx the kids had grown up, the two boys I
helped them, I loaned the money to buy coffee machines and drinking machines and put them in the factory xx
they paid me backed. Then Clair used to take them on the car after school. The boys and take them down to the
factory and they cleaned the machines and she watched them and they used to fill the machines and all that but
Clair used to take care of them. And that's the way they got into it.
End of part 3