"Toll on Call": The Seven Days article on Dr. David Toll, from November 14, 2012

 Dr. Toll's obituary (appended below) missed quite a few details that this 2012 article includes. A child and grandchild of Jewish immigrants, Dr. Toll was a long-time member of Congregation Beth El in St. Johnsbury, Vermont.

 

 

Dr. David Toll: A Beloved Country Physican, by Amy Ash Nixon, Caledonian-Record, December 128, 2018

 

DANVILLE — A visit to Dr. David Toll’s pediatric practice was like a step back in time.

If a child was sick, you were instructed to come right in, and often Dr. Toll himself would take the phone call and talk to the child’s parent to find out what the concern was.

He had a laboratory upstairs in his building, so getting a strep test, or bloodwork done was fast and he had the results almost immediately.

Dr. Toll’s office was Norman Rockwell-esque, vintage Fairbanks scales in the patient rooms, his office itself a converted Main Street white wooden house, with toys for the kids and magazines for the parents on tables.

He was known for never turning anyone away for inability to pay.

The death of Dr. Toll, 93, over the weekend, caused many in Vermont’s rural Northeast Kingdom to offer their condolences to his family, and to share stories of what the region’s most treasured pediatrician meant to them, their children, and their lives here.

“The Kingdom has lost a friend,” shared Darcie McCann on behalf of the NEK Chamber of Commerce. “We have lost Dr. Toll.”

McCann said, “Medical professionals like Dr. Toll came from a different era, one we will never see again. It was not just the longevity of his practice but how he put his heart and soul into the tens of thousands he treated during his decades of service. Being a doctor was not just a profession to him; it was a calling. His life was truly extraordinary on how many lives he touched in his own long life.”

Sue Willey of Kirby shared, “I had a trusting love for this wonderful friend and doctor. Shared my family with him from day one of Tracy’s life (50 years ago), then Christy for 17 years and Dallas’s into college even … So so sad … love to his family and his office staff that made every visit with him pleasant. Took the girls in once when they were covered with red spots and Dr. Toll entered the room took a look from across the room, announced ‘Your cats have fleas!’ followed by a few helpful suggestions about flea terminating and grinning left the room.”

Dr. Tim Thompson of Kirby, now retired, arrived in the Northeast Kingdom in 1973 and knew Dr. Toll for many years.

The three tenants which Dr. William Osler, remembered in history for being the father of modern medicine, are what Dr. Thompson pointed to in remembering Dr. Toll and his care of children in the Northeast Kingdom – availability, affability and ability.

“David had plenty of ability, and that’s not to make it the last one, but he was amazing at being available to his patients. He had people coming from all over the Northeast Kingdom and New Hampshire to see him. It was a great testimony to his persistence, to his ability to convince people he could really take care of them. He was just a wonderful doctor here for a very long time.”

Dr. Thompson continued, “His interest was in really making sure that kids had access to care, and it’s amazing that he did that as a single practitioner. St. Johnsbury was a pretty interesting place (to choose to practice in.)”

Of Dr. Toll practicing until his 90th birthday, Dr. Thompson said, “David didn’t know what else to do. He wanted to continue being a doctor and it was really important to him. His patients were very dear to him. He was sick once and I put him in the hospital and he said, ‘I’ve got to go take care of my two patients first,’ and he went to discharge them. I couldn’t stop him.”

Dr. Thompson said Dr. Toll’s wife, Bridget “took great care of him, she was a great wife and a great caregiver.” Running a medical practice as the sole practitioner for so many years is a huge commitment and “Bridget gets a lot of credit,” for being at his side, he said.

Dr. Thompson said Dr. Toll’s work here and reputation was “why a lot of people were willing to stay here,” and make their careers in St. Johnsbury.

People adored him, and trusted him with the care of their children, he said.

He said, “David was the standard here for pediatrics … I think everybody respected his persistence and his capacity to be able to deliver care.”

Paul Bengtson, the recently retired CEO of Northeastern Vermont Regional Hospital, worked with Dr. Toll for many years. “I worked with him as a board member and sometimes president of the medical staff,” said Bengtson. “I worked with him actively for more than 30 years. He always had a very active intellect, which personally I enjoyed. He wasn’t particularly enamored of administrators, but I could roll with that because I actually could understand his point of view a lot of times.”

“He had a very long and I would say vibrant and interesting career. He enjoyed a huge following, almost like I’d never seen as a medical professional. He was a very smart diagnostician,” said Bengtson. “A lot of people would approach him I guess around the region for his ability to diagnose, particularly conditions with children.”

Bengtson said, “He is one of those people who was a legend - and he was a legend in his own time. He leaves behind a very nice, large extended family. He was very aware and smart culturally, too. One of the things I enjoyed about him was his enjoyment of classical music.” Dr. Toll also was a reader of The Book of Ecclesiastes, and he and Bengtson would discuss things from it, he said. “He knew The Book of Ecclesiastes very well,” said Bengtson. “He made many references to it.”

Toll continued to see some patients well into adulthood – even their 50s, said Bengtson.

Holly Blair of Kirby on Monday said her mother, Merrillee Blair, worked as a lab tech for Dr. Toll in the years prior to his retirement.

“He was my doctor from birth until he retired when I was 33,” said Blair, now 35. “He was such a great man … I have a million fond memories of him – which is something to be said considering I do not typically like doctors and have been sick a lot over the years. Dr Toll saw me through everything from routine childhood illness of strep throats and stomach bugs to more complicated situations like hospitalizations … (he) probably saved my life several times.”

“The world has lost so much with his passing and we were so lucky for the many years of service he gave to so many,” said Blair.

Carrie Peters of Groton on Monday said Dr. Toll took care of her four children, Torie, 22, Shelby, 21, Wyatt, who died at 15, and Luke, 12.

“When I was pregnant with Torie I was trying to decide on a pediatrician and I thought it would be neat to go to the same doctor as my husband had,” she said. “So that started our journey. Things were pretty uneventful with my girls but when my son Wyatt was born with special needs then there was lots of visits to Dr. Toll and lots of questions. Wyatt was born with Microcephaly and had all sorts of neurological problems.”

“Of course we spent lots of time at Dartmouth, but it was Dr. Toll who when I asked him how long did he think Wyatt would live to be told me ‘a teenager,’ that Wyatt’s brain would not be able to keep up with his body’s needs,” Peters said. “Oddly enough the specialists at DHMC told me many different answers – from as long as 50-60 years old to Wyatt will just keep getting pneumonia and die. In August of 2015 Wyatt passed away peacefully at 15 years old, exactly how Dr. Toll predicted, not multiple pneumonia’s, just peacefully at home with us. It still amazes me today how he knew this. And Dr. Toll and Bridget coming to Wyatt’s funeral and coming over and hugging me meant the world to me and I will never forget that.”

When her son Luke was about 5 and was admiring the sailboat pictures on Dr. Toll’s office wall, Dr. Toll invited him on a 3-day sailing trip, which Luke went home and packed for, said Peters.

Peters said, “There are many stories about how he fit us in any day no matter how busy his schedule was,” said Peters, who said she still misses his ability to diagnose what is going on with her children. “I always knew I could call, get in, and that Dr. Toll would take great care of my children.”

A celebration of life service for Dr. Toll will be held at The Creamery Restaurant in Danville from 1-4 p.m. on Friday.

 

Photos from the History of Congregation Beth El, St Johnsbury, Vermont

Congregation Beth El used to meet in an upper floor of Luv's department store, across from today's Boxcar & Caboose in St. Johnsbury, Vt.

                                             From the Burlington Free Press, June 27, 1981.

Three long-term presidents of the congregation: from left, Ben Harris, Alfred Zeller, David Kanell.

                                            Art that hung in the entryway.

                                            

                            West Wall art by Chick Schwartz, on the west wall of the sanctuary.

Patty Caplan, 1941-2022, Synagogue Leader of Congregation Beth El

 

"Nate's": Christopher Ryan Describes the Opening of This Jewish-Owned Business in 1949

[The following letter was presented by the Caledonian-Record of St. Johnsbury, Vermont, on  January 9, 2021.]

May 1949 – Nate’s Opens

To the Editor:

On Thursday night May 5, 1949, the venerable and long-missed St. Johnsbury haberdashery and shoe store, Nate’s Inc., opened for business in the Randall Block of Railroad Street in Scale City. The article in the paper of record of that afternoon noted that the third and newest Nate’s store in Vermont “will be under the management of Ben Harris, who together with his [brother] Nathan Harris of Montpelier and [his father] Hyman Harris of St. Albans, operate the group of stores. [Ben Harris] is a native of St. Albans, where he learned the clothing business in a store owned by his father. A veteran of foreign service in World War II, Mr. Harris is a member of the Montpelier Elks and Kiwanis Clubs and for the past two years has served as treasurer of Vermont Jewish Council. He is a member of St. Johnsbury Chamber of Commerce.” (“New Nate’s Inc. Opens Tonight Men’s Clothing Store Will Hold Open House – Is Third In Nate’s Vermont Chain,” The Caledonian-Record, Thur. May 5, 1949, at pp. 1-2). On Fri. Apr. 6, 1951, Nate’s relocated to 77 Railroad Street.

Over the next approximately thirty-four years, Nate’s was a popular men’s clothing destination offering, in particular, a superb, high-quality line of suits and shirts. Around town, Nate’s proprietor Ben Harris (1913-2014), his wife Rosalie, and their children Gertrude, Andrea, and Bill are/were remarkable in their deep and steadfast involvement in St. Johnsbury civic service, school activities, and in their philanthropical efforts. Among the too many to mention of these associations were The Kiwanis Club (of which Ben was a member for decades both in Montpelier and in St. Johnsbury including service as president of the St. J. chapter); the St. Johnsbury Chamber of Commerce; the Northeast Kingdom Chamber of Commerce; serving as corporators of Northeastern Vermont Regional Hospital; support of St. Johnsbury Academy and the St. Johnsbury public school initiatives/Parent Teacher Association; and in the family activity in the religious life of Temple Beth-El/Congregation Beth-El.

St. Johnsbury is a praiseworthy hometown because of the resolute support of certain individuals to the continuous betterment of town civic, commercial, educational, and philanthropic endeavors and organizations. Count the Harris family members as very prominent in that group of St. J. residents sharing that high-minded ethos of public service to others that has always been an endearing attribute of Scale City.

Christopher E. Ryan

Simi Valley, Calif.

 * *

This blog presented other material on Nate's and Ben Harris in 2014: https://jewsinvermont.blogspot.com/2014/12/nates-mens-clothiers-st-albans.html

Here's Charlie Dolgin, who grew up nearby, showing his elegant Nate's-labeled hat.

* *

I note for the sake of completeness that my late husband Dave Kanell used to talk about the founding of the Nate's clothing store in St. Johnsbury. His version involved Ben Harris being sent to the "hinterlands" of St. Johnsbury because the family felt he couldn't handle the established larger stores -- and then, of course, Ben proved his value to the community by getting to know everyone, and making Nate's in this small town a thriving concern. 

Ben and his wife Rosalie presented the face of Jewish community for decades, and their presence at community events is sorely missed.

In the Jewish Section of Mt. Pleasant Cemetery: 4, Burton Zahler

There are only a few stones so far in the Jewish section of Mt. Pleasant Cemetery in St. Johnsbury, Vermont. It meant a lot to me to be able to choose this for my husband Dave Kanell's burial location. It seemed to me important to know more and share something about the others there. The following narrative was written with Burt Zahler's wife Sachiko Yoshida. Here is a photo of Burt with Sachiko, courtesy of the Vermont Arts Council.

Burton Ross Zahler, 1931–2016

 

Burt Zahler’s stone in the Jewish section of Mt. Pleasant Cemetery in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, includes the name of his wife Sachiko Yoshida, who lives in St. Johnsbury. She kindly allowed me to ask her about her husband and her decision to have his burial location be in this lovely place.

 

Ms. Yoshida grew up in a small city in northwestern Japan, and worked as an art teacher there in junior high school and special education. In 1994 she served as a volunteer in the Japanese Peace Corps, called the Japanese Overseas Cooperation Volunteers (青年海外協力隊, seinen kaigai kyōryokutai), or JOCV. In her thirties at the time, working with the team in Honduras, she was impressed by meeting psychotherapist Burt Zahler, then 62 years old and survivor of two wives, who had tragically died in their youth. Not only was he joyful and giving, but he had the energy and commitment to once again fall in love. Two years later the pair married and settled in Japan, where Ms. Yoshida had a sister.

 

However, Burt missed his children and America, and Ms. Yoshida agreed to move to the United States with him, to Vermont, where he had lived with his second wife. Here are some of the details of Burt’s earlier life:

 

Burt was born on December 12, 1931, the younger of two sons of the late Irving and Clara Zahler in New York City. Shortly after his birth, the family moved to the Lower East Side (Avenue A and 4th Street) where he learned about the hard scrabble life of the streets. Due to Irving's ill health, they moved to St. Petersburg, Florida, where, during high school, he became involved in trying to integrate the football team, earning him (and his friends) praise from Eleanor Roosevelt. At the University of Chicago, where he studied linguistics, he met Suzanne Dana Troy. After college, Burt and Suzanne married and moved to Houston, TX where their two children, Erika Robin and Adam Troy, were born. In 1959, Burt was accepted at Boston University for graduate studies in psychology and the family moved to Brookline, MA. Tragically, soon after arriving, Suzanne passed away, leaving Burt a single parent. Two years later, he met and married Michal Frank, another grad student. During his graduate school years Burt worked on a study of the psychotherapeutic uses of psychotropic drugs, including LSD. The study was led by Richard Alpert (known later in the 60's as Baba Ram Das) and Timothy Leary, who gained fame for his LSD advocacy. In 1963, the family moved to Vergennes, Vermont, where Burt took a position at the Weeks School, the state reform facility for juvenile offenders. There, Gideon Jacob, Burt and Michal's first child was born.

Burt conceived of an intensive therapeutic treatment center for young offenders aged 16-20. In 1966, Burt's second daughter, Rachel, was born and Lakeside Center was established in Burlington, Vermont. In 1968, Burt's youngest, Reuben Chaim, was born and one year later the family settled in Charlotte, Vermont. In 1970, Burt and Michal set up a private practice as the first non-psychiatric psychotherapists in private practice in the state. They established a clinic, The Center for Change, in South Burlington. Sadly, in 1981, Michal, too, passed away. Thirteen years later with his children grown and on their own, he sold most of his possessions and moved to Honduras where he met Sachiko Yoshida.

 

Burt opened a psychotherapy practice on Eastern Avenue in St. Johnsbury, and his wife reports that he also “had a lifelong passion for playing poker, playing at casinos and in tournaments until very recently, and in reading books of all kinds.” He did not affiliate with the local synagogue.

 

Although he had been raised in a culturally Jewish home, Burt was not at all religious. However, he told his wife he’d like his burial place to be the Jewish section of the cemetery in St. Johnsbury. His death took place on October 5, 2016, and Ms. Yoshida worked with Nelson Baker of Beth El Synagogue to set up the burial, along with a graveside farewell.

 

Ms. Yoshida treasures her Japanese culture and heritage, and is an artist working in both paint and sculpture. She honors her own Buddhist religion through meditation in her thoughtfully tended gardens. The burial stone also reserves a place for her with her husband, in the Green Mountains that she has adopted as her home.

 

 [To read more local Jewish personal stories and history, browse the whole blog: https://jewsinvermont.blogspot.com]

History of the Jewish Community of the Northeast Kingdom, Vermont, 1971–2019: David Kanell

Photo by Darcie McCann.

With heartfelt thanks to Dr. Erica Andrus of the University of Vermont, here is the interview she recorded with David I. (Dave) Kanell on March 30, 2019. May his name be for a blessing.

Beth El Synagogue St Johnsbury VT 1993 Dinner

Posting some documents as I sort the Kanell archives.

Caplan's Army Store, Part 2, from Peggy Pearl

A delightful addendum to Peggy Pearl's earlier write-up of Caplan's Army Store in St. Johnsbury, as printed in the Caledonian-Record on January 23, 2019.

Caplan's Army Store, St. Johnsbury, Vermont

This article from the Caledonian-Record of December 5, 2018, is a fine celebration of the enduring presence of Caplan's Army Store in St. Johnsbury, Vermont. Note that the Caplan family who founded the store were of Jewish heritage, cousins to Harvey Caplan (who later became long-time leader of Beth El Synagogue). Not only does the article show an early image of the store, but it also helps to bookmark the period when Jewish-owned businesses entered the community. Also, for the Caplan in the center of the second photo, Myron, there is a large plaque dedicated to his military service at Beth El Synagogue.

We note this in particular because the passing of Dr. David Toll last week was reported in the newspaper without mention of his Jewish affiliation -- quite a loss of history, since again, Dr. Toll's arrival in St. Johnsbury took place at a time when a Jewish doctor in the town was not entirely welcome, and Dr. Toll was a synagogue member for a long time.

So, hats off to Caplan's Army Store and its continued prosperity.

Dr. Nathaniel Gould, Vermont Physician, and His Patient Rocky Marciano

The noted American boxer Rocky Marciano (born Rocco Francis Marchegiano) received care from Dr. Nathaniel Gould, who had been a member of Congregation Beth El in St. Johnsbury. If the boxer's name sounds familiar, you may be an "oldtimer" who watched his success in the 1950s; or you may have seen Sylvester Stallone portray this American sports hero in the "Rocky" films. Here, thanks to long-time newspaper correspondent Chris Ryan, is the story from the November 15, 2018, Caledonian-Record:

Historian and researcher David Kanell adds the following dates for this family: Nathaniel Gould, MD, 1913-2008; his wife Edith Marion Spiller Gould, 1913-2011; their son John Samuel Gould, MD, 1939-2015.

PS For more stories about Jewish residents of Vermont, including their roots, their businesses (a furrier; St. Johnsbury Trucking; a scrap metal dealer in World War II; women who shaped communities and still do so), browse this blog. If you have a related story or photo to share, please let us know!

Harvey Caplan Boxes His Way into a New Decade

The founding families of Congregation Beth El in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, are marking significant milestones, as the synagogue also ages and changes.

This recent article from the Caledonian-Record includes Harvey Caplan, who with support from his wife Patty is finding new ways to stay active in his 80s.

With the Passing of Lillian Zeller, Memories of a Very Different St. Johnsbury, Vermont

I didn't know Lillian Zeller until around 2002; even then, she was lively, fun to be around, with a "wicked" sense of humor -- and stylish, my goodness yes! Driving her flashy convertible with the license plate LEZ, decorating her home, laughing at the latest news (followed sometimes by a sharp jab of critique for things and people she disapproved of). Visiting with Lillian was never dull! And her chopped chicken liver was "to die for" -- it was one of the foods my husband longed for me to learn how to prepare, and I did my best to match her recipe, but you know how it goes, there's always a little difference. Ah, Lillian!

Here's the newspaper obit. You can also read about the fur business she married into when she married Alfred Zeller and moved to St. Johnsbury (click here). I'll never forget how this chic and feisty woman also paid attention to her garden and the visiting deer, as well as every scrap of news about Beth El Synagogue's community. Glad to have known her.

Community Politics: A St. Johnsbury Memory

Dave Kanell found this newspaper clipping recently, from the front page of the local newspaper, the Caledonian-Record, on November 2, 1992. It was a one-time-only write-in campaign for long-time synagogue leader Harvey Caplan. The campaign failed, but the community sense of humor prospered.

High Holy Days in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, 1921

Records show that the Knights of Columbus acquired rooms in the Citizens Bank (now Union Bank) building, shown here, after the building's catastrophic fire in 1909 led to a new structure. The organization allowed use of its space by the Jewish community in 1921, as described in this local news article:

Caledonian-Record October 8, 1921

Jewish Services In K. of C. Hall

            Several families of the Jewish faith in St. Johnsbury are banded together in solemn observance of the Jewish new year. The service of prayer and fasting which began last week in Knights of Columbus hall will conclude next Wednesday evening. From 4 o’clock Tuesday afternoon until darkness spreads over the land Wednesday evening earnest Jews will be engaged in prayer and fasting. Business will be entirely at a standstill.

            The services of prayer in Knights of Columbus hall will be in charge of D. Zabarsky of Barton and I. Lavontil of Montpelier, and the families included in the solemn observances are those of H. Dolgin, A. Nurenberg, J. Arron and B. Goldstine of St. Johnsbury and Maurice Nurenburg of Hardwick. Mrs. Zabarsky and son, Harry, of Barton are here for the celebration of the holy days.

Memories Shared at Her 75th High School Reunion Weekend: Irene Dolgin Goldstein, Part 4

Irene and her cousin Barry, St. Johnsbury, VT, May 31, 2015.

Mrs. Irene Dolgin Goldstein -- "Irene," in the rest of this post -- attended her 75th high school reunion at St. Johnsbury Academy on May 30, and the next day, she sat with me in the dining room at the Comfort Inn and shared more memories. Some, she had been thinking about before her visit; some came with the reunion; and she brought two wonderful items to talk about.

At the Academy this reunion, she met Frank Powers, a classmate of her brother Arnold's (five years older; class of 1935), who had taken part in liberating train cars of Jews at the end of the Second World War. He wore a French croix de guerre, and a medal from the Dutch Queen Beatrice. Mr. Powers lives in Jacksonville, Florida; is now 98 years old; and told Irene, "I'll see you here again in five more years!"

Irene reconnected with three of her own (1940) classmates: Pauline Potter, Dick Cook, and Louella Drown; Louella, like Irene, went to grade school at the Portland Street School. Irene also recalls another close friend from those years, Ruby Page.

Driving around town with her younger cousins, Irene reflected on the neighborhood she saw this year on Elm Street in St. Johnsbury, and what it used to be: Jake Aaron and family lived in the first house past the railroad tracks, and when they moved to the Bronx, Irene's father Harry Dolgin bought the house. It has since been replaced.

Much of Portland Street has changed, including where Irene grew up in the house at 167, but across the road she found the edges of where her father's platform scale once sat, weighing laden trucks, including the ones delivering maple syrup to Carey Sugar, now Maple Grove -- and the maple processing factory still looks familiar.

Across from the Portland Street School (now Cornerstone) is the field that was a skating rink in winters when Irene was growing up in the 1920s and 1930s. (It is still flooded for ice each winter!) Irene learned to ice skate there. She had a problem with her ankles and needed special arches made for her shoes. Her mother was concerned that ice skates would be a problem. "I wanted to go skating in the worst way," Irene said, "and she said 'no I don't think you should.'" But Irene borrowed her brother Arnold's "shoe skates" to go anyway. Her mother saw her and didn't say anything to her, but went and got Irene a pair of white shoe skates of her own. Skating was from 7 to 8 pm, and every evening after supper Irene would go to skate.

Another rediscovery on her visit in May 2015 for Irene was the cottages at the St. Johnsbury/Lyndonville line. She remembers being able to take a right turn there to a pond that used to be clean and bright. It was a familiar location for her because her father owned the nearby Blue Moon Hotel. She says the man who owned it before her father sold Pontiacs, as well. One day he came to her father Harry Dolgin and said "I need your help" -- he wanted to sell him the restaurant. According to Irene, Harry said, "What's the matter with you, I'm a junk man, I don't know anything about a restaurant." But the man insisted he had to sell: "I'm an alcoholic, you have to help me save my life." Harry really didn't want to purchase the restaurant, so he made the man a ridiculously low offer, expecting to be turned down. The man put the key into Harry's hand. Harry said, "What have I done, I'm a junk man!"

Irene Dolgin's wedding photograph.

But it worked out well after all. Irene was already married at the time. She worked with her father to run the restaurant, and learned to carry a tray when needed! Mostly she "kept an eye on things" and did some of the buying, as well as working as cashier. The restaurant seated about 200 people for dinner. It was open for lunch and dinner, had a bar and liquor license, and also had a small room to seat about 28 people.

There is a photo of the "Blue Moon Restaurant and Ballroom" on page 337 of Claire Dunne Johnson's book "I See by the Paper," volume II. Irene said the ballroom was also a roller rink in winter, and dances were held there. In 1953 the ballroom/rink was destroyed by fire.

Irene enjoyed telling the entertaining story of her brother Irving working at the motel. "Somebody from ASCAP came by and wanted to know where the ballroom was." Irving said, "You'll have to ask Mr. Mephistopheles." "Where do I find him?" "You go right down the road to St. Johnsbury and ask anyone!"

Irving graduated from Lyndon Teachers College and became a schoolteacher, working in Orleans, Vermont. The family was happy that he was doing what he wanted to do. Irene says he was a very kind person. He was married two times and said, "That's it, I'm not going to get involved anymore." He also became a barber when he was disillusioned with teaching and had experienced three rounds of surgery through the VA hospital. Eventually he moved to Quincy, Mass., to be close to Irene. Every evening between 5 and 6 pm he would call her. When at last there was no phone call, and she called his home three or four times with no answer, she and her husband went to Irving's place and found he had died, sitting in his chair by the television.

After this sad story, Irene wrapped up the visit with an entertaining one that featured her mother. Irene's parents used to buy live chickens. Her father would purchase about half a dozen at a time from a farmer and carry them in a burlap sack with holes in it. He took them this way to the Shechita, the kosher butcher, so they could be properly slaughtered. At the time, the slaughter was available in either Montpelier, Vermont, or Sherbrooke, Canada (just across the line from Derby Line, Vermont). One time Irene's mother went to Sherbrooke to have the chickens killed, and Harry would de-feather them when Mrs. Dolgin returned from the trip. The car she used was one that had a history of use by rumrunners! [This was during the Prohibition years, when liquor was available in Canada, and local rumrunners would transport it to markets in the United States.] The police had taken the car from its owner and sold it to Harry, who bought used cars at his junkyard. Mrs. Dolgin went north, accompanied by the family's live-in maid, Rebecca. "Dad said don't buy anything, just come right back," Irene remembered. "But you don't dare to tell Mom that!" Her daring mother bought a small bottle of liquor and put it into her baby's diaper; Rebecca had one in her knickers, for her father. At the border crossing, the police looked in the trunk at the burlap sack. "What's this?" "You won't believe me if I told you, see for yourself," Mrs. Dolgin responded. The office stuck a hand into the sack, finding bloody dead chickens. "Who own this car?" he demanded to know. "Harry Dolgin," said Mrs. Dolgin. The officer expostulated, "Why didn't you tell me?" Mrs. Dolgin replied, "You didn't ask!"

Many thanks to Irene for allowing two special documents to be photographed for this report. One is her lovely wedding photograph. The other is a bill of exchange from 1925, when Charlie Martin sold his Maxwell Touring Car to Irene's father Harry Dolgin for $40 -- and also a Holstein cow, for $45, "worth more than the car," Irene comments with delight.

Newspaper announcement of the Blue Moon sale and purchase:

Growing Up in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, in the 1920s through World War II: Irene Dolgin Goldstein - Third Interview: Getting Married

[Mrs. Irene Dolgin Goldstein, interview 3, March 17, 2015, by phone - Beth Kanell]

Railyard would be on far side of river, left part of photo.

Mrs. Irene Dolgin Goldstein – “Irene” – made a correction to one date in interview 2, mentioned that her father had a siding and scrap yard near the railroad tracks, and said that her father’s arrival date in St. Johnsbury should instead be “after 1910 and before 1916.” [No archived materials address this; we only have the 1920 Census showing Irene’s parents, Harry and Frances Dolgin, living in St. Johnsbury with their son “Aron” (that is the Census record, although Irene says her brother’s name was always Arnold) at age 1 year, 11 months. I will keep searching.]

 Irene’s family home was at 113 Portland Street, St. Johnsbury, Vermont. Across the road was 80 Portland Street, which included a filling station. There, her father built an office, and a platform scale that could weigh up to one hundred thousand pounds, so it could weigh a big tractor or trailer, says Irene. She added that her father installed in later years steam heat for the scale, so it would work in the winter. “The police used to come by with some driver with his truck loaded and it would be [shown on the scale to be] overloaded, and they were so happy with that!” Also pleased with the scale was the Cary Sugar Company (now Maple Grove) further east on Portland Street. “Trucks bringing maple syrup [to the maple sugar company] would weigh before and after unloading. It was convenient, just down the road.”

Cary Maple Sugar Co., photo from about 1960; would become Maple Grove.

Irene learned to drive on a 1920 Oakland. “Everything had standard shift.” It belonged to “the girl who worked in the office” (her father’s office), and Irene’s mother arranged for this office worker to teach Irene in that car. The first car that she owned was a 1939 Ford convertible, “the last year they made the rumble seat.” Then a cousin of hers had an accident in a convertible, and Irene’s father took her convertible away, replacing it with a 1941 Pontiac.

1920 Oakland automobile

The driving test was in St. Johnsbury, although no particular office location came to mind. Helen, the office worker, took Irene in that 1920 Oakland. There was a written test first, and then they “drove around, not too long.”  As a new driver, she especially noticed how challenging it was to handle a standard-shift car going uphill: “Going up Eastern Avenue in the winter could really be something.” One time, she noticed a line of cars at the bottom of that hill, so without thinking much about it, she detoured to the shorter (and steeper, but less traveled) Sand Hill, made it all the way up just fine, then realized afterward that it could have been a bad choice!

As a girl, Irene wanted to be a nurse. “However, in those days, nurses did the dirty work,” and her dad said, “No daughter of mine is going to lug bedpans, period.” So instead she “did secretarial training.” She didn’t go to college because of the war (World War II). As she reflects on her career today, she says she had a lot of fun in all her jobs. For example, she worked for her father, and when he bought a restaurant, she’d sometimes help in there. “I learned how to carry a tray when they were shorthanded.” She also learned from her father’s business about scrap iron and metal: what they were, how they were treated. “And everything to me was learning. You can learn so much from different jobs.”

As another example from her career, later, when she lived in Montreal, she got an “entirely different job for a small firm importing textiles from around the world. I worked with letters of credit, and foreign exchange, and it was so great!” She worked four hours per day at that time, so she could be home for her kids after school. She took her work seriously, even though she enjoyed it, and one time the bank said her business had overdrawn one of its letters of credit. Her boss said to go home and not worry about it, but she went through all the numbers and worried all weekend – and on Monday showed that the bank had made the error, not her! [Later, she would work in Malden, Mass., for a building supply company, including bricks, and enjoyed learning that, too.]

Filene's on Boston, where Irene's mother bought the wedding dress.

Irene married at age 20, in Boston on February 22, 1943, a few weeks before her birthday. Her fiancé was in the Royal Canadian Air Force, and he suddenly got word of his leave being approved. It was okay’d on February 1, and Irene went to her mother and said “I’m getting married on February 22.” That put everyone into a rush to prepare – especially her mother. Three weeks! Her mother said, “Pick up the phone and call your aunt” [in Boston], who was a whirlwind at getting things done. Irene’s aunt said, “Tell your mother to get down her tomorrow and we’ll get started figuring things out.” Together, Irene’s mom and aunt rented a Boston-area hall for the wedding and printed up invitations. “Then they went to Filene’s Basement [famous dress shop in Boston, with a “basement” of wedding gowns] and my mother found a girl about my size and had the girl try on a gown” that seemed right. It fit, and Irene’s mother bought it. Then her mother came home, and the next task was to address all the invitations to Irene’s family members. Next, they went to Montreal to give invitations to Irene’s fiancé’s family to send out. Irene’s recollection is that her family had to provide checks for the Canadians to travel to the wartime wedding, so the Canadians could prove they were “not taking money out of the country.”

The dress was ready and right, but Irene had to go to Boston herself and, with her aunt, go purchase her headpiece and veil. About 250 people would be coming to her wedding. And now she had another challenge: Her older brother was in the service and stationed at Camp Gruber in Oklahoma, close to being shipped overseas to the war. All leaves had been canceled. But Irene was determined to have him be her best man. She sent a letter to Lieutenant Colonel Carver, who was head of his group, Rainbow Division. She said it was important to her to have her brother take part in the wedding, especially since he was being shipped out and she “might never see him again.” Her brother was given two weeks of leave, even though nobody else was getting any!

It was a big favor she’d been given, so she went to Cary Maple Sugar Company and got a case of maple syrup and sent it to the Lieutenant Colonel – her brother had told her that they didn’t have maple syrup in Oklahoma. Soon Irene “got a lovely letter back, the Lieutenant Colonel’s children had fun, they had only ever had molasses before.”

At the wedding, “the fellows were all in uniform.” Irene and her new husband stayed in Boston for a couple of days of sightseeing, then took the train to Montreal to see her new father-in-law, who had been sick and couldn’t come to the wedding. [Irene notes that this marriage, which took her to Montreal to live, lasted about 16 years; her other marriage was to Sam, also an airman, and lasted 34 years: “Every day was special.”]

At this point in the interview Irene took time to talk about the family years in St. Johnsbury again. She recalled other Jewish families in the area with the names Prolman and Brody, who were in-laws of each other. She also mentioned the Zabarskys, who “used to live in Barton. Daniel, the older one, was a junk dealer and would go with the two boys with horse and wagon to peddle” and would stay at the Dolgin home in St. Johnsbury. But Irene’s mother decided there really was not enough room for three extras, so she told Harry, Irene’s dad, to give the Zabarskys money for a hotel room, although they continued to come share meals.

Irene has in her papers a receipt written by her mother, accepting a cow as payment for a car at the family business – the cow was worth more!

Hilda Handy's family members, at their St Johnsbury ice house.

The family home at 113 Portland Street had a garage and office on the first level. The home, upstairs, had its own separate entrance, on the right of the building. The kitchen was 18 by 18 feet, and it was a lovely home. Irene’s dad would try to be home for supper each day, so they all ate together. Lunch was a family meal as well. When Irene was a teen, attending St. Johnsbury Academy on the other side of town, she would run home a mile and a quarter in fifteen minutes. Going back was an uphill trip, so sometimes she’d go over to her friend Hilda Handy and get a ride with Hilda on the Handy family ice truck back to school.

-- BK

Growing Up in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, in the 1920s through World War II: Irene Dolgin Goldstein - Second Interview

Frances and Harry Dolgin, Irene's parents

Irene Dolgin Goldstein, second interview by phone, January 16, 2015

In Interview 1, Mrs. Irene Dolgin Goldstein, hereafter “Irene,” told the story of how her father Harry Dolgin arrived in St. Johnsbury in 1916, right after marrying Irene’s mother Frances. On the day when he came to town on the train from Boston, local blacksmith John McLean helped him negotiate a bank loan to purchase a horse and wagon to start his business here, hauling scrap – known at the time as being a “junk dealer.”

Irene has another John McLean story to share: About 35 years later (1951?), John McLean came to see her dad and it was his turn to feel “low.” McLean explained to Harry Dolgin: He could no longer use the location where his blacksmith shop had operated for all those years, and when he looked around town, he found no place that he could afford to move into. “Dad had recently helped out the town of St. Johnsbury by trading a junkyard location for the stone sheds,” Irene recalled. [“Stone sheds” were specially built for the regional business in granite and marble, and stood next to the railroad siding. Some still do.] “He took John to the stone sheds and unlocked one.” Harry asked John whether the shed would work for the blacksmithing business, and John said it would be perfect. “Dad gave it to him for one dollar a year for as long as he wanted. Dad was so happy that he could do something for John.”

Many changes happened in the Dolgin family and business in those 35 years. For example, Irene recalls that around 1923, “Dad received an SOS from his sister Buzy [pronounced “Boosie” and listed on the Census as Busia] Shnitzer. Buzy hadn’t wanted to come from the Ukraine to America earlier, when Harry brought other members of his family (1910). But now her husband had been killed by soldiers. Some time later, a soldier entered the house and threatened to kill Buzy; her little girl ran in front and confronted the soldier, who then left the house. “So Aunt Buzy decided it was not safe, and gathered her seven daughters and a cousin, Jake Olshansky.” The fleeing family reached Romania, but did not have the funds to go further, and that was when they sent their “SOS” to Harry Dolgin.

Irene remembers that her parents chose to put guarantee the required funds to guarantee entrance to America for the immigrants, which by then numbered 10 people: “Mom and Dad had to have $42,000 in the bank to guarantee to get them access to the U.S.” Irene adds, “I think they came from Romania to Holland to New York.” Then they came to live near the larger Dolgin family in Chelsea, Massachusetts. An older daughter, Rivka, got married there, but the new family in general wasn’t happy there, and ended up moving back to the Bronx (northern part of New York City); they stayed in touch and there was plenty of visiting back and forth.

This is a good point to mention the early Dolgin family photo [found by BK, online] shown here. Irene confirms that the young man at the left rear is her father’s brother Philip, and then, from left to right, Aunt Minnie, a girl whose name doesn’t come to mind just now, Aunt Bertha, and Harry (Irene’s father). The man with the girl on his lap is Aunt Buzy’s husband; Aunt Buzy is sitting next to him; and the four little girls are theirs (they would have three more after this photo, which was probably taken in Ukraine.)

Among the Jewish families that Irene can name from her years growing up in St. Johnsbury (the 1920s into the 1940s) were the Cohens, Caplans, Stahls, Weiners, Shapiros, and Goldbergs, and in Lyndonville, Morris (Moishe) Nurenberg. She also recalls Jake Aaron in St. Johnsbury, who moved to Brooklyn with his wife, daughter Rose, and two sons.

The Goldbergs, like the Dolgins, were in the junk business, but with a different approach. Irene’s dad, Harry Dolgin, handled both automotive and other junk, but the Goldbergs mainly handled automotive scrap. (The Goldberg family’s auto scrap yards lasted to nearly the end of the 20th century.)

Irene recalls that her father used to melt down lead into “pigs” (large blocks) for the Fairbanks Scale Company. He would also bring cast iron to Fairbanks. Irene remembers that during the Second World War, her father sent the steel he’d collected to Pennsylvania.

[In fact, Claire Dunn Johnson’s book I See By the Paper notes that Harry Dolgin took over leadership on scrap metal collection for the entire town, for the war effort.]

During this wartime scrap collection period, Irene started wearing slacks. It was a necessary change of attire for her share of the wartime scrap movement: She would go to the junkyard, just during the war, to oversee one or two loaded freight cards going out via railroad at night. In order to make sure the loading was done properly, she’d climb up the side of the freight cars. “Everything had to be done as fast as you could get it done,” she says.

Other Jewish families in town were shorter term residents. “It was strange, but it seemed as if somebody moved out, and somebody moved in.” Irene estimates that there were about 25 Jewish families in town at any one time.

Let’s go back to one of the other names: “Mrs. Weiner had a ladies’ clothing store. I think her husband died young, and she had daughters. One moved to Montpelier or Barre; another one married Harold Shinauer, who was a bookkeeper for St. Johnsbury Trucking.” There was also a son who moved away, and a daughter Betty, a year or two younger than Irene. [From BK: I must have the spelling wrong for Harold, as I can’t find him, although there was a Harold Shiro who worked for St. J. Trucking. Mrs. Weiner was Sarah (Masur) Weiner, b. 1891 in Russia, and her husband was Maurice Weiner, b. 1882 in Russia; they immigrated to the US in 1911 and appear in the 1920 St J Census. The children who show in the Census and in a birth document are Samuel, b. 1919, and Bertha/Betty, b. 1925. In 1920 this family lived on Ely Street, and in 1940 Mrs. Weiner and these two children are at 4A Railroad Street.]

Harry Cohen and his wife had a small ladies’ store, and they had one son. They eventually moved back to New York (City) when Irene was about 18.

Pearl Stahl’s daughter had a ladies’ dress tore; her sister-in-law, married to Pearl’s son Harris Stahl, took it over. [Stahl records online: Pearl A. Stahl, b. 1912 in New York, d. 1985 in St. J.; Harris W. Stahl b. 1916, son of Rudolph and Augusta Stahl; Jeanette S. Stahl, b. 1915; family address 11 Boynton Ave.]

When Irene was about 10 or 11 years old, she asked her father whether she could have an allowance, as other kids talked about. He told her, “You don’t need an allowance. All you need to do is come to me for money.” He had charge accounts at stores in town, so that Irene and her mother could buy their clothes that way. When Irene was a schoolchild, every day her father would give her “a couple of pennies” and she’d go into Renfrew’s Store on the corner across from the (Portland Street) school and get penny candy.

On the corner of Concord Avenue and Portland Street, on the same side as the (Portland Street) school, was “a truncated fountain for horses and a spout on the side for people to drink.”

Irene remembers that Mr. Silver “had a farm of horses off Lafayette Street in the back there. I remember a couple of fellows on horses came down through the street. They said they were going to bring some cattle down to the train – ‘Everybody get off the street,’ especially Portland Street. We could stand upstairs and watch, they were herding cattle down Portland Street like you see in the movies.” It only happened once, and Irene was amazed by this! Not too long afterward, Mr. Silver sold his farm.

“We used to go swimming,” Irene recalls. They would swim in the (Moose) river in back of Carey Maple Sugar Company [now Maple Grove]. “We called that the Checkerberry.” They could leave their things untouched on the shore, swim into the river, sit there and sun themselves, and swim back.

Irene’s brother Arnold, before going into the service [for World War II], would go target practicing and sometimes take her along, further up the river [east from town], by the railroad tracks. They would gather up beer cans that had been thrown off the train. Irene would throw the cans, and Arnold would try to shoot them.

Irene’s father Harry Dolgin built a grocery store, then rented it out to the First National Bank. And he gave her brother Arnold a car. For gas, her brothers would siphon the remaining gas out of the old junk cars in the family’s junkyard, and they would add this bit of gas to the “glass carburetor” of Arnold’s car. They could then “drive around in a circle and toot twice, then have to siphon more!” They also would drive up and down a hill of ashes in the yard. Irene tried siphoning once, and never again!!

When Irene was in seventh and eighth grade, she and the other girls from Portland Street School had to go to the school on Summer Street to study home economics. She would have a nickel to spend and on the way back, she used to stop at the Cross Baking Company and buy a bag of broken candies, which contained so many, “that would keep you a week!” She learned to cook, bake, and sew.

For high school, Irene attended St. Johnsbury Academy. “That was a great school, it still is, and you know what, it’s 75 years since I graduated.”

As a child, Irene went for health care to Dr. Prevost. On one occasion, her brother had made a seat to slide down the hill. She thinks it could have been made from an iron spring from a car, a couple of inches wide and very long. Irene was told by her mother not to touch this, but she decided she had to. She took it across from the school and fell, getting a cut on her chin. “The doctor came right over, he wouldn’t stitch it, and taped it together.” She still has the scar. Her mother said to her, “Let this be a lesson, when I tell you something, not to do it, because G-d will punish you again!”

Across from the school was a skating rink with a little shack with a stove in it, “so you cold get warm and then go back and freeze yourself.” Irene would go skating in the evenings after her homework was done, in grades 7 and 8.

[I asked Irene whether she remembers people worrying about polio.] Irene remembers a girl she knew who got polio, and she remembers her children receiving the vaccine for it. “It was sad, so many kids got it, but we were lucky.”

Irene did have to go to the dentist as a child, and also had her eyes checked. She wore glasses for a while, but by high school her eyes were better and she didn’t have to wear them. She graduated from high school when she had just turned 17. This early age was a result of what her mother had done, putting her into school for first grade a year ahead of time when Irene was only five. Irene’s mother told the registering teacher that Irene was six. “The teacher said ‘I have to see her birth certificate’ and Mother said, ‘If you want to see it, you can go get it, here [in Massachusetts] is where she was born.’ The teacher said, ‘but I have to see it.’ Mother said, ‘Were you there? I was there!’” Irene’s mother told her this story much later, when she was a teenager.

The beautiful photo that Irene provided for her interviews (shown with Interview 1) was taken when she was 18 years old (1941).  A third interview follows this one.