The Southern Jewish weekly. [volume] (Jacksonville, Fla.) 1939-1992, 1942-02-13
A WOMAN'S
WORLD
BY RUTH KARPF

~AOAAA AC1 C1ldI1u d1O OGdu-
w. the first thing that strikes one
about Mrs. Alexander Kahn is not
only the sincerity but the depth of
her convictions. Coming from a
family with a socialist, in fact
socialist revolutionary tradition,
she does her bit in guarding the
heritage. She started way back
when she was just a little girl in
Woodbine, New Jersey, where she
helped in election campaigns in
stead of playing with her dolls.
Playing with dolls seems to be
stage in life which she skipped
completely. Coming from Russia
when she was about ten years old,
she helped as soon as she could to
make ends meet at home,
where her orthodox rabbi father
voted for a socialist ticket-which
probably made things still a little
more difficult in the small bur-
geoise Baron de Hirsh Colony."I
never had the distinction of work.
ing in a factory" she says with
wistful regret, "but I did odd Jobs
in and out of the house until I
got through with school,"
Going little further into that
getting through with school, Mrs.
Kahn earned her teachers creden-
tials when she was II; taught
night school when she was 16 and
came to New York where she
wanted to teach school at night
and study dramatics during the
day when she was 10. She did
teach for some time at the Edu-
cational Alliance on the East side.
II taught English to foreigners.
Grownups. There were these great
big boys and I had to teach them;
and I was just a little girl. It
was rather difficult disciplinary
problem" But she did it.
When she met her husband in
the same year, the stage lost both
a beautiful and spirited potential
actress.
After that is a long period of
"the very important and full-time
profession of home making" Mrs.
Kahn has two daughters and a son
and very attractive and COM
Portable home in Brooklyn COM
plete with a glowing Samovar and
Marx: Das Kapital, Herzl: Der
Judenstaat. In 1885 she went to
Palestine. II was afraid of going
there. was afraid of spelling the
picture which 1 had of The Holy
Land from my orthodox home .
But my husband was going to
Europe and from there to Pales-
tine. So I came with him as his
wife,"
"Well, and how did you like it?"
Mrs. Kahn pauses for a monute.
She has to think of how she can
put it drily, logically, as state
ment" should be. But her enthu-
siasm is too deep. 81 went mad
about it When I got to Tel
Aviv on a Friday night; all the
shops were closed and people went
to synagogue and said "shabath
shalom" as their greeting; felt
a glow then the like of which I
had never felt before. I was in an
all-Jewish city"
"And Jerusalem ?"
1.-THE first thing that struck me
about Jerusalem was its fascinat-
ing beauty. I was up on Mount
Scopus, looking down to the desert
and to the Dead Sea. Our chauf-
feur was explaining things to us.
He had been a professional before
he came to Palestine and it was
a very learned discourse. He, his
car, the desert, and Jerusalem be-.
low us illustrated as no words
ever could the miraculous tie of
the Jewish people to this, their
country"
Her heart and spirit had said
yves" to Palestine long before her
mind did. But seeing Palestine
is believing. I went to colonies,
the new ones that were all tents
and spirit; have never met any
thing like it. And the old ones,
beautiful Dagania where you al