East Side of New York, he walked with his head bowed down so low that the 6 ft. in statue in Boiberke was this time hardly recognizable, and I felt truly sorry for him.
During the week days when the landsleit were working at the sweat shops, he had no one to converse with. He used to go to the shoe shop of Yoisip Raucher on Pitt Street, also in New York. There he would sit on the low shoe maker stool and watch Raucher making shoes, while they chatted about Boiberke.
Observing the scene in the shoe shop once I was reminded of the role Moishe Gottlieb had played in Boiberke. I recall how the Chazan in the Boiberker Shul where Gottlieb worshipped would not begin the services until Gottlieb sat in his place.
I also recall the night after the fasting on Yom Kipur, the local band under the leadership of Chaim Gross, or Chaim Kleneter, (he played the clarinet) would come to Moishe Gottlieb's house and played their instruments, and the younger set of the town would stand at the windows to listen to the fine music.
Moishe Gottlieb felt that the streets of New York weren't for him. He left for Palestine and when his wife, Roisele, came from Boiberke to join him, they settled in Jerusalem.
In 1912, when I was on a visit to Boiberke, I was told that Gottlieb's oldest son, Josel, who was known as Moshke, always against the Jewish National Movement, had returned from a visit to his parents in Jerusalem, and as a real Meragel would tell the folks in Boiberke that he found Palestine dirty and filthy. No drinking water to speak of, the roads and highways the worst he had ever seen in his life. He said he would rather stay under the Polish regime in Boiberke than settle in that poor country which is called Palestine and is under the Turkish graft regime.
Josel and his family remained in Boiberke and his so-called Polish friends didn't lift a finger when they were slaughtered by the Nazis in the Ghetto of Boiberke. On the other hand, his parents live in Eretz Israel until they reached a ripe, old age and they were respected by all who knew them.
On a Saturday afternoon, if I am not mistaken it was on Decoration Day, May 30, 1905, I was on the lower East Side in New York, attending the place of worship of our Boiberker landsleit. I saw a man sitting at a table and reading the Psalms of David. As I looked at the man he lifted up his eyes and recognized me, although I hadn't seen him since I left the town of my birth. It was Simche the water carrier. He earned a meager living by carrying water to the house wives of Boiberke from morning to late in the night, six days a week.
I sat near him, and in reply to my question, he told me he arrived in New York several years ago. One of his sons (If I am not mistaken was a pants operator,) who came to this country some years previously, sent for him and the other members of the family. He told me that he did not lack for food and clothing and could even spare a few cents for the poor, but that he was praying constantly to God to forgive him his sins. What sins could you have committed in your life, I asked, slaving from morning to night in Boiberke merely for a dry piece of bread? This you call sinning? Oh Joel (this is my name), you do not understand, he told me; the sin is to eat the bread your son earned by desecrating the Sabbath. Simche lived to a ripe old age, respected by all who knew him.
Here is an interesting story which my late brother Samuel, who was older than I, told me some years ago. One Saturday afternoon, he came to the lower East Side in New York to observe the Yahrzeit of our mother, (this must have been the year 1900.) On Rivington Street he encountered a fellow Boiberker who used to be a cattle driver in Boiberke. In the winter he used to drop in to our house to warm up. When my brother met him on Rivington Street, he was dressed in a dark suit and a dirby hat and his chest was ornamented with a golden watch and chain which in those days was usually purchased from a pedler on payments of a dollar a week. When my brother asked him, Mordchy Hersh, how are things with you, you look 