Through a strange series of “happenstances”, we have come to own a bundle of letters written by a family we never knew. The correspondence is from the 1920s and is between a family in Brooklyn and their relatives who have recently moved to Palestine.
The letters are written in English and Yiddish, and for the most part are the friendly banter of a family homesick for the familiarity of their native home, and yet enchanted by their new “exotic” neighbourhood.
One of the letters goes into some detail describing the house they live in, at 37 Ha Levy Street, in the relatively new town of Tel Aviv. They try to explain to their family living in a Brooklyn Brownstone how people use their covered balconies as sleeping areas during the hot nights.
My husband recently visited Israel on business; and he had a commission from his wife, to photograph 37 Halevy Street. I was desperate to see if the house still stood. Regrettably it doesn’t, an ugly concrete bank stands in its place. However, right across the street is a building that matches the description in the letters. Here it is, the original Tel Aviv in all its glory.
3 comments:
Oi Gewalt! What a find! In the hotter parts of Australia most people sleep on the verandah in the summer time. I know a station owner on the edge of the Simpson Desert who has a large stone house with a 12'wide veranda all around enclosed with flyscreens. They live in the house in th ewinter and the verandah, complete with second kitchen and bathroom, in the summer.
Isn't it exciting to have a glimpse into other peoples lives after such a time lapse?
Jane, I recommend you visit Leah Namour's blog, "The Weather in the Streets". She's a Jewish New Yorker who writes excellent posts.
Check out my "My Haunts" blog list in the sidebar of "Keepsakes".
Kat
That is so interesting that there still exists a look-alike building! It is so hard to imagine how unbridgeable those long distances must have felt for the new immigrants and how important those letters must have been back then.
Sleeping porches were quite common in the American South, and not only there. Even up in Minnesota have I heard about people sleeping on the second floor in the summer, on the outside, screened-in porch.
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