The Jewish Press | September 30, 2016 | a5
Rosh Hashanah Greetings
The Pollak name has been around for at least 150 years
Oliver B. POllak ames are a big thing in the brick and mortar complex. They are printed in big letters on libraries, hotels, universities, hospitals, and airports, honoring owners and machers. Omaha examples include Dale Clarke, Joslyn, Kiewit, Clarkson, and Bergan. UNO boasts Roskens, Weber, Eppley, Baxter, Caniglia, Henningson, Sapp, Allwine, Criss, Kaiser, Durham, Mammel, Scott, Strauss, Thompson, Davis, and Weitz. They honor administrators and prominent citizen-philanthropists for contributing to Omaha’s economic and cultural life. Jews contributed to this phenomenon at UNO, Creighton and Lincoln libraries and programs: Philip and Ethel Klutznick, Natan and Hannah Schwalb, Dorothy and Myer Kripke, Norman and Bernice Harris, and Guinter Kahn. My name, Pollak appears inside the library catalogs and on the bookshelves. If it turns out alumni were in the slave trade or other nefarious colonial ventures, watch out. Their name is tainted, and calls echo for denaming and renaming; poor Cecil Rhodes and John C. Calhoun, et. al. We have two or more names. It is not always straightforward how it is spelled and pronounced, what syllable gets emphasized, are the vowels long or short. Anderson, Larson, and Stevenson can end with “on” or “en.” Smith can be Smythe. Phillip can be Philip and Denis Dennis. Ginsberg Ginsburg Ginzberg, Ginzburg could confuse the beat poet with a pornographer. Is it Alan, Allan, Alen, Allen, or even Alain? Pronunciation and spelling can bedevil and garble even popular names. There are three ways to pronounce Shapiro. Mel Brooks plays with Frankenstein. How lucky it is to have a single syllable name. I have taught thousands of students. Their syllabus has Pollak on it. At least 40% manage to add a “c,” Pollack, on their exams and term papers. My editors proof read and spell it Pollack. My two worst stories – I got page proofs of an article and my name was Pollak, when the article was published it was Pollack. The Jewish Press identified me as Pollack more than once; and one article spelled my name two different ways. It can be found wrong in index, bibliography, acknowledgements, on the web, just about everywhere, but my tombstone, though it was misspelled once on my law office letterhead. When I get a check with my name misspelled, I smile, and cash it. My father had some inkling of the Pollak name problem from living in Austria and England. When we came to America there was some discussion about anglicizing it to Pollard. Now wouldn’t that that be a treat, almost like changing it to Rosenberg in 1952. Parents sometimes honor an icon and name their children Lincoln, Jefferson, Washington, Roosevelt, and Gromyko. I have not recognized this so much among women, but watch out for some Hillarys in the womb. The Omaha phonebook has two Polacks, six Polaks, five Pollacks, one Pollak (that does not include me because we are unlisted), twelve Pollards and fourteen Pollocks. Phonebooks in different cities vary in frequency of the spellings due to immigration patterns. My name is pronounced softly, Pollak. Not Poe-Lack but pawlek. It is mispronounced about as often as it is misspelled. People frequently ask how to pronounce it. So what does Pollak mean.?Disregarding that the spelling Pollock is a species of codfish, and
Pollok is a Glasgow suburb. Some assume the bearer has a Polish background. My paternal grandparents lived in the Austro Hungarian Empire. As a child I overheard a conversation suggesting the prior family name may have been Wolf, and that’s all I know about that. Completely unconnected, my oldest grandson is named Zev. In 1987, the Austrian government published the Totenbuch Theresienstadt, damit sie nicht vergessen werden [Theresienstadt Death Book – so that they will not be forgotten] listing the Austrian Jews deported to Theresienstadt or Terezin. It shows their birthday, and all too often death day; Agnes Pollak, my paternal grandmother, was born on Feb. 6, 1871, and died Aug. 21, 1942, about two weeks after she arrived. My maternal grandfather, Felix Bachmann, survived Theresienstadt.
from
Marty and Iris Ricks
y p p a H ear Y w e N David and Bobbi Leibowitz 402-496-7499 | OmahaHouses.com
Happy New Year
The list contains 141 individuals named Pollak. The editors lumped almost all the various spellings under Pollak, an indignity similar to the nazis (I refuse to capitalize the word) inserting Israel and Sarah as the middle name for Jews. My first name, Oliver, may derive from being born in England in 1943 to refugee parents. Perhaps they wanted me to have an English name, and maybe it was because Oliver Cromwell readmitted the Jews into England in 1656. They had been expelled by King Edward I in 1290. 2006 was the 350th anniversary of re-admission. However, Oliver Cromwell was also a regicide who facilitated the execution of King Charles in 1649. Oliver was a republican, believing in government without king or monarch. The middle name on my birth certificate, social security card, military service papers and passport is Burt or Bert. It derives from my paternal grandfather Adalbert, who lived in Vienna. My cousin told me in August 2016 that our paternal grandfather, born in 1867 in Kalocsa, Bacskiskun, Hungary, was named Bela. He moved to Austria and took the name Adalbert and died in 1927. He is buried in the Zentralfriedhof [Central cemetery] that also contains an Adalbert Pollak who died in 1923. Why my father in 1943 preferred the Germanic Adalbert over the Hungarian Bela confuses me. Perhaps it was easier to anglicize. My sister’s middle name is Agnes, after our paternal grandmother. Born in Gilgenberg, Austria, her family name was Ehrenzweig. We cannot control our personal and family names. Nicknames, shortened or contracted, have a shelf life. Only those who knew me before I married Karen remember Oli or Ollie, and only I remember Stinky. My father moved around Europe, Palestine, England and America known as Wilhelm, Villie, Vilem, Hillel, Willie, William and just plain Bill. The most famous Oliver Pollock (1737-1823), of which friends and associates remind me, helped finance the American revolution and introduced the $ symbol. Sean Ferguson is my favorite joke about See The Pollak name page a6
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