Kobrovsky
endowment fund and was the first to endow funds with what was then the Allentown JewContinues from page 1 ish Federation, the concept for which he tested by starting an causes and with Temple Beth El individual philanthropic fund. in particular. He established the Kobrovsky Around 1934, Bernie met and Award for Campaign Excellence, married Florence Thompson of which is presented to the outgoPhiladelphia and, in addition to ing campaign chairman of the Barbara, they had a son, Stuart. Jewish Federation of the Lehigh Valley Annual Campaign. Wife Florence was active in ONE BIG FAMILY women’s causes, as were other women in the family. The KoIt is clear that all through his brovsky family has three named children’s growing up years, funds with the Federation, Bernie was deeply involved in including the Samuel Kobrovsky the Jewish community. He was Memorial Fund for seniors at among the founders of Congrenursing and assisted care facilind gation Agudas Achim on 2 ties. Street. He started the Cemetery What is less clear was how Fund. He was instrumental in Hakol 4x4_Sep_BeachBoys_Layout 1 8/1/2013 PMcould Pagemaintain 1 any one12:52 person beginning the Temple Beth El
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such a level of involvement. But it wasn’t just Bernie. Starting with their father, he and brothers Victor and Sam ran the steel scrap business, Al Kobrovsky and Sons, for the duration of their work lives. Marilyn recalled that her father Victor went out with a horse and buggy to collect scrap. Victor and wife Anna started a family. Later, Victor and Bernie shared a car between their families. “We had the car on the weekdays,” Marilyn said to Barbara. “Your family had it on the weekends.” It was really all one big family. Lillian Sussman, who married Victor’s son, Norman, in 1948, said, “I don’t think they were that assimilated.” Later, her son Larry Kobrovsky, originally of Allentown but now living in Charleston, S.C., explained that “everyone living in Allentown came from the same little villages. They were family members, or felt like family members and were responsible for each other. “We were Litvoks [from] the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth,” Larry said. “They lived in little villages in the forests and woods of Lithuania … among peasants and hostile people, among them but apart. It was the policy of the Russian government [which controlled the area] to convert a third of the Jews, kill a third and cause another third to emigrate. So it was the mission of the Jews to help other Jews, especially [those from] where you came. The whole ethic of the 6th Ward was like that.”
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MARILYN AND NATE BRAUNSTEIN took to heart the example of Marilyn’s father, Victor, and the Kobrovsky family.
REACHING FURTHER When Marilyn was 16, she met Nate Braunstein. Her father, Victor, was “overprotective,” said Nate, “so it was a constant challenge. He lost!” However, according to Fred Sussman – husband of Bernie’s daughter Barbara – in the long run, “Victor won.” For Victor’s brother, Bernie, lost no time in getting new relations involved in Jewish giving. “He brought us into the fold,” Nate said, “the newcomers who could partake.” “Bernie was out front and tough and straightforward,” Fred explained. “He told you what he thought and he told it like it was.” Fred was undaunted by Bernie’s direct manner at the time they met. “I was 16 years old,” Fred said. “I didn’t know any
fear.” Nevertheless, after he and Barbara married in 1958, “I was at the next Federation Board meeting,” Fred quipped.
THE PRESSURE WAS ON That was only the beginning. Later, when Bernie heard that Nate and Marilyn had bought a vacation home, he summoned Nate to the scrap yard office. “You don’t go out and buy a second home until you take care of the Jewish people first,” Bernie told him. Although Nate’s first reaction was that Victor – “the man hiding behind the newspaper over there” – was the only person who could speak to him in that way, Nate took Bernie’s words and example to heart. Both the Braunsteins and the Sussmans have demonstrated