This tape consists of a formal interview with Tatiana (Taybele) Moiseevna Marinina (née Palatnikov, b. 1921 in Teplyk) (part 1 of 2. See MDV 686). She discusses her family, including her parents and grandparents. Her grandparents lived to the ages of 118 and 115, and had moved to America with Marinina’s uncles before the war. She details what her uncles did for work in America and states that she lost contact with that side of the family after those uncles passed away. She also talks about other relatives who more recently immigrated to the United States, as well as her son, who lives in Germany, and her daughter and grandchildren.
From the machine transcript
Marinina notes the interview is in Teplyk and says she was born a week before a holiday and that neighbours marked her eightieth birthday. She gives her Yiddish name Taybele and her Russian name and address in Teplyk. She names her parents (father a butcher) and her grandparents, who died in Trenton, New Jersey at very great ages. She describes two uncles in Trenton, one with factories and one poorer, and their children, who no longer know the family; she names relatives in San Francisco, her son in Germany, and a daughter and grandchildren.
Includes details on her names, address and the American relatives' names beyond the catalogue's summary.
Marinina shares her memories of prewar Jewish life and her early education. When she was approximately ten years old, her family moved to the Lunacharkskii kolkhoz in the Crimea, where her family received assistance from the American Jewish organization Agro-Joint.
From the machine transcript
Marinina says she was born in 1921 in Teplyk and did well at school. In about 1930 the family was sent to a Crimean kolkhoz, where they first lived in a shed and were helped by the American Agro-Joint. She names the Sak district and the kolkhoz, named after Lunacharsky, and answers Kerler's questions about it. She also mentions her two courses at pedagogical institute and her husband's return from the army as an invalid.
Adds her father's butcher's license and Kerler's questions on the district and kolkhoz name.
The interviewee speaks about social life on the kolkhoz, stating that everyone lived together “like one family.” She details the kinds of work done on the kolkhoz, including the raising of livestock, horses and sheep, and tending to fruit orchards and vineyards. Marinina completed three grades at a Yiddish school on the kolkhoz, and thereafter went to a Russian-language Jewish school in Simferopol’, where she lived in a dormitory.
From the machine transcript
Marinina describes the kolkhoz where children lived like siblings, with livestock, sheep, horses, orchards, melon fields and vineyards. Her father and aunt worked there, and she remembers her mother as a good housewife. She completed three grades in the Yiddish school there, then went to a Russian-language 'Jewish' school in Simferopol' and later to Feodosiya, living away from home.
After finishing pedagogical training, Marinina worked for two years in an ethnic German village. She discusses her experiences during the war, detailing her time in various camps, such as Raygorod and Bershad’, the help she received from non-Jews and the forced labor she and her family performed for Germans and their local collaborators building roads and working in factories.
From the machine transcript
Marinina says she worked for two years in a village of ethnic Germans, until 1941, while studying part-time at the Simferopol' pedagogical institute. She recalls the war years in camps, including beatings and forced road building at Raygorod, Bratslav and near Bershad' by Jews, guarded by Germans and local police. Her father, a butcher for the Germans, brought her back to Teplyk. She also tells of a former kolkhoz acquaintance who spoke Yiddish and kept her secret.
Adds a former kolkhoz acquaintance who concealed her Jewish identity.
Marinina returns to the subject of her youth in the Crimea and sings a fragment from the popular Soviet Yiddish song “Dzhankoye.” She also comments on the various Yiddish writers she read for pleasure and in school. She states that although her father was not religious, he was nevertheless a highly educated and proud Jew. He thus encouraged Marinina to speak, read and write in Yiddish. She recites a fragment from the song “Makheteyneste Mayne.” Marinina’s mother was very religious and strictly observed Passover. Marinina observes Passover today and makes many of her mother’s traditional foods.
From the machine transcript
Marinina speaks about the two Germans who helped Jews during the war: a Czech-born driver and an officer who rescued children and took them to Bershad'. She also tells of a non-Jewish woman who saved a Jewish boy, and of the difficulties of getting this confirmed. The passage deals mostly with rescue and not with the Dzhankoye song or Passover, as the catalogue describes.
The transcript shows rescue stories, not the catalogue's singing, Yiddish writers and Passover.
Marinina explains the differences between the kinds of “lotkes” (latkes) made for Chanukah and Passover, and further discusses her mother’s baking and cooking. Cities and towns mentioned on this tape: Teplyk, Trenton (New Jersey), San Francisco, Kiev, Simferopol’, Bershad’, Raygorod, Bratslav, Leningrad, and Haysyn.
From the machine transcript
Marinina names the kolkhoz station and local geography near Simferopol', and Kerler asks about a Crimean song. She recalls reading Yiddish writers such as Itsik Fefer and Peretz Markish. She says the school taught in Russian, and her father, though not religious, was a cultured man who taught her to read Yiddish and a few Hebrew words. She recites a verse about a mother-in-law (a song fragment). She describes her mother's strict Passover preparations and her own Passover cooking, the latkes for Passover and Hanukkah, and her mother's baking and gefilte fish.
The latke discussion is a Passover and Hanukkah baking exchange; also includes Yiddish writers and the song fragment, as the catalogue assigns to s0005.
This tape is a continuation of a formal interview with Tatiana (Taybele) Moiseevna Marinina (née Palatnikov, b. 1921 in Teplyk) (part 2 of 2. See MDV 685). She describes Jewish life on the Lunacharka kolkhoz where she lived as a child, focusing on how holidays were celebrated. She briefly recalls the Passover “seyder” (Seder), detailing the various foods that were eaten then, including “keyzlekh” (dumplings).
From the machine transcript
Marinina lists the holidays kept on the kolkhoz (Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur fasting, Sukkot, Hanukkah, Passover, Purim). She describes the family seder, with her father's friends as guests, and the dishes her mother made, including matzo-meal dumplings (keyzlekh) and potato dishes. Kerler asks what keyzlekh are. She also mentions latkes at Hanukkah and Hanukkah money from her father.
Also covers Hanukkah latkes and Hanukkah money, and the other holidays kept.
Marinina talks about the “Gern” or “Subbotniki” (ethnic Russian converts to Judaism/practitioners of Jewish customs), that lived on or near the kolkhoz. According to the interviewee, they attended Yiddish schools and spoke Yiddish better than the Jews, some of them even registering as Jews in their internal passports. Marinina also comments on the generational differences within this group, noting that younger Gern (converts) spoke Yiddish better than their elders and were more likely to marry Jews.
From the machine transcript
Marinina talks about the Russian converts or Sabbath-keepers, called Gern or Subbotniki, who lived near the kolkhoz. She names a family (the name is unclear) and recalls one who learned at a Jewish technical school. Some were registered as Jews in their documents, and she tells an anecdote of a man declaring himself a Jew in court. Kerler asks how they spoke Yiddish: the older generation with a Russian accent, the younger ones better, and some married Jews.
The names of specific families and a court anecdote about declaring nationality; the catalogue's claim that the younger Gern married Jews is only loosely supported.
Marinina speaks about Jewish life in Teplyk before her family moved to Crimea, stating that she had both Jewish and non-Jewish friends. There were many non-Jews who spoke Yiddish well in the town, according to Marinina, and many of them were killed by the Germans during the war.
From the machine transcript
Marinina speaks about non-Jews in Teplyk who spoke Yiddish, among them her father's friend Kazarsky, who spoke better than Jews, and a fish dealer. She tells how, under the Germans, one man was beaten or taken after being taken for a Jew, and a villager's fate is told. Kerler asks whether they spoke with an accent. Her own Jewish and non-Jewish friends are touched on briefly.
Adds the specific non-Jews named (Kazarsky) and the wartime anecdotes.
Marinina shares her family’s traditional recipe for “gefilte fish,” stating that her daughter has already forgotten the tradition and makes her fish in a “non-Jewish” way. Marinina also notes some regional differences in how gefilte fish is prepared. She also briefly talks about the Passover seyder on the kolkhoz, stating that her father led the meal, despite the fact that he was not religious.
From the machine transcript
Marinina describes how she makes gefilte fish: fish stuffing with onion, egg and pepper, boiled for two hours, with only a little sugar. Her daughter makes it a non-Jewish way, and she compares other ways of making it. She then explains the Passover seder in her parents' home, with her father reading from the Haggadah and not being religious. Her grandfather and his brothers emigrated to America in 1924 (?).
Adds details of her father's family emigrating to America and a Torah booklet she owns.
Marinina answers questions from the research team's survey of dialectological and sociolinguistic inquiries. There is also a short discussion of Jewish funeral customs when Marinina asks the researchers if it is allowed in Judaism to repair a deceased relative's damaged gravestone.
From the machine transcript
Kerler puts dialectological questions: words for bed, a headache, crying, hunger, matzo, going out into the street, to baptize, to hear, vodka, cold, high, to come, people, mouse, later, a gravestone, greetings, non-Jew and peasant, vineyard and grapes, and others. Marinina answers each in Yiddish. Midway she asks whether Jewish law allows replacing her husband's cracked gravestone, and Kerler answers that it is a mitzvah to do so.
Adds the funeral-custom discussion about repairing the gravestone of her husband, whose son lives in Germany.
Marinina briefly comments on intermarriage and the contemporary situation of Yiddish in her town, stating that she has no one to talk to in the language. The rest of the tape consists of the interviewee answering more questions from the AHEYM dialectological survey. Cities and towns mentioned on this tape: Teplyk, Shchebetovka, Simferopol’, Uman’.
From the machine transcript
Marinina says she has no one to talk Yiddish with, mentions reading a Yiddish booklet, and notes that her granddaughter married a non-Jew, a militia officer. Kerler continues the questionnaire with words for book, pigeon, tooth, ten, a shed, to build, thousand, near, face, blue, green, yellow, and the Sabbath loaf (khale). She also recalls her father giving Hanukkah money and the size of her family.
Adds that the recorded speaker lives in a suburb of Teplyk and describes family details and a granddaughter's marriage.
