Welcome To

T his book came about as a result of aging: my own personal aging and the rapid aging of those in my family born before me. As I got older, I began to have more time to think about the lives my parents and grandparents led, and about the fact that I didn't know much about these lives. My first cousins, of whom there are an amazing 25, did not know much more than me. In addition, I began to attend many funerals—those of beloved aunts and uncles, people who took with them precious knowledge about our family. Never being one to procrastinate, I decided that before death took more members of my family, I would make an effort to capture whatever knowledge was still available about those who came before me. My father Iosif and three of his five siblings—Rosa, Inna, and Manya—as well as my maternal aunt Zhenya were able to contribute firsthand to our understanding of the family's relationships, strength, and history. In addition, several of my older first cousins helped by recalling stories and moments om their childhoods. My parents' and grandparents' generations lived during turbulent times. They survived multiple migrations, two world wars, communism, the pogroms, Stalin, and the Russian Revolution. Volsuns and Bravermans made journeys om Ukraine to Russia and then to the West and Israel. They made transitions om a Jewish-centered world, which is mostly gone now, to societies where it is difficult to maintain a Jewish identity. Family Is All That Matters spans all of these themes and epochs, chronicling our predecessors' struggles, successes, and determined pursuits of better lives for their children as well as revealing details about their work, relationships, and spirituality. Though their children make occasional appearances, this book is foremost about the generation of Volsuns and Bravermans born in Russia during the first two decades of the 20th century and the forces that shaped their lives. It is filled with individual moments in life, oen undistinguished. But these events are what remind us that families are formed by an accumulation of such moments, and through these moments we can get to know those who came before us. Unfortunately, the communist system involved risks which made it imperative that my family members destroy many photos, documents, and other physical mementos of their lives. In addition, the difficult emigration process om the former Soviet Union to the West did not allow any physical object older than several decades to be taken out of the country. As a result, very little documentary evidence exists about the people described on the following pages; there are very few letters, very few photographs, and no diaries or journals. I hope that this book can be part of the reclamation of our family's past, fixing in one place the stories, photographs, and documents that are part of our heritage. Many in my generation can relate to the life experiences of those who came before us, but relatives in the next generation, unless they are students of history, mostly cannot. This book is, in short, an expression of the love, gratitude, and honor that the descendants of the Volsuns and Bravermans have for the family that made our lives possible. I regret that I know so little about my great- grandparents. It is my goal that with this book, future generations of Volsuns and Bravermans and their extended families will not need to make such an admission. I believe that our family today stands for the same principles that our parents and grandparents exhibited: family solidarity, family loyalty, the power of education, the promise of quiet faith, and human decency. These things are more durable than glory, power, and wealth. By this book, the legacy of the Volsuns and Bravermans will endure. Lev Volsun McLean, Virginia June, 2010 Foreword Foreword

• Cover