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Family Is All That Matters 28 Shlomo's Jewish education equently helped him. Aer he arrived in Moscow, Shlomo made contact with the central synagogue. During services, the presiding rabbi wondered who this stranger was who knew the prayers so well and prayed with such ease. As the Torah scrolls were removed om the sanctuary for the Saturday reading, the rabbi invited Shlomo to the bima (sanctuary podium) for an aliyah (a blessing on the Torah, literally "rise up")—a high honor indeed. Shlomo read the Torah portion with a firm voice and an utter command of Hebrew. Aer prayers, the rabbi asked Shlomo to stay behind. He listened to Shlomo's story. Shlomo told the rabbi how he was hounded out of Ukraine, and how he had a wife and five starving children to whom he was sending money. The rabbi offered to help. The rabbi told Shlomo about a furniture factory being organized by The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JOINT). Shlomo went to the factory, where the communist manager interviewed Shlomo and asked, "What skills do you have?" Shlomo said, "I can do anything. Let me try and I will show you." So Shlomo was hired as an apprentice on a lathe, or wood turning machine that was used to manufacture furniture parts such as legs for tables and spindles for chairs. "My father was a quick learner and became one of the best workers in the factory," Iosif remembers. "He pretended to be a worker, inventing a blue collar history for himself." Near the factory, JOINT built a two-story apartment building. As a single man, Shlomo was given a bed in a dormitory for workers, where he shared a room with nine other men. Each apartment had two or three rooms, oen shared by one or more families. There was no running water. At dawn, Shlomo would rise and secretly pray. He ate only kosher food. It was very tough, because the other nine men were not kosher and did not pray. One day, Shlomo approached the factory manager and said how tough it was to live with so many young men. He said he had a wife and five children who were literally starving. Because he was one of the best workers, he was rewarded with a room of his own. The room was about 18 square meters. There was a small shared kitchen. The toilet was outside and there was a wood-burning stove for heat, fed by chips and wood waste om the factory. Helping Russian Jews Helping Russian Jews Founded in 1914 to assist Palestinian Jews caught in the throes of World War I, The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JOINT) first distributed money to needy Jews in Palestine and in war-torn Europe. World War I ended in 1918, but the suffering of European Jews continued. The aermath of the Russian Revolution and the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire brought new outbreaks of anti-Semitic hostility in Russia and Poland. Hundreds of thousands of Jews perished in pogroms and om disease and famine. Those who survived found their homes destroyed and their economic and social institutions in ruins. JOINT helped local Jewish communities establish relief programs and new health and child care facilities in Poland and Russia. It also supported religious, cultural, and educational institutions. In 1921, JOINT began working through local agencies to make Jewish communities self-supporting. It helped establish more than 300 locally operated Eastern European cooperative credit unions to assist Jewish-owned businesses. One of these was the factory in Moscow where Shlomo worked. Above: Ida during university in Moscow, 1947. Previous page: Rosa, Inna, and Manya Volsun in Ukhtomka, outside of Moscow, 1951.

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