Speech written for the Jewish Federation of Toledo, Testimonial Tribute By Alfred Billstein, Nov, 24, 1964 Dear Friend, The first I heard about this meeting proposing to honor me was through Brunette. She told me that Milton Silverman had approached HER - - excusing himself by saying that I had refused honors so often that if he talked to me first, he'd get a turn down again. He was never more wrong because this occasion was totally different. It's true - - - I refused to go through the chairs at Bnai Brith, also to head the United Drive and several other honors - - all of which required a lot of time and hours of work, - - nothing for a lazy man like me: - - whereas this honor requires no work at all and I get a free dinner too. Milton, how could you think so wrong? Besides, Brunette urged, "It's an honor for the children and those eight grandchildren who'll have the chance to brag about their grand daddy. So I said a not at all reluctant, "It's OK with me!" Then Marvin Lerner phoned for a picture for the Jewish News and we sent him one taken about ten years ago or a passport photo. When it appeared, a number of my good friends were unkind enough to suggest it must have been taken 25 years ago. Then when I read the text that went along with the picture in the Jewish News, I called Marvin and asked, "Who wrote this?" He said, "I did!" I said you drew a lot on your imagination, did you not?" He said, "not at all!" I replied, I graduated from Toledo Polytechnic School in 1903 and after hunting for work for five months, as a mechanical draftsman, I took an office boys job for $5.00 a week in February 1904. By 1907 I was earning the lordly sum of $7.00 a week and here you tell me I was "in the list of givers" that same year, the year the Federation was organized? Impossible!! He said again, "I'll show you," and he did. He brought me a 1908 printed report of the organization of the Toledo Federation of Jewish Charities, which I hold in my hand. It shows that Toledo raised in 1907 a total of 46,700. There were 270 subscribers, and sure enough Al Billstein is in there for $5.00. There were 104 $5.00 and $6.00 gifts, 23 of which were unpaid at the year-end due to 1907 being a year of depression. The President was Nathan Kaufmann, and Uncle of Margot Sanger. He was a grand person and the recognized leader of the Jewish community. A lot of your fathers and grandfathers are listed herein, but there's no time to read their names. So much for thisÉ.. Later I said to Marvin, "I suppose I'll be expected to say something after the Rabbi's address? How much time shall I take?" How much do you want, " he asked me? "Oh, I said, I can use up anything from two minutes to an hour." He gasped a little and said, "Better make it two to five minutes", so I said "OK". This honor has already caused me to review my own life's memories, starting in 1892 when Toledo got its first electric car line; in 1893 when the whole family went to the Chicago World's Fair, and I viewed Toledo's largest fire. I remember standing and crying, thinking the whole town would burn. What a span of historical events since then; the depression of 1893, the McKinley Bryan election campaign with its torch light parades, the special free trains going to Canton to hear McKinley who never left Canton to campaign. Then came the sinking of the Maine, and finally the Spanish American War in 1898. Here I am at 1898 with only five years of recollections and 65 more years to go and only a few minutes left. So, I'm forgetting history and getting on with some personal history, that I think you will find of more interest. While I wasn't exactly a brat, I cost my folks a lot of worry and money. When I was eight, in 1893, on the fourth of July shooting a toy cannon, I looked to see why the cannon didn't go off and got 41 pieces of powder in my face. The doctor got it all out in a week, except one piece still in my right eye. At ten I was laid up for ten weeks with a fever, which our family doctor, old Dr. Hammer, called typhoid-malaria, which I believe is a non-existent disease. Anyways, it left some ravages behind and at sixteen I was found to have an enlarged heart and a bad kidney. Later I found out, after a year of doctoring, that Dr. Lawrence Groch, a top diagnostician of Toledo, had told my folks that I had two years to live. A Cleveland specialist confirmed this. So you see, folks, I've lived on for sixty-one years of borrowed time. However, an aunt in Cleveland prevailed on my folks to see a Dr. Peskin, a German immigrant who put me on a year's diet of steak, to be chewed 32 times and discarded. Now some of you will understand why I eat so slowly. In fact, I'm the champ of Toledo at slow eating, but it did the job! At 18 I was turned down or life insurance. At 27 I got in the New York Life and Lincoln Life, but was rated up 7 years by each. At 40 I got 5-year term insurance. At 45 I got 20 year convertible term, which goes to prove how wrong the doctors sometimes are and also, how the older I get, the better I get É. but not in every respect. (look at Bru). Last July I was 79 and I got a lot of phone calls of congratulations. I thought it over, so I called up my doctor and said, "Hello J. Lester, congratulations!" He said, "What's this for?" I said, "It's my 79th birthday and it's for keeping me alive so long!" He laughed and said it wasn't such a tough job. He sort of inferred I might hang on for another five or ten years, so maybe I'll go out for ninety with its promise of two more honor parties and free dinners. On the other hand, I might be ready for Darlington House, and unless they build an extension, I couldn't get in. So I'm proposing here and now that we plan for a 1965 twelve to fourteen room extension and herewith offer the first pledge of $10,000 toward it. I'm elated with this party and honor, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart and I know I speak for my entire family.