Family Passover - St Louis

Here is the photo I alluded to recently. My father, standing, to the far right and his sister Joy at the left. My grandmother Eve (laughing) and Grandfather J.B. in the center. My guess is the photograph taken in '44 or '45.

From what I know, my great-grandfather passed into America via Ellis Island in the 1890s to escape the Russian pograms. His name was "Horn" but he wanted a Jewish sounding name so he told the attending officer "Hornstein" which was written "Orenstein." From New York, Orenstein moved to University City, St Louis, where there was an established Jewish community and this is where he thrived : he founded a textiles company which J.B. eventually took over, dropping out of school in the 8th grade to run the family business. My father, the first in his family to attend college (Northwestern) chose law school; he left the Midwest for the Peace Corps (Malowi, Africa), where he met my mother, and then Berkeley and us. Maybe Moe will fill in some of the space in story and, if so, I will put it here, on my blog.

The Passover Sedar is a Jewish ritual feast that marks the beginning of the Jewish holiday of Passover. It is held on the evening of the 14th day of Nisan in the Hebrew calendar, which corresponds to late March or April in the Gregorian calendar. The Seder is a ritual performed by a community or by multiple generations of a family, involving a retelling of the story of the liberation of the Israelites from slavery in ancient Egypt. This story is in the Book of Exodus (Shemot) in the Hebrew Bible. The Seder itself is based on the Biblical verse commanding Jews to retell the story of the Exodus from Egypt: "And you shall tell it to your son on that day, saying, 'Because of this God did for us when He took me out of Egypt.'" (Exodus 13:8) Traditionally, families and friends gather in the evening to read the text of the Haggadah, an ancient work derived from the Mishnah (Pesahim 10). The Haggadah contains the narrative of the Israelite exodus from Egypt, special blessings and rituals, commentaries from the Talmud, and special Passover songs. Seder customs include drinking four cups of wine, eating matza and partaking of symbolic foods placed on the Passover Seder Plate. The Seder is performed in much the same way by Jews all over the world.