Bernie Rose, Interviews with Jews in Utah, Accn 998

Page 43

Bernie Rose (1/20/R)) Mr. K Mr. R Mr. K Last time we really spoke mostly about your youth and New York j, and some what about boxing. You spoke a little bit thoughj one thing I didn't know that I thought, you know, because I simply didn't know you, was the fact that you'd spent that much time in real estate, and that that had been a ~ain tMi~i area of your practice. One thing that's important for this project and for what I'm doing is when did you get involved in the issue of nrayer in schools, the whole issue of where does religion end and the secular public world begin? ~ow did that happen and when? Circumstances created that. I was vice president with the United , ' ,- Jewish Councel in the area of public relations at a pecul~ time in Salt Lake's history. '~ (" Pecul~ to me in the sense that I had that job at a time when the total Jewish population was in a mat­ter of 3 to 5 years •••••••• I don't believe 'total' is the word, but a whole new Jewish population in a matter of 3 to 5 years came into Salt Lake City, shipped in by companies. We had a little while here when Salt Lake was undergoing quite a bit of growth. Companies were bringing in engineers to Hercules and here the last one was a whole batch of Jewish people who were brought in by American Express, you know, with their big thing here. Inbetween ~ercules and American Express, God knows how 0. : ~.t ~ i - many~companies brought in Jews, and we had them here. They were all young and they all had children, and many of them had children in schools, and they were outraged by what their children were bringing home from the school in terms of religion and terms of religious practices. When would you place this?