Opening of first Hebrew-language school

Declaration in 1917, when my mother donated her gold earrings to the Zionist cause. I have vivid recollections of attending the first school in which Hebrew was the language of instruc- tion, which opened in 1918, one day after the end of the German occupation and the creation of the new independent Poland. I remember my first membership in a Zionist club at our school. I treasure the notebooks of my history and geo- graphy courses and my Hebrew songbook. The well-known teachers Lejb Fajans and Mojsze Lewin were translating Russian books into Hebrew, since there were no Hebrew texts. In 1920, during the war between Poland and Com- munist Russia, my brother Kalman (Charles), while still in U.S. Army uniform, came to Bia- lystok and luckily we followed his advice and arrived at Ellis Island in N.Y. on January 1, 1921. In my later years, in the 1960’s and 70’s, I visited Israel and met teachers and many stu- dents of our class who emigrated there. ...