Oral Histories
Steve Shkolnik
Interviewer: We’re interviewing Steve Shkolnik here in an oral history interview for the Columbus Jewish Historical Society. We’re at the headquarters of the Society on College Avenue. The date is February 17, 2016. My name is Bill Cohen.
Interviewer: Steve, why don’t we start by a, do you have a Yiddish or a Hebrew name?
Shkolnik: Yerachim Herschel, Yerachim Herschel is my Hebrew name, Yerachim Herschel Ben Avraham, Ben Favel. (Laughter) That goes back to my mother. When we were growing up, we all had, all of my family had different names. I was Yerachim Herschel’s Hershey factory. Ronnie was ??? junk yard. We had fun names to go with our Hebrew name.
Interviewer: That had to do with the business you were in?
Shkolnik: We were six or seven years old. It didn’t have to do with anything. I was the best, Yerachim Herschel’s Hershey factory.
Interviewer: How far back can you trace your family. Can you go back to grandparents or great grandparents?
Shkolnik: Probably until my grandpa Levy came over around the 1900s, and all of his family. He came over first, and then he brought his wife over. They had kids here, in America.
Interviewer: This was your grandfather on?
Shkolnik: On my mother’s side.
Interviewer: On your mother’s side. Levy was the first name?
Shkolnik: Yeah, Sam Levy. He was active at Agudas Achim back then too. He was one of the founders. One of the good stories is, when they all came over.
Interviewer: They came from where?
Shkolnik: We’re not sure where, somewhere in Russia that doesn’t exist anymore.
Interviewer: He was in Russia?
Shkolnik: Oh yeah.
Interviewer: The town may not be there, a shtetl.
Shkolnik: Yeah. They came over and they asked at Ellis Island, Sam Levy when is your birthday. He didn’t know when his birthday was, so he says, December 25th is my birthday. So, everybody celebrates with him. When they went to school, this was back in the early 1920’s, the kids, they didn’t have American names.
Interviewer: His children?
Shkolnik: His children, my mother and my uncle Butch, Pat, they didn’t have English names. They went to school and what they did, they told the teacher my name is Sam Levy. There were three Sam Levys. Because they didn’t want to give their Hebrew name out, they couldn’t, the teacher couldn’t pronounce it anyway, so they said what’s your name. My name is Sam Levy because my grandpa used that name. They called the family, mom and dad. They said we’ve got to name them something else, Butch, (Saul?) Pat, and Foot. I had an uncle Foot. Don’t ask me why. His real name was Mendel, but we didn’t know that for years and years.
Interviewer: This was not in Hebrew school, but in regular school.
Shkolnik: Oh yeah, regular school. In Hebrew school they used the Hebrew name. They didn’t have Hebrew school back then.
Interviewer: That was the school where they had three Sam Levys?
Shkolnik: Yeah.
Interviewer: Do you have any information about any other of your grandparents?
Shkolnik: One grandfather on my dad’s side, Ben Shkolnik, born in Dayton. He was born here in America, which was unusual. He was on market for years and years, Central Market downtown.
Interviewer: Here in Columbus?
Shkolnik: He moved from Dayton to Columbus. My grandpa Levy, when he came over, he started out in Circleville, Ohio. What they did, he was in the scrap business. He would haul scrap from Circleville to Columbus.
Interviewer: He lived in Circleville?
Shkolnik: He lived in Circleville. There was a big Jewish population back in the 1900s in Circleville, Ohio. He would travel, probably horse and buggy, I would imagine. It probably took him a day to get here from Circleville. He sold his scrap. Eventually, he decided to move to Columbus.
Interviewer: He eventually decided to move to Columbus.
Shkolnik: Yeah, because it was too much of a schlep. He opened up a junk yard, 185 East Fifth Avenue, that was the junk yard.
Interviewer: What is now downtown Columbus.
Shkolnik: It’s still there, 185 E. Fifth, the building is still there.
Interviewer: The junk yard was actually there?
Shkolnik: Yeah. My brother and I used to go, it would be the 1940s. We’d go in, the junk yard had cars, we’d play with the cars.
Interviewer: The scrap metal was right there. In the 40s it was still there. The name of this company was?
Shkolnik: Fifth Avenue Auto Parts.
Interviewer: It was called auto parts, but it was more than auto parts?
Shkolnik: It was junk. The evolution of that part of our family started out as a junk yard, ended up, became a parts business, Fifth Avenue Auto Parts. After that, uncle Butch and my brother, Larry, started Nationwise Auto Parts. There’s a lot of stories with that. They started that out, a store over here on Courtright, where Lev’s Pawn Shop is. It was the first Nationwise store.
Interviewer: Courtright near Livingston?
Shkolnik: On Main Street. Lev’s had a big operation there on Main Street, and the store was there.
Interviewer: That’s the origin of your later going into auto parts?
Shkolnik: Yeah. That would have been in the 1960s. Larry, my older brother, Larry was two quarters away from graduating college. None of us ever graduated college. No Shkolnik or Levy ever graduated college. Most didn’t even graduate high school. My dad never graduated high school. They were working.
Interviewer: When you say none of them graduated college, even your generation?
Shkolnik: My generation, my younger brother, Ronnie, was the first one to graduate. I never graduated. Larry didn’t graduate. Larry was ready to graduate, my uncle Butch called up and said I got an idea. Larry said what’s the idea? He said I’m going to make a supermarket auto parts store. In those days you’d go in, there wouldn’t be chairs, you’d sit at a stool and it would be greasy. A woman wouldn’t walk in. I want to make a supermarket type store. That was the first one. He started out, do you remember Fame?
Interviwer: Sounds vaguely familiar.
Shkolnik: Where Walmart is now, on Main Street, used to be Fame and Calico(?). They had booths there. That where he got the idea why don’t I open up a supermarket type store.
Interviewer: A supermarket just for auto parts. That’s, of course, what we see all over the place.
Shkolnik: That’s all there is now. They were the first ones to get into that business.
Interviewer: Before that, it was kind of greasy, grimy.
Shkolnik: That is our family business. Larry got involved. My mom didn’t talk to Butch, her brother, for several months because she was so upset that he got Larry out of, you know, my son’s going to be a college graduate. He never made it.
Interviewer: Jewish parents value education and they want their kids to go to college, but some of your generation and your ancestors in your family, they found they didn’t need a college education.
Shkolnik: They didn’t. My dad worked on market, Central Market, with his father and he eventually became a tailor, and he worked for Hart Manufacturing Company. Hart made uniforms for the police and soldiers placed in the army, fireman certainly. It was a big building down in ???
Interviewer: Your father worked in this uniform company? What was the name?
Shkolnik: Hart Manufacturing Company
Interviewer: He didn’t own the company, did he, just worked?
Shkolnik: Yes. Larry and I, we went to Fairwood Avenue school. Larry is a couple years older than me. We had no money back then. Everybody’s got jeans. We got slacks. We said, “Dad, we can’t go to school in slacks.” He said, “They’re free, you wear the slacks.” (Laughs)
Interviewer: He said they’re free, you’re going to wear them.
Shkolnik: We wore nice suit slacks playing marbles on the playground.
Interviewer: You mean they were kind of dressy.
Shkolnik: They were dressy, yeah. We’d be embarrassed by them.
Interviewer: You were dressed too well.
Shkolnik: Yeah, way too well because everybody had jeans. We looked good.
Interviewer: You wanted to fit in. Let’s go, we’ll get to a lot more of the business in your family. You mentioned Fairwood Elementary. That was where you went to school, and that’s because you lived where?
Shkolnik: On Berkeley Road, 669 Berkeley. It was like two blocks from the school. We walked five miles to school in two blocks, in the snow, in the rain.
Interviewer: Berkeley would have been near Livingston?
Shkolnik: Berkeley was north and south. Fairwood was north and south. It was between Livingston and Main Street.
Interviewer: You lived.
Shkolnik: We lived there.
Interviewer: This was in the 40s or 50s?
Shkolnik: It was in the 40s. We started out on Oak Street, as our first house. You know where the new market is there, Kelton Market.
Interviewer: The old bus terminal?
Shkolnik: Yeah, we were two blocks from there. Larry and I used to walk down there and watch them turn the buses around on the circle down there. There was a great big huge area and the bus would pivot so it could turn. They did all the repairs over there.
Interviewer: Is this when the buses were electric and they had the line overhead?
Shkolnik: They had electrical posts. We watched. They would turn around at Fairwood, and we lived close to Fairwood, on Oak Street. We’d stand at the corner and watch them flip the wires down and the sparks would fly.
Interviewer: First you were on Oak Street, then you were on Fairwood.
Shkolnik: Berkeley.
Interviewer: I’m sorry, Berkeley. Both locations were west of Nelson Road.
Shkolnik: Yeah.
Interviewer: That’s what we might call today, the inner city. That’s where the Jews lived.
Shkolnik: It was the inner city. (Laughs)
Interviewer: Where did you move after Berkeley?
Shkolnik: After Berkeley we moved to North Stanwood. What happened, the freeway was coming through, and the freeway took our house on Berkeley.
Interviewer: I-70, east and west knocked down your house. What year would that have been approximately?
Shkolnik: I would say probably 1956 or 1957. When I was Bar Mitzvahed, we lived on Stanwood. That would have been in 1958. So, it would have been before that.
Interviewer: In 1956 or 57 the freeway knocked down your house on Berkeley, and then you moved to Bexley.
Shkolnik: They were all moving our way, to Bexley. Larry would have gone to East. The borderline was Mooberry. I went to Roosevelt Junior High. They tore that down too. My house was gone. My school was gone. (Laughs)
Interviewer: Did that facilitate the move to Bexley?
Shkolnik: Yeah, first of all, the freeway coming through was a real big reason. Secondly, Larry went to school, to East, for about two months, and he was the only white guy in his class because East was very heavily Black. That wasn’t the reason. We’re not prejudiced at all. I’ll tell you stories about that. The reason was because there was a tear down of the area. The whole area was just destroyed. (Note from transcriber who attended East High School during that time: East had a significant white population until Eastmoor High School was built around 1953 or ‘54 and most attended the new high school.
Interviewer: The reason that your family moved to Bexley, was there a Jewish angle to that? Was it because Jews were there?
Shkolnik: Jews were there. Schools were there. Bexley was a good school. East, a lot of kids went to South. On the other side of Mooberry, they went to South High. We missed it by a block.
Interviewer: You would have gone to East?
Shkolnik: I would have gone to East, right, exactly, but we moved. It was mainly the fact that we didn’t have a house. (Laughs)
Interviewer: This symbolizes your move from being west of Nelson Road and finally moving to Bexley. It’s kind of representative of where a lot of Jews used to live.
Shkolnik: They all did. They all lived in the south end. That was the biggest, Zettler and Parsons Avenue. Those areas down there were all Jewish. They eventually just moved. We built Agudas Achim in 1951, I think it was, there was nothing there. I’ve got pictures of the building of the synagogue and the groundbreaking. There were no houses around there. Did you live on Stanwood?
Interviewer: Merkle.
Shkolnik: Merkle, okay.
Interviewer: Your point is that in the early 50’s when they were building Agudas Achim, they were still building some of Bexley.
Shkolnik: Exactly. We lived in north Bexley where there were older homes. South Bexley was really minimum. I’m sorry. Central Bexley, where you lived, was highly developed. In south Bexley there were homes. It’s really where Capital University is and so forth.
Interviewer: Let’s take you back to when you were not living in Bexley. You were in your younger years. What was that like at school? Were most of your friends Jews or non-Jews? What was that like?
Shkolnik: We were all friends. We didn’t know what they were. Growing up, I remember, 4th grade, my mom says, “Invite over your friends for lunch. We’ll have your birthday party for lunch.” So, they came over. All my friends were Black. We didn’t know the difference, today either. There was no prejudice. I was friends with Tommy Sims (?) and David Chancelor (?), fellows that were all Black. They were great guys. We knew there were issues with the KKK, because we knew that Parsons Avenue, my mom kept it a secret, never talked about it. We knew they were marching down Parsons Avenue, the KKK, because Jewish businesses were very big on Parsons Avenue back in 30s, 40s, and 50s. There was a big Jewish population, you know, in the south end.
Interviewer: You’re telling us that the Klu Klux Klan marched down Parsons Avenue?
Shkolnik: I did not see it. My mom said there were some actions back then.
Interviewer: Your mother remembers.
Shkolnik: Yeah, we were oblivious to it.
Interviewer: In those years, before you moved to Bexley, did you experience any antisemitism at all?
Shkolnik: No, we were just, you know, we were 6,7, 8, 9 years old. Can you play marbles (Laughs)? Can you play baseball? Can you shoot a basket? Can you get on the slides? That’s where it was, with our nice pants. In my opinion, I didn’t see it, we didn’t know it, not until I got older.
Interviewer: After you moved to Bexley, any observations on how Jewish kids got along with non-Jews? Were there barriers?
Shkolnik: The JCC was opened in 1949, I believe, 49 or 50. That was our home. That was our home before our home. I remember stories when we first opened up the JCC, we took a tour of the building. My dad says the swimming pool is inside the building. I said how could you have a swimming pool inside of a building? First of all, a swimming pool. That was a luxury in itself, to have it inside of a building. We went in and said, “Oh my God, the pool is inside this building.” That was a shock.
Interviewer: You were impressed.
Shkolnik: We were impressed, I mean we couldn’t believe it. First of all, to go to a place with a swimming pool. We used to have the, there was a swimming on, I can’t remember the street, anyway, in the south end, we went to the pool there. That was it. Then a bowling alley.
Interviewer: What do you remember about the bowling alley?
Shkolnik: It was neat. We used to go back. Carl Berman was the manager. He would let us go back behind the pins and see how the pins were dropping. By hand, you put the pins in and then you pulled the lever and the pins came down.
Interviewer: He had actual people doing the work?
Shkolnik: Oh yes, all people. It’s all automatic now. To see that in action. The vending machines that were there, for a nickel you’d get a Tootsie Roll or something. (Laughs) Diverting a little bit, when we went to the south end, the south end was really a growing experience. You had the Main Theatre, the Livingston Theatre there, and for a nickel we could see a movie. There was a Dairy Queen on the corner of Lilley and Livingston. The first of the season, when they opened back up, they closed, you’d get a free Dairy Queen. We would stand in line. The line would be wrapped around the corner. Larry and I would stand in line and we’d go through twice. We’d get our free dairy queen. It was like a nickel for a cone.
Interviewer: That was a big deal.
Shkolnik: That era was neat. Across the street from the Fairwood Avenue school, was a store called Englands, it was just a grocery store.
Interviewer: England’s, like the country?
Shkolnik: Yeah, it was probably somebody’s name. You’d go there and you’d get these big strips of candy for a penny.
Interviewer: Penny candy, dots.
Shkolnik: Dots, thank you. We would walk down to, on the corner of Rhodes and Livingston, the was a huge building, a cookie factory.
Interviewer: They had irregular cookies.
Shkolnik: For a penny, you went in there and you’d get broken cookies. I said, “Mom, can I have a penny?” “Well, you’ve got to do some work first.” So, I would do something and I’d get my penny. (Laughs)
Interviewer: It’s interesting. You talk about that cookie factory. Just in the last year that cookie factory was finally demolished.
Shkolnik: Marty Hoffman bought it, years after.
Interviewer: A Jewish guy bought that property?
Shkolnik: Yeah. He bought the property. He had some sort of a can, canning business, had it for a few years.
Interviewer: He’s the one that redeveloped that land?
Shkolnik: No. He sold it. He’s been gone for a while.
Interviewer: You mentioned that you were very acquainted with Livingston Avenue. Do you remember when Martins Kosher Foods was there? Tell us about that. Do you remember all the way when it was on Livingston?
Shkolnik: I vaguely remember that, more when he was on Broad Street than Livingston. Back then, we had Resch’s Bakery which was on Champion. It’s in Gahanna now. The Schwartz Bakery was there, on Parsons. It was Livingston Avenue, close to Parsons. Reebs, remember Reebs.
Interviewer: It was a restaurant on Livingston.
Shkolnik: The one place, I don’t remember the name. It wasn’t Hepps. Hepps was over on Broad. You’d go in and its barrels, sawdust on the floor, of course. There was a big barrel. You’d put your hand in the barrel, and you’d pull out a pickle, and you’d eat the pickle. Today we’d be dead. (Laughs) (Transcriber note: There were three kosher butchers on Livingston Ave.: Mendelmans near Parsons, later took over Martins old store; Haas, east of Ohio Ave.; Briars about two blocks east of Haas, next to Don Shusterman’s Dental office.)
Interviewer: Would be dead because?
Shkolnik: The disease. It’s not sanitary. Who washed their hands back then. I was joking because my brother and I, we talk a lot. I’m 82. Larry is 85. How did we make it this long? The biggest reason is when we lived on Berkeley, we would get out of our house. About 6:00 in the morning we’d jump out. They’d bring the DDT trucks down the street, and they’d spray the alleys for mosquitoes. We’d follow that truck, the smell of DDT all the way down the street. Then, after that, the ice man would come with the cubes of ice, and he’d chip off some ice and throw it at us. (Laughs)
Interviewer: The ice man. They had giant blocks of ice.
Shkolnik: You’d put them in your freezer.
Interviewer: Did your family have an ice box?
Shkolnik: Yeah.
Interviewer: So you remember that as a child?
Shkolnik: Shoveling coal in the furnace.
Interviewer: You followed the fogging trucks.
Shkolnik: Yes.
Interviewer: Later, of course, we saw how dangerous that was.
Shkolnik: We’re here. It didn’t kill us. (Laughs)
Interviewer: What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. Were you Bar Mitzvahed?
Shkolnik: Yeah, Bar Mitzvahed at Agudas Achim in 1958. We’d just moved to Stanwood. Rubenstein was the Rabbi. It was October of 1958. Jerry Friedman was before me. The next week was me, I was the second week in October. The third was Bob Stine, R. L. Stine. Once you gave your speech, the previous Bar Mitzvah would take you out and sit you down, escort you down. I took Bob down. After that was Steve Shell, Dr. Shell. Mr. Solomon was my Hebrew teacher.
Interviewer: What was his name?
Shkolnik: Solomon (Bernard). He was fabulous.
Interviewer: You went to Hebrew School? Did the bus pick you up after regular school and take you somewhere?
Shkolnik: It used to be at Fairwood (Elementary School) The Hebrew School was at Fairwood Avenue. We would just stay there. (Transcriber note: Kids from other schools were bused to Fairwood. This was before the JCC was built. Everyone was then bused there. Fairwood was an interim solution between the old Hebrew school on Rich St. and the Center).
Interviewer: ou had Hebrew school inside a public school?
Shkolnik: Yeah, after school. After school, we would stay there for Hebrew School. Eventually the JCC took over. Rose Schwartz had a building on Bryden Road. It was like a day school, but it was also a building used for Hebrew school too. We stayed at Fairwood. They had bussing back then.
Interviewer: That’s fascinating, you started to learn Hebrew in a public-school building. Let me ask you this, and you have to be honest, did you enjoy Hebrew school?
Shkolnik: No. What happened, this is my own interpretation, The Jewish Center opened in 1951. At that time, I was there. We had more fun out front. We played football before we went in to class because the bus dropped us off, we’d play football, where the parking lot is now used to be where the old Center was. We’d play football, and then, in the rooms, we would take a pencil, when the teacher wasn’t looking, and flip it up into the ceiling. It was asbestos tile back then. We’d see can we get it up there or not.
Interviewer: You wanted to stick the pencil in the ceiling?
Shkolnik: Yeah, and the ceilings were full of pencils.
Interviewer: This was at the Jewish Center? You’re talking about actually learning some Hebrew at the Jewish Center?
Shkolnik: When the Center was built, they didn’t need Fairwood Avenue school. The Hebrew school was at the Center.
Interviewer: First you learned some Hebrew at Fairwood school, then the Jewish Center was built and you switched to the Jewish Center and learned Hebrew there.
Shkolnik: Next door was Berwick Party House. It’s no longer here now. Berwick had a store and we’d go in and get a pizza and stick it in the classroom. It wasn’t kosher, obviously. One time, one guy ordered a pepperoni pizza. A slice is what they’d give us. He took it in the classroom and, “Get that out of here.” They’d smack your hand. Mr. Kass would smack your hand, whack. (Laughs)
Interviewer: They’d give you corporal punishment.
Shkolnik: In my opinion, I think I’m right about it. They had to find jobs for the people that were coming here from the Holocaust, survivors. They would become Hebrew teachers. Were they qualified as Hebrew teachers? No. I’m glad they did it because they had a job. They came to America. Most of our teachers really weren’t qualified. Mr. Solomon was one who happened to be very good at teaching. (Transcriber note: Bernard Solomon was not a Holocaust survivor. He may have been an immigrant, but way before the Holocaust. He was also a bookkeeper and accountant. People like Mr. Kass and some others were Holocaust survivors).
Interviewer: You’re saying some of them were not qualified?
Shkolnik: It was a job, to settle them. We’re talking after the war, in the early 50s. The Korean War was still going. There were still survivors from the Holocaust.
Interviewer: Did you go to Sunday School also?
Shkolnik: We did go to Sunday School, but my parents were Orthodox, and we went to Shul every Saturday. We were Modern Orthodox and we went to Agudas Achim, and I learned my Hebrew by going to Shul. Just by osmosis, you pick it up just by going there.
Interviewer: You learned it in addition to going to the actual Hebrew school.
Shkolnik: I really don’t think I learned it in Hebrew school. I learned it more from just going there and learning how to daven.
Interviewer: Wow, oh fascinating.
Shkolnik: Today’s schools, the day school the Torah Academy, the kids are being taught. They learn about their past. None of that was brought up, we just learned Hebrew. That’s what you were supposed to do. We had no idea. We were reading Hebrew and we didn’t know what we were reading. We couldn’t interpret it. We were not allowed to interpret it.
Interviewer: You did not know what you were reading. You learned how to pronounce it.
Shkolnik: I can daven fluently, but you ask me what I’m reading, I have no idea about the prayers. Laughs) This guy’s a genius. He’s just got a good memory.
Interviewer: You wound up at Bexley High School. What was that like to go from a public school where there weren’t that many Jews, I don’t think, to then going to Bexley where there were 20 or 30% Jews?
Shkolnik: To me they were all friends. It was difficult for me because I’m kind of an introvert. I’d be standing in the corner just listening to conversations. I had a hard time when we moved to Bexley becoming friends because I wasn’t an outgoing person. I was very shy. Diane Handler and Debbie Zelizer both saw me. They were south end too. They said, “Come on Steve, I’ll help you out. I’ll take you out and introduce you.” hey became my friends. They saved my life because they taught me how to learn to be with people. It was a different world. I had more of an economic thing because we grew up, we were poor. We always had food on the table. My dad was always able to do that. It was different. The code you had money. We didn’t have money. (Laughs)
Interviewer: You were poor. Did your family say they were poor?
Shkolnik: No.
Interviewer: You felt you were poor.
Shkolnik: In comparison. As the evolution goes, my dad was at Hart Manufacturing Company for all these years. My uncle Hy, Hy Goldberg, he opened up a muffler shop, over on Main Street. He said to dad, why don’t you open up one too.
Interviewer: He tells his brother, your dad.
Shkolnik: No, his brother-in-law.
Interviewer: He tells his brother-in-law, your father, you should open up one of these muffler shops too.
Shkolnik: He did, on Town and Sandusky, where Mt. Carmel Hospital is. The freeway took that too. We opened up one, and then we opened up a second one, over on West Broad. When the freeway came through, it took that one also. (Laughs) We moved to 1220 West Broad. That’s when we started making money.
Interviewer: Your family owned two muffler shops?
Shkolnik: We owned one. Hy Goldberg owned one. I used to work there after school or on Saturdays. Saturday afternoon I would work at the muffler shop. I would learn everything. I graduated in 1961, and a friend of mine, we went to college for maybe two months. My dad says why don’t you come run the business with me. So, I said okay.
Interviewer: I didn’t like college. I didn’t like school at all. I was not a studious person. I opened up a store on Parsons Avenue, 1200 Parsons Avenue, Parsons and Thurman.
Interviewer: Was it a muffler shop too?
Shkolnik: That was the first one from 1220 West Broad. Then my uncle Hy went another direction. He went to his own store. He had a store on Main and Fairwood, called Mr. Muffler.
Interviewer: His first store was called Muffler King, part of a franchise?
Shkolnik: No. There were no franchises back then. It was just a store. He opened up a muffler shop.
Interviewer: It was called Muffler King?
Shkolnik: Yeah. So, then I said let me get involved in it, and I did. I ended up with 13 stores.
Interviewer: Thirteen stores, Muffler King. You had 13 stores in the Columbus area.
Shkolnik: Columbus, Lancaster, Newark, and Springfield.
Interviewer: That was your livelihood for how many years?
Shkolnik: Till, probably the late 70s. There’s a whole michegas story with it. My brothers were involved in Nationwise Auto Parts, the auto part business, and Larry wanted to open up his own group of stores. It was some sort of, like all the other family, a fight. We called it the great fight. So, Larry said maybe I should step down. He opened up a store called Benny’s Car Parts Outlet. He opened up like 30 or 40 stores. He was doing really well, and they needed the money to finance the business, to open up Benny’s Car Parts. So, Larry said why don’t you sell Muffler King. Larry wasn’t involved. He said why don’t you sell Muffler King. Being a family person, I said whatever you want to do is fine.
Interviewer: He wanted you to sell all 13 of your Muffler King outlets?
Shkolnik: Yeah.
Interviewer: What happened.
Shkolnik: As the story goes, this is 1978 or 79. It was when the oil or gas went from 25 cents to $1.50. The automobile business kind of went down anyway, but the auto parts business was still going up because people were repairing their car. I said what are we going to do. I was very active at the JCC. I’ve always been active in the community. Grandpa taught me that. “Give back. If you don’t have money, give back yourself.” So, I was involved very heavily in the community. Bob Schacter, he was the Executive Director of the JCC, called me and says I need somebody to help me build the building.
Interviewer: The old building?
Shkolnik: The JCC building.
Interviewer: The renovated?
Shkolnik: We tore it down.
Interviewer: You tore down the old and built a new Jewish Center. That was approximately what year?
Shkolnik: It was 1982. 1981 or 82.
Interviewer: When you say you helped build the Jewish Center, what do you mean?
Shkolnik: I was the liaison between, I represented the JCC with the builder and the architect. Issues came to me to build the thing. I had a committee of Lee Skilken, Jack Wallick, Irv Schottenstein, Mike Talis.
Interviewer: Movers and shakers.
Shkolnik: Movers and shakers. We built it and it wasn’t built upside down. I had all these builders, these smart builders on the side instructing me how to do it. They gave us more headaches than anything in the world, our committee, wonderful people. I learned a lot from Lee Skilken. He was a genius. Anyway, Bob Schachter hired me. We went from a 55,000 sq. ft. building which included a bowling alley.
Interviewer: The old building. It was 55,000 sq. ft. The new one was?
Shkolnik: 107 sq. ft. without a bowling alley. Part of my job was to build it and get the staff to understand that you may not see everybody every day. We had to learn how to incorporate ourselves. We were so big. We were in 25,000 sq. ft. of really office, the old Center with the gym, etc., you knew everybody, all the staff. Now you’re in a building where Early Childhood was down here and the gym was clear over there.
Interviewer: The leaders, the staff.
Shkolnik: The leaders and the staff, my job was to incorporate them together. We can do things together and learn how to work together as a group. That was part of my responsibility. I worked there about seven or eight years.
Interviewer: Wait, after the building was built, then you continued working?
Shkolnik: I stayed there for.., They wanted me to stay there for a while.
Interviewer: Seven or eight years?
Shkolnik: Yeah.
Interviewer: What was your job then?
Shkolnik: I was the Operations Director. I ran the building. Then I got a real estate License. Bruce Gilbert said, “Get your real estate license and just do real estate on the side.” So, I did. I didn’t do residential. I didn’t want to sell you a house. I wanted to sell you a business. So, I got involved in the real estate business.
Interviewer: Approximately what year was that?
Shkolnik: I got my license in 1986 or 87. I worked for Bruce for a few years. Then, Tifereth Israel was asking me to be their Executive Director. They wanted me to apply for it. Beth Shalom was doing the same thing. They wanted to build a building.
Interviewer: Beth Shalom was a new Reform congregation without a building.
Shkolnik: They met at Eastminster Presbyterian Church in Eastmoor – Eastmoor and Broad. Ben Mandelkorn, remember Ben Mandelkorn?
Interviewer: He was the director of the Federation.
Shkolnik: Yeah. He was very close to me. He said, “Steve, I think Tifereth Israel wants you, and Beth Shalom. Go to Beth Shalom because it’s new. You’ll create your own path.” I knew it was going to be a lifetime career for me but the idea of building a building was neat.
Interviewer: Beth Shalom wanted you to help build the building and also be their…
Shkolnik: Executive Director. So, I built the building and we marched from Eastminster out to New Albany. There’s a lot of stories about building the building, building the synagogue out there and dealing with New Albany.
Interviewer: New Albany, which for decades was a very non-Jewish place became Jewish due to (Les) Wexner.
Shkolnik: Leslie donated the land. It ended up the land was a water table, so you couldn’t put a basement in. The first floor was the basement. (Laughs) God love him. He was very kind.
Interviewer: Wexner donated the land upon which Beth Shalom now sits.
Shkolnik: They built the building.
Interviewer: Did you stay on as their director?
Shkolnik: I stayed on for a few years, like six or seven years. I still had my real estate license and Larry Rubin, I’ve been friends with Larry for many years, he says, “Come over to my office.” On Maryland Avenue, he had all these apartments, 3,000 apartments. “I’ll give you a desk, a phone. You’ve got a secretary and I won’t bother you. I don’t give a damn. Do whatever you want to do,” real estate wise. I said, “Alright, okay.”
Interviewer: So, you did even more real estate.
Shkolnik: That started in 2005. I was there till I retired, last year. (Laughs)
Interviewer: While you did all this you were helping Jewish Institutions and Jews in general?
Shkolnik: I was very active. For a guy that was introverted, I was very, do you remember Pegasus? I was President of Pegasus back in the 1950s.
Interviewer: That was kind of a Jewish fraternity in high school?
Shkolnik: Yeah, KTZ.
Interviewer: KTZ was another?
Shkolnik: Yeah.
Interviewer: Epsilon.
Shkolnik: Yeah, that’s it. That was the rich group. We didn’t go with the rich group. We didn’t go with the rich people. We just went with Pegasus. Pegasus was a more realistic group. (Laughs)
Interviewer: The common folk.
Shkolnik: The common folk. That’s a better word. I became President of that. I got very active in the community. I was Teenager of the Year for the Citizen Journal.
Interviewer: You were Teenager of the Year?
Shkolnik: Yeah, Teenager of the Week.
Interviewer: Teenager of the Week declared by the Columbus Citizen Newspaper.
Shkolnik: Yeah.
Interviewer: Not just the Jewish, overall.
Shkolnik: I stayed active. Agudas Achim, we renovated that. It would have been 1982. I was part of that renovation of the chapel. Herb Glimcher, Larry Rubin and myself did the renovation. I wasn’t paid for that, just as a volunteer. I got active that way and kept it going. I’m the only lifetime trustee of the shul.
Interviewer: They made you a lifetime trustee.
Shkolnik: Yeah, I’m the only one.
Interviewer: Quite an honor.
Shkolnik: Yeah, it was. It was very nice.
Interviewer: I understand you’ve also been active in men’s clubs or Brotherhood. Tell us about that.
Shkolnik: Yeah. We started off, it’s about the 45th or 46th year. I was the President of the Brotherhood. I’ve held every office in Agudas Achim, except Treasurer. Al Friedman, or Les Wexner or Herb Wolman were the Treasurers. I wasn’t going to compete with those guys, so I stayed away from that. I held every other position. We started the, Irv Leider was the Executive Director. He said I got an idea. We’ll have a program where we will have a prime rib dinner, all you can eat, open bar, free bar, and we’ll bring a comedian in. The first one we had was Myron Cohen.
Interviewer: Myron Cohen, the comedian, he used to be on the Ed Sullivan show.
Shkolnik: Yeah, he was fabulous. Men only because, you know why, you come home from work, you leave the office, you come to the shul, you eat and drink and have a good time with your friends, and your wife’s not bitching at you, “You had too many drinks, how many have you had?” (Laughs). They call you on it. The concept worked. This is our 45th year now.
Interviewer: What year did this start?
Shkolnik: 45 years ago.
Interviewer: 1981, something like that?
Shkolnik: Yeah. We made good money on it. We used the money for camp, for scholarships. It’s still going on.
Interviewer: Is that called the Brotherhood Night Out or something?
Sholnik: Night Out With the Stars. It used to be Boys Night Out. Unfortunately, the women, “We want to be there.” Joy Solove, she says you’ve got to have women. I said we don’t have to have women. Now you’ve got to have chicken, you’ve got to have fish. I don’t want to have to have chicken. I want prime rib. (Laughs). She won. Actually, my wife was on her side too. We should be there. An old concept went out the window, the concept of men only. It’s worked out well. We have 200 or 300 people every year that come to this program. My son now, the next generation, Jessie has taken over the kitchen. He’s in commercial real estate. He learned from Giuseppe how to make the ribs. Giuseppe would help us out as a fun thing.
Interviewer: Giuseppe was the chef?
Shkolnik: Yeah, well we still have Kenny Garver. That goes back to Ilonkas. Remember Ilonkas?
Interviewer: Ilonkas Party House.
Shkolnik: Garver was the owner of that and he always helped out the synagogue. Giuseppe said let me help out. So, we did. That’s how it evolved. We finally got a rabbi that could be part of the thing. This Rabbi Josh is just fabulous.
Interviewer: The new rabbi, Josh Warshawski. Let me ask you about major events in history. Where were you when they happened, etc.? Do you remember where you were when you learned President Kennedy had been killed?
Shkolnik: Yeah, right in the Parsons Avenue store, Parsons Avenue Muffler King. We were sitting in the waiting room, 12:00. I remember that. It just struck me. It struck all of us. We closed.
Interviewer: You closed up?
Shkolnik: Yeah, couldn’t deal with it. I remember that very vividly.
Interviewer: I was told that there were some Jewish gatherings that very night.
Shkolnik: I don’t remember that.
Interviewer: Do you also remember maybe Martin Luther King’s assassination?
Shkolnik: Yeah, I do remember it. I don’t remember where I was. It wasn’t as poignant as the Kennedy one. The Kennedy one was a shock. Martin Luther King wasn’t as shocking. Oh, I know, I was in the Service. I was in the Air force.
Interviewer: Where were you stationed?
Shkolnik: Lockbourne.
Interviewer: Lockbourne, just south of Columbus.
Shkolnik: Yeah, this is the time, 1965, when Vietnam was starting. Teddy Feerer he was in our class too. We were all working, Ivan Romanoff, Ivan ran his tux shop, Romanoff Tux and Jerry was a pharmacist. We all got worried we would be drafted, we were low.
Interviewer: Because the military buildup in 1965 with President Johnson sending troops to Vietnam. You were worried you’d get drafted. What did you do?
Shkolnik: Teddy says why don’t we join the Air Force National Guard, because they were called up in France, they probably won’t be called up again for a while. I said fine so I join. I go to boot camp, go through all that. Then, in 1968 they called us up. Schmuck, we’re standing in line at Lockbourne saying schmuck, we were being called up, (Laughs) to Pueblo.
Interviewer: Oh yes, North Korea.
Shkolnik: North Korea. Johnson called the troops. So where do I go? I’m in Korea. I spent a year there. Did you ever see MASH on TV?
Interviewer: MASH, yes.
Shkolnik: That’s how we lived, tents.
Interviewer: At least you weren’t being shot at.
Shkolnik: I wasn’t being shot at.
Interviewer: It wasn’t like being in Vietnam.
Shkolnik: I was there from 1968 to 69.
Interviewer: 1968 was when the Martin Luther King assassination took place. That’s where you heard about it.
Shkolnik: Most of the, because we were in with the regulars, in the Air Force, here at Lockbourne, they didn’t like the Blacks. You know, they were prejudiced.
Interviewer: Your fellow soldiers were prejudiced.
Shkolnik: “Well, they shot him, so it’s okay.”
Interviewer: That’s what you remember? You remember your fellow soldiers saying it was okay that Martin Luther King was killed. Two months later, Bobby Kennedy was killed. You’re over there, halfway around the world.
Shkolnik: You’re oblivious because you don’t know what’s going on anyway. The communication between America and Korea wasn’t real strong. My 25th birthday, I’ll never forget, I’m flying from Kunsong to Kongju. We transferred bases.
Interviewer: In Korea?
Shkolnik: In Korea. I’m on the airplane going across (Korea). I’m saying what the hell am I doing.
Interviewer: In general, Jews were not prominent in the U. S. military. Were there many Jews around you?
Shkolnik: In Kongju I was the only Jew on base.
Interviewer: Out of how many people?
Shkolnik: Probably 3,000.
Interviewer: You were the only Jew out of 3,000?
Shkolnik: If Tisha B’av came today. “Oh I got to take off. I can’t work, it’s Tisha B’av.” “Okay, get your tail off it’s the new moon. Take off the new moon.” (Laughs) They didn’t care. Actually, I’d rather work because the day goes faster. If you’re sitting around, I said what am I going to do, sleep, read another book. So, I kept working.
Interviewer: You said some of your fellow soldiers were not very tolerant of Black people. Did you experience antisemitism?
Shkolnik: I didn’t, not over there, because there was no reason to. I was stationed with a bunch of other National Guard people, a group from Buffalo, New York, Italians. They were very, very friendly, very close, very nice people. It was just basically the regular army. I just did my job. I kept myself clean. They said go left, I went left. Go right, I’d go right. You don’t need any issues. We didn’t have to salute. The base was so bare. It was a new base. No saluting the captains and the officers because if you don’t stick with your career, well you’re here. You can’t do anything wrong.
Interviewer: There wasn’t a lot of formality?
Shkolnik: No. The pilots, they were all very friendly, no issues at all because we’re all here. It can’t get worse. (Laughs)
Interviewer: Let me ask you about another big historic event. Seeing what you remember, 911, the terrorist attack in New York City?
Shkolnik: I was working for Bruce Gilbert in real estate. We heard what happened. Bruce’s son, Aaron, lived in New York. Bruce was always a late riser, so I knew he was going to wonder what’s going on, so I called Aaron. I said, what’s going on. He said we think a small plane ran into one of the towers. He said that’s not a big deal, or anything.
Interviewer: He said it’s not a big deal., at that point.
Shkolnik: Yeah, at that point. He was in New York. He was there. He didn’t know enough about it either. What happened is they played a small plane hit one of the towers. That was scary.
Interviewer: Only later, he discovered what really happened.
Shkolnik: Yeah, Aaron fortunately was safe. He didn’t have any problem. He was in the action too. He was there in Manhattan where it happened. It was crazy, just a bad time.
Interviewer: Sometimes I’m interested in finding out when you were young, you lived in a somewhat Jewish neighborhood, not majority Jewish, at least 10, 20, 30% Jewish, in the what we now call the inner city, west of Nelson. Only later did any of the Jews move into Bexley. Then for 20 years all the Jews were in Bexley, Berwick, and that general area. Now, after more decades, Jews are spread out all over, New Albany, Gahanna, Pickerington, Reynoldsburg, Arlington, what are your thoughts on that?
Shkolnik: I think it’s really good because growing up, going to Bexley, when we would go to Grandview, I was in the band and they’d throw stuff at us. Arlington called us bad names. You never went to these cities. Your sister would remember some of the stuff that went on. It really wasn’t good.
Interviewer: Was it antisemetic?
Shkolnik: Oh yeah. I’m 15, 14 years old. I didn’t know all the politics. They just were not nice. We would be in the bus, they’d throw stuff at our bus when we’d leave the place. They never cat called or made remarks but we knew that it was not a friendly place to be.
Interviewer: This was Arlington and Grandview?
Shkolnik: Arlington and Grandview were the big ones. Grandview more than Arlington, for some reason.
Interviewer: How did you decide that this was because you were Jewish?
Shkolnik: Because we lived in Bexley. Everybody who lived in Bexley was Jewish.
Interviewer: That’s what the other people thought.
Shkolnik: There is no goy there, it’s all Jews. (Laughs) Maybe 25, 30%, they think it’s 90%. It’s not, but I think what’s happening today, which I’m pleased with the fact that, look at Beth Tikvah, their congregation and how it’s grown and how it’s doing well out there. It’s a beautiful temple. The kids and I, we have lunches and come to shul. I joke with people, “Where do you live?” Upper Arlington. “How the hell do you live there, are you crazy?” It’s different. The world’s changed. To me they’ve accepted, not accepted, they’ve assimilated into the community.
Interviewer: The fact that Jews live now almost everywhere, that’s a good thing.
Shkolnik: I think it is.
Interviewer: Are there any drawbacks to it for the Jewish community?
Shkolnik: Well, for the immediate Jewish community, we’re getting too spread out. We’re not getting participation in the synagogues as we used to. We used to, every Saturday we had 300 people. Now if you get 100 people, you’re doing good. That’s not because of where they live necessarily. Some who live in New Albany come to Shul. It’s a schlep. Tifereth Israel has the same issue. Beth Tikvah, Beth Shalom, the Reform synagogues, in my opinion, are the ones that are leading the group because it’s more of America’s lifestyle. Bobbie grew up in Reform, my wife Bobbie. She loved Beth Shalom. I had a hard time with it, with davening there because, not that I’m religious, I’m used to the Orthodox, so it’s different. I wasn’t there to daven. I was there to work. They respected the fact that I went to Agudas Achim. I would go to Beth Shalom on the first day of Rosh Hashonah. The second day I would go to Agudas Achim. They were very respectful of me. They were very nice. I don’t know if I’m answering your question or not.
Interviewer: That’s okay. There aren’t easy answers to these questions. Looking back on your life, what would you say Judaism, what role has it played in your life?
Shkolnik: I think it has given me some firm directions, taught me ethics, although my parents and my grandpa were very strong in ethics, to give back and to help your fellow person. I was an arbitrator for the Better Business Bureau for like 17 years. I would call an arbitrator a calling because he gives honest opinions. It may not be the opinion you want to hear, but it’s an honest opinion and an honest decision. Also, the Better Business Bureau, I was Man of the Year there too.
Interviewer: For an introverted guy, you’ve done well for yourself.
Shkolnik: It’s given me a purpose. I think I could say it that way. I’ve been able to just respect everybody. I don’t care who you are or what you are. You’re my friend.
Interviewer: So, you’re saying it’s not so much theological as it is Judaism has helped you with how to live your life in a good way.
Shkolnik: Yeah, nothing is ever perfect, but you do the best you can to help the other person. My grandpa would say to me, “It’s not the money, it’s the (vibe)?, you doing something to help somebody.” I always remembered that. He was a good man.
Interviewer: Well, with those words, we’ll end our interview with Steve Shkolnik. My name is Bill Cohen and this oral history has been a part of the Columbus Jewish Historical Society Oral History Project. Thank you very much Mr. Shkolnik.
Transcribed by Rose Luttinger