Comrades and Chicken Ranchers: The Story of a California Jewish Community (Cornell Paperbacks)

Kann, Kenneth L.

ISBN 10: 0801480752 / ISBN 13: 9780801480751

Published by Cornell University Press, 1993

About this Item

Like New 1st edition Softcover. Condition Disclosure: Each book is individually inspected. Minor issues. This is a near new book with some minor -shelf wear. The cover is clean and new but has scrapes on the back bottom. The pages are all clean and new looking. The spine is straight. This item has gone through quality control and meets or exceeds all criteria for a book in this condition. Wize Books Ships NEXT DAY (m-f excluding holidays- when ordered before 1 PM PST) We provides tracking, guarantee and we give you the same customer service we would expect when "we" place an order. We strive to be your go to book supplier.

Seller Inventory # U2313B S1Nx 25 3 5.5 / 25

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Comrades and Chicken Ranchers: The Story of a California Jewish Community (Cornell Paperbacks)
• Publisher: Cornell University Press
• Publication Date: 1993
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0801480752
• ISBN 13: 9780801480751
• Binding: Soft cover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Condition: As New
• Dust Jacket Condition: Near Fine
• Signed: Signed by Author(s)
• Seller catalogs:
  • B: US HISTORY: Politics, Political Systems, War...
  • S: Signed Collectable Books:

About this title

Synopsis

Given its tumultuous history, one would hardly have expected Petaluma, California, to become transformed into the San Francisco bedroom suburb that it is today. It had been a small-town agricultural community, where Jewish chicken ranchers and radicals enjoyed a vigorous Yiddish cultural life, maintained intense political commitments, and took part in sharp conflicts among themselves and with the society beyond.

In this unique work of oral history, Kenneth Kann has ingeniously arranged and edited interviews with more than two hundred people, some of them telling their life stories in their own Yiddishized English. We meet an array of striking characters and families of three generations—East European immigrant settlers, their children, and their grandchildren.

The narrative begins with the immigrant generation's flight from the Old World and traces the immigrants' long, uneasy adjustment to life in America. It describes the dilemma of the members of the second generation, who find themselves torn between the ways of their parents and the gentile world around them. The book concludes with accounts of the third generation, who feel distant from their grandparents but who struggle to recover lost ethnic roots and are uncertain how to raise their children.

In this compelling chorus of voices, we find a Jewish Communist who describes being tarred and feathered in the 1930s and his grandson, recalling his own encounters, during the anti-war movement of the 1960s, with the grandchildren of the vigilantes who carried out the earlier assault. An immigrant proudly explains why she taught her children Yiddish, and a grandchild scolds his parents because they did not. One young woman finds the Jewish community too gossipy and confining; another is warmed by its closeness.

The cast is vibrant, their words both touching and often hilarious. Comrades and Chicken Ranchers is a delight.

About the Author

Kenneth L. Kann practices law in San Francisco. He is also the author of Joe Rapoport: The Life of a Jewish Radical.