Chapter 10 The Two-Moms Idea #3
“Moshe weighs about a hundred and thirty pounds—I weigh more than Moshe, but he can pick me up and I can pick him up,” Esther wrote to Honor.
Furthermore, Esther couldn’t be bothered to measure Moshe to see how tall he was.
Instead, she sent Honor an awful photograph.
It was apparent that neither Aunt Reva nor the Morgensterns were gifted photographers.
“You can’t see Moses Little Mountain at all!” Faith lamented. His face was pressed to Esther’s chest; the bridge of Moshe’s nose was aligned with her sternum, perfectly between Esther’s unnoticeable breasts.
“If Esther had bigger boobs, Little Mountain couldn’t breathe,” Hope observed. Esther was smiling at the camera, her big hand holding the back of Moshe’s head.
“Moses has no neck, but he has pretty big shoulders for a little guy,” Prudence said.
And Moshe’s upper arms looked strong. His arms were wrapped around Esther, but you couldn’t see where he’d locked his hands—maybe around Esther’s waist, or around her hips.
Esther’s waist was below the bottom of the photo.
“If Moshe is lifting Esther up, he might be bending his knees—he might not be as short as he appears,” Constance cautioned her family.
“Right you are, Connie,” Thomas told her, but everyone could tell he was anxious to hear about the trouble.
“Whether Little Mountain is bending his knees or not, he more than offsets how tall Esther is—he’s certainly short enough,” Honor wanted her family to know.
Of more relevance to the trouble Little Mountain was in, he had made a name for himself in Greco-Roman wrestling, competing against other sports clubs and wrestling in the lightweight class. “Moshe is a Leichtgewicht—that’s all you need to know about his weight class,” Esther wrote to Honor.
Before he and Esther met, Moshe Kleinberg had won some medals and trophies.
At that time, the trophies in Greco-Roman wrestling looked like Greek statues—maybe they were meant to evoke the ancient Olympian wrestlers.
Moshe had sent photos of his trophies to Aunt Reva, who’d shown them to Esther.
Reva took a picture of Esther, sending the photo to Moshe.
“Look at this statuesque beauty—you should come back to Vienna and meet her!” Reva wrote to her beloved nephew.
“Did you tell Moshe how tall I am?” Esther asked Aunt Reva.
“I may have exaggerated a little, dear—Moshe always looked twice at the tall girls,” Reva told Esther. (Liebe Esther was what Reva usually called her—dear Esther.)
“So Little Mountain had already seen Esther—he was smitten with her before they met!” Faith interjected.
“Little Mountain is a father waiting to happen!” Hope shouted.
“Esther will have to watch herself, or she’ll have Little Mountain’s baby too soon,” Prudence put in. Thomas and Constance wrung their hands, beseeching Honor to tell them about the trouble.
In an all-German wrestling tournament in 1931, Moshe Kleinberg had been impressive.
Esther said he’d received “some kind of recognition certificate.” The certificate had been signed by Hindenburg, then president of the German Reich.
Moshe had sent Aunt Reva a photo of the certificate with Hindenburg’s signature.
Esther sent Honor a photo of the photo. The photographs were black and white; there was the German eagle and what looked like a raised seal.
The lettering was capitalized, larger and more legible than Hindenburg’s signature.
RINGEN: LEICHTGEWICHT
KLEINBERG
Ringen was German for “wrestling,” Esther had explained.
Hindenburg was already in his eighties when he signed the certificate.
The former field marshal, and a World War I hero, Hindenburg was president of the German Weimar Republic from 1925 until his death in August of 1934.
Upon Hindenburg’s death, Hitler became president of Germany and then swiftly abolished the office of president and declared himself “Führer of the German Reich and People.” But even before then, with the rise of the Nazis in 1933, many Jews in Germany were persecuted.
With the Morgensterns’ guidance, Esther saw how Moshe’s success as a wrestler led to his persecution.
In what would be his last wrestling tournament in Germany, Moshe had lost a close match to the German Greco-Roman champion.
“The more successful Jews are more persecuted—the better we do, the more they hate us,” Esther wrote to Honor.
Esther said Moshe Kleinberg’s name was written on “some kind of blacklist.” The warning was unclear, but he’d been told he had to be careful.
With the Nazis in power, the activity of Jewish athletes in Germany would be restricted.
The Morgensterns had time to arrange Moshe’s immigration to Israel in 1934, when Moshe was twenty-eight.
His devoted aunt Reva would go with him, but the Morgensterns were worried about them.
“The two of them are like children—they have little awareness of what’s going on around them,” Joanna Morgenstern told Esther.
“For different reasons, Reva and Moshe are the last to catch on politically,” Bernard Morgenstern said.
Esther agreed. Reva was a loving aunt; she doted on her nephew to the exclusion of the outside world.
Moshe was a different kind of horse with blinders; he was dedicated to wrestling, and to his training, but he was lost in real-life situations.
“Moshe is the sweetest guy—you would love him,” Esther wrote to Honor. Esther reiterated that Little Mountain was a Pferd mit Scheuklappen—German for “horse with blinders.”
Constance saw what was coming. “Esther should go with Little Mountain and Aunt Reva—those two need help, and Esther is good at looking after someone!” Constance cried.
“Of course Esther is going with them, Mommy—Esther is on her way there anyway,” Honor explained to all of them.
In the Fourth and Fifth Aliyahs, many Jewish immigrants came to the port of Haifa.
The British had developed the port as a hub for oil.
Esther hadn’t planned to stay in Haifa; she was on her way to Jerusalem.
Moshe and Reva had other ideas. When their ship landed in Haifa, they decided they had traveled far enough; they weren’t moving on.
Naturally, Esther would stay with them in Haifa—at least until those two children were settled in.
Esther was the one who found the other wrestlers living in Haifa. The European wrestlers who made Haifa their home were from Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary. “Maybe wrestlers don’t like to move on,” Esther wrote to Honor.
There were almost three times as many Arabs living in Mandatory Palestine as there were Jews.
The Jewish wrestlers in Haifa found a job for Moshe, and a place for him and his aunt to live.
The wrestlers even found a job for Reva in a Hebrew kindergarten.
Esther wrote that Reva was learning “kindergarten Hebrew.”
In 1935, the Jewish wrestlers gained access to a sports hall in a school in Haifa, where they assembled a competitive wrestling team. The Haifa wrestling club was the only one in the country equipped and managed at a level equivalent to the European clubs.
The Haifa wrestling club was supported by an Israeli Jewish sports association called the Hapoel—Hebrew for “The Worker.” The Hapoel crest was a proletarian variation of the Communist hammer and sickle, encircling a boxer.
Esther needed to assure Moshe that Hapoel’s ties to socialist workers were okay with her.
By 1938, there would be 48,000 Jews (and 51,000 Muslims and Christians) living in Haifa.
A new wrestling club was up and running in Tel Aviv.
The best competitions were between the wrestling club in Haifa and the one in Tel Aviv, with Moshe Kleinberg winning most of his matches in the lightweight class.
There were also wrestling competitions between the Haifa wrestling club and the British military’s Eighth Army—stationed in Haifa.
In the summer of 1939, with the beginning of World War II, a few of the wrestlers in the Haifa club were recruited by the British military—Moshe among them.
“Do it, work with the British—for now, the British are our friends,” Esther told Moshe.
In Haifa, Esther had made friends among the British military; they’d tried to recruit her, too.
Perhaps the British military’s Eighth Army had recruited Esther as a nurse, but Esther was vague about it.
“I’m keeping my contacts with the British military open, but—for now—they know I’m up to my own business in Jerusalem,” was all Esther wrote to Honor about the British.
Thomas and Constance Winslow were frustrated that Esther was more specific about Moshe’s business than she was about her own. Esther was determined to be vague about what she was up to, but she’d been vague before. In 1939, Esther was thirty-four.
Esther’s long-range plan worried Thomas.
Real life was not a nineteenth-century novel.
Those novels managed the passage of time; long jumps in time were one of the things those novels did best. Maybe Moshe was smitten with Esther when they first met in 1934.
But what a long courtship Esther was trusting in.
“Little Mountain might meet another woman before Esther’s ready to get pregnant—maybe there are lots of women wrestling fans!
” Thomas told his family. “Little Mountain might get married! Esther’s good at taking charge, but only a novel can control what time can do,” Thomas said.
“You should write to Esther, Daddy—Esther is good at keeping a promise, and she’s good at getting a guy to keep his promise to her,” Honor told her father. (There was obviously something she wasn’t saying.)
“Esther should tell you herself, Daddy—you won’t believe us if we tell you,” Faith jumped in.
“Little Mountain made a deal with Esther—even if he has a wife and children, he’ll knock Esther up when she wants him to,” Hope said to Thomas and Constance.
“Well, really!” Constance exclaimed.
“Any guy would make that deal, Mommy,” was how Prudence put it.
“Right you are, Prudence,” Thomas said, quickly adding, “not that I would make such a deal, Connie—not if I were with you!”
“You are with me, Tommy,” Constance reminded him. In truth, Constance included, all the Winslows knew Little Mountain wasn’t the only guy who would make such a deal with Esther.