[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 10]
[Senate]
[Page 14266]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                      TRIBUTE TO THE SHANIN FAMILY

  Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, the 20th century story of the Shanin 
Family portrays the success of immigrants in America and the success of 
America itself.
  The naturalization papers of Freda Mermorvich Shanin show that she 
traveled from Lugansk, Russia and arrived at Ellis Island on October 
31, 1906, with her two children, Lilli and Max, enroute to joining her 
husband, Mordecai Shanin, in St. Joe, MO. The Shanin Family grew with 
the addition of five more children: Annie, Louie, Rose, Albert, and 
Margaret. Mordecai Shanin struggled to earn a living with a variety of 
occupations including selling Singer sewing machines.
  Lilli Shanin, later to become my mother, told me about her father 
dying in her arms form a heart attack in 1916 on the backstairs of the 
Shanin home at 922 South Ninth Street. My grandmother, Bubbie Freda, 
told me she was left a widow with seven children and seven dollars. 
Deeply religious, proud and independent, Freda Shanin raised her 
children with the help of Lilli, who left school to work in a tablet 
factory, and the other siblings pitching in when they became old enough 
to contribute to the family's support.
  In 1917 Freda Shanin met a young immigrant, Harry Specter, who was 
buying dry goods and blankets at the wholesale house for sales in his 
travels to farms in Nebraska, Kansas, and Missouri. Harry Specter asked 
Freda Shanin if she had a daughter. ``Yes I do'' said the protective 
mother, ``But she's too young for you.''
  Harry Specter courted Lilli Shanin, won her heart, went off to World 
War I, was wounded in the Argonne Forest, and returned in uniform to 
St. Joe to marry the beautiful 19-year-old redhead in her resplendent 
white gown carrying a large bouquet of roses. That union produced 
Morton, Hilda, Shirley, and Arlen Specter, who in turn brought Mordecai 
and Freda Shanin 10 great grandchildren, 25 great-great grandchildren 
and 6 great-great-great grandchildren.
  The three sons, Max, Louie, and Albert grew up in hard times in St. 
Joe with Albert, who added a granddaughter to the family tree, becoming 
a prosperous pharmacy owner who spent much of his time and drugstore 
medicines devoted to his ailing mother. Annie, who wrote a book of 
Hebrew poetry in 1945, married a distinguished chemist, Dr. Morton 
Kleiman, and they in turn had Dr. Adina Kleiman, a noted psychologist, 
and Dr. Jay Kleiman, an eminent cardiologist, who added two more great 
grandchildren to the Shanin family. Margaret ``Mashie'' Shanin married 
handsome Leslie Hoffman, who brought a truckload of watermelons from 
the family produce business in Waco, TX, to St. Joe. Mashie added to 
the family tree with four grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
  Rose Shanin left St. Joe at the age of 18 to live with her sister, 
Lilli, in Wichita, where Rose became a high-powered executive secretary 
for the Beyer Grain Company. In 1930, at my birth, Tante Rose 
intervened to save me from the name ``Abraham'' with the suggested 
``Arlen'' after the famous movie star, Richard Arlen. Rose would later 
start my brother Morton and me in the development of our work ethics as 
messengers riding our bicycles all over Wichita delivering bills of 
lading for Beyer and other grain companies. Rose married Julius 
Isenberg and added a daughter and son to the growing family tree.
  Judaism has continued to be the mainstay of the Shanin Family with 
many, albeit not all, maintaining strictly kosher homes, with a few 
emigrants to Jerusalem and Tel Aviv to strengthen the State of Israel. 
The 70 descendants of Mordecai and Freda Shanin have contributed to the 
values, prosperity, and success of the United States. Interspersed in 
the family tree are Ph.Ds, LL.Ds, MDs, a Federal judge, businesspeople, 
professionals, and elected public officials.
  Today, members of the Shanin Family have assembled in Washington for 
a Shanin Family reunion led by the matriarchs of the family, Annie 
Kleiman and Rose Isenberg and Joyce Specter, who were privileged to 
meet with the President today. The entire family visited the White 
House, the Senate, the Washington Monument, the Jefferson Memorial, the 
Lincoln Monument, President Kennedy's gravesite, and the Secret Service 
headquarters.
  America is the spectacular story of immigrants who have come in 
search of freedom and opportunity who have contributed so much. The 
Shanin Family is typical of the great contributions by immigrants, who, 
along with native Americans, have made the United States the greatest 
country in the history of the world.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I wanted to say this to the Senator from 
Pennsylvania. Not only is he proud of his family, but certainly they 
should be proud of him. He has rendered great service to the State of 
Pennsylvania and to this country. Even though we are in a real quandary 
for time here, every word he said I appreciate very much. I understand 
the pride he expresses in his family, as they should in him.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I believe it is probably the case, 
although we are not supposed to mention such things on the floor, that 
the family may be present. I welcome them and congratulate the Senator 
on such a fine progeny.
  Mr. SPECTER. I thank my colleagues for their very kind remarks.
  Mr. ROTH. Mr. President, I join my colleagues and say to the 
Senator's family what pride they should take in you. I know of no 
Senator that has had a more positive affect on the work of the Senator 
than Senator Specter. I am proud of him.
  Mr. SPECTER. I thank my colleagues from Delaware for those very 
generous comments.

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