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Working for 'the plain people' for 7 decades
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By CYNTHIA DETTELBACH Editor
He speaks knowledgeably of Luddites (techno-phobes like himself) and of acerbic New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd.
He describes complex legal matters that occurred almost 70 years ago, and, fast forward, of a production of "The Vagina Monologues" he recently directed for the playreading group he and his (late) wife, Sally, began 50 years ago.
He is 96-year-old Samuel Handelman, attorney at law. A still-practicing attorney at law!
Fit-looking, trim and sporting a full head of white hair (worn in a modified buzz cut), Handelman lives alone in the five-bedroom Cleveland Heights home he bought in 1951 where he and Sally raised their five children.
Handelman still goes to work almost every day, driving himself to his office at 75 Public Square. He is, he says, the oldest practicing lawyer in Cleveland, probably in Ohio, and perhaps one of a handful in the entire country.
Apart from his recent bout of shingles, which requires him to use a walker, Handelman doesn't look a day over 70. And he is blessed with a memory for names, dates and events that would be the envy of people half his age!
Handelman was born in Glasgow, Scotland, of Lithuanian Jewish parents. His father was "an ardent Zionist" who attended the first Zionist Conference in Basle, Switzerland, in 1897. The senior Handelman named his first child (Handelman's older brother) Herzl, after Theodor Herzl, the father of modern political Zionism and convener of the conference.
"My parents were freethinkers," Handelman says, and not much into religious training for their four offspring (two brothers and two sisters).
The family came to America when Samuel was 6 and Herzl (always known as Harry) was 9. The sisters are a few years younger.
Handelman attended Shaw High School and then paid his way through Adelbert College (tuition $250 a year) and Western Reserve Law School (tuition $300 a year) by working 20-25 hours a week at the U.S. Post Office. Although there were only four or five Jews (along with two women and one black) in his law school class of 105, Handelman never experienced any antisemitism, he says, either at law school or in college.
After graduation, Handelman set up a law practice downtown with another attorney. (Shared rent for a single room, $35.) When that partnership dissolved "amicably," Handelman partnered in law with his brother, Harry.
The highlight of his legal career, notes Handelman, came in 1937. Union pioneer John L. Lewis sent the 30-year-old attorney a telegram, asking him to handle the legal battles involved in attempting to unionize workers at Republic Steel here.
The steel workers went on strike that year, and company owners tried to run the mill with white- collar workers and scabs. To bypass the picket lines, they "parachuted" supplies into the mills. Company planes took off and landed at a makeshift company airport (basically an abandoned field) in the city of Cleveland.
By researching city ordinances, Handelman discovered that no plane could be operated in Cleveland without a permit from the airport commissioner - which Republic Steel never bothered to secure. After the young attorney endured much buck passing on the issue from city officials, a hearing was finally set. Although he was pitted against an impressive array of more seasoned corporate lawyers from Jones Day for three grueling days, Handelman finally succeeded in getting Republic Steel's airport closed down. That, he says proudly, "was our first big victory," one that cost the company the then considerable sum of $500,000.
But all told it took two-and-a-half agonizing years before the strike was settled and the steel workers could form a union. That ultimately became the C.I.O.
After the heady and hectic years of the Republic Steel ordeal, Handelman returned to his small general law practice. Which was just fine with him, he insists.
In 1948, he was engaged by the electrical workers in their three-year effort to unionize in Ohio. When that battle was won, Handelman returned again to "helping people of modest means" and working to preserve civil rights.
Handelman met his future wife in 1936 when both were working to help raise money for Republican Spain (ultimately defeated by the fascist Francisco Franco, with the help of Mussolini).
"My sympathy was always with the working class, the plain people of the world," he says. He still takes great pride in the fact that he "never represented a corporation."
Handelman was also sensitive to the plight of other attorneys. When he began practicing law in 1930 he became aware that of the 40 or 50 black lawyers in Cleveland, only one had an office downtown. (The others were relegated to less prestigious neighborhood offices.)
So he got several dozen white lawyers to sign a petition urging their downtown building owners to rent space to blacks. It took years, he adds, for the owners to agree.
Handelman has always been active in causes. On his 65th birthday, he was honored for his fund-raising efforts on behalf of Vietnamese children. At his 95th birthday bash last year hosted by his children, he requested that, in lieu of gifts, guests donate to any of five charities he supports: Amnesty International, NAACP, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Hunger Network. "And there's not a day I'm not involved in a campaign against capital punishment," he adds.
When his beloved wife (whose pictures are prominently displayed in the living room) died 10 years ago, Handelman soldiered on. He learned how to shop and cook for himself ("no red meat, lots of vegetables"). An avid consumer of news, Handelman reads The New York Times and Plain Dealer daily and the CJN on Fridays. He always has a book or two going, as well.
Handelman speaks passionately about his oppostion to the Iraq war and to President Bush ("Dubya, as Maureen Dowd refers to him") and would like to see either Dennis Kucinich or Howard Dean win the 2004 presidential election.
A lifelong lover of music, he went to the opening of Severance Hall in 1931, he recalls, and the opening of Blossom in 1968. He still goes to concerts when he can, as well as to events at the Cleveland Museum of Art. His favorite artist is 19th-century British landscape painter J.M.W Turner, and he shows me the book he is reading about Turner.
Then, of course, there's his law practice, which he restricts now to workers compensation and personal injury cases.
So who hires a 96-year-old lawyer? I ask him.
"If you've been around long enough and do decent work, people will send their kids and grandkids," says this grandfather of 13 and great-grandfather of one. "I get calls from the kids and grandkids of former clients."
Handelman admits he never made a lot of money practicing law, "and never will," but it's something he always wanted to do and he's proud he accomplished it.
"I'm a person with no great distinction or associations," he says with genuine modesty. "But I have done some good work in my life."
Well into his 96th year, he's still doing it!
He describes complex legal matters that occurred almost 70 years ago, and, fast forward, of a production of "The Vagina Monologues" he recently directed for the playreading group he and his (late) wife, Sally, began 50 years ago.
He is 96-year-old Samuel Handelman, attorney at law. A still-practicing attorney at law!
Fit-looking, trim and sporting a full head of white hair (worn in a modified buzz cut), Handelman lives alone in the five-bedroom Cleveland Heights home he bought in 1951 where he and Sally raised their five children.
Handelman still goes to work almost every day, driving himself to his office at 75 Public Square. He is, he says, the oldest practicing lawyer in Cleveland, probably in Ohio, and perhaps one of a handful in the entire country.
Apart from his recent bout of shingles, which requires him to use a walker, Handelman doesn't look a day over 70. And he is blessed with a memory for names, dates and events that would be the envy of people half his age!
Handelman was born in Glasgow, Scotland, of Lithuanian Jewish parents. His father was "an ardent Zionist" who attended the first Zionist Conference in Basle, Switzerland, in 1897. The senior Handelman named his first child (Handelman's older brother) Herzl, after Theodor Herzl, the father of modern political Zionism and convener of the conference.
"My parents were freethinkers," Handelman says, and not much into religious training for their four offspring (two brothers and two sisters).
The family came to America when Samuel was 6 and Herzl (always known as Harry) was 9. The sisters are a few years younger.
Handelman attended Shaw High School and then paid his way through Adelbert College (tuition $250 a year) and Western Reserve Law School (tuition $300 a year) by working 20-25 hours a week at the U.S. Post Office. Although there were only four or five Jews (along with two women and one black) in his law school class of 105, Handelman never experienced any antisemitism, he says, either at law school or in college.
After graduation, Handelman set up a law practice downtown with another attorney. (Shared rent for a single room, $35.) When that partnership dissolved "amicably," Handelman partnered in law with his brother, Harry.
The highlight of his legal career, notes Handelman, came in 1937. Union pioneer John L. Lewis sent the 30-year-old attorney a telegram, asking him to handle the legal battles involved in attempting to unionize workers at Republic Steel here.
The steel workers went on strike that year, and company owners tried to run the mill with white- collar workers and scabs. To bypass the picket lines, they "parachuted" supplies into the mills. Company planes took off and landed at a makeshift company airport (basically an abandoned field) in the city of Cleveland.
By researching city ordinances, Handelman discovered that no plane could be operated in Cleveland without a permit from the airport commissioner - which Republic Steel never bothered to secure. After the young attorney endured much buck passing on the issue from city officials, a hearing was finally set. Although he was pitted against an impressive array of more seasoned corporate lawyers from Jones Day for three grueling days, Handelman finally succeeded in getting Republic Steel's airport closed down. That, he says proudly, "was our first big victory," one that cost the company the then considerable sum of $500,000.
But all told it took two-and-a-half agonizing years before the strike was settled and the steel workers could form a union. That ultimately became the C.I.O.
After the heady and hectic years of the Republic Steel ordeal, Handelman returned to his small general law practice. Which was just fine with him, he insists.
In 1948, he was engaged by the electrical workers in their three-year effort to unionize in Ohio. When that battle was won, Handelman returned again to "helping people of modest means" and working to preserve civil rights.
Handelman met his future wife in 1936 when both were working to help raise money for Republican Spain (ultimately defeated by the fascist Francisco Franco, with the help of Mussolini).
"My sympathy was always with the working class, the plain people of the world," he says. He still takes great pride in the fact that he "never represented a corporation."
Handelman was also sensitive to the plight of other attorneys. When he began practicing law in 1930 he became aware that of the 40 or 50 black lawyers in Cleveland, only one had an office downtown. (The others were relegated to less prestigious neighborhood offices.)
So he got several dozen white lawyers to sign a petition urging their downtown building owners to rent space to blacks. It took years, he adds, for the owners to agree.
Handelman has always been active in causes. On his 65th birthday, he was honored for his fund-raising efforts on behalf of Vietnamese children. At his 95th birthday bash last year hosted by his children, he requested that, in lieu of gifts, guests donate to any of five charities he supports: Amnesty International, NAACP, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Hunger Network. "And there's not a day I'm not involved in a campaign against capital punishment," he adds.
When his beloved wife (whose pictures are prominently displayed in the living room) died 10 years ago, Handelman soldiered on. He learned how to shop and cook for himself ("no red meat, lots of vegetables"). An avid consumer of news, Handelman reads The New York Times and Plain Dealer daily and the CJN on Fridays. He always has a book or two going, as well.
Handelman speaks passionately about his oppostion to the Iraq war and to President Bush ("Dubya, as Maureen Dowd refers to him") and would like to see either Dennis Kucinich or Howard Dean win the 2004 presidential election.
A lifelong lover of music, he went to the opening of Severance Hall in 1931, he recalls, and the opening of Blossom in 1968. He still goes to concerts when he can, as well as to events at the Cleveland Museum of Art. His favorite artist is 19th-century British landscape painter J.M.W Turner, and he shows me the book he is reading about Turner.
Then, of course, there's his law practice, which he restricts now to workers compensation and personal injury cases.
So who hires a 96-year-old lawyer? I ask him.
"If you've been around long enough and do decent work, people will send their kids and grandkids," says this grandfather of 13 and great-grandfather of one. "I get calls from the kids and grandkids of former clients."
Handelman admits he never made a lot of money practicing law, "and never will," but it's something he always wanted to do and he's proud he accomplished it.
"I'm a person with no great distinction or associations," he says with genuine modesty. "But I have done some good work in my life."
Well into his 96th year, he's still doing it!
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This week's editorial cartoon by Stuart Goldman of The Exponent |
Coming attractions, detractions: survey of U.S. Jews |
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