They call themselves the “alta cockers,” a floating group of Jewish old timers who gather monthly for lunch at an Asheville restaurant, not a trendy nouveau-cuisine eatery but a steakhouse on Tunnel Road. They’ve known each other for going on three-quarters of a century, and their daddies and moms knew each other, too. Around the table, they recall whose store was located where, the old house that served as a JCC. Some never left Asheville; others left and came back. They all have stories: the Jewish beauty queen, the Jewish highway patrolman…
Local multigenerational Jews are an endangered species in their hometowns. In Southern Jewish communities, newcomers will almost always outnumber natives at any time or place. With the unprecedent wave of Jewish migration, old timers now walk into their shuls—places where the yahrzeit plaques and Torah mantels bear the names of their parents and grandparents—only to find themselves surrounded by strangers. Some are bewildered; others take delight in seeing their once dwindling communities revive. Or they feel both emotions.
Jerry Sternberg, who self-identifies as the “oldest Jewish Asheville native,” is the convener of the Asheville alta cockers. Nominally a retired scrapyard entrepreneur, whose German immigrant grandfather Siegfried began locally ca. 1900 with a tannery—his mother’s southern Jewish roots date to the antebellum era—Sternberg is famously known as the feisty Mountain Xpress columnist of “The Gospel according to Jerry.” For well nigh 30 years he has been opining on matters local and global in a voice that is, well, colorful and often at odds with received standard opinion. He takes the long view, fitting for a man whose Asheville home was once a hilltop castle overlooking the city.
Since last April, Sternberg, 93, has turned his column into a series, “A Jew in Asheville,” reflections of a native son.
“A Jew in Asheville” records an early memory when as a four-year old he came home to his mother puzzled by a playmate who called him a “doo.” He notes the local Jews’ ambition to “fit in,” fearing the consequences of being conspicuous. His mother discreetly employed the term “wedge”—roughly “Jew” backwards—when discussing affairs of the tribe. The columns bring to life a near century of Jewish community life. During World War II local families entertained Jewish soldiers (among them Zero Mostel). Cheers erupted at the JCC when Israel was established. He writes frankly of Black-Jewish relations, observing the unthinking acceptance of segregation as well as recalling how his father respected a black worker at this tannery and enjoyed home visit with him. If African Americans were burdened by Jim Crow, Jews, according to Jerry, confronted their own “Moshe Cohen” laws, unlegislated customs that promulgated Christianity in the public schools and closed civic and country clubs to Jews, no matter how much Jews contributed to the city’s economy and social betterment. He knows where of he speaks.
“A Jew in Asheville” Mountain Xpress columns are available online at https://mountainx.com/author/jerry-sternberg/. Or at https://gospeljerry.com/, you may wish to watch Sternberg’s recent talk, “Tales of Asheville from an Ol’ Jewish Country Boy,” cosponsored by the Center for Jewish Studies at UNC Asheville and Carolina Jews for Justice. At that site, you can also obtain, for a charitable donation, his collection, The Gospel According to Jerry 90th Birthday Edition.
(JHNC president Leonard Rogoff and board member Sharon Fahrer, the Asheville Jewish community historian, were invited to join that alta cockers as honorary guests.)
