"Lack of telephones has led to shocking incidents"
Today, you just say "hop" and you already have a phone that even fits in your pocket. Go explain to young people that many years ago not only did they not dream of a cell phone, even a landline phone was very difficult to obtain. Some waited seven years or more to get a phone line. Usually with a partner, so that when one person talked on the phone at home – their "partner"'s line was paralyzed.
Yes, there were days, like, for example, July 1945, XNUMX. A children's institution named after Sarah Wilbuschevich in the Ahuza neighborhood of Haifa wrote a letter that day to Mayor Shabtai Levy, and this is what it said: "Honorable Mayor. On the occasion of his visit to our institution on the sixth day, we turned to him with a request to help us obtain and install a telephone for the institution.
"For years we have been going back and forth to the post office about this without receiving a response. In the meantime, our institution has grown to 80 children, and the lack of a telephone has led to shocking incidents in the children's education. We are far from the settlement, and help for any trouble cannot be given to us due to the lack of communication."
The letter also states: "The Mount Carmel Police have recorded many cases of theft and assault that happened to us. In the last case, Negroes entered the girls' rooms. And let's not forget the medical help we lacked at the time."
The pressure from not having a phone.
"The Honorable Mayor will certainly understand our plight, and we ask him to recommend to the necessary places to quickly arrange a telephone in our institution. With thanks in advance and with great respect." According to the signs, this is currently the "Children's Mansion" of the WIZO on Horev Street at the corner of Idar Street.
"Operation Fly"
A plague of flies and rats struck Haifa in the spring of 1951. The municipality, headed by Abba Hushi, became ambitious and organized a comprehensive and noteworthy operation to eradicate these pests. The report on the preparations for the operation states that meetings were held with youth movements, with the sports associations "Hapoel" and "Maccabi", with organizations
Women, the People's Guard, the fire department, the Haganah, the Merchants' Association, with cafe owners and school principals. As part of the operation, in which nearly 800 men and women participated, an information campaign was also held. Slogans were distributed about the need to destroy flies and rats. Illustrated posters were distributed in homes, shops, restaurants and cinemas, and each household received an instruction booklet on how to deal with the pests. Cleaning operations were carried out in yards, streets, shops and restaurants. For this purpose, sufficient DDT was also prepared for spraying near garbage cans, and scrap was removed from the city limits.
As with any exemplary organization, inspections were also conducted. The inspectors wore cloth ribbons to identify them, and a symbol of the Health Guard was also prepared for them, and even the health insurance company provided appropriate ribbons. And how can you do anything in Haifa without ceremony? On this subject, a mechanized procession was held through the streets of the city with loudspeakers, records, and slogans denouncing the flies and rats.
"Eggs, gentlemen, Turkish eggs" – but only five!
There are several types of eggs: farm eggs, organic eggs, also called free-range eggs. There are hard-boiled and soft-boiled eggs. Before they say we're busy cracking eggs - have you heard of Turkish eggs? If you haven't heard of them - it's a sign that you weren't in Haifa on Tuesday, May 4, 1948. On this day, residents began to be given a quota of five Turkish eggs!
Advertisement number 17 published by the Situation Committee of the Hebrew Community in Haifa reads: "To the residents of Greater Haifa: We hereby announce that starting Tuesday, the XNUMXth of Nisan XNUMX, five eggs will be distributed once.
Turkeys for each adult sugar card. The price of "Tnuva" eggs is according to the official price. The price of the Turkish egg is 30 mil each.
"Each consumer will receive the eggs at the store where he is connected to receiving sugar according to the sugar card of the Food Inspector. Each resident will demand from his shopkeeper the aforementioned quantity of eggs, and any refusal to sell or extortion of price must be notified to the Economic Department of the Situation Committee at the Kaplan House, 61 Herzl Street, Haifa."
As far as I can tell – it currently has no real dispute with Turkey… So far from the Haifa City Archives.