The struggle going on between two of America’s most eminent hobo leaders is putting premature wrinkles in the brow of J. Leon Lazarowitz, elected king at a box car convention held last fall. Al Kauffman and Mr. Lazarowitz, gentlemen of the open road, have locked horns in battle. Each covets the titular rank of hobo king, each claims priority over the uncounted constituencies who roam over America’s fair soil and sleep in her freight trains.
Their Majesties have been written up in these columns. The recent Paterson, N. J., story, published in the Bulletin about Kauffman in which he made known his claim to the throne, obliged Lazarowitz to write an indignant letter to the Bulletin in which he slaps his rival and devotes considerable wordage to a general discussion of the Jewish question.
“This man Al Kauffman travelled from Bathurst, N. B., in Canada, as far west as Kitchener, Ontario, and in the United States.” he writes. “The Jewish communities in Uniontown, Pennsylvania, shunned and denounced him at a mass meeting at the local orthodox synagogue. Was in jail in Baltimore, Md., for stealing. He was sentenced to six months. Was in jail in Toronto for bootlegging and sentenced to three months in the workhouse. The Toronto Telegram can testify to that.
“He claims to be a Jew, but was never known to attend a synagogue. In Toronto he claimed that the Tip Top Tailors gave him a suit. The Toronto Star published an incerview with Tip Top Tailors and said Kauffman was a fraud.”
WAS DULY ELECTED
Mr. Lazarowitz avers that the Hoboes Union of North America, Inc., elected him “official king” at a Minneapolis convention held September 27, 1927. He was relected on September 4, 1933, at Saskatoon, Sask.
The letter enumerates the organizations which elected him honorary member, and the newspapers which carried stories about him.
King Lazarowitz appends a list of 312 cities in the United States with their Jewish population.
His contribution to the Readers Forum follows:
“Where we come from, Polish, Rumanian, Russian or Latvian Jews, or the so called high class Jews in the United States, let us unite and just be called ‘Israel Voicing Her Protest Against Tyrany’ Here in New York City and elsewhere, let every Jewish family be represented by one member of each family at the Madison Square Garden meeting on March 7.
“Let every Jew give until it hurts and still give. England must he shown that we desire our own country Eretz Israel once again and not to curtail Jewish immigration into the Holy Land to please the Arabs.”
His Majesty concludes the latter with, “I suppose you must be tried now.”
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
