According to herautobiography, My Life, Golda’s firsteight years were not happy ones. Born Golda Mabowehz in 1898, she lived withher father, mother and two sisters in Kiev, Russia, in part of the Pale ofSettlement, a ghetto-like area first established at the end of the 18th centuryto discourage Jews from mixing freely with Christians. Being a Jew in Russiameant always being on guard against pogroms. Supporting a family during thattime and place became nearly impossible, so Golda’s father, like so many of hiscountrymen, journeyed to the United States to earn money. Three years later, in1906, Golda and the rest of her family followed him to Milwaukee, where he hadfound work as a carpenter in the Milwaukee Road shops.
The Mabowehz familylived in an apartment on Walnut Street within a neighborhood dominated byJewish immigrants. Golda’s mother augmented the family income by operating adairy store, where Golda would man the counter when her mother went to themarket. According to Golda Meir: Portraitof a Prime Minister by Eliyahu Agress, Golda managed to master therudiments of the English language so that by the time she entered Fourth StreetSchool (now Golda Meir School) in 1906, she could understand what was beingspoken.
Golda’s interest inpublic service was evident even when she was a girl. In fourth grade, concernedthat her classmates were too poor to buy schoolbooks, she organized theAmerican Young Sisters Society to raise money to pay for them.
By 14, Golda wasabsolutely committed to her education. Her parents, on the other hand, wantedher to marry. She ran away to Denver to live with her older married sister,Sheyna Korngold. Sheyna and her husband regularly hosted freewheeling parlordiscussions where Golda was exposed to debates on Socialism, Zionism, women’ssuffrage and more. A year and a half later, her parents reconciled with theirdaughter’s fervent drive to keep studying, and she returned to Milwaukee toattend North Division High School.
In 1916, Golda attendedthe Milwaukee State Normal School for Teachers (one of the predecessors ofUW-Milwaukee). Her first job was teaching in a Yiddish-speaking Folks Shule,which was steeped in labor Zionism. It was then that Golda joined the PoaleZion (Labor Zionist) Party.
According to Agress, Goldasaid, “When I joined it, there was no doubt about my aliyah (immigration) at the very first opportunity.” In 1917, Goldamarried Morris Meyerson, a Socialist she met at her sister’s home in Denver,with one condition: Their marriage would take place only if he agreed to go toPalestine and live in a kvutzah (anagricultural community). Golda gave up teaching and devoted herself to partyactivities until the young couple saved enough money to leave Milwaukee for thePromised Land in 1921.
