Bertie Levkowitz
From left to right: Bertie Levkowitz, infant Bertie Goslins, Bertie with her first husband Jack Levkowitz
Bertie Levkowitz, a longtime Tucson resident and co-founder of Tucson Hebrew Academy, has contributed to the uplifting of the local Jewish community for decades through her dedication to education.
Born in Groningen, Holland in 1942, Bertie’s infancy and first years of childhood were indelibly impacted by the persecution that Dutch Jews experienced during the Holocaust. For three years, Bertie and her parents survived only because several families agreed to hide them each separately at great personal risk. After the war, Bertie and her parents reunited and the family moved to Assen, where they owned a successful clothing store. Her father had given his pre-war business in buying and selling meat to an employee, who refused to return ownership to him after his return. Two sisters were eventually born, Rose-Carrie in 1946 and Miriam in 1949. The family, joined by cousins of Bertie’s mother, lived above their store. Although reunited, the Goslins family was left to reconcile with the loss of over one hundred relatives during the Holocaust. Despite the reappearance of Jewish life in Assen, the lack of aid from the Dutch government or from any Jewish agency and the dispossession of previously flourishing businesses and homes left survivors struggling. These troubles were compounded by tensions between the West and the Soviet Union. Bertie’s father decided to move the family to the United States in 1953, where they eventually settled in Bellflower, California. Integration into American society did not come immediately for the Goslins; living amongst other Dutch immigrants, her parents barely spoke English and Bertie spoke none at all, which did not prevent her from abruptly starting school in the fifth grade in April of that year, in an area in which she was the sole Jewish student. Both parents worked in a department store to support the family while Bertie made daily two-mile walks to school, where she played softball, volleyball, and tennis.
During Bertie’s youth and early adolescence in California, her family’s approach to Judaism was ambivalent. While her mother had retained some elements of practicing Judaism, her father was an agnostic tending towards atheism, and the two shared the belief that Judaism had in fact died following the events of World War II and the Holocaust. The family occasionally went to service at a nearby Reform congregation, but the three Goslins sisters knew next to nothing about Judaism, except the most important holidays and the fact that they were indeed Jews. By this time, Bertie had already passed the confirmation age of fifteen. Left with a relative lack of resources, Bertie’s entrance into the world of Judaism was brought about by her involvement with her local chapter of the B’nai B’rith Youth Organization. When she attended her first meeting, she felt immediately accepted- it was the first time that she was in a Jewish friend group and within the first two meetings she was elected to be charter president. For Bertie, this was the point of both Jewish awakening as well as coming into her own. In her own words, tzedakah (charity) and mitzvot (commandments) became integral parts of her life.
In 1960, Bertie graduated from Bellflower High School as valedictorian of her class, and enrolled at California State University, Long Beach. Underwhelmed by the academic rigor and finding it difficult to make new friends, Bertie decided to transfer to University of California, Berkeley during her junior year and graduated in 1964. During her early college years, she made the acquaintance of Goldy Levkowitz, a Tucson native who was pursuing her master’s at USC and who became a Jewish mother figure for her. This friendship introduced Bertie to the man that would eventually become her husband, Jack Levkowitz, Goldy’s younger brother. After graduating from the University of Arizona and hoping to further his career as a dentist, Jack set out for Los Angeles. It was during a shabbat dinner that Goldy introduced the two, and a years-long courtship started between the eighteen year old Bertie and the twenty-seven year old Jack. Four years later, Jack proposed and made it clear that living in Tucson, where he could take care of his family, was his priority. Bertie accepted and in August of 1964 they were married and set up their kosher home in Tucson.
Bertie joined both the Levkowitz family and Tucson’s Jewish community; she became involved with congregations Young Israel and Anshei Israel and was involved in opening Tucson’s first mikvah, a Jewish ritual bath. At Anshei, Bertie was involved in both the Sisterhood as well as the board, where she helped to raise funds, and on a larger scale, she was also involved in the local chapter of the National Council for Jewish Women. Both she and Jack volunteered as chaperones with BBYO, and Jack himself was in Va’ad HaKashrut, a supervisory board for the upkeep of kosher standards in Tucson. Judaism was naturally prevalent in Bertie’s home life as well, as their family was one of the only kosher and shomer shabbat ones in Tucson at the time. Not long after moving to Tucson, two children were born to the Levkowtiz family, Helene, in 1966, and Howard, in 1967.
Perhaps the most important contribution that Bertie has made to the Jewish community in Tucson was her role in establishing Tucson Hebrew Academy. The brainchild of several different actors, THA was initially proposed by Rabbi Arthur Oleisky, who became rabbi at Congregation Anshei Israel in 1970 and bemoaned the lack of a local Jewish day school during his 1971 Yom Kippur sermon. David Leonard and Jack Levkowitz were two of the first individuals who came to Rabbi Oleisky’s aid in this pursuit. Bertie was originally opposed to the idea, as she believed that parochial schools did not contribute enough to support democracy and create well-rounded children. Despite Bertie’s reticence, Jack went on to work with community members including Henry Kaufmann and Maurice Cohen, who left an endowment to Anshei Israel for the eventual founding of a day school. Eventually, Bertie came to appreciate the merit of a Jewish day school, which coincided with her growing belief that providing secular and religious education simultaneously was possible, and with her attraction towards more traditional Orthodox Judaism. Bertie joined the board of founding members and participated in efforts to gain support for the day school from local families, which was a challenging task, due to varying perceptions of the school being either too religious or too secular. Finally, in 1973, Tucson Hebrew Academy opened, holding classes at Congregation Anshei Israel and offering education from first through eighth grade. Bertie and Jack served on the board, and although Bertie resigned soon after, she continued to work as a parent volunteer.
Bertie continued to lead an active life outside of her involvement with THA. She took courses in radio and television as well as tennis classes at the University of Arizona and she volunteered with the KUAT radio station, where she hosted call-in radio programs on health and dentistry. Bertie and Jack both lobbied Tucson Unified School District to make vending machines healthier and the two would even drive to Benson twice a week, for almost two years, to provide dental services to the residents. Jack went on to found two dentistries in the following years, namely the Academy Medical Center, located on Wilmot just to the south of St. Joseph’s, and ABC Dental Center, which was located at 123 S Stone Avenue. In late 1978 Jack asked Bertie to help him run ABC Dental Center for six months; this turned into twenty years of work, during which Bertie was charged with management of the business and educating clients on dental health. While running ABC Dental Center, the Levkowitzes sought to provide affordable dentistry to underserved communities and to hire young dentists in need of work experience.
After decades of marriage and committed partnership, Jack passed away in 1998. Bertie sold ABC Dental Center and retired in the fall of the following year and started once again to dedicate her time to volunteering. She returned to the board of THA and became a docent for elementary school groups at Sabino Canyon, a position which she occupied for fifteen years. Several years later, Bertie met Tom Herz, a retired lawyer who fled to the United States from Germany at the age of six. Bertie met Tom, who was widowed in May 2002, while he was reciting the Mourner’s Kaddish at temple. The two dated throughout 2003 and eventually married on October 4, 2004. Tom and Bertie split their time between Tucson and Milwaukee, where they spent four and a half months out of the year. Bertie’s community engagement persisted as well with her new volunteer work with Tucson’s Brandeis National Committee chapter, which included teaching courses and leading discussion groups and book clubs. During her marriage with Tom, Bertie picked up two habits that she takes pleasure in to this day: playing bridge and hosting Shabbat dinners on Friday evenings.
Bertie and Tom were married for almost twenty years before he passed away in August 2024. Despite this most recent loss, Bertie’s vitality and dedication to community, Holocaust education, and the flourishing of Judaism remain steadfast in her work with THA, Brandeis, and the Tucson Jewish Museum and Holocaust Center, where she speaks to student groups about her family’s experience during the Holocaust.
Interviews with Bertie Lefkowitz
Photo Credit: Lefkowitz Family