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A Friend Remembers
Ralph McGill
by Rebecca Mafhis Gershon
What can I possibly add to the multitude of stories, editorials
and tributes that poured out in bountiful measure following the
death on February 3, 1969 of Ralph McGill? Seemingly, little
or nothing. However, because of a friendship that extended
over a period of 56 years, perhaps I may be able to bring into
focus a lesser known angle of this man’s wide interest and extra
ordinary understanding.
Ralph McGill’s first introduction to a family of Jews came in
his early ’teens. Some of you may recall reading in the firs'
Chapters of The South and the Southerner McGill’s describing his
boyhood in Chattanooga. In this connection he speaks of meet
ing a girl through whom “a new sort of world opened up for one
but lately come from an up-river farm.” He goes on to say “the
Mathis family . . . took me in and made me welcome . . . Thereby
was I introduced to music, painting, books and a culture older
than mine ... I was part of conversations about issues, inter
national and domestic . . . the Mathis family gave me ... an
awareness of international events and of forces which were in
volved in them. They were a very real inspiration to me, broad
ening the horizons of my mind and making me see and under
stand beyond the provincialism of Chattanooga.” A brief bio
graphical sketch of the father and mother of the family and
their forebears follows, ending: “It was a wonderful family and 1
loved them all.” -
(Some of you know that I was Rebecca Mathis and that this
was my family; some of you have never associated the Rebecca
Mathis in the McGill reference with the Reb Gershon whom you
know; and most of you, I am sure, have never heard of either
name.)
In this home Ralph McGill came to his first knowledge and
understanding of Jews as a people, some of their history and
background, their trials and problems. This was not a Zionist
fami’y, simply a good Reform Jewish one where the father
served several terms as President of the Congregation and the
mother served as President of the local Council of Jewish
Women. The warm and affectionate contact over a number of
years combined with McGill’s own sensitivity to build a foun
dation for his continuing empathy toward Jews as a group. This
understanding manifest itself in many ways over the years;
periodic columns of interpretation of the Day of Atonement, the
festival of Passover, the rite of Bar Mitzva, his many appe lo
anees before Jewish groups, numbers of awards from Jewish
organizations ranging from a local group of Mizrachi women to
honorary degrees from Brandeis Univesity and Hebrew Union
College. And always he brought to these his deep comprehen
sion and forthright espousal.
In 1946 McGill had the opportunity to go to Palestine, then
in the last throes of the British Mandate. Some of his friends
expressed vociferous opposition to his going. Remember in 1946
Palestine had become a controversial issue not only in the com
munity at large but in the household of Judaism. Ralph ap
pealed to his old friend from the Chattanooga family for an
explanation of some of this opposition and asked for her own
opinion.
The 1946 trip did materialize and was followed in 1950 by a
second visit — now to the young state of Israel. These visits
supplied the material for a small but significant volume Israel
Reinsited. Re-reading this book less than a week ago I was once
more amazed at the rare perception and the penetrating under
standing expressed therein. Through Israel’s tribulations and
struggles, the 1948 War of Liberation, the 1956 Suez crisis, the
Six-Day War in June of 1967, the futile debate within the United
Nations Security Council, McGill understood as few editors or
obse-vers seemed to, and McGill spoke out in his widely syndi
cated columns.
Ralph kept contact with several Israeli friends made during
those 1946-1950 visits. Each of the four times that I went to
Israel he commissioned me “to get a bottle of good cognac for
Yitzak, a book for Jo Davis, (and once a layette for Jo’s antici
pated babe) and a nice gift for Millie,” Ralph very much wan
ted to go again to Israel to see developments and progress but
in his busy and demanding round it never seemed possible. The
last time he and his wife were in my home, a week before his
death, he was repeating this wish as he talked at length of Israel
with a young Israeli physician who was here on a special assign
ment at the National Medical Audiovisual Center.
Shimon Yallon, the well remembered former Consul
General of Israel, found McGill “the wisest and most understand
ing . . .” and added in a recent letter, “only people like Ralph
give us hope that democracy will function in spite of the troubles
of the world . . .”
Assuredly many things spurred Ralph’s own inquiring mind
and sensitive nature, but who can assess the influence of that
Jewish family in whose midst he was so at home during the
formative ’teen years?
The inscription on the fly-leaf of the pre-publication copy of
The South and the Southerner which he brought me read: “For
Reb who will I hope read in the lines which begin on page 54
some of the love which I have had for her and hers across a long
span of years.”
Many others have written with sincerity and eloquence of
McGill’s courage, generosity, sensitivity, his gift for words and
phrases, his interest in children, youth, education, his coopera
tion and helpfulness with other newsmen, his modesty and hu
mility despite accumulated awards and honors, his rare combin
ation of thundering excoriation and gentleness. To all these
praises I nod accord. I had the rare opportunity to watch a
slender, gangling super-shy youth develop into an international
ly renowned editor and publisher, beloved or hated according
to the advocacies of the reader. Always he remained the same
person unspoiled by any praise or position.
I told him more than once that this more than half-century
friendship in itself was “Day e nu,” and that on the two occasions
when he presented me to Eleanor Roosevelt and to President
Lyndon B. Johnson respectively as “My oldest and dearest
friend,” my accolade was complete.
Truly this man was a long-time good friend to Jews, to the
oppressed and persecuted, to the deprived and unfortunate, in
deed to all Humankind, and we shall not soon meet his like again.
The Southern Israelite
34