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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