Libbie & Louis Berkowitz
Blanche Gustinsky emigrated from Kalish, Poland in 1909 with her 1-year-old daughter, Libbie. In 1911, Blanche married Joseph Berkowitz, a native of London. The following year, their son Louis was born in Dallas, Texas. Whether due to Joseph’s death or absence is unclear, but in 1917 Blanche admitted Libbie (9) and Louis (5) to the Home from Galveston, Texas.
Libbie graduated from Isidore Newman Manual Training School in 1924, where she immersed herself in sports and other extracurricular activities. Her classmates predicted that she was going to be a “suffragette.” In 1928, after briefly attending Newcomb College, she completed her training in nursing at Touro Infirmary where she then worked as a nursing supervisor. In the 1930s, she worked as a registered nurse at the former Michael Reese Hospital in Chicago, Illinois.
Senior entry for Libbie Berkowitz, Isidore Newman Manual Training School Pioneer, 1924.
This 1923 photo of Isidore Newman Manual Training School girls’ intramural “Orange” basketball team includes Libbie Berkowitz, seated at far right, along with several other Home girls: Jennie Fort (top left), Annie Schneider (top, third from left), Anna Crystal (seated second from left). New Orleans States, April 29, 1923.
Libbie Berkowitz was one of forty-four graduates of Touro Infirmary School of Nursing in 1928. Times-Picayune, May 27, 1928.
As a First Lieutenant in the Army Nurse Corps during World War II, Libbie (who changed her last name to Burke) served in West Germany and at Fitzsimons Army Medical Hospital near Denver, Colorado. While at Fitzsimons, she attended the University of Denver, from which she earned her bachelors, masters, and doctorate degrees in psychology. Dr. Burke worked as a psychologist at Columbus, Ohio State Home and Training School, before moving to Grand Junction, Colorado, where she became chief psychologist at the State Home and Training School. “One of the problems of returning rehabilitated patients to normal life is overcoming bias,” Dr. Burke commented when speaking in Boise, Idaho at a 1961 conference on developmental disabilities.
Dr. Burke died in 1968 and was buried in the military cemetery in San Antonio, Texas, where her brother, Louis, lived.
Dr. Libbie S. Burke was buried in 1968 with military honors at the San Antonio Military Cemetery. Photo from Find a Grave.
Libbie’s brother Louis lived in the Home until 1928, having left Isidore Newman School before graduating to attend Delgado Trades School. Later that year, he was discharged to the Jewish Federation of Galveston, under the supervision of Rabbi Henry Cohen. While in the Home, Louis participated in the Home’s Boy Scout Troop, including one particularly memorable four-hour hike from the Home to Seabrook on the shore of Lake Pontchartrain for an overnight campout in August 1927. “We had a good time but the sun was too hot, too many mosquitoes and we walked too far,” Louis recounted in the Golden City Messenger, before concluding with a bit of sarcastic wit. “Other than that we had a fine time.”
This photo of the Home’s Boy Scout Troop covered the August 1927 issue of the Golden City Messenger, in which appeared Louis Berkowitz’s story about the Troop’s hike to Seabrook. Courtesy JCRS.
In the 1940s, Louis partnered with his mother to open the Fun ‘n Magic Shop in San Antonio, where he changed his name to Louis Berkie. During World War II, Sergeant Louis Berkie, assigned to Army Ground Forces, served overseas as a supply sergeant with the 28th Tank Battalion. For his service, he was awarded the Asiatic Pacific Theater Ribbon, American Theater Ribbon, Good Conduct Ribbon, and Victory Ribbon.
By the 1950’s, Louis claimed he had the largest mail order magic tricks catalogue in the United States and, with help from the Hebrew Free Loan Association, had begun to manufacture custom-printed “wooden nickels” for businesses and events. Over the next few decades, he was frequently in the news for his unusual novelty offerings (including Beatle wigs in the 1960s, dribble cups, joy buzzers, whoopee cushions, rubber chickens, and every imaginable magic trick) but it was the wooden nickel business that earned him the greatest fame and profit. In 1992, in addition to dozens of other articles, Berkie was featured in a full-page story in People Magazine. By the time he offered to sell the store five years later, he reportedly had made more than 206 million small wooden disks, for which he was dubbed the “Wooden Nickel King.”
Louis Berkie died on April 16, 1997, just a month after he began looking for a buyer for his store. He suffered a fatal head injury from a fall while recovering from pneumonia. The local chapter of the International Brotherhood of Magicians remembered Berkie at a meeting with its traditional one-minute standing ovation, explaining that magicians honor each other with applause, not silence. According to his obituary, Berkie was an active and generous supporter of many organizations and causes, including B’nai Birth’s Lodge 2176, the Hebrew Free Loan Association, Congregation Agudas Achim, as well as several magician and wooden money collector organizations. Although Berkie never married and had no children of his own, and was predeceased by his mother and sister, his obituary reported, “Mr. Berkie is survived by tens of thousands of children whom he had dazzled and amazed over the years, and hundreds of less fortunate people who directly benefited from his kindness and generosity.”
Louis Berkie’s wooden nickel business lives on today as the Old Time Wooden Nickel Company.
People Magazine, September 14, 1992.
Louis Berkie in his Fun ‘n Magic Store, undated. Courtesy of Larry Brook, Southern Jewish Life Magazine.
Louis Berkie business cards and wooden nickels. Courtesy of Larry Brook, Southern Jewish Life Magazine.
Louis Berkie wooden nickel. Collection of author.
