Earl & Mildred Foreman
In December 1919, after spending time in a Catholic orphanage, five-year-old Earl Abraham Foreman was admitted to the Home with his six-year-old sister Mildred Julia from Memphis, Tennessee. Their parents, Frank Foreman and the former Lillian Thompson, had separated and were unable to provide the necessary care..
Earl & Mildred lived in the Home until October 1929, when they were discharged into the care of their aunt and uncle, Leah (Foreman) and David Schuster in Shreveport, Louisiana.
Earl Foreman with his dog, Brother, in the Home courtyard, c. 1926. Courtesy JCRS.
After he left the Home, Earl went into the garage and mechanic businesses, claiming that he made the first diesel truck trip on the state highway to Louisiana in his Diamond T Hercules truck, before opening a cafe in Dallas. He married Bonnie Peal with whom he raised two daughters. Earl died in 2006 and was buried alongside Bonnie in Dallas’s Restland Memorial Park.
In 2004, JCRS Executive Director Ned Goldberg interviewed Earl Foreman, age 90, at his Home in Dallas. In this brief video clip, Earl describes the “no-money-back” guaranty he offered his Newman School classmates if they wanted to return a white rat or other small animal he had sold them. Read a transcript of Earl’s interview here.
While in the Home, Mildred participated in the Home’s Girl Scout Troop, who in 1926 enjoyed time at Camp Fannie Lee Pruden on the Bogue Falaya River near Covington, Louisiana. Golda Goldsmith, one of the Home’s Honorary Matrons who volunteered as a Big Sister, took Mildred to the theater and out to dinner.
After leaving the Home, Mildred lived with the Schusters until she married Nathan Clairfield, a jewelry auctioneer who later manufactured furniture. Their 59 years of marriage, during which they raised three daughters, ended with Nathan’s death in 1991. Mildred died in 2009 and was buried in Houston’s Temple Emanuel-El Cemetery.
Mildred Foreman, 1928, from the scrapbook of fellow Home alumna Bessie Mashinka Rothstein, courtesy of Bessie’s daughter, Debbie Wizig.
In Mildred's Own Words
In 2004, at age 91, Mildred Foreman Clairfield spoke with JCRS Executive Director Ned Goldberg about her childhood in the Home. As evident from this brief video excerpt, Mildred was grateful for the opportunities she received. Read the transcript of her interview here.