Sherry Frank

Life has taught me that we are all part of the same community.”

The first thing that strikes you when you meet and get to know Sherry Frank, the Executive Director of the American Jewish Committee’s Atlanta Chapter, is her impeccable sense of fair play and the fact that she doesn’t mince words when she speaks. There is warmth and humility but also a sense that she has no time for sycophants or small talk, simply because there is always a lot that needs to be done.

Sherry recalls growing up in Atlanta in the 1940s and onwards, in a small Jewish community with 2-3 synagogues, with every one knowing each other and living close by. “Life centered on the Jewish community and we spent Sundays at the Jewish community centre.” Growing up Sherry never felt any discrimination or anti-Semitism.” In fact one of my Jewish friends ran for President in my High school and won, becoming the first person to do so.” Sherry recalls the community to be an all white, segregated one and she didn’t have any interaction with any one who was African American.

Her uncle Joe Zimmerman however had a men’s clothing store in downtown Atlanta, called Zimmerman’s Men’s’ store and as a young girl, Sherry would go to his shop and help out during the holiday season. “I remember uncle Joe’s clientele being all African American and I used to sell ties, shirts and jazzy clothes to them. Later when my uncle died and Martin Luther King Sr. preached at his funeral giving a eulogy and also went to the MLK centre and saw the clothes that Mlk Jr. and other African American leaders wore were from her uncle’s store and realized how much my uncle was loved. I must have waited on many African American leaders but didn’t realize that as a young girl.”

Sherry’s father was in the insurance business, while her mother stayed at home and devoted her life to raising Sherry and her brother. All was going well, when suddenly Sherry’s father died when Sherry was barely 11 and her brother only 8.

“Now when I look back, I realized how truly remarkable my mother was. She went from being a house wife to a business woman in a short span of time, taking an exam, acquiring a license and taking over my father’s business. Because she managed her own business my mom made sure she was home when we came back from school. Today single, working women are a common sight but, in 1953 when my father died it was a rarity.”

Sherry got married at a very young age of 19 and spent the next several years having and raising four children. She spent whatever free time she had as a community volunteer, getting involved in the National Council of Jewish Women, a service and advocacy organization. “I got to know Andrew Young and actually drove people to the polls to vote for him! I was a very liberal Democrat and a socially conscientious activist, and felt that I was expressing my faith through my activism.” Sherry became President of the Atlanta chapter of the National Council of Jewish women and they had over 1000 members. ‘I remember saying that I was out in the community with a token Jew, the token Protestant, the token Catholic and Asian or Hispanic, where is every body else?”

Sherry’s activism began in the last 60s and 70s and she says at that time there was no equal partnership between the races. Her focus became to go inside inner city schools and do outreach programs, and bring the issues of the African American community to the public arena. “In a very simple way life taught me that we are all part of the same community. When people say to me, be very careful so and so is a dangerous area in Atlanta, I say there are no dangerous areas in Atlanta-everything is out there in the open. It also taught me the value of partnership very early on.”

Sherry says she considers Congressmen John Lewis one of her dearest friends and by the time he was running Sherry was working for the American Jewish Committee and she couldn’t do anything political to jeopardize the committee’s tax exempt status. Sherry told John and his wife Lillian that she would be happy to baby sit their son John Miles through the weekend as her way of helping out. In that election John Lewis was pitted against the charismatic, handsome Julian Bond who was also a fabulous speaker and invited John Lewis to debating issues with him. “There were more debates in that election than there have ever been in history!’ laughs Sherry. “John promised my son that if he won he would bring him to Congress for his swearing in ceremony.” When he was sworn in both Sherry’s and his own son were seated by Lewis. “The early days of my interaction with the African American community was what caused a life long commitment to social justice,” says Sherry, “I saw how horrible racism was.”

Sherry divorced her husband when she was thirty eight and while she was distraught about the end of her marriage, she says she saw her mother as a role model and believed that a woman could work and support a family while being an inspiration for her children. “I think in retrospect it made my children a lot stronger and able to overcome a lot of things.”

While coming to terms with her divorce Sherry was trying to decide between two job offers, in Memphis to help settle the Russian Jews who were just coming in to the country and the other which she finally ended up taking as a volunteer coordinator in a Jewish Nursing Home. Sherry moved to Atlanta a year and a half later and got a job as an assistant at the AJC (American Jewish Committee’s Atlanta chapter). Instead of being a direct service AJC did inter-group relations and coalition building. For Sherry the greatest satisfaction was to see their work reflected in other communities. “For example, we started the Black-Jewish coalition and spent a lot of time marching together and getting to know each other, and figuring out what we meant to each other. We looked at the whole issue of the devastating impact race can have society. We worked on the renewal of voting rights, established the MLK holiday in Georgia, celebrating the King week every year. We marched in their march against racism and intimidation when people like Hosea Williams were beaten up along with others by the Klu Klux Klan. We marched in Atlanta after the 1996 Olympics when a gay night club and an abortion clinic were bombed We also realized how often the media covers bad news so much more than the good news.” Frank says there were many Jewish-Black joint programs from Black and Jews in politics, business and a variety of other enterprises. “We did a couple of wonderful programs in South Africa and there was such a commitment to speak out against apartheid and social injustices.” Sherry was asked to go to South Africa after Mandela was freed and see how the Jewish community was there. ‘ I remember that for years I was the one who told folks not to go to South Africa during the years of the boycott but was then told by Mrs. King and Andrew Young the time was right for me to go now that Mandela was free and it was an amazing experience. We really came to appreciate each other’s justice issues. I remember I was walking around one day with petitions to be signed asking that Scharansky be freed. I was told we’ll sign your petition if you sign ours. Theirs was to free someone called Bishop Tutu, and I thought what a strange, peculiar name. I didn’t know who he was and hedged. When I went back to office and asked if any one knew who he was I was told to absolutely go and sign the petition, because he was one of the people who could and would bring change in South Africa.” Sherry says things have not always been idyllic lest people get that impression in spite of the out reach work between the two communities, with differences and split over several issues, like the issue of affirmative action for example, and the issue of dealing with Farrakhan. ‘Often our interactions was bonding, but there were times it was frustrating because as communities we have not gone through the same experiences, our communities don’t work the same way, our responses to challenges are not the same, and at times we did leave the table angry, and that is okay too. It is a part of an honest relationship. What is important is to stay together through the difficult times as well.”

Often when things happened they brought a sense of déjà vu. It made Frank realize that often when things happen, they are universal and not isolated within one community. “When Black churches were burnt I spoke up because it brought back memories of the bomb attack on our synagogue in Atlanta in 1957,” says Sherry, “I know what it feels like. I spoke out again when Haitians were being turned back because Jews were turned back during the holocaust with no safe place to go to.”

For Sherry the most important and satisfying aspect of her work has been the outreach programs with other communities. “It’s interesting how these relationships came about. I was always down at the King centre and met Subash Razdan and from him I found out the strong connection between MLK and Gandhi and that began some strong and lasting friendships with members of the Indian community.”

Again when the Rodney King verdict came, a riot was on the verge of breaking out and caught in the fray were Korean grocery stores. The then Mayor late Maynard Jackson asked the Jewish community for help. “Within 24 hours, we had a press conference in the city hall with the Black and Korean community members there and also several meetings on how Koreans could continue to work in the black communities and still be able to trust.”

The Jewish community also took a stand because it felt it was negative for the States to pass an English only Bill and worked with the Latino American Association which was very helpful for the Latinos. Sherry says they found themselves at the table with people of different backgrounds when they dealt with hate crimes, from gays to blacks, to Hispanics, to the south Asian communities especially after 9/11. Sherry says she always remembers John Lewis’s comment that we may all have gotten to this country in different ships but we are in the same boat together now, and was there for a service at the mosque after 9/11 when every mosque had been either threatened or defaced. “We understand how a whole community feels isolated when something like this happens. The incidents also taught me that rather than waiting for others to take the first step, there was nothing wrong in the Jewish community stepping forward, and taking the lead to rally around important issues.”

Atlanta has dramatically changed over the years and the Jewish community has grown and spread out. Atlanta has become much bigger, diverse and more inclusive. There have been tremendous changes globally and for the Jewish community. “And yet we are still struggling with the world to accept Israel and understand Israel’s right to exist among nations. We have seen the worst anti Semitism in Europe since the Holocaust and that is scary.

Sherry says the Indian community is the easiest to deal with and the key issue where the two communities stand united on is the issue of terrorism. “There is a tremendous thirst among Jews to learn about India and amongst Indians to learn about Jews and Israel and a continued strengthening of business and strategic relationships.”

In spite of all the turbulence Sherry sees around her she says she believes that each person can make a difference and we must not be silent. “When I look back I feel so grateful at the opportunities I have been given. I have been to a concentration camp, and traveled to South Africa to witness a changed nation. I traveled abroad with Christians and understood what it meant to read Jesus’ sermon on the mount. I went to the Tiber across the river Jordan and to Turkey and prayed in the mosque with the Muslims and really understood the power of prayer. Religion has been a powerful influence in my life. I feel that all I have done till this day was inspired in the way I was brought up and the traditions handed down to me. I see interesting one of my daughters is a president of a synagogue, the other is a president of her Jewish community centre and all four children are involved in dealing with social justice issues in different ways.”

Sherry says she admires Eleanor Roosevelt and President Carter for their work in human rights, Golda Meir and the remarkable work she did in getting Israel the arms and money it needed to survive. In the past 3 years Sherry has been involved in creating a new synagogue and the AJC she says has been very involved with strengthening relations with the Indian and Latino community. The Atlanta Women’s Foundation has received a grant to do some work in the areas of faith, feminism and philanthropy and Sherry wants women whose voices have not been heard before to also be encouraged to join in. The AJC has also raised close to a million dollars to help reconstruct the religious institutions that were destroyed during hurricane Katrina.

Sherry is a romantic and likes to believe that Atlanta is a city too busy to hate. “I believe that Atlanta is a city where diverse people can sit on one table and work together. I have lived through the whites being in a position of power and affluence to African Americans being in major positions and my greatest joy has been to see a woman mayor. I have found in every community there is something that connects us to each other.”