This is Session 8 of 8, of the Abe Arnold interview.
Session Summary:
Abe begins the session recalling several vacation trips his family took in Canada over the years, and trips he and Bertha made overseas. Abe tells about his retirement, and his going back to research and writing then, and continued his involvement with the Canadian Jewish Historical Society (while still writing for the Beaver and Outlook magazines), eventually taking the position of Acting President and then President. Abe recalls some of the articles he write during this time which lead him to complete his second book: Judaism: Myth, Legend, History, and Custom from the
Religious to the Secular, and recalls the traveling he did as a book tour. Abe then returns to 1966 to discuss the trip to Israel he and Bertha took that year. He then recalls traveling to Guyana with his wife Bertha, who was there in her capacity for Canadian Executive Service Organization, with which she became involved after her own retirement; Abe recalls many of the people they met and visited there. He also recalls traveling to Costa Rica with Bertha, their daughter, and their grandson, to promote Jewish books. He recalls traveling to Russia in 1999 on a writing assignment, where he and Bertha visited several Jewish organizations and synagogues, a trip which they returned from early, as their daughter was very ill. Abe reflects on some of the historical and fictional writing he did through the 1980s through to the 2000s and receiving an honorary degree from the University of Winnipeg in 2001, the Shem Tov award in 2003 (Jewish Community Council), and the Manitoba Human Rights Award in 2004, and the Order of Canada in 2004.