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Born in San Francisco on April 10, 1861, Rachel
("Ray") Frank was the daughter of Polish
immigrants, Bernard and Leah Frank, whom Ray later
described as "Orthodox Jews of liberal mind." Her
father, a peddler and Indian agent, claimed descent
from the eighteenth-century Jewish sage, the Vilna
Gaon.
Soon after her graduation from Sacramento High
School in 1879, Frank moved to the silver-mining
town of Ruby Hill, Nevada, where she taught public
school. Although nearby Eureka, where Frank's
sister Rosa lived, had over 100 Jewish inhabitants
and the first synagogue in Nevada, Ruby Hill was
home to few Jews, as were the western territories
overall.
The contrast between the non-Jewish surrounding
environment and the Jewish household in which she
was raised provided rich food for Frank's fertile
mind. She later wrote, "Although reared among
non-Jews, my childhood's home being in the heart of
the Sierra Nevada Mts and later on in the state of
Nevada, I at an early age became much interested in
all that concerned the Jews. Living where
prejudices of a theological kind were unknown, one
of the prime factors of this early interest was the
desire to understand the cause and meaning of
prejudice against the Jew." In the 1890s, Frank
would examine these ideas in her sermons, lectures,
and newspaper articles.
Frank's time in Nevada set the stage for her
subsequent career in other ways as well. Six years
as a teacher gave her a self-assurance and
confidence as a public speaker that would impress
subsequent observers. She also published her first
article, about education, in the Daily Elko
Independent.
Learn more about
Jews
of the
West.
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