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Holocaust Survivor Battles Into Her 90s
L OCA L
ANDY GOTLIEB | JE MANAGING EDITOR
EVEN AT 96, Holocaust
survivor Cherie Goren doesn’t
like sitting still.

The pandemic’s ended her
regular bridge game for now
and an insurance company
decision cost her some mobility
last month, leaving her largely
confined to her Merion Station
condominium. Goren said she’s been paying
into a long-term care insur-
ance policy with Transamerica
for 40 years. With her health
starting to decline last year,
she filed a claim and, in July,
the company approved her for
five hours a day with an aide,
who helped her run errands
and other day-to-day activities.

“If I don’t walk, I’m fine,”
she said. “If I walk, I fall.”
But in February, the company
sent out a nurse to assess Goren
and determined she didn’t need
the help, daughter Ellen Goren
said, and stopped approving
payments. The case is under
appeal, marking yet another
chapter in a long and inter-
esting life.

Transamerica Public Affairs
Director Erin Yang responded to
a Jewish Exponent inquiry that,
“Due to customer confidentiality,
we are unable to provide infor-
mation to you, but we have been
in contact with the customer to
address their concern.”
Born March 16, 1925, in
the seaport town of Memel,
Lithuania, as Sarah Fleishman
and nicknamed Tutti (a cousin
changed her name to Cherie
upon arrival to the United
States in 1939), Goren described
a happy, prosperous child-
hood with her two sisters and
Name: The Grant
Width: 9.25 in
Depth: 5.5 in
Color: Black plus one
Comment: Jewish Exponent
brother. Their father, Leo, sold
wholesale textiles, while her
mother, Judith ran her family’s
Schwartzen Adler Hotel.

“It was a good life — it was
a very good life,” she said. “We
had help. We had a beautiful
apartment. We had the only
car in the city.”
That started to change in 1937,
when her father returned from a
business trip to Czechoslovakia,
sensing growing anti-Semitism
and general unrest.

“He said, ‘War is coming’ and
‘We’re taking a trip,’” she recalled.

For the next two years, Goren
and her sister Frances lived with
their aunt in Riga, Latvia, while
her father liquidated his store
and began making preparations
to immigrate to the United
States. Most of the family’s
wealth went to grease palms to
enable their travel, Goren said.

When it came time to
Cherie Goren
Photo by Andy Gotlieb
From left: Frances (Fanny), Cherie
(Tutti) and Gisella (Gisa) in 1929
depart, the family avoided
Germany, moving through the
Scandinavian countries before
taking a ship to Great Britain.

From there, they took the Queen
Mary to the United States,
Courtesy of Cherie Goren
arriving in New York Harbor
and passing the Statue of Liberty
on April 20, 1939, which also
was Adolf Hitler’s 50th birthday.

“The ship passed close to
the majestic lady holding her
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