Transcript of Arab Indianapolis: A Hidden History

 (bright music) - [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] In 2015, Indiana governor Mike Pence tried to ban Syrians seeking refuge in Indiana from their country's civil war.
He determined that these Syrians were a security threat to the state.
[Pence] Donald Trump and I are committed to suspending the Syrian Refugee Program, and programs in immigration from areas of the world that have been compromised by terrorism.
- [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] It was a shock to Hoosiers of Arab descent.
Our people had been making a home in Indiana since the 1800s, and one of us, Mitch Daniels, became governor of the state in 2005.
[Daniels] But now I am so proud, that brave Syrians have stood up for the right to dream, and to live free, and to try to pursue better lives for themselves.
I'm so thrilled about it.
(audience applauding) - [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] So what makes a person Arab?
We trace our roots across the Middle East and North Africa.
From the mountains of Lebanon to the beaches of Morocco.
From the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers in Iraq, to the Nile in Egypt.
The word Arab encompasses multiple cultures, traditions, and nationalities.
But all Arabs are linked, one way or another, by the Arabic language.
- I'm historian Edward Curtis.
I know my name doesn't sound very Arab, but I'm the descendant of people with names like Nasira Hamod, and Hanna Samaha.
The Syrian refugee controversy inspired me to learn more about the history of Arab-Americans in Indianapolis.
I decided to team up with other Arab-Americans, to search for our shared past.
It is a history, it turns out, that is hidden in plain sight.
(bright music) - [Announcer] Arab Indianapolis: A Hidden History is made possible through the generous support of the Arab Indianapolis Foundation Incorporated, documenting the long history of Arab-Americans in central Indiana at ArabIndianapolis.com, and by Indiana Humanities in cooperation with the National Endowment for the Humanities.
- The heart of Arab Indianapolis in 1900 was right here.
It's now buried underneath Lucas Oil Stadium.
Around that time, there would have been about 100 Arabic speakers on one street.
Willard Street.
(contemplative music) A lot of the men were peddlers.
The women worked from sunrise to sunset, hauling scraps from a nearby lumber yard to fuel their wood-burning stoves.
The townhouses they lived in were just 15 feet wide, and up to 10 people might be staying in them at one time.
I invited Andrea Watts, a descendant of that first generation of Arab-Americans to join me in the part of town they once called home.
Andrea works for the city of Indianapolis, and part of her responsibilities touch on historic preservation.
I was curious what she knew about the history of her ancestors here.
- This is it.
- Right.
- This is where you would have found all the Arabic speaking people.
And if you can just imagine, right over there.
There would have been little kids speaking Arabic and playing on a pretty dusty street.
- Yeah.
We're standing on a little bit of history.
- But I don't think that everyone saw the Arabic speaking Syrian colony of Indianapolis in the same light.
In fact, I brought here for you to read a little excerpt from the Indianapolis Journal 1903.
- Okay.
- And here's what they said about this place.
- "If the prospective visitor to the Syrian porter "expects to come across a gaudy place "of painted mosques and minarets, "he is doomed to meet with disappointment.
"He will find instead two rambling rows "of old broken-down one-story frame houses "bordering a half-block of the dirtiest street "in all of the city."
- The dirtiest street.
- The dirtiest street, okay.
Wow.
I mean, okay.
Yeah.
I mean, it sounds like they were not a fan of the area.
- Well, right.
And I mean, it just reminds you that these people started with very little.
- Yes, yeah.
- Well let me show you, there are traces.
- Okay.
- There are traces of what it used to be like in 1900, and I want to show you a couple of those.
- Okay.
- You ready?
- Yeah, let's go.
- Okay.
- [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] Over half a million Arab people left the Ottoman Empire for North and South America before World War I.
Like so many immigrants, they were pushed to emigrate by a bad economy, and drawn to the Americas by the allure of a better life.
They came to the United States by steam ship, and sometimes by rail through Canada or Mexico.
Some landed in Indianapolis.
For others, Indianapolis was just a stop on the way to another city in the Midwest, like Terre Haute, St. Louis, Chicago.
After our walk, Andrea and I sat down at a nearby restaurant to talk about her Arab immigrant ancestors here in Indianapolis.
- Do you know if you have any peddlers in your family background?
- My grandmother's side they were yeah.
- And then from peddling, the family mostly went into the grocery business.
- I know that they started a grocery store in Haughville called Haboush Market, off 16th Street.
- I did a little research on your family, and I want you to take a look at the 1920 census page and see who you can find there.
- [Andrea] David Haboush.
- And who is David Haboush?
- That is my grandmother's father.
- Your grandmother's father?
- Mm-hmm.
Oh wow, son.
Daughter, Margaret.
My great-aunt Margaret.
- Okay.
- Wow.
I've never seen this before.
- Do you recognize any other names there?
Is George?
- Yes, son.
- If you look down here, he worked with his father in a retail market, a grocery, according to the 1920 census.
Now do you have any idea where that first grocery store was located?
- I don't.
- Okay.
Well, I found the sale of the first property that your ancestor bought.
It's a little hard to see.
Try to make that out.
- Pauline Shumacher to David Haboush part of lot 17.
The corner of Dearborn and New York.
Okay.
I did not know that existed.
Wow.
Yeah, I knew about the westside market, but did not know that there was an eastside market.
- Do you think that most people who live in Indianapolis are aware that Arabs have been part of this place since the late 1800s?
- I don't.
And I think that there is a really beautiful rich history, and a lot of stories to tell.
(bright music) - [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] After digging up a little bit about Andrea's family, I wanted to learn more about what life was like for these early Arab immigrants in Indianapolis.
I asked Professor Paul Mullins to help me understand it.
Paul is an urban archaeologist who has spent a lot of time studying Indianapolis history.
- How big a part were immigrants to the city in 1900?
- Well, there's a perception of Indianapolis as being, and Indiana as being kind of homogenous, and usually that's code for mostly white.
But there's always an enormous amount of diversity in Indianapolis, but it often is relatively modest populations, Arabs, overseas Chinese, Italians.
There's a very large German-American community, of course, by the mid 19th century.
We truly are a diverse community.
- In 1903, the Indianapolis Journal declared that Willard Street was the dirtiest street in the city.
I mean, what was it like to live just in the south part of downtown then?
- Part of that is rhetoric.
It's racist ideological rhetoric, that's being projected on particular kinds of communities.
They might be black, they might be immigrants, they might be religious minorities.
They might be all of those things, actually.
It also ignores that all early 20th century cities are actually enormously dirty.
Most of them do have a fair amount of heavy industry very close by.
There's not paved street ways.
There's not modern sewer service.
There's not utilities.
This is what the American city looks like in almost everywhere, not just Willard Street.
- If I take a step outside my apartment or my house on Willard Street, and I breathe in a big whiff of air, what's it gonna smell like?
- On Willard Street, like every other street frankly in Indianapolis, especially downtown.
We would have first of all smelled coal ash, and wood ash from wood-burning and coal-burning stoves.
We certainly would have smelled a variety of odors wafting over us from riverside industry, one of the largest pork packing plants on the face of the planet was along the White River where Victory Field is today.
There are metal factories, there are grain factories.
There will be an auto plant on the west side of the river.
We would have had all of the odors of industry, but this is what most cities with an industrial base look like in the late 19th and early 20th century.
- No wonder perfumes were so popular among the peddlers.
- That's a good point, actually.
- They loved it.
- [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] Paul and I decided to meet at Central Library downtown so we could look at the original city maps from this period.
Librarian Stephen Lane helped us locate the sources we needed.
- So what do we have here?
What are you showing us?
- So yeah, now we have the Baist Property Atlas of Marion County.
So they made these in Philadelphia.
And this one is from 1901.
And this is plan number 12.
- [Paul] Military Park is there.
There's the state capitol.
Soldiers and Sailors Monument obviously is at the center of the Mile Square.
- Mm-hmm.
And we're looking for Willard Street.
(soft music) - [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] From these humble beginnings, Arab immigrants put down roots in Indianapolis.
In 1900, all the local newspapers refer to them as Orientals, that is, Asians.
But by the 1920s, they were moving up the social ladder.
The peddlers became store owners.
Their boys and girls went to school and sometimes to college.
They were increasingly seen as white people.
Julia David was a great example.
She grew up on Capitol Avenue just a block away from Willard Street.
As a teenager, she volunteered at Indianapolis' Young Women's Christian Association, and then she attended DePauw University.
After graduating, she married another Arab-American, Nicholas Shaheen.
Together, they became one of the most prominent couples in Indianapolis' burgeoning Syrian community.
Their rug store was located on Monument Circle.
And today, it's part of the facade of Circle Theatre, where the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra plays.
The rug shop that Julia David and Nicholas Shaheen started here was a passport to achieve the American dream.
(soft music) But then, a wave of anti-immigrant feeling and violence swept across the nation.
Immigrants were falsely accused of trying to take over the country and eliminate Protestant Christianity.
The 1924 National Origins Act virtually cut off immigration from Syria, and all other countries in Africa and Asia.
Still, the Arab-Americans who had been in Indianapolis since the late 1800s fought their way into white society.
They flexed their community's muscles by establishing ethnic and religious organizations.
The most important in the 1920s was St. George Syrian Orthodox Church.
(singing in Arabic) (bright music) - Today, St. George Church is a $7 million Byzantine structure, featuring a large gold dome, and colorful icons.
It is also home to a popular annual Middle East festival which celebrates the cultural heritage of the church's founders who were Arabic-speaking immigrants from what is now Lebanon and Syria.
- [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] But the original church started here in what is now an empty lot at 28th Street and Sherman Drive on the city's eastside.
Thelma Hoover was born when the church was under construction.
At the time we sat down, she was the only living member of the original congregation.
- So my understanding is that you were born the very same year that the church was being built.
1925, is that right?
- Yup.
- So this is an early photograph.
It's not the earliest of the church.
Can you point to yourself here?
- [Thelma] Well, they finally told me this is me.
- Who else do you recognize?
There's Mr. Corey.
There's another Corey.
I wish I'd remember a lot of them.
- [Dr. Curtis] No, that's great.
- [Thelma] I don't know their names.
- [Dr. Curtis] That's, but you remember the faces?
- [Thelma] Uh-huh.
- [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] The Arab-American community needed $15,000 to build what they called the first and only Syrian church in the city.
The women of the congregation wore white ribbons marked Syrian Orthodox Church, and armed with tiny American flags, they fanned out across downtown and asked people for donations.
In April 1927, it was officially incorporated as St. George Syrian Antiochan Church Indianapolis.
Diana Najjar, Ken George, and Barbara Fisher are all connected to the history of St. George Church.
They joined Thelma to talk about what the church meant to their families, and that early 20th century Arab community.
- I miss the first church.
I really, really miss the first church.
- You were married in that church?
- Yeah.
I was married.
- Everything happened in that church for you.
You were married there, your children were baptized there, you were baptized there.
That's the one thing that they missed when they came to America, was the church.
Because the church is so important.
- [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] The location of the church tells us something important about how the Arab community was changing.
Syrians had moved out of their historic home at Willard Street and were now living in newly built homes on the eastside, especially in the Brightwood neighborhood.
Surrounded by a few brick buildings and wood framed homes, St. George was just two and a half blocks north of the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago, and St. Louis Railroad repair shops.
- They were trying to find land to build the church on, and they found this piece of property and thought that was great, and it had a sign on it, and so he's copying down what the sign says, because he's assuming it's an address, because he couldn't read English.
So anyhow, he brought it to someone who could read the English, and it said no dumping.
(Dr. Curtis laughing) So it obviously was not an address.
- What are your very first memories of the church?
What did it look like?
- It was beautiful.
The most beautiful church we've ever had.
And it was so cozy, warm.
You just felt like you were in a home.
The women sat on the right side, and the men sat on the left side.
And the children sat out in the front, unless they were real little, and they sat with their mothers.
- [Dr. Curtis] Did they explain why the men and the women sat on different sides?
- When you look at the altar, the Virgin Mary is on the right, and Christ is on the left, so the men sat on the left, and the women sat on the right.
And that was actually something that came from the old country, because that's how it was done there, so everything just continued in this country exactly as it was in the old country for centuries.
- I'm looking at this picture, and everyone knew everyone.
Everybody, we were all cousins.
If we weren't, we called each other cousins.
- Right.
(cheerful music) - [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] The church was the center of family life, and when the Knights of St. George Hall was built next door, the center of social life, too.
(cheerful music) - Everything took place in the hall.
The dances, the haflis, the dinners, the smorgasbords, the Sunday school classes, the bingo.
- What kind of music would they play at these dances, do you remember?
- American.
- It was for the young people who they were trying to get Americans, to be accepted.
So they had American bands, and they would have the dances at the church, and those were on a Friday night.
- How did you feel about your Arab heritage, or your Syrian and Lebanese heritage?
Is it something you wanted to share with other kids who were outside the community, or was it something, did you focus more on, or did you not want to share it?
- I really didn't want to share it with my friends.
I always felt a little different.
But I enjoyed the food, and I enjoyed the camaraderie with my cousins, and other people who were in my Sunday school class.
That was fun.
But outside of church, I really felt like I was different and didn't want to share it.
- Our lives were a little bit different from the people that I went to school with.
I mean, we had a really family-centered life.
- I remember my father told me that they kind of grew up, and they were considered foreigners much like Italians were considered foreigners.
And they sometimes had to fight just to make sure that they didn't get taken advantage of.
- Well I was called a wop one time, because they thought I was Italian.
It was really hurtful at a time when I said, no I'm not that.
I'm Syrian.
- Yeah, my own mother was mercilessly called names.
- Yeah, when they found out that my family was Syrian, oh, you're one of those greasy, garlicky Syrians.
- I remember my grandmother kept scrubbing my mother to get her clean, and mom kept saying it's not dirt.
That's just the color of my skin, you know?
For them, they did feel obviously darker.
- And I was much darker then.
Much darker then.
- [Diana] My mother was, too.
And so that was somewhat of a difficulty.
- I think the community was not accepting of our nationality.
- [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] Though they faced prejudice, Arab families in Indianapolis were making their way, and making a living, many of them as grocers.
If the church was the most important place in the community's life, grocery stores were a close second.
- How many of you all were related in some way to a grocer?
- Oh, we all were.
- We all were.
- Yeah, definitely.
- All of us.
- Our grocery store was small.
I helped stack the canned goods.
I can remember at six years old, I was slicing meat on the meat slicer.
It was one of those old-fashioned meat slicers.
- There was always the concern about slighting a customer.
So we always had to be I don't want to say perfect.
That's not the right word.
But we always had to be on our good behavior.
We would have windows broken in the grocery store, and the appliance store, items taken.
It was always pretty scary, and we lived above the store.
- Do you think though that these grocery stores were targeted because they were Syrian?
- Because we were foreigners.
They spoke with an accent.
But my recollection is they spoke English, because they were in America, they wanted to be Americans.
(jet engine whooshing) - [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] The events of December 7th, 1941, when the Japanese military attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor, soon disrupted the lives of these families.
Like other Americans, they committed themselves to the war effort at home, and abroad.
- The Coke man came into the grocery store right after Pearl Harbor with the Coca-Colas, and he looked at everybody, and he says I'm gonna go and sign up.
And so Dad, Uncle Ed, and Uncle Bill, all went with him, the four of them all went and signed up together.
And they all came home from the war except for the Coke man.
The rest of us, we got our parents back.
- When I was talking to Diana and Barbara, they expressed a lot of pride about the fact that their families had served in the US military during World War II.
So I felt like I needed to find out more about this part of our community's history.
(bright music) - [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] My research took me to downtown Indianapolis which has devoted more public space to memorializing those who wore the uniform than any city outside Washington, D.C.
The Indiana War Memorial was originally built to honor those who served in World War I, but it later expanded to include veterans of World War II, Korea, Vietnam, and the Gulf War.
One of them is the stepfather of Susie Baranyk.
His name was Raphael Joseph George.
Susie and her husband Steve, the keeper of the family's history, agreed to join me, and talk about the military experience of Arab-Americans in World War II.
- So Susie and Steve Baranyk, thank you so much for joining us.
So I want to talk to you first, Susie, about your stepfather.
- Okay.
- And what was his name?
- Raphael J. George.
That's what his mother called him, "Ray-ful," but it would be Raphael to most people.
He was really a wonderful man.
He was very hardworking.
He was very tall, very good-looking.
- Was he born in the United States?
- Yes.
He was born in Salina, Kansas, I believe.
Both of his parents were born in Lebanon and came over.
- [Dr. Curtis] Did you know about his service in World War II?
Is that something that you knew about?
- I knew about it in a vague manner, as typical of many World War II veterans, that's just something they didn't talk about.
Yeah.
- [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] Later in Ray's life, Steve was able to get more details about his service, and he filled in even more through research.
The story Ray had been quiet about for much of his life was a dramatic one.
(bombs exploding) - When World War II started in December of '41, and the draft was instilled, Ray was 32 years old, a bachelor, with no dependents.
He was draft bait, and he was put in the Army Air Corps.
And he became a radio operator on a B24, and radio operators also manned the waist guns, the 50 caliber waist guns.
They were attacked by the Luftwaffe.
(tense dramatic music) Shot down over Austria.
(artillery firing) He was pretty badly shot up.
He was so badly injured in his hands, he couldn't move them.
Here he is, in the plane, it's going down, he's wearing a chute pack, thank God.
But he can't pull the cord.
He was able to kick open the camera hatch, rolled his body, and popped the chute inside the plane, gathered it, and went out the camera hatch, and it opened.
I mean, the odds of that happening are so remote.
There are 11 men on Ray's plane at that time.
Seven died, four survived.
Ray was one of the survivors.
(solemn music) He came down in a rutabaga field.
He was picked up by a farmer and his daughter who were harvesting rutabagas.
There was one of his farmer two-wheel carts that they loaded him on the rutabagas and took him into town.
- [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] Back in Indianapolis, Ray's family was notified he had been shot down.
He was classified as missing in action.
But Ray was actually in an Austrian hospital in a town under German occupation.
There, he received two gifts from a local man.
A pair of wooden shoes, because Ray had lost his flight boots in his fall, and an intricate pipe.
These items meant so much to Ray that he took them with him as he traveled from one German P.O.W.
camp to another.
- [Raphael Voiceover] "Dear folks.
"I am now at a transient camp and will soon move "to my permanent camp.
"I am in best of health, and my hand injury is okay.
"We are treated fine, and have plenty to eat.
"Inquire at Red Cross in regards to mailing.
"Don't worry.
"Love, Ray."
- When the Red Cross came through, it was obvious that Ray could never be a combatant again.
So they let him go.
In 1944, in September, October, he came home.
(solemn music) - Did you know any other Arab-Americans who served in World War II?
- Oh, many.
Tech High School, from whence I graduated and my mother and my aunts and uncles did a project a number of years ago, there's a plaza out behind the arsenal.
They wanted to get names of Tech graduates, men and women, who had served in World War II.
So I started asking at church and found out all these people.
The Arab community, whether they were first or second generation, or immigrants, I think were so very, very proud to be in this country that they served.
It was something that you did for the privilege of being in America, you gave back whatever you could.
And in some cases, they gave their lives.
- [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] These Arab-American Hoosiers are not unique.
Tens of thousands of Arab-Americans from across the country have been enlisting since World War I, but wearing the uniform is only one of the many ways that Arab-Americans have performed public service.
They have also been involved in politics.
And as I researched their history in Indiana, I was completely surprised by what I discovered.
(jaunty music) I took a short walk from the Memorial to the state capitol to talk about the history of Arab-Americans in public service with Senator Fady Qaddoura, an immigrant, and the first Arab Muslim elected to the Indiana General Assembly.
- Welcome to your house.
The people's house.
- Thank you so much.
- [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] At the Statehouse, I ask Senator Qaddoura to walk with me to the former office of an Arab-American politician named Helen Corey.
- So I'm heading toward Helen Corey's office.
- Yes.
I've heard a lot about Helen.
I think she just turned 97.
- Yeah.
- [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] In 1965, four decades before Mitch Daniels, the grandson of Syrian immigrants, became the governor of Indiana, Helen Corey received over one million votes as the first Syrian-American elected to statewide office.
She was elected to an office that no longer exists, the Reporter of the Indiana Supreme and Appellate Courts.
Helen Corey grew up in Terre Haute, Indiana, where she got her start as a secretary for the mayor.
Her hard work for the state's Democratic party led to her nomination for statewide office.
- So this is now Judge Bailey's chambers?
- Yes.
- But in 1965, this is where Helen with two staff members published every decision of the Appellate and Supreme Courts of the state of Indiana.
- When I think about Helen, I think about the household of immigrant parents, and I can imagine her navigating her way between a household of immigrants who are still thinking and dreaming about their homeland, and the transitioning and the assimilation in a new land, and then here you go, a trailblazer, a young strong leader, a public servant at heart.
- So, I brought with me one of Helen Corey's books.
Now a lot of politicians write books.
They write memoirs.
Sometimes they write histories.
- Yes.
- But Helen was writing in a completely different genre.
As she's building her political career, I mean, she's traveling all over the state, and in the meantime, she authors a bestselling cookbook on Syrian-American food.
And this is a first edition of that book, and you can see, here she is in her pearls.
- What an amazing young woman.
So this is what I call soft diplomacy.
- Yeah.
(laughing) - I've personally noticed the Middle Eastern food is amazing.
- Right.
- Really, food breaks the ice and allows people to connect at a deeper level, to appreciate the beauty of each other's culture.
And this is not just about cooking.
I think about the courage of leading a family, and being able to express her culture and where she came from and what she stood for.
She is that type of person who deeply cares about inclusion and diversity, and enriching the world with all of these beautiful themes, and beautiful thoughts and ideas, that come from across the globe, and I appreciate her for that.
Appreciate it.
- Thank you very much.
- It's a pleasure working with you.
- People like Susie Baranyk's stepfather, Helen Corey, and now Fady Qaddoura have devoted their lives to their fellow Americans.
So it may be surprising that after four, even five generations of sacrifice and service, Hoosiers of Arab descent still face prejudice, discrimination, and sometimes even violence, just for being Arab.
But, in Indianapolis this apprehension of the Arab foreigner sometimes disappears in places like hospitals, where patients come to rely on physicians of Arab descent to save their lives.
(cheerful music) I took a little field trip with a couple of Arab-American doctors to the Indiana University School of Dentistry to talk about the history of Arab healers in Indianapolis.
Today, healthcare in the city has a national reputation for excellence.
Patients come from around the world to receive treatment for cancer, heart disease, and much more.
Arab-Americans have played an important but unrecognized role in the growth of Indiana medicine.
Thank you very much for joining me.
Thank you so much for coming.
I'm really glad to see you both.
Now tell me.
Let's start with Dr. Jalal.
You work at the IU Simon Cancer Center.
- You got it.
- Right, and what do you do there?
- Well, I'm a thoracic oncologist.
So that means that I take care of patients with esophageal and lung cancer.
- And Dr. Al-Haddad.
- So, I essentially take care of patients with all GI conditions, stomach, esophagus, colon, liver, pancreas.
We also do endoscopies, so when you're due for your colonoscopy when you turn 50, you come to someone like me.
- So, a lot of people don't look forward to seeing you, then.
- That's very true.
- Yes.
But we're glad you're here.
So tell me how did you get into medicine?
- Oh, I knew this since I was probably in first or second grade.
I wanted to make an impact in people's lives, and I think there's no better way to do that than to become a doctor.
- How did you get into medicine?
- I had an uncle that was a urologist in Jordan, and I watched him take care of people, I'd go visit him at clinic, and he'd be there all day, doing his own ultrasounds, doing kidney transplants.
I just loved what he did and his passion.
I decided that was what I was going to do.
- Okay, so you're probably wondering why I brought you to the IU School of Dentistry, because you both work across the street, right?
- Right.
- Right.
- So here's my question for you.
If you had to guess, what decade do you think Arab people started practicing medicine in Indianapolis?
- [Shadia] I have no idea.
- I would say back in the 1940s, 50s maybe?
- Sounds like a good guess.
- Yes.
- Let me introduce you to Waheeb Saleem Zarick.
As you're looking at him, can you guess what he's doing here?
- Lecturing?
- Yeah.
It looks like he's giving a talk.
- Yeah.
He was in the IU Bloomington Debate Club.
And this is his official debate photo.
And now, looking at this picture, can you guess the decade?
It's a little hard, because a penguin suit is a penguin suit.
- From the style of it, I was say as early as 19-- - 20?
- I'd say early 1900s.
- You're right, yeah.
1920s.
You're right.
1920s.
So let me show you his yearbook page.
This is when he goes to Bloomington.
So you can notice that he's a member of the Skeleton Club.
Do they still have the Skeleton Club?
- Not to my knowledge.
- Okay, that was the people who wanted to be, the pre-med club.
They called it the Skeleton Club.
- I'm not sure that's a good name for it.
(all laughing) - So okay.
So he's president of Le Cercle Francais, so can you guess where he came from based on that?
- Lebanon, probably.
- Yes, exactly.
So he was born in Tripoli, Lebanon in the north of the country, but he moved as a young boy.
His parents came here, and they moved to Frankfort, Indiana.
And then he went to IU Bloomington, and he went from being, going for his bachelor's degree, to getting his medical degree from the IU School of Medicine.
And get this.
He became the president of the Association of Magicians.
(all chuckling) So this man wore many, many hats.
Okay.
And so he becomes, see in the 1920s, he graduates with his medical degree, and then he takes a job in the 1930s right here.
At the IU School of Dentistry.
- That's amazing.
- Yeah.
As I was researching Dr. Zarick's role here at the IU School of Dentistry, I found the old 1934-1935 Dentistry School Bulletin.
- Wow.
- And I have a copy.
And Dr. Al-Haddad, I wonder if you would look, I think it's around page 15, and see if you can find out what he taught.
- Let's see.
He taught a course and it was Anatomy II.
- Anatomy II?
- Yes, and that's actually an extensive course.
192 hours.
That's a lot of teaching.
(soft music) - So does it surprise you that there was an instructor of medicine who was an Arab immigrant all the way back in the 1930s?
Is that surprising?
- It does a little bit, actually.
- Yeah.
And why is it important that people know that Arab-Americans have contributed to building this town and this society.
Why is that important?
- I guess that means we're Hoosiers.
You know?
And it would be good if we were recognized as Hoosiers.
- Are you two familiar with St. Vincent's heart program?
- Yes.
- Yes.
- [Dr. Curtis] What do you know about it?
- It's a really good program.
- So do you have any idea who founded that huge heart practice?
- When I took my daughter for a vaccination in St. Vincent's for her COVID vaccine, the vaccination site was Dr. William Nasser Center, or something like that.
- Yeah, a simulation center.
- Okay, yeah.
- Teaches doctors, they can simulate surgeries.
Yes, that's exactly right.
Arab-American William K. Nasser established that group in the early 1970s.
He was part of the practice at IU School of Medicine, and then St. Vincent's hired him away and offered him the chance to establish a huge heart surgery practice.
He didn't grow up in Indianapolis.
He grew up in Terre Haute, Indiana.
But like so many of the people we already talked about, his parents were also grocery store owners.
And they grew up, so he grew up, he did not grow up in a wealthy household.
He went to Indiana State University.
But he grew up in the 1940s.
He did not have an easy childhood.
He did not have an easy childhood because he was an Arab kid.
Dr. Jalal, if you would read this passage of his autobiography about what it was like to grow up as an Arab kid in Terre Haute.
- "I really should admit I didn't appreciate "my Syrian heritage during those years.
"There were all the drawbacks of discrimination "connected to it.
"My skin was a little darker, my nose a little longer.
"When I was about 10 years old "and began to ride the bus downtown, "I'd have to go to the back of the bus.
"My father wanted to be a Mason.
"They wouldn't take him.
"None of our Arab-speaking community "could get into the Terre Haute Country Club.
"One incident happened when I was a freshman in high school.
"I was interested in a freshman girl, "and my gang of buddies and I used to walk everywhere "around town, so I walked to my girlfriend's house.
"Her parents peered out of the windows.
"They wouldn't let any of us on the porch "because we were of other ethnic backgrounds than theirs."
I hope that doesn't happen to my kids.
That sounds pretty painful.
- Yeah, what's your reaction to this?
- Yeah.
I'm not surprised.
I can relate to everything that he said.
- Do you ever feel pressure because you're Arab and Muslim to perform or to be a good example to people, or even to maybe take away what you think might be their fears of you?
- So I sometimes do feel some pressure.
And I will say that I don't feel that with the majority of my patients.
But there are the occasional times where I feel people are, I'm gonna say, curious or confused.
So they wanna know where I'm from, but they don't want to ask.
And I don't fit in the box.
I don't fit in their idea of what an Arab-American, or a Muslim woman, right?
Because-- - Why not?
What would the box be?
- Well, some people think that you, you're controlled by men, or you don't speak your mind.
And I always speak my mind.
Having said that, that's never the goal.
Because I will tell you when I enter a patient's room, I leave my ego outside.
It's about the patient.
It's not about me.
It doesn't matter what they think of me.
I'm there to serve them.
If I say, for example, I'm going to pray for somebody, I've been asked what god?
And I chuckle.
And I say whatever god you believe in.
- What about you?
Do you ever feel the pressure to represent, to show a good example of an Arab and a Muslim?
- So for me, yes.
I do sometimes feel the pressure to be at my best performance, best behavior, all the time, because I want folks to walk away with the impressions yeah, this doctor is an Arab and a Muslim, but he's no different than my white doctor I see at the other side of town.
There's no reason why Arabs and Muslims cannot be a deep part of the fabric of this community here in central Indiana.
- [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] Some of the Arab contributions to Indianapolis are not matters of life and death, like medicine is.
Some of them just make our lives better, or, to be precise, they make life more delicious.
Samia, Edward (speaking Arabic), welcome.
- Thank you so much.
You know, I wore something special for today.
This is my one chance to try to pretend like I'm a chef.
- I like it.
- We're gonna be your assistants.
- No, no.
You're my instructor.
- No, you're the one with the shirt.
So.
- Okay.
(all chuckling) (casual music) - [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] There is perhaps no better way for a culture to touch the hearts of Americans than through our stomachs.
The traditional flavors of Arab cuisine have become a part of menus across the city.
I got together with my friends, Hiba Alalami, and Samia Alajlouni to prepare some of our favorite dishes, and talk about the connection between our culture and our kitchens.
- All right, what's on the menu today?
- Well, we have amazing things, some authentic dishes, and I think you're gonna be starting with-- - We're gonna make tabbouleh?
- The tabbouleh.
- Yeah.
What are you gonna make over there?
- So I'm gonna make an appetizer.
It's gonna be musakhan rolls.
It's an authentic dish.
- I didn't grow up with it because it's more of a Palestinian-Jordanian dish, and I grew up with Syrian-Lebanese food.
Some of the dishes are shared, but some of them of course are different.
Now, did you eat tabbouleh since you were kids?
- Yes.
- The parsley salad, okay.
Because it's known as the national dish of Lebanon, basically.
- Right.
- [Dr. Curtis] I mean, everybody eats tabbouleh.
- I'm making warak enab in grape leaves, and stuffed zucchini.
- Yeah.
- Squash?
- Squash.
- Squash.
- Well, yes, but-- - Zucchini is a type of squash.
- That's true, that's true.
So-- - Kousa, right?
- Yes.
Exactly.
- In Arab, kousa.
- Exactly.
- Kousa.
- And then we have a lamb tagine, correct?
- Oh that's right, that's right.
Yes.
When we were thinking of the dinner we would try to represent all the different parts of the Arab world, so from North Africa from Morocco in particular, we have the tagine.
And then for desert, you're making om ali.
- Yes, I am.
- Which means the mother of Ali, right?
- The mother of Ali, and it can be traced back to the Mamluk era.
When the wife of one of the sultans of Egypt asked some of her cooks to make her a really special dessert.
Om ali was made by one of the cooks, and presented to that sultana, and she loved it.
And since then, it's become the national dessert of Egypt.
- That's a nice story.
- I like it.
- As in every culture, as we cooked, we began to reminisce.
- Well you know, different people make tabbouleh differently.
So I grew up, my neighbor was Lebanese, actually.
And it would be a party-- - In Amman, Jordan.
- Yes.
- Yeah.
- When they make the tabbouleh.
She would call all the neighbors, including my mom, and they would get together, spend hours making the food, drinking coffee and listening to Fairuz, so it's really, it became a tradition.
- And now I'm gonna be adding the onions to the hot oil.
- I hear the sizzling.
- Yes, you can hear the sizzling.
I can smell the-- - That's the language of Arab love there.
- Yes.
- Exactly.
It's like, oh my God.
Aroma.
- Without a doubt, my Arab-American identity is tied very strongly to cooking.
My Arab grandmother was like my second mother.
- What was her name?
- So her name was Cassie.
She was born Cassie Moses.
It was her way of loving her grandchildren.
And I still remember the floor, it was yellow linoleum tile.
Because it was associated with all these scents.
I mean, so she would-- - [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] While Hiba continued with the musakhan rolls I asked Samia to school me on one of the most traditional and tricky Arab cooking techniques.
- Okay, Samia, I'm so excited to see you roll grape leaves.
I have to admit, I've tried to master this art.
I never really have.
- Same here.
- Okay, all right.
(all laughing) - First, you need to lay the leaf flat on its smooth side.
Because you want to put the stuffing on the rough side.
The stuffing has rice, meat, parsley, onions, tomatoes, little bit of vegetable oil, and some spices.
- So we go over first?
- Yes, and then you take the sides, and-- - [Dr. Curtis] You've got to make a little package, almost.
- Exactly.
And just roll it by squeezing a little bit.
(soft music) - [Dr. Curtis] Oh.
- [Samia] This is excellent.
- Yeah, not bad at all.
- It's very good, actually.
(gentle music) - [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] After a fantastic afternoon of cooking, talking, and laughing, it was finally time to get our dishes to the table.
Joining us for this feast of Arab flavors were Samia's husband Eyas, and Hiba's husband Mohammad, home from a long day of seeing patients.
- [Eyas] Oh guys, this looks so good.
- So thank you so much Mohammad and Hiba for hosting this fantastic event.
I really appreciate you opening your house.
It was a lot of fun to cook with you.
- It was.
- And with you Samia.
- Same here.
- [Dr. Curtis] Thank you for all of your hard work.
- Absolutely.
- Of course.
- I think I missed the prep part, but I won't miss the enjoyment of eating.
(all chuckling) - So, and with that-- - And Eyas can say the same.
- Absolutely.
This is what I'm here for.
- Okay.
How long do you think people in Indianapolis have been eating food like this?
- Well, you tell us who, when they started coming as Arabs, and I bet that they started then.
- That's right.
- Wow.
- So, I mean, by 1900, the heart of the community was on Willard Street.
According to the Indianapolis newspapers, they would cook a lot of mutton, a lot of lamb.
- Mm-hmm.
- And they would share it among each other, and they would sit out on their porches.
Kids would be playing in the streets, and it was all accompanied by food.
But after World War I, they really started cooking their food for other people.
- Obviously one thing that is very well-known of Arabs is generosity, and food is the way that Arabs really manifest that, and that's the way it's a message, right?
That I respect you, I want to be generous to you, I want to become your friend, or be closer to you.
- For me, when we were cooking, when I cook everyday, especially those authentic dishes, I think about my children.
Keeping the traditions alive, I want this to be their comfort food as well, because I would like to see it going for generations.
As we look at the past, I look as well at the future, and I see this food with our children.
- Wow, thank you so much again for joining, for all being together.
This has been fantastic.
- If you ever do this again, invite me.
(all laughing) - Ready to eat.
(all chatting) (solemn music) - [Dr. Curtis Voiceover] So much has changed since my ancestors first arrived in the United States over 120 years ago.
But one thing that remains is the food, like what I just shared with my friends inside.
Whenever I prepare the dishes my granny taught me, I conjure her memory, and I'm connected, not just to her, but to all the people who made my life possible.
The search for the roots of Arab Indianapolis taught me an important lesson about what it means to belong to a community.
It changed my mind about the idea that immigrants are always torn between the old country and the new world.
I discovered instead that a person can love more than one place, more than one culture at the same time.
The earliest Arab immigrants wanted to participate in their new country.
They volunteered for groups like the YWCA, they joined the US military.
Some of them married people from different backgrounds.
But they still nurtured that connection with their heritage.
They still embrace the language, or at least the food of their ancestors.
For me, these Arab-Americans in Indianapolis show that we don't have to make a false choice between unity and diversity.
Our city is big enough to embrace our differences, and to treat each other, not as strangers, but as friends.
(bright music) - [Announcer] Arab Indianapolis: A Hidden History is made possible through the generous support of the Arab Indianapolis Foundation Incorporated, documenting the long history of Arab-Americans in central Indiana at ArabIndianapolis.com and by Indiana Humanities in cooperation with the National Endowment for the Humanities.