Researcher: Stefan Broge, Stuyvesant '26

Jack B. Klein was born in Yekaterinoslav, Russia in 1903. The third of four children, he had an eldest sister, Rose Klein; an older brother, Harry Klein; and a younger brother, Benjamin “Dudley” Klein. When Klein was still only one year old his family moved from Russia to New York City as a part of the large influx of eastern European immigrants who arrived in the United States through Ellis Island. The Klein family initially lived on 19 Hinsdale Street in Brooklyn, where they worked to pay off their mortgage. Klein’s father, Solomon Klein, was employed in a cap factory at this time.

Though there are no records of Jack Klein or any of his siblings attending public schools, they were all taught to read and write by their polyglot parents. The Kleins moved to an apartment on 1402 Eastern Parkway in Brooklyn in the early 1910s, where they would reside for the rest of Jack Klein’s childhood.

Despite not taking part in any formal education as a child, Klein enrolled in the University of West Virginia in 1923 on the premedical track. He completed this two year program and then continued his studies at West Virginia’s College of Dental and Oral Surgery, which he graduated from in 1929. Klein then returned to living on Eastern Parkway as he began to work as a dentist.

As a Russian born Jewish man, Klein was very much part of the demographic that communism appealed to within the United States. Klein acted upon his liberal political beliefs by joining the Communist Party, and he would later be inclined to drop everything in order to fight in the Spanish Civil War on the loyalists’ side. He received his American passport on February 16th of 1937, and within two months he had set off towards Spain.

Klein, unlike the vast majority of the volunteers in the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, did not partake in any combat on the front lines. As a member of the American Medical Bureau to save Spanish Democracy, Klein was called in as a dentist for the Fifteenth Brigade. Almost all of the men whom he treated had not been provided with any form of dental care in several months, since joining the international brigade.

Klein operated out of a British ambulance, as American ones were not tall enough for him to practice in. He travelled a total distance of over 10,000 miles in his truck, treating over 3,000 people. He not only provided care to the soldiers of the international brigade, but also to Spanish citizens in small pueblos who had never been exposed to such modern medical practices. Unfortunately, due to the circumstances that Klein was forced to work with, he lacked access to some important supplies, such as anesthetic gas.

Some of Klein’s patients were hesitant to undergo treatment because of this, but Klein eventually gained the trust of all of them. The main obstacle that Klein faced was having to operate in a public setting, where dozens of men were lined up just behind his open truck as he treated patients. This was unlike anything he had done while practicing in the United States. However, Klein eventually became increasingly comfortable with this, as his practice grew to feel like a performance to him.

Alongside Klein worked his twenty year-old assistant George Waters, a Cuban-born American who also elected to fight for Spain’s Republic as a member of the Communist Party. Waters was responsible for most of the driving of Klein’s ambulance, and he was one of the 90-100 black Americans who volunteered in the Spanish Civil War.

While in Spain Klein met his wife, Josephine Liebert, a German woman. They returned to the United States aboard the Ile de France on October 25, 1938. They would eventually get divorced in the United States, and Liebert continued living in America. Klein would try to enlist in the Second World War, but he was denied service as he was deemed to be overage. He continued practicing dentistry until he retired, and then moved to Miami. Klein passed away on June 17, 1989 in Miami at the age of 86 years old.

Sources

Ink, Social. “Klein, Jack B.” The Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives, 15 Sept. 2022, alba-valb.org/volunteers/jack-b-klein/.

“An American Dentist in Spain.” The Volunteer for Liberty, November 13, 1938. Box 13, Folder 14. ALBA VF.002 Collection. NYU Special Collections.

Year: 1930; Census Place: Brooklyn, Kings, New York; Page: 4B; Enumeration District: 0741; FHL microfilm: 2341264

“Interview with Abraham Lincoln Brigade Technician Josephine Hill Liebert”, date; Manny Harriman Video Oral History Collection; ALBA VIDEO 048; ​​Box: 24 (Material Type: Moving Images); Tamiment Library/Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives, New York University.