David Gilmour ("The Film Club") wrote, "Picking movies for people is a risky business.  In a way it's as revealing as writing someone a letter.  It shows how you think, it shows what moves you, sometimes it can even show how you think the world sees you.  So when you breathlessly recommend a film to a friend, when you say, 'Oh, this is a scream--you're really going to love it,' it's a nauseating experience when your friend sees you the following day and says with a wrinkled brow, 'You thought that was funny?'"

"Genuz iz genug!'  (Enough is enough!) 
Be sure to see the 92-minute movie, "Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg" by Director/writer, Aviva Kempner.  And purchase the book, "Something on My Own - Gertrude Berg and American Broadcasting - 1929 - 1956" by Glenn D. Smith, Jr.  Many of the facts shown below were taken from this book.

From 1929 to 1959, The Goldbergs was one of the most "matsliakhdik" (successful) "radyo" and "televisye" shows.  For millions of Americans--Jewish and non-Jewish-- listening to The Goldbergs, a warm-hearted radio serial about a Jewish family, has been a happy experience, almost like slipping on a pair of well-worn/comfortable shoes.

One Jewish educator said, "This series has done more to set us Jews right with the 'goyim' than all the sermons preached by the Rabbis."

Shown below is a Yiddish guide to Molly and "The Goldbergs":

"adres" (address)
The Goldbergs lived in a walk-up brownstone, apartment #3B, at 1030 East Tremont Avenue in the Bronx.

"akhtsn toyznt" (18,000)
When Gertrude Berg was ill for one week and "The Goldbergs" was canceled, 18,000 letters poured into NBC's office.

"aktsent" (accent)
Molly, Jake, and Uncle David (Menasha Skulnik) all spoke with a heavy Yiddish accent, while the children favored standard American language patterns.

"best aktrise" (best actress)
Gertrude Berg appeared on B'way in a 2-yr. run with "A Majority of One."  She played a middle-aged Jewish widow who finds romance with a Japanese man [played by Sir Cedric Hardwicke], and won the Tony award for "Best Actress in 1959."

"bine"(stage)
Gertrude Berg said, "My profession has been making believe.  Almost everyday I move from my real apartment to a stage apartment.  I write words for characters who never were but aren't too different from people I've really known.  I have enjoyed this double identity so much that I've never really asked myself 'Why?'"

"briv" (letter)
Many fan letters were written to "The Goldbergs."  One, written by Mrs. Adolph Moses, admitted many of the program's episodes 'coincided with many instances in her family's life.'  She ended her letter pledging her devotion to both Berg and Sanka coffee.

Another listener wrote to Berg asking her help with her son's bar mitzvah speech, even going so far as to ask Berg to send the "speech your son [Sammy] gave at his [bar mitzvah]."

"bruder" (brother)
Molly's older brother, Charles, died from diphtheria at about age seven.  Dinah, Molly's mother, had a series of "nervez" breakdowns and was institutionalized.

"dray" (3)
Gertrude Berg had three TV husbands:
   Philip Loeb, 1949 - 1951
   Harold J. Stone, 1952
   Robert H. Harris, 1953 - 1956

"eydes" (witness)
The Goldbergs celebrated Passover on their CBS-TV program by presenting the "yomtov" in all its splendor.  Jake rendered the kiddush and the performance was authentic.  The matzo and "vayn" (wine) was "strictly Kosher for Passover."

"eytse" (advice)
In the final seconds before a broadcast of "The Goldbergs," Molly gave her cast some advice.  No, she didn't say, "farmisht nit di yoytzres!" (Don't mix things up!)  She said, "On your toes, darlings."

"fartekh" (apron_
Molly always wore an apron in the "heym."

"fentster shmu'es" (window conversation)
In the days before widespread "luftkilung" (air-conditioning), many buildings had alleys and airshafts to ventilate interior or rear apartments.  Housewives would "shmu'es" across airshafts or shout out a front-facing window to summon the children to "kumt arein" (come in) for dinner or homework.

Susan Stamberg called window conversation "the urban equivalent of the back-fence."

"filosofye" (philosophy)
Molly delighted audiences with her homespun philosophy:  "Better a crust of bread and enjoy it than a cake that gives you indigestion."  (The Yiddish word for indigestion is "nit-fardayung.")

"gast" (guest)
Molly made guest appearances on "The Perry Como Show," "The Tennessee Ernie Ford Show," "What's My Line," "Kate Smith," and "The Ed Sullivan Show."

"geboyrn-tog" (birthday)
Molly was born on Oct. 3, 1899; she died on Sept. 14, 1966.

"harts" (heart)
"Gertrude died with her boots on because she wanted it that way.  They said it was heart failure, but it was overwork.  She couldn't stop or even slow down."
            Quote by Lewis Berg

"hotel"
In 1906, Molly's father purchased an abandoned hotel in the Catskills Mountains--The Fleischmann Mansion. Berg began writing and performing skits at the resort hotel.

"kave" (coffee)
Molly addressed her "customers" by peering out her window and extolling the virtues of Sanka coffee.  The Sanka coffee can sat in the bottom right corner of the window.  She would say,

"Well, it's time for bed and I'm a little fatigued...but one thing I'm sure of--a good night's sleep, I'm happy to say.  And it's not just accidental that I'm sure of a good night's sleep--oh no!  It's because I know I'm a person that cannot drink coffee with caffeine in it and sleep--so--I do what every sensible person should do--I drink Sanka-- because 97% of the caffeine is removed...."

"kokhn" (to cook)
Molly publshed "The Molly Goldberg Cookbook" with Myra Waldo.  It contained 320 pgs. of recipes for chicken, challah, blintzes, and bagels.  In the introduction, she states her reasons for writing a cookbook:

"So how did I come to write a cookbook?  I had to protect myself, that's how.  When I cook for my family, I don't have trouble. But when someone, Mrs. Herman, for instance, asks me, 'How do you make this or how do you make that?' do I know?"

"kinder"
Molly and Jake ("The Goldbergs") had 2 children:  Rosalie and Sammy.  In real life, Molly had two children, too:  Cherney and Harriet.

"kindhayt" (childhood)
Gertrude Berg had a "shver" (difficult) childhood.  Her mother never fully recovered from the death of her young "zun."  Her father was unsupportive of her ambitions.

"krank" (sick)
Gertrude Berg's descendants tell of one Passover in her childhood when she was sick in "bet" and eavesdropped on her grandmother's seder through the window of her "dire" (apartment).

"komunist" (communist)
Philip Loeb, the actor who played Molly's first husband, was "ahf tsores" (in trouble). He was labelled a communist by the Senate Committee.  (Loeb insisted he wasn't.)  The Goldberg's sponsor, General Foods, demanded the "aktor" be fired.  Berg refused to do so and the series ceased production in 1951.  It was replaced with "I Love Lucy."

malapropisms
Molly loved to use malapropisms.  One example:  "It's late, Jake, and time to expire"

"man" (husband)
Molly met her husband, Lewis Berg, in the Catskills.  He was a chemical "inzhenir" (engineer) who helped invent instant coffee during WWII.  She married him in 1918.

"mentshlekh" (human)
The Goldbergs were regarded by the press as the first "human interest" program--an early derivation of the soap opera.

"mekhile" (forgiveness)
Molly used The Goldbergs to expose listeners, many of whom were not "bakant" (familiar) with the Jewish faith and Jewish customs.  One episode went as follows:

Molly:  Excuse me if we rush.  We're going to temple.

Eva:     Yes, that's right.  This is your holy  day.

Molly:  Yes, the Day of Atonement.

Eva:     The day you pray to your good Lord to forgive your sins.

Molly:  Yes, it is.

Pat:      It's a beautiful custom.

Molly:  Anything that has forgiveness in it is beautiful.

"orem" (poor); "shrekeydik" (timid)
One Hollyood reporter once referred to Berg as "poor timid Tillie."

"oylem kheylek" (audience share)
In Dec. 1950, The Goldbergs had a 47 share. That meant that nearly half of all TV sets in the N. Y. area that were on Monday night at 9:00 were tuned in to The Goldbergs.

"raykhkayt" (wealth)
Berg downplayed her wealth, although she was once the wealthiest woman in America, as well as the 2nd most respected.  (Eleanor Roosevelt was first!)

"rirn" (to move)
In "Molly," The Goldberg family moved to the suburbs--Haverville, New York.  Guild [Films] executives believed that the show's title, "Molly" lest the show be identified as "too Jewish."

"tsutsien" (to attract)
Women were attracted to Gertrude Berg because she seemed like one of them. She was unpretentious and "frayndlekh" (friendly) and acted like some who resided in the Lower East Side.

"telefon" (telephone)
In one episde of The Goldbergs, a telephone was installed in the apartment.  Molly exclaimed, "Ken you emagine, you put your mout here und you give a talk, 'Hulloh!' And right avay it henswers you beck!  Soch a brains vat pipple got!"

"Universitet" (college)
In 1961 Berg returned to CBS in a program named "Mrs. G. Goes to College."  This sitcom was about a "almone (widow) who returns to the university life.

"yente" (slang for "gossip")
Molly would often take a break from slicing fish or kneading dough to gossip across the airshaft, always wiping her hands on her "fartekh"