Placement in Foster Homes
On July 10, 1923, a dependency hearing involving Jack, his younger brothers Sam and Earl, and his sister Eileen, was held in Chicago’s juvenile court.[A16-60] The petition alleged that the children were not receiving proper parental care. They had, until then, been in their mother’s custody, living on Roosevelt Road, the border between Jewish and Italian districts.[A16-61] The juvenile court made a finding of dependency. It appointed the Jewish Home Finding Society guardian with the right to place the children in foster homes, and it ordered Joseph Rubenstein to pay the court clerk $4 per week for the support of each child. On November 24, 1924, this order was vacated, which apparently signified the termination of the guardianship and the return of the children to their mother. On April 8, 1925, the case was continued “generally,” meaning that it was inactive but could be reactivated if the court so desired.[A16-62]
Despite court records, the exact circumstances and length of time that Jack Ruby lived away from home are not entirely clear. Records indicate that Jack, Sam, Earl, and Eileen Rubenstein were wards of the Jewish Home Finding Society “for a short time in 1922-23.”[A16-63] However, Jack and Eileen stated they spent about 4 or 5 years in foster homes.[A16-64] Earl testified that he and Sam were originally sent to a private foster home and then lived on a farm for a little more than a year, while Jack was on a different farm “some distance away.” Subsequently the three brothers lived together in another foster home.[A16-65]
Subsequent Home Life
When Jack Ruby returned to his family, the unit was still disordered. His father remained apart from the children at least until 1936 and perhaps until a few years later.[A16-66] Mrs. Rubenstein’s inability to manage her home, which had been reported by the Institute for Juvenile Research in 1922, apparently continued. For example, in 1937 Marion Rubenstein observed that her mother “has never been any kind of a housekeeper, was careless with money, and never took much interest in the children’s welfare * * * she was selfish, jealous, disagreeable, and never cared to do anything in the home but lie around and sleep.”[A16-67] Dr. Hyman I. Rubenstein, the son of Joseph Rubenstein’s brother, recalled that Jack Ruby’s mother ran “an irregular household” and appeared to be “a rather disturbed person of poor personal appearance with no incentive for cleaning or cooking.”[A16-68]
Mrs. Rubenstein’s domestic shortcomings were accompanied by symptoms of mental disease. In about 1913, 2 years after Jack was born, Mrs. Rubenstein began to develop a delusion that a sticking sensation in her throat was caused by a lodged fishbone.[A16-69] Each month Hyman, her oldest child, took her to a clinic. And each month the examining doctor, finding no organic cause for discomfort, informed her that there was nothing in her throat and that the sensation was but a figment of her imagination. According to Hyman, this practice continued for a number of years until Mrs. Rubenstein tired of it.[A16-70]
In 1927, Mrs. Rubenstein once again began to visit clinics in connection with her fishbone delusion. Three years later, a thyroidectomy was performed, but she subsequently said it did nothing to relieve her discomfort.[A16-71] According to the Michael Reese Hospital, whose clinic she had visited since 1927, Mrs. Rubenstein was suffering from psychoneurosis with marked anxiety state.
By order of the county court of Cook County, Mrs. Rubenstein was committed to Elgin State Hospital on July 16, 1937.[A16-72] She was paroled on October 17, 1937, 3 months after her commitment.[A16-73] On January 3, 1938, the Chicago State Hospital informed Elgin State that the family desired that she be readmitted to the mental hospital. The family reported that she was uncooperative, caused constant discord, was very noisy, and used obscene language.[A16-74] A State social worker observed that Mrs. Rubenstein refused ever to leave the house, explaining that her children would have thrown her things out had she left. Mrs. Rubenstein rebuffed a suggestion by the social worker that she help with the dishes by stating that she would do nothing as long as her “worthless” husband was in the house.[A16-75] She was readmitted on January 14, 1938.[A16-76]
Mrs. Rubenstein was again paroled on May 27, 1938, and was discharged as “improved” on August 25, 1938.[A16-77] She stayed in an apartment with Marion, and her separation from the rest of the family apparently ended most of the difficulties.[A16-78] Subsequently, Jack Ruby’s parents were apparently reconciled, since their alien registration forms, filed in late 1940, indicated that they both resided at Marion’s address.[A16-79]
Fannie Rubenstein was admitted to Michael Reese Hospital on April 4, 1944, as a result of a heart ailment. Her condition was complicated by an attack of pneumonia and she died at the hospital on April 11, 1944.[A16-80] Hyman testified that, perhaps because she favored the education of her children and they recognized her difficulties in rearing them during a turbulent marriage, they all remembered Mrs. Rubenstein with warmth and affection.[A16-81] The evidence also indicates that Jack, notwithstanding his earlier attitudes, became especially fond of his mother.[A16-82] Following his wife’s death, Joseph Rubenstein stayed with the children in Chicago, where he died at the age of 87, on December 24, 1958.[A16-83]