IN THE MAIL: City of Rogues and Schnorrers: Russia’s Jews and the Myth of Old Odessa. Here is an excerpt from the concluding paragraph:
Those who had venerated old Odessa during the 1960s . . . maintained that Russia’s Eldorado had perished with the Revolution. . . . Socialism had avowed to negate giddy old Odessa with industry and temperance, but the Odessans who outlasted socialism refused to admit that such an atrocity could have transpired. Old Odessa was their memory; they were survivors from the fabled city of rogues and schnorrers.
A picture of Odessa, 2010 (JCI photo):