wished to leave money for a Jewish school in the land of Israel, when along comes “wicked Rome”—that is, the British—which helps itself to part of the gift for an Arab agricultural school in Tul Karm.2 This Zionist interpretation was passed down as bald fact from one generation of Kadoorie pupils and graduates to another.
As it happens, the government of Palestine was interested in building a Jewish high school in Jerusalem. But the legendary teacher Asher Ehrlich threw a spanner in the works: he began to lobby for a Jewish agricultural school around the Jezreel Valley, and, in 1925, a whole series of institutions, colony councils, community bodies, and so forth signed and submitted a petition to High Commissioner Herbert Samuel to earmark the funds for an agricultural school in the Lower Galilee and the glory of local education. Mes’ha added its voice to “the people’s will,” as it stated in its application to the high commissioner.3 The government of Palestine endorsed the idea of a Jewish agricultural school similar to the Arab school in Tul Karm, and the question of location came up for discussion. Several sites vied for the honor and the not inconsiderable benefits—a road, a well, and a boost to the consumer population. The felicitous choice ultimately fell to a hillock between Sejera and Mes’ha, bordering on a-Zbekh lands at the edge of the Tabor, and, following divine and human delays, construction began in 1931. The edifice designed by government engineers was expansive and tasteful: the barn alone was fairer than any of the buildings in all of the local colonies put together, as were the living quarters, classrooms, laboratories, and other enhancements.
The school belonged to the government of Palestine, coming under its Department of Agriculture. The department financed it, was to appoint the principal and teachers, and set the curriculum. At one of the early planning stages, Herbert Samuel suggested that it be an English school, only to provoke more furor: Jewish money was to go for a non-Hebrew school in the land of Israel?! The British backed down. They promised to build a Hebrew school with a Jewish principal and teachers, and a number of Yishuv representatives on the school board. Hereafter, government officials consulted with the Jewish Agency (JA) on all school matters. In Tul Karm, in contrast, the principal was indeed English and the school’s character was British colonial.
At the suggestion of the JA, Shlomo Zemach was appointed principal.4 This ideal candidate was an agronomist, a writer, and an educator, and the zealous champions of Hebrew could breathe easy.5 The fact that he belonged to the Ha-Poel Ha-Tza’ir Party, as did Chaim Arlosoroff, the director of the JA-PD at the time, presumably did not harm his nomination. He was appointed in 1933 and began to prepare actively for the school’s opening in 1934.
Allon acceptance at Kadoorie involved protracted negotiations between Paicovich, Zemach, and British officials about the boy’s fees. Paicovich was of the opinion that the school’s proximity to Mes’ha entitled his son to a full scholarship. In his address to Mes’ha, High Commissioner Arthur Wauchope had mentioned that one of the village children had been accepted at the new school. Paicovich understood that “the high commissioner meant that the lad study at the government’s expense for the benefit of the village nearest the school.”6 The motif the “lad of the village nearest the school” was reiterated in Paicovich’s letters as sufficient cause to relieve him of payment. The fees had been set at Palestine £24 per year, no mean sum at the time: an agricultural worker earned only 20 pennies (grush) a day, and a teacher about £5 a month. Given Mes’ha’s financial straits, it is hard to imagine that Paicovich could come up with the full sum. Zemach wanted a local child at the school and was sympathetic to Paicovich’s circumstances. To make it easier for him, he employed Allon for about a year in the school’s construction prior to its opening, in the hope that the boy would save up for the fees.7 Though the fate of Allon’s wages is undocumented, they certainly did not go for fees. After Zemach finally digested the nature of Paicovich’s objection to school fees, he referred him to the Department of Agriculture. Paicovich did in fact obtain an exemption—but only for the cost of a day pupil. Since boarding was compulsory, he had to make up the difference, Palestine £12 per year. He was thunderstruck: part of the sum had already been waived and he had imagined that boarding would be a pittance! He delivered an ultimatum to Zemach: either Zemach would allow Yigal to attend for £6 a year or Paicovich would remove the boy from the school.8 Zemach ultimately agreed.9 Paicovich’s “thank you” letter, announcing the first remittance in December 1934, quite some time after school had started, was penned by Allon.10 How the boy felt throughout the haggling, which smacked of wretchedness, both Paicovich’s and the village’s, is anybody’s guess.
The school officially opened on 20 June 1934 at a state ceremony under the patronage of the high commissioner. Regular studies began that autumn, following a summer preparatory course, which Allon attended. The school was to teach agriculture to graduates of the tenth grade. The first twenty-four pupils were handpicked out of some two hundred candidates,11 an elect group boasting a number of very bright stars indeed.
Yigal first met his classmates in the summer of 1934. The new pupils—strangers to the setting and the landscape, to farming and Arab neighbors—found themselves welcomed by a fair-haired, blue-eyed youth riding bareback. Most of them were around sixteen; he was about a year younger—no mean difference at that age. But he knew the place and its ways, while they were outsiders. Apart from Amos Brandsteter of Yavne’el, only Yigal hailed from the Lower Galilee. Moreover, he was familiar with Kadoorie, having worked there while it was being built.
The curriculum represented a compromise between applied and theoretical agriculture. Theory was on a high level. The teachers had been carefully drawn from top professionals in different fields: animal husbandry, chemistry, physics, economics, soil science, fertilization, and so forth. The British who designed the program were partial to the assumption that farmers needed to know nothing but their trade, and they limited the curriculum to scientific and technical subjects. Humanities did not feature in the formal syllabus.12
Figure 5. At Kadoorie Agricultural School. Allon is standing, third from the right. Photographer unknown. Courtesy of the Allon House Archives, Ginnosar.
The standard of education was far more demanding than Mes’ha’s schooling, and, after studies began, Allon found himself among the weakest pupils. He found physics and chemistry particularly hard,13 and his first half year at Kadoorie required supreme effort. Applying himself with determination and diligence, he managed not to fail. His teachers helped him, especially Zemach, whose eye he had caught. But more valuable still was the help he received from classmates. Those who had attended good schools, such as Amos Brandsteter, Arnan Azaryahu—nicknamed “Sini” (Chinese) because of his slanted eyes—and top student Joel Prozhinin, who had won the Wauchope Prize, helped the poorer students, such as those who came from Kefar Giladi and our lad from Mes’ha. The school atmosphere was not competitive. Rather, there was a sense of togetherness and companionship with the strong aiding the weak.
After his first half year Allon was able to sigh with relief, believing himself equal to the task he had undertaken. He remained an average student until the end of his career at Kadoorie, neither shining nor disgracing himself.
Allon’s academic standing did not affect his social position. He made up for his lack of scholarship with traits and talents learned at Mes’ha: he could ride a horse, hitch a wagon, wield a two-mule plow. Who knew farm work as well as he? City boys found it hard to rise to barn work or fieldwork at the crack of dawn; Allon was used to it. After his training at home, the four hours of daily work demanded by Zemach were a piece of cake. The farmer in him, nature’s child that he was, made him a model at Kadoorie. Sure, it was good to know chemistry, but other knowledge was just as important: how to clear the land of stones, how to plow, to plant, to sow, to reap. These skills soon propelled Allon into a strong social position, whatever his intellectual achievements may have lacked.
Kadoorie was not the Eton of Eretz Israel, though more
