On March 17, 1917, Minna Goldsmith (Mahler), Eva Effron (Robin), Ida Bienstock (Landau), Sylvia Steierman (Cohn) and Dorothy Cohen (Schwartzman), students at New York University Law School, founded Delta Phi Epsilon. Five years later, the organization was formally incorporated in the State of New York. Delta Phi Epsilon became a full member of the National Panhellenic Conference in 1951. Happy Founders’ Day, Delta Phi Epsilon!
Faye Safer Silverman, the daughter of Russian immigrants, was born on June 29, 1912, in Jacksonville, Florida. She graduated from Andrew Jackson High School and enrolled at Florida State College for Women (now Florida State University). The first woman in her family to attend college, she was also the first to join a sorority. She became a member of Delta Phi Epsilon.
After graduating in 1930 with a two-year teaching degree, she taught music at the Fishweir School in Jacksonville. On November 29, 1933, she eloped with Joseph Silverman, her high school sweetheart. They set up housekeeping in Gainesville where her husband was working at Brownstein’s Department Store. Unable to find a teaching position in Gainesville, she became the manager of the Fashion Shop.
Her parents loaned the couple $1,500 to start their own business. They called it the Collegiate Men’s Shop and it opened in 1935. According to one of the couple’s daughters, her parents “were true partners in this business.” The family grew to three daughters and a son.
The business relied heavily on the students at the University of Florida, then an all-male institution. The store sold tailor made suits and it extended credit to its customers, a rare commodity in those days. The couple hired students to work and they also chaperoned fraternity events.
Faye Silverman said in a 2001 interview:
I had brothers who went to school at the University of Florida. We had a big fraternity row, but the girls hadn’t come yet. I used to go to all of their parties. They used to have me chaperone when they had to have one. That’s how I got started going. In those days, we had all the name bands that would come to Florida. They would all stop off at the University, and we would have big affairs at the gym. We had big social affairs. We had the Military Ball. We went to everything. Every well-known band you could think of came to Gainesville.
During World War II, Jewish soldiers who were stationed at Camp Blanding in Stark often spent their weekends in Gainesville. Silverman helped organize a hospitality program for them. She was involved with the B’nai Israel Congregation and the Daughters of Israel. She served Hadassah as a lifetime member and past president and was also involved with the Girl Scouts, Gainesville Women’s Club and the Women’s Business Association.
In 1946, the store’s name and location changed. It became Silverman’s – the Man’s Store and moved to the north side of University Avenue, across from the Florida Theatre. Another move took place in 1960, when the store moved across the street to 225 W. University Avenue and featured women’s clothing, too. Silverman’s was one of the oldest clothing stores in Gainesville when it closed 1989. A newspaper headline read, “End of an Era: Silverman’s is Closing.”
Silverman served on Delta Phi Epsilon’s national board and was instrumental in establishing the chapter at the University of Florida in 1955, after it became a coeducational institution. In 1965, she helped establish the chapter at the University of Tampa. In a 2001 interview, Silverman recalled, “I used to travel for our sorority. I had five states that I used to have to travel to. I went to all the places we had sororities.”
Southern Jewish Weekly, October 22, 1954
Silverman died on March 2, 2003, at the age of 90.
