"I Was Blessed"

by John DiBiase

When I worked with Morris Eisenstein, I realized you could do a lot for families in neighborhood organization. Now some people didn't believe that. In fact, Fred Seidel was wondering about that until his friend, Mr. Si Kahn, who has written a number of books on community organization, said to him, "Look, you can do as much for people in community, neighborhood organizations - in fact more - than you can do in case work."

If you look carefully in any neighborhood you'll find all the strengths you need to help people help themselves. But you have got to have some form of leadership to do that and somebody who knows how to do that. Fortunately, all the background I had in community organization came out. And I said, "I was blessed, I had Morris Eisenstein, who taught me all these principles."