The original blueprint of the city of Herzliya was designed in 1925 by Richard Kaufman, a renowned city planner who divided Herzliya into four areas: Area A – along the beach -designated for hotels and resorts; Area B – designated for residential and recreation. Areas A and B were the dunes on the seashore and east towards the coastal road number 2 of today – what is now Herzliya Pituach. Area C was the elongated sandstone hill east extending to the coastal road, from the HaSira interchange to Kfar Shmaryahu – now Herzelia B – intended to serve as a regional center for business and commerce. Area D was the agricultural settlement – now the center of Herzelia – this area was supposed to provide the daily needs of the other three areas. A large bare area separated areas C and D and was known as the ‘Bassa‘ – today the charming Herzelia Park. The swamp was formed due to the topographic structure of the area, as a result of inadequate drainage of rainwater.
Areas A and B were desolate for many years until they came to life and became a tourist attraction along the seashore and a neighborhood of private homes. Area C was isolated on the sandstone ridge, and its residents contemplated cutting themselves off from other parts of the city and establishing an independent settlement called Kiryat Herzl. This move was not approved by the Ministry of Interior.
When planning the city was completed, “Kehilat Zion” marketed the city’s properties in a successful and quick marketing venture. Within a few months, 25 plots were sold to “Bnei Binyamin” in Israel. The remaining plots were sold to private individuals in the United States and Poland. It turned out that due to the rapid pace of sales, Kehilat Zion neglected to allocate land for access roads, streets and public buildings and had no choice but to cut the plots already sold by 15% and the Herzliya dunam was only 850 square meters instead of 1,000 square meters.
The Bassa was a hiding place for animals like jackals and mongoose, which hunted the chickens from the owners in Area C. In the winter an abundance of daffodils and wildflowers grew in the swamp that the children would pick and return covered in mud, to their mothers’ dismay. An ancient drainage tunnel quarried in the Roman-Byzantine period was discovered below the sandstone ridge leading up to the coastal dunes. The boys’ daring recreation was a night walk inside the tunnel with lanterns and candles, risking colliding into bats.
Herzliya D had a branch of the Histadrut’s largest health fund, Parzellina’s barbershop, the Yekutieli and Lahavid falafel stand and, as a contrast, the cemetery. The residents of Herzliya C planted orange groves from the ‘Shamouti’ variety, fenced them in with bitter orange trees and built a packinghouse. Later, the produce was marketed under the brand name “JAFFA ORANGES”. All the residents were seeking sources of employment and income in order to survive. People looked for a “day’s work” in construction, guarding, or sewing. At the time there were about 7,000 unemployed people in the Land of Israel, many of whom had to return to their birthplace due to their inability to find work. In 1929, Golda Meirson, later Golda Meir, came to Israel from the United States to visit her parents living in Herzliya C. She was amazed at the misery and poverty in which her parents and the rest of the community lived and began to help and support the residents. With her help and with the help of additional volunteers, two important buildings were established: a synagogue and a swimming pool. Some of the residents rented out rooms and managed boarding houses for vacationers, kept smallholdings of chickens, goats or cows. Some of the residents established the “Hof Hayam” cooperative for the mining of gravel and sand, which they transported on camels to construction site throughout the country. Thus the camels became part of the childhood landscape of many Herzliya residents.
The construction of Kfar Shmaryahu, which began in 1936, provided work for many of the workers in Herzliya. Roads were constructed and paved, including the road to Kfar Shmaryahu, now Nordau Street, named after Max Nordau, one of the Zionist leaders.
Life consisted of shopping at the grocery store on credit, half a loaf of black bread, a quarter package of butter, herring. Entertainment consisted of walking to the cinema to save the bus fare in order to buy half a pita with falafel or roasted sunflower seeds sold inside a newspaper cone. Cooking was by means of a smoking primus, the weekly wash was done in a huge multipurpose tub called “Peyla“. Most people lived in poverty but felt equal, there was a mutual help back and forth. The children of Herzliya remember a happy childhood in the countryside, wide fields with lots of wildflowers. Those who lived in Areas A and B remember that they would play games with boys and girls in the sand dunes near their houses – for example in today’s Wingate Street, in Herzliya Pituach. The games were kite flying, built by the children themselves, played “gogo’im“(from apricot seeds), five stones (jacks), “landmarks” and more. The children invented games such as jumping over puddles with a pole, sliding on corrugated tin sheets, walking to the sea through the dunes while searching for figs and “sabres” (prickly pears) on the way, and of course swimming in the sea. After school, the children helped caring for the livestock and other tasks at home.
The “Yekkes” who settled in Kfar Shmaryahu taught the residents of Herzelia the significance of the siesta and between 14:00 to 16:00 the children had to be quiet and play only games that did not make any noise. The Yekkes also taught the residents of Herzelia the importance of “punktlich“, as well as exemplary cleanliness and well-kept gardens. The Yekkes brought to Israel the culture of the holiday resort with all its characteristics and customs. Home Pensions were established by the Holtzmann, Deutsch, Gorman, Kaminser and Schlenberg families. Adjacent to the garden of Mr. Van Friesland, a Dutch-born Zionist leader (now dedicated to “Friesland” Garden), the Holtzmann couple opened a Pension and a small café. The guests would return to the Pension every summer, sitting in the shade of the trees to eat a strudel or a cheesecake made by Pnina and enjoy the feeling of home-away-from-home. It was ‘a small Europe in the Levant.’ Theodore Deutsch was one of the first to predict a bright economic future for Herzliya Pituach. He said, “There is the sea, there is sand, it is worthwhile to start a Pension so that people may come for their holidays”. The Deutsch family residence was located at the corner of Shalva and Basel streets in Herzliya Pituach. Willy and Elsa Gormans’ pension was in the area of King Saul and King David streets in Herzliya Pituach. The Pensions were operated as a side business, since making a living from agriculture alone was difficult and all family members helped with the various chores of the farms; cultivating tomatoes and strawberries or flowers. In the Pensions, excellent cakes and pies were served. During the British Mandate, British officers liked to stay at the Pensions and talk among themselves. The owners of the Pension would listen to the conversations and transfer the intelligence to members of the Haganah.
On Nordau Street a café “Galei Yam” was established in 1932 designed by an American architect, a building with a large concrete arch that became the symbol of the café and the entire Area C. The people from Tel Aviv arrived at the cafe with their beautiful cars, played cards, also the residents of the area came and especially the Yekkes from Kfar Shmaryahu came to “forget the daily grind”, beer was also served in the afternoon and so was homemade ice cream. There were those who claimed that “Socialists in the Land of Israel do not waste their time in cafés.” The children came to buy ice cream in a cup that cost half a penny or a penny.
Herzliya served as an informal part of the underground to land illegal immigrants on the beach: the members of the Haganah would invite the British soldiers and officers to the cafe to dance with them and get drunk. At the same time, an illegal immigrant ship was anchored off Herzliya Beach or Shfayim Beach and the immigrants were brought, under cover of darkness and without disturbance, in small boats, to the shore and smuggled into the houses of settlers in the area. In memory of those days, you can see a boat on the top of the hill of HaSira interchange when you enter the city of Herzliya.