Books: The Great Jewish Families

OUR CROWD by Stephen Birmingham. 404 pages. Harper & Row. $8.95.

Adolph Lewisohn spent $300 a month just for shaves and took up tap dancing at 80. Before giving his famous dinner parties, Carl Loeb held dress rehearsals on the preceding evening—with real food, real wine and substitute, or second-string, guests. On entering Williams College in 1895, Herbert Lehman, who later became New York Governor and U.S. Senator, took along his private car and chauffeur. Therese, daughter of Fanny and Solomon Loeb, could not button her dress at 18: servants had always done it...