At the age of 22 Sholom Mordechai met and married his wife, Leah Goldman. They spent their first years of married life in Brooklyn. His time was spent studying and teaching. Acknowledging his family obligations, he also worked for his father at the Brooklyn butcher store.
When the opportunity to enter his chosen profession arose, he moved his small family to Atlanta, Georgia, where he took up a teaching position with his father’s blessing. His successful stint as an educator in Georgia was short – he had to leave after a year to help his father in the family business.
Back in Brooklyn, Sholom resumed his earlier balancing act, doing his best to follow his dreams of community service while living up to his family obligations. Things changed in 1987 when his father, seeking to shore up his business’ supply of beef, invested in a shuttered packing plant in the Postville, Iowa.