Their daughter, Hodel, was born in July 1913, shortly after the publication of his third book, Gezang un gebet ("Song and Prayer") in Kiev. At the outbreak of World War I, he found work in the timber industry, which gave him exemption from military service. He continued to write and produced in 1918/19 the first of his books for children Mayselech in ferzn ("Erzählungen in Versen"; "Stories in Verse").