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How Fast Memories Disappear
I walk
past the old high school and discover it is now a vast, new and very attractive campus that stretches over what appear
as several acres, what with the playing fields, parking lots, and all. Then I come to the end of the street where the last
"old" buildings (built in the 1970's) used to be just a month ago. Now, it is a mass of rubble, huge machines,
and trucks which cart away the "old" remains. Demolition has opened up the area so that I never realized
how large it was. It is to be another parking lot. I stand and look at the mayhem and suddenly realize that I can't
visualize the old buildings that greeted me everytime I walked by! Those mountains of concrete brick, twisted old pipes
and the like are in the way. But I discover that when I close my eyes, the old buildings come clearly into view, as does
the old school. The "new" buildings and campus are very attractive, but I miss the original, especially those majestic
old trees that lined the front of the school. There are new little trees, but it just isn't the same. But when I close
my eyes...
Judy G.
A FAMILY LEGEND
World War II is, for most people today, a series of entries in the history books, or perhaps,
a stirring movie. For the stuhasdent, the war ends up as a pile of facts to be memorized for a test. But
to the people who lived it, just like all of us now living through the Iraq War, it was an accepted part of ordinary,
day to day life, with occasional terribly sad moments, and even very happy ones, particularly when a loved
one, for example, was discovered to be very much alive. Again, it was just the way it was--ordinary life complicated
by a hateful war:like today.
Both my parents crossed the Atlantic from Europe to become part of the vast number
of immigrants well before World War II. Like millions of others, they met and married here and reared a family, never to return
"home." My mother, still a teenager when she arrived in the United States, never saw her parents and grandmother
again, in addition to two brothers and their families and other family members who never left Europe. My father never
saw his mother after leaving while still a young man (his father died before he was born). However, his older brother came
to the United States while the middle brother remained in Europe to tend to the family's business. Both
my parents had a number of relatives who had come here earlier and stood ready to greet them and help them move
ahead into the American dream.
Memories and thoughts remained, however, of those left behind. My mother learned that
her parents, some time after World War I, had fled to the local synagogue for protection against a band of marauders
who attacked the town. Before leaving, for good measure they burned down the synagogue with everyone in it.
Her brothers, for whatever reason, survived to rear families of their own in in Europe. My father's mother apparently
died a natural death soon after he left. But one brother and his family remained in Europe, in charge of family property.
During the 1930's a number of my father's relatives fled to the United States ahead of the Nazis. And with
the coming of the war, there was no way to contact those who were left behind and, later, who might still be alive
despite the Holocaust in which six million Jews were slaughtered, along with tens of millions of others. All were presumed
dead. My parents, along with all their friends and families, mourned their terrible losses.
My father
was an avid reader of the Jewish Daily Forward, a newspaper that did so much to help immigrant generations become absorbed
into the American mainstream, which my parents accomplished with ease. They learned to read,write, and correspond in
English as soon as their feet touched solid American ground. But my father remained dedicated to his "roots." I
can still recall the sepia, or brown, picture sections from the Sunday Forward, and the light classical music coming from
the radio. Those melodies still remind me of those days.
One of the objects of The Forward newspaper
when World War II barely ended, was to serve as a clearing house for those seeking relatives still alive in Europe and uniting
them with families living here. And one day, my father and his older brother read an ad in The Forward by this man who
had survived and was then in a refugee camp set up in Italy for survivors of the war. This survivor was looking for his
brothers, and indeed gave his and their names. My father realized at once that the man in the ad was his surving brother!
With great joy, he and my uncle completed the necessary investigations and paper work to bring my "new"
uncle, Philip, to the United States,with his new family. The story Uncle Philip told was harrowing enough. He and his
then-wife and two sons lived in haystacks and such and survived the war through the good graces of their Christian neghbors.
Alas, his first wife and one son didn't make it. But he made his way to the Italian camp after the war with his remaining
son and there met another woman, whom he married. His new wife also had a daughter, and all four became new members
of the now extensive American family.
My "new" uncle and his family lived happy, productive
lives, just like ordinary folks. But, sorry to say, he survived less than 20 years after arriving. My mother was
not so fortunate in finding any of her family alive. She was unable to track down her brothers and members of their families,
and so for the rest of her life presumed they died. My younger son's middle name is Philip.
Judy
G.
LITTLE BROTHERS
I remember my mother telling me, "Watch your baby brother!" while she
was involved in talking to one of our neighbors in front of our apartment building. Being about six years old at the time,
I wasn't particularly happy at that responsibility because my baby brother was in the habit of trying to free himself
from his stroller. Besides, I wanted to join my new friends who were playing marbles against the curb. As my mother kept up
her conversation with the neighbor, l lost patience and drifted away to watch my friends at their game.
A short
time later, my mother finished her conversation and suddenly exclaimed, "Where's your baby brother?! I told you to
keep an eye on him!" I looked at the stroller, and sure enough he wasn't in it. "I-I don't know where he
is!" I stuttered. I was very frightened and ready to cry. That did it; my mother's face had panic written all over
it, and the panic, naturally, spread to me. What had I done-or not done! My mother shouted to me, "You look that way-hurry!"
she pointed. Hurry where? I hadn't the vaguest idea. Then I had a brainstorm. My vanished baby brother had recently begun
to walk, and that would explain his escape from the stroller, but the crucial question was "Where would he walk?"
He was nowhere in the street, so I guessed that the nearest place would be the front door of our apartment building
because it was open. I sped into the building with a prayer on my lips. What the prayer was, I don't remember. I was only
six years old. But I reasoned, since he wasn't in the vestibule, it was possible that maybe he could crawl up the steps.
So I shouted his name and prayed to hear his voice. Thank God, it came just loud enough for me to hear it. He was somewhere
up above, already several steps up. I ran up the stairs and found him as I suspected, crawling towards our apartment. He probably
didn't understand why I was kissing him all over his face. He wouldn't have understood that I felt like some kind
of hero for finding him and at the same time scared of what might have been. I was also scared of my mother and what she would
do to me.
Needless to say, my mother's face was transformed from panic to something close to ecstacy when
I brought him to her. Fortunately for me, she was so grateful to see her baby safe and well that she forgot to punish me.
Norman
G.
THE TELEGRAM
Mention Orson Welles to a movie buff, and he/she will immediately come back with "Citizen
Kane," the movie masterpiece of Welles' career as actor, writer, director, producer on radio, in the movies, and
on the stage. To me, however, the name conjurs up so much more.
In my childhood, radio and the movies
were the prime sources of enteratinment. The radio, however, was most often the focus of family enoyment. I remember
that our kitchen table held a small radio because the "big" set, in the living room, was off limits to childish
fingers that couldn't be trusted to handle all the dials with respect.
The radio was turned on when my
mother worked in the kitchen, allowing her to listen to her favorite soap operas, and it was often turned on as soon
as we came home from school to listen to "Buck Rogers In The 25th Century," (or was it the 21st Century??!!). In
the evening, we listened to "The Telephone Hour" for beautiful light classical music, Jack Benny, and
a host of other funny people, and so on and on.
Radio held riches galore for everyone, and the richest of
all to me was that glorious voice known as Orson Welles. I was mesmerized. I must have heard him via "The Mercury
Theater Of The Air." I becamed a compulsive Orson Welles fan, and while maturity lowered the emotional level,
I still kept track of his career and loved his early films when I finally saw the man behind The Voice. Fast
forward several years, when I began going to City College in New York down on 23rd Street. We lived way up the subway
line in the Bronx. (New Yorkers know whereof I speak.)
I read in the newspaper entertainment section that Orson
Welles was coming to New York to do a particular radio show at a theater in Manhattan before a live studio audience.
Well!! How could I resist writing to him c/o the theater and telling him how much and how long I admired him.
There
I was, in class, listening to the professor, when my older brother stuck his head in the door! I thought something had happened
at home. After a conversation with the professor, my brother beckoned me. My heart pumped away. What was so wrong that
he would ride the subway for over a half-hour to tell me--what?
"You have a telegram from Orson Wells,"
he said out in the hall, not too happy at having been sent "downtown" by my father, who was more impressed
at the possibilities because he knew of my childhood infatuation. I should mention that riding the subway for long periods
of time was a normal part of life. No one owned a car, except that same brother several years later. But I digress.
At home, I learned that Orson Welles had left two tickets at the box office for me to watch the radio show as
it went out over the airwaves--that night! After a quick change of clothes and a quick call to a girlfriend,
we took the subway downtown, and, sure enough, word had been left at the box office allowing us to enter. And
we were ushered down to the first row!!
I have no idea what the show was about. I do remember sitting goggle-eyed
as he (then a young man) put some of the actors and a "chorus" of spoken voices through their paces a few times.
It could have been a Greek tragedy. It could have been a radio version of an original play. My memory of what happened in
the theater stops there. I do recall waiting for him outside the theater entrance back stage. But he just sailed
out and was greeted by some friends who all chattered about something and left.
I never did get his autograph. But I
did get a telegram from Orson Welles!
Judy G.
JUICED
This I remember .. . From a conversation with Gene Krawitz and Art Glantz as we recalled our
childhood days in Hawley, PA.
We were talking about some of our local gentry who had reputations for "imbibing the
spirits." We lived on the upper floor of a two story house, and the first floor apartment was rented out. One of
our tenants was a fellow named Buster A. Buster was a short fellow, maybe five feet tall and quite an older man when
we knew him. And for some reason he always reminded me of the cartoon figure Popeye. Buster was, in fact a retired railroader
having been a conductor on the Erie Railroad. And each month, when Buster received his retirement check, a good part of it
went for the "juice!" Well, you have to conjure up a picture of the following in order to know what happened
to Buster. As you came in the door to the apartment, there were three doors. The one on the right led into the
kitchen, the one on the left went into the bedroom, and the one right in front led down a flight of steps to the basement. At
the bottom of the stairway was our coal burning furnace. Our house got pretty cold at night and my Pop would often times get
up at 4 or 5 in the morning to stoke the furnace, put some coal in it, so it would warm up the house by the time
we got up in the morning. Well, Buster must have tied on a good one on Saturday night, and he came staggering home at
some late hour. When he entered the house, instead of going right, into the kitchen, or left into the bedroom, he opened the
door to the cellar and went tumbling down the steps and hit the furnace at the bottom of the stairs. He must have battered
himself up pretty good because there was a lot of blood all over the place. But next morning, Buster washed off the blood
and seemed as good as gold; nothing broken. The only thing we could figure was that the booze must have relaxed him
and probably saved Buster from any serious injury, or even saved his life!
Ed
K.
RELIGION IN SMALL TOWNS
When I was a young kid (now 81) I knew there were Catholic
churches elsewhere in our County. I think most of those today have been closed. But there was a little wooden FORMER Catholic
church atop the hill that leads over a bridge to the present E-burg Catholic church. I recall being in it in those days upon
special occasions when some child had a program at the School (which is still there). The priest there then is buried
in a dilapidated Catholic cemetery (claimed by no Catholic parish). He was the Catholic Church for most of us, Father Butler.
But Stroudsburg itself had no Catholic church (now has a Greek one as well as the biggest membership in the Scranton Diocese).
In those days a Greek Catholic occasionally went to Easton, Allentown, or Scranton services, and often came to our Lutheran
or Episcopal churches. The one held by Father Butler was lovely (as it still is) but is outflanked by St. Luke's now on
our Main St., at Stroudsburg. Do not fret. Stroudsburg now even has a synagogue and some small start-up Baptists
in several places.
W.E.C.
Dennis
OLD-TIME BASEBALL
We were big fans of the NY Giants and we would go into NY to see
ball games whenever we could.
One time, my brother Gene and a friend, Tommy B. went in to the city to attend a
night game between the Giants and their Brooklyn rivals, the Dodgers. The Giants had just returned from a Western road trip
and I think Bill Voiselle pitched for the Giants that night.
The Giant's left fielder was Joe "Ducky"
Medwick who later was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
Medwick drove in a run for the Giants early in the
game, but the Dodgers led 3-1 going into the bottom of the 9th inning. Medwick came up to bat and sliced one right down the
right field line, 257 feet away from home plate and it went into the stands for what used to be called a "Chinese Home
Run."*
That tied up the ball game and it went into extra innings. Then in the top of the 14th, the Dodgers
put a run across the plate and they won the ball game when the Giants couldn't score in the bottom half of the inning.
After the game, we three waited outside of the dressing room for the players to come out. When Medwick appeared, I remember
that his shoes had such a terrific shine that you could see your reflection in them.
There were a whole bunch
of kids walking along with Medwick asking for autographs, but Medwick didn't pay any attention to any of them, just kept
on walking.Finally the only people walking with him were these three kids from Hawley with my brother on one side and I and
my friend Tommy on the other. My brother said, "Geez Joe, it's too bad we lost the game, you did everything you could;
you drove in all three of our Giant runs ." And he kept praising Medwick, who didn't even say thanks or pay any attention
- just kept walking straight ahead.
Finally, I decided that we're going to have to call a halt to this thing
and I said, "Yeah, with a Chinese Home Run." With that Medwick goes boom boom and to a halt and he looked at me,
and I can still see those steel grey eyes - and he looked at me as if he was ready to kill me,then he turned his head and
without a word just walked off.
*A "Chinese Home Run" was sometimes defined as a "cheap home run"
such as the one described here. Others have defined it simply as "a ball fouled off by a batter that goes into the stands
behind the plate." It would appear that Medwick must have accepted the first definition since it riled him so.
Medwick (1911-1975) played for the Cardinals, Dodgers, Giants, and the [then] Boston Braves. He was voted the National League's
Most Valuable Player in 1937 and he was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1968 on the eighth ballot with 84.8% of the vote.
Ed K.
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