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——–

Monday 4:30 P.M.

Dearest: –

This is the only paper that I
have on hand so you will have
to excuse me. ¹

I have spent all day serving
on two cases and being empaneled
on a third one,

It looks like I’ll have to lose
full days while serving on
the jury.

Out of 150 people trying to
get exempted only 2 succeeded
the others including myself
will have to stick through the
2 weeks.

I will have to take advantage
of my evenings to make up for
part of my lost time. ²

As far as the “Roseland” is
concerned they won’t be ready
to start for another week and
when they do its full swing it
will be at the end of this month. ³

In case I’m a little late tomorrow
night at Rose’s, know that only urgent
work at the store can detain me.

As you will note by the enclosed
everything is attended. ⁴

Everything being O.K. I am as ever

Your Loving

Harry.

———–

Matt’s Notes

1 – Papa wrote this letter on a torn strip of paper, the other side of which bears the letterhead from “THE LAW OFFICES OF HARRY GRAYER” at 44 Court Street in Brooklyn, New York.

I’m not sure why Papa was still carrying a letter dated November 20, 1929 as late as January 20, 1930, but its importance obviously did not supersede his need to write my grandmother a report on his jury duty status. This leads me to think…

2 – …we should, at this point, pause to discuss why Papa was writing to my grandmother at all in 1930. Remember, when he wrote his last letter in September of 1929, it was to beg my grandmother not to throw him over, after five years of intense courtship, for another suitor. He was frustrated, angry and sure his dream of transforming his life through partnership with my grandmother was about to dissolve. Yet here he was, just four months later, sending my grandmother a casually scribbled, familiar note to tell her he might be late for dinner at her sister Rose’s house. So what’s going on here?

As the family story has it, my great-grandfather, Samuel Pollack, died unexpectedly and relatively young in late 1929 or early 1930. He had been successful in business, counting at least one factory and an array of Brighton Beach properties among his assets. Unfortunately for his family, his wealth was tied up in a byzantine system of debts and credits that he had not yet, at the time of his early death, started to explain to anyone. My grandmother and her brother, Bob, tried to decipher his books, but it wasn’t long before they’d sold off everything and could no longer count themselves among the wealthy.

It was during this time that my grandmother, convinced of Papa’s good character and stability, announced her decision to marry him. Some members of her family objected, citing her father’s feelings about Papa (remember, her father introduced Papa to my grandmother’s less desirable sister, Sally, for matrimonial purposes and was dismayed when Papa fell for my grandmother instead) and tried to change her mind. As my grandmother used to say, though, she would not be dissuaded because she knew that Papa would “take care” of her.

The psychologist in me shouts “aha!” to see how my grandmother, faced with the loss of her real father, chose an older, paternal figure like Papa to fill the role of protector and provider. The death of a parent can lead to such decisions. In fact, we’ve seen it before in the course of Papa’s Diary Project: For emotional reasons I have previously discussed in detail, Papa had real trouble accepting America as his home until his father, who was back in the old country, died in 1924. After that, Papa seemed to realize he wasn’t going home again, and he became single-mindedly compelled to start a family of his own. (Ironically, this single-mindedness led to his exclusive commitment to my grandmother, who kept him in limbo for six more years.)

What should we make of Papa and my grandmother’s courtship, triggered as it was by the death of one father and resolved years later by the death of another? Is it sad, or odd, or more typical than we think?

3 – Though the famed Roseland Ballroom was in operation in 1930, Papa probably wasn’t referring to it here when he wrote about “the Roseland.” It was more likely a dress store he’d hoped to buy and run with my grandmother (Papa mentioned in his last letter his dream of marrying my grandmother and building a retail empire with her) though, according to my mother, my grandmother “chickened out” after they’d put a deposit on it.

4 -This letter contains a Brooklyn Edison Company electric bill that Papa must have paid for my grandmother while he was on jury duty.

The bill is addressed to my grandmother’s family’s home at 226 Hart Street, but it’s in her name. It shows a charge of $2.17 for the December-January billing period and an arrears charge of $2.22 for the previous month. It’s pretty clear, then, that at this point she’d lost her father and was having trouble managing his business affairs.

If you’re interested in such artifacts, the back of this bill contains an especially intriguing marketing message designed to get Brooklyn Edison customers to use more electricity:

Here it is transcribed:

Perhaps this is an appropriate way to begin 1930 and, as it happens, our final set of Papa’s letters. At long last, Papa has officially started caring for my grandmother and entered the world of electric bills, Mazda lamps, and dinner at his soon-to-be sister-in-law’s. In a way, this mundane bit of domestic correspondence could be the most satisfying letter he had yet sent.

Papa’s 1924 diary entry from the eve of Yom Kippur is worth another look.

——–

Tuesday

Most beloved Jeanie Dear:

I sincerely hope that you are in a
better mood today, I was really sorry
to have seen you aggravate yourself last
night the way you did.

It is in my belief a nervous state of
mind due to accumulation of various
troubles of late.

I’m sure you’re over it now.¹

I’ve had no chance to call you up
today so I’m writing you these lines,

This was quite an eventful day
to me as well as to many another
person connected with the trade
I am pertaining to the walkout in

./.

2

my industry.

Being in the midst of it all
throughout the day and being a keen
observer I’ve got enough impressions
to last me for some time.

From early in the morning the
people in the place looked up to me
as their guide and leader waiting
impatiently for the hour when they
would lay down their tools.

Promptly at 10 o’clock we stopped
and the establishment became all
quiet.

We said good by to the employers
who watched us in amazement at
the unanimous response to the Union
Call, and as we came down
streams of enthusiastic workers

3

were emptying the huge buildings
in the garment district, The scenes
were very touching indeed, The
strickers went to many halls
Similar scenes as I have described
have been repeated at almost
every dressmaking establishment,

Every canopy in front of of big
buildings on 7th Ave. was occupied
by news and reel cameras taking
down scenes of the masses.²

Of course whatever I’m writing
here is from the human side of it,

The only embarrasment of the
day came while standing on the
platform at Bryant Hall ³an Italian
girl worker overcome with emotion
ran up the platform and

./.

4

embraced me just immediately
after I’ve made an announcement.

It appears that the stricke won’t
last long I am very optimistic at
the outcome of it.⁴

I don’t know whether you are interested
in the descriptions of scenes, but I
am connected with it, and thought
I have to share my impressions with
my beloved.

So long Jeanie Dear, I
will call you at the office tomorrow
(Wed.)

Your

Harry

P.S.

Fathers photograph buttons will be ready
Thursday night.⁵

————–

1 – My grandmother’s “nervous state of mind” really was “due to accumulation of various troubles” at this time, as she was both mourning the recent, premature death of her father and struggling to prevent the consequential, sudden dissolution of her family’s wealth. (As I’ve mentioned before, her father had built his wealth by financing his holdings against each other. This house of cards quickly collapsed when he was no longer there to tend it, despite the best efforts of my grandmother and her brother, Bob.)

That said, my grandmother wasn’t exactly known for her adherence to the Serenity Prayer, and as my mother points out might have had “a fit the night before” Papa wrote this letter for any reason, or even for no reason. I think Papa’s willingness to explain away her mood tells us less about her specific circumstances than it tells us about his capacity to tolerate (and even take pleasure in tolerating) her chronic grouchiness.

2 – While Papa’s last few letters showed him at his most desperate and helpless as he virtually begged my grandmother not to reject him, this passage reminds us that he occupied a much more authoritative and respected position in the world of labor activism (and was, it seems, admired by women like the “Italian girl worker” who embraced him during his speech.)

The strike detailed here involved some 25,000 to 35,000 garment workers who, according to the New York Times, sought “a $5 wage increase for week workers; a 10 per cent increase in the minimum basic rates for piece workers; elimination of the sweatshop; confinement of all outside production to union contracting shops; creation of impartial machinery to police the industry and establishment of an unemployment insurance fund.” The International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union was the primary labor “factor”, while the Affiliated Dress Manufacturers, Inc., the Wholesale Dress Manufacturers, and the Association of Dress Manufacturers represented the management “factors.”

Papa’s account of the walkout provides, as he points out, a good look at the “human side” of the story and a good complement to the Times’ coverage:

Approximately 25,000 men and women employed in the dressmaking industry here went on strike at 10 A.M. yesterday to reorganize and stabilize the industry, to eliminate sweat shops, and to regularize employment.
…

Promptly at 10 A.M. the shop chairmen gave the signal. In thousands of shops power was shut off, sewing machines stopped, pressing irons clattered on the shelves and scissors and needles were thrust aside…

Chatting and joking vivaciously the dress employees circles the garment zone under the eyes of 4,000 patrolmen and then marches to the fifteen meeting halls, where they were registered and advised of the tasks awaiting them…

The union leaders were gratified by the large number of negro women who responded to the strike call. The walkout is the first one involving the negro dressmakers, who are comparatively new to the industry. Bryant Hall, Arlington Hall and the other meeting places were jammed with strikers who registered and who will return today for mass meetings.

3 – It looks like Papa was one of the “shop chairmen” mentioned above and, as his account indicates, supervised some of the goings-on at Bryant Hall, a venue with which he was probably quite familiar; located at 1085 6th Avenue near 42nd Street, it was an important gathering place for labor activists until the Horn and Hardart company converted it into a restaurant in 1934. Here’s a photo, via the Library of Congress, of a mass meeting held there in 1912:

Papa’s political activism stemmed from a sincere wish to make the world a better and safer place. His descriptions of his leadership role, the “anonymous response to the Union Call,” the stunned faces of factory managers, and the welcome site of “the masses” on the march show how truly carried away he was by the ideological and historical thrill of the moment.

4 – The Times’ coverage characterizes the dressmakers’ strike of 1930 as a rather orderly and reasonable affair thanks to the negotiating efforts of then-New York Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt and Lieutenant Governor Herbert H. Lehman. Still, the Times does mention one violent incident in which strikebreakers brawled with Millinery Workers on 38th Street, which implies, I think, that plenty more violence went unreported. My mother reminds me that that Papa had his nose broken by a strikebreaker at some point before he got married; could it have happened during the eight days of this strike?

Papa with his original nose (left) and strike-broken nose

5 – It was fairly typical for people to make photo buttons of loved ones back in the day, though why my grandmother wanted photo buttons of her father made three months after his death is a mystery. Perhaps she ordered them right after he died and it just took a long time to make them, or maybe she planned to distribute them at some sort of memorial service. In any event, it looks like Papa, who was now engaged to my grandmother and increasingly involved in her day-to-day life (in his last letter he discussed an electric bill he payed on her behalf) took care of the arrangements.

———

References for this post:

• DRESSMAKERS VOTE TODAY ON STRIKE; Balloting to Follow Address by Green at Ratification Mass Meeting. – The New York Times, February 1, 1930
• GARMENT STRIKE SET FOR TUESDAY; 35,000 Dressmakers Will Get Call to Quit at 10 A.M. and Go to 15 Meeting Halls. – The New York Times, February 1, 1930
• BRYANT HALL YIELDS TO MODERN BUILDING; Landmark Near Park in Hands of Wrecking Crew — Site Leased for Restaurant. – The New York Times, June 20, 1934
• GOV. ROOSEVELT ACTS TO END DRESS STRIKE AS 25,000 WALK OUT; Calls Leaders of Four Factors in Industry to Albany for Conference on Friday. – The New York Times, February 5, 1930
• FOUR HURT IN STRIKE FIGHT; Millinery Pickets Clash With Negro Strike-Breakers in Street. – The New York Times, February 7, 1930
• DRESS PEACE SIGNED AFTER 8-DAY STRIKE; SWEATSHOP END SEEN; Compact Provides Impartial Chairman and Board to Study Reforms in the Industry. – The New York Times, February 13, 1930
• Biography of Herbert H. Lehman from Wikipedia

A reader named Barbara, having come across Papa’s account of the February 4, 1930 Dressmakers’ strike, writes:

My 95 year old grandmother was a seamstress in the New York garment district during the Depression. She participated in two strikes. We are trying to piece together the years that these strikes took place, and some of the other details. She remembers leaving work at 12:00 (your [grand]father’s diary says 10:00), she was in the needle district, and that everyobody was pouring out of work and wandering around in the streets, as your [grand]father says. She says that they didn’t have signs and picket, that it was all workers in the streets, she doesn’t remember any violence.

And, on the subject of whether or not the Dressmakers represented a subset of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union:

It was the whole ILGWU. My grandmother has referred to it as the Dressmakers Union throughout the years. When I read the whole long name of the Union, I thought the Dressmakers were a subsection. She said no, that the ILGWU was the actual union she was a part of.

Long live the Internets!

I’ve tried to keep this blog focused strictly on Papa and his diary and letters, but I feel like it’s okay to break that rule just once (especially because it’s been weeks since I’ve been able to concentrate long enough to write a new post about Papa).

The Bush administration has authored a grotesque and shameful chapter in our country’s history, but today we started to turn the page on it. I hope, years from now, this moment will still seem as important as it does right now.

——–

Feb. 26, 1930

Beloved:

I called you this evening at home
and left a message with Sylvia. ¹

I gave in your dress to the cleaners last
night figuring that I’d get it back on Friday
but passing by this evening the man called
me in and explained to me that his dyer
was there during the day and told him that the
material of your dress would shrink considerably
if dyed, you see it has to be boiled in dye for
a half hour.

So I’ve decided that rather than spoil the
garment I’ll have it pressed only unless you
still want me to have it dyed.²

I got another string of beads in exchange
for the others, should you not care for them
I’ll get a credit slip for a dollar.

I have seen some real nice suits I
wish you could see them before I decide to
get one.

Since you told me that you would go to
the dentists tomorrow (Thursday) I’m sure
that you will forgive me if I’ll take the
privelege to meet you in front of the building
at 6:00 P.M. (at 100 W. 42nd St.) ³

./.

I’ve got my first weeks salary in this new
season so I can buy the things I need.
I had hoped that you’d come to the
store this evening after the court session
but I’m certain that somebody took
you home safely.

I may call you before I meet you
that is if I can manage to get away before
5:45.

Beloved: I am so longing for you
I know that I shall be impatient tomorrow
but happy in the thought of meeting you
in the evening ⁴

For the present

Au revoir

Your devoted faithful and loving

Harry.

————

1 – I’m not sure who Sylvia is, but my mother thinks she may have been a boarder my grandmother’s family took in as their financial situation worsened. (As we’ve previously discussed, my grandmother’s father died unexpectedly in late 1929, leaving behind an impenetrable tangle of business interests. The start of the Great Depression was obviously not the best time for this kind of thing to happen, and not surprisingly the financial stability of my grandmother’s family fell apart with the rest of the country’s.)

2 – What was the cleaner’s shop like? Was it a Garment District storefront, its front room bright and clean and filled with paper-wrapped packages of laundry? Was its back room contrastingly dark and humid, concealing a pessimistic dyer who muttered his predictions over vats of boiling clothes? I’m looking for photos of Prohibition-era laundry shops, so send ‘em if you’ve got ‘em.

3 – My grandmother’s dentist was fifteen blocks from Papa’s workplace (the Lion Costume Company at 13-15 West 27th Street, near Broadway) so Papa may have taken the Interborough subway line (the blue line in the illustration below) from 28th and 4th to Grand Central Terminal at 42nd and Lexington, grabbed a crosstown train to Fifth Avenue, and walked a block west to 6th Avenue, where my grandmother was waiting at 100 West 42nd Street. It’s more likely, though, that he took the BMT (the orange line below) from Broadway and 28th to to 42nd and 7th and walked a block east.

4 – When Papa met my grandmother, he felt like he’d been waiting for her his whole life. (For those of you just joining us, he courted her for five full years despite her and her family’s efforts to dissuade him. She had only decided to marry him a couple of months before he wrote this letter.) As I’ve mentioned before, though, what I really think he was waiting for was the chance to take care of someone like her, to see her happiness and comfort as his responsibility. Thus, no everyday domestic errand, from taking her clothes to the cleaner, to exchanging her necklace at the jeweler, to waiting for her at the dentist’s office, was too mundane to seem like less than a “privelege”.

———


Image source: 1930 Subway map from mappery.com

——–

March. 18. 1930¹

Beloved:

Before I go to the store I wish to write to you a
few lines, it is raining now and I won’t miss anything
if I’ll get there a little late. ²

You know Dear, your promise to be at the store
tomorrow after the court session was the stimulant that
gave me new life.

I had passed another miserable night in the fear
that I might lose you a thought that is torturing my mind.

You know Beloved: that I am of the idealistic
kind, and of all my ideals you are the one and only one
worth living and fighting for. ³

I have often read of people who who felt tired of
life, then I could hardly conceive anything of the sort, but
last night I felt it, I was so sceptical for a moment that
I really had those thoughts.

Sweetheart! let the opinion about me by your
your better friends like Mr. Richman, Aunt Celia etc.
outweigh that of gossips who really haven’t your best
interests at heart.

Oh Dear: when I reached home last night the world
was dark for me, I was whol wholly distressed.

With you Beloved life will be one of sunshine, everything
happiness, ambition and indefatigable spirit.

Without you (Lord beware) a life of desolation and
neglect, ambition killed and nothing to live and fight for
If I’d hear a melody it would fill my heart with sadness
instead of joy, The sun, the moon in fact everything that
beautiful nature has to offer would only remind me of You Sweetheart
and my lost happiness.

Beloved we are both meant for each other, Believe in
me, trust me. I am fighting my uphill battle and with your
encouragement nothing will stop me from getting to the top. ⁴

I will call you at 1:05 P.M. tomorrow (Wed.) on phone.

Meanwhile Dear Sweetheart Adieu.

Your loving

Harry

—————-

1 – I have only a few of Papa’s letters left and, since I remember how melancholy I felt when I published the last entry in his diary at this time last year, I’ve tried to put off the day when I publish his last letter (and with it the last words of his in my possession) by taking longer and longer between posts. In any event, I’ll pick it up again with this particularly difficult and raw moment in March of 1930, after my grandmother had agreed to marry Papa but had not, apparently, let him think it counted for much.

2 – Papa was an honest and responsible sort who was probably never late to work, much less deliberately so; his need to get his feelings on paper really must have been overwhelming. What could my grandmother have said to him to make him think their engagement was so tenuous? Had she hinted that she might change her mind, or even overtly told him that she was having second thoughts?

3 – As we’ve discussed at length before, Papa’s idealism was one of his most admirable qualities, but it may also have led to many of his romantic difficulties. As we saw in his 1924 diary, his need to find an ideal, perfect partner often left him unexcited by “ordinary” women, or, even more dramatically, resulted in cycles of elation and disappointment in which he’d meet a seemingly perfect woman only to be dismayed when she (as all people do) inevitably displayed less-than-perfect behavior.

For a number of reasons that we’ve also discussed, Papa had decided, by early 1925, to break these patterns. While I have no doubt that he truly loved my grandmother, I also think he was resolved not to find fatal faults or grow disenchanted with her. The fact that my grandmother was not ready, at 17, to be the object of his resolve didn’t seem to bother him much, at least for a couple of years. It was not until 1929 that his belief in the inevitability of their union started to buckle under the weight of her pointed attempts to cool his ardor and her ongoing interest in other men.

By the time Papa wrote this letter, though, my grandmother had agreed, decisively if not enthusiastically, to marry him. This would have been a great relief to him because it put an end not just to six years of courtship, but to the sense of displacement Papa had never shaken in the seventeen years he’d been in America. Now, at last, he could settle in this country and make it his own. Expressions of doubt from my grandmother, at this late stage, revived the specter of Papa’s long bout with loneliness and disorientation, and I don’t doubt that the idea of slipping back into that state was truly “torturing” his mind.

4 – Papa was a romantic sort and loved the melodrama of opera, great poetry, silent movies. I think the language he uses here stems from those influences, though of course the worry he expresses is sincere and immediate. What he meant here by getting to “the top” is hard to say since it means different things to different people, but I think I can guess what he had in mind: