Monday Aug 25

by


Attend an Executive m.
of the camp, at Nathan
Zichlinsky’s house in
Willoughby Ave. Bklyn. I
initiated and swore in
Treskinoff a new member.

—————–

Matt’s Notes

I love this entry. While we know what Papa’s talking about here — his chapter of the Zionist fraternal order B’nai Zion met in Brooklyn and Papa, as Master of Ceremonies, swore in a new member — the furtive quality of his sentences, the use of abbreviations, and the presence of a character named “Treskinoff” makes it seem like a passage from a spy novel, or maybe Doestoevsky.

Then again, the ritual Papa conducted would have involved some kind of secret combination of oaths, prayers, and the use of physical props, perhaps even in a candle-lit or blacked-out room. Maybe this put him into a clandestine, adventurous mood and accounts for the whiff of espionage on this page.

———————

Additional Note

Fraternal and mutual support organizations (a.k.a. landsmanshaftn) provided the only real sense of community for early Jewish immigrants, especially those who arrived befor the 20th Century. Their initiation rituals were accordingly elaborate, the better to establish a sense of exclusivity, belonging, and safety in a world where they were otherwise strangers. By the 1920’s, as the greater Jewish community grew more established and the process of assimilation less onerous, fraternal organizations played a less central role in the lives of people like Papa and their ceremonies, predictably, became a little more low-key. I’m sure the rite Papa administered to Treskinoff was far less involved than what their predecessors went through.

Tuesday Aug 26

by


Clara lived up to her old
traits, After what a strenuous
effort to see her safely off
to the station when she went
to the country & she does not
write me.

Well, she don’t interest me
anyway.

Excused myself on phone before
the unknown girl that on account of
a cold I could not keep appointment

—————-

Matt’s Notes

Boy, Clara II really gets under Papa’s skin. To review, Clara II (so nicknamed to distinguish her from Papa’s sister Clara) is a distant cousin on whom Papa’s had a crush for a while. She likes to have him around to flatter and do favors for her, but she obviously doesn’t plan to get romantically involved with him.

For example, as Papa mentions above, the other day she convinced him to help her to the train station as she left for for a Jewish country retreat in Spring Valley, and afterwards he wrote of the “disappointment” and “humiliation” he felt because she’d manipulated him through “trickery.” He received a card from her a couple of days later but insisted he was “indifferent to her.” And today he continues to protest too much: She’s obviously been on his mind enough for him to write an unprompted diary entry about her letter-writing negligence, but he insists she “don’t interest” him.

I wonder if his uncharacteristic use of improper grammar indicates how distracted and angry Clara II makes him, or if he’s trying out some stern-sounding slang for effect, or if he just made a mistake. I also wonder if he called in sick to his blind date because he was really sick or if his irritation with Clara II — which, again, was strong enough to surface in his diary out of the blue — made him too grouchy to deal with an “unknown girl.”

—————-

Additional Note

I added this as an update to my August 16th post, but I’ll mention it a few more times for those keeping score: Clara II might not be Clara Breindel (on of the cousins Papa temporarily shared a bed with when he first came to America) as I’d originally thought. I think she actually might be “Clara the daughter of Cousin Leizer,” a.k.a. “Clara Leizers,” who Papa met shortly after she came over from the old country back in January. Seven months would certainly have given them enough time to establish their patterns of flirtation and frustration, especially considering how quickly and completely Papa could become absorbed with women he found attractive.

Wednesday Aug 27

by

[no entry]

————–

Nothing from Papa today, so I thought I’d share this photo of him, in which he seems to be a little older than in his photos from the early 1920’s. It looks like it was taken in a photo booth, perhaps on the Coney Island boardwalk, some time around 1930. Had he already met my grandmother? Had he, at this point, finally overcome the forces of stasis and dispatched the unfulfilled longing he suffered from and wrote about in 1924?

———

And here are some notable New York Times headlines that might have caught Papa’s eye on this day:

  • Henry Ford Defends Klan As a Body of Patriots

  • Ohio Democrats Denounce the Ku Klux Klan, Putting Davis’s Statement Into Their Platform
  • COOLIDGE STUDIES KU KLUX KLAN ISSUE; President Reads Many Letters to Him Giving Various Views on the Klan.
  • Flier Going 105 Miles an Hour Broadcasts to Nassau County — Looks like radio communication from a moving airplane was still a novelty in 1924.
  • RADIO CONFERENCE CALLED BY HOOVER; Better Regulation of Wireless to Be Discussed — Public to Be Represented. — The explosive popularity of radio, and the crowding of the airwaves, demanded some kind of government action. Herbert Hoover, then Secretary of Commerce and a friend of big business (as was his boss, President Coolidge) was loathe to regulate anything but called a bunch of conferences to ask broadcasters, many of them large corporations, how they’d like to regulate themselves. Not surprisingly and despite Hoover’s occasional rhetoric to the contrary, commercialism and the influence of corporations dictated the development of the broadcasting industry during this period.
  • ASSAILS ALIENISTS OF FRANKS SLAYERS; Prosecutor, in Last Argument, Scores ‘Twaddle’ of the ‘Three Wise Men of the East.’ — The Leopold and Loeb trial was wrapping up. In his summation, defense attorney Clarence Darrow had made an eloquent plea to save his clients from the death penalty. Prosecuting attorney Robert E. Crowe now attempted to counter Darrow’s arguments, and ridicule the psychologists who helped support them, in a strident, passionate speech. Darrow prevailed, and Leopold and Loeb were sentenced to life in prison plus 99 years.

Thursday Aug 28

by


Had another little meeting
at the order S.O.Z. offices
rehearsing the rituals

—————-

“Order S.O.Z.” stands for “Order Sons of Zion,” a.k.a. B’nai Zion, the Zionist fraternal organization Papa belonged to.

It’s slightly unusual for him to refer to the parent organization or mention a visit to its 23rd street offices; most of his B’nai Zion activities revolved around “The Maccabean,” as his Lower East Side chapter, or “camp,” was nicknamed. He was his camp’s Master of Ceremonies, though, so it looks like he had to attend occasional refresher courses in fraternal ritual (like the initiation rite he conducted a few days ago to swear in a new member with the fantastic name of “Treskinoff.”)

Papa’s Diary Map

———————

Note: I’m having some trouble finding out exactly what kind of rituals B’nai Zion might have conducted in the 20’s, so if you, dear reader, know anything more about this kind of thing, please send a note or drop a comment.

Friday Aug 29

by


Had C. on the phone
promised her to come out
to Spring Valley tomorrow,
as I intended to go for a
rest for the week end, I
shall go there as it is the
nearest place to the city.

I need the rest badly.

—————-

Matt’s Notes

Papa’s Diary Project is, among other things, a way for me to have some sort of grown-up conversation with my grandfather, to look at him not just with a four-year-old’s awe but with an adult’s admiration for his strength and accomplishments. I look at each page, each word he writes, and try to find in his thinking and behavior the seeds of his future, the hidden keys to his character. To me, every choice he makes, every movie he sees, every phrase he composes is a potential lead, a unique clue, a moment filled with intrigue.

Once in a while, though, he acted just like any other young man, and I think this was one of those times.

He told himself he was finished with “C.” a.k.a. Clara II, the distant cousin he was attracted to but who took advantage of his affection, returned his overtures only with unfulfilled promises and arms-length titillation. He had, in recent weeks, forsworn his pursuit of her; he had vowed not be fooled by her “trickery”; he had said “I am indifferent to her” and “she don’t interest me anyway.” Yet when she called, he answered. And not surprisingly, he rationalized: she just so happened to be near the city, he needed the rest anyway, he probably would have gone to Spring Valley even if she hadn’t been there.

I don’t think this needs more interpretation. I suppose you can’t grow up to be wise and wonderful without kidding yourself into making mistakes along the way.

Saturday Aug 30

by


Shapiro called me
up last night and today
we went together to Spring
Valley.

C. helped us to find
quarters, at night visited
the girls camp.

————-

Shapiro is a familiar character in Papa’s diary, a good friend and B’nai Zion brother who turns up a lot at parties and gatherings. I figure he and Papa met for Saturday morning services on the Lower East Side, stopped by their apartments to pick up some things for the weekend, and then took subway to Grand Central and caught the train to Spring Valley.

I have a photo of Coney Island from the 1920’s in which men walk the boardwalk at the height of summer in jackets, ties and hats, and I assume Papa dressed similarly. Did he and Shapiro also dress this way as they went north? Did they share the train with lots of other similarly-dressed Jews, all heading to join their friends at camps or bungalow colonies in the country? Did they fill the air inside the cars with smoke and hopeful chatter about their prospects for the long weekend? And, when they arrived in Spring Valley, did they finally loosen their ties and drape their jackets over their forearms as they dispersed? Did they walk miles to their camps, hop on buses, pile into cars if they were lucky enough to have friends who drove?

It’s been a little harder than I expected to get my questions about Spring Valley camps answered, but they keep piling up. What kind of “quarters” did Clara secure for Papa and Shapiro? A couple of cots in a bungalow shared with a dozen others? A motel room? A canvas tent? When they visited the “girls camp” in the evening, what exactly went on? Did they sit around a campfire and sing socialist songs? Did the trees and the crickets, the smell of smoke in the cool August air remind Papa of the European foothills he left behind, trigger long reminiscences of the old country? Did men and women inch closer, some of them slipping off in pairs, away from the firelight, to provide fuel for the next morning’s gossip?

And what of Papa and Clara II? He had vowed not to pursue her any further, knew she used him for flattery and favors but would likely leave his romantic desires unfulfilled. Yet still, he came to Spring Valley to see her. Perhaps his forgiving nature led him to hope she would not disappoint him, would not be true to form. Perhaps he knew it was foolish to entertain such hopes. Perhaps, to sit and watch her face by firelight, to see her flirt and laugh and tuck her hair behind her ear and know he could never have her gave shape to the feeling of “great longing” he lived with and had written of, a feeling he could not yet imagine a life without, a feeling that somehow fed his romantic soul’s hunger for unfulfilled desire, his poet’s love of pathos.

I do not know exactly what Spring Valley was like, but I do know Papa did not simply sit and sing and clap and laugh along with his friend Shapiro and think of nothing else. For all the synagogues and packed subway cars and noisy trains and cramped country quarters and parties in the woods he saw that day, I know he felt alone.

————-

Update:

Additional Note:

Fred, the CRRO (Chief Railroad Research Officer) for Papa’s Diary Project, tells us how Papa would have gotten to Spring Valley from the City: He would have walked across the Hudson Terminal at Chambers street to the Hudson Tubes, where he would have grabbed the old H&M to Jersey City. From there, he would have taken the Erie Railroad to Spring Valley. His return trip presumably traced the same path in reverse.

Sunday Aug 31

by


Again visited the camp
this evening. I am in
a way glad I have no
affection for C.

Her actions entitle
her to a new title wildest
for she was the most
daring and noisiest of
all girls; she has such
peculiar ways, so dissagre-
able to me, No such type
for me.

However she is my cousin
and as such I tried to
take care of her in a way
unknown to her.

Enjoyed the party at the
[girls] camp, as for a change
of environment it was
interesting.

————

I speculated a bit yesterday on what a party might have been like at the “girls camp” up in Spring Valley, New York, where Papa spent his Labor Day weekend. Once again, for all the scenery and crowds and festive action, he focused all his attention Clara II, the distant cousin for whom he insisted he had “no affection,” insisted with the persistence and vigor of a man who’s kidding himself.

While he continued to look for new ways to find Clara II distasteful in this entry, he wrote an odd thing, as well: “she is my cousin and as such I tried to take care of her in a way unknown to her.” I’m not sure what this means, though I can’t help but think she got drunk on prohibition liquor, and maybe Papa took her home and gently put her to bed.

Whatever happened, though, it occurs to me that this moment might reflect a deep change Papa was going through at this time. If I’m right about Clara II’s identity, she was distant cousin from the old country. I wonder if his longing for her was tied to his longing for his boyhood home, and I similarly wonder if his struggle to lose his affection for her was tied to his struggle to leave that boyhood behind. Papa’s father died back in May, and since then he had, painfully, sought ways to give up his dreams of reuniting with his family, sever his ties to the old country, and finally build a life for himself in America.

I’m writing this on the verge of Labor Day weekend, the official end of one season and the start of another, so maybe that’s making me look for signs of change everywhere, anticipate new chapters, perceive myself, my city, my Papa, my world as on the verge of something. But it was Labor Day weekend for Papa, too, the end of a terribly sad and introspective summer, and maybe the party at which he stopped pining for Clara II and started taking care of her was something of a valedictory for him. For a moment, at least, he saw her as what she was, not an object of longing, but an immature young woman, perhaps lonely and homesick herself, who needed help from someone older and wiser. Maybe, in a small way, he was starting to set aside his daydreams and take his world in hand.

⇐ Previous 7 Days|Next 7 Days ⇒