Tuesday May 6

by


Movie at Academy of Music

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Matt’s Notes

As we’ve discussed before, the Academy of Music was a storied venue that had fallen on hard times by the time Papa went there to see movies.

Once the home of New York Opera, and therefore the very seat of Knickerbocker society, it’s primacy came to an end at the hands of William H. Vanderbilt. Some time around 1880 Vanderbilt, who was considered nouveau riche by the standards of Knickerbocker society, was so incensed by the unavailability of boxes at the Academy that he simply decided to build his own opera house. Other like-minded millionaires jumped on board, and by May of 1883 their project, the old Metropolitan Opera House on 39th and Broadway, was in business.1

The Academy, having remained on top for forty years since its 1849 opening, took another forty to expire from Vanderbilt’s vengeful blow. Its popularity (and box seats) were gone by the late 1800’s, and bit by bit it conceded to host lower-brow attractions like wrestling, musical theater, and, finally, movies. The wrecking ball ended its misery in 1926, when the Consolidated Gas Company knocked it down and built new corporate headquarters in its place (the Con Ed building still stands in the same spot at 14th and Irving).

Did Papa know the Academy had but two years of life remaining when he wrote the above entry? We can’t be sure, but we do know he most certainly didn’t see any of that week’s first-run movies like Men, with Pola Negri, or Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall, with Mary Pickford. The Academy wasn’t considered an important enough venue to make the New York Times listings, but it probably showed movies that had been hanging around town for a few weeks, like “The Thief of Bagdad,” “America,” “Three Weeks” or “Beau Brummel.” (While searching the Times archive I did come across a couple of enjoyable feature stories about the sorry state of subtitle writing and Hollywood’s lack of good scripts, complaints that persist today in movie journalism. Check them out if you’re a movie fan.)

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References

1 – As noted by Irving Kolodin in his History of the Metropolitan Opera 1883-1950:

Few of us today could imagine a society in which a mere whim could determine the existence of such a structure as the Metropolitan. Lilli Lehmann has recorded the circumstances in her memoirs, My Path through Life (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons; 1914): “As, on a particular evening, one of the millionairesses did not receive the box in which she intended to shine because another woman had anticipated her, the husband of the former [Vanderbilt] took prompt action and caused the Metropolitan Opera House to rise.”

Wednesday May 7

by


Stopped this morning long enough
to bid Bon Voyage to our leader
Weitzman, The scene was a very
impressive one as the huge ship
moved out slowly.

In evening had Miss B. out
for a bus ride it was pleasant.

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Matt’s Notes

The ship Papa saw off that morning was the Aquitania, the pride of the Cunard line in the early 20th Century (other Cunard ships included the Mauretania and the ill-fated Lusitania). Noted for her great size and opulent interiors, the Aquitania was the last of the “four-stackers” and a favorite among movie stars and aristocrats in the 20’s, so the sight of her leaving New York harbor would have been as impressive as her passenger list.

Among those on board with Chaim Weitzman were Ogden Reid, who had bought the New York Herald to create the Herald-Tribune just six weeks before, and Prince Felix Youssoupoff, flamboyant husband of Princess Irina of Russia, the niece of Russia’s last Tsar, Nicholas II. According to the New York Times, the Prince had been in America to sell off a “large collection of jewelry” while Weizmann “carried with him approximately $5,000,000 raised in the United States for the restoration of Palestine.” It might have been a tad awkward if Youssoupoff and Weizmann ran into each other on the Aquitania, since Youssoupoff had been a key member of Nicholas II’s brutally anti-Semitic court (so much so that he participated in the murder of Rasputin). Hopefully the cruise director sat them at different dinner tables.

Papa, of course, knew not of the Aquitania‘s luxurious dining rooms and lounges, so while his “leader” was sailing to England, Papa contented himself with a social cruise on one of New York City’s buses. We’ve seen romantic episodes unfold for Papa aboard trolleys and trains, so perhaps he thought a bus ride with “Miss B.” on a lovely, 65-degree day would have been just the thing (this is his first mention of her, so I wonder if she’s the woman he met at a Zionist ball a few days before). Was this a typical way for people like Papa to get acquainted? What bus would they have taken?

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References

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Image sources:

Thursday May 8

by

Again a marriage broker
tried to induce me to get
hitched up. He gave me
the phone numbers to some
fair maidens. I shall try.

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Matt’s Notes

Since my wife Stephanie sings the entire soundtrack to Fiddler on the Roof at least once during any long car ride (and we take a long car ride at least once a week) it’s hard for me to read about Papa’s marriage broker and not have the song “Matchmaker, Matchmaker” running through my head.

As you’ll recall, Fiddler‘s Yente faced a challenge as a new generation of young people who preferred to choose their own mates threatened the importance of her profession. Papa’s matchmaker (that’s shatkhn in Yiddish, so if you know someone named Shatkin, chances are their Anglicized name reflects a matchmaking heritage in Eastern Europe) must have struggled with an even more difficult cultural moment, since young Jews in America — even those right from the old country like Papa — were learning to date, eat in restaurants, congregate, go out in public and dress like any other Americans.

Papa certainly displayed some old-school attitudes toward dating, as his formal letter of affection to the “20th Century Girl” proved, so I’m sure he wouldn’t have dismissed the efforts of the shatkhn. Still, we’ve seen him balk a bit at blind dates because (I think) his poetic heart demanded a romance with more dramatic, sincere origins, so he most likely pored through the shatkhn’s catalog with some reluctance. I think, too, his skeptical attitude comes through in his use of the term “hitched up” and the phrase “He gave me the phone numbers to some fair maidens,” making this just about the only entry to date in which Papa employed American vernacular or irony.

All in all I think we see, in this account of Papa’s grudging interaction with the shatkhn, a well-preserved example of how Lower East Side Jews of the 1920’s started to shift, in their attitudes and behavior, away from the old country and into the new.

Friday May 9

by


Home.

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Matt’s Notes

A slow evening at home for Papa; he probably listened to the radio and perused the day’s headlines. It looks like it was a slow news day, though a couple of New York Times stories that might have caught his eye included:

REPORT MEASURE FOR RADIO CONTROL; House Committee Bill Provides for the Application of Anti-Trust Laws. – A bill to create a Bureau of Radio in the Department of Commerce, with broad powers to regulate broadcasting and “the correction of evils that have grown up as the science has progressed” was introduced before Congress. Papa was an early adopter of radio (the commercial radio industry was all of two years old in 1924) and would have been keenly interested in any attempts to regulate broadcasting.

This article shared a page with story about how “Houdini, the conjuror” challenged a young man named Joaqin Maria Argamasilla to prove his claim that he could read through metal. He couldn’t.

SAY BRITAIN APPROVES TUNNEL UNDER CHANNEL; France Hears Project, Already Authorized There, Is Planned to Provide Employment. – Britain agreed to finish a tunnel to France started in 1883, the construction of which had been halted due to security concerns (among them the dangers of a poison gas attack). The tunnel opened in 1994.

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While Papa’s taking it easy, we might as well take a look at another of his photographic calling cards, or “cabinet cards,” from the 20’s. I like this one because it’s tinted and signed:

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And remember, if you’re just getting started with Papa’s Diary Project, here are a few good subjects to check out:

Saturday May 10

by


Early this morning I took
Nettie to the Hospital.
Waited there all day
but no news.

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Matt’s Notes

Fear not: nothing was wrong with Papa’s sister Nettie. Though Papa hadn’t mentioned it before, she’d been pregnant all year and was now in labor. I’m not sure where her husband Phil was, but Papa was accustomed to helping his sisters out in various ways (you’ll recall how Papa paid for Phil’s English lessons, though that didn’t work out so well) so I’m not surprised it fell to him to take Nettie to the hospital.

Stand by…

Sunday May 11

by

Nettie gave birth to a baby boy
visited her at Hospital she
is weak.

Like through some misterious
power I feel downhearted.
Today,

Wired home to Europe
the news of the birth.

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Matt’s Notes

This is the second birth of a nephew, the second trip to the maternity ward, the second dash to the Western Union telegraph office for Papa in the last six weeks. Why, though, should such an event make him feel “downhearted,” a reaction so incongruous it feels like the work of a “misterious power?”

I’m sure Papa’s longing for a family of his own and for the family he left behind in Europe are partly responsible. We’ve seen, on several occasions, how holidays or milestone events served to bring those deep and difficult feelings to the fore, affecting Papa with sudden, seemingly inexplicable depression.

The birth of his other sister Clara’s son back in late March didn’t have the same effect, but the circumstances were different in several ways. Papa was in the opening throes of what he thought to be a burgeoning romance at the time, so perhaps the birth of his nephew contributed to an overall sense of optimism. The romance fizzled, though, plunging Papa into a long bout of gloom over his domestic prospects; maybe the birth of Nettie’s son reminded him of his disappointment and seemingly insoluble bachelorhood.

Nettie also already had a child named Ruchaly, but she was sickly and had, in fact, just experienced a serious illness a few months earlier. I gather that Nettie and her husband Phil were in difficult financial straits — Papa had recently been giving them financial support while Phil was out of work — so I’m sure the birth of their new child would have made Papa more than a little concerned.

Finally, we need to remember that Papa’s father had taken a bad fall at the end of February and still hadn’t recovered. Though he wouldn’t have written it down or acknowledged it to himself, he must have struggled mightily with the thought that his father might never see Nettie’s new son.

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I transcribed the fourth line of this entry as “Life brought some misterious new power,” but I’m not sure I’m reading the first two words right. Here’s the line in Papa’s handwriting:

Did I transcribe it correctly?

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Update: I’ve looked at this again and I the words are “Like through.” I’ve changed the tranncription above accordingly.

Monday May 12

by


A letter from Isaac brought
the distressing new of my
fathers death. A reply
from home later on my telegram verified
the news.

The news broke my heart and
body for my father was the source
of all my inspiration the guiding
spirit for the whole family.

The news was broken to sister Clara
[and] with her I am observing the Shiva
at her house.

Mothers wish to name Nettie’s child
after father will be complied with.
I cannot now state my feelings,
I am too much overtaken with
grief.

With a trembling heart voice I recited my first Kadish

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Matt’s Notes

It’s best, I think, to leave Papa alone with his grief for the moment and allow him to remember the face of his father, Joseph Scheurman.

photo of Papa's parents

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Only real life can devise such cruel timing. No sooner had Papa wired home the news of his new nephew’s birth than he received word of his father’s death.

The notification arrived by mail, too, meaning Papa’s father must have been dead for days while Papa naively went about his business. I’m sure this made the moment even worse for him because it would have affirmed just how distant and removed he was from the world of his youth. Any hope he might have had of recapturing what he’d lost, of reuniting with his parents and family, of seeing them all in one place, was now gone. He would never dream of home the same way again. A terrible turn for Papa, for whom dreams were so important.

The telegram and the letter from his brother must have remained, side-by-side, on the kitchen table while he wept. Later, he would have put them in his pocket, collected himself and walked to his sister Clara’s house. On the way he would have thought of his other sister Nettie, who lay, resting, in the hospital, unaware that her newborn son had just been named.

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