Brooklyn in Love and at War

This letter is from the U.S. Naval Training Station in Sampson, New York. Alex wrote it to Sylvia in 1943.

My darling

A week from today I’ll be in your arms at this time. Sweetheart, forgive me if I don’t write you long letters, believe me I am going in circles from work. They gave us another Battaglion (Battalion?) Standby watch and where ever they need work to be done they send us. Today we shined the administrator’s buildings floors, and besides that we have our own work to take care of, particularly because we have had our extra work taken away from us. I received all your wonderful letters, I can’t do justice to them and I am sorry.

I wrote mom and told her the time I’ll be home, I think we still should do as planned and go over to her home when I arrive. I don’t know what will you do about the shows, but honey I really don’t care. The only think I want is to be with you, near you, to kiss you and make love to you. Everything else is really secondary. So don’t worry about that, if worse comes to worse you will go by yourself after I left and will try to console yourself. This will sound lousy, but honey don’t worry we together and nothing artificial will be needed to stimulate us. I’ll be so happy in the Cookie and Mummy and Daddy combination. What else can a guy want?

It is very nice that the girls wanted to present you with the tickets to make our get together so pleasant, that is really friendship.

Poor Cookie, so she has a rash, I am glad you are taking her to the clinic and I hope her cold is a thing of the past by the time this arrives. You can’t imagine how hard it is to imagine her, because I could believe she is as small as when I left her and I can’t imagine her any bigger.

So mummy’s clothes can already be remodeled, that is splendid, and so cheaply too. I always knew that my wife was an artist.

Don’t feel badly about my castigation, I’d suffer hell for your sake!

Don’t send any mail after Sunday, but Sunday send a long letter so that I’ll be to hold out till Thursday.

That’s me pushing the broom.

That’s me sleeping on my watch.

That’s me dreaming of you and Cookie.

That’s me and you at the station next Thursday evening.

My love to you and Cookie,

Daddy

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This letter from Alex, written in 1943, is particularly interesting because it goes through such a wide array of sentiments in its short four pages. Each page seems dedicated to a different side of Alex and a different part of the life he is leading. Alex begins the letter in a tired voice, apologizing that he cannot write long letters like Sylvia does. He talks about the work he is doing and how he feels like he is going in circles. None of it sounds particularly rewarding.

On the second page Alex becomes sweeter – focusing on his trip home. Sure, it’s kind of uncomfortable to read about my grandpa wanting to have sex but once we get past that this page is a fascinating display of what kind of man he was. He is a little forceful in his opinion that he and Sylvia should go right to his mother’s house when he returns and spend the rest of their time doing whatever they want together. He does not want to go to a show that Sylvia has been planning to attend. He simply says he doesn’t care about the show and she will have to deal with it. He is  also saying this as a loving father who couldn’t ask for more than to be with his wife and child. The page ends with a kind sentiment that Sylvia has good friends. Alex is aware that he is being a little rude and this is the most tension I have seen so far in one of these letters.

The third page is Alex as a father and husband. He addresses Cookie’s cold and rash and then sadly relates that he cannot imagine Cookie any bigger than she was the last time he saw her. This leads him to tell Sylvia when she should and shouldn’t write to him. His somewhat bossy instructions just show how  important the letters are to sustaining his morale. I am not sure what castigation he is referring to his letter. Is there a family member out there who can shed some light on that?

Finally, the last page is comical and romantic. Alex draws little cartoons of him working, sleeping on the job, and dreaming of his family that are playful and wistful. I love that Alex is always wearing his sailor hat in the drawings and we also find out that he slept on the top bunk of a bunk bed! In this letter he is looking forward to a visit home and think of himself in his family role, signing the letter Daddy.

On a more general side note: I really enjoy reading Alex’s letters because of the way he writes in English. For the most part, he writes so well that you wouldn’t realize that English wasn’t his first language. But every so often you can see that he phrases something oddly and I am able to hear his accent and remember a small bit of how he spoke. In this letter he writes, “I don’t know what will you do about the shows…” There are not many solid examples in this letter but you can see that his letters sound formal sometimes because he doesn’t organize sentences in the same order, or speak as casually as a native English speaker might. It is just something to note and I will try to point this out when we hear more from Alex.

(The last letter is surely one I will need to revisit, there is too much to process all at once.)

In the last letter Sylvia spent a long time talking about what Adrienne ate. She mentions the creamy milk and the quarter of a chicken that ”Baby” happily devoured. The letter, written in 1944, indirectly addresses the rationing that the nation was dealing with during WWII. Families were issued ration books and points based on family size which served as a kind of currency for Americans. Meat and dairy products were parcelled out sparingly. Companies like Kraft gained popularity with their boxed macaroni and cheese to substitute for scarce fresh foods.  ”The government also printed a monthly meal-planning guide with recipes and a daily menu. Good Housekeeping magazine printed a special section for rationed foods in its 1943 cookbook.” (http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1674.html) It also became a mark of patriotism to “go without.” You were supporting the troops by giving up a portion of the meat you might normally consume.  When possible, families started their own gardens (named, of course, Victory Gardens). Of course, as this picture to the right points out, a good housewife would never complain about her hardships. She is a cute domesticated Rosie-The -Rationer.

It is so difficult, sometimes, to understand how many different ways the war impacted people’s daily lives, how much everyone was forced to adjust.  The very basics –  family, food and shelter – could not be taken for granted. Even when you built a family, had enough food, and made yourself a home – it all teetered on a tentative foundation.

Sylvia also talks a lot about how Adrienne misses her father and is jealous of another young girl who is playing with her dad. This heartbreaking scene must have been as painful for Alex to read about as it was for Sylvia to watch. Adrienne is obviously aware of her father’s absence, even though she couldn’t, at that point, have any tangible memory of him. Sylvia must try to strengthen the bond between father and daughter with her letters  and stories (she even devotes a page of the letter to Cookie’s scribbles), while trying not to make the distance between them feel any more painful.

An unlikely father figure in this letter is the rabbi who sits in front of Sylvia and Adrienne on their way to the Catskills. A lot of Jewish people from New York traveled to the Catskills when they needed a vacation from the city in the middle of the 20th century (it was such a big phenomenon that it was dubbed the “Borscht Belt”).  The rabbi is so good-natured about Adrienne’s actions so it leaves me to ponder, once again, my family’s relationship with Judaism. Once again Sylvia is representing a group of people. She belongs to an era, a culture, a popular movement even though you could read this letter and feel like she is completely alone.

We can’t know what movements in history we are a part of right now.  Nor can we believe that we act independently of the world around us.  But I’m also beginning to understand that doing something that may be commonplace (like being a Jew and going to Catskills in the 1940s or, say … being a 20-something with a blog…) can’t be dismissed simply as a cliché.  An individual’s connection to a community, city, country, or culture makes it possible to relate to - and survive in – the world.

In this letter Sylvia leaves the city with Adrienne! The letter is longer and more detailed than many of the other letters. If you only have time to read a page or two of this letter, read page 5 and 6. I will write about this letter in the next post.

My dearest,

Your letter was sent out to me yesterday and despite its shortness it was such a comfort. Darling, you have no idea how much I miss you – especially out here away from the family. Well, enough of that – as there’s no need to tell you how much I miss you, darling. You know all that.

Baby and I arrive in Catskill Thursday – and dearest, that was some trip. I carried Cookie and a heavy suitcase and by the time Cookie and I got off the train I was dripping wet and absolutely knocked out. Cookie slept for an hour and cried for an hour and peed and walked and didn’t enjoy it too much.

The trip was supposed to take 3 hours but it took 4-41/2 hours – and it seemed like a year. Out here, Cookie sleeps much better and also eats lots better. She drinks more than a quart of milk a day whereas in the city if she finished 3 bottles I was happy. I give her the plain pasteurized milk from the town and its rich and so creamy – much richer than the so-called rich homogenized milk in the city – and baby loves it!! Last night she grabbed the cooked chicken with both hands and ate it so fast – all by herself. She ate almost 1/4 of a chicken and a carrot and soup and crackers and milk and she was very happy until

I try to put her to sleep. She sings and dances in her crib – so I take her downstairs and put her in the carriage and she falls asleep to Yasse’s (the farmer’s son’s) crooning – and she sleeps out on the cool porch or under a tree until I’m ready to go upstairs – and then I put her in her crib.

It took her a little while to get used to walking on the grass, but now she does walk on it, slowly. She talks to the chickens and gets down on her hands and knees to kiss the cat and dog. I’ll get her a puppy when we get home since she loves the dog so much.

We have a small room up here but we’ll probably get a larger room in a few weeks when some of the family moves away. I’m very anxious for you to come up here after this trip. You’ll like it dear – as ten days here wouldn’t make you irritable with its crowdedness.

Cookie wrote this page to you – to tell you she loves you and misses you very much.

Darling, there’s so much to tell you- like how Cookie broke her milk bottle over a rabbi’s head on the train. He was sitting just in front of us, and he kept praying and his head went back and forth. Adrienne watched his head go up and down – and she was fascinated. Finally she said “da da dad” in rhythm to his praying. And in the middle of his prayer he’d say “sune- da da” “da da” – I was hysterical. She’d pull his hat – and hit him with her milk bottle and he loved it! Then after one particularly hard knock he turned his head and the bottle fell and broke and the milk spilled. It was like a christening of a ship and the rabbi being the ship.

Or else I can tell you how jealous she got when she saw one father here playing with his little girl – and his girl kept laughing and saying “daddy”. Adrienne walked over and stood there. Then she lifted her arms and said nodding her head, “daddy.” Darling it was all I could do to keep from crying … She misses you, dear and she’ll certainly enjoy your presence here when you come up. (and so will I!)

Keep writing me from wherever you are darling – and send me a cable to say that you’re alright! Also, hon, keep on collecting coins for my necklace. I’ll have it made after the summer.

About taking care of Cookie – I love it and don’t find it hard at all. So don’t worry about us. We’re both fine.

All my love hone and write me soon, drage (?)

Io te ama, amore

Sylvia

P.S. I asked the farmer and his wife how much they wanted for the room and the wife said $40.00 for the summer! Her husband protested as he wanted more. It was embarrassing for me – but it still isn’t a lot. I suppose Anna and I will share it. I won’t ask her for it unless she brings it up. Edward will probably be up here in about a week and he’ll love it out here.

Write soon, darling

All our love-

Sylvia and Adrienne

I had a truly close-to-perfect night at Coney Island this weekend. It started with a Brooklyn Cyclones game. The Cyclones, for those who don’t know, are the minor league team for Mets fans. (Yankees fans have the Staten Island Yankees.) If there is one quintessential Brooklyn icon it can be argued that it is Coney Island, accompanied by the Cyclone roller coaster and the Wonder Wheel. Over the last few years the fate of the amusement park at Coney Island (formerly Astroland) has been uncertain. The land could have, like many other New York sites, become a row of high-rise condos. But Luna Park has reinvented itself and thrives now off it’s long and romantic past as well as its exciting future.

Standing behind the Cyclones stadium and adding to its mystique is the parachute drop, which was declared a landmark in 1977 but had long been inactive as an attraction. Just beyond this stadium (and just a few blocks from the subway) is the boardwalk and the beach.

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Subway to the Wonder Wheel

Even the most avid and die-hard New Yorkers need a break from the city every once in a while. Wandering the city streets on a humid summer afternoon can quickly lead to a feeling of suffocation. But just hop on the B,D,F or Q and you can go straight to the beach, an amusement park, a boardwalk, and a baseball game. Once there, you can breathe a sigh of relief, eat a hot dog, and forget that you are just a few miles from the built-up, bustling, cement-covered island of Manhattan. Coney Island has the long tradition of being a popular working-class destination for New Yorkers in need of a break (who don’t have a car).

After the Cyclones game the audience waited for it to get dark enough for the fireworks show. The atmosphere was one of a big community dance party. People (and by that I mean myself) milled about, sang along to “Sweet Caroline” and jumped up and down trying to get a free T-shirt.

The fireworks did not disappoint. They exploded directly over the field and quite literally filled the stadium with smoke. The in-your-face intensity of the fireworks is a rare site these days when those darn safety regulations usually get in the way of good old-fashioned pleasures. In fact, Coney Island’s history of hazardous rides and repeated fires is not surprising.

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Luna Park originally opened in 1903. The new entrance to the modern-day Luna Park mimics the original design. This gateway creates an effective divider for the park from the street and the world around it.

Inside the gates you find rides blanketed in bright lights.  They look new and sleek but maintain an atmosphere that harkens back to a pretty cheesy and wondrous past (that you most likely never actually experienced).

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By embracing rather than erasing its history, Coney Island lets patrons relish the over-the-top environment – especially the Cyclone and the Wonder Wheel. to recapture something special from a different era. The Wonder Wheel provides the classic and simple pleasure of allowing you to go, well, way up in the air. A modern revelation made world-renowned at the Chicago’s World Fair in 1893, the Ferris Wheel represents both the old and new. The Wonder Wheel proceeded a new fad. A lot of cities today are re-employing the Ferris Wheel as a major (and lucrative) tourist attraction. (London and Paris have both used the Ferris Wheel to create modern and romantic viewing experiences.)

Maybe it was the nighttime air, maybe it was the beer, but running around Luna Park that night I couldn’t think of anywhere I’d rather be than on the rides swinging in circles again and again.

Of course, what made this experience a truly memorable one was the good friends who explored this new park by my side.

New York is a place of constant reinvention. But some joys will never change.

Next post: Sylvia leaves the city.

Just a quick announcement to let you know that I’ve now added a page where you can find a list of books that are topically related and that I think are excellently written or researched. In case you wish to pursue any topics that I touch on, these books might help you!

I’ll continue to update this list.

(Link is on the sidebar)

This letter touches on a number of important topics. Sylvia is living in her new home. She visited her in-laws on the Lower East Side and then took Adrienne home on the train which was exhausting even though the transportation is fairly convenient. She is looking forward to – and planning – Alex’s visit home. And she shares a bit of gossip about women getting pregnant, living with in-laws and starting jobs.  What I found most striking in Sylvia’s last letter was the detail in which she described the movie “The Impatient Years.” She recites the plot in its entirety – this being her argument that they should go see the movie.

I haven’t been able to see this movie (Netflix doesn’t have it) but, as Sylvia and IMDB tell me, it is a movie that looks at relationships that are interrupted by the war. It is about being married and still being strangers. It’s also about how the war rushes and then stalls relationships. (The tagline of the movie is: They found the answer to WAR-TIME MARRIAGES in the middle of a KISS!) The couple in the movie know each other for only three days before they get married and the husband leaves for war. Sylvia mentions that Alex wants to go to the hotel where they went for the “first night of [their] acquaintance.” (I’m not sure if this is a euphemism or not, or if it was commonly used). This leads Sylvia to talk about the movie and how the couple re-live their courtship. The poster for the movie claims to hold the answers about War Marriages. This, I imagine, held great appeal for the general American audience.

Sylvia lived with her parents when she first met Alex and it isn’t hard to believe that couples often got married quickly in the 1940s because it was otherwise difficult to find the time and space to be alone together. To me it seems both romantic and quirky that Alex, having never seen his new home, wants to take Sylvia to a hotel when he is on leave. Interestingly, this is the same idea that the judge has in “The Impatient Years,” when he wants to remedy a couples’ strained marriage. Like Sylvia, I don’t wish to draw a direct parallel between the movies’ broken relationship and that of my grandparents but reliving the courtship days seems to hold romantic merit. I, too, tend to reminisce about (or wallow in?) the early days of a relationship once it is ending.

So often, these letters are about finding personal space, finding a way to connect with family and spouses, learning how to be alone and together, and figuring out how to stay close across great distances.

Dearest old man of mine,

After your 3 letters this morning, I feel absolutely drunk with joy. I had a good dinner at your folks’ home – and your mother was afraid that I wasn’t eating enough. Of course, to her a gal merely 150 lbs. is emaciated. They were all delighted with Adrienne, naturally, as why shouldn’t they be.

I’ve just returned from their house with Adrienne, and she was quite a load to carry home. But she’s a good girl on the train, busy making friends with everybody and running all over. Charlie says she’s getting to look more and more like you every day. It makes me very happy to hear that. Anyway, dearest, you’ll be home soon and I hope our home will be fixed up by then. You say we’ll go to the Inn for our anniversary (where you took me the first night of our acquaintance.) Well, there’s a movie we must see, “The Impatient Years” whose theme is based on a young couple being ordered by the judge to relive their courtship day together. The husband has just returned from the Army and he and his wife are trying to get a divorce (no similarity to us) and the judge gives them this order. Of course, then they l.h.e.a. (life happily ever after). I didn’t see it, but someone told me about it. It’s a comedy.

Gossip:

1- Virgie is going to live with her in-laws.

2- Betty Lampel is pregnant.

3- Lida’s on her way out of New York to work with her little theatre

4- I’m busy with our home.

5- Your cousin Serena is pregnant.

6- Your cousin Margaret is in the hospital to be operated on a goiter or something.

7- If I knew what day you’d be in, I’d get tickets for some shows- but we’ll work it like last time. We’re going to have a swell time.

I must rush to Adrienne now, sweetheart – so hurry home to us. I’ll kiss you goodnight lover. Write us.

Love- Sylvia and Adrienne