1938-1941
The photos in Helen's Family Album show our family well dressed and enjoying life. But they cannot reveal the economic struggle Lena, Adolph, and my older siblings endured because of the ravages of the Depression, which climaxed during the late 1930s and early '40s. As very young children, Frankie and I were more or less spared the realities of these hard times, but like most children, happy and or freightening moments are "revisited" later in life.
We were living on Putnam St, probably still on relief. One thrilling moment Frankie recalls happened when he was a first or second grader at Fulton school. His older brother and idol, Phil, age 14, was making a paper mache marionette puppet named, "Niki Poo", the character Phil would act out and sing (as he worked the marionette) in the performance of the Mikado, presented by the 8th grade Glee Club May, 1937.
I turned 5 in February of 1937, not quite old enough for school. But by September of this year, I entered kindergarten. Our house on Putnam was the furthest point from the school, requiring Frankie and me to walk a long distance to reach Fulton. I don't recall much happening the first semester. But an event in the second semester has been etched in my childhood memories. Ms Shannon, my kindergarten teacher who sang with the WPA orchestra when they performed for the school, asked me to sing 3 short songs at the Glee Club's Spring concert. And to add to my incredible good luck, Ms Shanon bought me a pink Shirley Temple-like party dress to wear…pink with a long sash, and an attached matching-colored underslip that made a swishing sound" when I walked! It was probably the most beautiful dress I had throughout my childhood as most of my clothes were second hand. Evidently I had a good singing voice for my tender years and I look at this great event, as my debut.
Suddenly, though, this happy world changed about July of 1939 when we moved from Putnam street to Franklin Avenue, two streets and several blocks back to the older neighborhood of the 1920s. The aged street, badly deteriorated now, reflected the poverty of its residents and to the family it represented the "other side of the tracks".
Although our family was down and out, the Putnam street neighbors were not, and most of them were professionals or certainly far better off then we. The result of the move meant Frankie and I would have to change schools.
September, 1939 Frankie began fourth grade at Warren school and I first grade. Phil was a junior at Scott High School, within the school district, which enabled him to continue at the school and be with his friends. Life for him had not been altered as dramatically as it was for Frankie and probably me, although I was too young to understand why I felt as I did.
The exact reason for moving is unknown to us, but for sure it was a money issue. I've asked Philip and Frank what year this happened and they were hard pressed to remember. Evidently it was such a traumatizing change for the three of us, we unconsciously blocked it out of our minds all these years.
Because of this, I have spent the past two years trying to reconstruct this one six to eight-month period in our youth, a pivotal time, that best illustrates the impact of the height of the Depression on many, many, families--parents and children. Helen, Phil, Frank, and I were at home. Sidney having received his masters at Ohio State, moved to Baton Rouge, Louisiana and Stanford was attending Ohio State.
JEANNE
I recall the Franklin Avenue house from the outside, only, as most of the time I sat on the front porch steps and gazed across the street. The inside of our house with dark woodwork and apparently little sun light, made everything gloomy. That's all I recall. The object of my outdoor fascination, though, was a large, two story yellow house. I knew something about it was significant beyond the yellow paint which is one of my favorite colors. Later, I learned that it was the home of my mother's brother, Louis/Leibish Reiter and his wife Millie since the 1920s. Their daughters Fanny and Sadie lived there now with Millie, who was a widow. Fanny's daughter Yvette, told me that all of them moved away in 1941.
HELEN
It had to have been a trying time for Helen, 20 years old, working, and living at home. She had been corresponding with a young man who was a student at Ohio State University. I believe she may have met him in March, 1938 at the Hadasah convention she was attending as a Jr. representative. Pictures of her new found friend, a dapper dresser and good looking, were placed in Helen's photo album, dated 1938. It seems he drove his convertible that summer to Toledo to visit Helen and the family, but it was the last time Helen heard from him. His interest diminished, I'm told, when he saw how poor we were. In the meantime our upstairs neighbor had a boarder who took a very strong liking to Helen. He was an electrical engineer, Jewish, who had emigrated from Germany while there was still time to leave. Lena and Adolph saw him as a potential marriage partner who could provide Helen a good future and more secure life, (not unlike Chana and Fischel's plan for Lena, 24 years earlier). Apparently they urged her to go out with him, but Helen resisted, either because the engineer was not appealing to her, or she hadn't recovered from her heart-breaking romance. The last pictures Helen placed in the picture album were taken in the fall of 1939.
FRANK
For Frank, changing schools was particularly difficult as he left behind his friends at Fulton school. He looks back at this time of his youth in his memoirs, Eyes on the Stars. His sensitive account of the summer- fall of 1939 and winter of 1940, provides a close up view of a child's personal pain and how he dealt with it. It best sums up the feelings that each of us probably had, but until now never understood why. The exact years are still a mystery.
"Jeanne and I were going to Warren School in 1939. Jeanne was in second grade and I was oblivious to the world and in the fifth grade, I think. I say I was oblivious because it seems that I was only interested in having a good time. I was not taking this Depression Era condition very seriously, or maybe I was suppressing the whole event by intentionally turning my mind from it. It seemed that my drive was to repress this entire existence. I believe I have blotted out this part of my life because I detested living on Franklin Avenue. I had no friends that I can remember, and there were no redeeming qualities of that house or neighborhood. My parents evidently continued to suffer severe financial setbacks and struggled to remain solvent. It’s funny that my parents never let on that anything was wrong or that there was any money problem. They would never tell us anything, though I guess that there wasn’t much to tell. I suppose the older children knew what was going on, though. Our stay on Franklin Avenue was not to last long, anyway. The neighborhood was run down, and gangs were running rampant. Anti-Semitism was at an all time high, and, walking to and from school, I would circumvent the areas where the gangs hung out to avoid being beaten up, causing me to travel a large circuitous route to get to and from school.
I don’t remember much that first school’s term in 1939/1940. I do remember that the winter of 1940 was miserably cold. At one point during the winter around Christmas time the temperature dipped to 14 degrees below zero, the lowest that I could recall in Toledo. The schools closed down for two additional weeks at that time because, not only was it extremely cold, but also the schools ran out of money because the tax levy did not pass the legislature. I did not have a happy time there."
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Lena, too, was upset with the situation, and once again, after the first semester, we moved …this time to a very good section of the Old West End, 2626 Fulton Street. It was just a short 3-4 block walk to school and the neighborhood was more upper middle class. Our next door neighbor was a widow whose husband had been a salesman for Steinway pianos. Apparently they lived quite comfortably as their home was attractively landscaped and well maintained compared to the house my parents rented. It was one of the most beautiful homes on the street.
I rarely saw the lady outdoors, except those special times when the chauffer took her out in the "electric" car (a highly polished small black, one seater, with a glass window separating the driver and passenger). It was the most elegant sight to see the uniformed chauffer glide the silent car down the drive, as it gently moved along, carrying our neighbor, dressed appropriately for the day. I was momentarily transfixed and could not help but stare.
Frankie continues his remembrances:
"Shortly after that incident (Franklin Avenue), luckily, we moved to 2626 Fulton Street. This move took place in early 1941 just after the New Year. I transferred to the fifth grade at Fulton School, which was situated on the corner of Fulton Street and Delaware Avenue, north of Bancroft Street about two miles, and once again I was happy with my old friends. Lena and Adolph had rented a house near Rockingham Street, a beautiful location in the Old West End. It was a wonderful neighborhood, and most of my friends lived within walking distance of our new surroundings. This neighborhood was more affluent than the one we lived in on Putnam Street. We had lots of friends and it was relatively upscale compared to our previous location. It was a two-floor structure and I think we had four bedrooms, so I got a bedroom all to myself. I was very happy in this neighborhood, both with the location and the home. I remember that Stanford used to come home from Ohio State, occasionally, and Philip began college at the University of Toledo. He had bought a used Model A Ford Coupe with a rumble seat, and I loved to ride in that car. He paid $125 for the car in 1941. Today it would be worth a fortune, and many are still being driven as antiques."
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