Stories: GREENBERG Family

Story by Brian GREENBERG:

Morris GREENBERG’s birth year was 1913. November 12th is the date my father “chose” because his parents argued about the month he was born. He picked November because it was in between September and December. It was interesting that the petition for Morris you sent earlier had my father being born in December. My hunch is that Morris thought it was December, and Pauline was sure he was born in September. My father chose November 12th because it was easy to remember the date: 11/12/13. Dad loved numbers.

Stories about Morris, and other GREENBERG ancestors, as his granddaughter Annie remembers.

Morris was a spoiled son in a house of females and we all know how boys were cherished over girls in families like that. His sisters doted on him. He had an education. Spoke 7 languages, He was trained as an accountant. In order to avoid him being taken during the pogroms, he was sent away. Evidently, he had musical training as well and was an accomplished violinist. Music was part of European education back then and it shows he used that on the ship so probably true.

He also loved the song (which my father always told us and he would sing) Lucky Old Sun by Frankie Laine. The lyrics speak about a hard life; troubles, breaking your back just to make money so I imagine Morris being pampered to some extent in his young life found life hard in many ways as an adult.

I remember visiting him when I was a little girl with my dad and Mark. I might have been 5 or younger. He was always so warm and loving and made me feel cherished. He would tell me how pretty I was and spoke with a heavy accent – he would sit me on his lap and always gave me a silver dollar- some I saved to this date.

Another time towards the end of Morris’s life- I remember my mother fighting with my father to go help his father—my dad didn’t like to go. Morris didn’t accept help easily. His adult children would go and try to help him but like most old people, he wanted to live independently and didn’t want to be told what to do. Anyway, widowed and alone, probably struggling with health issues, the last time I saw him I went with my father. His house was messy and evidently he loved animals because it was filled with hundreds of cats he’d taken in.

Morris, standing, and his cousin Harry, seated as they appeared when they left Russia to go to America.

They came to America via Argentina but I heard Morris stayed there longer then he was supposed to & worked with horses on some ranch. The story I was told was that he was whoring around once he left home and when he didn’t show up when and where he was expected to or send for his wife and child, the family intervened. I understand it was his mother who made sure wife, Pauline and baby son Jake got to America.

I was told he was quite artistic (as are many of us). He once worked on doing sculpted cornices, etc. as we see on old buildings but being an immigrant, never seemed to be able to do white collar work, instead, he ended up having to work with his hands. He had a painting business he established. It was called Greenberg and Sons. I believe uncle Jake parted ways with them early into it because he and Morris butted heads but my father stayed on for awhile longer. According to my father, they always had work and made a decent living for the time.

My father met my mother when they were about 15 through her cousin Marvin Berger who was a good friend of Leon’s. My mother’s mom had leukemia and they moved around a lot. My father told me her house was alway sparkling clean but having no real furniture to speak of, were poor compared to him. My dad told Morris and the two of them picked up and delivered furniture people had discarded in alleys and brought it to them. Sofas, chairs, etc. They were so grateful to have what they brought. Evidently my mother’s mom loved my dad and he always spoke fondly of her. She died young, age 36 when my mother was 18, prompting my dad who was drafted to marry my mother so she’d have his benefits, etc. My dad told me once when he saw the old Victrola I’d purchased from the 1920’s that in those days people just put them out on the street because they were old technology and they were a dime a dozen.

Morris; while a loving family man was very much a European man of his time. He could be quite self centered and demanding. Pauline — my grandmother died right before I was born so I never met her, however I have always felt her watching over me- especially when I was young. I have a mirror of hers she brought from the old country.

Sadly, in those days coming as an immigrant put you at the lower rung of the social ladder. Much like today, immigrants stuck together in “ghettos” or neighborhoods with those of similar faith or ethnicity. Leaving behind your past and country, whether for danger or persecution or limited opportunities meant hard work and struggle for most and a strong desire that their children fit in. They didn’t share much about their past or the languages, unfortunately. I believe they wanted their children to be assimilated and successful—American and many of their memories were bad. Cousin Libby said her mother Fanny (Morris’s sister) talked about when she was a girl in Russia, being despondent and suicidal and having to hide whenever soldiers came to their village. Living under constant threat from traveling soldiers or being looked down for something you had no control of (being Jewish) had to be terrifying. And, frustrating. No one I asked really knew too much about Pauline’s family other than she came to America when she was very young. I was told she was 16. She left her family and most of them died in the Holocaust as far as I know. All the aunts; Bea, Sara and Shirley and my father and uncle Jake knew so little about their parents earlier lives and I don’t think they asked — each knew very little info even over 30 years ago when I first started asking.

My middle name Phylis, with a P was after my paternal grandmother. I would have rather had Paulina.

I was told Morris called her Paulina or Pollie, that she was sweet, maternal and very caring but he was verbally abusive to her sometimes. Perhaps typical European situation, the wife as subservient housewife, the husband the lord and master.

My father often said my brother Mark was exactly like his father Morris. He used to laugh and shake his head. Mark —well—is charming, he is very funny with a shrewd sense of humor. He is talented, artistic and a wizard with his hands but also very set in his ways, stubborn, demanding and (in my sisterly opinion) very controlling and difficult to live with. Like Morris and my dad in his youth, he’s handsome. Mark even has the same color eyes supposedly as Morris did, which were more of a hazel green brown than a true brown. My dad had a version of those too.

My own mother remembered Morris as a bit of a tyrant. She always felt bad for Paulina who was sweet and always cooking or doing things for everyone else.

So more about Morris. An autocrat he ruled the roost and because of his controlling ways, alienated the older children because as they each went to work he made them hand over their earnings. He kept a ledger and controlled and doled out their own money. Aunt Sara and Uncle Jake both told me versions of that. My dad actually liked that he did that for him since he liked other people to take care of him. Possibly a result of his being a spoiled much younger change of life baby. Dad was quick to say his father never spent the money, but he controlled it. When they needed or wanted it, they’d have to come to Morris. He would divy it out and mark his ledger.

Morris was hard on my dad though, called him names, put him down and got easily frustrated with him. Evidently he was tough on Uncle Jake as well. They all (he and Uncle Jake and their dad) worked together in a business called Greenberg and Sons.

I think Morris was a bit of a perfectionist and we know controlling. Probably a type A personality He wanted things done a certain way. My dad and Uncle Jake were easygoing, not perfectionists. My dad had many learning disabilities that in that day were not known. ADD, ADHD. He had a spotty education and was slow though extremely inventive and talented with his hands. He had a childlike quality about him that never changed through-out his life. I was told he ran wild as a kid. Aunt Sara said he was a spoiled brat. Aunt Bea was more indulgent.

Morris and Pauline lost a child— David who was older than my dad and younger than Aunt Shirley so that may be part of the reason he was babied. Dad went to reform school for an incident in elementary school. It was flag day. He may have been a bit too enthusiastic with his flag. The principal confronted him and took it away. He yanked it back and they were standing at the top of a staircase. The principal fell down and between that and all his truancies, my dad got kicked out of regular school. It was around 6-7th grade. He played hooky alot. His mother always made excuses for him. His sisters babied him too. Morris got furious.

Ben Vitcov who grew up with my dad and his family on the same street said my dad was very athletic. He could scale walls, hop trains and got into all sorts of mischief. And, fights. He was so agile and strong, they nicknamed him Spider for his ability to climb. Dad loved to tell jokes, do accents and was a great dancer. Also, a bit of a womanizer in his lifetime too.

Morris was tough on the girls (as were most European fathers) too. In those days, double standards were the standard. Women were seen as good girls or bad ones and it didn’t take much to be considered bad. He was always on their case about their clothes, make up, dating, etc. Aunt Sara hated it and rebelled. On the one hand, it must have been hard, a different culture and while Morris wanted his children to be Americans and have it easier than them, I imagine being a womanizer himself probably colored his judgment considerably when it came to his daughters.

Uncle Jake clashed the most with Morris. Knowing how easygoing he was—stubborn too, I also know he had to be really agitated/upset to react like he did. I think in retrospect, Uncle Jake was more like his mom, sweet and mellow unless pushed.

Both my dad and Uncle Jake had fierce tempers. It took a lot to fuel them but when they erupted—watch out! I am thinking that came from Morris too. :)

My father remembers the doctor coming by the house to treat his mother, Paulina with leeches. She’d be tired after that. It was a treatment used to alleviate high blood pressure. Interestingly, leeches have some renewed use today with various ails.

Being plump back in the day, especially for the ladies was very desirable—a beauty standard. It goes back to looking well nourished being able to afford food and wealth, whereas being thin was symbolic of poverty and hunger. ( wish it was still like that).

Anyway, Uncle Jake all his life was attracted to big, curvaceous women.

Aunt Sara also said that they moved many times, at least 6 from the time she was 10 to 16 before they landed at Peach Street.

My understanding was many of the towns in Russia were close to one another like cities are today. I feel the family had ties to a town called Mogilev- Podolsky in the Ukraine based on what my father remembered his father talking about.

My dad understood and remembered some Russian words, spoke fluent yiddish. He had a great sense of humor as did Uncle Jake and so did the sisters. I remember we always laughed a lot together. I like to think that even with all the yelling, when they came together, they laughed and enjoyed one another too.

My father especially cherished his memories of family brunches and get togethers when food and conversation flowed. Right before he was dying, he confided he had many comforting dreams of his mother visiting him. I believe it.

The only good thing about cancer I can think of is it gives you time to talk and say things like how much you love and appreciate someone, discuss your religious or spiritual beliefs (if any), etc. Despite being raised Jewish, my dad was not religious at all. He bordered on atheist and truly didn’t have any deep seated beliefs about the after life or what to expect. He believed ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

I truly believe we live many lives. I joked with him that since so many of his friends and family were already gone, maybe he should expect to see them. Why not envision a big brunch in the hereafter, all his family and friends there, smells of coffee, bagels and lox in the air and welcoming him to the table? He laughed and said he’d like it if it happened but didn’t think it would.

I have to say, my dad wasn’t always the best of providers or most supportive father in some ways but I always knew I was loved unconditionally, could always could talk to him and laugh with him and as an adult I always cherished our time together. I feel blessed by having so many great memories. Especially how bravely he handled being sick and dying. All along there was love, humor, strength and a dignity and fearlessness that still gives me strength to face loss today.

FAMILY PHOTOS:

Pauline with young Leon kneeling on the left, sister Shirley with Uncle Jules and cousin Sandy Greenberg, Brians older sister.