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As I grew up, Dad used to mystify scores of boys and girls with his disappearing penny trick. It certainly was wonderful to watch their faces as he placed the coin between his middle finger and thumb and snap it into oblivion, only to recover it in one of the youngster's ears. After two or three snaps he'd quit. Then he'd tell the child to come see him on his twelfth birthday and he'd teach them the secret. Sure enough, at age 12 he taught me how to do it. I've practiced it now for 50 or more years and have not only watched thousands of happy upturned faces as a result but have been able to pass the skill along to a number of others.

Another trick of Dad's was his ability to get attention from an errant child. He'd look at the child very sternly, raise his voice a bit and say "Pasta fazool!". All unfavorable action would cease and he then would proceed with the matter at hand. I'm told that the phrase comes close to describing some Italian food --- but Dad didn't know that, nor did the child. Communication was established. I heard one of my daughters use the phrase with one of Dad's great grandchildren not long ago.

Dad used to bring home gimmicks such as water glasses with little holes bored into the design below the lip so folks drinking from them would have little dribbles of water flowing down their chins. It was especially fun to watch very proper aunts and uncles dabbing their chins with napkins at family dinners. For years, these jokes may have been on the borderline between pure fun and fun at the expense of others, but Dad was pretty well able to select those who would suffer no harm if the trick was played on them.

One of his best was the little flattened bulb at the end of a very thin hose attached to a bulb to be held in the joker's hand. This item was especially effective when placed under the table cloth and plate of the person next door. His reaction to a plate that suddenly jumped a little bit was always a pleasure.

Another time Dad brought home some candy-coated garlic about the time our Jersey cousins on Mother's side came to visit. The red candy in a dish on the sideboard was disappearing fast as younger cousins passing by would snatch a piece on each trip through the dining room. I was afraid it would all be gone before Frank and I could enjoy it so I placed one of Dad's garlic candies in the dish. Sure enough, Katherine, age about 8, bit deeply into the garlic and thoroughly chewed it before she discovered the situation. She ran to her mother screaming. The incident required a confession on my part and a scolding not only for me but for Dad also. There was such a family unhappiness as a result, I don't remember Dad every bringing another gimmick after that.

Just about every Wednesday evening, Nana instead of returning to her room to write letters or read after doing the dishes, would sit in the rocker in the sun porch. It wouldn't be long before Dad would reach into the covered porch by the living room and bring out the folding card table. As Nana heard the activity, she'd come out in time to agree with Dad's invitation to a game of pinochle. This ritual was followed for a good many years while Nana lived with us. After Dad died, I'm sure that Nana really missed her card game. Uncle Frank says his Dad was an "expert pinochle player - know your hand before you played a card."

Dad didn't have much to do with the kitchen activity. I guess he felt that with a wife and mother-in-law in residence to take care of the cooking and two boys to clear the table and empty the garbage and put out the milk bottles, his services were not needed. "Dishes" came at about the same time as Gabriel Heater on the radio. There was one chore he did consider pretty much his --- chopping cabbage. No one could do it as thoroughly as he. I can picture him sitting on the little chair between the sink and the blackboard with a wooden chopping bowl in his lap chopping away at the cabbage. "Chop chop chop" - it went for seemingly hours. Many years later the chopping tool showed up in Mother's things. Her cabbage salad was excellent -- at least as long as she had a good chopper --Dad.

I think Dad was afraid of hospitals and of operations. Maybe a hernia operation was much more serious an occasion then. All 24 years I knew Dad, he wore a truss for his hernia. He hesitated to lift heavy objects and did not participate as physically as I would have wished. He didn't talk about this problem very much but I've often thought how much more pleasant life would have been for him if he didn't have to strap himself together every day of his life. My memories also picture Mother and Nana's corsets accompanied on the cellar clothes line by Dad's truss. These items were never hung outside.

Uncle Charlie and Dad both were short on hair for as long as I knew them. Dad, with a few more strands used hair oil rather heavily. I tried very hard not to lose my comb for Dad's was always so greasy. I wish he'd washed it more frequently. I think of him often as I gaze at my extended face in the bathroom mirror.

Dad was never satisfied with less than good quality. I don't think he had more than three suits and two topcoats but they all had "Rogers Peet" labels on them. He bought two new Chevrolets before he settled in on a second hand Buick. He would investigate thoroughly every major (and perhaps minor) product he bought. Well do I remember the decision to get an automatic refrigerator to replace the ice box that had served us so well. He studied the features of the gas-operated Fridgedaire as compared with the turret-top General Electric. Why we settled on the G.E. I don't know. It must have had real quality.

Frank's and my toys also were the best. Dad would buy one good Buddy-L truck for us rather than several substitutes made of tin. His great grandchild still plays with a 50 year old Buddy-L locomotive Dad provided. I do not have the investigative patience he had but I still appreciate quality.

All during my childhood Dad sold Christmas cards. They weren't ordinary Christmas cards. He only sold to corporate executives and in addition he provided a mailing and addressing service as well as a handwritten signature and address. Mother, who was especially adept at painting watercolor blue birds used to start painting Christmas Cards with blue birds on them early in the Fall. It was a good business netting two or three hundred dollars each year and financed the family Christmas.

The choir at St. Barnabas Church in Irvington was on of the best around. It was a paid choir of men and boys who rehearsed Tuesdays and Thursdays (boys) and Thursdays (men and boys). Since Earl Belcher, Rodney Ferguson, Frank and I, all boy members of the choir, had to go Tuesdays, Dad and Mr. Belcher (who also sang would alternate the driving chores and Tuesdays. Dad had an excellent bass voice. He knew most of the liturgical music by heart as he'd sung it since he had been a choir boy while at St. Peters Church in the Bronx. Choir practice was a social time for the boys who came from a radius of 6 or so miles of Irvington. Our socializing sometimes cause difficulties and the choirmaster would frequently have to shout to keep us in order. Dad, who never in my recollection shouted at us, would register disapproval by going "tch! tch!" and shaking his head. I can't remember him bringing the stories of our behavior problems home --- certainly if Mother had heard of our actions, the situation would have been unpleasant.

Mother, who met Dad through his choir work at St. Peter's church, told how he was offered a full scholarship to study music in Europe. A wealthy parishioner liking Dad's voice and knowing some of his financial difficulties had made the offer. Dad turned the offer down, she said, because he was needed at home to help support the family.

It was also around his choir activities at St. Peters that a great deal of Dad's social activities revolved. I'm sure that Dad never missed a Sunday singing in church unless he was on vacation, the church had burned to the ground or he was sick. I knew of no church burnings and never knew him to be sick on Sundays.
 

I can think of Dad being sick only twice though Frank says he did talk of having headaches. - the time when he was hit by a taxi in New York and the other time when he complained of a terrific headache and headed for the hospital from work. He died of a cerebral hemorrhage on the street before ever reaching his destination. It was a shock to all of us to learn that in his desk at the office were several boxes of aspirins. He had certainly never complained of any malady that I knew.

I often thought that if the choir directors, office managers, golf companions or others with whom he associated kept attendance ledgers, as do teachers, all the little spaces to the right of his name would be filled with checks indicating present.

Dad was very proud of his twin sons. I often think how we must have disappointed him on occasion. When we were younger (8 or 9) and he worked on Saturday mornings, as did most of the business community, he'd take us with him on the train into the city. We'd be kept as busy as possible with pencil and paper in an unused office while he attended to business matters. Of course he'd introduce us to all his co-workers, from Mr. Purdy and Mr. Douglas, the top men, right on down to Eddie the runner. It was difficult for us to behave though we really did try.

I remember in his old office we'd make, out of a sheet of paper, little boxes that would hold water. We'd fill them and then drop them on to the street about 3 stories below --- they broke with a splat. Dad caught us in the act as one of the office staff coming back from an errand had been "just missed" by one of the bombs. After explaining the deadly possibilities of such missiles, Dad didn't press the matter further. We no longer engaged in the activity.

The new office at 120 Wall St. was much more fun. From about 20 stories up, we had a wonderful view of the harbor and we were right above the piers of the Grace Steamship lines. This building was the tallest in the area at the time.

It certainly was exciting being with Dad in New York City. Saturday noon everyone poured out onto the streets. Some would head for home, but on Saturdays in November and December, many of the workers would shop downtown first. It was a special treat to eat with Dad. He knew of so many places in the business district that were different. The one that amazed me the most was a "stand up" cafeteria. Though the novelty of eating at high tables and counters was eclipsed by the cashier who collected after we were finished. She'd ask how much we spent, we'd tell her and pay her at the same time. We asked Dad if anyone ever cheated and he replied, "Of course not!"

After lunch we'd go to Goldsmith's which at that time was one of the most amazing stores I'd ever known. I believe it started as a stationery store for they certainly had everything one could imagine in that line. The store next door was still Goldsmiths along with two, three or four more --- each with a passageway to the next. The final consortium was a very non-fancy, much less expensive department store where Dad purchased many of his "name brand" articles.

Following our shopping there, we'd join Mother at Wanamakers for she'd some down on a later train. Dad had difficulty shopping with Mother. She was a lot less deliberate than he. Following Wanamakers, we'd subway to the Radio City area and eat either at a restaurant where "Uncle" Fred Gaensely worked, or at a very special Italian place. Then, to the wonderful, marvelous Radio City Music Hall where Dad knew of a little used entrance which seldom had a line of people waiting to get in. The train ride home on the smoky "Putt" capped a wonderful day at Dad' office.

No one knew the subways better than my Dad. As we entered the system at Grand Central a kind of metamorphosis took place. Frank and I, clutching to either of his hands, would suddenly find ourselves speeding up and bumping into people who didn't notice we were shorter than they. Dad would maneuver us to the front of the shuttle to Times Square, if it were the train on right that we were boarding, or to the middle, if it were the train on the left. This would place us closest to the 7th Avenue subway when we disembarked. We wouldn't sit down because it would slow up our exit. We usually stood in the middle of the car because the doors there were larger than the ones in the vestibules at either end and we could rush out faster.

On the 7th Ave. express going downtown, we would rush to "grab" a seat. Dad was usually a gentleman, but, when seated on the subway, he'd either focus his eyes in sort of a dumb stare at the floor or he'd bury his face in the newspaper so as not to have to give up his seat to some little old lady or great big stout one.

Oh yes, Dad was a sterling competitor in the daily commuter rush. As the New York Central train went underground at 125th street, Dad would fold up his paper, stand up and move up the aisle to the front of the car. He'd stand in the cab for almost 10 minutes as the train made its way into the station. The the minute the train stopped or even a second or two before, he'd be walking toward the stairs well ahead of anyone whose slowness might have clogged them. Whew!

Dad was very unhappy when Hoover was not re-elected to the presidency. Hoover was the Republican candidate and any logic other than that was not necessary for his election. Of course Dad didn't realize that no matter what he thought as to why, there was only one overriding rational. He agreed with most of his fellow commuters for Ardsley as well as his business associates from downtown that the "New Deal" of Roosevelt would ruin the country. When, after 4 years of FDR, Dad still had a job and his family were still eating, he still was sure the country would be "ruined".
He complained bitterly about the 5% Federal tax - Frank

So for the second time, Dad voted against Roosevelt. It wouldn't' have been so bad if Mother had kept her vote to herself. He was devastated to think that his vote had been canceled by his wife's action. Poor Dad, he died while Roosevelt was still in office.

Locally, Dad was also fervently Republican. He never ran for office himself but always actively supported the party's candidate. More than once he was disgusted when the opposing candidates won and would drive around honking their horns late at night. "Such behavior was ridiculous".I believe my Dad (Bob) voted for Norman Thomas once. I guess he didn't tell his Dad.-CB

For many years Dad was a bowler. I don't know how well he did or what night it was he bowled. It couldn't have been Tuesday or Thursday because of choir practice and Wednesday he played pinochle with Nana. It must have been Monday or Friday -- probably Monday because in season there were basketball games at the high school. For many years he was on the Throg's Neck bowling league. In Dobb's Ferry he was at Scamp's (?) and was a champion on the team - Frank

What I do remember about his bowling was an event that way may have ended his career in that sport. It was a party in New York. Dad, as far as I can figure, was a very proper person. It seems he was able to put up with other members of the team drinking on bowling nights --- maybe if members of his team didn't enjoy the beer, other team members did, for Scappy's Alleys (about halfway to Dobbs Ferry )certainly had drinks available. To conclude the season though, his team went to New York and I think attended a night club or a burlesque show. Frank and I were not fully informed as to what went on (or came off) but there was much discussion and even some self-righteous talk around the table on the nights following the affair. At any rate, I think Dad didn't bowl in the league the following year. I still don't know whether Dad enjoyed or didn't enjoy the party. Other recollections by Frank in the margin notes: "At Mamaroneck, Long Island sound fishing expedition in row boat with Uncle Charlie and Dad. Bob got 'sea sick ' left to shore. Fog rolled in - navigator lost his bearing found himself heading for Long Island shore instead of Westchester County shore after r the fog cleared etc."

Dad was a most unusual swimmer. Frank and I would always be a little embarrassed when he would join the family either at the beach at Playland (and earlier, Rye Beach) or at the "Ore Pit" in Copake Falls. He enjoyed the water and informed us that his father had swum across Hell's Gate in New York. He was able to stay afloat and did move ahead fairly well, but his stroke was utterly ridiculous. Every time his arm would move forward it would sort of hover in the air and then his hand would slap the water before being drawn back for another stroke. In the meantime his other arm and hand would go through the whole hover/slap procedure. Why he didn't adopt the American, Australian or even Chinese crawl I'll never know. It would all have been OK except Frank and I would see people on the shore calling his stroke to the attention of their friends.

In our house there were two clocks. One was in the kitchen on the hanging shelf near the breakfast nook and the other on the mantle on the fireplace in the living room. There may have been an alarm clock in Dad's room too but it certainly wasn't one of the main timepieces. Dad was in charge of both. Every Saturday night must before bed, Dad would open up the face of the kitchen clock, reach behind it fore the key and proceed to wind it. He'd repeat the process in the living room. The one on the mantle would strike the hours and the "striker" would have to be wound also. He didn't wind the "striker" on the one in the kitchen because it would have caused too much confusion. If one was alone in the house and it was quiet , and one was sitting in the dining room between the kitchen and the living room the ticks of the two clocks could be heard just a little out of synchronization. A fact of those days.

Mother said that Dad read a lot when he was younger but I think of him primarily as a newspaper reader. Not just any paper was Dad's fare. Every morning he'd "pick up" the New York Herald Tribune on the way to the train and every evening he'd arrive home with the New York Sun tucked under his arm --- probably already read on the train. After supper was completed, Nana would take the Sun up to her room so she would do the crossword puzzle the next day. On Sundays we'd get the Sunday edition of the "Trib" at the stationery store in the village on our way to church. At home, later, Dad would read the sports section, the (brown picture section) and the funnies. Frank and I would sometimes fight over the funnies, but after we finished, Dad would certainly enjoy them. Of course we also subscribed to The Ardsley Sun, a weekly, and The Yonkers Statesman, a daily, for the local news. Dad seldom read the local papers as the family had already digested them before he came home and if there was any thing important in them, we would tell him about it.

Mr. Edward, the undertaker said that the funeral processions from St. Barnabas Church in Irvington to Fernscliff Cemetery just outside of Ardsley was the largest he'd seen since gas rationing had been imposed. Frank and I , both stationed in the States at the time, were able to get home for it. I looked at the list of callers recently and note that more than 150 people had signed the guest book at the funeral home. He was well-liked.

I come close to tears now as I think of how much my Dad loved me and how little I loved in return. Wounded in action in the war in Europe, I spent some time in hospitals in England and then was shipped back to Halloran General Hospital on Statten Island which served as a staging area before we were assigned to hospitals in the states. Those of us who lived in the immediate area and were ambulatory could have a weekend pass. My left arm was still in a cast but I was otherwise in great physical condition, when I hopped a ferry to Manhattan and walked up to my fathers office at 12- Wall Street, so as to ride home with him on the train.
Changing from the electric train to the "Putt" (which had by then switched from steam to diesel) at High Bridge, we had to go up a long flight of stairs, across a foot bridge and down another flight. As we were climbing the first set, Dad kept saying in a loud voice "Are you OK Bob?", "Can I help you Bob?" and other similar words. I was very embarrassed as other commuters, many from Ardsley were looking in our direction. Dad in his won way, was showing pride in his son.

Early in his married life Dad invested $800 in some stocks and for a while was pleased with the results. For some reason they later became completely worthless. His only real investment after that was in the newly formed First National Bank of Ardsley --- $25.00. Many years later the bank changed hands and mother sold the stock at a good profit.

Dad was "cured" from then on and just wouldn't participate in anything but a sure thing. One of my disappointments in this line was the availability of a 100 acre farm near Copake Falls which had a charming old home on it and a sale price of $2,000. It was absolutely impossible to sway him even with all the convincing ability my mother had. There were times when I felt he was just plain stubborn.

When Mother and Dad agreed on a matter there was no way, even with Nana's help, that they could be persuaded that another course of action might be desirable.

Soon after we'd obtained our driver's license and while still in high school, a wonderful 1921 "Star" two-seater became available for $10.00. It was the oldest "living" car in the area, and would have been just right for two young men to drive to school. Certainly it would be available for family errands and the price, even for those days was very low. We could use it on our weekly egg route instead of the big expensive 1936 Buick. It just made good sense to have such an opportunity. Mother and Dad both thought we would be more likely to be out of control in our romantic ventures and might very well have a bad accident with it. It was also very conspicuous in its antiquity which if combined with our verve might make a very unfavorable family impression on the community. They just did not understand and were very stubborn in their ignorance.

During the final week of high school after a two year courtship, a very lovely girl with a wonderful family had finally agreed to "go steady". I was living on a cloud especially when her family invited Frank and me to spend a week with them at their summer place in Vermont. Dad and Mother were both firmly negative. Their response seemed to me absolutely ridiculous and though not directly expressed I am sure had something to do with the idea that I might have "gotten the girl into trouble." That was a decision especially rough on me at the time. It helped me to be less attentive to studies on weekends after I got to college and was free of the parental authority. I heard this story often enough through the years to think that he never was reconciled to that decision. Only recently, thanks to Google, I was able to tell hiim what happened to Anne Franke. Now he is once again dispappointed because she doesn't seem to be interested in corresponding. I saw several of her letters to him from his Ardsley and war days. I think she was stringing him a long. I think my step mother should be sainted for putting up with his "obsession". -CB

Dad enjoyed long walks and hikes. Well do I remember as a little boy on a Sunday afternoon before and after baseball occupied the time, walking from our house over to Beacon Hill and out past Cannings, across Sprain Brook Road past the egg farm and over to Ashford Ave. and back to our house. It seemed like many, many miles in this country. I know he had a great time.

At Copake Falls in the summer, he would be first to say "Let's climb Burke Mountain". So up we would go to the top where there was a fire tower we all enjoyed climbing. We didn't talk or philosophize much on our walks or hikes. It was more like having a goal and attaining it. Dad was a doer and not a talker.
 

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