I was still fairly young when the Depression started and the first thing I really remember about it was moving out of our flat and into the building Mama's grandparents had bought. Mama always said that her grandfather was the smartest man she ever knew. A few months before the stock market crashed, he bought an old tenement building and was planning to turn the first floor into a clinic and rent out the flats on the upper floors. The construction on the clinic was just about finished when the stock market crashed and he invited the rest of the family to move into the building rather than renting out the flats to strangers.
My grandmother was the second of fourteen children, so there were lots of cousins to play with. When we tired of playing with one, or had a spat with another, we had plenty more to choose from. It also meant more people to get into trouble with. The top floor was turned into a big playroom and there were also several smaller rooms where the aunts and uncles who were teachers taught us. We had a big kitchen and dining room with several tables because they said it was easier and conserved fuel to cook one big meal instead of several smaller ones. But Papa Daddy, Mama's grandfather, insisted that each family have their own space in the house, so he had all the uncles who worked in construction with Uncle Liam to build living rooms and bedrooms for each family. It was almost like a little house for each family, but without the kitchen.
The Depression didn't really affect us children much. Sure, we wore hand-me-downs that were patched and shoes were worn until they fell apart or grew too small before being handed off to someone else. And often times our presents for birthdays and Christmas were things that had been made by hand, but we never went hungry. We were content in our little world and saw very little outside of it.
I remember Pearl Harbor very well. My brother Geoff was a naval officer and had been stationed in Hawaii. Several of us had gone to see a movie that afternoon and were surprised when the movie stopped suddenly. A man came out and told us the news. Pearl Harbor had been attacked that morning by Japan. We raced home and turned on the radio, sitting there for hours waiting for news. Entire ships had been sunk, some with their crews still aboard. The family waited for days for some news of what had happened to our Geoff, but still none came.
After two weeks I could take no more…I had to do something. With Uncle Johnny's help, I traveled to Hawaii to find my brother. Of course, my parents were against it, but I couldn't let that stop me. I had to find my brother. The problem I hadn't been counting on was the number of unidentified dead and wounded. I volunteered in one of the hospitals in order to be around the men and for the chance that someone would know what happened to my brother. It was like search for that needle in a haystack, but I had to take a chance.
What I did find was my brother's best friend, a young man called Dash. He had lost one arm at the elbow and was blind, though the doctors hoped that it was only temporary. So I did what I did best, I spent most of my off-duty hours sitting beside him, entertaining him. I would read to him, or write letters, or just sit and talk for hours at a time. After a few weeks he told me what happened the morning of the attack…as soon as they realized that the harbor was being attacked all of the sailors were ordered to their battle stations. Geoff and Dash had hurried to their station and only a few seconds later were tossed in opposite directions by an explosion. The last thing Dash remembered was the explosion, but he had been told later that the others were either dead or unaccounted for.
Dash was a recent orphan when he met my brother during their training and the two had become instant friends. Because he had nowhere else to go, I offered to take him to my home when he was released. My family would never forgive me if I had done otherwise and as his sight had yet to return, Dash really didn't have much choice. And there were enough doctors in my family to take good care of him. So together we returned to my Brooklyn home, without my brother or any information on his whereabouts. As I had known they would, my family took Dash in and made him part of the family. On one of our daily walks, he told me that it my family could be a little overwhelming at times, but he loved them all and was glad to be a part of a family again. I had made the right decision in bringing him here.
His sight did return after several months and Dash insisted on taking me out to celebrate. After dinner and a show, he took me to Central Park and we walked through the park in the moonlight. He led me to a bench and had me sit down before kneeling in front of me, asking me to marry him. I quickly and happily agreed…I could think of nothing that I wanted more short of having my brother return home. Because of the war, we decided to have a simple ceremony with only my family present, but even that was a crowd.
Our beautiful daughter was born on August 15, 1945, the day the Japanese surrendered. We named her Cara…after my great-grandfather Charles. My parents came, along with my grandparents and great-grandparents, a few weeks later to give me a gift…a vanity set that had been given to my great-grandmother on her sixteenth birthday. I had grown up admiring the set and was thrilled beyond words to receive such a wonderful gift.