Enid Hinkes (60), Greg Tannenbaum (Union 82) and Arlene Chausmer Swirsky (64) ask for alumni assistance:
As my comment in the last issue of the “WHS Note” indicated, I have been trying to obtain the names of the Weequahic alumni who died while fighting for our country. The WHS Alumni Association has been assisting me, but aside from a plaque commemorating those who died in WWII, there is no listing. The stones in Untermann Field memorializing those who died in WWII and Korea couldn't be located.
Perhaps our alumni who remember their classmates, friends or relatives who died in WWII, Korea, and Vietnam could fill in the names of those who died and perhaps provide some biographical data about their lives and their service. Please send the names and bio info to me at ehinkes@aol.com. Thank you to all who will respond to my request. Enid
I am Jerry Tank Tannenbaum’s (59) son. My nickname is the same. As was a ritual we had when I was in the Marines, we chose nicknames and I chose my father’s.
I thank Warren Bratter (1/60) for remembering my father in his comments, especially the story at the Dairy Queen drinking 4 Chocolate Blizzards. I recall my father working at Syds, Don’s Barn and Don’s Diner. I would like to know if anyone recalls Shady Brook where, I believe he had a little luncheonette. We would go each morning to Watson Bagels and get a sack beforehand for use at the luncheonette.
I do not recall much about my dad and his family. I’ve been writing a book and wish I could find some history of my father and family, especially his Jewish history. Any memories and comments are welcome; please send to gtanknj1@gmail.com. Greg
I'm looking for a few good classmates of June 1964 who are interested in working on our 60th reunion this year. Being stuck in the wilds of Massachusetts, it makes it a bit difficult to get this done on my own. I'm fine with Zoom meetings or whatever else we might need to get this ball rolling. We've made it all the way to our 60th, let's do the work we need to do to make it happen. Please feel free to do this via email (acswrite@gmail.com), or just call me (508 826 5563). I'd love to hear from you all. Arlene
Sharon Rous Feinsod (66) recalls her neighborhood:
There were several "kids," at least younger than the group from 225 Meeker and Custer Place that appears with some regularity in the “WHS Note.”. Custer Place was one block long, very short and parallel to Weequahic Park and Elizabeth Avenue. The street ran between Custer and Meeker Avenues where it ended a short block from The Tavern, a truly elegant restaurant and bakery owned by Sammy Teiger. On Thanksgiving morning people were wrapped around Meeker below Elizabeth towards Frelinghuysen waiting to purchase the rolls, pies and cheese cake which were to die for. The aroma wafted through the street and the weather on that Thursday holiday morning had no impact on the length of the line.
Those of us who were just a little younger included basketball star Lenny (6/63) (may his memory be for a blessing) and Eddie Levine, Morey Gillette, Judy Moss (6/63), Gary Getto, Elliott (may his memory be for a blessing) and Michael Gottfried (1/64), my brother Marvin (one of the older guys) and the superintendent's son Tex, who, my brother has said, was a terrific baseball player. As a result of all the boys in the building, I had no choice but to learn to flip baseball cards in the court, ride a boys' bike on the rocky lot where my neighbors parked their cars and sleigh ride down the lot to Elizabeth Avenue, barely missing the buses (#10, 49, and 50, along with the 107 from NY). If my mother had seen me, either she would have died from fright or killed me first. Climbing trees was also part of the experience at 10 Custer Place.
Next door at the other apartment,18 Custer Place, lived Matt Naula and a girl named Bonnie Karstadt (Peshine 59). Matt was about six years older. But around the block on the corner of Custer and Elizabeth was 469 Elizabeth Avenue; with two elevators and two entrances. The Kessler family lived there; Robert (56) (much older), Michael (1/60) and David (1/60) (twins and older) and their late sister Susan and Ellen Ignatoff LeVIne (64). Susan and Ellen, who were cousins, were about two years ahead of me. Richie Roberts (6/56), much older than I, also lived there.
Across the street from 18 Custer was the ever-swanky 2 Custer Avenue with sunken living rooms. Howie Tepp (64), who became a well-known musician (later called Richie as in “Richard and the Young Lions” rock group), lived there.
Four sisters lived in a beautiful house on Custer Avenue just above Custer Place. One of them, Linda Fleischmann, it turns out, was the mother of one of my students in Linden. She mentioned she was from Newark, and, like all of the intertwined stories, I asked where. She mentioned Custer Avenue. When I replied about Linda Fleischmann, she looked at me and I heard, "I am Linda Fleischmann!"
Billy Pollak (1/53), a great ball player whose dad was our dentist and pulled my tooth when I was five and mounted it on a piece of wax, lived up the street on Custer Avenue.
Halloween was sugar heaven! We rang so many doorbells that it would have taken us a year to finish all the goodies the neighbors dropped in our bags. Selling Brownie goodies put me at the top of the list in my troop because nobody would refuse this rare girl in the neighborhood.
We had everything; the Good Humor man; all the stores at the bottom of the hill like Kelly's, the Meeker Pharmacy where my mother bought me a gorgeous, tall walking doll, a barber shop (Scola's?) where the guys always looked like more was going on than haircuts. I recall David Feldman, a handicapped guy who Kelly’s employed to deliver the groceries to everyone's apartment. And, of course, a block away the park where the lake froze and when I was about eight or nine, I could go skating.
Yes, even we "babies" have treasured memories. Who knew that my fantasy job, though I passed it over, was to drive the #107 Bus? Remembering Meeker Avenue with the dividers in the middle of the road filled with trees blooming. Remembering trudging up the hill as a little kid to Peshine Avenue School with no understanding of why all the kids in the playground at St Charles Borromeo, across from our school, all looked the same, and why the lady teachers (the nuns, of which we knew nothing) wore what we perceived at the time as weird clothes. Our world was cloistered, to say the least, but we had great run on the lot, roller skating around Custer Place and the courtyard, and always hoping to go to the Meeker Pharmacy for an ice cream soda or a malted or a milk shake at the store’s fountain. Sharon
Jac Toporek (6/63)
Sharon, sorry to intrude on your wonderful memories of our neighborhood, but wanted to add to your note, more specifically about residents at 469 Elizabeth Avenue. As I recall, that apartment building had what I always thought were tenants of greater means, at least compared to my new immigrant home in the apartment building down the block across from The Tavern at 225 Meeker Avenue.
Richard Fertell (62) lived there with his mom. Stuart Finifter (62) and family also were “469” residents. After graduation from WHS, Richie went to college in NYC and lived out his life in the city while maintaining his Weequahic connection through fraternity friends and the weekly newsletter. Stuart passed the NJ Bar and practice law in the Atlantic City area. I reacquainted with him in the late 70s under unusual circumstances concerning an antique fire engine he kept in his driveway which he came by as an obsessed collector. Jac
“Weequahic Neighborhooding and Nostalgia:
Alan Ginter (64/65)
To answer some previous Weequahic related concerns, yes, Margie's had a soda fountain and even served simple sandwiches. Halem’s was on Fabyan Place and Chancellor Avenue and Harjay's was on Leslie and Chancellor, not the other way around.
There, indeed, was a burned-out house across Chancellor from Halem's; we used to call it haunted. One late afternoon when I was very young, my cousin, Frances Feldman (61), my brother, Freddy (61), another Schley St. friend (maybe Geoffrey Radoff) and I ventured into that house. It was the scariest experience of my young life. Much worse than going into the dark basement. Freddy and Frances don't remember such a thing and Lenny Sherman (1/61) denies it was him. "They" tore down the haunted house and built a branch of Berkely Savings and Loan which was the only business in the neighborhood that had real cold air conditioning. Jeff Davis (64/65) and I would buy sodas at Halem's and then drank them while relax in the air-conditioned comfort of the bank. Life was tough in the colonies. Alan
