Main Street – May 27, 1948

By Morris Rote-Rosen

Riding on the "Laurentian" from Main street to Broadway, a four-year old boy, traveling with his grandmother, whom he had been visiting in Montreal, on his way back home, ran up and down the aisle of the passenger coach. He stopped and asked us to tell him a story and we obliged him with one about two little rabbits. The little boy became so interested he didn't leave us for a moment. When we reached Grand Central, he threw his arms around our neck and said: "You're the nicest man I ever met". And when we parted we could see him waving his little hand, smiling, but sad at our parting. And we walked out of Grand Central carrying with us a pleasant memory of a sweet little four-year old boy, Michael Jordan, whom we will never meet again, but who added a little joy to the things which make life worth living.

In a few moments we were on Broadway - the madhouse of the world ... The heart of New York is a human ant hill ... People rush to go underground on one side and are disgorged from a hole on the other side of the street in a never ending stream of human ants ... And where they go nobody knows ... They are the saddest looking people in the world ... Not a smiling face in ... They are so tired they sleep while going home from work and when returning to work in the morning ... Pasty-faced automatons, moving by an irresistible force, knowing little and caring less about the outside world.

Morning newspapers being peddled the night before ... Pitch men and barkers ballyhooing to a group of suckers, who readily hand over their cash, and not a country yokel in the group - all "wise" city slickers ... Boys and girls making love while waiting for the subway train, and the rest of the world passes them by without noticing them ... Dowagers, half-dressed, in the morning hours, leading their dogs to the nearest hydrants ... Mendicants holding out tin cups to passers by ... A blind man poking his way with a walking cane, holding out a tattered hat ... If he hears no jingle of the dropping coin in his hat, he taps the sidewalk so much harder to attract attention.

We meet a bum who recites that old familiar quotation, which we thought had gone out of existence a long time ago: "Say, bud, how's about a dime for a cup of coffee" ... The shriveled old woman bundled like a Laplander, grinding a miniature organ, begging for alms, only no music comes out of the box ... The broken down blonde, who has seen better days, trying to appear glamorous, but no takers ... Every move calls for a tip: the bell hop, the waiter, the taxi driver, the shoe-shine boy ... And if you don't tip, the icy stare you get would make a penguin look like the smiling Dutchman ... And if a New York learns you are from the country his first question is: "Are you a farmer?"

Courtesy to a lady is laughed at when offering her a seat in the subway or bus ... And if you step aside politely to let a lady pass first, those nearby look for hay-seeds in your hair ... A pleasant expression, or a smile, to those about you on the street, might bring the patrol wagon in an instant ... When a lady became ill on the street and needed a hand, people turned and walked the other way ... The city is a Babel of languages, where foreign newspapers catch your eye as you pass newsstands .. And if one pleasantly remarks about the weather to one standing nearby, he will move away from you as if from a contagious disease.

The highlight of the three day visit to New York was our witnessing "Command Decision" at the Fulton theatre, where Paul Kelly, as Brigadier General K. C. Dennis, is supported by an eighteen all-male cast, including Jay Fassett and Paul McGrath. Paul Kelly portrays a fighting general of a group of American fliers during the war. He is faced with decisions which send young American fliers to Germany, on bombing missions, to certain death and is constantly interfered with by swivel chair strategists in Washington and by Congressional committee investigations. Paul Kelly is a great actor and he held the attention of the audience from the rise of the curtain until its final drop.

Our stay in the Woodstock hotel, in New York, was the first since March 1919. Having just returned from service in the A. E. F., we tried to get a room at the Woodstock, but the hotel having been full for the night, we started out to find another hotel. Just then Waite Hicks came down and out of the elevator. He was stopping at the Woodstock. When we told him that we couldn't obtain a room there he offered to share his room with us. It was the first time we had slept in a bed in more than a year. And to this day we remember with appreciation the kindness of Waite Hicks.

From Archie "Bobcat" Ranney, from the Adirondacks, comes an interesting letter about his appearance in the Sportmen's Show in Schenectady recently as "The Hermit of Tombstone Swamp". "Bobcat" Ranney expects to return with next year's show. He writes that during January and February, the temperature registered from 26 to 46 degrees below zero. "I wallowed trails and dragged in my own firewood from four to six hours daily", writes the "Bobcat", "and I only bought one cord of chunk wood all winter. The woodlot is from an eighth to a quarter of a mile from my place. Not bad for a man of my age, It would buffalo some of the young men and I'd sweat the shirt off of them with a cross-cut saw."

Another letter in the mail to "Main Street" is from Detroit, Michigan. Louis Blossom, who was a young violinist in the Pember Opera House about forty years ago writes: "I am waiting for your next column on the Pember Opera House. Remember when Tom Boyle made Henrietta Crossman use the stage entrance on a rainy night? She wanted to come in the front of the house. And the time Frank Stoddard got excited at a rehearsal on a big musical show, kicked over his music stand and the traveling orchestra leader said: 'Pack up boys and just watch the show'. I can see old Cal Nichols, three-sheets-in-the-wind, on the stage, cussing and getting all mixed up with the stage lights. And I recall the time I drove from the farm for the five o'clock afternoon rehearsal to the opera house, wearing a derby hat, and froze my ears. If I come up this summer I would like to have a long visit with you."

Lou: Many incidents happened in "the good old days" in the show business. When Nance O'Neil and McKee Rankin played the Pember theatre in "Magda", she refused to walk from her "star" dressing room, up the few steps to the stage, unless the floor was laid out with a thick carpet. When Daniel Sully played in the "Matchmaker", his staged manager used such violent language to the men that they let go of the wood border ropes and dropped it on his head. And the roar from the audience which spoiled little Eva's trip to "heaven" in one of the Uncle Tom's Cabin shows, when the ropes got tangled. See you this summer, Lou.

Must we wait until we have a child's funeral in Granville before the speed maniacs are checked from tearing over the village streets at fifty and sixty miles per hour? We haven't enough on the police force to follow every lunatic driving an automobile who endangers the lives of our children, but it is time to call a halt even if the village board has to engage a motorcycle officer to arrest these traffic violators. And perhaps Police Justice Albert Berkowitz can forget the fine and just impose a jail sentence for everyone traveling over the village streets more than 25 miles per hour. Let's not wait until it is too late.

While some of our leading American citizens are beating their brains out how to stop the spread of Communism here, there are other Americans (?) who are doing all in their power to plant the seed of hatred and prejudice which nourishes Communism in America. Fifty-one children from New York, who were offered a trip to visit historical Washington, were compelled to cancel it because there were four Negro children in the group. Washington hotel doors were slammed in their faces because of the four colored children. Can there be anything more terrible among civilized people than that which strikes at the heart of a child because of the color of its skin? Can there be a greater strain on our flag that the cruel prejudice which takes revenge on a child because of its race? Give these youngsters a few more years and then try to talk to them about human rights, about democracy, about justice, about freedom and about what the Stars and Stripes stand for, then wait for their reply that the Hammer and Sickle beckons all persecuted as a haven of non-discrimination because of race and color. Will we ever learn?