Tag Archives: New York

#1 Polly: Our Parents, Ida Boshan and Charles Politzer

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There was an enclave of new Boschan and Politzer immigrants in New York City in the early 1900’s where relatives congregated as they emigrated from their birthplaces for a variety of reasons.  My father; to escape the inevitable draft in the army, my mother; to escape an arranged marriage.  The emigres supported one another during the process of adjusting to their new way of life in the United States.  Eventually, they moved on to other parts of the country when opportunities arose.

My mother, Ida Boshan, did not know my father, Charles Politzer, before arriving in New York.  However, each had gravitated to that area where their relatives had already settled and they found that they had relatives in common.  I have learned that Boschans and Politzers had married before them.

A cousin of mine, Lilian Politzer Rubin, told me that our fathers (who were brothers) came from Siefer, Hungary.  My father had done his apprenticeship as a butcher in Vienna, Austria, and, rather than face mandatory conscription into the Austro-Hungarian army, he immigrated to New York around 1906.

My mother also arrived in New York in 1906.  She left home rather than become party to an arranged marriage to a local farmer, perpetrated by her parents.  She grew up in Trnava, Austro-Hungary, which is now Slovakia, the eldest of ten children; two brothers and seven other sisters

Ida Boshan is the lady in the middle, Charles Politzer is the gentleman in the middle
The Boschan family before Ida, on the far right, left for America.

It was the custom then that the oldest girl in the family must marry before the younger daughters could marry, and her younger sisters were already engaged and applying pressure.  Their father had been in Kaiser Franz Joseph’s army in Herzegovina and, later, became an overseer of the Kaiser’s fields, so the family resided on a large plot of land and were farmers.












Though I have been resentful of my father’s attitude that girls were less valued than boys, it also provided me with the impetus to prove him wrong, and to strive to do my best whenever possible.

Between the two of them, I feel that I have inherited healthy and quality genes, a respect and admiration for family, and regard for citizenship.  Hopefully, I have passed some of these qualities on to my own children.

Ida Boschan and Charles Politzer were married in New York city on 3 March, 1907, in a Jewish ceremony and here are their Katubas in English and Hebrew.

#16 Fritzie: Playing college student in 1940

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I was a working girl in Detroit in 1939.  I was a freelance fashion designer making clothes for women in the more affluent Detroit suburbs, including wedding dresses, etc.

Through the work/study program at Antioch College, Polly took a summer job in 1939 at the Mt. Washington Hotel in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire.  When she and I talked about doing something together the following summer, we decided to go work at the hotel again.  Then, at the end of the summer when Polly would go back to school, I would have saved some money and would go to New York City to try and find work as a fashion designer in the big city. 

I was past student age, so I had to leave out some details when I applied to work at the hotel, because it was really a summer job for college students.  But since I look much younger than I am, no one could tell the difference or felt any reason not to believe me.

So in the late spring of 1940, we took off.  We had very little money and decided to start our trip by taking the boat from Detroit to Cleveland.  We traveled steerage to save money, which meant that we had no warm place to sleep and spent a cold windy night on the deck with nothing to eat.  Then we took the bus to New York City and lived on red bananas for a day or so while we were there.  We stayed in Antioch House.  I visited Valentina, a fashion design house, to see about a job later on.  We bought a wind-up victrola at Macy’s department store and two records, one of which was Tchaikovsky’s piano concerto #1.  The victrola was our prize possession – which was very heavy and which we had to drag along with us everywhere on our way to Vermont.  On the day we arrived, we were met at the train station and immediately taken to the hotel and our rooms on the top floor.  My sister Polly and I roomed together.   I think the boys stayed in rooms that were part of the golf clubhouse near the golf course.

It was a huge hotel. If you were a hotel guest you entered up a wide stair case in the front that opened onto the second floor into the lobby.  The dining room was also on the second floor, a large solarium with windows all around looking toward the mountains.  And on this same floor on either side of the entrance stair case were verandas; big wide verandas that curved around the whole building, where we served tea every afternoon at 4:00pm.

As it was 1940 and already World War II, what was wrong with the hotel that year, from our point of view, was that the guests staying there that summer were mostly refugees from Europe with little or no money.  So we waitresses weren’t making the tips we might have made some other year and even though the hotel was completely booked there was very little extra money coming in.  The hotel management was cutting as many corners as they could.

There were about 50 of us student workers from all over the country, Vasser, Antioch all the big schools; half and half boys and girls. The girls filled the positions of waitresses and the boys were either bell-hops or golf caddies and were also hired to play baseball on a regular schedule to entertain the hotel guests.  The bell-hops had to be available to meet the hotel guests at the train station.  For recreation the bell-hops could either caddy or play golf with the hotel guests.  The waitresses played tennis sometimes.

We would get up in time to be inspected in the dining room by 7:00 am for breakfast.  Lunch started at about 11:00 and we would be finished about 2:30 pm.  Then 4 of us would be picked to serve tea at 4:00 pm. There was also a special breakfast buffet for the late comers where we waitresses took turns similar to the afternoon tea time.  The rest of us were off until 5:00 pm when dinner started and then we would work through until 9 or 10:oo pm each night.  We had to clean all the glasses, and the A-1 sauce bottles and the silverware and put it all away before we were finished.

Before each meal, we were lined up by Mr. Grey, the maitre’d who checked our uniforms, etc., and explained to us our duties.  He was a very pleasant man, but very strict about protocol.  He would check our hands and fingernails and hair and makeup.  One of the most important things that I learned from this job, I learned from Mr. Gray about the preparation of the dishes they cooked for the dining room.  He would describe to us how they were made so that we could tell the guests when we served them.  For example:  Fresh Trout from the local mountain streams, Amondine.  Saute’d in butter with lemon Juice and toasted Almonds.  My sister Polly, can remember the fried breaded eggplant sticks that were served as a side dish.

Sunday nights were “grill nite” and the grill short-order chef was a sight to behold with a bandana around his head and another bandana around his neck and he sweat and swore a blue streak the whole evening long.  And when we served steak, A-1 sauce was served with it.  I can remember very well that we were required to clean those bottles after they were used each time.

This was the second year of waitressing for my sister Polly.  Besides the regular duties of a waitress, Mr. Grey gave her the job of being his secretary as well.  She was kept busy all the time with the extra work.  (She’d been here the year before and dated a football player from Moonsocket, Mass.  He couldn’t come back, as planned, the second year and Polly was so disappointed that she didn’t date anyone else the whole summer.)

We had a mutiny/strike among the student workers.  We protested over the fact that the hotel staff were giving us only left overs to eat.  So we rebelled.   We didn’t eat their food for almost a week.  Some of the fellows went out and got hamburgers so we wouldn’t starve.  We understood that the hotel was having a hard time and had to use all the food they could-even to feed the college boys and girls, but it was supposed to be good, healthy food.   I don’t remember how the strike ended.  Eventually we just worked it all out and went on with our work and play.  

#18 Fritzie: Fall 1940, Looking for a fashion job in the Big City

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Finally we arrived in the Big City of New York, to look for work…

Eve Marie and I found an apartment in Greenwich Village for a month. 

I found a job in a dress shop doing alterations.

Eve Marie’s job hunting escapades were fantastic and exasperating.  She was born in Germany originally and this was during World War II and she was considered an enemy alien.  She was trying everywhere with no luck.

One time she was supposed to go to an interview in a man’s hotel room and she was suspicious of the set up.  So she asked me to wait in the hotel lobby and if she didn’t appear after a certain amount of time, I was supposed to go looking for her.  Well the man turned out to be a real gentleman, with a very interesting job to offer her and her qualifications were perfect, except for her alien status and she didn’t get the job.

At the very end, I tried again to find a job at Valentina’s fashion design house and others, but it was summer, 1940 – the war and there was very little going on and since I had no documented experience in fashion design to speak of; no references, no resume, no one was ready to hire me right away. 

We had to leave New York City…………………..

We had enough money to keep the apartment for a month, but at the end of the month Eve Marie still hadn’t found a job and we had to go our separate ways.

I went back to Detroit, Michigan and Eve Marie went back to live with her parents in Tampa, Florida.

Years later, when her daughter was already 10 years old, we saw each other again.  We were both married by then.  We had a good time reminiscing about our Summer at the Mount Washington Hotel and our time in the Big City.