Stanley and Elsie Fried's

Joint Autobiographies

1945 onwards

as told to

Albert Fried-Cassorla

from 1990 on.

 

Last updated 3-1-03

 

Forrest Hills, 1945 - Living with the Maiers

While there, I started at Brooklyn PolyTech. I was still in the service. I went at night. I was commissioned, but I was permitted to live off base.

Elsie and I had a room in the apartment. One day while I was doing an inspection of the ship in Bayonne, a gas bottle (heavy metal) fell and struck me in the foot, causing an injury and tremendous swelling. I was unable to report for several days, and the Navy send a medical corps wanting to put me in the hospital. Having had experienced the difficulty of getting out of military hospitals, I refused to go. I was on crutches

Hank and Rose flank my suster Carol at her graduation

The word came back to the commander, who ordered me to go to the hospital. I protested to the captain (equivalent of a colonel), a nice Jewish man, who counter-manded the lieutenant colonel's orders. One earlier, in Italy, when I was put in the hospital for a fever, the only way I got out of the hospital was to dip the thermometer in cold water before the read it. At that time, the MD in charge came in every morning swinging his tennis racket, took a cursory look and then left for the day. So I was getting no care.

I hobbled around on crutches for several weeks. I received my discharge papers in early 1945. Upon discharge, Elsie and I started looking for an apartment - a place to live. In those days there was a tremendous shortage of housing because of the number of military returning to their homes.

 

Living in Scarsdale, late 1945

We finally got a place through an attorney in Elsie's office… she was working in a law office. Danny Myers' father owned United Cigar Stores, a big concern, and an apartment house in Scarsdale on Garth Road - where we moved.
That was an upper middle class neighborhood. I resumed my old job as Supervisor of Shipbuilding with the U.S. Navy, in lower Broadway near the Battery. Elsie was working in mid-town. I was going to Brooklyn Poly in downtown Brooklyn, and Elsie was going to Brooklyn Law School.

It was quite a chore to get up early, work, go to night school. Elsie had to do work - case work at the library. So we stayed up late and took a train back to Scarsdale. There wasn't much time to sleep or even have social intercourse. It became almost an impossible situation. Elsie: there were a lot of drunks on the trains.

 

1946 - 6th Street in Manhattan

So we swapped our apartment in Scarsdale for a one-room apartment in 65th Street in Manhattan near Madison Avenue. The quarters were cramped, but who cared? At least we had more time.
After being there for one year, we received notice that they would tear down the building and we would have to evacuate.

P.S. It's still up!

What impressed us about 65th was that it was a very wealthy neighborhood. We couldn't afford anything there!

I made application for an apartment being built at Stuyvesant Town while were still living in Scarsdale. I told the interviewers our difficulties in commuting. Metropolitan Life Insurance built and owned Stuyvesant Town under a large subsidy from the City of New York.

Our friends visited us… but we were busy people. But we had parties in that small apartment. Going to school at night was tough.

1946 - Elsie works at Boudine, Cohen and Glickstein

Elsie: We represented unions, changing status from dishwasher to, say, vegetable man. This would increase their salaries. Even in private industry, job salaries were fixed. There was price, salary and rent control.

Sy Glickstein interviewed me and said, "We're not an eleemosynary institution." Elsie was a college grad and a woman - there were few of these. My mother would hock her engagement ring to pay tuition, then get it back and re-hock it.

Rose would bring a ring worth, say $500. The pawn shop man in turn would LEND her, say $350, a portion of the total value, using the ring as collateral. But the ring would not be re-sold. Then she would pay back the $350 plus interest, say $100, and get the ring back.

Elsie: I wasn't hired as a potential lawyer. My friend Belle (Seligman) Harper, talked me into it. I met her there.

 

 

1946 - 1965 Section -- Beginning with...1946

 

Elsie: We represented unions. the government was instituting wage controls,

The Unions waned higher wages. Negotiations got very hot. We worked with shop owners, or restaurant owners to change job titles to make raises legal.

A dishwasher might be promoted to vegetable cleaner , for example.

I was not yet lawyer -- no until 1948. Belle Swelgman now lives in Rye, Westchester, where she's a particular

I worked there until about 1949.

 

 

Elsie's Law degree - Brooklyn Law School

They would not acknowledge the law courses I had taken. they wold not allow credits from their own courses.

So I went to Brooklyn Law School. Stan was working as Supervisor of Shipbuilding again, and he was designated as a naval architect.

"My name was god," Stan adds with a laugh.

I worked there until 1955. Now it was contract administration and efficiency work. They were going through Gant charts and such.

I was in chare of the demolition of the German passenger ship, The Europa, in Bayonne.

I remember miles of copper wire in that ship. I saw them stripping it and cutting the keel. There were new design going on. Big naval architecture firms were designing new ships.

I was Communications Officer for the 12th Fleet, and I got top secret info about battles and such. I had no safe, so I hid it in trunks.

 

 

1947 - 1956 Moving into and living in Stuyvesant Town

They were very desirable apartments. I pleaded with them, because wee students at night. What they really liked was that I had lived in Scarsdale.

We saw vans of others movers-in, and they were also from Westchester.

That was the place to be from. We had been living at 56th St and Madison Park. We got a notice that we had to move out because the building was being torn down. What a racket! The building is still standing!

Lil, with Peg (left) and Martha, circa 1954

Our friends in Stuyvesant Town were few, mainly ex-GI's and their families. When Metropolitan, which owned it asked for rate increases, all of the accountants on our group analyzed the data and found that Stuyvesant Town was one of their more profitable properties.

Maier family, circa 1950

Elsie: I used to see a friend, Frankie Knapp, on First Avenue. her husband had a paint shop He died, she had terrible stomach problems.

 

January 18, 1950 - The Birth of Martha

 

I went into strong labor. I had a Chinese dinner in my apartment, and I had to leave it. I was hurrying everyone to get me out of there.

Stan: We paid a classy obstetrician, so we could go to Lennox Hill Hospital in the 60s between Madison and Park Avenue.

Elsie: I almost didn't make it. I got into a cab. It was very painful, and the labor was tough. You got through that. And afterwards, I saw Martha.

I used to bring the baby down to the playground, and we mothers would yack away while the older kids played in the playground.

 

Grandparents came and took pictures. The Shwartzes became our goods friends.

Stan: I got Stan Schwartz a job for the Navy at Super Ship in about 1947.

We were in Stuyvesant Town from 1947 to 1948.

Peg and Martha, circa 1955 in Stuvesant Town.

1950 - Peggy's Birth

Peggy was born in 1950, 18 months apart. Peggy's birth was very fast, but longer than Martha's. Martha's doctor was a Park Avenue guy, who never made it to the hospital.

Peggy was a colicky baby, and we used to carry her all night long. The obstetrician never sent out a bill -- you paid what you thought you could afford as you left the office.

Peggy was born in Beth Israel Hospital, on 16th Street or so. Dr. Diamond was her MD.

Stan: I worked at Supe Ship until 1955. I resigned from Supe Ship. I wanted to get out of government service; I had been in it long enough.

Here I am on a sofa with Jane on my lap. Tommy is between Marcia and myself, and

Martha cavorts in the foreground, circa 1953

 

1955 - Stan works for Self-Winding Clock Company

It was in Brooklyn. This simply means that it used a battery that drives a cam, and the speed was corrected by a master clock.

In the Eastern Union Building in downtown Manhattan, there is a very accurate clock that receives a signal from Washington that corrects the clock.

Peg, Martha and Jane on right, in 1955.

The master clock delivers signals to their leased clocks. It was used by the railroads for many years until corrected AC current came long in the 1920s. Cycles are controlled in a generating room. The clock company began with Jim Fisk and Pratt in the 1870's.

 

I was Assistant to the General Manager. I did a lot of contract work. We repaired and maintained these clocks used in cooks by railroads around the nation. Some of the escapements, notched gears, were o worn, that the were almost like knives. The escapement is the wheel you see moving inside a clock.

Another busy family shot...Tommy in the foreground looking like Buffalo Bob just walked in!

We had friend next door, one named Carol Rosenbloom. We lost touch with them. One neighbors was a traveling salesman for Men's shirt.

During the day, I cooked and cleaned. The Schwartzes used to come visit. on one New Year, I danced on the piano and got drunk!

 

Mr. Rosenbloom made some crack about my being pretty good-looking. That made me feel good -- I delighted in it!

Martha: Our phone number Spring 7-0461. We were in apartment 5G

 

 

Putnam Lake Visits - early 1950's

Stan: We went to Putnam Lake. We also took trips to Williamsburg and Gettysburg. Peggy broke her finger while diving into a motel pool.

Present unwrapping, circa 1954. That's Lil on the sofa in the back with Herbert's first wife,

Doris appraching. Agnes and Martha have fun in the foreground.

 

At Putnam Lake, Elsie, Martha and Peg stayed there during part of the summer. Stan came up during the weekend.

We swam, washed cars. One old car slid backwards, a Dodge, slid backwards on a country road and got banged up.

There was no canoeing or boating. The neighbors nearby wore big crosses, and that used to bother me.

The state line ran through the house, the Connecticut-New York State line. When we bought the place, they showed us a new cesspool that had been put in -- but not connected to the toilet. Also, the entrance to the cesspool was higher than the toilet. So we had to spend hundreds of dollars on a new cesspool.

Nathan and I bought it. A lot of people came and visited us there: Josie, Arty, Marcia, Carole.

 

About Otto Fried

Stan: My father died in the early 1950s. He may have died of TB, but it was arrested. He was a heavy smoker, smoking Sweet Caporals, the first commercially rolled cigarette. Otto Fried worked for the Third avenue Railway System, and his ran on Webster Avenue in the Bronx.. He was the conductor and motorman on the trolley. He was a taciturn man.

Else: I remember his sitting at the table at Stuyvesant Town and we were handing the baby (Martha) around.

He (Otto Fried) said, "If only it was a boy."

Otto Fried died in 1953. His step-sister told me about his hard life as a kid, being thrown out of the house ad a kid.

He came from Ellis Island with his mother, Hannah Green, who later remarried.

 

 

1953 -- The Threat

Someone called our apartment and said, "I'm going to have an affair with Elsie."

Stan called the police, and they came up. We made an appointment for the criminal to come up and see Elsie.

The criminal never came up. The police told me to tell him,

"Sure come up. I'll see you."

I did. The police were there, but he never showed. The caller called several times and was very lewd.

 
Carol Stadler graduates from the University of Chicago, circa 1953. That's Henry on the left,m of course, and her mom Rose on the right.

More Memories

At Lake Putnam, Rose carried the children on her back all around the living room.

I was pregnant with Amy in 1958, and she was born in that year. We had only 2 bedrooms, a living room, a dining room and a bathroom.

So we needed to move. The Schwartzes had moved into Roslyn Heights, so we followed.

 

I lost touch with Larry Neary during the war. He went into the merchant marine. Later we drifted together again.

 

 

1955 - Stan Quits Self-Winding Clock, Starting work for Yardney Electric

I quit because they closed! They had been in Brooklyn, then on Varrick Street.

I began working for Yardney Electric and stayed there for 11 years. They were bought out. Yardney was located on Leonard, Street, Manhattan, but they had a factory in Pawcatuch, Connecticut, near Wesleyan, RI.

Most work was moved up there in 1963. In the 1950s, I worked with people on the use of batteries in appliances t meet their needs. For example, a missile to satellites to electric tools, like a drill.

I developed the first Black and Decker power tools. (Stan adds with a laugh) I should have bought stock! People called with ideas, and told them if it was practical.

We developed the first batteries for submarines. Originally, subs were run on batteries, not diesel.

At Yardney, I met Frank Solomon, and they live in Little Neck. Frank was in development, developing several their batteries.

People's function changed with the whims of that schmuck who ran the country. But he patented everything. Mr. Michel Yardney.

The PR guy was a lush. Whenever they wanted to boost stock, they'd trot out their electric car, get some news. I don't know exactly how they profit from that -- gaining investment capital or buying and selling.

I got some stock options in Yardney in an IPO.

Elsie was home taking care of the kids in the 1950s.

Elsie worked as a law guardian, for the state.. any attorney is an officer of the court, and was paid on the number of days she spent defending children.

 

 

1956 - Moving to Roslyn Heights

We stayed in Stuyvesant Town till 1956. We ran out of room when my was born. Stanley and Sheila Schwartz lived there in south Park.

The house suited our finances and needs. It showed up in listings by 3 agents and had been built in 1948.

The move to Roslyn Heights was easy. We had professional movers. We knew the Breuers from our Book club, which we started in Stuyvesant Town.

The Brewers moved here by coincidence, in North Park.

We met the Zilko's from other neighbors South Park and belonged to our book club.

We sold the Putnam lake property -- Grandpa probably sold it.

Bessy lived until 1967.

Amy Fried and Barbara Wall play with our new pup, Yani. Circa 1960.

1965: Elsie defends an abused teenager

Elsie began defending children in the 1960's.

"One case was where a man was charged with incest -- having taken one of his children up to thee third floor of his house to sleep alone. believed hew did it.

"He was a very prominent brother of an officeholder in Nassau County, and so I was being urged to reduce the charges and let him off easy.

"I was defending the children. The child was in the hospital for mental care, about 13. I interviewed her. I was shocked by what she told me."

"I insisted upon the case being heard, and I don't recall the decision, but it was worse than what they wanted to settle for..."

Walls and more! Donald, Heidi, Barbara, and Herbert's second wife, circa 1970.

 

Late 1970's - CO2

Whippany, NJ

CO2 was a job I had for a year or two and I wanted out of it. I was an applications engineer. They had a unique battery, a product which the owner, Leon, completely screwed up.

Leon something. (I forget his last name) We had contracts to buy the batteries, but he used old equipment. (That sabotaged our work.)

1970 - Peg and Fred get married

1971 - Albert and Martha graduate from Harpur College

Betty Cassorla, Albert's Mom, remembers one incident:

"We were on our way to the graduation area. An African-American man said something nasty about "the Jews," thinking he was speaking privately perhaps, and Elsie overheard it.

"She laced it into him. I had such respect for her. She said something like, 'Don't you say bad things abut Jewish people, you anti-semite. You have no right to do that!'"

"I had such respect for her, not to let something like that go by, but instead to speak up!"

 

1971 - Elsie Teaches at Stony Brook

Elsie taught a section of literature at stony Brook.

Elsie audited courses at graduate Center at City College, then at 42nd Street. (Stan's CCNY was at 139th Street). One of the instructors she had was Louis Menand, who writes regularly for The New Yorker. She'd go into Manhattan with Albie Brewer.

1971 - Started with the Navy working at Grumman.

 

Nat and Rose...beautiful people...1977

 

1973 - Albert and Martha get married.

They had a play in a bird sanctuary as part of the wedding celebration.

We had a ceremony in the backyard.

A ceremony at the house included a rabbi and an ethical culturist. Albert wrote a poem in which each person present had a fruit or vegetable representing something. Very few were invited to the actual ceremony, but Nathan Maier and Sophie Cassorla, surviving grandparents, were there.

Also, there was a softball game for friends of Martha and Albert held across the street from us, on the grass and on the street at Cherrytree Lane.

1978 - 1983 Working for the U.S. Navy at Grumman

Having worked at the Navy earlier in my life, I still had rights for jobs. That's how I got the Navy-Grumman position.

My title was contract administrator. I was in conflict with them the whole time.

One guy defamed me, saying I was impossible to deal with.

So I sat him down and said, "If you don't stop that, I'm going to sue you right away."

There was no predecessor to me. I negotiated their overhead for fixed price contracts. They made F-14s after the Viet Nam war.

After making the LEM (Lunar Excursion Module), NASA would never deal with them again.

One example is their treatment of retirement funds within contracts. Grumman claimed retirement amounts higher than what people were making while working!

I even brought in an actuary to prove what they were doing was not reasonable. Taxpayers paid for it.

I had friends there, but nothing special. Grumman was in Bethpage.

1976 - Amy went to Harpur College. Elsie started her legal work in Nassau County.

 

1980 - Amy Graduates from Cornell

We went to the graduation. Sylvia Petersen also came. We visited Ithaca.


1983 - U.S. Air Force contract Officer at Republic Aircraft and RETIREMENT

They made A6, attack planes. I retied from there in 1983. They tried to throw a party for me.

I wrote something -- I wrote characterizations of all the people there. It was intended to be fun, and it was.

It was difficult to make progress and do the job well.

I had 23 years when I retired. My retirement was no big deal.

 

1984 - Amy and Tom get married.

They had a tent. The ceremony was led by Rabbi Moishe. Amy and Tom baked bread and had a wedding cake. They had square dance music.

 

1988 - Pilgrim Sate Hospital, Brentwood, Suffolk, NY

I was volunteering there with mental patients. I saw that people were dying at too great a rate from complications, such as constipation.

I was on the Board of Directors for about three or four years. Then my friend Ed Pool and I were thrown off.

It's an appointment from the NY Senate. I spoke to Tom DiNapoli from Roslyn.

We tried to find out why (we were removed). She spoke to my local assemblyman, and he said, "Don't ask any further."

Also, I had a good friend, an Afro-American state senator. She word she got was that Ed and Stan were "prejudiced," and someone had told (accused) the Black Caucus about this.

She was denied bills she wanted, and in a late night session we were replaced, when she was not there.

We never knew the exact reasons, but we think the doctors felt that we were too much trouble.

Sometime in the Mid-1990's, Else stopped lawyering.

 

Volunteering at Nassau County Medical Center

I also established a branch of AMI, Alliance for the Mentally Ill, there.

When I applied for the RSVP program, they liked the fact that I had volunteered at Bellevue for medical visits, in the psychiatric division. They gave me a test for stability.

I worked there for over 15 years. It was one to one. My main work was talking to mental patients, and I sat in on treatment meetings.


1983 Stanley retires from the U.S. government

I worked mainly at Fairchild Aviation. They made the A4, ground support type plane. I was a contracting officer.

Millie and Jack Zilko

Millie and Jack Zilko became friends by living close to us and through the book club. Elsie: "I liked them very much. Millie spoke a lot, and Albie Brewer too. Jack Zilko too. Dottie too."

 

The Maier children, circa 1990. From left to right, Marcia, Carol, Lee and myself.

Herbert had passed away by then.

 

1988 - Hannah was born in Madison, Wisconsin

 

Early 1990's. - The Book Club

At the end of a book club we would also talk about several books we'd read.

Herb and Millie Resnikoff were there, and he was a big talker.

 

Stanley and Sheila Schwartz

We saw Stanley and Sheila Schwartz - we went out with them. We'd make day trips together. We once or twice went to their country club. He was a golfer and she a tennis player.

 

1998 - Selling the Roslyn, Long Island House

I sold the house because of you kids. Elsie and were in the hospital at North Shore. I was in for an infection. We felt it was entirely too much.

W had to put down around $100,000 to get into Cadbury. We sold it (the house in Roslyn Heights) for $220,000 of which I had to pay some for treatment of Elsie.

1998 - Moving to Cadbury Retirement Center, Cherry Hill NJ

We moved to Cadbury, Cherry Hill, to be cared for, and also to be close to our daughters Martha and Amy.

 

 

More photos... mostly undated

 

My brother Herbert, with his daughter Agnes on the right.

 

The Maier girls' children (mostly!). Standing, left to right: Amy, Martha, Heidi, Beth and Barbara.

 

The Stadlers... Hank and Carol, with Cecile, John and family.

 

One of my newest nieces, Olivia Dallape, Beth and Gregg's daughter.

 

2001 - Elsie writes to Sidney Hook's Son

___________________________________________________________________________________

Note from Albert:

Elsie Fried recently wrote the letter below to Sidney Hook's son,
recounting her experience as a student of the eminent philosopher.

Since it's suich a well-written piece, I asked Elsie if you could see it
and she agreed. By way of background... Elsie dictated the letter to Stan.

The son did reply,though it was a brief response.
I hope you enjoy this piece!

___________________________________________________________________________________

June, 2001

Professor Ernest Hook
School of Public Health
UC, Berkeley
140 Warren Hall #1360
Berkeley, CA 94720-7360

 

Dear Professor Hook:


Perhaps I should introduce myself: Elsie Fried, (my sister is Carol Stadler), and a former student of your father, Sidney Hook, at Washington Square College of N.Y.U. I happened to be reading your father's biography, "Out of Step", when I came across his desire not to include in the book what he characterizes as "professional philosophy", which he indicates as being available in his published works. In so doing he omits what he brought to the teaching of philosophy during the times I bad him as instructor.

As I recall it, the process of getting into his class was a difficult one-in addition to the normal chaos of registration day was the fact that too many students wanted to take his course. It became a test of "first come, first serve," which added to the mayhem of the day.

Once in class it was difficult to remain silent in the constant give and take between Professor Hook and his students. He played devil's advocate just to test our ability to argue against material which was finally shown to be erroneous- this with all hands waving to be recognized. Perhaps this accounts for the excitement and breathlessness I experienced at the end of such sessions.

Or perhaps our teacher would capitalize on his reliance on the boys' passion for baseball. He would deftly introduce the subject, and then proceed to the standing of the teams and the batting averages of the players in order to apply percentages to philosophy.

Professor Hook was also generous with his time. From early on we were all invited to expand the period by joining him in the downstairs cafeteria, to sit at his feet while he continued the pleasure of teaching whatever came to mind.

I took advantage of this extra time as did many of the other students and I still remember the picture we made sitting in a circle at Professor Hook's feet.

I thought the above might amuse and gratify you, and I paid the ultimate distinction of taking my father to sit in on one of your father's classes. A fine time was had by all.

Yours sincerely,

Elsie Fried

___________________________________________________________________________________

2001 - Elsie and Stan in Melrose Park, visiting Martha and Albert

 

The end... so far!