CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
1935
The ad says the millinery department is up on the fourth floor,” Anne said to her friend Matilda. Dressed to the nines, the two young women turned heads as they walked through the main floor of Strawbridge & Clothier. When Anne looked up from the first level and eyed the moving stairway, her body began to shake. Her face turned pale and her breathing became labored: she knew it was the start of a panic attack.
“Anne,” Matilda asked, “are you all right?”
“When did they replace the stairs?”
“They put in an escalator a few years ago.”
She took a moment to regain her composure but couldn’t bring herself to set foot on it. “How about we go over to Bonwit Teller and take a look at that other hat? We can use your employee card and get a discount.”
“The hat at Bonwit is twenty-five dollars, even with my discount. You’ll have to use all of your winnings. But you’ll sure look swell when Ed takes you to the wedding.”
“I’m not going with Ed.”
Matilda was startled: this was news to her. For two years Anne had been dating Ed Silverglade, a handsome champion wrestler from New Jersey in the 175-pound class. As a three-state Ping-Pong champion of New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania, Ed was also well-known on the table tennis circuit, which is how Anne, also an accomplished Ping-Pong player, met him.
Why did they separate? One of Anne’s girlfriends was getting married. Anne was asked to be a bridesmaid and Ed an usher. Scheduled on the same evening as the wedding was a table tennis tournament in Asbury Park, New Jersey, chaired by Ed. She told him that he should let someone else take over the tournament that night, but he refused. Anne was extremely upset and gave him an ultimatum: if he attended the ping pong competition that evening, they were over. She made him choose between their relationship and his commitment to sporting events: Ed chose the tournament.I
Matilda, however, eyed this as an opportunity to set Anne up with her friend Ben Kravitz. Matilda was like a sister to Ben, and she decided it was time that he settle down and find a wife. She introduced the couple on the night of the big table tennis tournament at the Adelphia Hotel, where Anne was scheduled to compete in the finals for the Women’s Championship of Philadelphia. Matilda, knowing that Anne’s anxieties prevented her from learning how to drive, called her friend to tell her she was going to pick her up to take her to the hotel.
Matilda had Ben drive, and it was in her father’s borrowed car that she introduced the couple. Ben took an instant liking to Anne; he told her that she was a beautiful Russian girl. Anne thought he was presentable, but she wasn’t looking for romance; she was on the rebound. Ben, too, had suffered heartbreak a number of times: he had abandoned a prestigious scholarship at the National Farm School near Philadelphia in search of his first sweetheart Bebe, the love of his life who married another man for his money as soon as the Depression hit. His heart was soon warmed, rebroken, and then warmed again by a bevy of beauties, including Myrtle, a fashion model who appeared in newspaper ads. Ben was actually quite fond of her, but her dysfunctional family played a significant role in their breakup. It was this relationship that had just ended before he met Anne in the fall of 1935.
Ben was twenty-seven and running the meat and delicatessen department in a supermarket on Friday and Saturday evenings. He worked there as a bookkeeper and cashier and was making twenty-five dollars a week, which, in the height of the Great Depression, wasn’t bad.
He was also a former athlete but was forced to give up a promising baseball career that began well before his fifteenth birthday, when he was a star pitcher for two semipro teams owned by the Reading Railroad in Atlantic City and the Yellow Cab Company in Philadelphia. In the mid-1920s, scouts from the Baltimore Orioles were interested in signing him, but his Jewish immigrant mother, Pearl, refused to allow her underage son to attend training camp for the champions of the International League. In her mind, education was far more important than sports. If Pearl had allowed her son to pursue his baseball career, he might have made it into the record books as their youngest player and would have pitched from the same mound where Babe Ruth had briefly gotten his start a decade earlier.II
The week following their introduction, Ben called Anne, now the new Ladies Table Tennis Champion of Philadelphia, and asked her out on a date. It would have to be on Sunday because he worked late on Saturday nights. On that particular Sunday, however, Anne’s mother was preparing to go to Brooklyn, New York, to help her sister Bessie, who was expecting a baby. Anne told Ben that she was sorry that she couldn’t meet him, because as the oldest daughter, it was her responsibility to run the household in her mother’s absence. He asked if he could call her again and she said, “Sure.”
Just as she put the receiver down, the phone rang again; this time it was her friend Belle Jacoby. “Anne, what are you doing tonight?”
“Nothing special, I’m staying home.”
“Why don’t you join me—there’s a dance tonight close to where I live.”
Reluctantly, Anne went with Belle to the dance, but immediately regretted her decision. She wasn’t accustomed to these types of socials where a man would walk right up to a woman and ask her out onto the dance floor. The men and women didn’t have a chance to meet and talk first. All the older and shorter men were asking her to dance; she wasn’t interested and kept saying no.
Belle met a nice fellow who spent the entire evening by her side. Anne was about to give up hope of finding a suitable dancing partner, when a good-looking young man approached her and asked for a dance. She finally agreed.
As they took a spin on the dance floor, Anne couldn’t help but notice that he was grinning from ear to ear. Unable to contain her curiosity, she asked him why he was so happy.
“Because I just won five dollars,” he answered.
“What do you mean?”
“All of these men have asked you to dance, and you didn’t want to dance with them, but you danced with me.”
As her face became red with indignation, she retorted, “Well, if I had known, I wouldn’t have danced with you, either!”
A couple of days later, Ben called again and asked for a date the following Sunday. When Sunny first met him at the front door, she immediately thought he was the perfect man for Anne. On their first date, the young adventurer took her on an airplane ride. She was absolutely terrified, but he dared her to board the plane. The couple took off at the Philadelphia airport, and in a panic, Anne, who had never seen the inside of an airplane before, grabbed hold of Ben’s tie so tightly that she nearly choked him to death. She clung to him during the entire flight, and he felt like a hero. Letting her date take her for an airplane ride was scary enough. But it was 1935, before modern safety regulations were implemented… what would her mother say?
One evening, the couple was taking a walk on Ritner Street when Ben stopped and pointed to a house, remarking that it was his. He suggested that they go inside. Through the window, Anne could see his mother, Pearl, sitting on the sofa, preoccupied with her knitting. Anne was hesitant to meet Ben’s parents—they didn’t even know that the couple was dating—but Ben wouldn’t take no for an answer. He introduced a very nervous Anne to his mother and told her to take a close look at the young beauty.
Pearl looked up at him questioningly, “What do you mean?”
“Take a closer look. I’m going to marry this girl.”
His mother was so taken aback by the sudden news that she dropped her knitting needles.
After she got over her initial shock, Pearl decided that she wanted to learn more about her perspective daughter-in-law’s family, and who better to pump for information about a Jewish European family than from their kosher butcher. So, unbeknownst to Ben, his mother went clear across town to pay the butcher a visit, asking questions about the Caprove family. Luckily, the butcher happened to like Rebecca, and not only did he say nice things about the family to Pearl Kravitz, but he also tipped off Rebecca, telling her, “There was a lady here inquiring all about Channa, who must now be calling herself Anne, and your husband, your family and what kind of people you are…”
Pearl meant business. In the Old Country, she was a modern woman living in an antiquated world. She was the daughter of Hersh Mindes Saltz, a prominent landowner in Pochayev, in the province of Wolyn. While Hersh devoted himself to the people and charities of his shtetl, including taking on an active role in the Chevra Kadisha,III he was also the owner of a bar. He smuggled goods, including alcohol, from Galicia into Russia with the help of hired hands.
Pearl often assisted the smugglers by distracting the guards at the border. When Ben’s mother was not involved in such daring activities, she was a well-respected money lender in her shtetl, continuing with her business even after divorcing her first husband. When Pearl later married Ben’s father, Israel Kravitz, a handsome scribe in the tsar’s army,IV she continued to dabble in her profitable business.
Within a month of their introduction, Anne and Ben found themselves sitting and talking on the parkway in Philadelphia when Ben turned to her and said, “Let’s get married.”
“What?”
Ben’s mother was not the only one to be taken aback by talk of marriage.
Ben was the first man to show such serious interest in Anne. In general, men tended to be intimidated by her. She was twenty-three years old, it was the Depression, and she liked to take care of herself. She held a steady job at an ink factory, but it was not enough to support her love of high fashion. To supplement her income, she entered and won two local beauty contests and cashed in on the winnings. Men were scared that they couldn’t afford to support her, but Ben wasn’t afraid.
Anne weighed her options. She barely knew Ben, but in order to get to know each other more intimately, they had to get married first. Anne was disgusted with all her previous boyfriends, and Sunny was praising Ben to the Lord when he uttered those magical words, “Let’s get married.”
And so it was that Anne agreed to become Mrs. Kravitz. The couple settled on a date: Thanksgiving Day, November 28, 1935. Most of the country celebrated the holiday at home with their families as President Franklin D. Roosevelt carved the turkey with First Lady Eleanor looking on in Warm Springs, Georgia.
Anne and Ben celebrated rather differently. On Thanksgiving Day, he pulled up in his father’s car and they secretly drove to Elkton, Maryland, the elopement capital of the East Coast. Famous for its fast and convenient marriages, they stood in front of the justice of the peace and got hitched. Anne was wearing her elaborate twenty-five-dollar hat as Ben quietly slipped a five-dollar ring on her finger. The justice’s wife witnessed the nuptials. They then drove to Atlantic City and only stayed half the night. Afterward, they separated: he went back to his house and she returned to hers. Anne made Ben promise not to tell anyone about their elopement, and he agreed that they would not live together until they had a proper Jewish wedding.
Sunny kept their secret as the couple formally announced their engagement.
In honor of the impending marriage, Rebecca prepared a formal dinner for her future machatunim (in-laws). As she served her famous Russian strudel, God only knows what Pearl and Israel Kravitz were thinking when they got their first glimpse of Anne’s poor immigrant family. Their humble rental on Mercy Street was so tiny that they didn’t even have enough room to invite Ben’s siblings.
Pearl and Israel had immigrated to America two decades before the Caprove family and had already established themselves financially in Philadelphia. There were awkward moments between the two families until Israel shared a story over dinner that would break the ice.
“Thirty-five years ago, I left Russia in hopes of making my fortune in America,” he said. “For four years, I could not convince my wife to leave Pochayev. Out of desperation, I decided to write her a letter and give her an ultimatum.”
“What did it say?” Isaac asked with great interest.
“I threatened that if she didn’t come right away to Philadelphia, I would take the first ship to Camden!”
Everyone laughed: Camden was just a short ferry ride from Philadelphia.
“I panicked that I would never see him again,” Pearl continued. “I collected as much money as I could that was owed to me by my customers before leaving Europe.”
“I had slipped a Blitzstein passenger ticket inside my letter,” Israel added.
“Once I landed in America, I took a look around,” Pearl said. “What modern, conveniences—it was a new world! I decided to stay awhile.”
Anne and Ben’s second wedding, which, of course, everyone assumed was their first, was planned for Sunday, March 22, 1936. It would be one of those affairs that no one would brag about. There were many nice restaurants in Philadelphia where they’d feed you a meal, but they were expensive, and Isaac couldn’t afford it. Anne’s papa wasn’t making a decent living as a shoe repairer and was forced to borrow one hundred dollars just to throw the party. He booked a downstairs hall located at Eighth and Mifflin Streets and hired a three-piece band.
The weekend of the festivities, Rebecca’s family, the Cutlers, and the Stumachers, arrived in carloads from New York City, and the tiny house was filled to capacity. They all slept on the floor as nobody could afford a hotel room.
Disappointed that the wedding would not be the elaborate affair she dreamed of for her son, Pearl Kravitz decided that she would throw a party herself. The evening before the wedding, Pearl threw a big reception in her fancy house, to which she invited all her own wealthy friends and relatives. Ben, however, had a demanding job and was disappointed when his boss at the supermarket refused to give him Saturday night off. That didn’t stop Pearl—she threw the pre-wedding bash without her son, the groom.
In the end, Ben’s employers were generous in providing all the potato salad, corned beef, and cold cuts for the fifty wedding guests.V Ben arranged a three-day honeymoon package in New York City. At one of the big nightclubs, the couple watched comedian Milton Berle perform, followed by radio star Rudy Vallee and his orchestra.VI
When Anne and Ben returned home, they were faced with the dilemma of where to live. There was no room at Anne’s parents’ house, so the newlyweds went to survey the situation over at Ben’s house. Pearl and Israel Kravitz owned a large, beautiful home that was well furnished, but their older daughter, Ida, already lived there with her husband and daughter. Ben’s younger brother, Milt,VII who would often bring around his steady girlfriend, Beatrice Kaplan, also lived in the household.VIII
When Ben’s father returned home that evening after making the rounds to collect rent from his tenants, Pearl asked him in front of the newly married couple, “Did you get anything today?” She could see on his face that not only did her good-natured husband forgive his tenants’ monetary obligations to him, but he also gave them cash out of his own pocket. When he showed up at their doors asking for the rent, he saw firsthand that these families didn’t have enough food to eat. It was a typical scenario: Israel Kravitz would rather lose his properties than let his tenants starve. In the United States, Pearl and Israel Kravitz owned a great deal of real estate but lost most of it during the Depression years.
Times were pretty tough, even for Pearl Kravitz.
In the end, Anne and Ben made a home in West Philadelphia, near Anne’s friend Belle Jacoby.
Anne later went on to represent the City of Brotherly Love at the Table Tennis State Championships and advanced into the finals. When she looked up into the stands, Ben and Matilda were there once again cheering her on. Anne and her opponent were closely matched and continued to rally back and forth; each player alternated in holding match point. Anne’s opponent now held the lead: the audience was silent. A long volley ensued, and Anne tapped the ball, which touched lightly into her competitor’s far corner. The referee, however, who was sitting on the opposite side, missed the call.
“Match!” he declared, and her opponent was crowned the Ladies State Champion of Pennsylvania. The girl who had made it all the way from the little town of Stavishche had to settle for second place.
1. I. Ed had an elderly relative who did attend the wedding, and being an immigrant, she was unfamiliar with American customs. That night when the bride and groom opened their gifts, they found that she had taken one of Ed’s prized state trophies, wrapped it up, and gave it as a wedding present. She probably thought that Ed would never miss it.
Long after Anne’s public engagement to Ben, the phone continued to ring; Ed Silverglade was calling, but she never acknowledged him again. Anne had cared for him deeply but felt that she could not depend on him. After her marriage to Ben, the sports section of their morning newspaper often mysteriously disappeared; Ben would see Ed’s picture in the paper and didn’t want his wife to read about her former flame.
Years later, Rebecca heard that Ed had married and became a Trenton police officer. His unyielding dedication to sports paid off as he became the director of health, education, and welfare for the city of Trenton, New Jersey, and a founder and the executive director of the Police Athletic League. Later he became an Olympic boxing official and the manager of the US Boxing teams in the 1980 and 1984 Olympic Games.
2. II. In 1914, Babe Ruth was briefly signed to play minor league baseball for the Orioles before heading to the Red Sox.
3. III. Hersh was a member of Pochayev’s Chevra Kadisha, a private organization comprised of Jewish men who acted as the shtetl’s burial society. It was the responsibility of the Chevra Kadisha to see to it that the bodies of Jews were prepared for burial according to Jewish law. Since tending to the dead is a favor that the recipient cannot return, it is considered to be the greatest mitzvah that one can fulfill.
4. IV. Israel, who was born in Trostyanets in Podolia, was stationed in Pochayev with the Fifth Group of the Yakutzker Regiment when he met Pearl.
5. V. Now that he was a married man, Ben’s employers gave him a raise of two dollars per week.
6. VI. By 1936, Milton Berle was already a radio star after appearing many times as a guest on the variety show The Rudy Vallee Hour.
7. VII. Milt was later a track star and a standout hurdler in the Penn Relays, a national collegiate event.
8. VIII. The day that Anne and Ben returned from their honeymoon, Bea stopped by the house to see Pearl Kravitz. Milt and his sweetheart, Bea, had been seeing each other since grammar school; they had never dated anyone else. Milt worked long hours at the post office, even on holidays, in order to put himself through Temple University; he eyed a future for himself at University of Pennsylvania’s Graduate School. He didn’t want to put Bea’s future on hold while he pursued an education, so he told her that she could date other men. Bea arrived at her future mother-in-law’s house crying, “Milt doesn’t love me anymore; he wants to drop me.” Later on, when Milt returned home, Pearl Kravitz made her youngest son pick up the telephone and tell Bea that she wasn’t being dropped. After that, they remained together forever.