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Day 4: Philadelphia to Pottstown
We got breakfast from Starbucks downstairs. Marion packed while I walked up to City Hall to see if I could find Hyman and Ida’s marriage license (my great-grandparents). City Hall is huge and there’s no obvious main entrance. I was looking for the ‘Orphan’s Court’ (although I never did figure out why this is where the marriage licenses are). I tried one door and found the Hall of Records which I knew was wrong so I tried another. It seemed hopeless so I went back to the Hall of Records, which was at least open and asked where to go. They pointed me to the right corner of the building where I signed in and gave my ID and they gave me a pass to the 4th floor. While quite amazing looking on the outside, the place is dreary inside. Dark, dingy, low level fluorescent lighting. Industrial desks. But the people were all nice and helpful. I just wandered in and told the guy what I was looking for and he looked it up. Government efficiency. I was grossly unprepared though. Maiden name of spouse? Uh…. Oh yeah, Krawitz. Do I have a stamped self- addressed envelope? Uh no. No problem, we can give you one. Pay this guy over here $20 and it’s in the mail. Should be there when we get home. I would have liked to have seen it but that will have to wait. I’m hoping there’s more info about where they were from and maybe parent’s names. We’ll see.
As I left the license office, a young couple stopped me in the hall. “Would you take our picture? We just got married and want a photo in front of the office.” I was happy to oblige. I took their picture and congratulated them and went on my way. I did forget to sign out though. So hopefully they’re not still looking for me.
Then off to Hertz at the Marriott to get our rental car. I thought I knew how to get there but of course I got turned around as I always do. I headed off in the wrong direction multiple times. Including at least once while actively using the GPS. It was a block and a half away and I needed satellites to find it. Oh well.
The Marriott is huge but I got directed to the counter. I filled out the forms and headed out front to meet the woman with the car. I had to go upstream against the Penn State Women’s Lacrosse team that was filing in the door.
It’s 3 or 4 blocks back to the hotel. Can I make it, with GPS navigation? No. I thought I was going up Broad St but I was actually going down. I turned (to come around the block to go the other way) *just* before I would have figured it out. So it was a 6 block jaunt through traffic to find my way back while Marion wondered where I was. She had to get all the bags (two big ones, backpack, her purse) down to the lobby herself since when she called for a bellman no one showed up. But she’s a trooper.
We headed back towards City Hall and down Ben Franklin Pkwy by the Art Museum and out along the river past the boat houses. These are 6 or 8 very pretty houses where the local colleges keep their rowing sculls. Fairmount Park continues along the river. It’s a very pretty drive and a nice area. It would have been nice to linger there. But this day was cemetery day. So it was off to North Philadelphia to see Albert and Nana’s (my grandparents) graves.
It was about a 40 min drive through “interesting” neighborhoods but the cemetery itself is very pretty. I had a map for this one so I thought it would be easy to find the headstone. But no. We wandered around (in 90 degree and humid weather in long pants) for about 20 min and just couldn’t find him. So finally we went and found the office. They gave us the location and we went back out and tried again. But the spot they pointed us to was empty. We thought maybe there was no headstone although I vaguely remembered visiting once when I was little and seeing one. So back to the office again. This time, the woman there came out with us. It turns out they didn’t give us quite the right spot. I was preparing to call 60 minutes to get Mike Wallace out there to find out what they were doing with the bodies. But we did finally locate it. It was well hidden between some bushes. And as it turns out, Nana has no marker. So she’s there beside him but you wouldn’t know it. Likely because at the time she died (much later than Albert) the family funds were not in particularly good shape.
By now we were dripping with sweat. We went back to the office and asked about adding a marker. It would be about $1000 dollars which is pricey but I’m still thinking we should. As it turns out, Susan (Dad’s wife) is the legal ‘owner’ of what you can and can’t do because Dad was the executor of Nana’s estate and Susan was the executor of Dad’s. So we’ll need to talk to her. And figure out what to say on it. And decide if it’s worth it since there’s a good chance neither we nor anyone else will ever be back. But it seems like the right thing to do and something Nana deserves. The women we talked to said “interesting way to spend your vacation – visiting cemeteries.” We didn’t get the chance to tell here it was just for the day (or it’s none of your business).
Then back in the car for some blessed A/C and a drive back to South Philly to go to Pat’s for cheese steaks (a family tradition). It’s in an interesting neighborhood and nice to get out of city center to see it. We passed the Mummer’s Museum and I tried to explain to Marion what a Mummer was. But it’s rather difficult. The best thing to do is look them up on YouTube. It’s hard to describe. They are uniquely (I think) Philadelphian.
We found a parking spot nearby and headed over to Pat’s. They’ve gotten so efficient now it’s a 4 second exercise to get your sandwich. Slap, slap, splash some cheese whiz and here you go. But sadly, it’s not as good as I remember (and thought that when Daniel and I stopped on the baseball trip too some years back). It might be time to (blasphemy) try someone else (although not Geno’s). They really seem to be phoning it in now. Although they’re still plenty busy. We had trouble finding a place to sit.
We took a brief wander around the nearby neighborhood and came across a place selling cannolis. Neither of us had ever had one and they had a wide selection (plus a poster on the wall with the quote from The Godfather – leave the gun, take the cannolis). Marion got a dark chocolate covered one with traditional filling of ricotta cheese. And I got a milk chocolate covered one with Nutella. They were not bad, but not worth the calories as it turned out.
We spent a few more minutes wandering around looking at stores. This was the area I remember as the Italian Market but as time has gone on and immigrants have changed, it’s looking more and more like the Mexican Market. There was one place with live chickens! Just like picking your lobster I guess. I prefer my chicken pre-packaged.
So from there, on to the next cemetery to look for Hyman and Aunt Lillian. This one was at the other end of town from Albert and Nana. My Waze GPS app took us through some interesting parts of town. It optimizes for the best route which often means side streets and shortcuts. I had no idea where we were. We meandered down small streets and through neighborhoods. Primarily low end. The kids were just getting out of school.
We finally made it towards the end of the day to the Har Jehuda cemetery in Upper Darby. It was definitely older and more ‘haphazard’ looking than Roosevelt Memorial. But it had more character. I had no clue where to look this time so I went into the office right away. A little Jewish man was in there who didn’t seem overly pleased to see me, but he somewhat begrudgingly it seemed, gave me the info. We walked out to the spot where he said and … couldn’t find him. This was becoming a trend. And the day wasn’t getting any cooler.
We wandered around a bit and lo and behold. Ida! His wife. I didn’t even think to look for her there but there she was. So that was a nice surprise. But still no Hyman. Finally Marion spotted him. We left rocks on the headstones (as we did for Albert) like you’re supposed to. Then went looking for Lillian, my great Aunt. Try as we might though, and we tried for some time, we couldn’t find her either.
We’re sweating up a storm and about to give up when the little man from the office came out and said “I thought you might have some trouble” and tried to help us. Which was very nice. But he couldn’t find her either. We found a spot that seemed like the right spot and there was an opening there. So maybe no headstone? I had no idea in this case whether there was or not. I was going to give up but he offered to go back to the office and see if there was a stone and who the people nearby were. He came back in about 10 min and determined we were in the wrong row. He found the people next to her but still nothing. Then he looked down, thought for a moment, and wiped away a pile of grass clippings and there she was. It was like a scene from an Indiana Jones movie uncovering an artifact.
He ended up being very helpful and asked if we needed anything else, etc. He said they would try to raise up the stone so it was easier to spot. That seemed like a good idea. Although the odds of anyone coming looking again are sadly pretty slim. He turned out to be a very nice man and had stayed late and come out in the heat in a shirt and tie to help us. He was probably annoyed originally since he was planning to go home and then we showed up. And this on the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend.
Hyman’s grave marker has something written in Hebrew on it that looks to be more than just his Hebrew name. I can kinda sorta sound out some Hebrew but this didn’t make any sense to me. I’m going to try to track down a Hebrew speaker to see if they can figure out what it says. My efforts using translators on the Internet did not pan out. The Hebrew on Ida’s grave is clearly her Hebrew name so that one was easy. Same with Albert’s.
Postscript: My friend Les’ wife speaks Hebrew and she was able to translate it. Basically it says this – using various abbreviations: Here lies” Chayim Aaron, son of a worthy Jewish man Israel Kessler. Died 27th of Tishrei 5704. May his soul be bound up in the bond of eternal life. But, according to Google, 5704 is 1943 and he died in 1944. It should be the 26th of Tishrei 5705. So looks like someone got it wrong.
By now we were drastically overheated. So a quick stop at the WaWa for something to drink and Marion had the bright idea of getting some food so we wouldn’t have to go out in Pottstown when we got there. So we got some salads. (An excellent plan).
We headed off to Pottstown. Some things looked familiar. (King of Prussia, Conshohocken, Valley Forge) and some things didn’t (Oak, Audubon). We passed the Limerick nuclear plant which dominates the horizon and into Pottstown, coming down Hannover St, which is not a good way to enter. It’s pretty run down. But we had a drive down High St past the Hill School and back and are settled happily into the very basic Quality Inn. A step down from the Hyatt for sure. I suspect that unlike the Hyatt, where every president since Teddy Roosevelt has stayed, that the number of presidents, or politicians in general for that matter, who have ever stayed at the Quality Inn in Pottstown is precisely zero. However, based on what we could observe of the clientele, members of the carny industry are frequent guests. My friend Barry from Pottstown had warned us about the hotel, giving us the impression we might be taking our lives in our hands by staying there. So we were a bit nervous about it. But it was fine and not even top 5 of worst hotel rooms ever. That’s a list for another day.
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