May Street Tapes - Florida Trip and a Party at Home

For openers, JPZ/Daddy/Dziadzi reads a letter he has received from Eleanor, who has taken the train for a Florida vacation. At 0:33 Eleanor in her letter says "Emily and I."  Is Emily her sister?

At 0:57 she expresses in her writing the fond hope that JPZ will be "visiting Johnny" (presumably at the home of his Kotwas grandparents) so that Johnny will not be "missing her too much."  Hilariously, JPZ breaks in in his own deep voice with a hearty "Me too!!"

At 1:03 Eleanor's letter mentions "Gwennie and Dickie." These must be Kotwas relations also. Can somebody figure this out and let us all know the specifics? It would be terrific to have names and photos to associate with these voices.

At 1:24 she tells of their getting dolled up and going to a Martha Raye show. Raye was a very popular  singer and actress who did a lot of USO tours as well, during WWII and subsequently.

Correspondence now dealt with, we come to a mystery poem, or prayer in verse, at 1:50. Can anyone offer a hint as to what this is? Król  is "crown."  So it sounds like a reference to the King of Kings, in niebieski, heaven.

And there cannot be an event like this without a poem about an orphan. At 3:30 we hear of the sierota.  I'd love to find a transcription of this poem; let me know if you find one, please? 

(On a wall of the Marilla house hung a print depicting an orphan girl, weeping as she leaves the cemetery where she evidently has been visiting the grave of her parents. I cannot find that painting on an image search, which is a sad thing. There were several framed prints in the house which I suspect were purchased by Dad, our EJZ, while he was in Chicago in 1943-1944. One of them has a label on the back with the name of a Chicago art dealer. Sierota may have been one of those.)

Back to the sound file: They have Johnny back to praying again from 4:18 to 6:00. Spiritually, the partiers are covered.

What is the beautiful song at 6:25?  I'd love to learn that song! Can anybody come up with a title or first line or a keyword?

From 6:44 the celebration is for Grandma Victoria Zdrojewska.  "Let's all sing for Busia . . . na imieniny."  This day was her name-day. She was named after a saint, and this is the feast-day of that saint. Her family sings to her Vivat!  Sto lat!

Sto lat, sto lat,

Niech żyje, żyje nam.

Sto lat, sto lat,

Niech żyje, żyje nam,

Jeszcze raz, jeszcze raz,

Niech żyje, żyje nam,

Niech żyje nam!

           One hundred years, one hundred years,

           That she lives, she lives among us.

           One hundred years, one hundred years,

           That she lives, she lives among us.

           Once again! Once again:

           That she lives, she lives among us,

           That she lives among us!

Following the whistling performance, at 8:34 JPZ has a little visit with his grandson Mark. This helps date the file to about 1955; does that sound reasonable? JPZ jingles some Christmas bells and asks Mark Co to jest? - What are these/is this?  I wonder if he was hoping for an answer in English, "bells" or in Polish, dzwony.

Following the jingle bells is an interlude of conversation in which a lady says  the word południe repeatedly.  Południe means "noon," "midday." It also means "south." Think about how ancient a word must be, if the directional term, "south," is the same as the primitive astronomical observation a person can make just by standing outside at midday.

Stand there at midday, when the sun is as high as it ever is going to get that day. Raise one arm and point it directly overhead. Raise the other arm and point to the sun. If you walk in the plane determined by those two line segments your two arms, and walk on a line in the direction from the overhead-pointing arm and toward the sun-pointing arm, you are walking south. 

You need noon to determine south. That's the way it is in the Northern Hemisphere of our planet. We use words invented by very distant forbears living the lives of pastoralists, farmers, and hunters.

By 9:10 in this file the partiers are starting discussions on singing Christmas carols. Johnny livens things up by bringing out his new toy six-gun. Merry Christmas, everybody!

Hey! Finger off the trigger and out of the trigger-guard!

What a ride this file has been!  Thanks, Marty, for your rescue operations.

Related, previous posts: 

Three Bears;

Good Night Prayers - Our Father;

Good Night Prayers - Hail Mary;

Good Night Prayers - Conclusion and Mystery Poem.

Grandpa Ludwig, Grandma Victoria, and Uncle Stanley

Casimir, John, Eugene

Posting Updated

There's an update on the previous post, incorporating Kotwas family data John sent.  To see the corrected version, Wedding and Graduation Season, 1946? - Updated and Corrected with Kotwas Family Members, is up on Gene and Clara's.

Dziękuję, Janek

Julianna

Wedding and Graduation Season, 1946? - Updated and Corrected with Kotwas Family Members

The previous posting featured Casimir Zdrojewski in his high school dorm at St. John Kanty preparatory school in Erie, Pennsylvania.  Here is Casimir all robed up for graduation therefrom.  It looks like the basement at Kanty; maybe it rained that day.

Grandma Victoria Zdrojewska, her daughter-in-law Eleanor Kotwas Zdrojewska, and to her left (in white dress and black hat) Eleanor's mother, Ludwicka ("Louise") Chmielewska Kotwas.

John, our JFZ, writes of his maternal grandmother Louise, our LCK, as "the kindest person I have ever met."

Also, "And, interestingly, Louise' parents came to America in the late 1870s and were among the first parishioners of St. Stanislaus Church in Buffalo."

Continuing around the table, we have 3 mystery people, JPZ nattily dressed, and to the JPZ's own left is, as John writes, "Eleanor's father, who came from the Russian partition of Poland in 1902."

Then we have the man of the hour, Casimir with boutonnier and mortarboard.  Oh, and diploma!

Does someone have more photos of this event, or the diploma to scan?  If so, please send them; I would love to put them up!

And here below, a terrific find from the New Trove - thanks, Marty!  Casey and Gene and a very cool car, all right at the front doors of Kanty Prep.

Andrew, you are the Spirit and Image of your grandfather at that age.  Come walk around Krakow with me so I can have fun watching you run into a doppelganger around every corner. 

A Google Image search on "Ford coupe converible 1941" returns many pretty pictures of cars like Gene's, including these two:

Must be Eugene took the photo below, probably in 1946.  JPZ and Eleanor were married in August of that year.  Casey is grinning wickedly in his James Dean hairdo still.  And a similar Ford is prominently included in the shot.  Paint job? New car? JPZmobile?

Le pique-nique with Grandma Kotwas, Eugene, JPZ,
the picnic basket and percolator, Casimir, and Eleanor.

Below, we see Eleanor, at right, and Clara, at left by Eugene, gamely smiling as they realize the antics their new family gets into at the drop of a hat, or some napery, or a potted plant.

Paul Zadner's lovely Mamma is unfazed. Paul has no idea that there is Chow Mein in his future. We saw this photo near the beginning of this blog, in - let's see - "Wedding Photo on the Wall".

Hot Times, Hot Dogs: Update

John has straightened me out about the hot dog post. 

"I think the caption is: "Taken in the summer",which is rather obvious, and it should be 1948.

The "three men with hot dogs" was taken at Glen Park, a small scale amusement park for children in Williamsville. It is Marty. And the young man on the right is my cousin, Dick Kotwas, then of Auburn, now a dentist near Plymouth, Ma. It was him and his two brothers that we visited with last summer in Saratoga."

Thanks, John.  That's why I put these things up: to get things straightened out.

Julie

Casimir Zdrojewski High School Graduation

Casimir Zdrojewski processes at his graduation ceremony.
  Which graduation is this?  What is the year?
What does D. O. M. stand for?
Would those who know please post a comment and clue us in?

Congratulations, Cazu.

Paul Zadner sent me these photos  - thank you, Paul.  This one he labeled "Grandmother Z. at  Casey's graduation."  Who is the gent with the fabulous necktie?  Who is the lady with the hat?  The third lady, in the dark dress with white polka dots, must be Grandmother Victoria.  The fourth lady, sporting shades, is Eleanor, proud Mama of Casey the Graduate.  What year is this?

Standing:  Casimir (handsome lad!), his father John.
Seated:  Eleanor, Grandma Victoria,  Who, please?, and Who, Please?