Thursday, January 26, 1995
Swapping Tales with Gene Dorfman
The information technology industry is truly a wonderful thing. Without it a community newspaper - or any newspaper - would be in trouble. Now a reporter can type a story directly into a computer, and it gets formatted into newspaper columns, without a need for a typesetter, proofreader or copy editor (a mixed blessing, these latter two, but they do reduce costs). There is another computer, a scanner, that reads a ragged-edge manuscript and converts it into justified (that is smooth-edge) newspaper columns, ready for paste up. It can also take a
Eugene Dorfman, FSA, a resident of 2nd Ave and 21st St for 35 years, is moving to a nursing home in Boca Raton, FL on January 26th. Gene was a community activist for a number of years, as a volunteer worker in Congressman Bill Green's office and as a teacher of English as a second language through the auspices of the English-Speaking Union. A math graduate of Williams College (1936), member of the US Army during WWII and an actuary with a local life insurance company for many years, he had a life-long interest in philosophy, and corresponded with Sir Karl Popper, the British thinker. He was also a collector of the books of Henry Miller, and brought them in from France during the years when the explicit autor could not be published in his native country. On several occasions the US Customs confiscated his cargo, but Gene persevered.
Swapping tales refers to Gene's vacations in the South of France, in the Provence, and in Toulouse, where he visited the hometite of Fermat, the margermatician whose theorem seemingly has is in the way of being solved. He vacationed in the sunbathers' island, Isle de Levant, in the Isles de Hyeres, South of Toulon, where French and British nudists congregated. The scenery of the Hyeres Islands was appealing, and when my wife, an avid reader of George Simenon's Inspector Maigret series, read his Arche de Noe novel, with its descriptions of the countryside on the Isle de Porquerolles, in the Hyeres , we decided to look into it.
We called the French Tourist office, which expressed wonderment at this farfetcherd inquiry and eventually sent some mimeographed pages in French, describing the island. Surprisingly, there was an Arche de Noe hotel there.
That was enough for us. Next year we vacationed in Kandersteg, Switzerland, and took a train from Domodossola on the border, through Genoa and the lovely Italian Riviera countryside, to Nice. The Nice beach is rocky, and the sunshine people had to take the little local train to Juan les Pines or Cab d'Antibes for beach life . we did that for two days, and took the local bus to Touluse, to see the French Riviera on the run. Cannes was rainy, and we took a lunch brak in , Brigitte Bardot country. The bus was on the quayside, near a huge yacht that had an ekeectrified sign in two languages "Entree Forbidden." Not intimidated, wew ent to a cafe and ordered local fish soup. The waiter told us to take local red wine with it. "Fish ?" we questioned, to which he gave us the local equivqlent of "Trust me." We did, and the heavy Provence red balanced the stew completely.
Moving right along we now came to to Le Levandou, a saeport stop. I jumped out to ask whether they had a ferry to Porquerolle, to be told that the summer ferry schedule had stopped at the end of August. Back to the bus. Nothing daunted, (to be cont)
Eugene Dorfman, FSA, a resident of 2nd Ave and 21st St for 35 years, is moving to a nursing home in Boca Raton, FL on January 26th. Gene was a community activist for a number of years, as a volunteer worker in Congressman Bill Green's office and as a teacher of English as a second language through the auspices of the English-Speaking Union. A math graduate of Williams College (1936), member of the US Army during WWII and an actuary with a local life insurance company for many years, he had a life-long interest in philosophy, and corresponded with Sir Karl Popper, the British thinker. He was also a collector of the books of Henry Miller, and brought them in from France during the years when the explicit autor could not be published in his native country. On several occasions the US Customs confiscated his cargo, but Gene persevered.
Swapping tales refers to Gene's vacations in the South of France, in the Provence, and in Toulouse, where he visited the hometite of Fermat, the margermatician whose theorem seemingly has is in the way of being solved. He vacationed in the sunbathers' island, Isle de Levant, in the Isles de Hyeres, South of Toulon, where French and British nudists congregated. The scenery of the Hyeres Islands was appealing, and when my wife, an avid reader of George Simenon's Inspector Maigret series, read his Arche de Noe novel, with its descriptions of the countryside on the Isle de Porquerolles, in the Hyeres , we decided to look into it.
We called the French Tourist office, which expressed wonderment at this farfetcherd inquiry and eventually sent some mimeographed pages in French, describing the island. Surprisingly, there was an Arche de Noe hotel there.
That was enough for us. Next year we vacationed in Kandersteg, Switzerland, and took a train from Domodossola on the border, through Genoa and the lovely Italian Riviera countryside, to Nice. The Nice beach is rocky, and the sunshine people had to take the little local train to Juan les Pines or Cab d'Antibes for beach life . we did that for two days, and took the local bus to Touluse, to see the French Riviera on the run. Cannes was rainy, and we took a lunch brak in , Brigitte Bardot country. The bus was on the quayside, near a huge yacht that had an ekeectrified sign in two languages "Entree Forbidden." Not intimidated, wew ent to a cafe and ordered local fish soup. The waiter told us to take local red wine with it. "Fish ?" we questioned, to which he gave us the local equivqlent of "Trust me." We did, and the heavy Provence red balanced the stew completely.
Moving right along we now came to to Le Levandou, a saeport stop. I jumped out to ask whether they had a ferry to Porquerolle, to be told that the summer ferry schedule had stopped at the end of August. Back to the bus. Nothing daunted, (to be cont)
Tuesday, January 10, 1995
Greetings, Friends and Neighbors - Valentine's Day Poem, 1995
LOOKING AHEAD by Wally Dobelis
Happy friends, another year, gone before the grimsby reaper
cuts the blooms of yesterspring. But we sing and sing and sing.
Doomsday cometh, Almanack, Nostradamus tells us wither,
but we titter, titter, titter, dance on life's immortal track.
We have got the silver bullet, we're untouched because we care.
Doomsday never calls our number 'cause we're busy elsewhere.
So, dear friends, let's celebrate, drive the grimsby out of state,
keep the spark of life a-blooming, 'cause we care, we care, we care.
Raise a little glass of sake for Mario Cuomo, George Pataki.
And that famous hedge-fund warhorse Europe's savior, George Soros.
Smite the zither, clang the drum with the Clinton pair, old chum;
save a thought for Hard-Times Rudy, trimming budgets, doin' his duty.
Ring the bells, chime the clock with Phyl, Herb and Rabbi Block.
If these days your hope doth falter, try consulting Rabbi Alder,
Dr. Pike, Father Byrne, Pastor Ames, Philip Rothman,
Sylvia Friedman, Steven Coe, Evie Strouse, Barbara Harry,
Sam Isaly, Norman Siegel, Susan Parker, Celia Sagnes.
Think of Nelson Mandela; the Russian general who won't shoot.
Hospital's the place to rest, take a load off, get a test.
Make some calls to friends who're sick: Gertrude Barber, Eugene Dorfman,
Rex Wassermann, Minna Michaels. Irwin Dienstag, one of the best.
And the doctors. They work hard. Friedbergs, Falkensteins, Levitzkys
(Frank Lopez may attest).
When your gall exceeds your ken, grab that old Ameche invention,
spin the dial, spend the dimes, give the word to Barry Farber,
Lynn Samuels, Bob Grant, or Imus.
If your'e musically inclined, play a gentle obbligato
for Sens Moynihan, D'Amato, Goodman, Abate, Ohrenstein.
And for the Parksiders gang, Aldon James, Connie Gibson,
James Dougherty, Jack Taylor, Arlene Harrison, Peter Ryan,
Arthur Abbey, May Miculis. Clink a little glass of vino
with Clint Blume and Dom Crispino, Gary Papush, Nicholas Fish,
Lou Sepersky, Gerald Schriffen, Barry Benepe, Jeanne Tregre.
You can watch your children grow, in the care of Jean LeShaw,
Richard Eldridge, Jean Ramirez, William Freedman, Robert Durkin,
that's the rollcall, quite a firkin.
Now for law and order, bird: Honor Robert Ward, Fed Court,
Judge Jay Dankberg (and Louise), then yer life will be a breeze.
But if yer fixed on drugs or booze, Captain Duffy, Owen Hughes
will provide the right enviro to keep you a crime tyro.
If reading be your only crime, gentle books about the past -
Carol Klein's remarks will last. When you're coping with life's flipside
read the Times, Robert Lipsyte. Roberts (Ray) makes fine books too.
As for words that will infuriate you, try some Charles Murray,
Richard Armey, Newton Gingrich. But no jam for the strange breed
that calls a book a good read. And no bread from Lynda B lankenhorn.
'Tonio Pagan will move you, make you active, do things;
Tom and Nan DeRosa help you, Carol Maloney will hold hands;
Jane Crotty, Steve Sanders, Andy Eristoff, Charles Millard;
Edith Charlton, Agnes Atwood, Jack Bringmann and Al Doyle,
Jo-Ann Polise, Pete Doukas; a better city is their watchword.
If your business needs a doctor, just one name - Carol Schachter.
If antiquity's your thing, give a call to Donald King.
Editors of great renown, spelling is their star in crown,
grammar of profuse perplexion, words from many, many diction-
aries: Todd Maisel, Frank Gribbon.
Company to drink a beer in, Rob Walsh, Tom Knierim,
E. K. Kane, esteemed friend, Herman Diamond, no end
of the folks who make a life.
So I wish you all a treat, sip of Scotch, singlemalt, no blend.
Save a thought for those who bleed, make a wish for those who need,
say a prayer for the world, we're the ones who lucked out.
Turn the ugly thought unsaid, may the priestly words descend,
benediction for the world, no end.
Wally Dobelis thanks Roger Angell (18 years of Greetings) and the late Frank Sullivan (40 years of Greetings), of the New Yorker.
Happy friends, another year, gone before the grimsby reaper
cuts the blooms of yesterspring. But we sing and sing and sing.
Doomsday cometh, Almanack, Nostradamus tells us wither,
but we titter, titter, titter, dance on life's immortal track.
We have got the silver bullet, we're untouched because we care.
Doomsday never calls our number 'cause we're busy elsewhere.
So, dear friends, let's celebrate, drive the grimsby out of state,
keep the spark of life a-blooming, 'cause we care, we care, we care.
Raise a little glass of sake for Mario Cuomo, George Pataki.
And that famous hedge-fund warhorse Europe's savior, George Soros.
Smite the zither, clang the drum with the Clinton pair, old chum;
save a thought for Hard-Times Rudy, trimming budgets, doin' his duty.
Ring the bells, chime the clock with Phyl, Herb and Rabbi Block.
If these days your hope doth falter, try consulting Rabbi Alder,
Dr. Pike, Father Byrne, Pastor Ames, Philip Rothman,
Sylvia Friedman, Steven Coe, Evie Strouse, Barbara Harry,
Sam Isaly, Norman Siegel, Susan Parker, Celia Sagnes.
Think of Nelson Mandela; the Russian general who won't shoot.
Hospital's the place to rest, take a load off, get a test.
Make some calls to friends who're sick: Gertrude Barber, Eugene Dorfman,
Rex Wassermann, Minna Michaels. Irwin Dienstag, one of the best.
And the doctors. They work hard. Friedbergs, Falkensteins, Levitzkys
(Frank Lopez may attest).
When your gall exceeds your ken, grab that old Ameche invention,
spin the dial, spend the dimes, give the word to Barry Farber,
Lynn Samuels, Bob Grant, or Imus.
If your'e musically inclined, play a gentle obbligato
for Sens Moynihan, D'Amato, Goodman, Abate, Ohrenstein.
And for the Parksiders gang, Aldon James, Connie Gibson,
James Dougherty, Jack Taylor, Arlene Harrison, Peter Ryan,
Arthur Abbey, May Miculis. Clink a little glass of vino
with Clint Blume and Dom Crispino, Gary Papush, Nicholas Fish,
Lou Sepersky, Gerald Schriffen, Barry Benepe, Jeanne Tregre.
You can watch your children grow, in the care of Jean LeShaw,
Richard Eldridge, Jean Ramirez, William Freedman, Robert Durkin,
that's the rollcall, quite a firkin.
Now for law and order, bird: Honor Robert Ward, Fed Court,
Judge Jay Dankberg (and Louise), then yer life will be a breeze.
But if yer fixed on drugs or booze, Captain Duffy, Owen Hughes
will provide the right enviro to keep you a crime tyro.
If reading be your only crime, gentle books about the past -
Carol Klein's remarks will last. When you're coping with life's flipside
read the Times, Robert Lipsyte. Roberts (Ray) makes fine books too.
As for words that will infuriate you, try some Charles Murray,
Richard Armey, Newton Gingrich. But no jam for the strange breed
that calls a book a good read. And no bread from Lynda B lankenhorn.
'Tonio Pagan will move you, make you active, do things;
Tom and Nan DeRosa help you, Carol Maloney will hold hands;
Jane Crotty, Steve Sanders, Andy Eristoff, Charles Millard;
Edith Charlton, Agnes Atwood, Jack Bringmann and Al Doyle,
Jo-Ann Polise, Pete Doukas; a better city is their watchword.
If your business needs a doctor, just one name - Carol Schachter.
If antiquity's your thing, give a call to Donald King.
Editors of great renown, spelling is their star in crown,
grammar of profuse perplexion, words from many, many diction-
aries: Todd Maisel, Frank Gribbon.
Company to drink a beer in, Rob Walsh, Tom Knierim,
E. K. Kane, esteemed friend, Herman Diamond, no end
of the folks who make a life.
So I wish you all a treat, sip of Scotch, singlemalt, no blend.
Save a thought for those who bleed, make a wish for those who need,
say a prayer for the world, we're the ones who lucked out.
Turn the ugly thought unsaid, may the priestly words descend,
benediction for the world, no end.
Wally Dobelis thanks Roger Angell (18 years of Greetings) and the late Frank Sullivan (40 years of Greetings), of the New Yorker.
Monday, January 09, 1995
Looking For Traffic Congestion Relief in NYC
LOOKING AHEAD by Wally Dobelis
Letter on hand from the New York City Department of Transportation, announcing that they have federal funds to support community-based projects for addressing transportation and air quality problems. This is under the Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement Program, administered by the Fed Highway Administration. Now I understand the mysterious form I had to fill out at the office, explaining my work travel patterns and use of bridges and cars vs. public transportation.
It is ironic that this request should come at a time when the State DOT will choke off the access to our Waterside area for two years, as a result of the routing of traffic through Marginal Street while repairing the FDR Drive North. But tieups due to infrastructure repairs are not the type of problems that the DOT wants to hear about from you and me. I do have a recommendation, borne out of four years of mental strain and torturous driving while the 59th St bridge was under repair. Expedite! Use the Fed money to work overtime on crucial, unavoidable projects, with multiple crews, to shorten the periods of suffering for the public! It is evident that some road and highway repair projects are just stretched to provide extended employment, at immense mental anguish, time costs and suffering to the public.
Back to the environmentalist interest in alternate modes of traffic and air cleanup.Obviously the bike is not the transportation and pollution control answer for most of us. We will never be another Beijing. The bike paths so loved by Mayor Koch have not worked out, midtown congestion is too much, pedestrians were hit and died in bike accidents, scaring us off. Yet, according to Charles Komanoff of the eponymous Energy Associates consulting firm, this judgment may be rash. In 1993 two pedestrians in 664 accidents were killed by bikes (.3 percent), vs 289 in 13,811 accidents (2.1 percent) by cars. There were also 12 bikers killed by cars; spread over the not quite 4,000 bike/car accident rate, that still produces a .3 percent bike death incidence. I still see it as a dangerous form of city transportation - the rate of bike/car encounters under the present road conditions is too high, considering the few bikes in the road. A young bike enthusiast friend from Maine, who came to the city to join the Demented Messenger Service (I think that's what they all are), had three accidents in four months and retired to Arizona to run a mail-box service. Nevertheless, a man in my office rides a one-speed red L.L.Bean cycle across the Queensboro Bridge all summer, for health and visual pleasures. More timid folk limit themselves to using the closed-to-traffic paths in Central Park on weekends, if they dare the ride to and from.
The staggered office hours have been much more successful in shifting the overload on roads and busses away from the deadly drive time congestion times. Then there is the method of installing two-shift operations in business and industry, which also relieves the stress during the daytime shift in the physical plants of our manufacturing and office buildings, besides saving on capital expenses of buying high-cost land and putting up new buildings as business expands. Look at the bright side - it keeps costs down, makes the firms more competitive, and steadies consumer prices. Given that we do not control the population explosion world-wide, what else can be done? We the people, with our infinite capacity for suffering, will just have to take it on the chin some more. In NYC, we will have to literally accept the idea that "the city never sleeps."
Whether subway transportation will ever come back as a substitute for cars, which many use for perceived safety, remains moot. Cars will not disappear if electronic tolls are installed on the East River bridges. That is evident, based on the volume on traffic on the for-pay Midtown Tummel. Certain crosstown streets may just have to be closed for daytime pasenger traffic (cabs excepted), to let trucks in and out, and minimize air pollution. That is already being tested on 56th and 57th Sts, 11-1 PM and 3-6 PM, and may be expanded.
Meanwhile, we now have rollerblading. Fortunately, the 'bladers are more considerate than the bycicle quick-food deliverymen, and use the street rather than sidewalk. If your'e out at 3PM at the corner of Park Ave South and 14th St., be prepared for an experience. There are mesengers darting in and out between cars, competing for space with roller-bladers - kids from our three highschools get out at that time. Skate-boarders practice on both sides of Union Square Park, fortunately not on the three (or is it four?) market days, and rollerblade daredevils try to skate the edges of the park steps facing Bradlees, dropping sparks when metal meets stone, and occasionally themselves.
Some more about the ways DOT is trying to reduce the traffic jams:
Bus lanes are being aggressively enforced, to make sure that buses can move through traffic unimpeded, and that cars don't have to duck lumbering monsters suddenly swerving in their lanes. It also provides emergency access for cops and fire trucks.
Motorists should note that ticketing for "blocking the box" is now done every day, not just on gridlock days. Since November the Police Dept is charged with enforcing the spillback regulations, and they issue a small number of tickets daily (very costly, $50 plus two points!) Watch out, and stay out of the intersection when it looks like the light is changing and you may get stuck. And if you stay prudently on your side of the box, a firendly hand may tap on your window and give you a reward, a free Metro card, good for one ride. Over 100 of these are given out each day.
The faster, high access lane on the 59th St Bridge reserved for cars with 2 or more persons is also a reward for better car utilization.
There are 15 redlight cameras in five boroughs to catch people running lights, and the locations are secret, for obvious reasons.
The DOT would like to encourage us to address their people as traffic enforcement agents and not "browns." Besides, most of them now wear blue uniforms.
If you have some alternate, real proposal for the NYCDOT, or want to bid on a project that will alleviate the transportation and air pollution situation, send information to Sally A. Hood, Director of Community-Based Projects, NYCDOT, 40 Worth St Room 1002, NY NY 10013. NYCDOT is interested in such projects as educating the public (groans!); application and promotion of innovative, low-polluting, efficient modes of transportation and air pollution control; promotion of environmentally sustainable development (wow!). And you can send them to me too, for a follow-up article, if and when. Keep truckin'.
Wally Dobelis thanks Charles Komanoff, Robert Lipsyte and NYCDOT spokespersons for information.
Letter on hand from the New York City Department of Transportation, announcing that they have federal funds to support community-based projects for addressing transportation and air quality problems. This is under the Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement Program, administered by the Fed Highway Administration. Now I understand the mysterious form I had to fill out at the office, explaining my work travel patterns and use of bridges and cars vs. public transportation.
It is ironic that this request should come at a time when the State DOT will choke off the access to our Waterside area for two years, as a result of the routing of traffic through Marginal Street while repairing the FDR Drive North. But tieups due to infrastructure repairs are not the type of problems that the DOT wants to hear about from you and me. I do have a recommendation, borne out of four years of mental strain and torturous driving while the 59th St bridge was under repair. Expedite! Use the Fed money to work overtime on crucial, unavoidable projects, with multiple crews, to shorten the periods of suffering for the public! It is evident that some road and highway repair projects are just stretched to provide extended employment, at immense mental anguish, time costs and suffering to the public.
Back to the environmentalist interest in alternate modes of traffic and air cleanup.Obviously the bike is not the transportation and pollution control answer for most of us. We will never be another Beijing. The bike paths so loved by Mayor Koch have not worked out, midtown congestion is too much, pedestrians were hit and died in bike accidents, scaring us off. Yet, according to Charles Komanoff of the eponymous Energy Associates consulting firm, this judgment may be rash. In 1993 two pedestrians in 664 accidents were killed by bikes (.3 percent), vs 289 in 13,811 accidents (2.1 percent) by cars. There were also 12 bikers killed by cars; spread over the not quite 4,000 bike/car accident rate, that still produces a .3 percent bike death incidence. I still see it as a dangerous form of city transportation - the rate of bike/car encounters under the present road conditions is too high, considering the few bikes in the road. A young bike enthusiast friend from Maine, who came to the city to join the Demented Messenger Service (I think that's what they all are), had three accidents in four months and retired to Arizona to run a mail-box service. Nevertheless, a man in my office rides a one-speed red L.L.Bean cycle across the Queensboro Bridge all summer, for health and visual pleasures. More timid folk limit themselves to using the closed-to-traffic paths in Central Park on weekends, if they dare the ride to and from.
The staggered office hours have been much more successful in shifting the overload on roads and busses away from the deadly drive time congestion times. Then there is the method of installing two-shift operations in business and industry, which also relieves the stress during the daytime shift in the physical plants of our manufacturing and office buildings, besides saving on capital expenses of buying high-cost land and putting up new buildings as business expands. Look at the bright side - it keeps costs down, makes the firms more competitive, and steadies consumer prices. Given that we do not control the population explosion world-wide, what else can be done? We the people, with our infinite capacity for suffering, will just have to take it on the chin some more. In NYC, we will have to literally accept the idea that "the city never sleeps."
Whether subway transportation will ever come back as a substitute for cars, which many use for perceived safety, remains moot. Cars will not disappear if electronic tolls are installed on the East River bridges. That is evident, based on the volume on traffic on the for-pay Midtown Tummel. Certain crosstown streets may just have to be closed for daytime pasenger traffic (cabs excepted), to let trucks in and out, and minimize air pollution. That is already being tested on 56th and 57th Sts, 11-1 PM and 3-6 PM, and may be expanded.
Meanwhile, we now have rollerblading. Fortunately, the 'bladers are more considerate than the bycicle quick-food deliverymen, and use the street rather than sidewalk. If your'e out at 3PM at the corner of Park Ave South and 14th St., be prepared for an experience. There are mesengers darting in and out between cars, competing for space with roller-bladers - kids from our three highschools get out at that time. Skate-boarders practice on both sides of Union Square Park, fortunately not on the three (or is it four?) market days, and rollerblade daredevils try to skate the edges of the park steps facing Bradlees, dropping sparks when metal meets stone, and occasionally themselves.
Some more about the ways DOT is trying to reduce the traffic jams:
Bus lanes are being aggressively enforced, to make sure that buses can move through traffic unimpeded, and that cars don't have to duck lumbering monsters suddenly swerving in their lanes. It also provides emergency access for cops and fire trucks.
Motorists should note that ticketing for "blocking the box" is now done every day, not just on gridlock days. Since November the Police Dept is charged with enforcing the spillback regulations, and they issue a small number of tickets daily (very costly, $50 plus two points!) Watch out, and stay out of the intersection when it looks like the light is changing and you may get stuck. And if you stay prudently on your side of the box, a firendly hand may tap on your window and give you a reward, a free Metro card, good for one ride. Over 100 of these are given out each day.
The faster, high access lane on the 59th St Bridge reserved for cars with 2 or more persons is also a reward for better car utilization.
There are 15 redlight cameras in five boroughs to catch people running lights, and the locations are secret, for obvious reasons.
The DOT would like to encourage us to address their people as traffic enforcement agents and not "browns." Besides, most of them now wear blue uniforms.
If you have some alternate, real proposal for the NYCDOT, or want to bid on a project that will alleviate the transportation and air pollution situation, send information to Sally A. Hood, Director of Community-Based Projects, NYCDOT, 40 Worth St Room 1002, NY NY 10013. NYCDOT is interested in such projects as educating the public (groans!); application and promotion of innovative, low-polluting, efficient modes of transportation and air pollution control; promotion of environmentally sustainable development (wow!). And you can send them to me too, for a follow-up article, if and when. Keep truckin'.
Wally Dobelis thanks Charles Komanoff, Robert Lipsyte and NYCDOT spokespersons for information.
Saturday, January 07, 1995
Sylvan Wood Quintet at National Arts
by M.C. Dobelis
The Sylvan Wind Quintet, a group of young virtuosi devoted to exploring the literature of chamber music for the woodwinds, played an unusual program at the National Arts Club on January 12th.
This is to the credit of Aldon James Pres., and Daniel Schiffman, Chairman of the Music Committee, his valiant vice chairs, Countess Emilie de Rohan-Chandor, Barry Goldberg, Mrs Gordon A. Lewis, and the 18 committee members and the chairmen emeritae, who all contribute.
Johan Sebastian Bach's Concerto No. 2 after Vivaldi, S. 593, transcribed from organ for the woodwinds by Mordechai Rechtman of the Israel Symphony orchestra, is a cheerful piece of Bach, easy on the ear.
Darius Milhaud's La Cheminee du Roi Renee, with its seven movements of clown/juggler/performer-descriptive music, is thin but presents a variety of moods. This is movie music, not the greatest of Milhaud.
A joy was the Quintet in F Major by George Onslow, four movements of pleasant, fully orchestrated tuneful music. Onslow (1784-1853) was a frenchified English lord, who learned quartets and quintets from Antonin Reicha, an associate of Beethoven. He had a lot on the ball, melodically, if this brief selecton is credible, and should be revived.
The young artists of the Sylvan Wood Quintet are wonderful: Svjetlana Kabalin, flute, Jon Manasse, clarinet, Mark Hill, oboe, Charles McCracken, bassoon and Jeffrey Lang, horn.They play both classical and new chamber music, originals and transcriptions, and have performed premieres of works by such composers as Gustav Holst, Gunther Schuller, David Chaikin and Arthur Weisberg.
The Sylvan Wind Quintet, a group of young virtuosi devoted to exploring the literature of chamber music for the woodwinds, played an unusual program at the National Arts Club on January 12th.
This is to the credit of Aldon James Pres., and Daniel Schiffman, Chairman of the Music Committee, his valiant vice chairs, Countess Emilie de Rohan-Chandor, Barry Goldberg, Mrs Gordon A. Lewis, and the 18 committee members and the chairmen emeritae, who all contribute.
Johan Sebastian Bach's Concerto No. 2 after Vivaldi, S. 593, transcribed from organ for the woodwinds by Mordechai Rechtman of the Israel Symphony orchestra, is a cheerful piece of Bach, easy on the ear.
Darius Milhaud's La Cheminee du Roi Renee, with its seven movements of clown/juggler/performer-descriptive music, is thin but presents a variety of moods. This is movie music, not the greatest of Milhaud.
A joy was the Quintet in F Major by George Onslow, four movements of pleasant, fully orchestrated tuneful music. Onslow (1784-1853) was a frenchified English lord, who learned quartets and quintets from Antonin Reicha, an associate of Beethoven. He had a lot on the ball, melodically, if this brief selecton is credible, and should be revived.
The young artists of the Sylvan Wood Quintet are wonderful: Svjetlana Kabalin, flute, Jon Manasse, clarinet, Mark Hill, oboe, Charles McCracken, bassoon and Jeffrey Lang, horn.They play both classical and new chamber music, originals and transcriptions, and have performed premieres of works by such composers as Gustav Holst, Gunther Schuller, David Chaikin and Arthur Weisberg.
Thursday, January 05, 1995
Requiem For A Visitor - Rene Heyum
LOOKING BACK by Wally Dobelis 12/16/94
Rene Heyum, an annual visitor to the Stuyvesant/Gramercy area until recent years, died in Honolulu on Dec 13, at the age of 78. She was an anthropologist, Curator Emeritus of the archival Pacifica Collection of the University of Hawaii, Chevalier de l'Ordre Nationale du Merite of France and my wife's aunt.
She knew and loved the South Pacific, having spent time every summer for 20 years traveling the islands, visiting each puny government office and personally collecting the publications which the carefree islanders could not be bothered to send to her nearly unique (The Aussies have another) archival collection. She was a Pacific-wide resource for the islands. She knew every police chief in the Pacific, and when the one in Fiji asked her for material on juvenile delinquency in the region, she duplicated all pertinent articles into a book and sent copies to his colleagues throughout the Pacific. Some 7 years ago, during a politically hot period, when we worried about her summer trips, it turned out that she had been in the Solomon Islands, Vanu Atu and Nouvelle Caledonie, the three trouble spots of the day. Semi-seriosly, we thought of asking if she was connected to the CIA, but did not dare. Rene had a reserved manner that discouraged certain types of inquiry, and her cool voice and ironic words could cut the conclusion-jumper to shreds.
Her stories were fascinating. For me, it was Jack London, the great author of my Polynesia and Melanesia, come to life. And Sommerset Maugham. She knew of the Papuan headhunters who moved directly from Stone Age into the 20th Century with their habits intact, and would drive into Port Moresby in their Toyota pickups and attack and clean out a house completely, because the predator life style was their custom since days immemorial. And of the few thousand Naurus, whose phosphate island would soon be mined out of existence, and who were putting their profits into banking, presumably to buy another island and live happily ever after. And the cargo cultists who 45 years after the war were waiting for the big birds with the fine goods to return. Trobriand cricket games and rules; Malinowski and Levi-Strauss. And the mahu, women-men, accepted as such in various island cultures. The many stories of islanders taken advantage of, subjugated and held captive. The colonialist powers as saviors and predators.
Rene was somewhat of a story herself. Born in Frankfurt, Germany, her father brought the family to Paris well before WWII, to open a tiny 25-room hotel at the fashionable address of 6 avenue Victor Hugo. The family were Jewish, French nationals, and when the Germans occupied France, the mother and the two daughters were hidden by a French baker in return for long hours of their labor 7 days a week. When Rene broke her leg, no doctor could be called, and she spent most of her life with a grotesquely sideways bent right knee, until 10 years ago a Hawaiian surgeon rebroke and righted the limb.
After WWII the family regained their hotel, and Rene, who had lost several years of education, labored there as an all-purpose hotelier - until she declared her independence, to study librarianship. The tri-lingual Renee did so well, in record time, that she was accepted by the Musee de l'Homme in Paris as assistant to a distinguished Irish-French anthropologist, Pere Patrick O'Reilly, the editor of the important annual bibliographies of the Pacific. She studied under him and eventually replaced him as the bibliographer.
In 1966 the University of Hawaii had a world-wide search for a curator of the American national archival library of the Pacific area, the Pacifica Collection, and the largely self-taught tri-lingual Rene was the top contender. Her first seven years were misery - I remember us sending her smoked German sausages and European delicacies from New York, at the request of her sister and brother-in-law (my wife's uncle), who were our hosts whenever we visited Paris. Their hotel had an elevator, Ascenseur Combaluzier, that held either two persons, or one and two bags, or three bags, with the guest using the stairs. Grandiously named Metropole, the hotel went from four-star to three-star rating when Uncle, at for him an immense cost, installed a tub-shower partition in each room. But the streetside rooms had a tremendous view of the Arche de Triomphe from the tiny front balconies, and it was said that the independence of Israel was cooked up in the private "salon" adjoining the all-white dining room, which eventually became breakfast room as Uncle Hermann and Aunt Caro grew older and less mobile. A nice safe nest it was for us, to drink wine and regard Paris in September.
The fledgling Rene did not seek a safe nest. She persisted abroad, made friends and grew to like Hawaii. Not a social researcher of the Margaret Mead type, she was an organizer and collater, and a most important resource for the students. This was known, and the question "Who is Rene Heyum?" would appear in anthropology midterm exams year after year. Formidable in her profession, she not only trained her successors but also helped her associates advance to such collections as the Bishop Museum.
After retirement at 70, Rene continued her work as a library volunteer. Always in frail health and with a painful back that fusing operations did not repair, she traveled to the mainland yearly, and went swimming at the Ala Moana beach daily when at home. Her apartment was a museum of what she described as "tourist quality" Polynesiana, including an important collection of fans.
But a stroke at 74, from which she recovered, thanks to her incredible will power, eventually conquered her. She will be remembered for the fully funded scholarship in Pacific studies for native-born Pacific Islanders which she gave to the University, to help her belowed local people acquire social standing and equality.
Aloha, Rene. Though a haole, you are also a kamaiana, an oldtimer, and your ashes will be rowed out and scattered in the Pacific by eight strong men in a longboat. And the French and academic community will have a party to honor you, as is the Hawaiian custom. You are remembered by a few people in a small island within New York City, a part of the whole, that you recalled fondly as a community. We too are islanders, trying to keep our culture - with a few among us acting as the Papuan predators, and a few more slightly like the cargo cultists. We are somewhat more akin to the Naurus, undermining our own island, but without the hope of buying a new one. We may need the Marquesan compass to chart our future.
Wally Dobelis explains that the Marquesan sailors found Hawaii by using a compass made of a complex board of sticks.
Requiem For A Visitor by Wally Dobelis 12/16/94
Rene Heyum, an annual visitor to the Stuyvesant/Gramercy area until recent years, died in Honolulu on Dec 13, at the age of 78. She was an anthropologist, Curator Emeritus of the archival Pacifica Collection of the University of Hawaii, Chevalier de l'Ordre Nationale du Merite of France and my wife's aunt.
She knew and loved the South Pacific, having spent time every summer for 20 years traveling the islands, visiting each puny government office and personally collecting the publications which the carefree islanders could not be bothered to send to her nearly unique (The Aussies have another) archival collection. She was a Pacific-wide resource for the islands. She knew every police chief in the Pacific, and when the one in Fiji asked her for material on juvenile delinquency in the region, she duplicated all pertinent articles into a book and sent copies to his colleagues throughout the Pacific. Some 7 years ago, during a politically hot period, when we worried about her summer trips, it turned out that she had been in the Solomon Islands, Vanu Atu and Nouvelle Caledonie, the three trouble spots of the day. Semi-seriosly, we thought of asking if she was connected to the CIA, but did not dare. Rene had a reserved manner that discouraged certain types of inquiry, and her cool voice and ironic words could cut the conclusion-jumper to shreds.
Her stories were fascinating. For me, it was Jack London, the great author of my Polynesia and Melanesia, come to life. And Sommerset Maugham. She knew of the Papuan headhunters who moved directly from Stone Age into the 20th Century with their habits intact, and would drive into Port Moresby in their Toyota pickups and attack and clean out a house completely, because the predator life style was their custom since days immemorial. And of the few thousand Naurus, whose phosphate island would soon be mined out of existence, and who were putting their profits into banking, presumably to buy another island and live happily ever after. And the cargo cultists who 45 years after the war were waiting for the big birds with the fine goods to return. Trobriand cricket games and rules; Malinowski and Levi-Strauss. And the mahu, women-men, accepted as such in various island cultures. The many stories of islanders taken advantage of, subjugated and held captive. The colonialist powers as saviors and predators.
Rene was somewhat of a story herself. Born in Frankfurt, Germany, her father brought the family to Paris well before WWII, to open a tiny 25-room hotel at the fashionable address of 6 avenue Victor Hugo. The family were Jewish, French nationals, and when the Germans occupied France, the mother and the two daughters were hidden by a French baker in return for long hours of their labor 7 days a week. When Rene broke her leg, no doctor could be called, and she spent most of her life with a grotesquely sideways bent right knee, until 10 years ago a Hawaiian surgeon rebroke and righted the limb.
After WWII the family regained their hotel, and Rene, who had lost several years of education, labored there as an all-purpose hotelier - until she declared her independence, to study librarianship. The tri-lingual Renee did so well, in record time, that she was accepted by the Musee de l'Homme in Paris as assistant to a distinguished Irish-French anthropologist, Pere Patrick O'Reilly, the editor of the important annual bibliographies of the Pacific. She studied under him and eventually replaced him as the bibliographer.
In 1966 the University of Hawaii had a world-wide search for a curator of the American national archival library of the Pacific area, the Pacifica Collection, and the largely self-taught tri-lingual Rene was the top contender. Her first seven years were misery - I remember us sending her smoked German sausages and European delicacies from New York, at the request of her sister and brother-in-law (my wife's uncle), who were our hosts whenever we visited Paris. Their hotel had an elevator, Ascenseur Combaluzier, that held either two persons, or one and two bags, or three bags, with the guest using the stairs. Grandiously named Metropole, the hotel went from four-star to three-star rating when Uncle, at for him an immense cost, installed a tub-shower partition in each room. But the streetside rooms had a tremendous view of the Arche de Triomphe from the tiny front balconies, and it was said that the independence of Israel was cooked up in the private "salon" adjoining the all-white dining room, which eventually became breakfast room as Uncle Hermann and Aunt Caro grew older and less mobile. A nice safe nest it was for us, to drink wine and regard Paris in September.
The fledgling Rene did not seek a safe nest. She persisted abroad, made friends and grew to like Hawaii. Not a social researcher of the Margaret Mead type, she was an organizer and collater, and a most important resource for the students. This was known, and the question "Who is Rene Heyum?" would appear in anthropology midterm exams year after year. Formidable in her profession, she not only trained her successors but also helped her associates advance to such collections as the Bishop Museum.
After retirement at 70, Rene continued her work as a library volunteer. Always in frail health and with a painful back that fusing operations did not repair, she traveled to the mainland yearly, and went swimming at the Ala Moana beach daily when at home. Her apartment was a museum of what she described as "tourist quality" Polynesiana, including an important collection of fans.
But a stroke at 74, from which she recovered, thanks to her incredible will power, eventually conquered her. She will be remembered for the fully funded scholarship in Pacific studies for native-born Pacific Islanders which she gave to the University, to help her belowed local people acquire social standing and equality.
Aloha, Rene. Though a haole, you are also a kamaiana, an oldtimer, and your ashes will be rowed out and scattered in the Pacific by eight strong men in a longboat. And the French and academic community will have a party to honor you, as is the Hawaiian custom. You are remembered by a few people in a small island within New York City, a part of the whole, that you recalled fondly as a community. We too are islanders, trying to keep our culture - with a few among us acting as the Papuan predators, and a few more slightly like the cargo cultists. We are somewhat more akin to the Naurus, undermining our own island, but without the hope of buying a new one. We may need the Marquesan compass to chart our future.
Wally Dobelis explains that the Marquesan sailors found Hawaii by using a compass made of a complex board of sticks.
Rene Heyum, an annual visitor to the Stuyvesant/Gramercy area until recent years, died in Honolulu on Dec 13, at the age of 78. She was an anthropologist, Curator Emeritus of the archival Pacifica Collection of the University of Hawaii, Chevalier de l'Ordre Nationale du Merite of France and my wife's aunt.
She knew and loved the South Pacific, having spent time every summer for 20 years traveling the islands, visiting each puny government office and personally collecting the publications which the carefree islanders could not be bothered to send to her nearly unique (The Aussies have another) archival collection. She was a Pacific-wide resource for the islands. She knew every police chief in the Pacific, and when the one in Fiji asked her for material on juvenile delinquency in the region, she duplicated all pertinent articles into a book and sent copies to his colleagues throughout the Pacific. Some 7 years ago, during a politically hot period, when we worried about her summer trips, it turned out that she had been in the Solomon Islands, Vanu Atu and Nouvelle Caledonie, the three trouble spots of the day. Semi-seriosly, we thought of asking if she was connected to the CIA, but did not dare. Rene had a reserved manner that discouraged certain types of inquiry, and her cool voice and ironic words could cut the conclusion-jumper to shreds.
Her stories were fascinating. For me, it was Jack London, the great author of my Polynesia and Melanesia, come to life. And Sommerset Maugham. She knew of the Papuan headhunters who moved directly from Stone Age into the 20th Century with their habits intact, and would drive into Port Moresby in their Toyota pickups and attack and clean out a house completely, because the predator life style was their custom since days immemorial. And of the few thousand Naurus, whose phosphate island would soon be mined out of existence, and who were putting their profits into banking, presumably to buy another island and live happily ever after. And the cargo cultists who 45 years after the war were waiting for the big birds with the fine goods to return. Trobriand cricket games and rules; Malinowski and Levi-Strauss. And the mahu, women-men, accepted as such in various island cultures. The many stories of islanders taken advantage of, subjugated and held captive. The colonialist powers as saviors and predators.
Rene was somewhat of a story herself. Born in Frankfurt, Germany, her father brought the family to Paris well before WWII, to open a tiny 25-room hotel at the fashionable address of 6 avenue Victor Hugo. The family were Jewish, French nationals, and when the Germans occupied France, the mother and the two daughters were hidden by a French baker in return for long hours of their labor 7 days a week. When Rene broke her leg, no doctor could be called, and she spent most of her life with a grotesquely sideways bent right knee, until 10 years ago a Hawaiian surgeon rebroke and righted the limb.
After WWII the family regained their hotel, and Rene, who had lost several years of education, labored there as an all-purpose hotelier - until she declared her independence, to study librarianship. The tri-lingual Renee did so well, in record time, that she was accepted by the Musee de l'Homme in Paris as assistant to a distinguished Irish-French anthropologist, Pere Patrick O'Reilly, the editor of the important annual bibliographies of the Pacific. She studied under him and eventually replaced him as the bibliographer.
In 1966 the University of Hawaii had a world-wide search for a curator of the American national archival library of the Pacific area, the Pacifica Collection, and the largely self-taught tri-lingual Rene was the top contender. Her first seven years were misery - I remember us sending her smoked German sausages and European delicacies from New York, at the request of her sister and brother-in-law (my wife's uncle), who were our hosts whenever we visited Paris. Their hotel had an elevator, Ascenseur Combaluzier, that held either two persons, or one and two bags, or three bags, with the guest using the stairs. Grandiously named Metropole, the hotel went from four-star to three-star rating when Uncle, at for him an immense cost, installed a tub-shower partition in each room. But the streetside rooms had a tremendous view of the Arche de Triomphe from the tiny front balconies, and it was said that the independence of Israel was cooked up in the private "salon" adjoining the all-white dining room, which eventually became breakfast room as Uncle Hermann and Aunt Caro grew older and less mobile. A nice safe nest it was for us, to drink wine and regard Paris in September.
The fledgling Rene did not seek a safe nest. She persisted abroad, made friends and grew to like Hawaii. Not a social researcher of the Margaret Mead type, she was an organizer and collater, and a most important resource for the students. This was known, and the question "Who is Rene Heyum?" would appear in anthropology midterm exams year after year. Formidable in her profession, she not only trained her successors but also helped her associates advance to such collections as the Bishop Museum.
After retirement at 70, Rene continued her work as a library volunteer. Always in frail health and with a painful back that fusing operations did not repair, she traveled to the mainland yearly, and went swimming at the Ala Moana beach daily when at home. Her apartment was a museum of what she described as "tourist quality" Polynesiana, including an important collection of fans.
But a stroke at 74, from which she recovered, thanks to her incredible will power, eventually conquered her. She will be remembered for the fully funded scholarship in Pacific studies for native-born Pacific Islanders which she gave to the University, to help her belowed local people acquire social standing and equality.
Aloha, Rene. Though a haole, you are also a kamaiana, an oldtimer, and your ashes will be rowed out and scattered in the Pacific by eight strong men in a longboat. And the French and academic community will have a party to honor you, as is the Hawaiian custom. You are remembered by a few people in a small island within New York City, a part of the whole, that you recalled fondly as a community. We too are islanders, trying to keep our culture - with a few among us acting as the Papuan predators, and a few more slightly like the cargo cultists. We are somewhat more akin to the Naurus, undermining our own island, but without the hope of buying a new one. We may need the Marquesan compass to chart our future.
Wally Dobelis explains that the Marquesan sailors found Hawaii by using a compass made of a complex board of sticks.
Requiem For A Visitor by Wally Dobelis 12/16/94
Rene Heyum, an annual visitor to the Stuyvesant/Gramercy area until recent years, died in Honolulu on Dec 13, at the age of 78. She was an anthropologist, Curator Emeritus of the archival Pacifica Collection of the University of Hawaii, Chevalier de l'Ordre Nationale du Merite of France and my wife's aunt.
She knew and loved the South Pacific, having spent time every summer for 20 years traveling the islands, visiting each puny government office and personally collecting the publications which the carefree islanders could not be bothered to send to her nearly unique (The Aussies have another) archival collection. She was a Pacific-wide resource for the islands. She knew every police chief in the Pacific, and when the one in Fiji asked her for material on juvenile delinquency in the region, she duplicated all pertinent articles into a book and sent copies to his colleagues throughout the Pacific. Some 7 years ago, during a politically hot period, when we worried about her summer trips, it turned out that she had been in the Solomon Islands, Vanu Atu and Nouvelle Caledonie, the three trouble spots of the day. Semi-seriosly, we thought of asking if she was connected to the CIA, but did not dare. Rene had a reserved manner that discouraged certain types of inquiry, and her cool voice and ironic words could cut the conclusion-jumper to shreds.
Her stories were fascinating. For me, it was Jack London, the great author of my Polynesia and Melanesia, come to life. And Sommerset Maugham. She knew of the Papuan headhunters who moved directly from Stone Age into the 20th Century with their habits intact, and would drive into Port Moresby in their Toyota pickups and attack and clean out a house completely, because the predator life style was their custom since days immemorial. And of the few thousand Naurus, whose phosphate island would soon be mined out of existence, and who were putting their profits into banking, presumably to buy another island and live happily ever after. And the cargo cultists who 45 years after the war were waiting for the big birds with the fine goods to return. Trobriand cricket games and rules; Malinowski and Levi-Strauss. And the mahu, women-men, accepted as such in various island cultures. The many stories of islanders taken advantage of, subjugated and held captive. The colonialist powers as saviors and predators.
Rene was somewhat of a story herself. Born in Frankfurt, Germany, her father brought the family to Paris well before WWII, to open a tiny 25-room hotel at the fashionable address of 6 avenue Victor Hugo. The family were Jewish, French nationals, and when the Germans occupied France, the mother and the two daughters were hidden by a French baker in return for long hours of their labor 7 days a week. When Rene broke her leg, no doctor could be called, and she spent most of her life with a grotesquely sideways bent right knee, until 10 years ago a Hawaiian surgeon rebroke and righted the limb.
After WWII the family regained their hotel, and Rene, who had lost several years of education, labored there as an all-purpose hotelier - until she declared her independence, to study librarianship. The tri-lingual Renee did so well, in record time, that she was accepted by the Musee de l'Homme in Paris as assistant to a distinguished Irish-French anthropologist, Pere Patrick O'Reilly, the editor of the important annual bibliographies of the Pacific. She studied under him and eventually replaced him as the bibliographer.
In 1966 the University of Hawaii had a world-wide search for a curator of the American national archival library of the Pacific area, the Pacifica Collection, and the largely self-taught tri-lingual Rene was the top contender. Her first seven years were misery - I remember us sending her smoked German sausages and European delicacies from New York, at the request of her sister and brother-in-law (my wife's uncle), who were our hosts whenever we visited Paris. Their hotel had an elevator, Ascenseur Combaluzier, that held either two persons, or one and two bags, or three bags, with the guest using the stairs. Grandiously named Metropole, the hotel went from four-star to three-star rating when Uncle, at for him an immense cost, installed a tub-shower partition in each room. But the streetside rooms had a tremendous view of the Arche de Triomphe from the tiny front balconies, and it was said that the independence of Israel was cooked up in the private "salon" adjoining the all-white dining room, which eventually became breakfast room as Uncle Hermann and Aunt Caro grew older and less mobile. A nice safe nest it was for us, to drink wine and regard Paris in September.
The fledgling Rene did not seek a safe nest. She persisted abroad, made friends and grew to like Hawaii. Not a social researcher of the Margaret Mead type, she was an organizer and collater, and a most important resource for the students. This was known, and the question "Who is Rene Heyum?" would appear in anthropology midterm exams year after year. Formidable in her profession, she not only trained her successors but also helped her associates advance to such collections as the Bishop Museum.
After retirement at 70, Rene continued her work as a library volunteer. Always in frail health and with a painful back that fusing operations did not repair, she traveled to the mainland yearly, and went swimming at the Ala Moana beach daily when at home. Her apartment was a museum of what she described as "tourist quality" Polynesiana, including an important collection of fans.
But a stroke at 74, from which she recovered, thanks to her incredible will power, eventually conquered her. She will be remembered for the fully funded scholarship in Pacific studies for native-born Pacific Islanders which she gave to the University, to help her belowed local people acquire social standing and equality.
Aloha, Rene. Though a haole, you are also a kamaiana, an oldtimer, and your ashes will be rowed out and scattered in the Pacific by eight strong men in a longboat. And the French and academic community will have a party to honor you, as is the Hawaiian custom. You are remembered by a few people in a small island within New York City, a part of the whole, that you recalled fondly as a community. We too are islanders, trying to keep our culture - with a few among us acting as the Papuan predators, and a few more slightly like the cargo cultists. We are somewhat more akin to the Naurus, undermining our own island, but without the hope of buying a new one. We may need the Marquesan compass to chart our future.
Wally Dobelis explains that the Marquesan sailors found Hawaii by using a compass made of a complex board of sticks.
