Paul Feldman: An Introduction

Paul Feldman was born and raised in New York, the Bronx to be exact. A member of the armed services as a young man, Paul met his future wife Ruth in uniform....literally. In this first excerpt, Paul remembers his childhood.
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My name is Clarence Paul Feldman. F-e-l-d-m-a-n. People leave the D out quite often. I was born in the Bronx, New York, August 20th, 1938. I was born with the last name Ballin, and my father passed away from a coronary thrombosis at the age of 43 when I was four and a half. Mother remarried when I was just about to turn ten, and the very nice gentleman that became my new father was named Nash Feldman, who adopted me and my name became Feldman after that.

(Did they have children together, the Feldmans?)

Both of them had been beyond their childbearing years, but they came into the marriage, both of them, with two sons. So we became a family of four brothers, and we were close from the beginning. We are still close today, although we are only three right now, since my brother Bert passed away about eight or nine years ago, a victim of lung cancer. But the three of us are very close even though we live distant from each other.

(Tell me, where were your parents born?)

Samuel, my biological dad, was born in Georgia, Russia, just before 1900. And my mother was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Her mother came from a farm community in Hungary, where my grandfather was a teacher.

(Did you grow up in a particularly religious home?)

I was 41/2 when my father Samuel passed away but I still cherish a few of the memories I have of him. Some memories include sitting in synagogue with him on wooden folding chairs during the high holidays. I don’t know that he was particularly religious to the point of going weekly to services. But I know that our Jewishness was always important to my brother Morty and my mother.

(Did you live in a predominantly Jewish neighborhood?)

I lived in New York City. (laughs)

(Did you live in the Bronx?)

I lived in the Bronx.

(What part of the Bronx?)

I lived in the part of the Bronx that was crossed by the Fordham Road and Jerome Avenue, very close to NYU’s Hall of Fame. And then when I was almost 10, Mom and my second dad, Nash Feldman were married and the six of us moved to Queens, New York settling into a 3 story home in the town of St. Alban’s.

(Very familiar place. Right on the Long Island railroad.)

That’s right, yes.

(Very convenient. Can you describe your home as a child? What do you remember, everything from sounds and smells to what it was like being eventually one of four boys?)

I loved being part of our instant family of four boys. Up to that point, because my older brother was away at college when I was between the ages of five to nine and a half, and my Mom was working. So I was pretty much alone. My brother would visit on during vacations, and so when all of a sudden our family expanded to four boys, and the other two boys were still at home, I now had two new full-time brothers.

Mom was no longer working so her days were spent cooking large meals for her newly enlarged family. She was constantly baking and since that was before anyone knew about cholesterol, everything was heavy with butter, eggs and cream. I used to love coming home from school because there was always the delicious smell of a cake fresh from the oven to welcome me. Believe it or not, between my brothers and I, we would finish a large cake daily. Mom was famous on our street for her marble cakes and something she called an “orange kiss me cake”. The whole orange went into it.

My new brothers, Seibert and Melvin, were very generous with their time although always very busy. They were both going to college but they made time for me. They introduced me to opera, the theater, good music and took me to my first concerts. I just loved being around them. They were always doing the most interesting things and above all did what they could to make me feel part of our new family.

As far as our “Jewishness” was concerned, we were one of those families that did not regularly go to services. I remember when I was studying for my bar mitzvah, I had to be at services every Saturday and Friday evening, but felt like I was praying for the whole family because no one else in my family was going. I was going, and I felt that I was the one that was carrying the religious load for everybody in the family. I remember protesting to our Rabbi Spielman, that the Haftorah was in Hebrew with no English translation so I didn’t know what on earth I was reading. I wanted to understand, but the Rabbi was always too busy to translate it for me or provide an English translation, so I was left with the 78-rpm record he made for me in Hebrew and I was just memorizing his version, which I was able to do over a three-month period. I just gave back to him what he had given me on the record.

I was frustrated because I felt that I was just going through the motions. I really didn’t understand what it was all about and I felt disconnected from the main reason for having a Bar Mitzvah. I was missing the message and was frustrated because nobody was concerned for me know what it was about.

My new Dad (Nash) insisted on making a Bar Mitzvah celebration I could only have dreamed of before he met and married my mother. He was a wonderful man who always made sure my biological brother, Morty and I never felt there was any difference between us and his two sons from his first marriage.

As soon as my bar mitzvah was over I would only occasionally go to services, but my attendance fell off quite a bit until I went to college and went to services at college mostly to exercise my Jewish identity and meet other Jewish people. When I was drafted into the army, I went to services every Friday evening, mostly to be with Jewish people. I confess it wasn’t until later years that I began to be interested in the religious part of my Jewish life again mostly as a result of my conversations with Ruth’s father, Jose’ Baum. His religion was always an important part of who he was and he read and studied a lot. He was the only person I ever knew whose hobby was writing sermons. I had never bothered to read about Judaism. I had read biographical books about Jewish people and the Holocaust, but I had never gotten involved with books dedicated to religious or philosophical themes. It was not until later that I understood it is my responsibility, if I want to understand and enjoy the benefits of our rich religious heritage, to do my own studying and reading. I enjoy this although I know I am just scratching the surface and tend to be lax in this area. There is so much to learn and I know it is up to me to take responsibility for myself as a Jew.

Transcript by Sandy Adler, Adler Enterprises LLC.