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Executive Times |
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2008 Book Reviews |
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Touch and
Go: A Memoir by Studs Terkel |
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Rating: |
*** |
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(Recommended) |
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Click
on title or picture to buy from amazon.com |
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Memories Grab
a cup of black coffee (or a drink) and listen to Studs Terkel tell stories in
his new book, Touch and
Go: A Memoir. The rhythm of his writing matches the mannerisms of his
speaking style, and will often bring a smile as you read what he says. He’s been
a lifelong student of people, and this book is packed with his memories of
some of his most interesting characters. Just when you feel all light and
comfortable, Studs gets serious and displays his wisdom and notes the ways in
which we need to stand up for our rights in a society that seems to have
forgotten the price we have paid for our liberty. Thanks to Studs, our
collective memory can come alive, as he presents history in a manner that is
easy to listen to and understand. Here’s an excerpt, all
of Chapter 5, “Teachers of the Gilded Age,” pp. 48-51: I haven't mentioned my four
remarkable old teachers at theMcKinley High School in Chicago. Some had begun
teaching in the nineteenth century, during the Gilded Age. All four were
Edwardian in style and demeanor. George W. Powles Jr., teacher since
1800-and-something. Pince-nez balanced delicately on nose, white mustache overflowing;
his daily mantra: a cigarette was "a light at one end, a fool at the
other." He very much enjoyed my precise reading of Charles and Mary
Lamb's Children's Shakespeare. "Oh, young sir, you could
handle that Lady Macbeth all right. One day, I'll boast that I taught
Shakespeare to a young Sir Henry Irving" I had no idea who Sir Henry was
but obviously professor Powles put me in fast company. Some of my fellow students were
impish in nature—a few, members of the '42s, who were to the Mob what the
Junior Chamber of Commerce members were to their elders. The '42s
liked me because
I always shoved my finished papers to my left while a certain '42
member-in-good-standing
was seated behind me. He moved his chair to the left. His vision was
apparently 20-20
because he'd
always wind up with an A, much to his parents' surprise. There was in our
class an ROTC chieftain, with medals brightening the sunshine where he was.
He finked numerous times on his classmates. One, Louis Fratto, who won the
Catholic Youth Organization (CYO) featherweight title, beat the bejeepers out
of the medal-honed one. He asked me if he had gone too far. I kissed both his
cheeks as General Foch did those of American soldiers in World War I. As a parting gift, Mr. Powles
offered me two books. I say "offered" because it was more than
giving. Two books: Roget's Thesaurus and Olive Schreiner's novel The
Story of an African Farm. The
latter was written under the name of Ralph Iron, much as George Eliot found a
name of her own. What astonished me so many years later, during a visit to
South Africa, was that Nadine Gordimer told me that was one of the books she
had read as a young woman in her family store near Johannesburg. Now, the wondrous question: How
did George W. Powles, an Edwardian schoolteacher, come across this book? Of
course, after the two precious books had been many years in my possession, I
lost both. (If there were time, I could heartbreakingly explain how I
misplaced and never recovered a letter from Charles Chaplin in Vevey,
Switzerland, and an astonishing note from Douglas Fairbanks Jr. on the
horrors of ageism. Young Fairbanks was a grandfather at the time and I was
his co-speaker. It was an assemblage of old guys and dolls, who gave him a
standing ovation. I also lost a Western Union telegram from Sterling Hayden,
its language so foul that the operator refused to repeat it other than to
another woman. It was a lovingly hilarious note of congratulations on my
having won the Debs Award. The second of my McKinley
mentors, Robert Potter, was rugged of face with a scraggly mustache. Though
he and Powles were venerable contemporaries, their temperaments were somewhat
at odds. Andrew Potter taught algebra. He was aware of my woeful weakness in
anything involving numbers. Nonetheless, he maintained an air of patience. I
found his kindness to me inexplicable, though as a quiet, shy boy, I was
very well behaved. When he spoke of certain kinds of people, his speech was
less than tender. I assumed he meant "Mediterraneans." It was the
time of Italian and Portuguese workingwomen first writing and then loudly
singing "Bread and Roses." No, Mr. Potter had discovered a people
to be disliked even more than Mediterraneans: the Jews. As an offering of
farewell, he gave me, all wrapped in thick rubber bands, the Dearborn Independent.
It was Henry
Ford's beauty; he was publisher. (There was much talk among affluent Jewish
groups seeking to put forth a car to rival the Model T. It was called the
Star. To say that it flopped is to say that Jack Dempsey defeated Billy
Miske. The fight lasted one round.) Not a bet was missed; the paper covered
everything from the Protocols of Zion to the killing of Christ. Perhaps Mr. Potter thought I
was a Mel Gibson born a generation too soon. I started reading them and they
caught my attention and held it fast. They contained the most virulent
anti-Semitic speeches I had ever encountered. It was so shameless; it
approached an eloquence I had never explored. Meyer told me to throw them
into the stove, but I hesitated, for I had seen nothing as sensational since
Peaches exposed everything about Daddy Browning.* I regret that I was never
able to express my gratitude for Mr. Potter's largesse .. . Our gym teacher was no Jack La
Lanne, nor a Jane Fonda. He was in his seventies, with the traditional
mustachio, pocket watch in jacket, suit, white shirt and tie formal attire,
except for well-worn white sneakers. "George Commons, sir, is my
name." They all had a common attribute, ingenuity. Mr. Commons always
wore heavy sweaters because it was forever cold. The elves came through, the
'42s. They'd run by tossing hot pennies at him. Drawing himself up to his
full height, he'd threaten to take on "a dozen of you Mediterraneans. My
favorite of all was the gentle Miss Olive Leekley, who was not merely our
Latin teacher (she insisted it be pronounced softly Lat-hin, which came
easily because she was so thoughtful of everyone's feelings. She even passed
the young oaf who suggested that Nero was a southpaw with the Boston Red Sox.). Most important, she was our
debating coach. Each school had an affirmative side and a negative. At
McKinley, I had suddenly developed a case of logorrhea, and I was on both
sides. The favorite topic was, of course: Resolved, the Death Penalty Shall
Be Abolished. There was no honor. The students did the choosing and the '42s
saw to it that I did well. They attended all the debates in which I appeared.
I think of what I might have been, had I gone along with the law and
maintained my friendship with the '42s. I might have been Sidney Korshak—Mr.
Clout. When Senator Estes Kefauver, a genuine public servant, headed a
committee investigating the Mob, Korshak saw to it that he stepped out.
Korshak had everything on everyone. Oh, when I was on the negative, I was a
small boy Torquemada. I'm not sure I came out for
quartering or the rack, yet some of these buggers had to be punished. I do
remember saying as a grotesque small-boy epilogue: "Of course, I didn't
mean it." "Oh yeah?" said one my '42s classmates. "Why
not?" * Bernard MacFadden published a scandalous
tabloid, the Telegraph. One of its memorable exposes concerned the
teenaged Peaches and her Daddy Browning. Peaches' Ma approved. If you
liked the excerpt, you’re likely to enjoy all of Touch and
Go. Steve
Hopkins, April 21, 2008 |
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The recommendation rating for
this book appeared in the May 2008 issue of Executive Times URL for this review: http://www.hopkinsandcompany.com/Books/Touch and Go.htm For Reprint Permission, Contact: Hopkins & Company, LLC • E-mail: books@hopkinsandcompany.com |
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