(Ignore May 1, 2017 publish date – this was published on October 20, 2020)

As far as I’m concerned, fish crows are the dopiest birds ever. The literature will tell you otherwise, but I think we could do just fine without these fighting-over-garbage loudmouths.

I’ve written about their stupidity elsewhere on this blog, but lately, we’ve been inundated with them.

A few days ago, (it seemed like) hundreds of them were flying around my building and screaming their sounds-like somebody-stepped-on-a-duck squawk non-stop.

This was the view – and sound (crank it up) – from my living room (you can hear a real crow at the 0:30 mark):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uvwkOHl_4E

 

I live on Union St in Hackensack. On the other end of the street – about a mile away – is Union St Park, which has two large walls that’ve had organized graffiti on them for years. The artists are really talented and I enjoy shooting it.

I haven’t been there in ages, but I happened to pass by there today and decided to renew acquaintances with the art there.

Wouldn’t you know that the only other living beings in the small park were a herd of freakin’ fish crows. They made fools of themselves on park benches and generally just flew around with beak-selected garbage and wallowed in the receptacles.

 

Classy bunch.

 

On to the stars of the show………..

I did a “best-of” of one wall:

 

……….and a photo stitch of the entire other wall (click twice to enlarge):

 

Something for the artists to crow about (groan), for sure.

 

 

(ignore April 30, 2017 publish date – this was published on October 30, 2020)

 

 

From Wikipedia: Mad Monster Party is a 1967 American stop-motion animated musical comedy starring the voices of Boris Karloff, Allen Swift, Gale Garnett and Phyllis Diller. It has become a cult film.

 

Let me state right off the bat that I have never seen this film, don’t know much about it and am not connected to it in any way, shape or form…………..EXCEPT:

 

In 1995, a very good and talented friend of mine – Charlie Stoddard (you may remember him from the Uncle Floyd Show) – asked me if I could help him out with something.

 

He was VERY into this type of scene and actually had the ability to create molds of the movie’s characters and create perfect resin likenesses of them from those molds.

 

Because he was creating a business with them, he needed many copies of each character. I had the time and the space (my old and recently-retired darkroom) and the training to create exact chemical solutions and follow strict procedures to get the job done.

 

“Sure – sounds like fun.”

 

He drove up, brought me the molds and chemicals and showed me what to do.

It turned out to be a bit more difficult than I anticipated. This resin solidified REALLY quickly. I still have my first original resin creation from 25 years ago and I still find it amazing…………..and it’s NOT a movie character.

 

Apparently, I was pouring resin from a cup into a funnel, which I imagine was inserted into a mold. The resin never made it into the mold:

 

The resin made it into one-piece stop-action art.

 

So that’s the one item I’ve had that reminds me of that time in my life a quarter-century ago…………….until I recently found another one of those tucked-away mystery shopping bags of stuff:

 

And looked inside:

These are some very-yellowed rejects that I apparently kept.

 

 

Because I haven’t used the darkroom in all this time for anything (still waiting on that call from the Smithsonian), I STILL have the shirt I wore when working on these resin pieces and it’s STILL hanging from the darkroom’s inside door handle:

I have no idea why only part of one letter of “GUITAR” is still green (Guitar World was a magazine I shot for), but I think the shirt’s kind of cool-looking in a sloppy, artsy-fartsy way.

 

So now that I have all this newfound stuff and it’s October, it’s kind of a ready-made Halloween post, no?

 

On to the defective pourings (from which I’ve removed a LOT of yellow):

I don’t know most of their names, but I think we all know Frank:

 

……….and his lovely Bride (her voice and look in the movie were provided by Phyllis Diller):

 

NO idea who this is, but he has two flags behind him that say, “Big Daddy is our Leader” (Garlits or Roth?):

 

I think this is The Mummy:

 

No clue:

 

Don’t know her either, but these had resin-thinness problems under the arm (left) and in the skirt (right). Her sign says, “I love to go out at night – WAY OUT”:

 

Further research reveals that this was a 1966 Aurora kit called, “The Vampire” and I found 3 examples of finished products from the kit:

 

No idea who or what this is, but it’s really tiny:

 

Not so tiny is Francesca:

 

This guy looks somewhat related to Francesca in a similar non-tiny way that went straight to his head:

 

From what I can gather, this character’s name is Yetch and he’s Frank’s butler:

 

Dunno who this lovely lady is, but what a great head of hair she has! I took all the yellow out of the second pic and I think I can see fingernails in the picture, but that level of detail couldn’t really be gotten from the mold:

 

Finally! Someone we all can identify – Gilda Radner’s second husband:

 

Leftover sign, probably belonging to one of the above people/creatures:

 

Encore!

 

As the cast returns to the stage, they sing their theme song:

 

 

 

So, Happy (non-existent 2020) Halloween from me and the spooky cast of…………

 

I’ll leave you with a much happier Halloween photo I took 37 years ago.

 

From my site:

 

Greenwich Village, NYC

 

Grieving New York sophisticates recoil in horror at the sight of another brutal, senseless homicide.

 

Terribly sad.

 

 

Well……………….some of the people look happy.

 

 

Late bonus: If you read the Sears Closing post, you may recall that I tripped and fell hard on my shoulder on August 6. I’ve been going to physical therapy for the last two months (they finally figured out that I had a sprained AC joint – the same injury the Jets’ Sam Darnold received a couple of weeks ago when he was slammed to the turf).

While I was on an arm machine this week, I noticed this scene right next to me…………….interesting name:

Between the name and the happy armless pumpkin witch suspended by its neck, I thought that somebody’s got to be pulling my leg………..er, arm.

Turns out the doctor is real. My apologies, KFC (even the initials are interesting!).

 

On the way home from PT, I shot these Halloween-festooned homes from my car in the pouring rain (beware the scary Hackensack recycling can in the second pic):

Another happy customer who saved 20% here:

 

Telle est la vie à Halloween!

             (Such is life on Halloween!)

 

 

 

                                                      (ignore April 30, 2017 publish date – this was published on November 6, 2020)

 

Raise your hand if you have any idea what that title’s about.

Hmm………I think I see some hands going up in the Peach State.

 

Pylon was an influential Athens, GA, band that I shot twice in the early 1980s: once when they opened for Gang of Four at the Ritz in Manhattan in 1980 and again when they played at Hitsville in Passaic Park, NJ in 1982.

Not familiar with them?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pylon_(band)

The Box: https://www.ajc.com/life/music-blog/athens-band-pylon-to-release-comprehensive-box-set/BVK4SG5BFVDORLM3YA5HRJP7H4/

 

In March 2019, I received an email from Vanessa Briscoe Hay, Pylon’s vocalist, saying that she found a shot of the band that I had taken in an old issue of Trouser Press and wondered what else I had of them because they were “working their way towards a reissue project”.

Here’s the TP page and image she found:

 

Because I had shot them from far away at the Ritz when they had almost no light on them, I concentrated on the much-better Hitsville performance images that I shot from almost point-blank range to send to her. I had also done a quick backstage shoot with them and sent those along too (the TP shot that she liked was one of the backstage ones). The Hitsville shots were fun ones with lots of smiles, personality and dirty socks:

 

And-oh-by-the-way, I also sent the one semi-sort-of-decent dark Ritz one, but only because that show was their first (I think) big New York City gig, opening for a band they really liked. Stuff like that is important to any band.

After much discussion, I was very surprised to find out that they really wanted to use the dark Ritz shot. I couldn’t imagine why, but – hey – it’s not my project.

After a fair amount of work, the image was put into acceptable shape (though I was still hoping one of the backstage Hitsville shots would get switched in).

As the Box came into being, I found out that it would contain 4 reissued VINYL albums and a book……….not a booklet, but a 200-page hardcover BOOK!

 

AND MY DARK RITZ SHOT WAS GOING TO BE ITS FRONT COVER PHOTO!

 

 

Had they lost their minds?

I really wanted to know what the thought process was here.

Vanessa explains it here in an interview……….note that she was leafing(!) through an old Trouser Press:

But that didn’t explain everything, so let’s dig deeper. It turns out that the band had donated a lot of things to the Special Collections Library at the University of Georgia at Athens, including a drum kit and the dress that Vanessa was wearing in my photo.

They took those items and added Pylon member Michael Lachowski’s bass and borrowed the late Randy Bewley’s guitar from his sons and set all these things up at the SCL@UGA to match the band placement setup in my photo and the resultant photo is the book’s back cover image.

or

As Brady Brock from New West Records (Pylon’s label) says:

“They think your photo is the definitive live image of the band. They also love the symmetry of it (we are talking about art school kids after all!). The special collections library has long housed Vanessa’s dress, which she also wears on the back cover of Gyrate as well. It was her favorite during this period. We recreated your set up with the dress and the instruments at the library for the back cover of the book.”

 

Vanessa adds:

“Well they are mirrors, aren’t they? Your photo and the back photo were chosen by Michael Lachowski, our bassist, to reflect each other.”

 

NOW, I get it (finally)………….and I’m honored.

 

And now YOU can get it………….it’s being released today! (I hear that a CD version will be out next March).

 

Just don’t do what this masked man is doing and steal this book (with a respectful nod to Abbie Hoffman):

 

 

 

(Ignore April 30, 2017 publish date – this was published on November 13, 2020)

 

NOTE: there are NO pictures in this one! Sorry.

 

I’m not sure why I’m writing this. This story rumbles through my mind every few years, so maybe I’m trying to get it out of my head for good. Speaking of “good”, no other good will come from this because the story is almost 50 years old, so there won’t be any happy ending.

It began in the Fall semester of 1971 at Bergen Community College in Paramus, NJ. I was a hippie freak chemistry major who had an Afro, wore VERY-patched jeans and an old denim jacket with a big US flag on the back where a peace sign replaced the stars.

One day, I saw the most stunning woman I have ever encountered. She was beyond beautiful and had the most incredible figure I had ever seen. She wore expensive-looking clothing that covered everything, yet fully showed off that figure to maximum advantage.

What was this absolute goddess doing on the Bergen Community College campus? (uh, she was a student, dumbass).

Being a fairly confident raggedy hippie freak, I summoned up the nerve to approach her one day. Would it surprise you to learn that I could not get so much as the time of day from her?

I spent the rest of that semester trying to control my drool flow from afar.

 

The Spring semester was my last one before graduation and I carried a monster load, course-wise: Instrumental Analysis, Organic Chem II, Technical Writing and a couple others I don’t recall.

Guess who wound up in my Technical Writing class? Rather than continue to refer to her by her appearance, let’s just call her “Jade” (definitely NOT her real name).

I usually sat in the back of the class, which came in handy in this one because the TW professor tended to make somewhat outrageous statements and I tended to make somewhat quiet comments on them, but not at class-clown level.

The prof must have had her hearing aid turned all the way up one day when I made a semi-innocent comment. She stopped what she was doing and demanded that I immediately move to a seat right next to her desk up front.

Omigod! What would Jade think? I’m not exactly helping my cause here.

The prof changed her class-questioning M.O. to “Mr. Leafe” questioning. What she didn’t know was that I was a good student who wound up getting the school’s Award in Chemistry for having the highest GPA.

I was prepared and answered all her questions correctly. She took notice and her attitude seemed to change.

She wasn’t the only one.

 

A certain JADEd figure suddenly started giving me the time of day that I had previously not been able to extract from her. She had a thing for scholastic ability!

We started talking more, but she was still pretty guarded when it came to providing personal information. I think I found out what her hometown was, but not where she currently lived. The way she acted, she might have been married.

One way to find that out was to ask her out. She declined, but not in a slam-the-door-shut manner………….so I persisted. And she resisted, but always with a small smile on her face.

It was getting close to the end of the semester and graduation…………time for one BIG final push.

Her answer THIS time surprised the hell out of me. She AGREED to go out with me…………but with a catch – a rather large catch.

She said she would go out with me if I got an A in every one of my difficult courses.

 

I have to explain here how BCC let you know your grades back then. After all final exams were done and graded, the school posted everyone’s final grades on a bulletin board for all to see. Everyone had to drive to the school and find this bulletin board. There was no way to lie about my grades (not that I needed to).

Boy, did THAT give me incentive to do well on finals!

I breezed through all of them and was supremely confident on grade-posting day. Finally – the girl of my dreams – beautiful AND brainy………….and seduced by intellect…………would go out with me.

 

I approached the board, searched for my name and read the results:

A

 

A

 

A

 

A

 

 

 

 

 

B???????????

 

What the hell? I got a B in Instrumental Analysis?

 

How could that be? The final was easy!

 

I was FURIOUS and ran through the building searching for the instructor. I found her in a classroom, sitting at her desk facing a student-less room.

“Mr. Leafe……..what can I do for you?”

“You can start by telling me how the hell I got a B!”

“I have the graded exams right here…………here’s yours. You got one wrong.”

(As I recall, there were very few questions on the test. One wrong got you a B.)

I went through the math and could find no mistake. I asked her what the correct answer was.

She told me.

“That’s exactly the number I arrived at!”

“Coincidence. You did it wrong. You didn’t use the one formula that gives the correct answer. It can’t be done any other way.”

“It was simple! I solved it using proportions!”

She laughed. ”You cannot solve this problem using proportions.”

 

I practically dragged her up to the blackboard and made her go through EVERY step of the entire solution using proportions.

She got the same answer.

She changed my grade to an A………………….WAY too late to matter, though.

 

I never heard from Jade again. In her eyes, I failed the test. There was no way to tell her about the pig-headed professor who didn’t believe there was a simple way to solve a supposedly difficult problem.

I was left to hope that Dream Girl had reason to visit the bulletin board again, but who was I kidding………………

I gave it my best shot and was stymied by something that was so unfair, but also so out of my control.

 

Decades later, I looked up Jade online – not to try to hook up, but just to tell her the story – and thought I might have found her: same name, science professor at a local college………….that fits so far.

I dug deeper. I found something about how students grade professors at that school. Surely they’d all say nice things about her, right?

“Knowledgeable professor, but I couldn’t get past that accent.”

Wrong person – I give up.

 

One minor consolation: The Technical Writing professor told me that I earned the only A in the class, which means Jade got a B! By her standards, I couldn’t possibly go out with someone who didn’t get all A’s, so adios, gorgeous!

 

 

 

(Ignore April 30. 2017 publish date – this was published on November 20, 2020)

 

His name was Elmer Kibbe – my mother’s father – and no one called him “Curly”
nor was he in The 3 Stooges. And given his receding hairline, that’s the last thing anyone would call him. I just made up that name and you’ll see why later.

He died when I was 9, so I really didn’t know him as well as I would have liked, but that’s 9 more years than I got with my other grandfather, who died 3 days after I was born. My father used to tell me that he took one look at me and keeled over.

Here’s a shot of Grandpa Kibbe from 1944 and one from a dozen years later, when his son Joseph – who was my godfather – got married to the lovely Rita:

 

Grandpa – who served in WWI – loved his country and his cars………

 

….and two-tone shoes, apparently………….

(These last two pix are from 1951 and 1944 when he was with his wife and 3 daughters – whom he also loved – in Atlantic City. Thumbs up on the wingtips and thumbs down on the saddle shoes, Gramps – too Catholic schoolgirly.)

 

Forced labor at rolling-pin-point, however, was not among his loves:

 

Sometime during the mid-1960s, he was awarded this certificate posthumously by President Lyndon Johnson:

 

As mentioned above, he served in WWI. Here are two photos from that period. One is labeled “WWI” and the other just says “1918”:

 

I have one other picture from that time period that’s undated, but mentions two related children and “Uncle Elmer”:

 

This photo is from 1922 at an unknown location. Grandma and Grandpa are the first two people on the left in the top row. Everyone else are their relatives:

At around that time, Grandma was about 4 months pregnant with her first child (of 6), Eunice.

 

Since Eunice was born in mid-December, this undated picture is probably from 1923. Here’s the new Mom and Dad (who’s holding MY Mom):

 

Thus concludes the non-Curly part of our show.

 

 

Sounds-Unrelated-But-It’s-Not Department: One of the reasons I originally took this apartment was that it came with its own storage room a couple of feet away. After 32 years – and after inheriting the family histories of my mother (as the eldest, she had it), my father (an only child, so he had his) and my own (I’m the eldest) – it’s pretty full. But due to yet another absolutely insane move by my landlord, I’ve had to find a way to temporarily store most of it in my apartment, which now might qualify to be on the “Hoarders” TV show.

The only positive out of all this is that I have a chance to go through it all and discover some pretty interesting/unusual things I was unaware of.

FOR INSTANCE – I found an old photography studio portrait of my Grandpa Kibbe that I could not believe. He was born in 1895 and he looks to be 10 years old or under, so this is a 1900-1905 image.

 

Are you ready for this?

 

 

 

 

NOW do you understand the sudden nickname?

 

But this isn’t even the weird part!

 

I also found a very old candy box that once held Norris Chocolates from Atlanta. The contents were mind-blowing:

 

From me, my siblings and dozens of cousins…………….thanks for the 115+ year-old surprise, Grandpa Curly!

 

(“Curly Kibbe” has kind of a nice rhyming/rhythmic sound to it, don’t you think? It’s a lot cuter than what one of my ancestors did………naming a child “Green Leafe”!)

 

And to all those cousins: first, second, third………once, twice or thrice-removed AND my siblings: I had you all in mind when I put this together since I’m apparently the only one of us who had any interaction with the man.

He could be pretty grumpy at times, but you knew that deep down, he loved you.

 

LATE ADDITIONS (November 25, 2020):

 

This is what happens when you have a mountain of history to go through (there may be more).

I just found Grandpa’s 1919 discharge papers in their leather folder:

 

And here’s into whose arms he was discharged (that’s my grandmother?):

 

“I’d better marry this babe.”:

(I don’t know what the story is with Grandma, the witnesses AND the priest all being Goldings)

 

There’s actually an interesting story about this certificate I sent to a cousin recently:

Regarding the E&C Kibbe marriage certificate: I recall offering it to their kids when I found it and the only taker was Uncle Bill…………..but he didn’t want me to send it in its frame – just the certificate. No problem.

When I pulled it out of its frame, I found that the cardboard backing had a drawing/painting on it that had a semi-familiar look to it. I thought it might be a village on the Hudson River just south of the George Washington Bridge area (but maybe pre-GWB). It turned out to have been created by a local artist who was a member of the Hackensack Art Club a long time ago and was semi-known.

I put it up on eBay and it went for $150! :

Thanks, Gramps (and Uncle Bill)! :

 

 

SOMEBODY looks pretty happy about the first three late-addition images:

 

Back to the curls thing:

I also just came across two black-and-white studio photos of me that were taken for my second and third birthdays AND something from the New York Mirror newspaper. Unbeknownst to me, my mother had submitted at least one of them to the paper’s “Charming Child Contest” (I found a submission form taped to the back of one of them).

Apparently, I wasn’t charming enough to win. I’m guessing that the note from the paper was the their kind rejection notice.

I also found two hand-colored copies of those pictures and noticed that I hadn’t had my first haircut by my second birthday, but did by my third. It reminded me of Annmarie’s comment about saving children’s hair. I haven’t found any other hair collections, so maybe this was Mom’s way of preserving my locks (which look somewhat gray to me……………and the gray seems to have transferred to part of my face in the colored shot of me at three):

 

Next late addition (December 28, 2020) – Grandpa’s dogtags:

 

(Ignore April 30, 2017 publish date – this was published on November 22, 2020)

 

Things you never forget:

 

On November 22, 1963, I was a junior at Bergen Catholic High School in Oradell, NJ, and was in a class taught by someone who was not well-respected by the students. He liked to make really bad jokes that he thought would endear him to his class, but they had quite the opposite effect.

 

Early that Friday afternoon, he was called to the classroom door by someone. He returned ashen-faced and announced that the President had been shot.

 

The class erupted in mock laughter, thinking that it was another of his dumb jokes. He looked at us in utter horror. A few minutes later, the principal’s announcement over the PA told us that the President was dead.

 

I belonged to the school’s intramural bowling league, which met after school on Fridays at Ten Pin On The Mall in the Bergen Mall in Paramus. We were sure it would be canceled after the announcement, but, for some reason, it wasn’t.

 

It was impossible to concentrate on bowling, so we spent most of our time in Ten Pin’s bar, which had a TV. Normally, we would not be allowed in there, but it was understood that everyone needed to be near a TV on that horrible day.

 

 

(Ignore April 30, 2017 publish date – this was published on November 30, 2020)

 

I was hoping to get to this in time to post it on November 2, which would have been my father’s 99th birthday. Then I swore I’d have it done by Veterans Day, November 11. Instead, I just barely got it done in November…………..on his other son’s birthday (HB, Ed!).

Since I wrote about my mother’s father being in WWI, it’s time to switch to the Leafe side of the family: MY father in WWII.

The real impetus for this topic actually revealed itself about a month before I made the Grandpa post when I came across a large draw-stringed bag that contained military jackets that covered some metal things…………a pair of helmets!

A week or so later, I found a box with a lot of old Kibbe and Leafe photos and other items that support both stories, so now that you’ve seen the opening act, here comes the headliner: Sergeant Dad.

What I found lets me piece together the first quarter-century of his life………..sort of.

I was amazed to find a photo of him and his mother when he was 6 DAYS old:

 

This photo is undated………..how old could he be here – 6 or 7?

 

I seem to recall hearing something long ago about him being “in need of discipline” (or words to that effect), which resulted in him being enrolled at the Bordentown (NJ) Military Institute (BMI), but I didn’t know when or for how long.

This photo offers zero information, but it’s definitely military-looking:

However, nothing identifies it as BMI-issue.

 

Enter 2 of the 3 jackets in that bag. The first:

This appears to match the jacket in the photo (and what’s up with the folded-up sleeves? A rebellious fashion statement?)

 

The buttons and ROTC patch cinch the deal:

 

The second jacket is a bit less-festooned:

 

I wanted to see if I could get some more information about his time at BMI. I found an email address with “bmicadets” in it and sent all the questions and pix.

Here’s the reply:

As you may know, Bordentown Military Institute merged in 1972 with the Lenox School in Lenox, MA.  The merger lasted only one year and BMI/LENOX closed its doors forever in June 1973.  We do not know what happened to all of the records after that time.  However, I do have a BMI Alumni Directory dated 1968.  It lists Leafe, Norman S. Jr., ’34-35.  That means he attended BMI for only one year and did not graduate. The 1968 directory lists his address as 523 Cumberland Avenue, Teaneck, NJ.  I worked at BMI as a secretary for 22 years and I regret that I do not have more information to help you with your search.

Well, it’s more info than I had before. If their school year began in September, then he entered BMI when he was 2 months shy of his 13th birthday. I know he went to Teaneck High for junior and senior year, but I don’t know where he got his sophomore-year schooling.

 

Here are Norman S. Leafe Sr. and Jr. on July 28, 1935 – probably the month after he exited BMI. I don’t know how much discipline he absorbed there………….he still looks like a bit of a wise-ass. By the way – NSL Sr., is the grandfather of mine who died 3 days after I was born:

 

I’ve been looking for some way to work this interesting family photo into this post………..I mean – look at her: that smile, that phone, that seat backing, that thing in her hat that looks like a bird diving beak-first!

This undated photo identifies her as “Norman’s grandmother”…………which Norman? So she’s either my great-grandmother or my great-great-grandmother. I’m guessing it’s the former.

Either way, she looks like a real character…………and kinda cool.

 

I bought this 1938 THS yearbook (Dad’s senior year) on eBay. It belonged to a classmate of his named Dorothy Parrish. I DO have his copy, but – of course – it has everyone’s signature but his:

 

The above pic/info was previously posted here: https://iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com/?p=9366. If you want to know what the “less amorously-demanding” comment is about, here you go:

 

Now out of high school, here’s Dad on 9-18-41 with his harem-attracting hot convertible:

BTW – I remember that license plate………….well, plates…………hanging in our garage when I was a kid. I was disappointed that I never found them when I cleaned out my parents’ house after their passing. I always wanted to get that same BP77E in the same configuration (B over P), but it’s never been available that way.

 

Dad had started working at IBM World Headquarters at 590 Madison Avenue in Manhattan – where the boy from Jersey met a girl from Long Island (future wife Eunice) – but I don’t know when he started there or when he entered the army.

But I DO have one of his army jackets – the 3rd jacket I found in that draw-stringed bag:

 

At least I hope it’s his. In the inner upper back of the neck area, it appears to have the word “WALT” written in it:

 

But it DOES have a sergeant’s patch and I know he made that rank. Here’s that patch, along with everything else that’s on the jacket:

I have NOT researched what they all represent, so if anyone is knowledgeable in that department, please post in Comments.

 

The Helmets!

I don’t know much about these either, so if you do…………

I think the second one may be from WWI. This looks similar: https://tinyurl.com/WhichWar

 

This undated photo shows Dad somewhere during WWII:

 

This may be one of the most interesting things I found. I wonder if many (any?) other solders kept a small notebook with them throughout 29 months of service in the Pacific Theater.

In it, Dad made note of every departure and arrival at every place he was sent during those almost-2½ years AND the name of every ship that took him to those places.

I had found that notebook years ago, scanned its pages and printed them out. Now, I haven’t been able to find the notebook (yet), but I DID find the printouts and rescanned them to be larger:

 

Dad in 1944, but there’s no indication as to where this was taken:

 

Mom was part of the Men-In-Service Committee at IBM (second woman from the right standing against the wall):

 

This is the same Committee’s Christmas card. Mom is sitting on the left:

I remember that her boss’ name was George Skelton. The woman standing on the right (Rose Cobb) was a longtime friend of my mother’s whom I remember visiting in Poughkeepsie when I was a kid. We called her “Aunt Rose”, but I could never figure out how we were related (nobody told me we weren’t).

 

The IBM Wall of Honor was an ongoing Committee project throughout the war. Dad is circled in green:

 

A different angle………….this time Dad’s circled in yellow. Mr. Skelton appears to be sitting at the same desk as in the Christmas card picture (the same flag photo is behind him). Mom is at her desk (closest woman to the window) and Rose Cobb is behind her. Mom has an IBM “THINK” sign on her desk. When she died, her sister Joan requested and received it. I have my father’s sign placed above the entrance to my bathroom, where it’s said that a man does his best thinking (or is it “stinking”?).

 

By the way – my mother was a secretary at IBM. I found a strange item amongst all this memorabilia that I had never seen or heard of before: steno cuffs, which supposedly protected your sleeves from…………….something (not much online info about these items):

 

I found some letters from Dad’s Mom (our Nana), Dorothy Kavrik (she divorced NSL, Sr. and married a Little Ferry, NJ, police captain named Stanley Kavrik). She refers to “Cap” in the letter, so I guess that’s him). They actually lived on Kavrik Street! (I have NO idea how that came about).

Some of the letters are handwritten and many pages long, so I picked this one-page 8-6-45 typed letter from her office at work. Some of it went off-topic and personal, so I redacted that part:

You’ll note that she calls him “Spence” near the end. She always called him that to differentiate him from his same-named father, Norman Spencer Leafe, Sr.

She overloaded on the “darling”s so much that even she made a note about it. Too bad she didn’t include a picture of the chickens with his name on them. 😉

 

She mentions the “Empire State disaster”. On July 28, 1945, a bomber flew into the 79th floor of the Empire State Building. In a subsequent letter to Dad, she included the front page of the next-day Herald Tribune:

 

According to my father’s War Wanderings list, he was in the Philippines on 8-6-45, so I don’t know why his APO mail in San Francisco was redirected to his home address in Teaneck. That happened on the other ones I have as well:

 

By the way, you may have noticed JASCO in the midst of the Philippines listings. That stands for “Joint Assault Signal Company”, which might give a clue as to what he actually did during the war (Sibs: try https://tinyurl.com/NSLJASCO).

 

Nana worked in the engineering department (I think as a secretary) of Air Associates, Inc. Here’s a 1945 ad for them:

 

On 10-10-45, the secretary of the Men In Service Committee (Mom) sent a letter and photo to NSL, Sr.

 

A month later, Dad was back to work. Here’s his 11-5-45 IBM ID card:

 

The following Spring, Dad appears to be considering a new uniform and way of life:

 

This appears to cause Eunice to consider doing the same:

Uh, oh! A rift?

Actually, this sequence of images makes it seem that way, but the truth is the sequence is actually backwards. Mom in uniform was taken on 2-6-44, Marine enlistment contemplation was taken on 11-4-45 and Dad’s apparent LGBTQ dalliance was shot on 4-21-46, so it never happened.

Want proof? Two months later (6-24-46), Mom submitted her letter of resignation from IBM because she was marrying Dad on 7-13-46:

 

Good thing she did or else I might not be here to post this:

 

Extra picture that didn’t fit in anywhere:

590 Madison Avenue is between 56th and 57th Streets. Trump Tower would have been right behind them on 5th Avenue. The info on the back of the picture says it was taken from IBM’s roof on 4-20-45. The Chrysler Building on 42nd St is the second building from the left edge and the Empire State Building on 34th St is the third building from the right edge, so this picture is a south view:

Nice shot, Mom.

 

One last rather cosmic connection (they loved this): In October 1968, I was subcontracted to IBM in their East Fishkill, NY facility’s chem lab for one year to analyze chemicals that were used on computer chips. If that story is of interest to anyone, it’s included here: https://iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com/?p=6541

 

 

(Ignore April 30, 2017 publish date – this was published on December 10, 2020)

 

Amongst all the family stuff that I’ve been writing about lately, I found this ugly plastic bag containing an even uglier book (of sorts) inside it:

 

I had seen it before some years ago and knew that I’d better write about it someday.

Someday has arrived.

The book is not 400 years old, but its story DOES go back to 1620, so it’s appropriate that I get this out this year.

It’s even uglier out of the bag. I’m not sure what the covering is, but it’s falling apart. Little pieces kept falling off whenever I tried to do anything, like open it or turn a page.

Those pieces were all over my desk and the floor. When I tried to pick them up, they colored my fingers (and carpet) a reddish brown. When I finished examining the book and picked it up to return it to the bag, it left the same color outline and smears on my white desk.

This thing is almost sweating blood! There’s no way I can put this on my scanner multiple times…………..or even once. I’ll HAVE to photograph everything.

Here’s the front of this little charmer:

 

And here’s the back:

 

I knew I had to take a lot of pictures of the book’s contents, but there was nothing I could put it on without staining it. I finally settled on a paper shopping bag from a supermarket that I could just toss afterward.

Just today, I searched online and found what the original cover looked like. I had seen the name “The Mentor” inside the book (Volume 8, November 1920), so the book/magazine/whatever had just turned 100 years old:

 

As the cover tells you, it’s all about the Pilgrims: The Mayflower, Miles Standish, John and Priscilla Alden (the only three names most of us barely remember from school).

A quick, worth-your-time refresher: https://www.history.com/topics/colonial-america/mayflower-compact

After opening the cover, you can tell that something’s very odd in the binding:

 

The first image:

 

Here’s where I found this publication’s name and Volume number:

 

And here’s a closeup of the opposite page’s image:

 

The Mayflower:

 

The closeup (it came out with weird color, so I made it a black-and-white):

 

Don’t worry – I’m didn’t photograph every page of the whole book/magazine…………it’s not THAT interesting, but the Mayflower Pact signing was important (as you know from the above link):

 

The closeup:

 

For all you Miles Standish fans out there……….his house:

 

I had forgotten about this John and Priscilla story (followed by closeups of both pages):

(Note: The term “Darby and Joan” used to be in common use in the UK to denote a devoted old couple who are living out their retirement years in quiet, if impoverished, contentment.)

 

After a page about the “Home Life of the Pilgrims”, something unusual shows itself – something that was VERY unique: an after-sale addition to the publication, which may be the reason the original covers are gone.

It’s a TWELVE-generation, hand-typed, genealogical family tree that began with John and Priscilla Alden!

First page – Generations 1 and 2:

 

Second page – Generations 3 through 6:

 

Third page – Generations 7 through 12:

 

I hope you made it to the bottom of that page………….there’s your surprise!

(and NSL Sr. died on August 20, 1947 – not August 19)

Oh yeah………….I forgot to include what came before the first generational page:

 

…..and its closeup:

 

My father’s mother (our Nana) was originally named Dorothy Dunbar. She married a gentleman from Derby, England, named Norman S. Leafe and became Dorothy Leafe. They had a son – my father – Norman S. Leafe, Jr.

She divorced NSL, Sr. in 1940 and later married Stanley Kavrik – a police captain in Little Ferry, NJ and became Dorothy Kavrik. All three of her names pop up at various points here, so I thought it might help to explain them all in advance.

So who put this addition together?

The answer’s on the last page, facing the snazzy inside back cover:

 

The closeup:

 

An Ohio dentist who was Nana’s uncle by marriage and unrelated by blood created this in 1925.

Oh yeah – one other thing was included between that last page and inside back cover…………this photograph of a photograph of Abraham Lincoln. I don’t know why and there’s no writing on it:

 

When I was a kid, Nana would always send me certificates showing that I was enrolled in the National Mayflower Society. I didn’t believe her because almost EVERYBODY claims to have had ancestors on the Mayflower and they all say that their ancestors were John and Priscilla Alden – the only names anyone remembered.

I think she was disappointed that I showed no interest whatsoever and she’d be REALLY disappointed if she knew that I have no idea whatever happened to any of those certificates.

Something I DID find recently were all these issues of The Mayflower Quarterly from May 1976 to August 1978, addressed to her at my parents’ house in Teaneck. She had spent the last few years of her life there, but died in December, 1975. I guess no one told MQ:

 

I found this article and “comic” in one of the MQs:

I’m guessing that the “Five Generations Project” it mentions is related to the above 12 generations addition for our family because it states that the fifth generation would have been around the time of the Revolutionary War. Our fifth-generation entry contains someone from that time period.

 

 

So……….although I don’t have my Mayflower Society certificates, I DO have Nana’s 1974 one, proving that her lineage goes back 400 years to our ancestors, John and Priscilla Alden:

 

One last pic I have to leave you with is what that paper bag looked like after I finished photographing the book on it. This was done with no book motion on the bag – it just laid there and then went into the trash:

 

No muss, no fuss and no cleanup.

It died a hero.

 

 

Note to siblings: The last typed information in the addition must have been done by H.O.V. in 1925. Nana’s handwritten entries since then brought things up-to-date with our births. She must have made her last entry regarding our 12th generation in the 1960s.

Nothing’s been added in about 60 years. Obviously, you guys have produced a 13th generation since then. It’s important that I add your offspring to this book, so please send me all pertinent information (names, middle initials, spouses, birth dates, etc.) to keep this going.

One day, this book will be going to one of your kids, who hopefully will be adding to it.

Not every family gets to have one of these centuries-long records that goes back so far to such an historical couple, so let’s not be the ones to end it.

Thanks.

 

 

LATE ADDITION:

There was one other item I found – 1865 discharge papers from the Civil War – that I could not connect to either side of my family. I had no idea who Joseph Brennan was, though I thought I had seen that surname somewhere, so I started to go through everything again.

Then I noticed in the 9th generation of the Alden family tree that Nana’s mother’s maiden name was Agnes Brennan. Could she be the connection?

Let’s see………….Joseph belonged to the 90th Illinois Volunteers and was discharged in 1865. Agnes was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1868.

I think we have a match.

These papers belonged to Nana’s maternal grandfather – my great-great-grandfather (who I never heard of before today):

Pic

 

 

 

(ignore 4-30-17 publish date – this was published on December 15, 2020)

 

 

The is the fourth – and probably the last – post to come out of this box of old family………..stuff (Leafe on the left, Kibbe on the right):

 

These Three Little Pigs…….uh, I mean Books, are courtesy of Nana (Dad’s Mom), though I’m not very sure about the first one, which is about 3” x 4 ½” x 1.25”:

 

On the very first page, you can see something that looks like a handwritten 1860. I can’t read what’s under it:

 

Turning the page brings us to the inscription, which says “To my mother from her son James   Christmas 1882”:

 

I have absolutely NO idea who James was. Perhaps he was an ancestor in the Dunbar line (Nana’s maiden name was Dunbar), but I have zero proof of that. All I know is that I found this book with another similarly-small religious book that was definitely Nana’s.

However, there’s one little monkey wrench in the mix: the book, titled, “Manual of Piety” says that it’s “a collection of Catholic prayers and devotions with the epistles and gospels” and Nana wasn’t Catholic:

 

This thick little book has 488 pages (!) and contains a fair amount of Latin (with translations), but only ONE other picture:

So don’t buy this book if you only wanna look at pictures.

 

Both this book (bottom) and the smaller second one (2.74” x 3.75” x 1”) have shiny gilt-edged pages and golden clasps from back-to-front to keep the books closed:

 

This is Nana’s First Communion book (created in 1899):

 

The inscription (from 1904) – is all in French:

Nana spoke French, but I don’t know how that came to pass nor do I know why her Communion Book is all in French.

 

The first two pages (separated by an attached – and ripped – piece of something like tissue paper):

 

Here’s Google’s title page translation:

“Piety flowers collection of own prayers to each Christian”

(There are no pictures in its 348 pages.)

 

The bishop’s imprimatur:

 

There’s an interesting loose item inside the back cover. It appears to be some sort of latticework paper with what I guess is a young female first communicant attached to it:

There appears to be a missing piece on the bottom, but that piece is actually sitting sideways on the left side near the bottom. I only noticed it after having completed the photography:

 

The grand finale is the big boy of the bunch: 4.75” x 6.25” and it also came in a plastic bag, a la Nana’s red rot Pilgrim/Alden lineage book:

 

The front and back:

It’s my father’s 1921 baby book.

 

Inside the front cover:

 

I have no idea who Mrs. M. A. Farrington is, but here’s the envelope and its contents:

What does a B&W negative of an adult have to do with my father’s birth?

 

Absolutely nothing. I scanned and inverted it to W&B. It’s my father. The palm trees indicate that it was probably taken at Nana’s home in St. Petersburg, FL in the early 1950s:

 

These 6 double-images and 2 single ones are all pretty self-explanatory:

 

What? Dad never had a first party? Oh, baby!

 

He walks! He talks!

 

Besides the ribboned curl, there was this little fold of paper that says, “Normy Leafe”(?) NORMY? I’ve NEVER heard that before. It must have been before Nana decided to call him “Spence” to differentiate him from his father. Good thing – I don’t think he would have lasted 5 minutes in kindergarten as “Normy”.

Anyway, the fold contained a lock of some dirty-blondish hair that’s not as yellow as the picture would have you believe (Who made this crummy scan? Let’s blame Normy.):

 

Look at all the gifts Normy scored!

 

If you think he got good stuff at birth, you should see his kids!

 

 

(ignore April 30, 2017 publish date – this was published on December 17, 2020)

 

Actually, this is from a little earlier than 2020:

 

 

I wonder why my mother had to write the year on the second page. I think I did a fairly good semi-legible version on Page 1.

#2 – Not sure about this one. I must have wanted that for my mother…………uh, yeah – that’s it.

#6 – How did I know?

#15 – I had to Google this one to find out what it was.

#16 – What?

I’m sure a shrink would have a field day with the variety of my wants, but I’m also sure that every other kid did the same thing at that age.

And yes – I’m aware of the odd accentuation in part of my address at age 6, but remember: I was a “good boy” (and maybe kinda sorta still am).

 

Merry Christmas. I hope you all get everything on YOUR lists.