Explanation
The following manuscript, in pencil on yellow lined paper, was written by my maternal grandfather, Samuel I. Woldin on 10 February 1975 at his home in Cranbury, N.J. He wrote it at my request. - TSR
As far back as I can remember I was interested in athletics. When I was about six or seven my father gave me on my birthday a baseball bat, ball and glove. They did not last very long as I immediately went out to play with the big fellows and it wasn't long before the bat was split and the ball was no longer playable. But my interest continued. When I was in the eighth grade I was asked to play on the high school team. In my senior year I was elected captain of both the baseball and basketball teams. Some time later I started playing tennis with considerable success.
I was a member of a doubles team which captured the Somerset County championship. It was just before this time that I became acquainted with a new arrival in town -- Paul Robeson. I suppose it was my early upbringing that caused me to have such an admiration for him. My parents were of the Jewish faith being subjected to much discrimination and prejudice. Of course I noticed this but never accepted it. To me my parents were two wonderful people who would never harm anyone. In time they were looked up to and admired in Somerville.
I suppose my recoil from prejudice came from them so my interest in the abused black people developed from them. My great interest in Paul Robeson started when he excelled in Somerville High School athletics. So I naturally followed his career at Rutgers. His accomplishments there were monumental. Not only in athletics but in scholarships and debating. He was chosen as an All-American football player and also shone in basketball, baseball, and track. After leaving Rutgers he studied law at Columbia University. And from then on he became famous internationally for his singing and acting. Well, so much for Paul Robeson. But to me he is the greatest American of the twentieth century. I still follow him in the great number of news articles about him.
After I had completed high school I went to New York University and graduated in 1924. For a while thereafter I helped my father operate his retail shoe business. In the thirties I started my accounting career which I operated until 1970. My wife and I managed to have three children. They all married and are now raising fine families. The first real tragic event in my life occurred in 1968 when my wife died. She had been a tremendous help to me since 1930. We were married in a civil ceremony in New York City by the clerk whose name was Cruise, which was also my wife's name. An article appeared in the New York papers a few years later that this Cruise fellow was not legally certified to conduct marriages and that those that he had conducted marriage ceremonies for should be remarried. My wife and I laughed but did nothing about it. We certainly felt really united. The greatest joy in my life right now are my nine grandchildren.
I am still greatly involved in [fighting] discrimination against all minorities but mainly the black race. I suppose this is due to my early bringing and experience, and will remain with me until I die.
My feeling is that if more people were involved in [fighting] this inequity maybe in time it could be erased from our society.
-- Sam Woldin
2-10-75
Scrapbook of Yesterday from The Somerset Messenger Gazette.
Obituary of Samuel Woldin from The Princeton Packet, 22 March 1978.
WOLDIN-SITZ FAMILIES IN U.S.A.
