By Doris
All of my friends were now in college, some four year colleges and some two year junior colleges. Some of my classmates went to Katharine Gibbs Secretarial School in New York City to become executive secretaries in search of the glass ceiling. Mal, one of my best friends, went to a local college and was always ready to go to New York to see a Broadway show. Our mode of transportation was a bus to the New York Port Authority Terminal and then on to the theatre district, which in the 1950s showcased musicals that have become classics and are now popular revivals.
My Fair Lady, with Julie Andrews at 19, was the hottest ticket in town, along with West Side Story and Chita Rivera. One was set in London and portrayed a young cockney girl and the other was in New York City showing young Puerto Rican girls and a different culture. Fifty years later when the revival of West Side Story played in Naples Jennifer, Kelly, Laurie and I went to see it at the Philharmonic. Great to share it with them. Sitting next to me was an older lady who had also seen the original in New York in the fifties.
Some other great shows we saw were Damn Yankees, the Pajama Game, Auntie Mame, The Boy Friend, Guys and Dolls and Once Upon A Mattress with Carol Burnett. Competing with the musicals were some great dramas by Tennessee Williams and Eugene O’Neill, Tea and Sympathy, Long Day’s Journey Into Night, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and A Doll House. Some were over my head at the time, but I felt like a sophisticated New Yorker in the moment!
Years later it was wonderful to see Jennifer and Kent participating in shows in Summit High School led by Phyllis Armstrong, a music teacher whose great talent in working with young people produced many wonderful shows.
Some of the big names of the era were Frank Sinatra and Louie Armstrong. Although we were not part of the 1940s swooning girls at Sinatra’s concerts seen in old newsreels, we were big fans and saw him twice. He was a skinny kid from Hoboken, NJ who was now a huge success. Louis Armstrong at the Ballroom was a great showman and opened our eyes to a new culture. Sammy Davis Jr. had an enormous booming voice and had several hit records before he was in Mr. Wonderful, with the Will Mastin trio, his father and uncle. Television was in its infancy and I had never seen a picture of him. When the curtain opened and this big booming voice came out of this tiny black man I almost fell out of my seat!
When our New York evenings ended it was time to return to reality so we ended with a cheeseburger at the Port Authority Bus Terminal, which had the best cheeseburgers I have ever tasted!
One time, my friend Jeannine’s dad won a go-go mobile (a tiny car) as a door prize at a shoe convention in New York City. It had to be picked up there so I went with Jeannine to claim it. Jeannine’s dad was 6’4” tall and her brothers were even taller. Jeannine was 5’ 9”. These were very big people for the 1950s, winning a very tiny car! Jeannine, being the smallest, became the prime user of the car. But first, we had to negotiate the streets of New York and the Lincoln Tunnel to return to New Jersey, hoping the other drivers would see us in our toy car. It was so light weight it was sliding a little on the floor of the tunnel. We survived and Jeannine used the car to drive to the train station to commute to New York and to drive to the Jersey shore. One time she returned to find it picked up and moved a block away, another time it turned up on the porch of a house we had rented at the shore!
Ft. Lauderdale was the most popular spring break place in the fifties and Mal and I and a college friend of hers decided to take part. On my bank stationery, masquerading as a responsible adult, I made reservations for us at a nice motel, we had tickets for our first plane trip and off we went. Somehow we were able to rent a convertible and were now ready for a fantastic week of sun and fun. I loved Ft. Lauderdale and marveled at the beautiful boats, homes, and scenery.
Spring break was everything we hoped for, one big party on a beautiful beach with many people we knew from our hometown, we hated to leave. Turned out leaving wasn’t easy. In those days it was necessary to reconfirm your return plane reservations, which we should have known but didn’t. So our tickets were invalid and we had to find a new way home, and it definitely wasn’t going to be in our rented convertible! Being enterprising young ladies we were able to get reservations on a train from Miami to Newark, the only drawback was it was an 18 hour trip. We spent many of those hours in the club car talking and laughing about a truly unforgettable trip!
My second plane trip was with Mal and Jeannine when we went to Quebec in Canada and stayed at the truly grand Chateau Frontenac. This trip was Jeannine’s idea and it was in April, off season in Quebec. It was so off season it was like having our own private chateau. We loved the old historic city and enjoyed the wonderful small restaurants and shops. I was able to use a little of my high school French and experience a foreign culture for the first time. And we remembered to confirm our return plane reservations!
As my friends graduated from college and started working, some in New York in advertising agencies and publishing companies, we started to spend weekends at the Jersey shore, mainly Bay Head. For two years we rented a large house for the summer, which we used on weekends and for our vacations. During the week we would rent it to married acquaintances, which worked out well financially. Many groups of young working people were also renting houses and on weekends I got a taste of what college party weekends were like. There was always something fun going on somewhere in Bay Head on the weekends in the summer and great memories were made. The fifties were a carefree decade and it was a great time to be young!
The best trip of the fifties was my trip to Bermuda with my friend and neighbor, June. Bermuda was also a premier place for spring break, but June was now employed in New York so this was part of our annual two week vacation. The Elbow Beach Hotel was on the beach and offered the American plan, which meant that breakfast, lunch and dinner came as part of the vacation package. I doubt that this exists anymore, but we took full advantage of it. This meant that on the night that changed my life I was not going to miss dinner!
We had gone to the hotel mixer, had drinks and met two very nice young naval officers, Don Lidke and Fred Easter. As events unfolded later we joined them in Don’s Volkswagen bug, with June in the front with Don and me in the back with Fred, and away we went. Where we were going I don’t recall, but coral walls got in the way! June hit the windshield and Fred and I connected at the hip and when we stopped June had a bloody nose and I couldn’t walk properly. Something was out of sync, including my hip and pelvis.
This was when Don sprang into action and we went to the hospital. My choices were to go into traction at the hospital or go home. Home was the choice, especially now that I knew Don was from my hometown and would go with us! I knew he was special when we were able to joke and laugh about things on the plane going home. We have been laughing together ever since!