52 PICK UP

On November 5, 2024 many of you had the day off. You’re welcome. This happened because it was my 52nd birthday. I’m not sure that I will be able to line that up again for all of you, but I will try my best.

All joking aside, I am a student of history. When we all learn about the past in school, I have always felt that the vast majority of us are too young to fully understand or appreciate it from the lens that time from living on the Earth affords us. In my 20’s, I became curious about my own history and how I landed in New Hampshire of all places.

Well, since you asked….

Let’s go in reverse for a moment, shall we?

In the middle of the 1800’s, a man named Ferdinand Moeschen arrived through the “Golden Door” at the Castle Garden Depot on the southern tip of Manhattan in NYC. He later sent word to Germany for his wife and children to come to America. One son, William, listed his occupation as “drummer” on his entry card to the United States. Several years later, during the next census, he changed it to “painter.” For my musical friends, apparently it was hard to get a steady gig in New York City in the 1870’s. That tracks right?

In 1872, Ferdinand had a son named George. This man was my great grandfather. On September 1, 1914 George was married with 5 young kids and was living near Glens Falls in upstate NY. Records show that George was a popular, outgoing socialite who designed wallpaper with fancy designs drawn by hand for people who could afford such things. He also owned a motor carriage, which in those days, had to share dirt roads with horse-drawn buggies, cattle, and people walking. From what I could find, George was popular and well-liked (also tracks right?) and was involved in several community activities including a local Elks lodge type thing just over the border in western Vermont.

Late that evening, George was driving home from a meeting at the Elks Lodge with a buddy named Charlie Harrington. I was told that George was drunk. The guys got behind a wagon on the dark, dirt road and decided they were going to slow. George increased speed and passed the wagon on the left. He didn’t realize that the railroad track bed was there AND was a good deal lower than the road. His friend was ejected from the car, landing on someone’s front lawn, alive but missing several teeth. George died at the scene. His wife and 5 kids were in NYC on a “holiday.” Some poor bastard had to travel to the city the following day to inform Mrs. Moeschen that she was a widow. After learning the news, she stayed in the city with the five kids and worked to survive. The man who would become my grandfather, Frank, was 10. As a kid, he swam in the Hudson and East Rivers. If you have been to the city, you will understand that things like this are not possible today….

Anyway, Frank grew up in Manhattan, married a woman named Helen Carney, who held a college degree from Columbia University, which was pretty badass for a woman in the 1920’s. Both of my grandparents were athletic, and had a dream of running a summer camp far away from Manhattan where “the art of natural living could be enjoyed among friends.” During the depression, against stacked odds, they looked for property on the Maine coast, and inland in Vermont and New Hampshire. They bought a place in Enfield, NH in 1933 and started a business that ran every summer until 1968. During the winter months, on the upper east side of Manhattan, Frank ran an afterschool “club” for kids. From what he told me, it sounded a lot like our Boy’s and Girl’s Clubs of today.

In 1942, Frank and Helen’s second child was born. His name was Tim. Tim grew up on East 83rd Street in New York City and was given a Catholic education. As the 1950’s drew to a close, schools placed a big emphasis on science as the Soviet Union had just successfully launched the first man made object (Sputnik) into orbit. Tim thought it would great to major in chemistry and was accepted to Georgetown University to study. He drank his classes away and was “asked to resign” after one year. He returned to New York City and began working in the financial sector for a company called Dean Witter (Now Morgan Stanley) where he ran trade slips for buyers and sellers on the New York Stock Exchange. There he met a young woman named Helen Valdatta, who had grown up in Hyde Park New York (about 2 hours north of the city). Helen and her best friend Elise simply moved to NYC after graduating high school to work for the FBI. Badass. They became “pool secretaries” typing up briefs and reports from the field. Helen thought it would be all spy J. Edgar Hoover stuff, but it turned out to be boring, so she bailed and went to work for Dean Witter.

They dated for 4 years, and finally Tim popped the question while they were drinking at their favorite neighborhood bar. (Sensing a theme here?). Helen laughed and told Tim to “put that ring away….” but said yes. In April of 1968, Tim and Helen were married. At 2:45 AM on Sunday, November 5, 1972, my life began at Doctor’s Hospital, located at 170 East End Avenue, between 87th and 88th Streets opposite Gracie Mansion in the Yorkville neighborhood of the Upper East Side of Manhattan, New York City. My parents lived in Brooklyn until I was 2. I already hated the Yankees.

Tim went back to college, obtaining a history degree from Adelphi University on Long Island. He had already begun a career working for IBM, a typewriter and data company that would eventually make computers. Tim and Helen did not want to stay in NYC in the 1970’s, so Tim arranged for a work transfer to Boston, MA. They moved to a southern suburb called Weymouth and had a girl, Sheila, on December 9 1975.

In December of 1976, the Moeschen family of 4 moved to Salem, NH, a small town about 30 miles north of Boston. Tim worked in Boston, then Burlington, MA, Waltham, MA, Manchester NH and finally back to Waltham before retiring from IBM in 1992. Helen was a stay at home mom until my sister and I were in high school. At this time, Helen began a 15-year career as a home health aide. I was told that the main reason that southern New Hampshire was my parent’s chosen spot was simply because they loved the Enfield camp property so much (the family held onto the property after it closed as a business and we still own it today), that they wanted to be within a 2 hour drive of the place to go there on weekends and in the summer.

I grew up in Salem, moved to Lowell, MA for college and then got a teaching job in Salem, so I moved back. As my condition progressed, there was no financial way for me to buy a home and make it wheelchair friendly, so I built on to my childhood home and now have somewhat of a sprawling duplex thing thing. I have travelled to 38 states and New Hampshire still remains “home” to me.

I’ve been in New Hampshire since I was 4, I still hate the Yankees, and now am raising another generation of Moeschen kids. This is 52.

Stay awesome, stay safe, and stay tuned.