Discovering my father’s wartime photo

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Discovering my father’s wartime photo

I can’t even begin to describe the feelings I had when I discovered an envelope filled with negatives of photographs my father took during his time in Burma in World War II. This envelope contained several medium-format and 35mm negatives he took while serving in the 14th Army, Royal Armoured Corps, which was a tank corps of the British Army.

Years ago, I discovered a box full of hundreds of negatives he had taken after the war when he emigrated to the USA and travelled around and photographed post-war America. I’ve gone through them a few times and scanned a number of them, but I was astonished to realize I had somehow missed this particular envelope containing these special photographs from his time in the war.

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My grandfather Kostja

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My grandfather Kostja

My grandfather Kostja Zetkin had an extremely interesting life. I didn’t get to spend a lot of time talking to him when I visited him at his home in British Columbia when I was younger, by that time he would speak mostly German to me with a big smile on his face completely forgetting that I didn’t understand a word he said. He was my step-grandfather as my grandmother Gertrude married him well after my father had been born.

This is a picture of Kostja as a young man on the left and as a much younger man on the right with his girlfriend Rosa Luxembourg. Kostja’s mother was Clara Zetkin, one of the leaders of the Weimar Republic and a staunch working-class feminist and advocate for women’s rights.

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…scanned from my archive. My grandmother Fanny

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…scanned from my archive. My grandmother Fanny

My grandmother Fanny was one of the sweetest and kindest people I ever knew, almost to a fault. She lived for her family and friends and would literally do anything to help or support them, but as a result I always wondered about her own happiness.

She raised my mother and her brother Jerry, and helped my grandfather Boris run his photo studio on the boardwalk, just downstairs from their ocean view apartment in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn. I of course have dozens of photos my grandfather took of her, posing almost demurely for the camera in his studio, on the boardwalk, the beach or their roof (otherwise known as tar beach). These two photos were mixed in amongst them all, but stood out because they were not the typical poses or expressions I see in most of the other photos of her.

The one on the roof was not taken on my grandparent's roof, there were no giant container tanks near their home, but I love my grandmother’s almost haughty attitude and posture towards the camera, so unlike her. I have to imagine she was either playing for the camera or grandpa was in the doghouse big time and his stare down was captured for history.

The other photo looks like a studio shot but so much more relaxed than they usually are. Her smile is the prettiest I have seen on her, and whatever grandpa did in the first photo, he must have made up for by thge time this was taken.

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…scanned from my archive. 1969 - Fifty years ago I went to Woodstock

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…scanned from my archive. 1969 - Fifty years ago I went to Woodstock

I arrived at the Woodstock Festival three days before it was scheduled to start. My friend Clifford and I actually had tickets for the festival, we were 14 and 15 years old respectively and ready for anything. Cliff’s mom was going to be driving to her country home near Bethel and she offered to drive us up, but the deal was we had to go up a few days early if we wanted the ride.

When we arrived, we found the few people already there doing the work of building and putting together the festival grounds. We somehow migrated to the area the Hog Farm had set up, they had a free kitchen that fed us and in return we helped build some concession stands and other structures around the area. They also gave us free hash breaks, which made the work a bit more pleasant.

Once the music started there were two options: cram yourself into the throngs of people sitting on the hill around the stage, or walk around and take in the scenery. I spent a lot of my time doing the latter. People would offer up a variety of drugs as I walked around, both the smoking kind and the pill kind. Sometimes they would just hand you a bottle, jug or goatskin canteen (a bota) filled presumably with wine, but often with some mescaline or other hallucinogen diluted in. Taking a sip was always an adventure, which I sometimes indulged but often didn’t. I suppose I would size up the offerer before making my decision.

The music was always there, whether you were looking directly at the stage or off somewhere in the rambles or over a hill or in one of the few unfortunate Porta-Pottys. I had seen many of the bands perform before, I was a regular at the Filmore East, usually as the result of my asking for free tickets from the parade of concert attendees filing into the theatre. But The Who, The Band, The Dead, were always a must see if I could. I had seen Hendrix a number of times, always magical, but I was long asleep by the time he played at sunrise.

I remember the one band everyone was talking about and anxiously awaiting was Crosby, Stills and Nash

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…scanned from my archive. My mom’s 97th birthday

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…scanned from my archive. My mom’s 97th birthday

…scanned from my archive. My mom’s 97th birthday

Yikes! Today my mom turned 97 today. In honor of this event I pulled out a few of my favorites and a few I’ve not shared before.

I literally have hundreds of photos of my mother growing up in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn. As I’ve mentioned many times, my grandfather had a photo studio right on the boardwalk near Brighton 4th Street. In our family, growing up in front of the camera was a big part of our lives. My mother, her brother Jerry, myself and my cousins Michael and Leslee all spent part of our formative years posing in the studio for my grandfather.

The five older photos I chose were all taken in the studio or on the boardwalk railing just next to it. My mom still has the same haircut she did as the child in the photos, as you can see from the photo I took last week of her and Luke. She did try the big hair thing for her prom. The dress is from Orbach’s I’m told.

Happy Birthday Mom, your spirit is an inspiration. More photos here…

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…scanned from my archive. Tim and Nico go out Midwest – 1974

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…scanned from my archive. Tim and Nico go out Midwest – 1974

In 1974 my brothers Tim and Nico took a trip out the Midwest to visit their grandparents. My stepmother Susan was originally from Minnesota but her parents had relocated to Missouri and so the family took off for the heartland. Along the way they stopped for a visit to Mount Rushmore.

I love this shot that my father took. The quintessential snapshot would have typically had my brothers facing the camera, framed from head to toe (because we all know how important it is to include footwear in meaningful family portraits), with the four presidents shrunk to minuscule versions of themselves in the background. My father was a good photographer however and he managed to catch this quizzical pose of my brothers tilting their heads to presumably enhance their viewing of the famous landmark (I must remember to ask them why one of these days).

In a way this kind of photo is more powerful as it forces the viewer to imagine the faces of the two curious boys while adding a bit of humor to the picture and keeping the presidents framed up clearly.

The photo of Tim water skiing on a lake in Missouri was badly faded. Sometimes with older prints, the inks fade at different rates, typically the blues, which leaves the picture with a reddish cast to it. I restored the photo a bit and brought back some of the original color, a little Photshop can go a long way.

I like the portrait of my brothers taken against the side of the house, it reminds me of some of the old WPA photos taken during the Depression by the likes of Walker Evans and Dorothea Lange of workers photographed against barns and other structures out in the dust bowl. Probably a stretch considering the difference in attire and circumstances, but photos evoke what they evoke and that’s the beauty of it. More photos here…

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…scanned from my archive. Boris Lenoff, Fire Island 1958

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…scanned from my archive. Boris Lenoff, Fire Island 1958

…scanned from my archive. Boris Lenoff, Fire Island 1958. While growing up, there were always certain photos that seemed to be present, either in frames on the wall, taped to cabinets, stuck to the fridge or in one of the several photo albums lying around. My father and my mother’s father Boris, were usually the photographers of most of the family photos, so they aren’t present in as many of the family photos as other family members. Boris was a professional photographer, so like myself, he was usually much more comfortable behind the camera than in front of it.

So this particular image was always very important to me because it was one of only a handful of photos that had both my grandfather and me in it. It was also taken at one of my favorite places in the world – Fire Island. This was shot on the side of our house in Fire Island Pines with the big dune that protected us from the winds and our neighbor’s eyes looming behind us.

If you know Fire Island at all, you know it is all sand and dunes, so if you don’t like sand you are in a lot of trouble. I loved sand and I loved standing next to my dad or granddad and watching them saw, hammer in nails or do just about anything with wood. So I was a really happy kid in this photo, and by the looks of Boris, he was having a good time too.

Emotional connections with photos are made through repeated viewings, and that through that process we start to develop the visual narrative of our life story. The photos on our walls, our fridge and our family albums will always be the way I remember those parts of my life, and I was so lucky to have had so many great photos to tell that story. This one will always be one of my favorites. Larger photo here

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…scanned from my archive. Mom, circa 1928

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…scanned from my archive. Mom, circa 1928

…scanned from my archive. Mom, circa 1928. Mom just celebrated her 96th birthday last week. She’s here in LA, a long way from her Brighton Beach, Brooklyn roots, but she is close to her family, especially her grandson, and that is more important to her than geography. These are a couple of photos taken in her father’s photo studio which was located on the first floor of the apartment building she grew up in. The entrance to the building was on Brighton 4th street, but my grandfather’s studio was entered to directly from the Coney Island Boardwalk, just a hop, skip and a jump from the beach and the Atlantic Ocean. The studio awning prominently displayed its name - Boris Lenoff’s Photo Portrait Studio, and all family members were at one point or another required to pose for their picture.

My mom had her eye scratched when she was very young and was virtually blind in that eye all her life as a result. Now she has macular degeneration and is losing sight in her other eye. She can’t read anymore, so she listens to mystery novel after mystery novel sent to her by the Braille Institute,  a truly amazing organization. Her spirits are high and her mind is sharp and I can only hope I am in half the shape she is if I am ever lucky enough to be a nonagenarian. More photos here…

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