if you felt like giving an idea of the discussions, that would be very interesting indeed
so, not really an idea of the discussion, but just some thoughts.
Some of this is, I think, generational. Charlie was born in 1935, and was the youngest of my mom's siblings. The family had come through the Depression, somehow, and were basically, not blue collar exactly, but working class Queens folks. Not desparately poor, but... of limited means.
Folks like that can basically see serious poverty in the rear view mirror. And too far back, either. It's tangible to them in ways that it is not to people like, for instance, me. People who are more solidly and securely middle class.
For my grandparents especially, and for my mom and her siblings, there was serious shame around being "on relief". Around receiving welfare of any kind. It meant that you had failed to maintain your toehold in the respectable world.
There is also a sort of patriotic dimension to it. We had overcome the Depression, we were to go on to prevail in WWII. We would follow that up with the Marshall Plan, and then later with the international aid and "soft power" politics of the Eisenhower and Kennedy years.
All of which covers my uncle's youth and young manhood.
My grandparents and mom's siblings really did think of the US as the greatest country on earth, maybe (probably) in history. Because it arguably was, mostly, for a minute.
So there is that.
And there is a cultural dimension.
My uncle was a NY City fireman, retiring as a lieutanant. In NYC, first responders - cops, firemen - tend to be conservative. Uncle was probably more so than most - not that many FDNY folks are Birch Society chapter heads - but that was likely the common direction - the prevailing winds, if you will - of his social context.
He was also a founder and elder in a relatively conservative church. Which was a chosen social context, of course, but also one that would be likely to reinforce his own conservative instincts.
And I would add, perhaps somewhat oddly, Charlie was a New Yorker. New Yorkers tend to be chauvinistic - tend to think in "we are the best" terms.
That's all I got. Make of it what you will.
2025-11-05 04:42:40
I couldn’t help wondering whether, at some stage of your young to later manhood, you ever tried to find out how such an otherwise lovely person conceptualised his political opinions
Never had that conversation. We talked about family stuff, or the heirloom fruit trees he had planted in his yard, or odd old songs he had discovered somewhere. And we played games.
2025-11-04 01:21:10
Are you in contact with your Apache and Hopi cousins?
I'm in touch with my cousing Peter - the Apache - on Facebook. After Charlie retired from FDNY he painted houses, and Peter basically apprenticed with him and continues to work as a house painter and general handyman. He had some bumpy times, but is all good now. Peter has the best family pictures and has become kind of the family archivist.
My cousin Tara - the Hopi - grew away from the family a bit at some point, although she and her daughter Kateri are still in touch with Charlie's kids.
2025-11-04 00:24:07
Charlie and his wife (and the rest of them) sound like wonderful people.
They were a pretty remarkable crew.
FWIW, the younger guy on the left, sitting in front of my grandfather (older Archie Bunker looking guy in the white shirt) was Eddie Gonzales. Not a brother by birth, but basically unofficially adopted into the family.
Eddie's father abandoned him, and his mother was an alcoholic. Eddie himself was gay, which nobody ever talked about but everyone knew, and nobody really cared about one way or the other. He was good friends with the brothers, so he came and lived with them and my grandfolks raised him along with the rest of the gang.
Eddie was at every family gathering and was just part of the family, full stop. Just a part of the larger Richmond Hill crew.
So yes, this weird dilemma of people who are personally beautiful - kind and outgoing and generous - but aligned with social and political movements that are... not.
I think a part of all of this for my mom's folks was coming up through the Depression, and then WWII. The brothers were too young to serve in the war, but my father (guy in front of the Christmas tree holding the baby - you can only see the top of his head) did, and they all dealt with rationing etc.
They were basically poor - not desperately, but poor enough to have to watch every nickel and do without a lot of things. Like everyone around them was. Tucky - the brother in the middle with the big smile - was offered a full basketball scholarship to Columbia, and wasn't able to go, because the family needed him to work and bring money into the house.
My sense is that all of those experiences - the anxiety of having just barely enough, the sacrifices around wartime - gave them an ethic that you pull together and help out whoever needs help.
But lots of folks came through all of that and were not quite as open-hearted.
This crew and their kids were my people, really - my father's family were all in Georgia, and I did not see them as often, many of them I never even met. They were a joy to know, and I miss them.
if you felt like giving an idea of the discussions, that would be very interesting indeed
so, not really an idea of the discussion, but just some thoughts.
Some of this is, I think, generational. Charlie was born in 1935, and was the youngest of my mom's siblings. The family had come through the Depression, somehow, and were basically, not blue collar exactly, but working class Queens folks. Not desparately poor, but... of limited means.
Folks like that can basically see serious poverty in the rear view mirror. And too far back, either. It's tangible to them in ways that it is not to people like, for instance, me. People who are more solidly and securely middle class.
For my grandparents especially, and for my mom and her siblings, there was serious shame around being "on relief". Around receiving welfare of any kind. It meant that you had failed to maintain your toehold in the respectable world.
There is also a sort of patriotic dimension to it. We had overcome the Depression, we were to go on to prevail in WWII. We would follow that up with the Marshall Plan, and then later with the international aid and "soft power" politics of the Eisenhower and Kennedy years.
All of which covers my uncle's youth and young manhood.
My grandparents and mom's siblings really did think of the US as the greatest country on earth, maybe (probably) in history. Because it arguably was, mostly, for a minute.
So there is that.
And there is a cultural dimension.
My uncle was a NY City fireman, retiring as a lieutanant. In NYC, first responders - cops, firemen - tend to be conservative. Uncle was probably more so than most - not that many FDNY folks are Birch Society chapter heads - but that was likely the common direction - the prevailing winds, if you will - of his social context.
He was also a founder and elder in a relatively conservative church. Which was a chosen social context, of course, but also one that would be likely to reinforce his own conservative instincts.
And I would add, perhaps somewhat oddly, Charlie was a New Yorker. New Yorkers tend to be chauvinistic - tend to think in "we are the best" terms.
That's all I got. Make of it what you will.
I couldn’t help wondering whether, at some stage of your young to later manhood, you ever tried to find out how such an otherwise lovely person conceptualised his political opinions
Never had that conversation. We talked about family stuff, or the heirloom fruit trees he had planted in his yard, or odd old songs he had discovered somewhere. And we played games.
Are you in contact with your Apache and Hopi cousins?
I'm in touch with my cousing Peter - the Apache - on Facebook. After Charlie retired from FDNY he painted houses, and Peter basically apprenticed with him and continues to work as a house painter and general handyman. He had some bumpy times, but is all good now. Peter has the best family pictures and has become kind of the family archivist.
My cousin Tara - the Hopi - grew away from the family a bit at some point, although she and her daughter Kateri are still in touch with Charlie's kids.
Charlie and his wife (and the rest of them) sound like wonderful people.
They were a pretty remarkable crew.
FWIW, the younger guy on the left, sitting in front of my grandfather (older Archie Bunker looking guy in the white shirt) was Eddie Gonzales. Not a brother by birth, but basically unofficially adopted into the family.
Eddie's father abandoned him, and his mother was an alcoholic. Eddie himself was gay, which nobody ever talked about but everyone knew, and nobody really cared about one way or the other. He was good friends with the brothers, so he came and lived with them and my grandfolks raised him along with the rest of the gang.
Eddie was at every family gathering and was just part of the family, full stop. Just a part of the larger Richmond Hill crew.
So yes, this weird dilemma of people who are personally beautiful - kind and outgoing and generous - but aligned with social and political movements that are... not.
I think a part of all of this for my mom's folks was coming up through the Depression, and then WWII. The brothers were too young to serve in the war, but my father (guy in front of the Christmas tree holding the baby - you can only see the top of his head) did, and they all dealt with rationing etc.
They were basically poor - not desperately, but poor enough to have to watch every nickel and do without a lot of things. Like everyone around them was. Tucky - the brother in the middle with the big smile - was offered a full basketball scholarship to Columbia, and wasn't able to go, because the family needed him to work and bring money into the house.
My sense is that all of those experiences - the anxiety of having just barely enough, the sacrifices around wartime - gave them an ethic that you pull together and help out whoever needs help.
But lots of folks came through all of that and were not quite as open-hearted.
This crew and their kids were my people, really - my father's family were all in Georgia, and I did not see them as often, many of them I never even met. They were a joy to know, and I miss them.