The Brown family, a farming family with roots in the American Revolution, invited my family to watch the McCarthy hearings on television. We didn’t have a TV and, like most of the established families in our little Massachusetts town, the Browns wanted us to know they didn’t like Joe McCarthy and his witch hunt one bit.

So, one day, after services at the Unitarian church, Wilbur and Mary Brown invited us to sit in the living room of their rambling old farmhouse and watch Republican Senator Joe McCarthy allege that the U.S. State Department and other government institutions had been infiltrated by Americans with communist leanings.

No one, including Joe McCarthy, knew what a communist was — and they still don’t. Communism has never existed anywhere on the planet in the form defined by Marx, Engels, Trotsky, and Lenin — but Joe McCarthy was confident that he knew what communism was and that he could spot a Communist — with an upper-case “C” — from across any Senate hearing room.

The hearings began in 1950 after the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) had laid the ground for McCarthy’s alcoholic inquisition with a spectacular attack on Hollywood’s allegedly hammered-and-sickled Babylon. The Hollywood attacks began in 1947, before anyone had a television.*

I must have been about six or seven when the Brown family invited us to watch the suited Senator Joe McCarthy et al grill the suited alleged communists. There were no women Senators involved or any woman communists. I remember a mob of men in suits, white shirts, and neckties sitting behind microphones at the hearing tables. I remember the televised sound had a harsh, tinny ring to it, and McCarthy droned over the proceedings in a malicious monotone.

Joseph Welch (seated) and Senator McCarthy, just before Welch famously said, “have you no shame, Sir?”

I recall watching the black and white figures leaning into the microphones, while the Browns and my parents expressed their outrage at the proceedings. We attended several sessions at the Browns, but Steve and Derek Brown usually lured me out to the barn to build hay bale forts in the hay loft.

At four o’clock, Wilbur Brown would amble into the barn to begin the evening milking. He would keep the radio tuned to a classical music station. No McCarthy hearings for Wilbur’s Holsteins. They preferred Strauss waltzes.

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*Friend and classmate Tony Kahn, was, like me, the son of a blacklisted American. Tony’s father, Gordon Kahn, had been fired from Warner Bros studios after being subpoenaed during HUAC’s 1947 hearings. Much, much later, Tony wrote and produced “Blacklisted,” a powerful radio docudrama about his father’s — and his family’s — fate under fire. Highly recommended!

Years ago, we attended a fundraiser for affordable housing (an ongoing dilemma) on Martha’s Vineyard. The evening began with a reception on a large property where the Clintons had stayed while he was still in office, then fanned out to smaller parties across the island for special dinners and entertainment. We attended a “magic” party…we had been clued in to request this event, as it would be special. We knew most of the people there, the venue was gorgeous, host and hostess most gracious and the mystery guest was incomparable. Our host had hired him for corporate events, so already knew his caliber of work.

Our hosts lived next door to David Letterman, who was a reclusive presence on the Vineyard. They had private beaches on Edgartown Great Pond. I would see him jogging while I was on my morning bike rides. He’d wave and I would wave back, but he didn’t participate on the charity circuit. He came to relax. He also had a place in Montana, for longer get-aways. He was still the king of late night when this transpired and his son was young, so the Vineyard was an easy, relaxing get-away from New York City. Letterman was friendly with his next-door neighbor, who brought Jason Randal over to meet him before that first event started. Letterman was truly fascinated.

It was time for Jason’s act. We could not believe what we saw. He did up-close magic with cards, mind games, sleight of hand. He was phenomenal, the best any of us had ever seen. Great patter, pleasant demeanor. He sat with us later and chatted. We were entranced. I can’t describe what I saw, but will include a video of a Letterman appearance, since Dave loved him too. Dave called him his favorite magician and would have Jason on to celebrate Dave’s birthday – a huge compliment.

The fundraiser happened for several years and our host brought Jason back. One year, Letterman came over to introduce him, then disappeared. That was extremely rare, as he just didn’t do such things. He gave a little monologue by way of introduction. One woman shouted something at him. His put-down: “Lady, I work alone.” He was in cargo shorts and a tee-shirt. But he was there to support Jason. High praise, indeed.

Here is a Vimeo clip of an appearance on the Letterman show doing his card tricks. Letterman is as amazed as we are. Amy Sedaris is the other guest.

I must have been around 7 or 8 when I got my first bike, a Schwinn 3 speed with silver fenders and a head light similar to the Featured photo. My father dutifully ran along side me as I learned to pick up speed while gaining my balance. I had to know how to start from a standstill and brake while gently putting my foot down safely. Now that I think about it, I had an earlier bike – handed down from my brother; a boy’s bike with a crossbar that had training wheels. I have a vague memory of tooling up and down our street on that. I had a Dutch Boy haircut and people who didn’t know me said, “Hello, son”. That really irked me.

But the Schwinn was MINE and a girl’s bike – no crossbar. I loved that bike. I pretended it was a horse named “Star”. The head light was the horse’s head. We rode together for several years. I don’t know why I pretended it was a horse. I had no affinity for horses, I’d never ridden one or been near a real one. Perhaps by that point I’d read “Black Beauty” or “National Velvet” and loved those books. Or maybe it was Mr. Ed on TV. Whatever the impetus, I loved my own “horse/bike”.

I was only allowed to ride around the block. I couldn’t cross the street by myself at that age. But in my mind, I had lots of adventures as I rode. Around the block was Renfrew Rd. I had several girlfriends who lived on the next block, but I couldn’t yet visit them, as I’d have to cross the street. But the brilliant Michael Kinsley lived on the block directly behind me, so I’d pass his house on my frequent rides. He was two years older (and went to Harvard with several of you Retro writers), but his younger sister Susan was an elementary school peer of mine. Rounding the corner onto Bloomfield Street, I remember hearing a plaintive bird call. I stopped to listen. It captivated me; I searched out its source and discovered the bland grey/brown bird. I had discovered a mourning dove. I listened intently. It’s melancholy call spoke to me in deep ways.

Turning the corner I was back on Briarcliff Rd. I quickly passed the creepy, unkempt Gothic house, then the neighbors where the blue jay had fallen out of its nest. I was home again. I repeated this pattern day after day. I didn’t ride with anyone else. I was happy in my solitude. I could think and observe the natural world.

We moved out of Detroit to a near-suburb when I was just shy of my 11th birthday in 1963. In other stories, I have previously described the trauma associated with that event: my mother’s nervous breakdown which led to her taking to her bed for many weeks, the JKF assassination the day before my father’s 50th birthday. We held his party/housewarming that day with my mother still in bed. No one was capable of celebrating. My birthday  followed three weeks later. I got a bigger, better bicycle as a present. I remember it well. My mother was up, but barely functioning. She wasn’t really “present” to wish me happy birthday. She was off to a psychiatrist appointment, which she hated. He was evidently a strict Freudian who told her she hated her father. She  was not prepared to hear that and the therapy didn’t do much good.

But I loved my new bike, a 12 speed beauty. On it (in better weather), I roamed the neighborhood to get away from my increasingly erratic mother. Now I could visit my girlfriends, once I had some.

I had two mother-surrogates, both cousins, whom I loved to visit and I was always welcome in their homes. Depending on how much time I had, my near rides were to my cousin Harriet’s, just a few blocks away in Huntington Woods. I was friendly with her son, though he was several years younger than me. He visited me once when I lived in Chicago.

A farther ride was to cousin Connie’s in neighboring Oak Park; several miles, a good ride. She had three sons, all younger than me. I’m still friendly with all, went to all their b’nai mitzvot even though by that time I was married and had to fly in from Boston – worth it to see my family. They came to Boston for my kids’ ceremonies as well.

With my Grossman cousins at one’s daughter’s bat mitzvah in the Detroit area, many years ago.

The household was lively and fun. I still stay with Connie when I go to Detroit (I haven’t visited since 2015). All are welcome with me anytime. That bike gave me the ability to come and go as I pleased, away from my mother’s hectoring and anxiety. I often used it when I was home from college.

Some 30+ years ago, I bought a UniVega 12 speed and used to ride a lot in Newton and the Vineyard. My rides would vary between 8 and 20 miles. In Newton, I’d ride on the carriage lane, or the street, as I rode further up the hills made famous by the marathon. As long as the roads had no snow or slush, I’d ride down to 35 degrees. I had winter gear. I loved the exercise. On the Vineyard, I stuck to bike paths, but they were full of people rollerblading, walking, pushing strollers, etc. Increasingly, people were “plugged in” and couldn’t hear when I shouted “passing on your left”. It was an accident waiting to happen. Dan bought a fancy new, expensive bike in 2018, promptly had three serious accidents in two years and is now forbidden to ride outside at all.

I gave up riding as I took up other forms of fitness. I took up Pilates twelve years ago, got serious about losing weight ten years ago and began gym workouts (including doing intervals on a recumbent bike). So my very old bike rusts in our garage. I haven’t touched it in years.

My “current” bike, a 30+ year old UniVega

”And that’s the way it is.”

I’ve written about my family dinners as we listened to Lowell Thomas reading the day’s news on our Emerson radio,  and how to my childish sensibility it seemed he was speaking directly to us in the intimacy of our kitchen.   (See Kitchen Radio)

Years later on my parents’ black and white TV we watched the distinguished journalist Walter Cronkite,  called “the most trusted man in America”,  on the CBS Evening News.

And then that awful night in November 1963 we watched him wipe his eyes as he announced the death of President Kennedy,  and we felt he was trying to wipe our tears away too.

RetroFlash  100 Words

– Dana Susan Lehrman

This prompt asks what is the first news story we remember. For me that's easy. It was Quemoy and Matsu.
Read More

My first memory of broadcast news is the image of my mother madly ironing while watching something on television that clearly angered her, the Army-McCarthy hearings. I was just a kid and thus she never explained to me why she kept watching this when it was clearly upsetting her. I guess my grandkids could wonder the same thing about me as I can’t stop watching the House January 6 Committee Hearings. Like my mother, I am clearly distressed and yet I can’t look away.

My mother’s villain, Joseph McCarthy

Of course, the huge difference between these two broadcasts is that I can choose to watch the January 6 hearings on any cable network, so I choose one on which I know the commentary will agree with my assessment. Also, I can record the hearings if it is inconvenient to view them live and watch recaps over and over. So, unlike my mother, I can be upset 24/7 if I choose.

They wished each other “goodnight”

My parents always watched the evening news. I’m guessing they were fans of The Huntley–Brinkley Report that aired on NBC beginning in 1956. Even though I watched that on occasion, the broadcast news I remember best came from Walter Cronkite on CBS, once dubbed “the most trusted man in America.” For 19 years, from 1962 to 1981, he was the person I turned to deliver the news. Like many of us, I especially remember the newscast in which he told me President Kennedy had died. When he removed his famous dark-rimmed glasses to wipe his eyes, I dissolved into a flood of tears.

Until 1968, Walter Cronkite shared what the government wanted us to know about the war in Vietnam, but I was already firmly in the camp of total opposition. Because I respected Cronkite, I was thrilled when he delivered what came to be called “the Cronkite Moment” during a broadcast following his trip to Vietnam to cover the war, and the Tet Offensive.

At the close of his broadcast, Cronkite warned viewers that he was about to share his opinion rather than the traditional “objective” news. “It seems now more certain than ever that the bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in a stalemate . . . It is increasingly clear to this reporter that the only rational way out then will be to negotiate, not as victors, but as an honorable people who lived up to their pledge to defend democracy, and did the best they could.”

This statement made anti-war sentiment mainstream and was a first step toward the media shaping the opinions of its viewers rather than just towing the party line. For me, it affirmed what I believed about the war and, at the time, I appreciated Cronkite telling the public that this war was a huge mistake and not winnable.

For years, my husband and I watched the Ten O’clock Nightly News with local co-anchors Walter Jacobson and Bill Kurtis to get a recap of what was happening and to hear the local sports and weather forecast. I used to exercise to the beginning of the Today Show because its first 20 minutes were commercial free. Fast forward to more recent times with the growth of cable “news,” which is much more opinion than news. I had a brief addiction to Morning Joe even though I didn’t agree with most of Scarborough’s opinions. He was on at a convenient time so I could exercise before going to work, and he often inspired blog posts.

Bill Kurtis and Walter Jacobson, photo by Robert Feder

Next, I recorded Rachel Maddow (before she switched to Mondays only). More recently, I have worked out to All In with Chris Hayes, which I like even more because he is intelligent and thoughtful without some of Rachel’s schtick. I could fall down a rabbit hole and spend most of the day switching between CNN and MSNBC, but the news is too depressing to watch the same stories over and over.

When my mother was 90 and living on her own, my brother introduced her to MSNBC. She was hooked but found the news so distressing that I told her to find something else to fill her days and finally asked my brother to cut her off. Now, I fear I could easily become my mother, watching endless coverage of the January 6 Hearings. I try PBS for a less biased version of the news, but I can’t bring myself to watch Fox to see what the other side thinks. I really don’t care, and that’s the way it is.

I needed a car my senior year at Brandeis, as I would be student teaching at a local public high school first semester. My parents arranged to “sell” me (for one dollar) my mother’s seven year old Valiant (similar to the car in the above photo). Dan, my steady beau, flew out to Detroit to help me drive it back to Waltham.

1973, in my Huntington Woods house before driving back to school

The car was already old, but I was thrilled to have it; my first car. It didn’t have power anything besides steering. No A/C, but at least it was road-worthy at the time. When Dan graduated a few months earlier, he had taken out a loan and purchased a Toyota Corolla 5-speed that I couldn’t drive. I did not yet know how to drive a stick-shift. I also knew nothing about caring for a car. We didn’t think about oil changes or snow tires or anything else to help keep my car on the road. We lived in an apartment complex (then a condominium complex) with outdoor parking only.

Dan and I married right after I graduated and we settled in an apartment in Waltham, then, two years later, bought a condo in Acton, quite a long drive for both of us, as I worked in Waltham (a half hour drive) and he worked in Cambridge (at least 45 minutes, maybe longer, depending on traffic).

At some point, the knob that controlled the heat fell off and was lost. I could no longer turn the heat on and the winters in New England are cold. The car also leaked oil like crazy. I passed a Shell Station on my way to work each day. My joke – always – was, “fill up the oil and check the gas”. But it wasn’t funny. No one had thought to tell us that we should be doing more to keep the car running smoothly and now it needed a gasket job.

The guy at the gas station (those were the days when stations also had repair shops) also informed me that I could replace the knob easily and get heat again. Miraculous! So that go fixed. But before I could give up the car for that gasket repair, I rear-ended someone at a stop light on Rt 2 in Acton in October, 1977. I wasn’t paying attention; lost in thought. We had seat belts in those days, but no shoulder belts and my teeth went through my lips when my face hit the steering wheel. An ambulance took me to the hospital for stitches, the car was totaled. It was 10 years old and not worth much.

I hastily bought a VW Rabbit with front-wheel drive, much better-suited to the winters.

We keep our cars a long time. With all the bells and whistles on them, when something goes wrong, it can be very costly and then it can be time to trade it in. We always do the routine maintenance (we learned our lesson after that Valiant) and do very little driving these days. Mostly back and forth to the Vineyard, 90 miles each way. Other than that, it is local errands, just a few miles running around town. Though Dan has a fancy car, he likes to put the mileage on my less expensive car, so drives it all the time when we are together.

So far, so good, though just a few weeks ago, the lock button on the front passenger door of my car started to rattle. The only thing I can do to make it stop is push it down manually. Dan thinks my car is still under warranty for a few more months. I hope so. They may have to take the whole door apart. This could be the start of a big repair…