Chapter 16 Version 2
1941
There are events in a person’s life that have a particular
significance. A weather event like a hurricane, tornado or flash flood can be
one. A graduation can be one. A stock market crash or a war starting or ending
can be one. Military service can be one. A science triumph or disaster can be
one. A birth or death can be one.
Ludwig rose up from his hospital bed and gestured toward the
corner of the room to his right.
“Look Matka, John is here. He came for me” said Ludwig who
always called his wife matka which is
Polish for mother.
The blood transfusion treatments were not helping. Ludwig
Borsuk was lying in his hospital room in Holyoke when Agata and Jane arrived.
Ludwig had been sick with aplastic anemia for months and there seemed to be
nothing that could be done to cure his condition. Ludwig had an uncommon blood
type. Fortunately, his apprentice in the cobbling business had the same blood
type and was willing to donate his blood for Ludwig as often as he could. When
Ludwig would get the transfusions, he would bleed from his eyes, nose and
mouth. Agata had told him not to put nails in his mouth when he was repairing
shoes but Ludwig had a mind of his own. For a cobbler, it was the easiest way
to keep the nails close at hand. Unfortunately, the metal in the nails caused
the sickness.
John was a close friend of Ludwig. Sometimes Agata felt like
Ludwig needed a mother to oversee him. Ludwig liked to wrestle with his
friends. Agata, to her dismay, would sometimes find Ludwig wrestling with a
friend on the kitchen floor. After one of the combatants emerged victorious, both
would head on down to the Pulaski Club for a shot of vodka. Ludwig never drank
beer. Vodka was a social occasion shared with a number of friends. Mr.
Postalewicz would stop by the house on Maple Street with his small son Joe
every Sunday after church for a vodka shot on the walk home. But Ludwig would
not be doing any vodka shots or wrestling in the hospital. John was not in the
corner of the room for those purposes. Agata did not need to look over in the
corner to find John that day in September.
John had died six months before.
It was a pleasant evening in September 1941 by the time Agata
and Jane returned to their house in Easthampton. Two hours later the phone rang.
Ludwig had left with John.
Later in autumn there was chill in the air. Agata had
ordered coal and it was promptly delivered down the coal chute and into the
basement. There was a crisp knock on the front door. A middle-aged woman in a
winter coat stared sternly into the front door.
“When will you be moving out?” the woman asked but it was
more like a demand.
Agata stared back at the woman.
“I have just been to the bank to sign the papers to buy this
house and I need to know when I can move in” the woman explained.
Apparently Ludwig had a mortgage on the house that no one
else knew about. With Ludwig no longer making payments, the bank quickly
foreclosed and sold the house. Not only was Agata a new widow, she and her
brood were also homeless. While Ludwig had a life insurance policy on his
mother-in-law who died four years earlier, there were no insurance policies on
Agata or Ludwig.
Oldest daughter Sophie rescued the family. Sophie had worked
as a secretary in the clerk’s office in the town hall. She graduated from
Northampton Commercial College and was now working in Springfield at the
Springfield Armory. Sophie was thrifty as well as smart and had saved enough to
afford a down payment on a house. She quickly found a house to buy at 4 West
Lake Street and the Borsuk clan moved to their new quarters. Money would be
scarce so they brought the newly delivered coal too. Agata would need to make a
decision in the future as to whether to remarry or go to work in a factory.
There was another hot topic by the early winter of 1941.
Jane was a sophomore in high school and was taking a history class. Soon after
the December 7th Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Jane’s history
teacher asked her:
“Jane Borsuk, can you tell us how the war started in
Europe?”
The history teacher knew Jane’s family was Polish and that
the war had started two years earlier in 1939 when Germany and Russia had
coordinated an attack on Poland. But Jane had just been through the death of
her father and her eviction from the house on Maple Street. The war in Europe
and the bombing of Pearl Harbor in Hawaii were too distant to be seared into
her brain as a momentous happening at the end of 1941. However, the war would
soon be affecting young men of draft and enlistment age from both the Borsuk
and the Zywar families.
Jane’s significant event for 1941 was her father’s death.
The funeral was very well attended as Louie, as he was known locally, was well
liked by many in the community. He was laid out for three days before his
burial in the front room at his home 27 Maple Street. A black wreath was put on
the front door to indicate that people could stop by and pay their respects. Many
did.
A few years before Ludwig died, he was walking with Jane and
Ludwig had a friendly exchange of pleasantries with a person on the street
reputed to be the town drunk. Jane asked
why her father talked to that person. He explained his actions to Jane with the
comment:
“I talk to everybody because nobody is beneath me.”
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