The Boys in the Boat
All things pass. But sometimes they return, even if for brief moments. That may be the best definition of eternity any of us can ever achieve. This morning I was at JFK staying at the TWA Hotel, which I wrote about. I was reminded of John F. Kennedy and Howard Hughes. That was their glimmer of eternity as they sparked memories in one Baby Boomer’s brain and found their way onto paper. My day today is being spent in the Cornell Club in midtown Manhattan. Few places can evoke such life and career memories as this place. Just the cab ride through midtown this morning with Kim had me point out places I had known and frequented…I’m sure I was boring her with it, but she goes through the same in Hell’s Kitchen I’m sure. Cornell and this Club are in a weird place with me right now. I am going through my separation year with my Homeward Bound Ithaca residence of twenty-six years. It is alternately traumatic and dismissive (on my part). I want to say I am “done” with Cornell, but the truth is that I will never be done with it, it is indelibly etched into my life and, indeed, my soul on many levels. My mother matriculated there in 1933 at the age of sixteen, entirely on her own steam. She met one, Irving Aaron Jenkins, a 6’4”, 240 pound young man from the lower East Side who had been a Heavyweight Golden Gloves Boxing champion and was then on the Cornell Heavyweight Crew Team. That was the Team that rowed in the national finals and was beaten by The University of Washington Team that became the “Boys in the Boat” that went on to win gold at the Berlin Olympic Games in 1936. Irving stroked that Cornell team, which meant that he was their leader. Instead of going to Berlin, his leftist leanings (his father was a downtown labor organizer), he went to Barcelona and was destined to participate in the Alternative Olympics there until Adolf called Francisco and thus began the Spanish Civil War and the attempted onward march of fascism across Europe. Irving escaped via a U.S. warship anchored off Marbella, but the point was that he was part of that history.
As I type away here in the Cornell Club’s Club Room (so far I am all alone here) I am spending the day killing time before we go to Newark for our flight to Rome tonight. Every quarter when I get my dues bill for this Club that I have been a member of since it began in this location in 1989 (it had been located in an obscure second floor spot over on Third Avenue), I wonder why its worthwhile for me. I kept my membership through COVID and now I am seeing the benefit by having a comfortable place to hang out as we travel to Europe. Given that my kids are still in NYC, coming through NYC whenever we can is still important to me. It is even more important to Kim as she is still woven into the fabric of the NYC cabaret community.
But back in the Club Room, I am staring at collegiate banners and crossed oars on the wall as well as a painting of….the boys in the boat on the Cayuga Lake Inlet. It makes me think about good old Irving Jenkins. He and my mother reconnected in retirement (she had been long divorced from my father and he had been recently widowed from his wife) and they married when my mother was 75 years old. Irving was a wonderful companion to her for the last stage of her life. He died in 2009 at the age of 95, which is ripe old age for a big dog like him. He left behind only one son, Irving, Jr., who I’ve met and who lives in Hawaii, but has no children of his own. And I’ve never heard of any other relatives, so Irving’s eternity could easily pass into the annals of the sea of history, which they say now encompasses a total of 117 billion human beings who have ever lived. That’s a big sea and as big a man as Irving was, he is a speck of sand on that beach.
But Irving was a man who’s humility precluded him attaining the fame he truly deserved and I feel the need today to remind myself and my world of what a great man Irving was. I could talk about his awards in Golden Gloves Boxing or on the Cornell Crew Team, as a member of the Alternative Olympics or as a member of the Sphinx Head Society at Cornell, the most prestigious Senior Honor Society, a hall that has certainly never heard my name mentioned. But what really stands out to me about Irving was what he used to say whenever I met him. When asked how he was, he would always say simply, “Better and better.” He was such an upbeat persona and always a pleasure to be around. He literally lighted up whatever room he was in. I am so happy that my mother got to spend her later years with him because I believe he brightened her life measurably, though she was upbeat person in her own right.
Irving was an unusual blend of liberal and conservative. His heritage was clearly liberal. I would not be at all surprised to learn that Irving was a member of the Communist Party in the heyday of the 30’s. His active involvement in the Alternative Olympics stands out as a clear marker that he was strongly anti-fascist and a collectivist at heart. That said, after college Irving took a tramp steamer from San Francisco out over the Pacific to see the world with no particular agenda in mind. He landed on the big island of Hawaii probably when his funds were running low, and decided to stay a while. It seems that his agronomy degree from Cornell (there’s another sign of this political leanings….for a kid from the lower east side to study agronomy) was quite valuable to the plantations of Hawaii. So, Irving spent the majority of his working life as plantation manager of a Del Monte Pineapple Plantation, striding horseback across the landscape of Waimea Bay while he commanded the actions of 2,000 coolies. That’s right, he called the ethnically Chinese laborers Coolies. When I challenged him on that he said that they themselves called themselves Coolies, so why shouldn’t he. Political correctness did not permeate much of plantation life apparently.
In his older age, the only time I had the pleasure to know him, Irving was a pleasant and congenial man who could pinch pennies with the best of them. Given the estate he left behind when he died, this was not for lack of funds, but rather an ethic or sorts about waste and frugality. Irving would tell me that when he traveled across the long roads going from the Atlantic shore of Florida to the Gulf of Mexico, he would stop midway and spend an hour wandering through a local supermarket, just to compare local prices. I would no sooner use my time for that purpose than jump out the window. But Irving saw value in keeping on top of local prices even though he could afford it either way. Strangely enough, his penury ways benefited his son, who was probably neither frugal nor particularly productive in an economic sense (he was more of an artist). He never said so, but I’m sure there was an element of disappointment by Irving in his only son.
What my recollections about Irving remind me is that there is not such a vast divide between those on the right and those on the left if they maintain a civility about their views. There is plenty of room for divergence, but not if every cause is a reason to break the pick and stomp off the field of play. When I think of Irving, I think of the boys in the boat. They must learn to row together if they are to succeed. There is no room for the glory of individual achievement and yet they each and every one must be a world class athlete in their own right. To my mind when a modern libertarian talks about the importance of the human spirit and the prizing of individual achievement over all (Uber Allis), I think of the boys in the boat being led by Irving. The individual champion and the team champions can co-exist with the right leadership and Irving was such a leader. I miss Irving.