Maybe the silver lining to the passing of the shoemaker’s daughter is the antidote her story offers to increasingly negative perceptions of the United States. Let me explain.
Nikola Grujicich was my maternal grandfather. He left the Balkans in 1906, at age 14, for America. He was accompanying his father to seek jobs in the coal mines of West Virginia. Grujicich quickly became Grovich. After World War I, Nikola returned to the Balkans and, not long thereafter, wed my grandmother in an arranged marriage. Her father, Milo Ivanisevich, was the town cobbler in Cetinje, Montenegro. He made boots for the king, a fact proudly trumpeted in the window of his shop on a dirt road.
After the marriage, Nikola returned to work in America, leaving behind my grandmother and their newborn until he could afford to send for them. That happened in 1927.
My grandmother made the 12-day journey with their firstborn and arrived at Ellis Island. She left behind her roots and parents she would never see again. Awaiting her was a limited network of fellow Slavs. She did not speak English. She once told me that while sailing for America, she was homesick and frightened and wished the ship would turn back. Lucky for me, it didn’t.
My grandparents briefly operated a boarding home for miners in West Virginia and then relocated to Hazleton, in Pennsylvania’s coal region. There, they raised 11 children (eight girls, three boys) before my grandfather succumbed to black lung.
Those 11 children are still alive, which is itself an extraordinary testament to American health care. The 11 have led comfortable lives. Each has been formally educated and consistently employed. Each owns a home and a car. They have traveled extensively. Their children have had it even better. My cousins’ educations extend well beyond those of their parents. Their homes today are larger than the ones in which they were raised. None wants for any basic necessity.
Portrait of King Nicholas Petrovich, the last king of Montenegro, in the national Museum of Montenegro, in Cetinje, wearing boots presumably made by my great-grandfather.
They are leading typical American lives. This is not only a story about my grandmother, but also about many of our forefathers.
What a land of opportunity! This takes me back to the way we are regarded.
In the last Pew Global Attitudes Project survey, the United States’ favorable ratings declined in 26 of 33 countries. Anti-Americanism is extensive and has been for the last five years. There are a few surprises as to where we are well-received—more favorably in some of the Third World than with former World War II allies, for example. Another tidbit: Americans are more popular than America. (See the report at http://pewglobal.org/reports.)
No one should be shocked to learn of rising hostility toward the United States, given the situation in Iraq. Nor the corresponding decline in the president’s popularity.
I’m concerned about the way we are perceived around the globe. And I am worried about the way we regard our own nation. My hunch is that the negativity from abroad and the vitriol directed toward our president here at home are causing an American loss of self-respect. I sense a collective tail being placed between our legs in response to a constant barrage of all that is wrong with America. I may be mistaken.
My evidence about how we view our own country is visceral and anecdotal, not quantitative. (I did, however, see a recent CBS survey that found that 72 percent of Americans believe that if the Founding Fathers came back, they would be “disappointed” rather than “pleased.”)
Don’t get me wrong: We’ve certainly got our share of problems, Iraq chief among them. Fixing them and our standing in the world should be a never-ending goal.
But it’s healthy to take stock of all that we are afforded in this country—namely, an environment in which we can still live free and pursue dreams. Frankly, that is why we have an illegal immigration problem.
Despite what Paris Match and the Manchester Guardian say about us, millions are still breaking barriers to go where the streets are figuratively paved with gold.
They want what the shoemaker’s daughter experienced.
AFTERWORD
On Mother’s Day in 2015, I wrote a Sunday Inquirer column under the headline: “Thanks to Mom for Opportunity.” It was about the importance of the decision both my parents made when they were young to move to Bucks County, Pennsylvania. I continued the family story begun here by noting that my mother, the onetime Miss West Hazleton High School, married my father when both were living in that Luzerne County coal community. Soon they moved to Lykens, in Dauphin County, where my father was hired to teach school. My brother was born shortly thereafter. By the time I arrived four years later, my family had moved to Doylestown, which is where my brother and I grew up. In that Mother’s Day column, I told a couple of stories about Mom:
Like the time when Mom drove my brother and me to Little League baseball and decided to step into the batter’s box, only to hit one over the left-field fence. Or how, at our urging, the night before a rock festival was staged in our small town, she drove us slowly in our ’66 Chevy so we could spy the “hippies” sleeping out in tents. We might laugh about the night she dragged my brother out of a dance after seeing some “hoodlums” smoking outside. While my brother and I most feared my father as a disciplinarian, it was usually Mom who meted out justice, with a yardstick she acquired from Cross Keys Hardware.
And I wrote about her incredible business success:
When I was in the eighth grade, the state of Pennsylvania raised the credits required to sit for the real estate exam. That change spurred my mother, a high school graduate, to take weekend classes and take the test. My job was to follow her around our house, posing questions from a manual supplied by the Schlicher-Kratz Institute. The day of the test she was so nervous she didn’t want to get out of bed. But she did and she passed. It was the start of a spectacular career that continues today.
My mother has twice built thriving residential real estate businesses. Her hard work and success as a Realtor afforded our family a lifestyle (and me an education) we would otherwise not have enjoyed. Today I’ll thank her for that, and for guidance, and for unconditional love. But now I’m adding something new to the list. I want to thank her for not only how she raised me, but also where. I always suspected I had an advantage growing up in Doylestown—now there is data to prove it.
Then I drew on recently released research from the Harvard economists Raj Chetty and Nathaniel Hendren on the relationship between where children grow up and their future well-being. Their findings support those of previous studies revealing that growing up in good neighborhoods produces better longterm outcomes for children. According to the data, Bucks County ranks among the most advantageous in the nation for upward mobility, while the county where my folks were raised, Luzerne, is at the other end of the spectrum. My brother and I didn’t grow up poor. When Dad was a guidance counselor and Mom was a secretary (before selling real estate), we were decidedly middle class. My family’s experience only reinforces my belief that the combination of good schools with better test scores, intact families, and civic engagement provides a big boost for those who want to climb the economic ladder.
Or as my mom, the Realtor, would say: “Location, location, location!”
PROOF A SON’S HEAD IS FAR
FROM DISMAL ADULT EVENTS
Philadelphia Inquirer, Sunday, August 5, 2007
I JUST PICKED UP my 11-year-old namesake from sleepaway summer camp in New Hampshire.
He’d been away for five weeks, and writing letters is not his forte, so I wasn’t sure what to expect when his grandfather and I picked him up.
The second I saw his Mohawk haircut, I knew all was well.
Notwithstanding his mother’s shock and horror, I’m elated. And not just due to follicle envy.
My son’s restyling told me his head had been in the right place while playing sports and living in the woods. Better there than where we adults have been, swamped in some dismal headlines this summer of 2007.
He’s been swimming, b
oating, playing tennis, making friends, and eating Fluffernutter sandwiches, far removed from significant events during what are normally quiet months. So when he asked me what was “new” on the way home, I had to weigh which of the following was worthy of the attention of a preteen:
the uncovering of another U.K.-based terror plot earlier this summer; the record pace of homicides in Philadelphia;
professional wrestling’s latest plot twist, the murder-suicide of Chris Benoit;
the Delaware County native who works as an NBA ref and is now the focus of a law-enforcement inquiry;
or that Michael Vick is being charged with being involved in dogfighting?
I decided instead to lead with the news that the Phillies are hanging tough despite continued pitching woes, and the Eagles are back at Lehigh with Donovan McNabb looking strong. I figure my son will have plenty of time later in life for the heavy lifting.
This is not to say that his recent exploits have been totally free of stressors.
He’s had no Internet, played no video games, and watched no TV for weeks.
And the 13-year-old barber who created his Mohawk gave him a bit of a scratch on the back of his neck. (Chalk that up to salon immaturity.)
Son no. 1 sporting a Mohawk at Camp Tecumseh, Moultonborough, New Hampshire, summer 2007.
It could have been worse. After all, there’s that poor camper who lost in a game of Truth or Dare and had to read the daily mail list in front of other campers on a day he’d had to put Icy Hot on his private parts. (“That was rough,” my son tells me, “because it was a day when there were lots of packages, Dad.”)
What exactly do you do with 20 or so bunkmates who may need to get up in the middle of the night? Well, a couple of guys had to run morning sprints because they did not walk the full 20 paces mandated by the unwritten camp rule spelling out the distance one must travel if getting up in the dark and needing some relief.
Speaking of sleeping, every night when his head hit the pillow, in a bunk in a cabin just off a glimmering lake, he had to contend with the knowledge that the crimes of the infamous Mary B had never been solved. The counselors not only revealed the camp’s origins as what they called a “funny farm” (PC they are not) but also felt it appropriate to share the legend of Mary B with the younger campers. She was an escapee who returned years ago to wreak havoc on the more recent generations of campers. (“It was a huge story a while back,” said my son, with more than a hint of surprise that his columnist/talk-show host/news pundit/father had missed this whopper.)
And it had to be true, because one of her victims was the brother’s sister’s cousin’s niece (“or something”) of one of the current counselors.
So it all checks out.
By now, of course, it did sound familiar. Only my recollection was that Mary B had an accomplice who had a hook for an arm and ended up terrorizing local couples on Lovers’ Lane.
Perhaps you’re wondering if my son was staying at Camp Granada. No, it was Camp Tecumseh, but Allan Sherman sure would have been proud to hear his tales.
Not even a seven-hour delay at the airport when it came time to fly home could have spoiled my pride.
Maybe that’s because there have been many recent days I’ve wished I had a Mohawk, and not just because I’m bald.
AFTERWORD
I recently asked my son whether Tecumseh has changed. He sadly reported hearing that “the Widow” had undergone modification. That’s the nickname for the lavatory that had six commodes facing one another, sans doors. He said it made for interesting conversations but suggested I confirm with one of his classmates, Jack Keffer, a Tecumseh lifer. Jack is a camper-turned-counselor. His dad, grandad, and great-grandad attended the same camp. Jack reported that indeed a giant wall was installed in the Widow to separate the previously open stalls, adding that the move was “a big hit to the integrity of the place.” He added:
It also pains me to tell you that there is no more Fluffernutter offered in the dining room. It’s even more painful to tell you that no one reads the packages list at lunch anymore because of the havoc and rowdiness it would cause. Basically, the mail boy would get up in front of the dining hall, say, “Packages,” and the entire camp would scream “PACKAGES” in the most outrageous ways possible for roughly two minutes, making it virtually impossible for the mail boy to read out the names of anyone who had received a package that day.
But other than these minor changes, Tecumseh lives on! There are still no cell phones, TVs, or video games, despite pressure from parents for camp to publicize daily activities on social media, so the Tecumseh Instagram page has been a big emphasis and photos are sent to parents weekly. Through all this, they still do a great job of making good boys better.
A NAVY SEAL’S GUT-WRENCHING
TALE OF SURVIVAL
Philadelphia Inquirer, Sunday, August 26, 2007
WHEN FOUR U.S. NAVY SEALS surreptitiously tracking a high-level Taliban official in Afghanistan encountered three wandering goatherds, they faced a dilemma with perilous consequences: Were the herders harmless civilians or Taliban scouts? What should be done?
One hour after deciding to let the three go, the SEAL team was surrounded by 80 to 100 Taliban fighters, and in an ensuing gun battle, three of the four SEALs were killed.
The lone survivor was Lead Petty Officer Marcus Luttrell, hence the title of his best-selling book. President Bush awarded him the Navy Cross for combat heroism, and Luttrell’s account of what happened in the Hindu Kush in June 2005 is now the buzz of book clubs across the country. It asks us: When war obscures your vision, what do you do? And as Luttrell offers his explanation, his story shows how the fog of war can spread beyond the battlefield.
Luttrell recounts that the SEALs voted on whether to let the goatherds live or to kill them. According to Luttrell, the tally was 2–1, with one abstention, in favor of letting them go. Petty Officer Second Class Matthew G. Axelson was in favor of killing the herders, Luttrell writes, while Petty Officer Second Class Danny P. Dietz was noncommittal. Lieutenant Michael Murphy wanted to release them, and Luttrell agreed with his superior officer, breaking the deadlock. About that decision, he writes:
It was the stupidest, most southern-fried, lamebrained decision I ever made in my life. I must have been out of my mind. I had actually cast a vote which I knew could sign our death warrant. I’d turned into a f——ing liberal, a half-assed, no-logic nitwit, all heart, no brain, and the judgment of a jackrabbit.
After Luttrell repeated those sentiments recently on the Today show, a Newsday article said that Daniel Murphy, Lieutenant Michael Murphy’s father, believed Luttrell’s published account differed from what Luttrell told the Murphy family during a condolence call. Michael Murphy was gunned down by the Taliban in the midst of the firefight after voluntarily entering an unprotected area to call for reinforcements. For that bravery, he is reportedly under consideration for the Medal of Honor.
Lone Survivor is a searing narrative, one that elicits an emotional commitment to the SEALs, and any reader will be pained to think that friction might now exist between Luttrell and the family of a man with whom he served. This reader decided to call Mr. Murphy to find out more.
Daniel Murphy began by telling me:
There’s a controversy that is not really a controversy. When Marcus came to our house, he . . . told us Michael was adamant that the civilians would be released, and they were released. . . . Michael’s decision . . . is what carried the day.
I asked him if Luttrell mentioned there having been a vote. Daniel Murphy said no. He also told me he thinks it’s a “disservice” to Axelson for Luttrell to suggest that he wanted to kill the goatherds, or that Dietz was “ambivalent” about the choice.
Still, Daniel Murphy assured me that he bears no hostility toward Luttrell; to the contrary, he “loves” him. As for why there is a discrepancy between the book’s account and what Luttrell told him previously, Lieutenant Murphy’s father said he believes he knows the answer:
Luttrell, he thinks, is burdened by the guilt of surviving.
[Marcus is] acting like his friends would be alive if it wasn’t for him and his actions. And that’s not what happened. And Michael would not want Marcus to believe that, and we don’t want Marcus to believe that. We love Marcus. I just think he’s taking too much guilt for what happened by saying, “You know, if we had killed these civilians, my friends would be alive.”
And I’ve tried to tell him that’s not what we believe, and that’s not what happened.
The father’s appraisal of his son’s character makes sense and rightfully honors the heroic men we lost as well as the patriot with his guilty burden. In addition to Murphy, Axelson, and Dietz, eight other SEALs and eight Army specialists died that day when an MH-47 Chinook helicopter sent to help was shot down. That day brought the largest loss of life to Naval Special Warfare forces since D-Day. Murphy said:
I don’t think Michael could have lived with himself. To kill innocent people, . . . it is such the antithesis of the character of my son Michael, who I’ve known for 29 years. It would not have even occurred to him.
I hung up, admiring the father, just as I admire his son and those he served with in the SEALs. And I kept thinking about that decision made two years ago on a mountaintop 8,000 miles from home. So last week, I asked Marcus Luttrell to revisit that fateful decision concerning the goatherds.
Luttrell, too, admired the son. He said:
I mean, obviously, Mikey was in charge. He had the final word no matter what, but he was a great officer, and he used every man and all the talents they had and he did it well. That was our decision, and we all got together and that’s what we came up with.
Clowns to the Left of Me, Jokers to the Right Page 17