Generations Back

Third Bob, as he is known, recalls a family story about his father, known to familiars all his life as Bobby, and about his grandfather, known more formally (from childhood) only as Robert. And, of course, about Amma.

The story begins with this: The second Roosevelt had just been inaugurated when Amma went into labor and grandpa Bob rushed her to the hospital.

Skip forward three days: she was ready to leave, with her new baby, but President Roosevelt had closed all the banks, had called a 'bank holiday.' This meant that the hospital refused to accept a check - they had no idea how long it would be before the paper would do them any good. They were demanding cash.

It is amazing (one would always say, hearing the story) that people were so well behaved. Wouldn't there be anger in the halls, people demanding their checks be accepted? rushing for the exits if not? Were there a lot of fearsome looking Pinkerton men about? Not a lot of people had a lot of cash ready to hand in March 1933.

But no, fathers (accepted as the paying party in these situations) led their wives, the mothers of their new children, back to their rooms -- including Amma and new born Bobby, and the families, including the one remembered fondly by Third Bob, accepted the fact that they were now hostages "until I can drum up the cash."

Which Grandpa did, getting the cash that his tenants had hidden away given whatever emergency of their own they had been storing it for. There were two tenants on a small shack on his land, and since times were bad he had been accepting of the non-payment of rent. So now, he thought, they were his bank.

And with a combination of pleading and harassing: they were.

Amma and Bobby arrived at home, the large house that shared the two-acre plot with that shack, on the fourth day.

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