Holidays
JULY 4, 2006: What It Means To Be An American
In Chapter 3 of my new book, Anthony and the Magic Picture Frame, my real-life son, twelve-year-old Anthony, time-travels to 1907 and meets his immigrant great-grandfather at Ellis Island, arriving from Italy. It's a tale of America's earlier immigration experience, but it's also a story of what it means to be an American.
This July 4th, enjoy a traditional backyard barbecue, but take some time to reflect on what it means to be an American. Discuss it with your children. Watch one of the movies, listen to one of the songs, or visit one of the places that Anthony recommends. And, when you bite into that hot dog, remember how the hot dog came to America!
Here is an excerpt from Chapter 3 of my book - Anthony's last conversation with his great-grandfather:
*****
As I helped my great-grandfather stack cans of tomatoes and olive oil in front of his grocery store, I thought about everything the Picture Frame had shown me about his life. As a child, he was dragged across the Atlantic Ocean, in the foul belly of an overcrowded steamship, for the opportunity to live in a rundown tenement building in Hell’s Kitchen. Growing up, he had to fight, or deftly avoid, street thugs on his way to school. As a young man, he was tossed by cruel chance into the bloody trenches of World War I. After the war, his hopes for the “good life” in America turned into a sour decade of hard times during the Great Depression.
I had to ask: “Do you ever regret your decision to come to America?”
“No, I have never regretted my decision to come to America,” my great-grandfather answered, without hesitation. Then he stopped stocking the display, and turned toward me. “Why do you ask? Do you think that life can’t be hard in America?”
My great-grandfather took two fresh peaches out of the pocket of his grocer’s apron, and tossed one to me. Then he sat down on an empty crate by the curb. I sat down next to him and took a bite of my peach. For a few minutes we just sat side by side, eating our peaches and watching the early morning traffic go by.
“Life can be hard anywhere,” my great-grandfather said, suddenly breaking the silence and continuing his earlier thought. “But America is a place where, even in the hard times, every morning brings new hope and a new opportunity for a fresh start. You see, in America, today is not tomorrow, and the past is not the future.”
“I’m not sure I understand,” I said.
“I mean that in America, my past is not my future - if I don’t want it to be,” my great-grandfather explained. “My father was poor, but in America, I can become wealthy. My father was uneducated, but in America, I can become a scholar. My father was a laborer, but in America, I can become a business owner. America is the only place I know where I can choose not to let my past, or my circumstances, define who I am - or who I will become. People say that America is the land of the free. Well, isn’t choice the ultimate freedom?”
I nodded agreement.
“No, I have never regretted my decision to come to America,” my great-grandfather said once again. “But you have asked me the wrong question, I think. What you really want to know is do I regret becoming an American?
“I’m not sure I understand,” I said, again.
"Did your teachers make you read the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States?” my great-grandfather asked.
“Yes,” I said.
“Mine did, too. But I didn’t understand what the words meant until I was older - until I had seen more of the rest of the world . . .” My great-grandfather’s voice trailed off; he seemed to suddenly get lost in a new thought. So, for the next few minutes, we just sat quietly on the crate and took the last bites of our peaches. They were the last peaches of the summer, sweet and fleshy and full of juice. I don’t think I have ever had a peach that tasted as good.
My great-grandfather stood up and tossed his peach pit into an empty coffee can by the curb. Then he said: “Being an American is not about heredity, or blood, or ancestry. America was designed such that it wouldn’t be about that. That’s what my teachers were trying to tell me - and that’s what your teachers were trying to tell you. Being an American is about believing in the ideas in those documents your teachers wanted you to read.”
I nodded, but I wasn’t sure what my great-grandfather was getting at.
“You see,” my great-grandfather continued, “you could go to Italy and live there all your life - you could even become a citizen - but you could never become an Italian. Yet, I became an American overnight. I became an American because I believe in America, and it’s my belief in America that makes me an American. Capisce [Do you understand]?”
Those were the last words that my great-grandfather ever said to me. I thought about them for a long time; long after the Picture Frame took me to other times and places. And finally, I realized that my great-grandfather was right. America is an idea as much as it is a place. I was born in the United States, so no one would ever question whether I am an American. But in truth, even though I was born in the United States, I am no different than my great-grandfather and all the immigrants who came to this land: I can only be an American by choice.
Capisco [I understand].
*****
ANTHONY RECOMMENDS:
Movies:
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)
Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942)
Johnny Tremain (1957)
1776 (1972)
America’s Heart & Soul (2004)
John Ratzenberger: Made in America (TV Series)
Music:
America (Samuel Smith, 1831)
America the Beautiful (Ray Charles, 1972)
America, Why I Love Her (Speech: John Wayne, 2001)
God Bless America (Kate Smith, 1939)
Fanfare for the Common Man (Aaron Copland, 1942)
God Bless the U.S.A. (Lee Greenwood, 1985)
This Land Is Your Land (Woody Guthrie, 1940)
The Liberty Bell March (John Phillip Sousa, 1893)
The Meaning of the Pledge of Allegiance (Speech: Red Skelton, 1969)
The Star Spangled Banner (Francis Scott Key, 1814)
Where the Stars and Stripes and Eagles Fly (Aaron Tipton, 2002)
The hot dog in America:
The invention of the hot dog is credited to Charles Feltman in 1874, but Nathan Handwerker made the hot dog famous. In 1912, at the age of twenty, Nathan Handwerker immigrated to the United States and went to work in Charles Feltman’s Coney Island restaurant, splitting rolls for hot dogs and sausage sandwiches. In 1916, Handwerker left Feltman’s restaurant and opened his own hot dog stand on Coney Island. Handwerker used his own special recipe and offered his hot dogs at the incredibly low price of five cents apiece (half the price of a Feltman hot dog). But people didn’t think that a five-cent hot dog was safe to eat and they refused to buy them, so Handwerker surrounded his hot dog stand with people dressed in white gowns. “If doctors eat my hot dogs,” Handwerker said, “you know they’re good!” There was some controversy over whether or not the people in white gowns were really doctors, but Handwerker’s hot dogs became popular and famous nonetheless. In Anthony’s time, delicious Nathan’s Famous hot dogs are available throughout the United States.
*****
Have a great 4th of July!
Thank you.
Michael S. Class
Web Site: www.MagicPictureFrame.com
Blog: www.MagicPictureFrame.blogspot.com
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