Danny's Beginnings by Danny Winchell, November 19, 1997 The following will give you an idea where it all started back on September 11, 1926, in Brooklyn, NY. I was born Daniel Weinshal, the second son of an immigrant cantor who came from Bialystock, Poland, and a mother who came from Minsk in Russia. My father George or "Getzel" as he was called, grew up in a city in Poland called Bialystock. We had no records on him except he was born in 1888. We heard he had two sisters who in all probability perished in the Holocaust. He came to America, all by himself at the turn of the century. He earned his living as a rabbi and cantor living on the lower east side of Manhattan in New York City. His weekends were spent visiting various Jewish congregations in little towns scattered around the area. He would pray and sing on Friday evenings and then again on Saturday mornings before coming home on Saturday night or Sunday morning. (It was rare while growing up I saw my father on weekends). At a Synagogue in Providence, Rhode Island, he met a man named Frank Lury, whose family had also come from Eastern Europe to settle in a strange new land called America. Frank invited my father back to his Synagogue many times. It was at one of those times, my father George Weinshal met Sadie Lury, my mother. My Mom Sadie Lury was born in Minsk, Russia in 1898. Her parents came to America with their children Abraham, Annie, Frank, Sadie, and Morris. Dorothy and Joseph were their two children who were born in America. I never knew my parents and relatives and I only knew for a short while my mothers' mother, Molly. She only spoke Yiddish making it hard for me to understand her moods. It must have been very difficult for her to raise 7 children all by herself, especially since the loss of her husband shortly after they arrived in Providence, Rhode Island, in the early '20's. My grandmother saw a good thing when she met my father. Her daughter Sadie, would make a perfect wife for my father, who had no family in America. Molly cooked up the grand scene arranging a marriage to take place just after WWI. In 1921, my brother Samuel was born on April Fools Day. I don't think my mother and father ever got along and they never loved one another. But my mom always told me she did not want my brother to be alone so she became pregnated again to have another son, who turned out to be me on September 11, 1926 in the Willamsburg section of Brooklyn, New York. First as I remember we moved to the Bronx, a borough of New York City, until I was 3 years old. Then we moved back to Brooklyn into a neighborhood called Brownsville, known as "Murder Inc.," for it was an area of the Jewish Mafia. Almost to the day we moved in there was a gang led war that took place just a few houses from where we lived. Back in the late 20's, America was having major problems. The stock market crash of 1929 brought the country to its knees. It was very hard to make a living and my father worked hard and long to bring in some money so we could have food on the table. I remember him going out in the middle of the night to shovel snow for the city just to make a few extra pennies. Times were tough. We moved to a section called East New York in Brooklyn into a tenement house with 24 other families. Our rent was $14 a month. First we lived on the 2nd floor, then we moved to the third floor cause it was cheaper. My mother got a job as a sales clerk at a dry goods store a few blocks away from our house. She would go off in the morning, come home in the afternoon to check on me and then go back to work until dinner time. We lived across the street from Public School 174. It had a big school yard which my mother could see from her bedroom window so she could always keep an eye on me when she was home. My mother and father never got along. Rarely spoke to each other. To make up for this my father threw all his love on to my brother, Sam, and my mother did the same with me. The 30's was very rough for both of them but the 40's was even worse. The 2nd World War that started in 1941 changed the lives of millions of Americans. Everyone over the age of 18 had to register for the draft. My brother was 20 years old when he was inducted into the army. I was 15. The shock of my brother leaving home to go into the service caused my father to have a stroke. He couldn't stand the thought of his older son being in the army and what could possibly happen. When the possibility of his going overseas almost became a reality, he had another stroke that landed him in hospitals until he died in 1948. In 1944, I became eligible for the draft but was deferred due to hardships caused by my fathers' health. For the next two years the draft board would call me every 3 months and each time I was let off until I had to get a defense job at the Brooklyn Navy Yard until the war came to an end. That wasn't the end of it though. The Korean War in 1950 has yet to come but more about that later. Right now it's time to tell you all about my education. Public School 174, Junior High School 109, and East New York Vocational High School PS 174 was directly across the street from my house. It had a large school yard where I would play with my friends. When we went jumping over fences or rooftops of all the tenement buildings on the block. I broke a collarbone, a hand, pushed into a fire, and had six stitches sewn on my forehead. We played lots of games like "Ringaleevio," "3 feet off to Germany" "Off the Ice Pack" and "Kickity Can." When I got a little older we played stickball, baseball, handball, and basketball. I  grew up with guys who had the oddest names like Skinny Mutty, Fat Mutty, Moish the Mock, Meyer the Indian, Itchy, Deef, Shea, Big & Little Toilet, Heshy, Yankle, and my favorite of all, "Schlombo Schmutz." Public school was fun. I had good teachers, especially Mrs. Solomon, my 6th grade tutor. I got decent marks on my report card. I graduated to PS 109, and Junior High School, located in the Brownsville section, a much longer walk to school each day than my public school which was across the street from where I lived. The year was 1938. I was twelve years old. Went to school every day and then ran home to play with my friends in the schoolyard. The rumble of war was breaching out in Europe. I couldn't care less. I was to young to understand the ills of the world, and 12, I didn't give a hoot about a pending war in Europe. Except for the lack of love and understanding in my own home, I was a free soul enjoying my life playing all kinds of sports with my friends. And then I turned 13, a time in a Jewish kid's life to be bar mitvahed. I had gone to a Hebrew school for almost two years to prepare myself for the big occasion when a boy becomes a man. My parents scraped up enough money to give me a party. I was so happy on that day. I even got my mother and father to kiss one another. I think that was the only time they ever embraced. My father passed away at the age of 59. The last few years of his life was in and out of hospitals. My brother was in the army far away from home so it was up to my mother and me to take care of dad. Confined to a hospital for a long time, we would visit him every weekend taking trains and busses to the hospital way out on Long Island, about two hours from our home in Brooklyn. Times were tough and there was no money coming in. So when I told my mom about quitting school, she had no objection, besides I had realized the high school I had chosen was not for me. I wasn't meant to be an auto mechanic. I was 16 years old looking for a job in the big city of New York. I went to work as an order taker at a dress manufacture in the garment center, a shipping clerk at a retail sporting goods store and an errand boy at a curtain manufacturer. I knew those jobs were not for me. I needed to get around and into a business that would make me happy. I liked to sing and since being a vocalist with a big band in those days was very popular, a cousin of mine working for a music publisher got me a job with the company in their mail room. It was a very big and successful publisher affiliated with Warner Brothers. The main office was located in Rockefeller Center & twice a day I would walk or ride the bus to the warehouse located on the other side of town near the Hudson River, about two miles away. I loved that job. 17 years old working for one of the top music publishers in the world right in the heart of Manhattan. Meeting the most colorful people connected to the world of music. Song writers, artists, band leaders, producers, etc. The year was 1942 and I was in love with the music business and felt it would be my role in life. My weekly take home pay was $18 a week. The rent at our apartment in Brooklyn was $16 a month. I was a happy teenager going to work by subway on a daily basis, meeting all kinds of interesting people, some of whom we are still friendly today.

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