Jon Baumann Positively 4th Street
October 13th 1967
Peter at work said that I should try to work on my English. He said I should start keeping a diary. I never had much education back home, especially not in English, so it seems like a good idea. I don’t really know what you are supposed to write in a diary, but I guess I’ll just start with my story. My name is Jacques Montfort, and I am 27 years old. I was born in Brittany, a region in France to the west along the Atlantic Ocean. I grew up near a town called Quimperle. Compared to New York it is very small, but growing up I would spend much of my free time there. My family were farmers, and I helped work the land with my parents and siblings. By American standards we would have been considered very poor, but my siblings and I didn’t mind. I went to school for a few years, but I left to help my family. My father taught me what he knew about carpentry, and I was able to make money fixing and making things for people in town.
When I was growing up I would always hear people talking about America. The soldiers that had come through our area during the war had left things behind, and it was from these that I learned about New York. I was too young to remember much about the war, but I remember a day when I was very young where everyone was celebrating what I later learned was the liberation of Paris. My parents and older siblings told me stories about what life was like with the Germans. My father knew people working against them, but I do not know if he was involved directly. The stories they told me about America and its people would fill my head with dreams about going there myself. America was an amazing place, where even someone as poor as me could make a living. After years of dreaming, I would finally leave for New York when I was 26. I had never been on a boat that big before, and I spent most of the two weeks of the trip sick below decks. Even with all of my money I couldn’t afford much, and I also had to save enough to get to my cousin Jean in New York. He had been there for 5 years, and he had arranged for me to stay in an apartment in a building near his on 71st street and West End Avenue. It is small, but more than enough for just myself. Compared to what I had back home I feel like a king here. Everyone here has running water, and there’s a bathroom down the hall. Back home if I wanted water I would’ve had to go down the road for almost two miles to the nearest pump. Jean also helped me find a job as a waiter at a restaurant on 60th Street called Le Veau D’or. A lot of the other waiters there spoke French , and since I didn’t know how to speak English, it was good to have people I could speak to in my own language. I have been working there ever since, the money is good but the hours keep me up late into the night. I think that I will end this entry here. I have caught up to the present.
November 6th 1967
I haven’t been able to write recently. I have been working more hours recently and it leaves me too tired to do much else. I can’t complain much though, the extra money means I may be able to move to a bigger apartment soon. Everything is so much bigger here than back home. The tallest thing back home was the church, and even that looks tiny compared to my apartment building. I can see why they call them skyscrapers. I remember seeing King Kong once when I was younger, but I never would have imagined how big the Empire State building looks in real life. The idea that people made these buildings still seems crazy to me. New York truly is like nowhere else. I like to walk around the city when I have free time. There are so many people here, and so many different types. I see more people walking down the street in 10 minutes than that lived in my entire town. It feels like the entire world lives in New York. It makes me feel small sometimes. Back home I knew everyone, and they knew me. Here I know some people in my building and from work, but not very well. I am glad that Jean and his family live close by. Unfortunately he moved to Queens two weeks ago, to a town called Bellerose. He says it is much less crowded than here, and he has his own house. I haven’t seen him much recently, but I will be visiting him for Thanksgiving. We do not have this holiday back home, but I miss spending holidays with my family. I am glad that I came to New York, but sometimes I feel lonely here. Maybe one day I will have a family and a house of my own like Jean. I think I would like that.
November 23rd 1967
Today is Thanksgiving. I was able to take off work today so that I could have dinner with Jean’s family, and I am staying the night at his house. This is the first time that I have been to his house, and it is very nice. He has a backyard, and when it gets warmer he says he’s going to try to grow vegetables. We had dinner with Jean’s neighbors, who like him had recently moved here from the city. They didn’t have any other relatives nearby. The dinner we had was very good, it reminded me of being back home. I haven’t had a dinner like for a long time. Even back home we didn’t have enough money to have the kind of food we had here. A lot of what we ate we grew, but most of the time we had to sell most of our crop to make money. In America though we were able to make enough money to afford this. A man like Jean can afford his own house. This is why we came to America. There are so many opportunities here. One day I will have a house of my own.
December 15th 1967
Christmas in the city is unlike any time of year. The other day I was able to go to Rockefeller Center to see the tree there. I didn’t know trees could get that big. To see it at night was beautiful, the entire thing was covered in lights and ornaments. I have no idea how long it must have taken for them to put the lights on it. They used to decorate the town a little bit back home, but it was nothing like what they do here. Everywhere you look here there are lights. People seem to be excited for the holidays, everyone you see seems to be doing something to prepare for them. I went to Macy’s the other day to get gifts for Jean and his family. I have heard of how big the store was, but I had no idea it was an entire block! They seemed to have everything anyone could ever want in there. In just one store you could find anything. Back home there were a lot of shops in town, but each one only sold one thing. To get everything for Noël it took a day of going around town. It seems American’s enjoy shopping a lot more than back home. Everything seems to be about Christmas now. On the television they play almost nothing but Christmas shows. I don’t really mind. I don’t watch much TV since by the time I get home nothing is playing but the test pattern. I have managed to see a few of these shows though. My favorite is How the Grinch Stole Christmas. I’m going to be going to Jean’s house again for Christmas. I am thankful that I have family close to me. A lot of the other waiters are alone here. I can’t imagine how lonely it must be to live here with no one. My friend Peter has family though, since he came here with his wife and her brothers. I should ask the others to see if they have anywhere to go. Christmas should be spent with friends and family.
December 27th 1967
I spent the weekend before Christmas with Jean and his family. He has two young children, and they were very excited for Christmas. On Christmas eve they could hardly keep still thinking about Papa Noël coming that night. On Christmas day we all went to mass early, and when we went home we gave each other gifts. I got a very nice new pair of shoes from Jean and his wife. My old pair was starting to wear out. They seemed to like their gifts as well. Jean also got me a few comic books. He said that they would be good for working on my reading. He got me one with Superman and another with a character called Spider-man. Superman I have heard of, I think almost everyone has. One of the soldiers that came through my town during the war had left a few books with Superman on them, and even though we couldn’t read, the children in my town used to play superman when we were young.
I should see if I can find a store that sells comic books. Jean was right about them being a good way to improve my reading. I had only went to school for a few years before I left, and I did learn how to read, but only in French. I have learned how to read in English in the time I’ve been here, but I only knew enough to get by. Maybe once I get better at reading I will get myself a library card. I’ve past it before, but I’ve never gone in. The building is huge, and the two stone lions on either side must be three times bigger than even the biggest real lion. I can only imagine what it must look like inside. Back home there wasn’t really a library. The church had books, but I never had any interest in borrowing them. There was no need to read on the farm, and between helping my family and making furniture for people I didn’t have much time to read. In America though I feel like everyone reads. In the morning almost everyone you see has a newspaper in their hand, and at night the same thing is true. I’ve tried to read the newspaper, but my reading was never good enough to make sense of most of the words. Hopefully soon that won’t be true. I really like the Spider-man book that Jean got me, and I should try to find more of them. I should ask Peter what he thinks I should use to work on my reading. It was his idea to start writing this journal, and it has helped my writing a lot. Back home you could get by without knowing how to read or write, but in America I feel like it will hold me back.
January 3rd 1968
New Years Eve was very busy at work. By the time I got back to my apartment it was almost dawn. I made a lot of money in tips though, so it was a good night. Looking back on this year I am amazed at how much has happened. It’s been almost two years since I arrived in New York. I miss my family. Maybe soon I will be able to afford to go back to visit. I will be moving into a bigger apartment soon, so I will have to save money for a little while to afford going on such an expensive trip. This new apartment is very nice, much nicer than my current one. It has its own bathroom, a kitchen and even a living room. I could never have dreamed that I could live in a place like this on my own money. I remind myself of how successful I have been in the two years I have been here when I start to miss home. This is why I came to America.
January 28th 1968
I went to see a movie the other day. I haven’t seen a movie in a long time, I don’t I have since I left home. The movie I saw was called The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. It’s a western with an actor named Clint Eastwood. I have seen him before on TV, but I haven’t seen a movie with him before. The movie was very good, it had a lot of action. It was very long though, almost three hours, but it went quick since it was a good movie. It was nice to get out of the cold for a few hours though. I should go see more in the future on my days off.
February 18th 1968
Not too much has been happening recently. I have been working mostly. It’s been too cold to do much else, so I spend most of my time inside. I found a place to get more comic books the other day. I asked if they had any of the old Spider-man and I ended up getting the very first book he was in, Amazing Fantasy 15. In this one he gets his powers. It was a very good story. I like Superman, but Spider-man feels like a real person. When he is Peter Parker he has problems like I do. He worries about paying the rent and taking care of his aunt. I got a library card the other day too. The inside of the building was even more impressive than the outside. It could have been a palace, but instead it is a place for the people. I didn’t take out any books this time, but maybe next time I go I will.
March 27th 1968
I saw another movie the other day. This one was called The Producers. It was a very funny movie about two men trying to scam money with a Broadway play. It was very funny how they had the Nazis in this movie. The actor who played Hitler was my favorite. This is one of the better movies I have seen.
I am happy that the weather is getting warmer. This winter was cold. When the weather is nice I think I will walk around again when I don’t have work. Sometimes I wish I didn’t work at night, so that I would have a more regular schedule. I don’t know what other work a man like me would find. I am thankful that I was able to find a job as quickly as I was. I am lucky to have had Jean’s help. I haven’t seen him for a few months, but I will see him in a few weeks for Easter.
April 15th 1968
The past few weeks have been crazy here. I spent Easter with Jean and his family again, but that was the least of what has happened recently. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated earlier this month. In response there have been protests all over the country, including very large ones uptown. From what I have heard though, other cities like Chicago had much worse riots than here. There wasn’t much activity by me, but diners at the restaurant were afraid that the riots would move down to where we were. Getting around the city the days the riots were going on was scary. I have never seen anything like this before. I was watching it on the news and sometimes I thought I could hear the sirens out my window, but that must have been my imagination. From what I have heard, many buildings were set on fire during the protests here, and the news says 3 people died. The news said that 11 people died in Chicago, and 12 in D.C., so I guess that 3 is not as bad as it could have been. I hope that nothing else happens, I have heard people talk about other riots in the past, but I don’t remember any others while I was here.
June 8th 1968
I haven’t written anything in here for almost two months, and I don’t think I will be continuing to write anything in here after this. I think I will try to take classes to get my high school diploma. I have been working on improving my reading with library books and I think that my writing has improved greatly in the six months since I started writing this journal. Hopefully I will be able to work full-time as well, but if I can’t I have enough money saved up from work to start working part-time while I take classes. Unfortunately I think most of the classes are at night. I will figure something out.
