Page 6: (Photo of Castelmezzano) • Handwritten inscription: Castelmezzano near Potenza – Basilicata – Southern Italy • Caption: This is where it started.
Page 7: I – LIFE WITH FATHER
One never escapes from childhood’s lessons, impressions and experiences which form the philosophy of life. This is not to say what you already know, but to put into perspective these reminiscences in which my father, Charles Vincent Paterno, is central. My filial admiration for him is lasting.
This is not to discount by inference or disregard my love and respect for Mother. The reality is that Dad was a dominating personality in family and in business.
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In physique he was short and in appearance dapper, neat and fastidious. He walked stiff-kneed from boyhood. His was an energetic, innovative, opportunistic and shred mind which achieved such marvelous success in business — as the record shows. Dad evinced a business acumen, imaginative drive and judgmental timing that was remarkable. To borrow from baseball parlance, his lifetime score card could never have had a bottom line of: no runs-no hits – no errors. He had a champion’s batting average and runs-batted-in record in the game of living.
Page 8: Charles Vincent Paterno, my father, was one of ten children born to Giovanni and Carolina Trivigno Paterno in the mountain hamlet of Castelmezzano, Province of Basilicata. Potenza is the city east of the ancient seaport of Naples in southern Italy. Birth date was August 4, 1878. Dad told me that in those days many children were considered to be nine months old at birth. As a result he was never positive of his birth date so he took August 4 as his official birthday.
Castelmezzano was a picturesque little town. At the time Dad left, its population was about 800. To travel to Naples one had to walk three miles to the railroad station, and then it was a seven hour trip by train.
Initially, my grandfather, Giovanni Paterno, came to America alone leaving his wife and children in Italy because he could afford only one passage.
It must have taken great courage for a man to leave his homeland and venture off to a foreign country, travel on a crowded ship taking at least two weeks over rough seas and wind up in a noisy, strange speaking metropolis after that rural simple life in a mountainous region.
As a little boy of six years, Dad arrived in America with his Mother, sister Celestine and two brothers, Saverio and Joseph. They came as poor immigrants, just as millions of other did from southern and eastern Europe who belong in the sage of God Bless America.
Page 9: John J. Campagna, son of Anthony and Marie Campagna and my first cousin, tells the following about our grandfather.
“He worked very hard in New York and saved every dollar he could until he had enough to send for his family. He went to the docks every day starting on the date their ship was due to arrive in New York. There were severe storms at sea and the ship was reported delayed and then lost. However, he never gave up hope and prayed, on his knees, at the dock every day week after week. His prayers were answered when the ship finally came into the harbor and he started jumping with joy. The workers at the pier, who knew him well by that time, were so impressed that they rower him out to the ship for the long awaited family reunion. My mother was born exactly nine months later in New York City of January 2, 1887.”
Page 10: One of Dad’s penny earners was selling newspapers on the streets of lower Manhattan. To conserve a nickel of trolley fare he would carry a stack of newspapers 20 blocks to his selling stand. On one 13th trip Dad was so weary he rested on the sidewalk and fell asleep. His bunch of pennies were tucked in his shoes for safekeeping. When he awakened from his doze his shoes were off and those pennies were gone! That was the night before Easter. Because he was afraid to go home penniless, he decided to take immediate employment with the local florist. By noon on Easter Sunday he had recouped all of his loss of the night before. So he was able to go home with his pride restored and pockets bulging!
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As a kid Dad played leapfrog over curbside fire hydrants. While trying to jump over one of these a playmate pushed him into an accidental fall that caused a broken leg. The fractured limb was kept too long in the cast for healing so that the knee joint had a lifelong stiffness. This caused frustration and problem for him.
“Stop Grating The Cheese”
Immigrant Italians on the lower east side of New York commonly had pasta as a main dish. As eldest son it was Dad’s chore to do the grating of the Parmesan cheese on to individual plates around the table. To stretch-out the…
Page 11: …cheese it was Dad’s finesse to pass quickly over plates of sisters and brothers. To serve his own plate he would divert attention from his own extra share by talking an imagined brag that some day he would be rich enough to build a castle overlooking the Hudson River.
That’s how the taunt: “Charles, stop grating the cheese” became a family jest.
***
As an enterprising youth, he contrived a matchbox arrangement with a needle inside. This enabled him to foretell which was the needle was going to point because of a tiny magnet concealed in his hand while the trick was being put on. The tricky matchbox playthings were sold on street corners.
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For one Fourth of July celebration he bought a bunch of American flags and mounted them on sticks. When they didn’t sell well in New York he entrained to Philadelphia where they sold quickly in the big parade there commemorating Philadelphia’s great history in the founding of the United States of America.
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Wanted to Be A Doctor
Dad always wanted to be a doctor but this meant a lot of money for the college education. This did not faze him. When the top boss of the New York subway system died, Dad had some business cards quickly printed for presenting next day at company headquarters in behalf of an idea of his.
Dad professed to be shocked when the receptionist tactfully explained that the man he wanted to see had just died. He made such an insistent fuss about the importance of his idea that he was sent to see another executive of the subway management.
He had invented a simple device to mount on gas illuminating jet lamps in subway station. It was a fan-shaped cap for covering the round gas jet so the flame would flare outwardly to give more lighting. The selling conference resulted in permission to install his lighting innovation in two subway stops for a 90-day try-out. There developed a 25% saving to the company on its lighting costs.
Father received a large order for this device. The profit from it paid for his going to college to prepare for a medical career.
Why He Grew a Beard
Charles Vincent Paterno was a member of the first graduating class at Cornell Medical College on Manhattan’s upper east side. As a youthful, clean-shaven intern at Bellevue Hospital he had charge of the clinic during three days of the week. Frequently young women patients objected to having such a youngish intern examine them. Older men were preferred.
That’s why Dad grew a beard to make him look older. The full beard solved the problem.
DAD’S FAVORITE MAXIM: WHY WORRY?
“I wonder why folks worry. There are only two reasons for worry. Either you are successful, or you are not successful. If you are successful, there is nothing to worry about; if you are not, there are only two things to worry about. Your health is either good or you are sick; if your health is good, there is nothing to worry about. If you are sick, there are only two things to worry about – you are going to get well or you are going to die; if you are going to get well there is nothing to worry about. If you are going to die, there’s only two things to worry about. You are either going to Heaven or you are not going to Heaven. If you are going to Heaven there is nothing to worry about; and if you are going to the other place, you will be so damned busy shaking hands with your old friends that you won’t have time to worry.”
SO WHY WORRY?
(photo of Charles, Carlo, and donkey) Caption: In Florida with Dad when I was 3 months old.
Page 14: (photo of Charles) Caption: This is how I remember Dad best. He was truly “The Giant” in the Paterno Family.
As time passed, his beard was smaller. When death came Dad’s was a distinguished, very small goatee with mustache and that is how I remember him best. However, recollection remains with me of that oval-framed portrait which Mother kept on her dresser from the occasion of their marriage when he wore a full beard.
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Grandfather Thrived
It was opportune destiny for grandfather Giovanni Paterno to be in the building business in New York City as the great port of entry for the immigrant flood of the 1890’s and early 1900’s. In this “God Bless American As a Land of Opportunity” the metropolis was populating rapidly. People had to be sheltered away from those tenements of the lower East Side.
Grandfather Paterno thrived busily. He built the first apartment house with an elevator in New York City near Columbia University. At the climax he was constructing apartment housing on Morningside Drive in Upper West Side Manhattan. When grandfather died, the Paterno family conference decided that Charles, as eldest son of the brood in America, should recess from his medical internship at Bellevue Hospital and finish the building project. Family resource were all tied up in this.
Before completion there came a good offer on a money and profit basis that was irresistible. The deal involved a vacant piece of land as partial payment. My father decided to erect an apartment house on this land before returning to his career pursuit at Bellevue Hospital. But he stayed in the building business.
Disillusioned
In late years, Dad’s inventive knack had him investing quite a lot of money with a chap who designed an underwater cable through which on could talk. The cable was placed in a bathtub of water for testing and it seemed to work well. He went to Washington, D.C., got a $1 million signed contract with the government. What Dad had to do in developmental testing was to speak through the cable from the sandy spit of Fire Island across the mainland of Long Island.
What Dad had to say about this is easy to recall. He stayed on Fire Island three days on a diet of hot dogs, repeating again and again his “Hello” voice and still hearing no response via the underwater cable.
The inventor and his family had been supported by Dad for three year. Disillusioned and indignant, Dad told the man to “…take all this cable and take all your equipment…I never want to see you again.”
Dad was a strong believer in never sinking good money after bad. This turned out to be prudent advice to me as I gradually became involved in the world of business and finance.
NEXT: CHAPTER II • YOUNG MAN’S FANCY FINDS LOVE
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The below photos were not part of Carlo Paterno’s book but the images fit well with his information so henceforth placed here.
