The Buck Stops
Here
by Jilliana
Ranicar-Breese
People seem to
be comfortable telling me their life stories. One
of my willing ‘victims’ was Ted
Buckwald who I had the pleasure of meeting with
his ‘significant other’ as he described
Ecuadorian Mercy Medina, his soul mate and
partner for the last 4 years. They met playing
Ping Pong. ‘I pinged and she ponged!’
he told me tongue in cheek in Cartagena, Colombia
where they approached me in the street beckoning
me over as they loved my style of dressing. Ted,
at a sprightly 85, looked dapper in his colourful
bandana which he changed every day of his life
and did not look a day over 65. A man
prepared for all seasons!
An amazing storyteller and joker who loved to
make willing listeners laugh. A collector not
only of 40,000 butterflies which he incorporated
into his artwork of blown up photographic
butterflies suspended in space but also one-liners
which he had heard over 40 years on the radio,
cinema and TV. In addition to this gigantic
collection of words, his thoughts of the power of
positivity and happiness would come to him while
soaping his lean and fit body in the shower every
morning. Thus he would write these down too.
Words flowed effortlessly like running water.
He assured me longevity was in his genes as his
father Benjamin, known as Buck to be Americanised,
had lived to the grand age of 105 and Ted was out
to beat Buck by any which-way even if he had to
buck the system!
A typical Jewish immigration story starting
in Imperial Russia (The Pale Settlement) in 1899
when Ted’s grandfather, Joseph Samuel
Buckvald, a tailor, wanted a better life fleeing
from Anti-Semitism first to Vienna and then
moving after World War One to the land of
opportunity, America. He arrived at
Ellis Island and changed one letter in his
surname to sound less guttural. Buckvald became
Buckwald! He came with some means and 4 children
including baby Benjamin aged 1 born, to become an
all American and proud of his country. ‘God
bless America’ wrote Jewish Irving Berlin.
Uneducated academically, young Benjamin, known as
Buck, lived in the multi ethnic area of Brooklyn
called Bensonhurst, a mixed neighbourhood of Jews
and Italian immigrants at the turn of the century.
The grandparents spoke Yiddish and probably never
learned English. Buck grew up, married Esther and
produced 3 sons, Ted being the eldest born 85
years ago. Then the middle son Arnold and finally
the youngest of the trio, Peter. The family was
tightly knit with no secrets, at least not in the
early days!
Young Buck was clever with his hands fascinated
by electrical components, alternating currents
and high frequency power circuits. He had been
inspired by the doyen of electricity non other
than Tesla. He could repair anything and was
proud of his knowledge. So many people in his
neighbourhood came to him wanting their cherished
radios repaired that Buck thought he would open a
small shop selling new radios. He loved the Art
Deco angular lines. To Buck it was sculptural art
with emitting sounds and thus he began his
intriguing radio collection. Obviously influenced
by his father’s passion for collecting and
hoarding, young Teddy, as Esther would call him
after President Roosevelt, would help his father
in the workshop in the basement of their large
family house.
His grandfather, Joseph Samuel, had put
aside some money to help finance Buck’s
dream business, but where? Not Bensonhurst for
sure. Buck was reaching for the stars and
there was only one place which drew the crowds
right on his doorstep in Brooklyn. Coney Island!
Coney Island was a huge attraction in the summer
months comprising of 3 distinct areas, the 5 mile
beach extending from Brighton Beach, Wonder Wheel
with its famous Ferris Wheel and Luna Park, an
amusement park featuring the famed Cyclone Roller
coaster, street performers and the circus
sideshow. In fact between 1880 and 1945 Coney
Island was the largest amusement park in the US.
Buck was far sighted and had become a collector
of $100 dollar bills, putting aside a bill every
week. Later in his heyday he would hoard the bill
every day during the summer season! He
witnessed the advent of television in New York
City on July 1, 1941 and decided to increase the
size of his shop to incorporate the growing
demand for TV sets. He even provided the Turner
microphone for President Kennedy’s speeches
to be broadcast to the patriotic crowds.
Ted at 22 by this time after having served in
Korea and Germany for the US army as a trained
combat photographer in 1954, had moved to New
York City first working as a stylist for the well
known hair dresser to the stars, Mr Kenneth.
Later he would open his own salon when he got
fired, taking his 300 best customers with him. He
would tell his blue rinse ladies that beautiful
things never grew old! Everyone adored chatterbox
Ted and so his salon was a big success. He was
Lee Remick's personal hairdresser and even
beautified Maria Callas and Sarah Churchill. His
quote was and is today 'Do what you like
and like what you do!'
He, however, never forgot his love for Coney
Island in the summer, the smell of candy floss,
licking ice cream popsicles, munching roasted
popcorn, riding the carousels and roller coasters.
Memories of Buck’s arch enemy Dutch Nathan
with his wife Ida famous for their sizzling hot-dogs
which he devoured daily with sweet mustard. A
meal in itself and salivated at the memory of
Nathan’s famous hot dogs.
His shrewd father had moved with the times
realising that the hawkers and buskers needed
microphones to draw the crowds in to see the
shows and take the thrilling rides. Buck had the
monopoly and the knowledge that others did not so
other funfair owners would sub lease technical
sound equipment from him as their businesses
expanded too. Money was the name of the game.
Buck’s collection of undeclared $100 notes
grew. He became a Scrooge hoarder, giving his
wife money from time to time but was stingy and
frugal. He collected the notes in bundles of 5”
thick with a $100 note at the top and the bottom,
each roll sealed with special electrical masking
tape to secure the bills. Over the years Ted
reckoned he had squirrelled away $1 million which
he never spent. Always living in the same house,
he had become, instead of the merchant of Venice,
the merchant of Bensonhurst. Esther was not happy
in her Scrooge marriage.
She knew there was cash in the house and one
evening in Buck’s absence called her 3 sons
together instructing them to search the house for
the hidden fortune but although they searched
high and low or low but not high enough, they
gave up looking and getting frustrated so it
appeared. Ted’s long-suffering frustrated
mother finally left Buck and bought a guest house
in the famous Borscht Belt, in the Catskills
where Ted would go in his fancy Pontiac every
summer fraternising with comedians such as Jerry
Lewis, Lenny Bruce and countess others who had
begun their stand-up comedy acts in the famous
summer bungalows. He would impress by taking them
out for rides in his black coupe white 1955
Pontiac which he had bought through the US. army
that had had it shipped back to New York. Ted
already knew Vic Damone, Elliot Gould, Eddie
Fisher and Larry King as they had grown up in the
same neighbourhood of Bensonhurst. This of
course gave him the traditional love of Jewish
American humour and one-liners which was to
influence Hollywood and the subsequent movie
industry.
All 3 sons married and had families. Peter and
his family moved to California and Ted often
wondered how he managed to buy a big house and
set up his vacuuming store as he apparently had
so little to start with. The brothers all went
their separate ways. Later Esther moved to
California to be close to her beloved Peter, her
favourite son. The years passed, 15 in all. Ted
was not in touch much with Peter as they had
grown apart over the years with life styles and
all that jazz but he kept up his brotherly
friendship with Arnold who had remained in New
York also in the vacuum business with 4
successful stores but had had a bush with the
Mafia because he did not want to pay for
protection, so he too moved to California. Ted
had no intention of leaving his beloved New York
and continued to make his upmarket clientele
beautiful.
One night back in New York, Ted was caught with
Arnold in a terrifying electrical thunderstorm in
his Pontiac. Arnold was scared and, thinking they
might n8 not make it through the night, decided
it was time to confess to Ted that the weasel
Peter had left for California with the hidden
money! He had confessed to his mother that he had
found it in the ceiling and had spent hours
substituting the $100 bills inside each role for
$1 bills, leaving the top and bottom $100
notes so Buck would not suspect the theft. No
wonder he had shrewdly invested the cash in real
estate and set up a vacuum cleaning business.
Peter had told his mother in confidence which is
why she moved colluding with her adored rogue of
a son.
Poor Ted never knew about his family’s
betrayal. Even his trusted brother had hidden the
truth from him. Arnold had eventually been told
by Esther but he, like Ted, never got his share
of the stash of money either. Beats me how
Arnold could still love his mother and younger
brother after her betrayal, let alone Peter’s
dishonesty.
But Lady Luck took over. Ted somehow knew the tax
law and what a ‘Walking Trust’ was.
After his mother’s death from excessive
smoking at the age of 72 in 1982, Buck
could not access Esther’s money, which
ironically unknown to him was his own money,
without her signed death certificate as they were
legally separated and Ted was the Executor of her
will. It was blackmail. Ted refused to release
the certificate unless he was given his share of
the booty! When Buck finally relented, Ted
deducted his thieving brother’s portion and
divided the rest between himself and his brother.
Ted asked Buck if he had any secrets but Buck
Said ‘no’ never mentioning his hidden
fortune. That was his mother’s Estate
but when Buck finally passed away at the grand
age of 105 in 2004, Ted inherited a mere $200,000.
Why so little you might ask? Buck in his senility
decided to put his cash of all places in the bank
because he thought it would be a safe place! What
a joke as of course the bank took most of his
undeclared cash for tax purposes!!
Ted however got enough to invest in a goldmine in
Mali of all places. Once again Lady Luck was not
on his side. He decided to fly to Mali to check
out his investment and discovered the owners had
not re-leased the property from the Government as
they should have done within 6 months. Thus the
company lost their right to mine and Ted lost all
his money. Undeterred he remained in Africa for a
further 4 years and saw real poverty which
altered his values. He began to search for rare
butterflies again and help educate the poor with
the technical knowledge he had learned while
working for Buck in Coney Island over 7 years
before he became an apprentice hairdresser with
Mr Kenneth.
One day, after a 30 year silence and his dear
brother Arnold had died from smoking like Esther
8 years earlier, Ted decided to forgive Peter the
weasel who was his only family left. Egged on by
a distant cousin he spontaneously called him in
California, not mentioning the money and resumed
their brotherly friendship just like in the old
days. ‘Let bygones be forgotten’, said
Ted. Blood, after all is thicker than water,
especially Jewish blood!
Today Ted lives frugally but blissfully, through
happenstance, in a rented condo in a unique
retirement condo in Deerfield, Florida surrounded
by his 40,000 butterflies and his butterfly art.
He proudly calls himself a Lepidopterist!
Long live Ted who beat Buck to win back his lost
bucks!
Written
in Casa Isabel, Getsamani and Sofitel Santa Clara,
Cartagena, Colombia with help from the
indefatigable Ted on WhatsApp. 10.2.18.
Read at The Cascade Cafe, Brighton on 5.5.18.
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