Martin Koby - April 20, 1999
Birth of Granddaughter
...birthday party, okay? I'm going to...
And this is my first formal...
I'm going to break the flow here for a second.
Okay.
What happened today, this morning?
When, when--which way? Oh, my granddaughter was born!
Okay. Uh, speaking of birthday parties.
Parties, yes.
When you heard that the--you got a phone call, I assume.
Oh, yes.
Yeah. When you heard that you had another grand...uh, grandchild.
And everybody was fine. I was delighted. It was very nice.
What do you think when you--when it--something like that happens in your life? What comes into your mind?
That they're healthy and they grow up to be happy Jews. That's the only thing I'm going to leave behind me.
I mean--you didn't think about having grandchildren in 1951, I mean, I...
Are you kidding?
So...
Never! Me have grandchildren? You're out of your mind!??? me thinking that I'm going to be a grandfather someday?
Does--does any--do you make any connection to your experience in the war when something like this in your family happens? I mean, when--I mean--what--there's nothing else that comes--that approaches it, but when some joyous occasion occurs?
I wish my father was around.
Oh.
See, my mother--my mother never--maybe she did privately, but she did not show uh, happiness or did not enjoy these things that happened--nice things. You went to college--you say you know, "Grandson is going to go to college, he got accepted to be a dentist. "So she said, "How can he, he did not finish there, how can he become a dentist? Go to school to be a dentist?" "Ma, he's going to..." "How can?" "Because he's smart." "What do you mean, he's smart?"
Hm.
"Your grandson is going to be a dentist." This is--"How you going to pay for it?"
I see.
"It's okay," I said, "we'll--we'll find a way." The kid--I used to bring them over, the kids. I'd say, "Ma, we got to talk in English so the kids can understand, you know." "They can learn Yiddish." I said, "What do you mean, Yid...they came to visit you!" My father wouldn't have done that.
When did your father die?
My father died in '58.
So he was here already.
Yeah. A grandson was--a first grandson was born. We were--his sister was going to be born in October, but he died in July.
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