Buckle Up! Peter Pan Is Taking Off, Again

Will you be watching Peter Pan tonight? I probably won’t, though Gilda has influenced me into taping the three hour live production (taping allows me to zoom through the plethora of commercials that would make this new version of the classic show almost intolerable to view live). Which raises the question, which moron at NBC thought it brilliant to air a children’s show that would end at 11 pm on a school night?

I’m not inclined to see this version of Peter Pan because I adored the mid-1950s production starring Mary Martin and Cyril Ritchard. Each year I eagerly absorbed the black and white telecast, excitedly clapping to keep Tinker Bell alive, crowing along with Peter, singing “I’m an Indian, too” with Tiger Lily, and crossing swords with Captain Hook and Smee. I had a green felt hat with feather, just like Peter wore, at least in the Walt Disney cartoons of Peter’s adventures that aired in the same decade, and plastic swords to duel pirates. I had a Peter Pan board game. 

In short, if I wasn’t imagining myself as Davy Crockett in my coonskin hat, I was visualizing myself flying through the air as Peter Pan. Perhaps that’s why I liked the Robin Williams film Hook and the Johnny Depp flick Finding Neverland that extended my youthful fascination with the J.M. Barrie boy who never wanted to grow up. I never wanted to, either (Gilda would say there are many a day when I display child-like behavior, but that’s a subject of another blog that probably will never see the light of a computer screen). And for the record, I also really enjoyed watching the Disneyfication of Davy Crockett starring Fess Parker and Buddy Ebsen.

Gilda does not share my enthusiasm for Peter Pan. I don’t believe Ellie does, either, but her musical theater career includes two portrayals of Wendy, once in the traditional role as part of a Play Group Theatre production while in high school and then at Skidmore College in a dark, avant-garde reorientation of the classic story. All I recall from that play is Ellie singing, a major coup for a freshman to be chosen ahead of theater majors.

A Story Full of Irony

Here’s a story full of irony. But first, I'm indebted to Ken G for turning me on several months to a most interesting and educational web site http://jewishcurrents.org/jewdayo which delivers a daily recap, from a Jewish perspective, of four important events or people from that day in history. Regrettably, I don't always read the historical notes each day they appear in my email, which explains why I am behind with this blog entry from a missive from last week.

For last Wednesday, June 13, the Jewdayo message revolved around one of the first widely publicized anti-Semitic events in U.S. history. Seems a certain Judge Henry Hilton, in 1877, refused to allow a wealthy and politically influential banker and railroad investor, Joseph Seligman, to stay at the Grand Union Hotel he owned in Saratoga Springs, NY. As Jewdayo explained, “Hilton, a member of the Boss Tweed political machine, had a personal grudge with Seligman, who was a member of an anti-Tweed political faction—but the reason offered to Seligman for being denied a room in the hotel (where he had previously stayed several times) was that business was off because gentile customers did not like sharing the hotel with "Israelites," therefore all Jews were being barred from registering.”

In short order, signs proclaiming “No Jews or Dogs Admitted Here” sprouted up in many hotels across the country.

Here’s irony Number One: Though he shared the same name with Conrad Hilton, who wasn’t born until 1887, Judge Hilton was no relation to the famous hotelier.

Irony Number Two: Some 45 years after Judge Hilton died in 1899, the Grand Union was bought by a syndicate of Jewish investors, Tikvah Associates, Inc. of New York City. Gilda’s father, Irving Barasch, was president of Tikvah Associates. Irving’s family owned two hotels in Saratoga Springs, the Empire and the Brooklyn. Both served kosher food to their Jewish clientele.  But anti-Semitism still ran strong in the village. Within months, civic pressure forced Irving and his partners to sell the Grand Union. 

Irony Number Three: The Grand Union, at one time the world’s largest hotel, was demolished in 1952-3, replaced by (wait for it) .... a Grand Union supermarket. At one time one of the nation’s largest supermarket chains, Grand Union is now just 21 stores and is part of Tops Markets of Buffalo.

Irony Number Four: Conrad Hilton’s hotel chain eventually came to Saratoga. The Saratoga Hilton is at the north end of Broadway, exactly where the Empire and Brooklyn Hotels stood before they were taken by eminent domain in the early 1970s as part of Saratoga’s redevelopment. 

Irony Number Five: Wikipedia says In 1879 Judge Hilton bought a 1,500-acre estate named "Woodlawn" in Saratoga Springs. Following his death “the property was left to decay, and was auctioned off as eight parcels in 1916. A portion of Woodlawn is now the campus of Skidmore College.” Our daughter Ellie is a graduate of Skidmore College.