Community of brighton each, in brooklyn. A beautiful place right on the beach. Long island sound. Many poor russians lived there in those days. , we were veryhad poor. My father was a restaurant worker all his life. What did your mom do . Ben my mother worked in the garment industry, so she will take the subway downtown from the bronx every morning to work. My father worked in a cafeterias. My sister and i roslyn i were left more or less alone most of our lives. I was pretty much left alone most of the time i was growing. Growing up. Ut that was fine, i loved it in the bronx, where we lived in the bronx park, a wonderful place, the bronx zoo, a Botanical Gardens that i used to go to all the time, i use to sneak into the bronx zoo overnight to see the animals after it had closed. I had no planes at all. We had a great time being poor. Better, beach was even right next to coney island. I could go to coney island, ride on the cyclone, get hot dogs and at nathans. I was a pretty lucky kid. Even though i didnt have to nickels to rub together. What was school like even though we are in the bronx . Ben i went to seven Public Schools. [laughter] because my father moved around. Every time we get a new job we had to move. Sometimes we got evicted because we couldnt pay the rent. We had a rent strike. We were thrown out of our apartment. So, i went to a lot of schools, all public of course. Several in brooklyn and the bronx. Did make it harder to maintain friends . Youre bouncing from place to place. Ben i had a focus. I have to tell you this is important. I had a community which i considered my home. My home community. Where my longterm friends were. I grew up effectively in a communist neighborhood. The coops were organized the workers themselves. An important part, just like now. It was basically jewish. It was exclusively radical and partly communist. In most cases you might say that people were read. Red. Pick your color. When you say communist, is a if communist in reality is in spirit or communist in practice . Ben communist in practice. My father was a member of the communist party. Many people there were members of the communist party. It was not considered to be particularly a horrible thing at that time. Everybody i knew, practically, had the same kind of radical background. Many of them were russian jews who had fled russia because of the persecution by the czar. They were naturally gravitated towards the revolution because all they thought that the revolution would change russia and not be so antisemitic. Turned out in the end, boy were they wrong. Stalin was more antisemitic than the czar, in the end. But thats another story. Have that kind of strange background. Friends. Ry close i belonged to the Young Pioneers of america. Equivalent of the communist boy scouts. I became a bugler. I marched in the bugle drum corps. I was going to study the bugle. We marched in the may day parade. I grew up in the bronx, basically a happy kid. I enjoyed lots of hobbies. Stamps, model airplanes, just like every other kid, practically. So, i was normal in most respects. Except for the politics, which i guess was somewhat abnormal. You mentioned the you were poor growing up. Did your family notice a difference when the Great Depression started to come true in the thirties or was it the same thing for you . Ben no, the Great Depression affected us very badly. That was the time when my father could not find any work. 1931 and 1932 he was unemployed. We lived on relief. That brings me to my next adventure you might say. Adventure, you might say. He heard of a group of restaurant workers who had been recruited to go to moscow, russia. Moscow in russia. To construct a restaurant a huge for a huge factory, a ball bearing factory in moscow. It was a group to use American Equipment and american know how to produce a huge kitchen for the workers of the ball bearing factory. My father signed up for this. Believe it or not, in 1932 at the very depths of the depression, we went to moscow to live. My suspicion was they expected to stay there. Didnt quite work out that way. [laughter] but we lived, at first we lived [speaking russian], which to this day is a fancy hotel in the middle of moscow. We didnt stay there long. We got put up in a brandnew apartment, apartment house by the ball bearing factory, which is on the outskirts. It was very luxurious apartment. They had two bedrooms for me and my sister and my parents but it parents, but it should come as no surprise to experts on the shared the entire apartment with an entire family the same size. [laughter] so, there were two families living in a two bedroom apartment. We stayed there probably about six months six months in the hotel and six months at the apartment from the ball bearing factory. My sister and i commuted into moscow to the Angle AmericanAnglo American school, which is where i went to school while i was in moscow. There was an English Speaking school run by couple of communists naturally. We didnt learn very much. [laughter] but the big advantage of the school was they served free lunches. At least we had a good meal every day. What was the food difference like . Two countries, i mean thats gotta be. Food in russia is not what i would call very good. This is an understatement. At the school where i had my lunches, we mostly had fish. My parents had been told when we went from america to russia to take along some veluda. Thats foreign money. My parents took along a few hundred dollars worth of american dollars. That saved our lives because something, there was a store, a store in moscow russian]peaking devoted entirely to foreign currency. Russians were not allowed to go there and they had no foreign currency anyway. We were allowed to go because we were american citizens. We could buy enough food there to keep us going. It was the few dollars that we had that really made it possible for us to survive. It was a very, very bad time. When you moved there, was it in the summertime or the middle of wintertime . [laughter] ben the first thing that roosevelt did when he was thing, the first november, 1932, within weeks was to recognize the soviet union. We got our visas and passports and went to russia. We got to russia at the beginning of the russian winter. The winter of 1932 was a bad one. Man. Ben we really froze out. We had heat inside but outdoors we really froze. So, now you come back from russia and you come right back to new york . Ben we somehow managed to get export visas from the russians. We got, we had our passports, so we did get out. About june ofas 1933 that we got out. Thats, thats another story. Because we only had enough money to get to berlin. We bought tickets, rail road tickets, and we got flat broke by the time we got to berlin. And now you have to think back. What was happening in berlin in june of 1933 . Hitler just come the power. Thats right. Ben [laughter] ended up in berlin, four jews with no money in the middle of nazi germany. [laughter] thats a funny story in itself. What saved our lives and to this day i still remember and always managed to give them something a at christmas time was [ speaking foreign language], the hebrew rescue society. That was established to help jewish refugees. We somehow or other my father sent, sent a cable, a telegraph, who sent his brothers, us money to get to london. Thats as far as we got. He sent us money to get to london. Berlin fored in little while week or two. , aspeaking, i have to say, my mother spoke you dish, which sounds like german. So, my mother would go around is,in in 1933 speaking get thinking that she was speaking german. That was pretty funny. [laughter] somehow, we survived. We were american, so they didnt bother us. Leningrad, broke again. They thought we were german refugees. They thought were refugees from germany. So, they picked us up and put us in a hotel and paid for our stay while we were in london. At first they thought we were german ruffin german russian refugees, but they then they found that we were coming from russia. Somehow, we managed to get the fare we were on a small u. S. Ship. I was seasick the whole time, getting back. And we got back to new york. Again we were flap brock. One of my fathers brothers put us up in one of their coops in their apartment for a while. So, we live with them for a while for free what my father found a job. Found a job in a restaurant. Thats when we started to get our feedback. We eventually ended up with a small apartment. We always loved in one bedroom apartments, family of four. Kitchenette, living room where my parents lived, and a bedroom that i shared with my sister. At that point in 1933, we had a rent strike. The landlord raised the rent and we refused to pay. They threw us out with our furniture on the street. We moved back into the coops. They took us back for a while. Eventually, we got that all squared away. My father finally got a halfway decent job in the cafeteria. He worked for a while in the bronx, then he got a job at the brighten beach cafeteria. We moved close to coney island and i had a great time there. Then we moved back to the bronx, again. But then the most important thing of my life, i think, happened at that this is really point. Important. I want everybody in america to know this. I got a Free Education at city college. Thats what happened. See, new york city has ccny. A brooklyn college, queens college. They gave students with decent marks Free Education. By free, i mean really free. The only thing they charged was lab fees. I think in my first year was five dollars, which i didnt even have. They waved to the lab fee of five dollars. Can imagine . That but they gave me a Free Education and a good education. City college was a good education. Now, so i went back got into , city college. I went there for two and a half years. Then the war started. And in the middle of my education, about two and a half years after i started, i could quit city college and took a defense job. I got a nice defense job working for the u. S. Signal corps in expeditinga, doing of orders of war goods to requisition to army organizations. Whileworked there for a and i got drafted. At that time. That took us, took me too late o late in 42. Starts my42, that army career. That takes care of my childhood. [laughter] that covered a lot. You went everywhere. You did more Public Schools in more countries than most people do before they ben im well aware. I went to 6, 7 Public Schools. I lived in two countries. The defining thing was going to city college. Free education. Ben the Free Education is what did it. Up to that point, i had just standard education. I left, i knew i was going to be a scientist all along. I know i, i thought i was going to be an astronomer when i was five. Why . Ben i had already decided i was going to be an astronomer when i was five. I had seen some Science Fiction movie and i came home and i told my parents that i was going to be an astronomer when i was five or six. And i didnt change much, from astronomy i came to physics, which is not that different. But i always, throughout my entire childhood, i kept, i kept diaries of science. I read science books. I read Science Fiction a lot. So, i was oriented toward science, thats what got me away from politics. I lost my interest in politics when i was late high school, when entering city college. My politics had virtually disappeared. Because i was much more interested in science. I mean, now that youre in college, youre 20 years old when pearl harbor gets bombed. Do you remember where you right you were at when you found out . Ben yes. I was walking home and i walked into the entrance to my apartment house and somebody said that the japanese bond pearl harbor. Thats how i remember that. We knew that everything is going to change that time. What was your first reaction . Were you angry . Ben no, i wasnt angry. I was just impressed by the enormity of it. I knew what was going to happen. That is why i enlisted. Im sorry, i didnt enlist. Joined theol and signal corps as a civilian. By that time, you have to understand, everybody was in favor of the war. Its not like now, the country was entirely united at that time after pearl harbor. Not before pearl harbor, but after pearl harbor, the entire country became united. Everybody was working for the same ends. So was i. So, when they drafted you, you didnt have a choice . Ben i did have a choice. I did you did . Ben i worked for the signal corps. They asked me to ask for deferment, but i said no. I said i would rather go into the army. Why is that . You had a good job, you are civilian status. Expeditingut i was equipment. That wasnt really fighting the nazis or anything like that. So, i decided i would rather go into the real army. Slight little patriotism in there, i wanted to do something. Ben i have to tell you, you know, everybody felt the same way. I felt the same way, i hated the nazis, i knew about what the nazis were doing to jews, i know what they were doing to europe, i knew what the japanese are work were doing to china. It wasnt very difficult to be in favor of the war and to do everything you could. We did everything. We collected cigarette linings for the aluminum in cigarettes. Money what they called pushkas. Handheld receptacles to get the money. To help the war. It was pretty unanimous. And of course, in addition to all that, hitler had invaded russia. So, we were very pro russia, that added to our patriotism. Especially, you were in moscow before. It got personal. How dare you . I been there. Ben so, it all fit together pretty well. X so, you get drafted into the army, into the army air corps. So, you get drafted into the army, into the army air corps. Ben no, i started thats started, thats another funny story. I got drafted into the army a a little i was never sworn into the army. They took me to to an army base in an island outside new york. To get my physical, to get sworn in, but i went to the bathroom and by the time i got out of the bathroom, they had already sworn everybody else in. So, i always felt that i could if i really got mad at everybody i could say, im not in the army because i never was sworn in, but i never had the nerve to do that. [laughter] was it Governors Island that you want to . Ben yes. Thats where i went. Two Governors Island. To Governors Island. Because that was a big post before it shut down a few years ago. Ben Governors Island is where i went. I went from a physical there, and i was not sworn in at Governors Island. I got my orders, after a few weeks, and i went to fort dix in new jersey. Fort dix, new jersey, it was a huge army base. Where i was supposed to take my basic training. Another funny thing about my military training, youre supposed to do basic training i training and i did three days worth of basic training. On the third day, they ship me out, because they needed people to go. They needed tail gunner for be b17s. They needed tail gunners like mad in 1942. But the tail gunner was also the Radio Operator. So, i had to go first to Radio Operator school. So, they sent me to Radio Operator school from from fort dix after the fourth day. At Radio Operator school, i forgot to say, target practice was the fourth day of basic training. That was the fourth day. I left on the third day. I missed target practice. [laughter] ben and i ended up, this is hard to believe, i ended up on Lake Michigan in the Biggest Hotel in the world. Thats the army had taken over the hotel, and that is where they had the radio school, it was in the hotel. So, i ended up with a few of the group on Lake Michigan, in the middle of chicago, going to radio school. [laughter] at radio school, i learned morse code. I learned how to operate the equipment. And everybody at the end of the three months, everybody else got tripped up. They got shipped out from tail Gunner School and they kept me there as an instructor. Why did they keep me there is an instructor . I guess because i had already had two and a half years of college and i knew some radio theory from my first courses. I knew a little bit more than most of the other guys did. So, they kept me there and i became an instructor. For the radio school. [laughter] ben so, i stayed in chicago, having a great time as a gi in this wonderful town, which was very gi happy. They loved soldiers in chicago. The midwest, leaving new york and learning a little bit more about america by going to chicago, which is in the midwest and which is really midwest, friendly and warm, and completely different than green hook. I loved it there. [laughter] chicago, veryand different. Ben very, very different. [laughter] so, i became a radio instructor, i went to the various soldier places, like the various places where they have kids eating, playing pingpong and things like that. , there was a nice place there to meet nice jewish girls. Had a wonderful time in chicago. So, this is like 42, 43. Ben this is 42, 43. This is 43. Did you ever get a chance to go to a cubs game or any baseball games . 43, you had the all american girls starting around there. Ben i didnt go to baseball games. I was not a cub fan, i was a dodgers fan. [laughter] i wasnt interested in the cubs. But i was interested in girls. The jewish welfare board had a really wonderful place where i would go, all the time. After school, after work, i would teach the gis, teach the radio and then i would go off. They would go to tail Gunning School and i would stay there and teach more. How long did you stay at the school . Ben six months. I believe, it was three months in tail Gunner School, in radio school, and then i became an instructor. I was there for six months is an as an instructor. And then i heard of something called the astp. Have you heard of that . The Army Special Training program . Ben thats right. The astp. I couldnt believe my luck. [laughter] the astp, the army realized that world war ii was not like world war i. It was a technical war and the army needed technical people. They n