July 9, 2013--Midcoast: Little Old Ladies

The morning had not gotten off to a good start and the highlight, by 11:00, was finding a parking place right in front of the Maine Coast Bookstore where we had gone to buy a copy of the New York Times.

When we emerged, grumbling that we had arrived too late and all the copies had been sold, a woman approached us with brochures in hand, looking as if she wanted to sell us tickets for a Puffin cruise or a half-off special for a twin lobster dinner.

"Do you know about Frances Perkins?" she asked. We tried to ignore her. She persisted, "There's an exhibit about her inside." She pointed toward a path through a lush garden that led to what looked like a small store adjacent to Maine Coast.

She smiled at us, undoubtedly picking up our out-or-sortness. "It's free and will only take a few minutes. You have the perfect parking spot for both the bookstore and the Frances Perkins exhibit."

"Maybe we should," I mumbled to Rona. "Lately, I've been reading a lot about the New Deal and Frances Perkins played a big part in it. Especially when it came to figuring out how to conceptualize the Social Security program."

"Wasn't she the first female cabinet member?" Rona recalled.

"Indeed she was," the woman with the brochures bubbled. "And do you know, she summered in Newcastle, at her grandmother's place right across the bridge from here." She gestured up Main Street. "She's buried there. Frances. At the old Glidden Cemetery. Between her husband and grandmother, Cynthia Otis." She looked around and whispered conspiratorially, "They say it's haunted."

"This is right down your alley," Rona said to me, still smarting about not being able to get the Times, especially its crossword puzzle. "You love old cemeteries. You never seem to get enough of them. So maybe we should go inside and learn a little more about Frances Perkins so when we visit the cemetery you'll know who's who."

The docent, that is what she turned out to be, was enjoying our spatting. "Come inside with me. It's cool and I have ice water for visitors."

We followed her and she directed us toward the corner of the room where the exhibit started with information about Fannie's childhood. "She was named Fannie Perkins but later, after college--she went to Mount Holyoke--she became Frances Perkins, thinking it would be a more fitting name for someone wanting a career. She felt there were enough barriers at the time to women's advancement that she didn't want to be stuck with, to her, an unserious-sounding name such as Fannie."

"Just like your Aunt Fannie," Rona remembered, "who worked in a sweatshop, became a suffragette, was about as old as Frances Perkins, and wanted us to call her Fay."

"Which my father, to needle her, always refused to do."

Being surrounded by history, the aura of the remarkable Frances Perkins, and recalling my Aunt Fay begin to pull us out of our funk. The ice water on the very hot and humid morning also helped.

It was indeed a small exhibit and we had worked our way through it in less than half an hour, though we enjoyed the docent's chattering.

As we turned to leave, a group of four clearly very elderly women walked haltingly up the garden path. When they finally made it to the door I held it open for them and Rona rushed over to help one, who was using a walker, up the single step into the room.

After they caught their breath and soaked up some of the air-conditioned air, the docent welcomed them and, as with us, told them where it was best to begin. Rather than follow that suggestion they shuffled toward that part of the exhibit that had information about Secretary of Labor Perkins' role in 1935 in establishing Social Security.

Though the docent, Alice, continued to point to other parts of the exhibit, the women seemed only interested in Social Security. I assumed that was because all of them must receive it. Perhaps depend on it. Also, I confess, I thought maybe they were a little past their prime and not following what Alice was suggesting. So I drifted over to them to see if I too might be able to help orient them to where they were and what surrounded them. It could easily be that at their age they could be quite confused.

"You know if it weren't for that," the woman who seemed oldest said, pointed with a trembling hand toward the section of the exhibit devoted to Social Security, "it would be so difficult for Henry and me. He's gone, wouldn't you know," she said wistfully to no in particular, "I don't know how we'd get by. Even heat our house. It gets so cold here." She shivered as if to demonstrate how frigid it gets during Maine winters.

"Do you remember the time," I asked, "before there was Social Security?"

"What did you say, son?" She cupped her ear toward me.

"I was asking about Social Security."

"Oh, that. Social Security." I waited for her to continue, which she didn't. She appeared to stare blankly ahead.

But she continued, "I remember back in, what was it, 1930 or so when it was approved." I didn't correct her recollection of the actual date. "How old was I then? About your age," she said with a full smile. When I shrugged, with a twinkle, she said, "I'm just having some fun with you, dear."

"I too am old enough to collect it," I said, returning her smile, "For a number of years now. Though I appreciate your flattering me. On these days when I'm all aches and pains I can use whatever encouragement comes my way."

"Did you know my father knew Eleanor Roosevelt?"

"No, I didn't." This seemed like a non sequitur.

"You know about My Day?"

"I sure do. It was the newspaper column she wrote, I think, six days a week. For many years."

"For more than 25 years. It was published in 90 papers around the country. She wrote about family matters but also about workers and women and how badly Negros were treated. To some, it was very controversial. Well, my father worked for United Press, actually United Features, and he was her editor and responsible for syndicating it."

"That's amazing," I said, truly amazed at who one from time-to-time encounters.

"They were so close that my family, including me, spent a weekend in the White House and then many times we went to Hyde Park and stayed in Mrs. Roosevelt's cottage. I forget the name. It's something like Overkill."

"Val-kill," I said. "I think that was its name."

"That's right. It so frustrating when you get to be my age how much you forget."

"You're doing just fine," I said, meaning every word of it.

"And Ernie Pyle as well."

"Who?" Rona asked.

"You're not old enough, darling, to remember; but I'm sure your uncle does." I held back from telling her that we are married. This happens all the time.

"Wasn't he," I said, "the war correspondent? During the Second World War? As we would describe it today, he was embedded with the troops, even on D Day."

"The very same. It was my father, also, who suggested to him that he become a war correspondent. I remember him too. He asked me to call him 'Ernie.' Such a sweet man. But he was killed in the pacific after the German's surrendered. My father was so upset, believing it was his fault that he died in combat."

She sighed deeply, thinking back over all those years and the events of her life.

The docent, Alice, was hovering in the background and to lift everyone's spirits and bring us back to Frances Perkins, said, "Do you know about her contributions to the Social Security Act? How, if it weren't for her, after it was passed by Congress, it likely would have been declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court?"

"Indeed I do," one of the other women said. "At the time they were overturning all sorts of programs. The National Recovery Act and many of the minimum wage laws. I remember that as if it were yesterday. So when they were working on Social Security, Frances Perkins said it was important that they think about how to protect it from the Court. She came up with the idea not to call it insurance, thinking it would be found to be unconstitutional if it was presented that way. She suggested--and this is what they did--that it be considered a tax program. And she was right--the Supreme Court upheld it."

"Not unlike what just happened with Obamacare," one of the other women added with a wink.

"Time for us to go," the first woman announced. "We have to get home before the temperature hits 100. We all have weak hearts," she whispered to me.

"I don't know what your doctors think," I leaned close to her, "but your hearts seem pretty strong to me."

After they left, Rona said, "Who needs the newspaper anyway when were surrounded by so much richness. The crossword puzzle, on the other hand . . ."