I am in the east room of the White House on June 2, 2015 for what is turning out to be the most amazing family reunion I could ever have imagined.
At the podium, President Barack Obama is presenting the Medal of Honor to my 86 year-old cousin, Elsie Shemin-Roth, and her sister, Ina Bass, who are both daughters of Sargent William Shemin, a man who fought bravely in World War I almost a century earlier. This is an extremely rare posthumous presentation of the Medal of Honor, the military’s highest award for battlefield valor, in consideration of Sgt. Shemin’s “extraordinary heroism and selflessness, above and beyond the call of duty.”
William Shemin, whom we knew in our family as Bill, was a younger first cousin to my grandmother (Leah Shemin). Leah—my father’s mother—and many of my Shemin relatives had their origins in a small town called Orsha in what is today Belarus. Around the turn of the 20th century this Russian town near the Dnieper River had a population of about 13,000—a little more than half of them Jewish. My grandmother’s branch of the family, and a whole generation of our forebears, including Bill Shemin’s parents, fled Tsarist pograms, famines, and a general lack of opportunity in Russia to come to America in the late 1800s and early 1900s. (If you’ve seen Fiddler on the Roof, you can imagine Orsha back then, even though Fiddler is set in Ukraine, a few hundred miles to the south).
Like William Shemin, who was born in Bayonne, New Jersey in 1896, my father was a first generation American, born in the Bronx in 1915 to Russian immigrant parents. As my father made his way through high school, college, and law school, Bill Shemin would give him his first job working in the greenhouse Bill ran after he had returned from WW I, obtained a forestry degree at Syracuse University, and established his business growing trees, flowers and plants on Boston Post Road in the Bronx.
Esta historia es de la edición Issue 60 de Weston Magazine.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 9,000 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor ? Conectar
Esta historia es de la edición Issue 60 de Weston Magazine.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 9,000 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor? Conectar
Chicken Mcmansions
There’s nothing like fresh eggs. I know because our cook used three of them in my Camembert omelet this morning.
Hamptons International Film Festival's Silver Anniversary
LIGHTS! Camera! Action! It’s hard to believe the Hamptons International Film Festival (off this) is celebrating a quarter century of showcasing great works in film.
A Medal Of Honor For Sargent William Shemin…a Century Long Odyssey
I am in the east room of the White House on June 2, 2015 for what is turning out to be the most amazing family reunion I could ever have imagined.
Breaking The Fourth And Fifth Wall
Dear Evan Hansen began as a germ of an idea about the yearning for a connection with others; co-lyricist and writer Benj Pasek was considering the embellished ties his teenaged peers had to a suspected victim of suicide.
The Heirs
Eleanor belonged to that class of New Yorker whose bloodlines were traced in the manner of racehorses: she was Phipps (sire) out of Deering (dam), by Livingston (sire’s dam) and Porter (dam’s dam).
One Atlantic Events
Over the ocean, your perfect special event venue is waiting.
Scott Swimming Pools
Scott Swimming Pools, Inc. is a luxury design-build swimming pool company celebrating its 80th year in business this year.
Is Marijuana The New Ambien?
Science and anecdote in the quest for better sleep
Black Edge
The Fall of SAC Capital.
Brain Fitness - It's All In Your Mind
Frozen in mid-sentence, you forget a name. With your pen poised over a check, you cannot recall the date. You’ve gone into the kitchen, but you can no longer remember what for. And where is that damned cell phone? Are you one of the worried well? Many of us are anxious to live a long life, but fearful of our potential for the humiliation and debilitation of dementia. What to do? Should you try a computer game? Magnesium tablets? A week at an expensive brain training center? Brain fitness is the new buzzword and wealthy aging baby boomers are eager to buy a healthier brain.