James Landreth

One of the mistakes I made in my life was to take German. After the debacle of Latin as a freshman in high school I chose German as my foreign language elective for the next three years and then a year in college. I should have chosen something simpler. Although modern German and English are both derived from Proto-Germanic and West-Germanic antecedents, and hence have some similarities of vocabulary, the grammar and syntax are quite different. It was a disaster.[i]

So, in my second year flailing about in German my father suggested I get a tutor. There was a woman in his office whom he knew who was Austrian[ii]. She would be willing to help with my struggles. Her name was Hedy Fishman. We would meet once a week at her apartment in Center City, Philadelphia and spend an hour going over my text book and homework. I don’t think I improved much in spite of her valiant efforts. Yet, I did learn quite a bit from her as I will relate.

First a word about Frau Fishman, as I addressed her. She was from Vienna originally and was born two years before the end of the 19th century. The family were dealers in coal. They were Jewish. They were wealthy. Fin de Siècle Vienna was an amazing place at the time and up until the First World War both historically and culturally renowned for its arts and arts and scientists and inventors. She described to me going to the opera with her family in her fancy gowns as a young girl. She spoke of the revolutionary art that was going on with artists such as Klimt or Schiele or Richard Strauss or Mahler. She herself was trained as an artist. This is not to say that the family didn’t enjoy at the Musikverein or Staatsoper those other more ancient Austrians, Johann or Wolfgang. She married Leo Fischmann (presumably changed to Fishman sometime after immigration to the States) and they arrived from London in 193? travelling to New York. He was a young lawyer but his specialty was copyright law and he made a name for himself in representing the new and climbing authors of Austria and German in securing their copyrights.

So, I will return to our German lessons. We were reading a standard German anthology[iii] of poems, plays and short stories. I would struggle with the translations of, for example, Durrenmatt’s Der Richter und Sein Henker, Hesse’s Der Steppenwolf, Brecht’s Die Dreigroschenoper or Mann’s Buddenbrooks. But what was remarkable was the fact that, through her husband, she knew these authors and their works. She would make little, pithy comments about so and so, “Oh, he was a real egotist” or “another young anarchist”. In retrospect, little did I realize what an amazing woman she was and what a treasure of in learning modern German literature. And I shouldn’t neglect to mention that at the end of the session she would invite me to her kitchen for a cup of tea and a Viennese cookie or perhaps a Linzertorte.[iv]

But one further thing about Hedy. Her apartment. It was generally dark but amazingly decorated. It was dark because the furniture was dark and were framed by heavy curtains. The furniture was dark because it was old, very old. Hedy, being an artist, had decorated with artifacts and paintings and statues from the fourteenth or sixteenth centuries. I remember there was one painting hanging above the stairs by an artist I’ve now forgotten, Judith and the Head of Holofernes. While this has been a subject of many artists for centuries, for example the above noted Gustav Klimt, myself not being familiar with the Hebrew canon or Christian apocrypha, it was an amazing discovery not only for the story but for the painting itself. But there were also medieval wooden statues and modern abstract paintings. It was like having German lessons in a museum or an art gallery.

To explain how this came to be is itself an amazing story. Apparently Hedy and her husband knew that trouble was coming in the mid 1930s. They made careful preparations to leave Vienna and they packed up their household in one very large crate, as she described it, and left for the England at some time before the Anschluss.[v] As noted, this household included many of the aforementioned works of art and furniture and accoutrements that were now in Hedy’s apartment. She said that she had moved to Philadelphia because she had seen a post-card of the city and the Parkway[vi] which had reminded her of the Champs-Elyssès in Paris and so any place that remined her of Paris was where she wanted to go.[vii]

After high school I moved on to college and continued with my German for one more year.[viii] The requirement was for six credits and so after the one course of reading and more floundering I gave up German. I then took a German culture course about Wagnerian opera. At least it was in English. When I would come back to Philly on breaks I would stop in and visit Frau Fishman. One time we went to a Metropolitan travelling production of Meistersinger at the Civic Auditorium in Philadelphia. No German lessons but tea and cakes were in order. She died in 1974 at the age of 76. What was interesting was that the entire contents of her apartment, or at least the art but not the tea spoons, was gratefully accepted by the Philadelphia Museum of Art. If you go there and browse the medieval German collection you will find on the little card alongside of the artwork, “Gift of Hedy Fishman”.

[i] An example of this is the time we (Aleda and I) were in Nuremberg, German on a tour of that country. I wanted to buy a book as a souvenir of the country and there was a nice bookshop near the town square. I went in and was browsing around and the sales clerk came up to me and asked, in English, if she could help me. So, wanting to put to use all those years of German I said, “Ich möchte ein Gedichtbuch von Goethe kaufen.” Well, something like that. She seemed to suggest that she had no idea what I was talking about. I think that this was because, as noted above, the word order of the verbs is changed in German, and I had said “Ich mōchte zu kaufen ein Buch von Dichtung von Goethe”. That didn’t register with her. Nevertheless, we found a book of Goethe’s poetry and I walked out pleased with the purchase and humiliated with the language.
[ii] A brief note from the Philadelphia Inquirer of 23 Aug 1970. “Mrs. Hedy Fishman, 72, retired last week after years of yeoman service as a design draftsman with the sanitation division of the Streets Department. She was responsible for checking the accuracy of architectural drawings for the departments projects. City Hall’s publicity machine, the office of the city representative, cast about for an appropriate eulogy that would crown Mrs. Fishman’s career. “She is credited with having an intimate knowledge of over 100,000 rendering of various facilities, including all the city’s six incinerators.” In that case, Mrs. Fishman knows where this press release, along with so many others, ended its brief life.”
[iii] The high school book was “The German Heritage” by Phelps and Stein. The college book was “Fleissend Deutsch”
[iv] There were occasional cultural activities outside of the book-work. We went to a production of “Meistersinger von Nurnberg” in Philadelphia, I believe at the Convention Center sometime in the 60s.
[v] Anschluss means “joining” but in English would be called the “Annexation”. This idea began after 1871 with the unification of German which excluded Austria and Austrian Germans and remained a hope among Austrian Social Democrats until the rise of Hitler, when it was less attractive. It was completed on 12 March 1938 with the union of Austria into the Third Reich.
[vi] If you have seen the movie Rocky then you have seen the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. In the famous scene – called the Training Montage – where he is jogging through Philly and climbs the steps of the art museum, he then turns, raises his arms above his head and looks down the Parkway towards city hall. That’s the Parkway.
[vii] The 1940 census reports: Hette Fishman, lodger with Iola Sundstadt at 1716 Spruce St. in Philadelphia, age 40 and that she was living in Austria in 1935. Listed that she was an artist and worked in a department store. And that she was single.
A 1942 draft registration card for Leo Fischmann notes 1737 Vine St. Philadelphia, age 54, (DOB Nov 4 1887, Vienna Austria). Alien. Person to contact: Mrs. Hedwig Vortrefflich Fischmann, same address. Employer Carl Schurz Foundation, 420 Chestunt S., Phila. Old Customs Bldg. The Carl Schurz Association was established in 1930 to promote and improve the teaching of the German language and culture and to foster friendship between the United States and German—speaking countries. (also notes we was 5’4”). Comment: given the full name of Hedwig (Hedy), it is likely her maiden name was Vortrefflich.
A New York bound passenger list of 24 Nov. 1939 on the SS President Harding from Southhampton. lists: Leo and Hedwig Fischmann (h/w). Leo age 52, Hedwig age 41. He: Lawyer, she: no occupation. Both born in Vienna, Austria. Last permanent residence Vienna, Austria. Both listed as nationality: Hebrew.
Ships Manifest Immigration record of President Harding (no. 5 and 6 on the list) notes: Name of relative/friend in the country where they came from: Friend: Mr. Lempel 103 Fellows Road, London, NW3. Passage paid by Leo F.
Intends to become citizen. Length of time to remain in US: Permanent. Name of Person they are going join: Friend, Mr. G. Manner, Friendsgove, PA. near Phila. (note: today, there is a Friends Grove School, which is near Kennet Square, PA (west of Phila.) and which is near Lincoln University.
Leo Fishman worked as a Lecturer of Sociology at Lincoln University outside of Philadelphia for a number of years but he had died before I met Hedy. See Lincoln University Yearbook, 1952. The Lincoln University 1950-651 lists faculty: Leo Fishman, A.M. Pennsylvania; LL.D. Vienna; Instructor in Sociology.
Faculty Notes of Lincoln University 1950 notes: “two others joined the faculty. Dr. Leo Fishman took James Young’s classes in sociology when the latter joined the Air Corps. Dr. Fishman was born and educated in Vienna. He has taught at Storer College, Harpers Ferry WV and Olivet College, Olivet Michigan.
Lincoln Univerity Bulletin 1953-54: Instructor Sociology
A 1941 document in the archives of N.Y. Public Library notes: Emergency Committee to Support Foreign Scholars records: Leo Fischmann, 1941. B.57f 44
[viii] I realized that at one of our sessions it would soon be our last and so I asked her for an example of one of her drawing as a keepsake. Perhaps she was too modest, perhaps not, but instead she gave me a painting done by a friends of hers, I think it was the tenant upstairs at her house. The painting was “Morning Light on Capri”, a watercolor done by Catherine Milhous. Catherine Milhous was an author, and an illustrator as well, notable for the children’s book, “The Egg Tree”. This book won the Caldecott Award in 1951. Mark now has the painting and we have the book.