Albert Poland and Victor Rosenbaum; the Famous Kids from School #43 - by Nan Brooks

 

Standing: Albert Poland and Victor Rosenbaum

Sitting: Julia Beaman and me with fancy glasses

Memory is odd, eh? Sometimes I long to remember details from, say, 1954. And sometimes the kindly forces of the universe provide prompts.

A few months ago I was musing about my elementary school years at James Whitcomb Riley School #43 in Indianapolis and the kids I knew there. I kept returning to memories of one Albert Poland, who encouraged my acting in ways I doubt he ever knew. I remembered the other brilliant ones too, like Victor Rosenbaum, whose music moved me. It turns out my memories of Albert and Victor were clear signs of who they would become in adulthood.

Albert asked me to help with his puppet shows, as I recall, because he needed girls’ voices. My pal Julia Beaman and I pitched in and I was flattered no end. We helped construct a puppet theater complete with a curtain on a pulley. Puppets – technically marionettes, I suppose – might have been made from plastic dolls on strings and operated from above. It’s all fuzzy now, but I do remember a fairy tale princess in a fluffy pink dress, whose voice I supplied. We presented shows to classes at school; at one point, Albert was given a full hour each week to present his latest creation. One afternoon, whoever was operating the princess from above (was it me?) dropped the whole thing and she (the princess, that is) went crashing to the floor of the puppet stage, her strings and attached popsicle sticks (?) piled around her. I remember Albert whispering, “Keep talking!” So, aware that the Show Must Go On, I made up something about fainting and attempted to sound like a damsel in distress. The hand of Whoever reached down, picked up the puppet and strings, and the show went on. It wasn’t my first adventure in ad lib, but it must have felt significant because I can feel the tension in my shoulders and stomach as I write about it now.

Albert and his other ventures were significant too. I remember sitting a corner of his parents’ garage, where he operated a limited-range radio station somehow or other. I remember being at a small table, clumsy at typing letters that had something to do with Judy Garland. And I remember addressing post cards.

There the memories fade out except for the presence of Julia and Victor Rosenbaum, Albert’s buddy.

One of the gifts of quarantine this year has been time to browse online for books, especially theater memoirs. I was doing just that in April when I came across Stages: a Theater Memoir by – yes, Albert Poland. It turns out he ran off to New York from the Midwest as soon as he could and became a leading producer and general manager of such productions as Grapes of Wrath, Little Shop of Horrors, As Is, and almost a hundred more. He was particularly suited to the worlds of Off-Broadway and Off-Off Broadway, which he loved. He is described as legendary and now describes himself as “blissfully retired.”

Albert also founded the first Judy Garland Fan Club – maybe the only one. On New Year’s Eve, 1955, after sending multiple letters to Judy and receiving no response, Albert did a daring thing. He called her up, long distance. He did so without parental permission or knowledge, which his father would mention for years afterward. I believe the Universe was blessing Albert’s dreams when someone answered the phone and that person was Judy Garland herself. It is a mark of young Albert’s mettle that he managed to speak at all. He told her he loved her. He told her wanted a career in show business and that she was his inspiration. He told her he wanted to form her fan club and that he needed a letter of permission from her to provide to the movie magazines where the club would be listed. They exchanged addresses and it all went from there.  It’s all in Stages in Chapter 2 and beyond.

I read the book in two sittings only because a pressing appointment interrupted me. I was fascinated to learn about his memories of those School 43 days and, as a theater artist myself, enthralled by his stories of triumphs, struggles, outlandish personalities, and especially of the kind people, the people with integrity with whom he surrounded himself.

I admire how Albert knew what he wanted and went after it, how he kept his integrity, how he supported and inspired so many artists and audiences by his work.

Victor Rosenbaum, a pianist who was often encouraged by the School #43 faculty, became a concert artist, educator and administrator. He toured internationally, taught at the New England Conservatory, Eastman School of Music, Brandeis, and elsewhere. From Wikipedia: “One early review said: "Rosenbaum is one of those artists who make up for all the drudgery the habitual concert goer must endure in the hopes of finding the occasional, real right thing." (Boston Globe). When he was about 14, Victor set to music the poem, “God’s World” by Edna St. Vincent Millay. I can hear bits of it now and quote the first line, “O world, I cannot hold thee close enough”. A gift from Victor that echoes in my mind still.

What strikes me now is how Albert was very much who he is back there in the third grade when Miss Milliken gave him a full hour each week to present his work to the school.  And how Victor was who he was, encouraged by the adults around him who recognized his particular genius. I smile every time I think of them.

And I eventually come round to the realization that I was who I am too, though my career goals went the way of most white middle class girls in those days. I married and had two sons, of who I am most proud. Eventually, I formed a theater company and spent twenty years encouraging and teaching theater skills to women, then portraying Eleanor Roosevelt, ad libbing my way around the country. But that is another story.  Who were you as a kid?