Last edit of this page 2022.JAN.31
Ida Simon was born July 19, 1915, joining the large Simon clan in the family house in Mocanaqua.
This account was written by Gary Simon about his Aunt Ida, based on many stories and details from Ida’s daughter Ellin and son Jesse.
She has told the story of a childhood misadventure in which she got into the Passover wine, became tipsy and was found in a field near the family home. She recounted being friends with Lee Vincent in Mocanaqua. Lee Vincent became a respected and beloved bandleader around Wilkes-Barre.
Ida liked to write stories and she covered Shickshinny High School [last update 2022.JAN.10] for the Times-Leader Evening News.
Aunt Ida went through difficult situations. Her mother died when she was a young teenager. Her father committed suicide a few months later. Ida and her younger sister Ruth were the ones who made this discovery. With both parents gone, she was cared for by her sister Edith and her husband Herman in Binghamton, New York.
Ida bottled up the trauma of discovering her father’s suicide to the extent that her children were not told.
Ida must have been a football fan! This was in the Wilkes-Barre Evening News, 1931.OCT.17. It is not known why she used the X as a middle initial.
Ida had many talents, including debating. This appeared in the Wilkes-Barre Times Leader Evening News, May 12, 1932.
The country was in a deep economic depression, and Ida could not go to college. She had wanted to be a teacher. Instead she continued to live with Edith and Herman in Binghamton, and she worked as a bookkeeper. Edith had also worked as a bookkeeper, and it is possible that both worked in Herman’s store.
July 24, 1935. This was an interesting adventure … with a fortunate ending.
The circumstances of the hospital trip, June 20, 1936, are not known.
We do not know how she met her husband Milton Reisner. Milton’s family had moved its mattress manufacturing business to Binghamton. Milton’s father had his business in Brooklyn, perhaps also in Bridgeport, and eventually Port Chester. He later set up a business in Miami.
Ida took a trip with Milton to Mocanaqua to meet Nate and Abe, later writing to ask them how they liked him. She was living then with Edith and Herman in Binghamton. This may be Ida’s engagement picture.
The wedding announcement appeared 1940.FEB.06. The United States Census for 1940 gave the home address as 59 (not 56) Schiller.
Ida and Milton married in Binghamton and lived there till the end of World War II. Milton was disqualified from military service because of a punctured eardrum, but he worked in a war plant.
Their first child, Jesse, was born in Binghamton. After the war the family moved to Brooklyn, where their second child, Ellin, was born. While Ellin was a toddler, the family moved to 65 Wesley Avenue in Port Chester.
The house on Wesley Avenue brings memories of regular wiffle ball games, extended as home-and-away series for their visits to the Simon home in Kingston.
Aunt Ida had a busy life in Port Chester. She was very active in the local Hadassah and served as the chapter president for a few years. She was also on the Board of the Hebrew School. With support from other synagogue mothers, she pushed to allow for girls to become bat Mitzvah. She was successful in this endeavor, and Ellin’s class was the first to become bat Mitzvah. The big event was held on a Friday night, with five young women achieving this milestone.
Ida and Milton were devout Democrats. Their political interests made them followers of the New York Times, the liberal-era New York Post, and the Port Chester newspaper. The papers were read by the whole family. When Ellin was about five or six, Mom took her to an Adlai Stevenson rally. Ellin recalls having a button “All the way with Adlai.” Ida admired Eleanor Roosevelt, kept a scrapbook with articles about Eleanor Roosevelt’s work; Ellin may still have this scrapbook. Ida also admired Golda Meier, and passed to Ellin a well worn biography. These memories, including the efforts to secure bat Mitzvah ceremonies, very much identify Ida as a feminist in a world which constrained her own ambitions.
Ida was in her own way a force of nature. She despised gossip and refused to participate in it. Her feelings can be directly related to the stigma of Jacob’s suicide.
It was always fun for Gary to be with Aunt Ida and her family. The trip to the Reisner house in Port Chester was not easy, so there were fewer trips than desired. Gary’s father Abe had a life of driving was in small Pennsylvania towns and on hilly back roads. The traffic-intense trip through New Jersey and Westchester County were not easy for him.
The visits were always fun. Uncle Milton was happy and jovial, and Aunt Ida was endearing. Gary and his sister Kathy were easily compatible with their kids, Jesse and Ellin.
Jovial and fun-loving indeed!
There are recollections of Uncle Milton’s furniture store, an impressive business operation in a busy part of Port Chester.
At some point, Uncle Milton and Aunt Ida sold that house and took an apartment on King Street in Port Chester. King Street was a named exit from the parkway, so the apartment was easy to find.
While they lived at the apartment, they acquired a dog which remains in memory for two reasons. First, it was given the name Jose Sputnik. Second, the dog drank from the toilet bowl. It’s not unknown for dogs to do this, but it came as a surprise.
When Ellin was in nursery school at the Jewish Center in Port Chester, Ida was friendly with a local artist, Lily Harmon, who painted murals in the Jewish Center. Lily’s daughter Amy and Ellin were very good friends. Ellin recalls their big Victorian home on Ridge Street in Port Chester. The garden at this home had many sculptures, and there were many paintings inside. Amy’s parents got divorced and moved out of Port Chester, losing touch with the Reisners. This friend was Amy Hirschorn, daughter of Joseph Hirschorn, the eponymous donor of the museum in Washington. As a child, Ellin had no idea that the garden where they played held famous and valuable sculptures belonging to Amy’s father.
In many ways Ida was a protective mother. She always worried about her children, especially when bike riding with friends. She would always give permission, but with special instructions to let me do it, but told me to have fun and be careful.
She was the matchmaker for Jo and Ron’s Aunt Dorothy (DoDo), introducing her to Shanks Friedman. DoDo was Harry Naveen’s sister. They married and lived in Port Chester.
She liked to entertain and enjoyed a good party. She was a very good cook and baker – as were all the Simon sisters. She was also a very practical person, so that her friends of Mom and family members often sought her advice. Ellin recalls her as being very fair minded and not judgmental.
She suffered from serious hypertension, well before there were good drugs for treating the condition, and ultimately died too young from a massive coronary. She died April 24, 1980.
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