Worried, Hannah did not panic; Jane knelt down beside her. “What has happened—is Fritz …”
“Ach, no. No—tank de Lord for dat—but troo my fine front window—it smashed—a big brick—dey trow at me because I’m a Hun!” Hannah began to cry—not big sobs suited to her size and temperament but small hiccup ones, like those of a frightened child.
“Oh, no—that can’t be the reason.” Jane holding Hannah’s hands patted them trying to comfort her.
“Sure it is! De note say so!” came out between half-swallowed sobs.
“Note—what note?”
“Around the big brick, tied on—oh—Mein Gott! Vhat vill I tell Fritz vhy de vindow is broken? If he tinks everybody hates us—ve are de enemy not American—he vill maybe do bad something so angry. He mustn’t know—Ninnie, please, please no telling—keep mum, promise, not even John! I find a story, make up someting vhy vindow is smashed. But vhy? Vhy? Us good citizens have first papers already—even!”
After this, which became known in secret as “de bad brick day,” Hannah became acquainted with fear-expected; an inner nervousness that takes up residence within the spirit as though its pleasure is its destruction. She rarely spoke of it, perhaps was even ashamed, considering it a weakness of character. But it was there—and as with all insidious fear, it feasted on its host depleting it.
November brought its icy winds and the news from afar that Russia was in the possession of victorious Bolsheviks. Overnight those Russians on Ford’s assembly lines who retained their ancient loyalty to the House of Romanov became designated White Russians; those in favor of the new order, Red. Suspect that anyone siding with revolutionary concepts would most likely be prone to also embrace unionist ideology, these were quickly weeded out from the employment roster of the Ford Motor Company. The Boss’s vehement dislike of the very concept of workers banding together, empowered by a collective body to dictate to an employer, was a seething hatred throughout Henry Ford’s life. The Ford Motor Company was a free shop and as long as he, as its caring father figure, benevolent benefactor existed, dreaded union free it would remain.
While impatient children waited for the expected magic of Christmastime, their elders worked to make it come true. Having kept the gingerbread house wrapped in baker’s parchment, Hannah needed only to replace the sugar icicles that had been eaten off its roof and fashion a new marzipan witch to restore its perfection. This year it was Rudy who found the tree, perfect in its needle steady symmetry, brought it home on the trolley all the way from—of all places—Greektown. Hannah approved—but kept wondering why Greeks would have Christmas trees to sell and how had Rudy gotten the idea that they would. Taking Fritz aside she asked if he thought maybe their Rudy was regaining his Casanova talents. But Fritz shook his head saying it was much too soon and she shouldn’t meddle, and to leave the poor boy be. Hannah chastised, gave her husband one of her looks and returned to her kitchen.
When Jane suggested baking extra loaves of dark flour bread for her to distribute amongst her tenement charges, Hannah quite upset that she could have forgotten those in greater need, threw herself into baking so many that Jane measuring and greasing tins, knew she would have to ask Rosie and Henrietta to help carry their pungent Christmas bounty and that it would take more than just one trolley ride to do so.
Now considered old enough, John, the younger, was permitted to join his brother in the very serious contemplation of where exactly the three kings should be positioned, then getting into trouble when he tried to eat the Baby Jesus. Being a child who preferred screaming to crying, he screamed when his father smacked his behind, but quickly refocused on the gingerbread boy that Hannah offered him instead. When Fritz and Rudy lit its candles, the tree glowed with the expected magic that seems forever new. Returned from his many adventures among the cantonment camps, Ebbely entertained a parlor sadly depleted of its former inhabitants. Though everyone ring-a-linged Hannah to wish those present a Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukah, even the excitement of hearing their voices coming over wires could not quite make up for them being all together as in days gone by. This year Fritz chose not to sing his “O Tannenbaum” considering such German tradition in questionable taste during wartime.
On New Year’s Day it snowed so hard no one felt like skating; Johann went, but that was only because he was a Hollander and couldn’t help himself, was how Hannah explained it. Fritz lit a fire in the grate, Hannah brought her special biscuit tin of marshmallows, John and Rudy cut sticks for the children, Ebbely played catchy tunes on his new banjo while Jane and Henrietta made sure no one burned their sticky fingers.
The beginning of 1918 held a singular glow. There were no factory layoffs this holiday season—America was at war and her unrivaled capacity to produce the articles necessary to wage it took precedence. Feeding this new army, Tuesdays became meatless—with an added meatless day mandated for every other day. Hoover, who believed that the world lives by phrases, had food messages printed in many immigrant languages including Yiddish. Those that appealed to Hannah, she pinned up among her postcard collection.
There was: “If U Fast U Beat U Boats—if U Feast U Boats Beat U” and “Don’t let your horse be more patriotic than you—eat a dish of oatmeal!”
As fresh produce could not be shipped overseas and meat was needed for the training camps, one of Hannah’s great joys stemmed from Mr. Hoover’s Food Administration’s zealous effort to retrain America’s civilian palate for meat—to that of fish.
When Jane, having read “Catch the Carp; Buy the Carp. Cook the Carp and Eat the Carp” in one of John’s out-of-town papers, brought her the news, Hannah dropped her turkey feather duster, ran upstairs, reappeared with bluebird hat secured and market satchel swinging, marched off to the trolley and Detroit to purchase that so-longed-for carp that surely had become affordable because her lucky charm was now a sanctioned patriotic fish.
Having taken another one of Mr. Hoover’s dictums to heart—“Do not permit your child to take a bite or two from an apple and throw it away. Nowadays even children must be taught to be patriotic to the core”—Hannah had Fritz build Michael a wagon so he too could show his patriotism by collecting household garbage. On the government’s solicited salvage lists were fatty acids for soap, glycerin for explosives, fruit pits and nutshells for carbon that went into gas masks, the rest was for pig food and fertilizer.