10 North Shore Towers Courier n January 2017 Happy Birthday, George! Story and photos by Stephen Vrattos On Saturday, December 3, family and friends gathered in Towers on the Green to celebrate an event 110 years in the making, the super-centenarian birthday of North Shore Towers resident, George Feldman. Born in 1906 in Kings County and living most of his life in the New York area, Feldman grew up the son of Jewish immigrants, David Feldman and Mary Feinstein, who came from an area of Russia between Kyiv and Odesa. As a youngster, he helped out in his father’s Brooklyn store, Feldman’s Furniture for All, attended Erasmus High School and later studied literature at Syracuse University. Feldman’s career began as a partner in Diamonds Haberdashery in Manhattan. During the 1950s and 1960s, he was a principal of Long Island Mortgage Company, a housing and construction lender, as well as a principal of Mutual Mortgage Company, a small business administration company, which financed many business and real estate ventures. We love you, George! Feldman married twice, respectively to Helen Price and Renee Gettinger, had three children, seven grandchildren, and twelve great grandchildren. This past fall he experienced the second of two World Series the Chicago Cubs won in the franchise’s history, the last in 1908! He watched the Brooklyn Dodgers at Ebbets Field and has been a long time Mets fan. During his life, Feldman’s lived through two world wars, witnessed the conversion of street lights from gas-lit to electrical, horse-drawn George in his younger days cabs to gas-fueled engines, the initial take-off of airplanes to the first men landing on the moon, and rotary to smart phones. His love of jazz extends back to his teenage years; he even had a jazz singer and band at his Bar Mitzvah in 1919! On Saturday, children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren and guests shared their love and reminisced about a man who touched hundreds of lives. NST Resident Selda Steckler presented a poem she’d written. She sat at a table of Feldman’s good friends from his twenty years living at the co-op. There were also area dignitaries. Both District #23 Council Member Barry Grodenchik and Community Board #13 Executive Secretary Jerry Wind were on hand, respectively bestowing a citation and proclamation to the Birthday Boy! “I love you all,” Feldman cried with a flurry of thrown kisses. The feeling’s mutual, George. See you next year! The Matchton Group, Ltd. Mac Matchton President 50 Years Experience NST Resident All forms of insurance including: ������������������������������������������������������������ ������������������������������ ���������������� ���������������������� HOUSE CALLS! 111 Great Neck Road, Suite 303 Great Neck, NY 11021 ���������������������������������������������������������������� [email protected] Guest of Honor 10 NORTH SHORE TOWERS COURIER ¢ December 2016
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