Stanislaus Markoski: Where Did He Go?

We last saw the Markoski family leaving the farm in South Hadley, Hampshire County, MA around 1931. The Holyoke-South Hadley-Chicopee directory said they “removed to Brooklyn”. This was news to me and didn’t seem to fit what I knew about the family. Yet, Stanislaus and Joanna didn’t return to the Holyoke area until 1936, so they had to be somewhere! I had to cast my research net a little wider and view them in the context of their whole family.

The children were growing up and beginning to live their own lives. Oldest son Max moved back to Holyoke about 1928, which is when I assume he married Catherine Harazmus. Stephen began work as a rubber worker (I assume at Fisk in Chicopee) about 1927 then moved to Springfield in 1931. Robert, an outstanding athlete in high school, began attending Williams College in Williamstown, Berkshire County, MA in 1930. Doris worked as a “tuber” in an auto tire factory (probably Fisk) and Anita was a waitress. Youngest sons Bruno and Charles started high school in South Hadley and got involved in sports like their older brother.

It was in October 1931 when my grandfather Bruno’s life changed dramatically. While playing football for Central High School in Springfield (why he was there, I don’t know), he had a terrible injury that gave him a serious concussion and hospitalized him at Wesson Memorial Hospital. As a result, he took some time of from school, presumably to fully recover.

I imagine that the combination of Bruno’s hospital bills and other effects of the Great Depression had an impact on Stanislaus’ and Johanna’s finances, and perhaps they could no longer sustain the farm. This is only a guess. But what would make them move to Brooklyn or anywhere other than the Holyoke area?

Brooklyn Bridge! Courtesy Wikipedia.

First of all, despite me not being able to find them in any records there (yet, anyway), the Markoskis did spend some time in Brooklyn. Apparently my grandfather told my mother that this period of his life is when he became a New York Yankees fan. He’d said he was able to see them play–and this was when both Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig were on the team!

As far as why they moved, I may never know for sure, but I believe it may have something to do with daughter Doris. Sometime in the early 1930s, she married John Miezianka. I was told that my grandfather lived with her in Riverhead, Suffolk County, NY (in eastern Long Island) to finish high school. I recently found out that Charles went to high school there as well! (And both met their future wives there.). It only follows that Stanislaus and Johanna lived there too.

Both Bruno and Charles had a successful time at Riverhead High. Because of his injury and subsequent time off, Bruno graduated later (1934) and was president of his class. I imagine that being older than his fellow classmates gave him a certain maturity that they looked up to. Charles graduated the year before and was secretary of his class, involved in sports and drama and was the class poet. Charles, like Robert, was able to go to the college prep school, Deerfield Academy and later to Williams College (I assume on athletic scholarships). My grandfather, whose sports career was long over, went into the working world.

After about five years in New York, the Markoskis returned to Holyoke, but their lives were to be much different from their first arrival there.