Long distance love

By Bob Cudmore, Focus on History, Daily Gazette

     In the summer of 1931, my parents lived on what my father called ”long distance love.”

Born in England in 1909, Clarence Cudmore came to America with his mother Elizabeth and three siblings in 1912. My grandfather Harry Cudmore and oldest uncle were already in Amsterdam, weaving silk at Fownes Brothers glove mill. The family settled with other relatives in the East End on Eagle Street.

Julia Cook, my mother, was born in Randall in 1914 and moved to Amsterdam with her mother and two siblings after World War I. Her mother Margaret was a widow and started a boarding house on Forbes Street to support her family.

Clarence and Julia met at East Main Street Methodist Episcopal Church.  Clarence left school to work in Mohawk Carpet Mills. Julia skipped two grades and graduated high school in 1930. She went to Albany Normal School to earn a teaching degree but left school because of emotional and money problems.

She and her sister Jane spent the summer of 1931 working as maids at a Jewish Catskill resort.. Their mother had grown up near Phoenicia and relatives kept their eyes on the girls.

That summer Julia and Clarence exchanged 24 love letters.  “It seemed awfully queer and funny to me Sunday not having you come after me and loving me too, “ Julia wrote in June.

Clarence responded with a story about a rain-soaked church picnic in Tribes Hill where the minister’s car got stuck on wet grass and Clarence and his friends put chains on the tires, “I had my new suit on, so you could imagine how mad I was.” 

“Oh, by the way, I have an appointment with my cousin on Thursday to go to see “Dracula” at Fleischmanns,” Julia wrote. ’You don’t mind, do you? He’s my cousin and we’ll be chaperoned thank God.”

Clarence had a sudden expense--$3 to fix broken glasses. His sister, Gladys, was mad when he told her how much it cost.

In July Julia had an attack of hysterics. Clarence told her of a wedding at their Amsterdam church where the groom was late and the 100 guests were served sandwiches which were left over from a church picnic. Julia refused two dates and said business was brisk at the inn. Clarence hitched a ride with Julia’s sister’s fiance for a visit in Phoenicia.

Clarence wrote, “Gladys (Clarence’s sister) asked if you threw your arms about me when you saw me. I told her ‘What did you think she was going to do, break out with smallpox?”_

Julia came down with stomach ulcers. A doctor prescribed medicine and a bland diet for the rest of the summer. “Nothing but milk and cereals,“ she wrote.

Clarence responded, “If I was the doctor, I wouldn’t give you anything but love and kisses.”

Clarence made another trip to Phoenicia and came back with pictures to show his mother, “After my mother looked at them for five minutes, she said ‘Is that Julia?’ I told her it was Greta Garbo!”.

In August, Clarence wrote, “I don’t like the idea of living on long distance love.”

Julias health had improved but she was fearful after a summer of swimming because infantile paralysis was spreading in the Catskills. “They are closing the movies and churches,” she said.

Julia and Clarence were married in Amsterdam by the Reverend Frank T. Love at East Main Street Methodist Church in Amsterdam in 1934. They raised two children and had been married 60 years when Clarence died in 1994. Julia died two years later.

Bob Cudmore is a freelance writer.

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