Schneck Post1930

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All three children were put in an orphanage, “Homewood Terrace”, on the corner of Sloat Blvd in SF. This was the 2nd time for Tom.
The very next day, after school, Tom found his way to escape.
Tom ran away and learned to live independently. To earn a living, he sold newspapers for the S.F. Call-Bulletin on the streets of San Francisco.
(Ironically, 35 years later, Sophy's eldest son sold the peach colored, "Call-Bulletin" on Valencia and 22nd St in SF. 41 years later, son 2, Frank home delivered it).   Pressmen at the newspaper printing plant allowed him to sleep on newspaper sacks near the warm, news printing presses.
Later, he joined the U.S. Navy.   When he joined the Navy, he was asked what he wanted to do. He replied that he was a “street fighter”. The Navy replied that they used fighters as entertainers, namely boxers, who would be transferred from ship to ship.   So, Tom became a boxer.   Aboard ship the boxers were supposed to practice boxing. However, they spent most of their time playing cards. They posted a lookout and when a non-comm supervisor was spotted, the “boxers” would work up a sweat, and in a minute would appear to be practicing.   When the supervisor left, it was back to the card games.
Then someone told Solomon that Tom was in the Navy. Solomon went to the Navy and reported that Tom was underage.   Tom was given an honorable discharge just before his eighteenth birthday. Tom then went on to serve on ships as a waiter. He worked for Matson Lines out of S.F., sailing the Pacific, mostly on cargo ships carrying only a few passengers. The slogan at that time was that “every banana is a guest, and every guest is a pest”.
In 1930 Tom met Ruth Inda, who was working in a cigarette factory. Tom and Ruth married.
Tom Jr. was born in 1939 and Richard in 1941.
During WWII, Tom worked as a pipe fitter on ships.   At one point the pipe fitters went on strike and Tom was arrested because strikes were illegal during the war. He was defended by Vincent Hallinan, via the Union.   Hallinan, a top S.F. criminal attorney, told Tom to come to court unshaven and in his pipe fitter clothing. When the prosecutor asked a witness if Tom was the striker among the pipe fitters, the witness could not identify Tom and the case was dismissed.
While in S.F., Tom was at the Union Hall waiting for the next waiter job and a bartender job came up.   Someone gave him a drink recipe book and he became a bartender at the Palace Hotel, He later moved to the St. Francis Hotel.
While working at the St. Francis as a bartender Tom met a housing contractor who could not get bank financing to build houses.   Tom made a handshake deal with the contractor to build a house on Randall Street in S.F. with Tom would making monthly payments.   The house was fully paid in a few years.
Neither Tom nor Ruth had educations, but they wanted the best educations for their kids.   To them, this meant Catholic schools, including Catholic grammar and high schools, even though the schools were expensive, and Ruth did not work.
Tom and Ruth moved from S.F. to Santa Clara due to Tom Jr.’s childhood asthma.   The commute from Santa Clara to S.F. was too much, so Tom left the St. Francis Hotel, where he was head bartender, and unsuccessfully looked for a similar job in the San Jose area.
He eventually became a letter carrier for the Post Office, where he retired.   He and Ruth travelled and got to see a few grandkids.
The honorable discharge that Tom got from the Navy earned him a military tombstone at Santa Clara Mission Cemetery in Santa Clara, CA., where he is buried.
Maurice: Eventually, moved first to Wisconsin and then to California's Morro Bay and established a motel business. He married Agnes and had two daughters.
Sophy: changed the spelling of her name to: Sophie and began working at a local Boarding House where she met the fun-loving, electrical technician, George M. James, son of a spiral staircase carpenter, Samuel.
They got married and enjoyed going to the "Playland at the Beach", amusement park.
She loved to ride, "Shoot the Shoots", a boat of 20 people, that after going through a dark tunnel, climbed roller coaster high, turning to quickly slide down until it splashed into the water.
At Sophie's age, 24, they had a son, William, b. 1936.
Later they had another son, Frank b. 1941.