My Fathers' Houses - by Steven V Roberts (Paperback)

From the Back Cover

From Steven V. Roberts comes My Fathers' Houses, a memoir of growing up in Bayonne, New Jersey, an immigrant community in the shadow of the Statue if Liberty, and the story of how his father and his grandfather's dreams-and their own passion for writing and ideas-influenced Steven's future, and inspired him to seek his fortune in New York City, the media capital of the world.

This is a story of a town and a time and a boy who grew up there, a boy who became a New York Times correspondent, TV and radio personality, and best-selling author. The town was Bayonne, New Jersey, a European village so close to New York that Steve could see the Statue of Liberty from his bedroom window. The time was the forties and fifties, when children of immigrants were striving to become American and find a place in a booming post-war world. The core of Steve's world was one block, where he lived in a house his grandfather, Harry Schanbam, had built with his own hands.

But the story starts back in Russia, where the family business of writing and ideas began. Steve's other grandfather, Abraham Rogowsky, stole money to become a Zionist pioneer in Palestine before moving to America. The tale continues through the Depression, when Steve's parents lived one block apart in Bayonne, wrote letters to each other and married in secret.

During the war years, Steve's father wrote children's books and based one of his best sellers on outings he took with his twin sons to the local train station. As his byline, he used his boys' middle names-Jeffrey Victor-so Steve got his first writing credit before he was two. The story concludes with the boy leaving Bayonne, going on to Harvard, meeting the Catholic girl who became his wife, and starting work at the New York Times-across the river, and worlds away, from where he began. Now a grandfather of five, Steve Roberts looks in the mirror and sees his own father and grandfather looking back at him-a family chain that started in 19th century Russia and thrives today in 21st century America.

Review Quotes

"Taking the boy out of Bayonne may be possible, but taking Bayonne out of the boy is not---at least, according to this warm and welcoming memoir by journalist Roberts... As he makes clear in this memoir, his Bayonne beginnings greatly informed the man he is today." - Library Journal
"Set against Bayonne's population, made up of Eastern European Catholics and Jews, Roberts' affecting recollections of sports, girls, and family seldom omit an ethnic component, and fairly burst with his feelings about his family's lore. A singular saga of assimilation." - Booklist
"An emotional story about fathers and sons that encapsulates the American experience." - Richmond Times-Dispatch
"Roberts' story is almost as much about Bayonne as it is about his family. He lovingly remembers "The Block" and its neighboring streets.... [My Fathers' Houses] is a classic American success story, a warm memoir of U.S. immigration when it was in its heyday, and a loving reminiscence about a neighborhood." - Providence Sunday Journal
"Compelling storytelling.... [My Fathers' Houses] is a warm and thoughtful book about family values and a valued family." - Hartford Courant
"A sweet book." - New York Times
"[My Fathers' Houses] brings back a time... when imagination rather than television ruled, a time of rare and wonderful innocence.... With much the same sweet, self-deprecating tone of fellow journalist Tim Russert's 'Big Russ and Me'... treasured family stories are passed along from generation to generation, along with a strong sense of the American dream and all its attendant possibilities.... A moving tribute." - New Orleans Times-Picayune
"[A] warm and welcoming memoir." - Library Journal