Valentine Photos

September 15, 1945

Chris Shoulet found pictures in an antique shop of her great-grandmother's brother Lew. They are publicity photos from the Acme Newspictures Company in New York. Each had copy on the back.

 “VALENTINE MAKES DEBUT AS “GANG-BUSTER”

NEW YORK - - Lewis J Valentine, Former New York City Police Commissioner, Starts his radio career as “Gang Buster’s” Teller of Tales. Flanked by pretty maidens Louise Fitch (Left) and Julie Stevens (Right). Sound Effects Man Robert Prescott (background) holds two pistols in the air to put people in proper mood. Valentine quit his post as Police Commissioner to take radio job. He made his debut Saturday Night (Sept. 15)...BU 80...
Credit Line (ACME) 9-15-45 (RM)

July 31, 1940

"VALENTINE IN MOVIE PLEA FOR BOMBING INFORMATION "

NEW YORK CITY - - Lewis J. Valentine, Commissioner of New York City Police, making his plea, for distribution in the nation’s movie houses, for information concerning the bombing outrage at the British Pavilion at the New York World’s Fair in which two detectives were killed several weeks ago.

CREDIT LINE (ACME) 7/31/40 BURS BUFF LON (GW) 567443

(Stamped Aug 10, 1940. Photo By Acme Newspictures, Inc, 820 E. 42nd street, new York city, Please Credit “Acme Photo”)

September 6, 1945

"VALENTINE RESIGNS TO GO ON 'GANGBUSTERS' ”

NEW YORK - - Police Commissioner Lewis J. Valentine says goodbye to the press in his office today (Sept, 6) after he announced his resignation, to be effective from Sept. 14th. Commissioner Valentine will assume the role of Chief Investigator and Commentator on the “GANGBUSTERS” radio program. He has been affiliated with the New York Police Department for 42 years. 11 of them as Commissioner. Left To Right: Al Williams, First Deputy Police commissioner,; Commissioner Valentine; and John J. O’Connell, Chief Inspector.

CREDIT (ACME) 9/6/45 (MO), BU #1A MGS, (Stamped Sep 11, 1945), ACME NewsPictures, inc. 3) 770932, New York Bureau, 11? Eighth Ave, New York City. Please Credit “ACME Photo”

The Search Box

There's a new feature over in the left hand column, a SEARCH box. Type in the subject or name and search this blog for your own self or a topic like dogs.

Left to right: Elizabeth Daly Valentine,

 her son Commissioner Lewis, his wife Teresa  and daughter Miriam 

at his Swearing-In Ceremony in 1934

 For example: Type in Lew and three or four pages of posts referring to Lewis Valentine come up at the top of the text. 

Try  Brooklyn or Grandpa

You can also search by Label. Many of the posts have the names of the families in the labels, which you will see at the bottom of each post. See the labels at the bottom of this one.

Click on the family name or topic there and you'll see all the posts with that label. If you are looking for a particular person or family try both search methods.

PS: I've been trying out the Search box and find it's hard to work. Just keep trying is all I can suggest.

Cece in the Newspaper

Cece, a professional singer and actress, was recently interviewed for the Weekly Valley Vantage in her home town. For those who don't subscribe we have pirated some excerpts and added a few photos.

How did you first get involved in singing/when did you know it was what you love to do?

Cecelia and her grandmother

I knew from a very, very young age that I was fascinated by the mechanics of singing. I listened over and over to the records my older brother and sister brought home from the time I was 5 or 6, imitating every nuance I could of each individual singer, trying to knock off their styles, accents, everything. I listened to the Broadway recordings of musicals like South Pacific, Funny Girl, Jesus Christ Superstar, anything I could get my hands on, over and over ad nauseum! I’m sure it drove my siblings insane.

About 10

From them, I inherited my obsession with all the Beatles albums, and the Beach Boys’, and learned all about harmony. I lived and breathed that stuff. It got me through a lot of adolescent angst, like many of us, I guess. I had a good ear to begin with, and really fine-tuned it by constant attention to detail.

Two piano-playing aunts with saxophone playing uncle: Jack, Vera, Ann

I also came from a very musical family on my Mom’s side (she had 12 brothers and sisters, and I had around 60 first cousins), and we had big family gatherings where people played instruments, sang and danced. My aunt used to drag me up to the piano to sing from the time I was pretty small, although I was terror-stricken by it, most of the time. I preferred to sing alone in my room.


My parents had an enormous old stereo system in a huge hutch cabinet in the living room, and I would sit in front of one of the huge speakers and pull the cabinet doors around me on either side so I could listen and sing along in my own little world, when nobody was around....


Do you have any musical inspirations? People, places, objects, memories?

I remember seeing my first live play at about age 9, a high school rendition of “Carousel,” and feeling transfixed, literally floating out of the theater in a state of suspended animation. Or maybe it was arrested development - I’m not sure. But it was transformative. It wasn’t til almost 5 years later that I had the chance to audition and get cast in a high school play of my own. I think they only cast me because I was LOUD-which was a plus in those days. But I was hooked. I had finally found my niche. Unfortunately, that niche was in New Hampshire, not exactly the center of the entertainment universe.


Later, during my freshman year at college, I worked for a concert promoter, and was assigned to be Ella Fitzgerald’s dressing room attendant during a series she did at my school. I don’t think I appreciated her fully at the time, but I learned to, fast. That was incredible - to sit and listen to the best of the best, up close and personal. I have so many memories of great artists with whom I was privileged to hang out. I worked with local bands in college, and we had some great people coming through town.

After I moved to LA in '76, I ended up going on the road pretty quickly with a French artist named Veronique Sanson, whom I met through my then-boyfriend, who was working with Stephen Stills, Veronique’s then-husband. She is a hugely popular artist in Europe, and we toured every city, town and village for months. That taught me a lot, and opened a lot of doors to me.

Back in LA, I was lucky enough to work closely with Tori Amos in the early days of her career, singing on her first LP. I toured for several years with Rita Coolidge, also working with great folks like Connie Stevens, Bill Medley of the Righteous Brothers, Eddie Money, Cheap Trick, Diana Ross, Olivia Newton-John, Jude Cole, Poco, Mick Fleetwood, Graham Nash, Stephen Stills, Mike Trampp, Timothy B. Schmitt, Bob Cowsill, either touring or recording, or both.
 *****
You'll have to refer to the Weekly Valley Vantage for more. It may have been foolish of Cece to send the article to the editors of the McNally Family Album, who are always looking for copy. But we (the editorial we) think her cousins will enjoy knowing more about her career.

Love Stories: Kay and Warren

Girls growing up in the 1950s thought a lot about love, and being a McNally was perfect since there were so many love stories told about all those aunts and uncles. No valentine was better than the story of Kathryn and Warren, teenage sweethearts who absolutely adored each other all their lives.

Warren was a formidable man to us short little kids (even shorter than him, we always teased.) He was brusque and pugnacious, but he wore his love for his wife and kids on his sleeve.

January 1946. Steve is a few weeks old.

His family were Swiss watch manufacturers and importers.

 A watch on eBay with the word Gisiger on it

The business, Fabrique d’Horlogerie B. GISIGER-GREDER (Gisiger-Greder Watchmakers), was located in Selzach, a municipality in the district of Lebern in the canton of Solothurn in Switzerland.

Emma Catherine and a granddaughter in 1958 when Emmy was about 58.

Right after World War I Warren's father Walter and uncle Hans came to New York as watch importers. Emmy---family history says she was Walter's French tutor when she was 16 years old--- followed him here. They were married in 1920 and lived first in Jersey City where Warren was born in 1921. (Jersey City seems to have had a lot more to do with his persona than any Swiss heritage.)

The Gisigers spoke French at home and Emmy did not learn English until Warren went to school. They moved to Jamaica where Warren went to high school and met Kathryn, a year younger than he. That was it.

Kathryn in 1938 when she was about 16.

Poor Warren.

Kay was born on July 6, 1922, her grandmother Elizabeth Valentine's birthday.

This week she'd be 88.

1943

Lorraine found this photo in Jack's things. It may be Kay & Warren's wedding photo.

Another photo from Jack's pictures. It's inscribed:

"Kay's New Feather Cut, 1943"

When the War began Warren enlisted in the Air Force. Kay joined him in Baton Rouge while he was waiting to be shipped out and they married there in January, 1943. Cece says she was told often that when Warren asked permission to marry Grandpa’s ninth daughter, “he said something to the effect of, ‘Oh, you're gonna do whatever you want to anyway, so go ahead….’ " (Grandpa seems to have learned a lesson from his previous futile experiences in marriage prohibition.) Kay was 20 and Warren 21 when they married.

Warren at 22, home on leave in summer, 1943

Warren was a navigator attached to Air Force bombardment groups stationed in England. An online history of the 390th Bombardment Group (H) group mentions him with an accounting of their service:

During 31 months beginning in January, 1943 “the 390th [flew] 301 missions, dropping 18,755 tons of bombs, destroying or damaging 454 enemy planes with another 57 probable destroyed. These war-time achievements come with a price for both men and machines. Only fifteen of the original thirty-five flight crews returned home.”

The planes were B-17s

We were all raised on stories of Warren’s war years---how dangerous the bomber runs were, how frightened the family was for him and Kay, and how he was (fortunately) badly injured in the forearm by a piece of shrapnel, which allowed him to come home before he was killed. Cece wrote: ”He spent some time in an English hospital before being discharged. I have the piece of shrapnel they removed from his arm, and his purple heart.” We really are lucky he survived.

Warren may also have flown with the 569th Squadron

In the history of the 390th they list all the runs each crew member made. Warren’s missions date from October, 1943 through March, 1944 and include flights to Frankfurt, Paris, and Rjuken, Norway. The unit’s

“missions included attacks on marshalling yards at Frankfurt, bridges at Cologne, oil facilities at Zeitz, factories at Mannheim, naval installations at Bremen, and synthetic oil refineries at Merseburg.”

Read more about the 390th here: http://www.390th.org/

And specifically about Warren here:
http://www.390thspace.com/missions.php?name=Gisiger%2C+Warren+E

Read more about B-17's here.
http://telstarlogistics.typepad.com/telstarlogistics/2007/02/time_travel_in_.html

Pat B. in her Uncle Warren's lap

 from Jack's photos, inscribed "Pat's Birthday",

probably when she was 3 in August,  1943

After the War, Warren joined the Gisiger family business, located on Nassau Street in the Wall Street area. Due to the depression and also probably to wartime trade restrictions, his father had switched his focus to stamps, philately. Walter Gisiger became one of the important dealers in the stamp district on Nassau Street. Ten years after the war he died suddenly and Warren took over the business.

Kay after the War on a camping trip to Montauk in 1945.

This is one of my favorite photos.

That woman knew how to camp.

Steve and Susan were born a little over a year apart soon after the war.

Steven's First Communion 1953

Cecelia surprised us all nine years later. Her older cousins  were thrilled (most of the time) with new babies Cece and Kathy B.

Uncle Ben with the three kids in October, 1956

The family moved from Long Island to New Hampshire, building a replica of the Parson Capen house, one of the oldest surviving structures in New England.

The original Parson Capen house

1983 in Palm Springs

Cece's husband Kim, Bill B, Kay, Jane, Barbara, Barbara's ex-husband and Cecelia.

Kay, like some of her sisters and nieces, suffered from an auto-immune disease that affected her lungs. She and Warren spent time in Southern California, where they hoped a climate warmer than New Hampshire would help. They also sought experimental treatment there for scleroderma. Their motives for spending winters in Palm Springs may have been sad, but their presence pleased their California niece and their youngest daughter.

Kathryn, aged 61, died during the treatment in 1984 and Warren a little over a year later. None of us could really imagine him living very long without her.

Below: Kathryn Rosemary, born in 1987, and her grandmother (in 1944) whom she never met.

Like her mother Cecelia Jane, Katy Rose is a singer.

Reunion Party 1980

Aunts Billie and Patty next to Maureen. In front of them on the floor: Michael Neary. Jane sitting on the floor.
Susan Gisiger and Chrissy (or maybe Jamin) in the chair.  On the floor looking at the camera Danny McNally and with his back to us ???


In Jane's photo albums I found these two snapshots of a reunion party labeled October, 1980. I photoshopped both of them to improve the exposure. The one above was overexposed on one side and underexposed on the other so I seamed two slightly improved pictures together.

Then we polled a group of cousins to ask who the heck was there. Kath Bentley says it was at the Bentley house in Smithtown.

The consensus:
On the very back row: Michael Neary and Billy McNally.
Middle Row: Aunts Billie, Patty, Peggy McNally and Edna. Uncle Tommy.
Maureen's standing front and center with a black shirt on and right behind her Susan with her two kids, Jamin on the left and Chrissy behind her. Some thought that might be me---but I don't remember being there. Chrissy does and she says she was standing on a chair.

To the right of Maureen: MaryAnn Neary and then the twins Dolores and Diane McNally with Uncle Pat between them. In front: Danny McNally.

The Beach

Ben and Cele, 1938

Kay & Dot 1938

To go to the beach you had to have an army blanket.

Cele, second from left, and Vera with friends in 1940

Warren in Montauk, 1945

Kansas is almost as good as New York, except we have no beach. Growing up near the beach is a great thing, a constant excuse for a party. Nothing held more excitement for me when I was a kid than the news that we were planning a trip to the ocean and Jones Beach. I always was irritated that Joan had a beach and I did not, however.

Front Row: Who's that baby on the left? Jane is the baby in the middle

Standing: Barbara behind Joan, then Pat with Maureen and Susan

Behind: Steve, Warren and on the right Ben and Bill (?).

1950

Susan, Maureen, Bill and Jane in back, 1966.

Kathy Bentley and Jane

Buddy, Ronnie, Peggy Bentley, Barbara and Peggy McNally, 1978.

 It's not that I liked the sun. I just liked the beach.

The New Yorkers have the proper wardrobes---and tans.

Ben, Moe and Biff, 1966

 Peggy behind Joan and Maureen and Joan's kids.

And who is that with her head turned?

 1978

Cecelias

Saint Cecelia is the Patron Saint of Music

The caption says "Dot, Kay, Cele, Vera, 1938." No mention is made of the banjo ukulele.

When I was young I learned the McNally sisters' names in order as a kind of poetic litany. Marie, Elizabeth, Veronica, Cecelia, Loretta, Margaret, Anna, Dorothy, Kathryn and Patricia---all Saints, all rather elegant and rather old-fashioned. Cecelia, my mother's name, was my favorite. I can still hear her sisters fondly articulating three syllables, Ce-cel-yuh, when they called her, although everyone mostly called her Cele (as in seal).

Cele and Jane 1949

We found a copy of her Baptismal Certificate that tells us where she got the name. Her aunt Cecilia Donohue Valentine was her godmother. On this copy, made in 1937 when she got married, Cecilia is spelled with two i's but Cele's birth certificate shows it with two e's---Cecelia.

Cecelia McNally Brackman inspired her own namesakes---Ben's sister Edie named her only daughter Cecelia---we never call her anything but Cecelia.

Cecelia in 1947

And Kathryn named her youngest Cecelia. We never call her anything but Cece (as in See-See). We don't have any trouble keeping Cele, Cecelia and Cece straight in family conversations.

The name continued into the fourth generation. Kathy Bentley named her daughter Kristen Cecelia.

The most interesting thing I've learned about the name Cecelia lately is that  it's pronounced something like Chinchilla in Italian. Wikipedia explains the pronunciation of Italian opera singer Cecilia Bartoli's name as tʃeˈtʃilja. It sounds like Chay-cheel-ee-uh to me. The other interesting thing I found in writing this post is the banjo ukulele in the beach picture above. In the family album the picture is so small the ukulele is not noticeable. I would guess that was Cele's instrument. She was, after all, named for the patron saint of music.

A banjo ukulele, according to Wikipedia, " is a four-stringed musical instrument with a small banjo-type body and a fretted ukulele neck. 'Banjolele,' sometimes also spelled banjelele or banjulele is a generic nickname given to the instrument, which was derived from the 'banjulele-banjo,' introduced by Alvin D. Keech in 1917. The instrument achieved its greatest popularity in the 1920s and '30s, and combines the small scale, tuning, and playing style of a ukulele with the construction and distinctive tone of a banjo, hence the name."