Watching King Kong At Paul Newman's

Robert & Jane Newman

  I was talking on the phone with Jane Newman in Stamford Conn. the other day. We talk more frequently these days now that her husband, Robert, my first cousin, died late last year at age 91. Jane is very lonely and misses the love of her life.

  And well she might.

  It had been a magnificent marriage, and Jane who married Robert later in life found the perfect mate. Robert, a renaissance man for his time, a retired vice president for finance and product development at General Electric, and Jane a retired librarian. He collected rare ancient coins, traveled the world, made magnificently produced films of almost every country in the world.  On his 80th birthday he and Jane traveled around the world, Europe, Siberia, Mongolia, China. (They never missed their traditional two Martinis before dinner, even on the Siberian Express.) It is all recorded and meticulously narrated on film.

  Jane did mention in our recent conversation that she is still invited to the traditional Saturday night movie showings at Cousin Paul’s place in nearby Westport.  “We watched King Kong. We all thought it was awful,” she noted with a chuckle.

  The revived relationship between these two first cousins, both Clevelanders, living out there lives in Connecticut was serendipitous. When GE moved it headquarters to Stamford, Robert and his family moved to nearby Springdale. Cousin Paul happened to live in Westport.

  Paul grew up in Shaker, Robert lived on Derbyshire in Cleveland Heights. The two spent some time together at The Oakwood Club bowling, but they were not close. The fathers, Joe and Arthur founded the Newman Stern Co. Joe later became a columnist for The Press and author of the famed City Club shows. (Joe married my father’s sister Babette Weidenthal, which explains our relationship)

  The two boys were very different. Paul, a devil-may-care handsome Shaker grad, and Kenyon playboy; Robert an ungainly, political radical, science and engineering genius, who attended Case and went on the MIT.  (Robert was such a radical that GE moved him and his family to Mexico in the 50’s to protect him and the company from a possible onslaught from the McCarthy investigations.)

  In Connecticut, time had mellowed them both and they became them friends and companions. Robert and Jane were always at Paul’s multiple holiday parties at “The Newman Barn” where they shared the annual fun with numerous New York notables. They were very much involved in Paul’s “Hole in the Wall Gang Camp" for very sick children.  Movies at Paul’s were frequent.       

  When Robert turned 88 Paul showed up at the house with “88 bottles of beer” in keeping with the ancient drinking song. When Paul turned 80, Robert gave him of his Roman coins bearing the head of Caesar, because he saw a striking resemblance.  Paul attached it to a chain and wore it around his neck when he appeared recently on the Jay Leno show. He showed it off and boasted about the gift from his cousin.

  When Robert turned 90, and was already quite ill with prostate cancer, he and Jane scoured their maps of the world looking for a place they had not been. They found Malta, and spent, so I was told, a wonderful two weeks there. It was their last international voyage. Jane says she treasures those magnificent memories, but somehow the world and the house in Springdale is not the same, and it really wasn’t that much fun watching King Kong at cousin Paul’s, without the man of her life.