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A Dream COME TRUE

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Contents

Prologue................................................................................................xiiiOnce Upon a Time........................................................................................1Berlin and Sunny Italy..................................................................................3Growing Up in Athens, Georgia...........................................................................18High School in Wartime..................................................................................27Venturing Beyond Athens.................................................................................34Higher Education........................................................................................40Putting John Through Medical School.....................................................................52To the Midwest..........................................................................................61Neighbors, Houses, and Rabble-Rousing Ladies............................................................68The History Class.......................................................................................83Balancing the Garish with Greenery......................................................................86Seeing the World........................................................................................97Adventures of an Economist..............................................................................104Cancer..................................................................................................116The Joy of Sailing......................................................................................122The Next Generation.....................................................................................127One Long Day at a Time: Making the Dream Called The City of Sandy Springs Come True.....................129"Eva!" The First Campaign...............................................................................131Saving Our Springs......................................................................................135Sandy Springs—Yes!................................................................................142Forming a City Government...............................................................................150Afterword for Part Two: A New City Underway.............................................................155

Chapter One

1928-1933—Berlin, Germany

My maternal grandmother, Regina Sternberg Lewy (Oma), was a constant in my life from the beginning—she was jolly, loving, and my sister and I could do no wrong in her sight. She attracted people, she loved good food, and she was always able to see the bright side of life. She was quite attractive with grayish-green eyes and high cheekbones. She wore her straight hair pulled high on her head with combs to hold stragglers in place. She often wore dark dresses with white lace collars.

She was born in Ostrovo, in what was then Germany but reverted to being Poland after World War II. She grew up in a small town, but was well educated by tutors and local schools. When she was sixteen, she was sent to a girls' boarding school in Berlin. She writes in her memoirs that many young men followed the girls home from school, but the chaperones chased them away. There were large families of numerous aunts and uncles, however, which engendered lots of gatherings where eligible young partners could meet. She met her own future husband at one of those gatherings and noticed that he was pleasant and seemed to be well educated. Grandmother liked interesting people and always enjoyed jokes, so I imagine her husband must have been entertaining as well.

Max Lewy, her husband, was the son of Louis Lewy, Jr., the owner of the largest department store in Breslau. My grandparents went on a grand tour for their honeymoon. My grandmother was very close to her father, who cried when she departed on the trip. They began in Vienna, and then on to Venice. She was scared in Venice at first, because they arrived late on a winter evening, when it was already dark. That time of year there were no tourists, and she was alone with the gondolier while her husband looked to the luggage. They traveled in winter and summer, because fall and spring were the busy seasons in the store.

In Venice they stayed at the Hotel Danieli. I visited it when we were there as tourists in 1975. It was still a very ornate and swank place. We stayed next door, in what was a somewhat less expensive but also a highly decorated hotel, with lots of engravings and embroideries throughout the suite.

My grandmother writes of the glorious sun shining the next morning in St. Mark's Square. She fell in love with Venice then and maintained that feeling for the rest of her life. A guide showed them works of art and the sights of Venice. He also accompanied them to the stores to buy gifts and then to a fine restaurant for lunch. She writes that she realized, in retrospect, that he probably got a fine commission from every place they shopped. They attended the opera, and marveled at how loud and enthusiastic the Italian patrons were in comparison to the more sedate Germans.

The next stop was Nice, on the Riviera, with the blue Mediterranean on one side and the fields of blooming flowers, violets, carnations and roses for miles and miles in every direction, and the mountains in the background. Their afternoon entertainment was to parade along the Promenade Des Anglais, where their hotel was located, and to "people watch" from cafes. They proceeded to all the famous resorts: Sanremo, Bordighera, Menton, Cannes and Monte Carlo. The people in light clothes with bronzed complexions presented a sharp contrast to the people they had left in Germany. In Monte Carlo they gambled for a short time. Their Riviera stops included Cap-Martin and Cap-Ferrat where they indulged in drinking coffee or listening to music in the sun. Homeward bound, they stopped in Milan to see the famous cathedral and the Leonardo da Vinci mural there, The Last Supper. She remembered the opera at the Scala—Lucia Di Lammermoor. The final stop was Pavia, where they viewed an old cloister with works of art, and went shopping to buy presents for every member of the family at home.

They returned to Breslau from their month-long honeymoon to find a totally furnished apartment. Every piece of furniture and equipment was in place, including a grand piano, down to the "toothpicks and matches." Her in-laws had prepared it all.

Upon her husband's death at the end of World War I, my grandmother inherited considerable wealth, which enabled her to live well. During the horrendous inflation in Germany after the war, however, her memoirs describe the daily struggle for food, as inflation reduced the value of currency each day. By the end of this economic cataclysm, shoppers were wheeling the worthless currency around because it was too bulky to carry on one's body. One of the important stamps Dad would show us in his collection was a German one: "See," he would point out, "the original value has been stamped over with lots of zeroes for the millions to show the new price."

Even in the difficult post-war years, when my grandmother was trading rooms in her home for butter from a renter's farm, she traveled. From resort to...