Oral History Interview with William S. Bartman, 2005 September 14
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Oral history interview with William S. Bartman, 2005 September 14 Funding for the digital preservation of this interview was provided by a grant from the Save America's Treasures Program of the National Park Service. Contact Information Reference Department Archives of American Art Smithsonian Institution Washington. D.C. 20560 www.aaa.si.edu/askus Transcript Preface The following oral history transcript is the result of a recorded interview with William Bartman on September 13 and 14, 2005. The interview took place in New York City, and was conducted by John Zinsser for the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. This transcript has been lightly edited for readability by the Archives of American Art. The reader should bear in mind that they are reading a transcript of spoken, rather than written, prose. Interview JOHN ZINSSER: This is disc one of the William Bartman interview, for Archives of American Art. You getting any sound on that? Okay. Bill? WILLIAM BARTMAN: Yes, sir. JOHN ZINSSER: We are at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City, and it is September 13, 2005. Bill, because we're going to do an oral autobiography we can skip around, but I thought we should in fact start with some facts about your life, so— WILLIAM BARTMAN: Okay. JOHN ZINSSER: —if you could tell us where you were born? WILLIAM BARTMAN: I was born in Chicago, Illinois, at Pasavant Hospital. JOHN ZINSSER: Hold on. I'm going to write down some— WILLIAM BARTMAN: P-A-S-A-V-A-N-T Hospital. JOHN ZINSSER: Okay. WILLIAM BARTMAN: Chicago, Illinois—Cook County, Illinois. JOHN ZINSSER: And— WILLIAM BARTMAN: 1946. October 14. That's if I remember correctly. JOHN ZINSSER: Okay. WILLIAM BARTMAN: And according to my mother, it was a few minutes after midnight, and that was a problem because she lost a contest she was having with her best friend who was having a baby also that night, who won, and I was constantly reminded the rest of my life how—by this friend's daughter who was sort of a friend—that she was born before me. JOHN ZINSSER: And you have siblings, right? WILLIAM BARTMAN: A brother and a sister. Older brother, 16 months. A younger sister, six years. JOHN ZINSSER: And what can you tell us about your parents? Your father was who? WILLIAM BARTMAN: My father was William Bartman, Sr., and I'm William Bartman, Jr.—William S. Bartman, Jr., which is not supposed to happen in the Jewish community. You can have one name in common but not exactly. I'm actually William Samuel Bartman, Jr., which is exactly my father's name. And they'd had some sort of discussion about that, but they decided fuck them—excuse me—we're going to call him whatever we want to call him. JOHN ZINSSER: And— WILLIAM BARTMAN: So I'm a junior. JOHN ZINSSER: You're a junior. WILLIAM BARTMAN: Complete junior. JOHN ZINSSER: And what was – WILLIAM BARTMAN: That was always made a big deal of throughout my life. JOHN ZINSSER: The name? WILLIAM BARTMAN: That I was the only Jewish Junior that people knew. It usually skips from William S. Bartman to William S. Bartman, II. So it made it very a special—[they laugh]—position for me, and also a horrible position between my brother and sister, which is bad already just going in because you're the middle child to begin with. JOHN ZINSSER: Right, right. And what was your father's occupation? WILLIAM BARTMAN: He was an attorney. JOHN ZINSSER: In Chicago proper? WILLIAM BARTMAN: In Chicago proper to begin with. He ran—my father—my grandfather died at a very young age, and owned a clothing store called Hill Clothes. My father graduated—university graduated, got his law degree all in the same year. There was some kind of special program called—by William Hutchins [ph]—who was the director of the university at that time, and which allows you to graduate law school and get your law degree at the same time. JOHN ZINSSER: Now, was he part of a larger firm or did he have a specialty? WILLIAM BARTMAN: He was—originally, I guess that he had his own firm. Basically what he did was represented the family. JOHN ZINSSER: In this— WILLIAM BARTMAN: Yeah, but they also represented people. Like he was the lawyer for Baskin-Robbins ice cream for 30 years, or 20 years, until they became something else—Food Corporation of America or whatever they became. JOHN ZINSSER: And how would you describe him as a man or a father? WILLIAM BARTMAN: Someone who was obsessed with being liked, and wanting to be cared for and wanting to accomplish a tremendous amount in his lifetime. He was willing to do anything for anybody literally on a moment's notice. JOHN ZINSSER: And was he a workaholic? WILLIAM BARTMAN: Yes, he was a workaholic. JOHN ZINSSER: Was he away from the home? WILLIAM BARTMAN: Not so much away from the home, but he brought his work home and we became part of it. There was always someone at dinner. I don't ever remember having—very rarely ever having dinner without having someone, at least one or two people there. JOHN ZINSSER: Was he a formal man? Did he wear a suit at home? WILLIAM BARTMAN: He wore a suit home, but he got his necktie off when he came home—usually his shoes and socks, too. JOHN ZINSSER: What can you tell us about your mother? What is her name? WILLIAM BARTMAN: Norma B—that's for Berkson—Norma B. Berkson Bartman, B-A-R-T-M-A-N. She and my father went out with each other in college. JOHN ZINSSER: And that's where they met? WILLIAM BARTMAN: I was the second child remember. JOHN ZINSSER: Right. WILLIAM BARTMAN: So obviously there was a first child, and he must have gotten—been a child right after they got married and then I came very soon after. 16 months is very soon. JOHN ZINSSER: Both families from the Chicago area? She's from Chicago area as well? WILLIAM BARTMAN: Yeah, yeah, both of them from Chicago area. But my mother's more—part Cleveland also. JOHN ZINSSER: And what type of family is she from? WILLIAM BARTMAN: My grandfather owned an automobile parts store. I'm sure it's one of the first automobile parts stores in the United States. Now, it's not a manufacturer. It's just a distribution store, you know, so people could come by and buy a spark plug. JOHN ZINSSER: Right, right. WILLIAM BARTMAN: So he bought generic stuff from people and they sold generic stuff back to people. JOHN ZINSSER: And were they part of kind of society in Chicago? Were they both Jewish? Were they both— WILLIAM BARTMAN: They were both Jewish, but that wasn't part of their society because most of their friends were—that was not a big deal within the community. In fact, we were never baptized. JOHN ZINSSER: So you didn't grow up going to temple? WILLIAM BARTMAN: We went to temple on Roshashana. We were Roshashana Jews. JOHN ZINSSER: And were they part of a certain social class or kind of social milieu that existed in Chicago at that time? WILLIAM BARTMAN: Yeah, upper-middle class, Jewish, intellectual, conservative, ingrained in them to be family- oriented. My grandfather was—I never met my grandfather. He died just before I was born. My father was raised as a strict Christian Scientist. JOHN ZINSSER: Oh, really? WILLIAM BARTMAN: Went to Christian Science high school. JOHN ZINSSER: But he didn't raise you that way. Did he carry over any sort of— WILLIAM BARTMAN: Christian Science thinking? I don't think I ever went to any Christian Science stuff. I don't think he liked it very much. JOHN ZINSSER: And what type of neighborhood did you live in? WILLIAM BARTMAN: We lived in a hotel. JOHN ZINSSER: Really? WILLIAM BARTMAN: Called the Park Shore Hotel, which was apartment buildings at the time. JOHN ZINSSER: So you had a residential suite? WILLIAM BARTMAN: Yeah. JOHN ZINSSER: And there were other residential suites in that building? WILLIAM BARTMAN: Yeah. It was full of residential suites. JOHN ZINSSER: And so you were in a floor of that—was it a kind of large, sprawling space? WILLIAM BARTMAN: I don't remember much about the space because we left Chicago when I was 16 months old. JOHN ZINSSER: Okay. Well, then we better get to that, okay. Alejandro, what am I missing here as far as salient information? ALEJANDRO: I think at 16 months we can— JOHN ZINSSER: Sixteen months we can keep moving? WILLIAM BARTMAN: Yeah. JOHN ZINSSER: Okay. WILLIAM BARTMAN: I remember a lot of stuff before 16. JOHN ZINSSER: You remember things in your memory from – WILLIAM BARTMAN: Yeah. JOHN ZINSSER: —before 16 months? Such as? WILLIAM BARTMAN: Such as that I collected butterflies and I kept them in jars, and I kept them in the closet, hidden in the closet, so my mother wouldn't find them. And my mother apparently—I collected, actually, caterpillars. They weren't butterflies yet. JOHN ZINSSER: But they became butterflies. WILLIAM BARTMAN: I didn't know that. JOHN ZINSSER: So there was— WILLIAM BARTMAN: Don't blame me. JOHN ZINSSER: But did it happen? WILLIAM BARTMAN: Yeah, it did. JOHN ZINSSER: So there was this— WILLIAM BARTMAN: My mother came into the closet one day and she found this big jar of black-looking sort of things, and they started—and she opened the jar and a bunch of them flew out at her, and she screamed and didn't know what the hell had happened in her closet.