A journey to the past Every week The New Yorker Magazine arrives in my mail box as it has since 1978. Despite the changes in management in recent years, The New Yorker continues to contain a wealth of well-written articles, short stories and poems. The cartoons remain classy. The stable of writers like James Thurber,S.J. Perelman, Ludwig Bemelman, and the drawings of Hirschfield are gone. They could make one laugh out loud. But it is still a darn good magazine. The other day, while leafing through a recent issue of the magazine I thought of Charlie O'Connor. It was he who started a gift subscription for me back in 1978 and keeps renewing it every year. I met Capt. O'Connor 45 years ago when he arrived in Calcutta in the summer of 1959 to begin an assignment as head of the Operations Department of an American Flag steamship company based in New York City. He was my boss. What made us click was our interest in reading -- newspapers, magazines,books. He subscribed to many periodicals, including The New Yorker and Saturday Review. They arrived by surface mail,3 to 4 months behind the publication date. That didn't matter. He passed them on to me after he was done. How I enjoyed them! Between them and the British Council Library my needs were well taken care of. But Charlie did more than that. He was a mentor. A great deal of what I learned about cargo ships and the world of ocean transportation was from working under him and asking questions that he patiently answered. Charlie was born in Brooklyn,NY, and went to sea at an early age. He became a Master Mariner the hard way, by working his way up the ladder and passing the stringent U.S. Coast Guard examinations. Charlie had a taste for spicy food. There were days when he would send out for kathi rolls (kababs rolled in parathas) from Nizam, and we would feast on them at lunch. I left India in 1969 and began a career in the steamship industry in San Francisco. It was after Charlie retired in the mid-seventies and settled down in a high-rise apartment on the edge of the Hudson River in Hoboken that we met again. Charlie became a regular visitor. I showed him my favorite places in California. We talked about changes in the industry. By that time the era of containerization had begun its march to replace the break-bulk ships. As an "Old Salt", Charlie decried the passage of the romance of shipping associated with crates of whip snake skins, bags of coffee beans and cashew nuts,chests of tea,bales of jute,and rolls of carpet. They were still being shipped but no longer visible. One could only see the large steel containers which carried them. No question that containers are far superior in terms of efficiency, safety, and handling costs than the centuries old break-bulk method. That is progress. Charlie's last trip to California was in 1994. Age related problems stopped him from traveling. At 87, and with a bad knee, he can no longer do much walking. About a month ago, in October,I decided to go and see him. I flew to Newark on a red-eye flight from San Francisco. It was a short, 20-minute cab ride to his apartment. Except for a day trip to New York I spent 4 days with Charlie in his apartment crammed with books. He was into history of World War II. We talked of the people we knew and about the forthcoming presidential election. We were on the same wave length about George Bush. His apartment on the 24th floor offered a good view of New York (the Hudson is less than a mile wide). He reminisced about growing up in the City; his favorite bars there and in other ports that he called at as a merchant seaman. Those days the break-bulk ships spent days loading and unloading cargo; a container ship's port stay is counted in hours. We wondered about the madams of the whore houses at ports of call around the world. They used to keep track of the schedule of liner ships which brought patrons who were "regulars". Nowadays a seaman seeking pleasure of the flesh would find it hard to get time for that. At the most a quick "slam, bam, thank you ma'am" in a joint near the water front. On the morning when I left to return to California, Charlie stood at the door of his apartment while I waited down the corridor for the elevator. We waved as I entered the elevator. We both knew that we would not see each other again. "The past, with its pleasures, its rewards, its foolishness, its punishments, is there for each of us forever, and it should be." ----Lillian Hellman Comments Anonymous — 2010-02-05 I so enjoyed reading this piece about "Doc O'Connor," my late father's closest friend. You captured him perfectly. I recall writing to him as a child, imagining his exotic location, and carefully addressing the special blue airmail stationery to CAPTAIN O'Comnnor. Thank you for this lovely tribute to your friendship and to him.
Dr.Mary Margaret Kerr
University of Pittsburgh Anonymous — 2010-12-30 It is with great sadness that I report the death of Captain Charles George O'Connor Jr. in the wee hours of the morning today, December 30, 2010.
A truly wonderful man, "Uncle Bud" as he was known to most of his family and those of us who were fortunate enough to be accepted into the O'Connor sphere, was a unique individual who made the world a richer place.
Charlie was my wife's uncle and like a grandfather to my daughters. We will dearly miss him.
Paul Blizzard
Huntington, NY (formerly of Jericho, NY) musafir — 2010-12-30 I had a note on my desk to call him this morning.
Charlie never failed to call before the holidays to offer his good wishes and to ask about my daughters and their families. He had come to know them during his visits to the west coast until age and ill health put a stop to his travels. This year, he did not call. I knew about the stroke he suffered few months ago and was worried about his silence.
I wept after reading your message in the "comments" section of my blog. But glad that you took the trouble to find my website and do so. Thank you.
Rana Sircar dimpleresta — 2011-09-29 This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.