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He began with the earliest names he knew, which were those of my great-great-great grandparents Khanne and Laibe, (the kh is pronounced like the German ch in Ach du lieber Augustin, or the Scottish Loch Lomond.)   Laibe owned a flour mill near Mistislavl (named after count Mistislavl; a town, by the way, much fought over by the Germans and Russians in the last war, and where, as I'll tell you later, my mother was born).  Eventually, they bought much land in Balobos-chine (where my father was born), a hamlet 30 versts from Mistislavl, a name which the Jewish people of the town, including our family, always pronounced, for some reason which I'll never know or understand, Umtseeslev!  Well, Laibe and Khanne had five sons:  Sholem, Hirsche, Osher, Yoshe, and Khayim.  Osher and Khayim settled on the land in Balobos-chine (which shows that contrary to historical gossip, Jews, when allowed, were farmers).  Sholem, my great-great grandfather, had three sons and three daughters: three children by his first wife and three children by his second wife.  They were in order of age:  Vellye, Khayim, Isaac, Tobe, Esther-Khaye, and one other girl, name forgotten.  Sholem was poor and unsuccessful.  Hirsche was rich, had several daughters, but rest of family unknown.  Osher was very rich and successful, and owned an inn in Tatarsk, ten versts from Balobos-chine.  He had three daughters and two sons.  Names in order of age: Sorre-Laye, Gittel, Hinde, Orre, and Itche.

Yoshe is an interesting case.  He was a Kantanyist (or Nicholayevsker soldat).  That is he was kidnapped as a child, somewhat in the way that pressgangs used to kidnap young men in England for the navy and army.   But whereas the pressgangs shanghaied young men of military age, in Russia they stole boys of nine or ten and spirited them away to be brought up as cadets, and later soldiers and sailors.  They would be indentured servants for twenty or more years.   I am not sure whether these kidnappings were confined to Jewish boys only, but I am under the impression that they were.  I seem to recall father saying also that great pressure was put on them to forsake their religion and become Christians, and I suppose some of them did.  In any case they were lost to their families for decades.  If they survived, however, they were given lots of privileges.  I don't remember whether they got a pension, but I do remember that they were allowed to live in cities where no other Jews were allowed.

Of course cruelty of this kind in the 18th century was not confined to Russia -- even in enlightened England children of nine were hanged for stealing a bun -- but when I hear true believers speak of their religion, whichever one it happens to be, and talk of being saved, of redemption, of heaven, and of sitting on the right hand of God, (or is it his left hand?) -- and then think of the centuries of utterly heartless actions, of which I suppose merely kidnapping a nine-year-old and having him vanish from his family for the whole of his childhood and youth and sometimes forever, would be among the lesser horrors -- I'm inclined to think that attributing the madness of the Roman aristrocracy to the use of lead in cooking pots is an evasion.  Madness is endemic in the human race and no religion can cure it.

Anyway, when Yoshe finally came home he married his niece, Sholem's daughter Esther-Khaye, and they had two sons and three daughters: Braine, Tsippe, Itte, Payshe and Avrom-Simkhe (who was a jeweller by trade).

Khayim, my great -grandfather, had three daughters and three sons:  Mordkhe (my grandfather), Eeddl (who was the father of Herman and Edward Adaskin of Springfield, Massachusetts, of whom more anon), Ellye, Liebe-Faygl, Rishke, and Shchere.  Vellye, Sholem's son, had as far as known, one daughter Sorre, and three sons.  Osher's daughter Sorre-Laye had three sons:  Nokhem, Mendel and Laibe, and three daughters: Esther-Gittel, Khanne-Blume and Bashe.  Gittel had two daughters:  Khanne and Esther.  Hinde had two daughters and one son:   Shendl, other daughter forgotten, and Maishe.  Itche had Shlayme, Mayer, Rishche and another daughter.

Well, that was the end of my fathers's recital, and if it bored you it only shows that you're not a reliable literary critic.  But I'll give you one more chance by reciting the direct line from Khanne and Laibe, without digressing to the great-great uncles and aunts and the cousins five and six times removed.    Mentioning males only then, there was Laibe (ca. 1750), Sholem (ca. 1780), Khayim (ca. 1810), Mordche, after whom you are named (ca. 1840), and finally your own papa Khayim-Laib (1876), me (1901), you (1931), and your son Jon (1968).  And there you are, from the time of Bach, to the time of electronic music!

Why we chose Sholem, who was poor and unsuccessful, as our great-great grandfather, I'll never know.  After all, his brother, Hirsche was rich, and his "udder brudder mudder" Osher was very rich, and even owned an inn in Tatarsk, doubtless called Adask Inn, which we might have inherited and which would have made us very rich ourselves.  However, this shows you the value of a family tree.   For now I can explain our financial status:  we're descended from Sholem!  And it serves us right.

I never knew our paternal grandfather Mordkhe and his wife Slava for they never came to America and I never went back to Russia.  Oddly enough I never even saw a photograph of them.  We had photos of my mother's parents but none of father's.  I remember as a boy hearing father complaining rather wistfully that whenever he sent his parents money, which was fairly frequently, he would ask them to use a rouble or so and have themselves photographed so that we children could see our grandparents.  But they never did.  "They just ate the money, " father would say to my mother.  And I remember thinking: how can you eat money? -- it must taste awful.

But as I grew older, and listened to father's stories of his boyhood, the picture became clearer.  I think being poor means nothing to children, especially if they are surrounded by it.  They can amuse themselves with anything -- even a heap of rubbish -- perhaps especially with a heap of rubbish.   When a house is being done over, for instance, while the family is living in it, which happens even in affluent circles, the parents are irritated by the noise, the dirt and the workmen under foot, but the children go berserk with joy.  The more racket, the more sawing and hammering, the more shavings and plaster to trample on, the happier they are.  Morning just can't come soon enough for them to immerse themselves in that glorious mess.  So that, while father's stories of his youth sounded harrowing, I don't think they were harrowing at the time to him or to his brothers and sister.   And for all I know, perhaps not even to his parents.