In Memoriam: Marty Weiss

“Cowboys don’t cry, and heroes don’t die.” —Alan Jackson 

I had this premonition that it would happen while I was out of the country. And it did. I was in Tel Aviv when I got the news that Marty, my friend, had only a few days left to live, and I was back in Budapest when I got the note from his daughter, Gail, that Marty was not with us anymore.

I had visited Marty a week before we left for Hungary. He was his regular self at age 94, well-dressed, a little slow to walk with his walker, but in good spirits. We talked about all the things we had always discussed before, like family, politics, and the Museum. As usual, he did the talking, and I listened as if I were hearing his stories for the first time. Marty had an amazing long-term memory. He remembered tiny details from his childhood, teenage years, and, of course, the Holocaust. He only could not remember that he had told me the stories countless times in the past 12 years, since I had gotten to know him. And I loved his stories every time.

Marty was my landsman—Yiddish for a Jew from the same nook of Europe. My mother was born only 40 kilometers from the small village where Marty’s family had lived in what is today Ukraine. I found this out the first time I met him, when Rabbi Weinblatt at B’nai Tzedek in Potomac introduced us to each other. From then on, it was like we had known each other from childhood.

Marty came from an orthodox, observant Jewish family. He knew most of the Jewish prayers by heart. He was proud of his Jewishness but he did not strictly follow the Jewish dietary laws. My stepfather would have called him a “ham-eating Jew,” although in his case, shrimp would have been his treif (un-kosher).

Marty loved his children and grandchildren. During the 12-plus years I knew him, I heard countless stories, sometimes the same stories countless times, about his children, Gail and Jeff. He was so proud of their achievements and success. Without fail, every time he talked about his family, it ended up in his signature choking up with great love and admiration.

In our family, Marty was a legend for his stories from the “Old World,” where you visited your friends in the next village by riding a horse; where you actually communicated with them in person, not texting them while you were sitting across the same room; where children did not sit down at the Shabbat dinner table until their father sat down first. My youngest daughter included her interview with Marty in her final term paper, and she got an A⁺.

Marty was loved not just by his family and my family, but also by the family of the Museum. He loved to brag about how the young volunteers and interns hugged and kissed him when it was his turn at the Survivor Desk. Of course, this was before COVID-19, which unfortunately put a damper on personal interactions and isolated Marty for the last three years of his life.

I had spent time with Marty on various occasions, from our synagogue to the Museum, from the JCC Men’s Club to advising him on all things that involved technology. Marty had many talents, but working with 21st-century technology was not among them. During his 90th birthday party toasts, one of his friends introduced himself as the president of Marty’s fan club. At my turn, I introduced myself as the chief information officer of the same club, taking care of Marty’s phone, tablet, laptop, internet service, software, and TV remote. Fortunately, our wonderful Museum staff Emily and Keri were there for Marty, too, when after countless hours of education, he still could not connect his laptop to a Zoom meeting.

Among Marty’s many talents and interests was cooking. After his wife’s death, he lived alone but never resorted to carry-out, canned food, or TV dinners. He made enough meals from scratch for three to four occasions, and he froze the leftovers in individual containers/bags, one for each day. I could never leave his apartment without a pack of lentil soup or cholent.

We had many things in common, among them the love of a plum brandy from central/eastern Europe called slivovitz. Marty was an expert on slivovitz. He was exposed to it at a very young age, in moderation, when he drove his family’s horse-drawn cart to the nearby distillery to pick up a small keg. We would always kid each other about whether the Hungarian Zwack brand or the Czech Jelinek was better. One day, we decided to have a blind taste test. We both had a shot, maybe more, of each, and we selected the winner. Marty won—Jelinek was the undisputed winner. I might be a computer genius, but Marty was better when it came to slivovitz.

Marty accomplished a lot during his life and had plenty of achievements to be proud of. I hope others will tell other stories, like when Marty carried the Olympic torch for the Utah Olympic winter games, or the one when he was invited to the White House by the president to light the Hanukkah candles.

Alan Jackson has a line in one of his songs: “Cowboys don’t cry, and heroes don’t die.” Marty was not a cowboy, so he choked up during his presentations or even during an everyday conversation. His tears were genuine, not signs of weakness, but that of his strength and of his humanity. Marty was a hero for many. He might not be with us anymore, but his memory enriches many lives.

Marty, in your honor and in remembrance of you, I raise my shot glass filled with slivovitz. Of course, it is Jelinek.

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