Remark Christmas Party, 1955

The 1955 Christmas party at Remark Building Services. Front row, second from the left, my wife's late father, W. Frank Kraemer, and to his right, his father, Will Kraemer. In the back row, second from the left is her late brother Jeffrey, then aged 12. Chances are that everyone had a drink -- this being a holiday party -- probably including the 12-year old. These guys all worked on rope scaffolds, often many stories above the street, in the days before much modern safety equipment was employed. 

Years later, Jeff was immortalized in the Red Grooms sculpture Ruckus Manhattan, hanging off of one of those scaffolds fifty or so stories up the exterior of the Woolworth Building. Jeff had befriended Red's wife, Mimi Gross, who contributed, from what she has told me, a good deal of painting to the sculpture for which she has never received full credit.