1.1 - Heading to Manhattan
The Austerlitzes Leave Omaha for a Grand Adventure
On May 10, 1899, a first-generation immigrant mother, Johanna Austerlitz, gave birth in her Omaha home to a son so sickly that the family feared he would not survive[1]. His older sister, Adele, remembered her brother as being born “half dead” (Riley 7). But their mother, called “Anna” by her husband, dedicated herself to ensuring that Frederic Austerlitz II would grow stronger and thrive. Adele, who had been born on September 10, 1896, inherited a love of performing from her father, called “Fritz” by his many friends. To encourage her talents, the parents enrolled her in Omaha’s Chambers Dancing Academy, and believing that the lessons would help develop their frail son’s strength, they enrolled Freddie as well.
The brother and sister soon began performing together at private homes, church socials and other events, including the competition for the annual Coronation of the King and Queen of the Knights of Ak-Sar-Ben (“Nebraska” spelled backwards) in 1904 (Levinson 7). Willard E. Chambers, their dance instructor, believed that the children, especially Adele, had the potential for a career in show business but that they would need the more advanced training and professional connections available only in New York City. Eventually an audacious plan was hatched. Anna, Adele and Fred would go to Manhattan. The children would attend a stage school recommended by Chambers. Fritz would remain in Omaha working as a salesman at the Storz Brewing Company to earn the money necessary to support them in New York. Anna would draw on her experience as a tutor at a local Lutheran school to continue the children’s basic education.
It was bold for a 26-year-old mother who had lived only in Omaha and been raised in a repressive home to set out essentially on her own with two young children into a completely new life. Biographer Kathleen Riley argues that the decision fulfilled needs of both the father and the mother (20). Fritz, who had hoped to become a singer and musician in New York when he first immigrated from Austria in 1892, still nursed theatrical ambitions that he might fulfill vicariously through his children. Anna saw the opportunity to escape the daily despair of marriage to a man who was frequently absent due to his work, whose drinking reminded her of her own alcoholic father, and who was rumored to be a womanizer. The only thing keeping them together was mutual devotion to their children, who looked on the trip to New York as a grand adventure in a mythical metropolis.
The Austerlitzes set out for Manhattan in January 1905. While no record exists of the specific trains they took, the Official Railway Guide for 1905 shows a handful of railroads that they could have used. All would have required a trip to Chicago and then a transfer to a different railroad to New York. Two railways offered a route from Omaha to Chicago. The Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway offered Train No. 2 (The Overland Limited) leaving at 8:20 p.m. and arriving at 9:25 a.m. or Train No. 4 leaving at 7:55 a.m. and arriving at 9:55 p.m. or Train No. 6 leaving at 5:45 p.m. and arriving at 8:35 a.m. The Illinois Central Railroad Company offered two choices on its Chicago-Dubuque-Council Bluffs-Omaha Line: Train No. 2 (Omaha-Chicago Limited) leaving Omaha at 7:50 p.m. and arriving in Chicago at 9:35 a.m. or Train No. 4 (Chicago Day Express) leaving at 7:25 a.m. and arriving at 9:25 p.m.
For the longer Chicago-to-New York leg of the journey, the family could choose between two major rail rivals: the New York Central Line or the Pennsylvania Railroad. In his autobiography, Steps in Time, Astaire says that the family “arrived at the Pennsylvania Station on a gray day” (Astaire 16), but since Manhattan’s Pennsylvania Station was not built until 1910, Fred’s memory was faulty. Before the opening of the Hudson River tunnels, passengers coming to New York City via the Pennsylvania Railroad had to transfer to double-ended ferryboats at Exchange Place in Paulus Hook, New Jersey, and ride over the North River (as this section of the Hudson River was then commonly called) and reach Manhattan at the 23rd Street Station. Surely Fred would have remembered a long ferryboat ride across the Hudson in the middle of a frigid January.
It is far more likely that they would have taken the railway offering the only direct passenger route into Manhattan ─ the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad, whose trains terminated at the Grand Central Station at 42nd Street and Fourth Avenue. In 1905 the New York Central offered nine different trains from Chicago to New York, including the famed 20th Century Limited, which left Chicago’s La Salle Street Station at 12:30 p.m. and arrived at Grand Central 20 hours later at 9:30 a.m. A tight budget (not to mention two young children in tow) would likely have prohibited the family from taking this luxurious train that catered to notable businessmen. The family probably would have chosen Train No. 40 (the New Yorker), which left Chicago at 5 p.m. and arrived in New York at 8 p.m., or the New York Express, which left Chicago at 10:30 p.m. and arrived in New York at 5:15 a.m. Another choice would have been Train No. 22 (the Lake Shore Limited), leaving Chicago at 5:30 p.m. and arriving in New York at 6:30 p.m.
No matter which train they took, it would have been a grand adventure, especially for Anna and the children, who had never taken such a long journey. In his autobiography, Fred recalled listening to railroad whistles in the night and imagining long train trips as one of his most vivid memories of Omaha (Astaire 10). This long trip in 1905 would be the first of many that he, Adele and Anna would take as they ventured on countless vaudeville routes and Broadway show tours in the next three decades.
[1]According to biographer Tim Satchell, Frederic “Fritz” Austerlitz was so unsure of his son’s survival that he neglected to register the birth. Anna would apply for the birth certificate years later when one was needed for Fred’s marriage license in 1933 (Satchell 11).
SOURCES
Astaire, Fred. Steps in Time. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1959.
Levinson, Peter J. Puttin' on the Ritz: Fred Astaire and the Fine Art of Panache. New York: St. Martin's Press, 2009.
Riley, Kathleen. The Astaires: Fred & Adele. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012.