Play It Again Sam: The Sam Schoenfeld Story

By Stan Friedland

Sam Schoenfeld was a basketball wizard! He was one of the most outstanding basketball players of his generation, and was compared favorably to Nat Holman, who was considered the very best. He became one of the top high school basketball coaches in New York City history, and then went on to become one of the best college basketball officials as well.

This book details the unlimited passion that Sam had for the game of basketball and of his impressive contributions and achievements in it. The reader is taken along for an exciting ride through the short but full life of an extraordinary man!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: May 20, 2004
• ISBN: 9781469106564

Stan Friedland

Dr. Stan Friedland has had a varied and illustrious career in education, featuring stints as a teacher, guidance counselor, high school principal, college professor and CEO of his own educational consulting firm. He holds a doctoral degree from Columbia University, has written extensively in the field of education, has presented hundreds of workshops and seminars all over the country and, for ten years, has hosted radio and television shows, all dealing with education. This is his fifth non-education book.

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Copyright © 2004 by Stan Friedland.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This book was printed in the United States of America.

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Contents

INTRODUCTION

FOREWORD

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

EPILOGUE

APPENDIX I

TO THE UNIQUE AND POWERFUL LOVE

ONE HAS FOR FAMILY

TO MY WONDERFUL WIFE AND FAMILY

SF

TO THE MEMORY & LEGACY OF MY FATHER

RPS

INTRODUCTION

The genesis of this book is Bob Schoenfeld.

Dr. Robert P. Schoenfeld has been my personal physician for the past fifteen years. He directs a fine medical practice in Plainview, Long Island, staffed by some of the friendliest and most competent medical assistants and doctors one can ever hope to find in a doctor’s office.

I had a physical exam with Bob early in 2003, and afterwards we were shooting the breeze. Bob knew that I had co-authored a book in 1998, which detailed my growing up in a Brooklyn orphanage, and he asked me several questions about its name and location. I told him that it was the Pride of Judea Children’s Home, situated in the East New York-Brownsville section of the borough. He then asked if I had gone to Thomas Jefferson High School. When I said yes, he said, Then you knew my dad, Sam.

I was incredulous! Your dad was Sam Schoenfeld? Of course I knew him. Everyone who went to Jeff knew him. When he mounted the platform in gym class, he was a very striking figure. He was a great basketball coach as well.

Bob asked how well I knew him. I said, I not only had him as a teacher, but when I majored in Physical Education at Brooklyn College I came back to Jeff to student teach. Your dad was one of my mentor-teachers. He was a strong teacher who was very knowledgeable in his field.

He then said, I’ve been working on an application to have my father accepted into the Jewish Sports Hall of Fame. I replied, On what basis? I don’t think his coaching would be sufficient for it.

His reply was, Did you know that he was one of the very best basketball players of his generation? Did you know that he also was one of the top collegiate basketball officials and was the major founding father of its most important regional organization, and that a major sportsmanship award has been given in his name for the past forty seven years?

Once again I was astonished! I truly hadn’t known any of the above and was quite surprised. Bob then said, I have at least seven hundred newspaper articles about my dad that describe these accomplishments and other great things that he’s done. Would you like to see them? I have photocopies of them.

Seven hundred clippings? Wow! I’d absolutely love to see them, I responded. Let me take them home for a few days so that I can do justice to them. Bob gave to me a formidable bundle of large size sheet pages, each with about five articles or more, and I lugged them home. When I began to peruse them, my eyes kept widening. This man’s achievements really were awesome!

When I brought them back less than a week later, I said to Bob, I don’t think anyone but a devoted son could go through all of these and see the full magnitude of your dad’s accomplishments in their total perspective. I really think your dad deserves a book to do his life its fullest justice. Would you be interested in my writing your dad’s biography?

His eyes widened. He thought I was kidding. I wasn’t. And so this book was borne!

The life of Sam Schoenfeld does deserve a biography. Read it and see for yourself.

Stan Friedland

December 1, 2003

FOREWORD

By Bob Schoenfeld

Dear Dad,

Your sudden death, in 1956, hit me like a ton of bricks. You were not even 50 years old, and I was a young 22. There was so much more of you that I wanted to know, and so much more of me that I wanted you to know. That never came to pass.

It was only about a dozen years ago that I began to go through your extensive scrapbook of newspaper clippings about your professional activities, and I was truly amazed! As a young boy growing up in the shadow of a father who was a famous sports figure, I really never knew about most of your achievements. You were always a modest man and rarely did you ever open up to me about your activities and successes. As I read through each of the 700 plus clippings in your collection, I was awestruck by your many and unique accomplishments. They were truly remarkable.

I never knew about your accomplishments in basketball, not only in high school, but in both of the colleges you attended. The championships won by your schools, with you as the star player of each team, reflected the reasons why you were considered to be one of the best basketball players of your era. Your making the all star teams at every level of play was further testimony to this sterling record. I never knew any of this!

When you played professional basketball, you led each of your teams to unbelievable winning records. It was estimated that your winning percentage by all of your pro teams was over 800, a figure unheard of today! Yet, you never once let on that you had such a fabulous career. When I saw some of the exciting newspaper headlines previewing your forthcoming appearance in games, it sounded like they were talking about Michael Jordan in his heyday. You were a real draw and played to packed gyms. You helped put basketball on the map. The crowning compliment was when you were compared most favorably to Nat Holman, who was known as Mr. Basketball in the first part of the 20th century. Yet, believe it or not, I was unaware of most of this. Dad, I hardly knew you!

I realized that you were a successful coach at Thomas Jefferson High School, but I didn’t know how truly successful you were. To lose only seven league games in seven years is unbelievable! Your clippings bear eloquent testimony that you were regarded as one of the very best high school basketball coaches in New York City. Yet, you rarely spoke about it to me. I wish you had.

How about your work in summer camping? At least I knew about that because I went through the wonderful Camp Deerhead that you created during twenty delightful summers. That, again, is but another one of your crowning achievements.

I knew you were also a terrific basketball official because you took me to some of your games at Madison Square Garden. But I had no idea just how good you were, how highly regarded you were, and what a great leader you became in strengthening the role of officials in collegiate basketball. What a major contribution that was! I wish you had shared some of that with me.

Your playing, coaching and directing at the Brooklyn Jewish Center, over a 20 year span, also was spectacular. Yet, I barely understood just how good your record was, even though I had gone there with you on several occasions.

I was astonished to read the articles which detailed your attempted invention of the scoreboard basketball clock. It seems that you were right there on the cutting edge, always looking for ways to improve your beloved game of basketball. Here again, I knew nothing about this endeavor until I read those clippings.

I’m glad that you lived long enough to have seen me off to medical school because you always were interested in science and medicine during your lifetime. That also speaks to the fine teacher you were because I knew that you always tried to incorporate the latest advances in these areas into your health and physical education classes. I am grateful to you for your encouragement of me to pursue medicine as a profession. How wonderful it would have been had you lived to share my career with me. You left us much too soon!

Dad, while I sometimes knew bits and pieces of what you did, the total scope of your accomplishments is truly amazing and most impressive. Your modesty and your busy schedule kept so many areas in the dark.

I am proud to be your son, Dad, yet I’m sad because you left all of us much too early and we really didn’t have enough time to share our lives together. ,UHDOO\GLGQ¶WNQRZ\RXDVZHOODV,ZRXOG KDYHZDQWHGWRSo in your honor Dad, this book is going to play your life again, one more time for me and for everyone else!

Your loving son,

Bob

Dr. Robert P. Schoenfeld,

December 1, 2003

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

A good biography requires ample documentation, authenticity and accuracy, plus a plentiful number of eye-witness sources to provide the human and colorful elements of a particular individual. This book has been blessed by all of the above.

As stated previously, Bob Schoenfeld carefully maintained a collection of well over 700 newspaper clippings, initially compiled by his parents. These touched upon almost every newsworthy accomplishment in Sam Schoenfeld’s life. Many of these clippings have been inserted into the narrative so that the reader can experience them first hand. I thank Bob most heartily, not only for this treasure chest of history, but also for his active collaboration with me on every phase of this book. Indeed, he has been its genesis!

As for eye-witnesses, each of the people named below could not have been more responsive and generous in providing me with their important, first hand memories of Sam Schoenfeld. Indeed, almost all of them, upon hearing that I was contacting them about Sam Schoenfeld, lit up noticeably, with eagerness and enthusiasm, to share their intimate and interesting recollections. I clearly was transporting them back in time to their exciting activities with a very favorite man. Their comments complement the clippings and do much to create a more vivid, three dimensional portrait of our subject, Sam Schoenfeld.

Sam had three sons: Bob, Ed and Peter. Each is well represented in the book and I thank each of them for their important perceptions about their dad. I know how emotionally satisfying this project has been for them and I hope they will like the end result.

Sam’s kid brother, Jack Schoenfeld is 83 years young and was a tremendous historical resource for me. Each time that I spoke to him and his delightful wife, Goldie, Jack was generous with his time, and was a fountain of first hand information that helped me considerably. He was just delighted to be a part of this project that honored a brother he had loved very much. Thank you so much, Jack.

Other members of the Schoenfeld family also were most helpful. Leon Axelrod, Sam’s brother-in-law, had important material for the book. Thanks Leon. Cousin Bailey Seltzer and nephew Arnold Kirschbaum also were good resources. Thanks to both of you.

Then there was the vast contingent of Alumni from Thomas Jefferson High School, and were they ever so impressive! Whether I spoke to them in person, over the phone, or via e-mail, each was tickled pink to be involved in this project. They either loved Sam or Thomas Jefferson High School, with most falling strongly into both categories. Their contributions were substantive and enthusiastic and added much to the total book. I sincerely thank each one of you.

Here is a veritable All-Star line-up of Jefferson Alumni, both students and faculty, each of whom is well represented in the book: Dr. Robert Schain, Bernie Zises, Jack Dutch Garfinkel, Jack Rip Goldman, Moe Finkelstein, Ed Cuffy" Rosenberg, Sid Rabinowitz, Manny Sokol, Mac Tischler, Iggy Gordon, Alan Cedarbaum, Al Solomon, Bernie Stock and Frank Pflanzer.

Thanks to Al Solomon who does a great job as President of the Thomas Jefferson Alumni Association, and his good colleague, Stu Rothstein, the able Treasurer/Secretary of the Association. Thanks to Allen Jay who provided me access to the Jefferson Class of 1953.

I’m also very appreciative of the valuable memories of Sam provided by Larry Pearlstein, Arthur Stevens, Hank Rosenstein, Zelda Spoelstra and Tom Lopes. Look for them in the story. Thanks to each of you.

No bona-fide biography is any good without the services of a competent genealogist. Since our time-span goes back into the 19th century, we needed a good one to access obscure records, dates and names. We had a real fine genealogist in the person of David Priever, who did an outstanding job for us. Many thanks, David.

The last, but most certainly not least criterion of any good book is the quality of its writing. For that, an author can only do his very best, but he also can recruit the very finest editors his friendship can buy. Here again, good fortune smiled upon me.

Joyce Zanchelli, former English teacher extraordinaire and a valued life-long friend, was a brilliant editor, even though she dubbed me King Comma and proceeded to surgically remove many of them from the copy. She edited the entire manuscript even though she was in the middle of a major move to a new home. That’s friendship! Many thanks, Joyce.

Another treasured life-long friend, Joel Kass, also was most helpful in editing the manuscript. Joel compiled a strong record as Physical Education Chairperson of John Dewey High School in New York City. Consequently, he is most knowledgeable about the book’s subject matter and his expertise was most beneficial. Thanks so much, Joel.

Last, but certainly not least, is the person who knows my writing the best and is not hesitant to wield a mean scalpel when editing it; my wife, Fran. Thanks sweetheart. You really did make the book better in a number of important ways.

This truly was a fun project for me. I enjoyed relating to each of the people mentioned above, and I am most grateful to each and every one of you. I hope that you will enjoy the end product as much as I enjoyed its creation.

Stan Friedland

December 1, 2003

CHAPTER ONE

The Schoenfeld Memorial Sportsmanship Award

At the end of the 2001-2002 basketball season, the New Jersey City University’s men’s basketball team, and 20th year head coach Charles Brown, were selected as one of eleven area winners of the Schoenfeld Sportsmanship Award. The school’s Athletic Director, Larry Schiner had this to say:

This is the most prestigious award that a coach and university can get and we are deeply honored to receive it.

The award was presented to this school by the Collegiate Basketball Officials’ Association (CBOA), the largest regional group of its kind in the country. The current website of the CBOA offers the following history of this award:

Sam Schoenfeld, former college basketball great, who possessed a great deal of energy, impeccable honesty and a charismatic personality, was one of the CBOA’s founding fathers. Sam espoused integrity and strong character, which set him apart from most men. A brief illness took Sam’s life in early 1956 and the CBOA decided to memorialize Sam through an award that would be presented annually to a coach and college basketball program which best exemplifies the principles and characteristics so prominently displayed by Sam Schoenfeld. Accordingly, the award is presented annually to the college or university, which, in the judgment of the CBOA membership, best exemplifies the highest degree of sportsmanship, character and ethics among their players, coaches and spectators. This is the highest honor that CBOA annually bestows upon any collegiate institution.

The website goes on to list every single college and university that has received this prestigious award since it first was given to Canisius College at the end of the 1956-1957 basketball season. In 2001-2002, the CBOA decided to give out multiple Area Awards rather than one, and a total of eleven schools were recipients. (See Appendix I)

At each awards ceremony, down through the forty six year history of this award, the CBOA presenter has made it a point to provide a brief profile of Sam Schoenfeld and to communicate to the audience just why he was so special and why this award has such great meaning each year.

Who was Sam Schoenfeld that he’d be so honored with such a national memorial award that’s even gained in prestige with each passing year? Did he really fit the magnificent description accorded him by the CBOA?

Why not meet him and judge for yourself. He’s well worth knowing!

Image279.JPG

John Nucatola, President of the Collegiate Basketball Official’s Association, and Mrs. Sam Schoenfeld present the first Schoenfeld Sportsmanship Award to the President of Canisius College, April, 1957.

Image287.JPG

CHAPTER TWO

Basketball: More Than A Game

His stage was basketball. Only it became more than a game; it became his entire life.

How did this happen? Was there something identifiable in his roots; in his childhood?

Sam’s Schoenfeld’s parents, Benjamin and Sarah, were strong, resolute and hard working people. They met and married in Austria in 1898, and, according to the historical evidence on hand, their name at that time was Schuster. Benjamin was a butcher and had a small but profitable shop. Sarah gave birth to their first child, Jean, in 1900. The family lived in a border section of Austria, which, in that era, was under the disputed rule of Poland. The territory always seemed to be the source of a tugging match between the two countries and the political instability made life rather precarious.

One day, in 1901, Benjamin was summoned to the town hall and, without prior warning, was drafted into the Polish Army! He was given a uniform, told to get his affairs in order, and then was instructed to report for duty two days hence. Benjamin went home, buried his uniform in the back yard, took his money out of the bank, and with his wife and baby, left town under the cover of night. It is quite probable that the Schusters had to buy a new passport and adopt the new surname of Schoenfeld, because that was the name on their respective passports when they passed through Ellis Island with their one year old baby, Jean, late in 1901.

The Schoenfelds had cousins living in Peekskill, New York, and that became their first hometown where they opened a small butcher shop. There were approximately one hundred Jewish families living in the area at that time, and their shop appears to have been the second or third butcher shop in town. It may not have been the best choice of location for a new home and business. They had to work very hard to make ends meet. One of them had to make the long trek into the Bronx each weekend to buy the meat and haul it back to Peekskill for the weekly sales. Since they both were strong, able people, they persevered and survived.

Two years later, another cousin, living in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, informed them that his neighborhood was in need of a kosher butcher shop. By now, the Schoenfelds were more than ready to leave Peekskill, so they moved into an apartment in the back of a store on DeKalb Avenue and opened up a new butcher shop at that location.

Hard working people, they labored in the shop six days a week plus Saturday nights when they prepared the meats and chickens for the next day. They were able and honest and provided good service to their customers. As a result, their shop thrived and the family soon was able to move into their own home nearby. Their second child, Herman, named after Benjamin’s father, Hyman Schuster, was born in 1904, and Sam, their third and last child, was born in September, 1906.

Regrettably for Sam and his family, their time with Benjamin would be far too brief. In March, 1913, an accident occurred. One of the men who worked in the shop fell from a ladder, injuring himself quite seriously. Benjamin, a powerful and strong person, picked up the injured individual, and with the help of another worker, carried him to the hospital. Lightly dressed for the unseasonable snowy weather at the time, Benjamin was chilled when he returned, but he continued his daily work which of course, meant going into and out of the freezer. Unfortunately, Benjamin contracted pneumonia from this episode and passed away early in April, 1913. He was 37 years old. His youngest son, Sam, was only 6 ½.

Sarah was a capable and strong person and she took over the butcher shop and ran it well. She obviously needed the help of her children Jenny, (Jean’s nick-name) aged 13, and Herman, aged 9, who pitched in most willingly. Sam also did what was needed of him, but he soon became distracted. From early on Sam loved sports and would fill virtually all of his free time playing with his friends. A dutiful son, he juggled his butcher-shop chores with his passion for his games. He became a regular in the playgrounds of his neighborhood and soon became quite skilled in the reigning sports of his time, baseball, basketball and handball. Every free moment he had was spent playing in one of these activities, seven days a week.

Sam was a natural athlete. He had excellent eye-hand coordination and moved very well. He had a keen understanding of whatever situation he was in and could anticipate what was coming next. He soon became one of the best players in each of these three sports and logged much time in developing his skills in them. Since they were played at different times of the year, Sammy Schoenfeld was never at a loss for things to do.

It soon became apparent that his favorite activity amongst the three was basketball. And the basketball bug bit him hard! This was a sport that could be played throughout the entire year. All one had to do was bring a ball to the playground. No one there? No problem. He could just practice different shots until some one came along. And that’s what he did, becoming a skilled shooter and ball-handler, skills that