What’s in a name? You tell me
- Mike Dewey: Life Lines
- January 4, 2025
- 314
There have been any number of famous Deweys in U.S. history:
—Gov. Thomas Dewey, who lost the 1948 election, a stunning defeat that resulted in the memorable “Dewey Defeats Truman” headline.
—Admiral George Dewey, best known for his victory in the battle of Manila Bay in 1898, a milestone American maritime achievement.
—Librarian Melvil Dewey, inventor of the Dewey Decimal System.
—John Dewey, progressive educational reformer and philosopher.
—Merton “Dewey” Bunnell, founding member of the band America.
—Jack Black’s Dewey Finn, featured in 2003’s “School of Rock.”
—Dwight “Dewey” Evans, All-Star Boston Red Sox outfielder.
—Dr. Dewey Selmon, All-Pro NFL linebacker for Tampa Bay.
—Huey, Louie and Dewey, nephews of Disney’s Donald Duck.
Now before you even start to think about it, I’m not suggesting that, one day in the not-too-distant future, I might join their august company; I mean if I were destined for fame, I’d already be there.
But that’s life, right? Some of us get the doughnut; others get the hole.
You can’t waste precious time fretting on the what-ifs and maybes.
Still, it’s a hard habit to break, especially in matters of the heart, but that’s why God invented rock ‘n’ roll, or maybe Chuck Berry did.
That’s not for me to say, though I am eternally grateful to poets like Dylan and Joni, Jackson Browne, Paul Simon and Neil Young.
Their wise words, set to some fine music, have gotten me through more endless dark nights than I care to remember and have enabled me to emerge on the other side, not only intact, but also a little stronger.
“Don’t let it bring you down
It’s only castles burning
Just find someone who’s turning
And you will come around.”
If you need me to tell you who wrote those lines, maybe find another columnist. There are hundreds out there … just choose one.
Hmm.
I seem to have strayed rather far afield, once again, from the point I was trying to make, which had something to do with famous Deweys and how I was never going to be included in their number.
So let’s turn this ship around right now … I’m not really a Dewey.
You read that right.
My name is, or might have been, Stanley Michael Duszynski.
That’s pronounced “Du-ZIN-ski,” for those of you who may have stumbled over all those consonants jammed together like cars in a chain-reaction crash on an icy highway, ambulance lights flashing.
At this point in the story, I’m going to venture into speculative territory — a place I don’t often visit because I’ve always valued the truth, especially when I’m sharing my varied experiences with you.
This time around, though, there’s no alternative since the only person who could inform my perspective has long since died.
I probably should have asked Dad directly why he changed his surname, which was Duszynski, to the more anglicized Dewey, but I never did. To me, growing up and seeing the evidence hanging quite obviously from the family tree, it was like wanting him to talk more openly about his WWII service, which he never did.
My father was a good man, an educated man, a gifted man, the kind of man who listened more than he spoke. If it was his preference to keep that information to himself, I respected that.
But I’m going to make the assumption that it was based on his desire not to have his children face anti-Polish prejudice, something so ugly it had to have scarred him at some point.
People of Polish descent were often the butt of cruel jokes in mid-20th century America; I mean who hasn’t heard them and laughed at them, ignoring the hurt they can inflict on the innocent?
Q: What does a Polish woman get on her wedding night that’s long and hard?
A: A new last name.
Q: How many Polacks does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Three. One to hold the light bulb and two to turn the ladder.
Q: Did you hear the one about the Polack who locked the keys in his car?
A: He needed a coat hanger to get his family out.
That kind of stereotypical humor was as endemic as it was ignorant.
Marlon Brando’s portrayal of Stanley Kowalski in “A Streetcar Named Desire” fought back on the big screen as did Michael Stivic, played by Rob Reiner in TV’s groundbreaking “All in the Family.”
Polish Americans were hardly alone in being singled out for ridicule, but they (we) were always an easy target for bigots.
Immigrants from many other countries felt the same sting of being categorized, marginalized and ostracized, reduced to a living cliché.
And while I wish it weren’t the same thing today, I’d be foolish to believe otherwise. Ascribe any blame where you want it, but it won’t change the reality that immigration and border security aren’t part of the bedrock foundation of a new American blueprint.
Allow me to close my last column of 2024 with a quote I found, quite by accident, as I was studying the Russian Revolution:
“Last day of this year and, God willing, it will never return. Let such a year as this die forever and never come back. How I’d love something new, to cheer my soul and make my heart clean and bright again. I want to be happy. Instead, there are tears in my eyes. Oh, Lord, what is this and when will this end? This is the end of the hateful year 1916 — let it disappear into oblivion, forever.”
I have no idea who Vasily Mishnin was, but the man could write.
May the new year be a damn sight better than the old one for us all.
Mike Dewey can be reached at Carolinamiked@aol.com or 1317 Troy Road, Ashland, OH 44805. He invites you to find him on his Facebook page, where the ideal of a melting pot is still simmering.