The Summit

Abe Schwartz

Abe Swartz is a resident at the Summit at First Hill in Seattle, Washington. He was born
on April 29, 1921 in Manhattan, New York, to his mother and father. Both of his parents grew up
in Poland, his mother from Zgierz and his father from Chenshen. They traveled separately to
America both around 1912. His mother living with her brother and his wife ended up taking
Abe’s father in as a border to live with them. They ended up getting married and having Abe!

Abe spent his childhood and life in New York. Like many Jews in New York City, Abe
and his family moved to the Bronx, Abe spent the rest of his life living there. In the Bronx, Abe
grew up orthodox Jewish, he kept Kosher and spoke both Yiddish and English at home. His
grandmother sent him to Hebrew school at Uptown Talmud Torah (UTT) in hopes that he would
become a rabbi. However, Abe later attended college at City College of New York (CCNY) and
majored in Biology and minored in Electrical Engineering.

Abe was in college at the beginning of World War 2. After hearing President Roosevelt’s
speech, Abe decided to get a job in the army. Abe first got a job in the army then decided to join
the army to serve. He was stationed in Texas and Arizona, and was supposed to go to Japan.
However, right before leaving, Abe and some friends were sitting around a radio in Texas when
they heard the news of “a bomb that had hit in Japan, so we heard about the bomb and the
second one a week or two later.” Instead of traveling to Japan, Abe was sent to Munich
Germany for post war stations. With his minor of electrical engineering, Abe was able to join the
Air Force in Munich and teach his fellow soldiers about bombsites and autopilot so they could
operate planes as well.

While in Germany helping to set up displaced persons camps, Abe decided to look for
family members. He knew many had been killed but wanted to see if he could find any survivors
of the Holocaust. After some time of not finding any relatives, Abe started to lose hope. Then,
on the march to the trains to take the soldiers back to America, Abe hears someone call
“Schwartz!” from the crowd. Sure enough, Abe’s cousin was standing there. Abe spent the
whole train ride catching up with one of the only surviving relatives in Europe.

Back in New York, Abe’s friends started to get married. One of his close friends was
getting married soon so Abe attended the party, little did Abe know that the host of the party
was his future wife. At the party, Abe was reading a book about animals when a young woman
came up to him asking if he wanted to go on a walk through the forest. Abe went with the girl
and they spent hours exploring together and talking. Less than a year later, they got married.
Abe and his wife raised three children: two boys and a girl, in the beautiful city of New York.

Abe also liked to spend his time volunteering at the Bronx zoo. One day a baby hippo
got delivered, requiring four volunteers to watch it. Abe volunteered along with three other
women. A week into volunteering, one woman walked to their supervisor saying she had to quit
because the hippo repeatedly tried pushing her into the pool in the hippo habitat. Abe did not
think much of it until the two other women another week later complained of the same thing.
Abe became the only volunteer left to take care of the little hippo. Abe stayed volunteering there
for the next five years.

Abe moved to the Summit at First hill only last year to be closer to his daughter who
teaches at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma. Abe continues to be one of the oldest
residents at the Summit reaching 98 years of age!