Sonny Hacker
Irving "Sonny" Hacker was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1931 and was called Sonny from the age of two. His parents were born in Austria, in a village called Bukovina that later became part of Romania, and immigrated through Ellis Island around 1921, sponsored by his father's uncle Leo, a pharmacist. His father, Adolf Hacker, worked as a butcher and laborer in meat packing houses and slaughterhouses, and once ran a kosher butcher shop in Greenwich Village with Uncle Leo before the Depression forced it to close. His mother worked as a forelady in the garment district. Though money was scarce, Sonny recalled a childhood full of love, family, and endless ball games, spent alongside a tight group of friends in a social athletic club called the Vultures.
As a teenager, Sonny worked summers in the Catskills, starting in a hotel kitchen and working his way up from middleman to busboy to waiter, an experience he treasured all his life. After graduating high school in Bensonhurst in 1949, he attended the Drake School of Business for a year and then took a mailroom job. He enlisted in the Navy near the start of the Korean War, completed boot camp in Bainbridge, Maryland, and trained at aviation prep school and aerial gunnery school in Jacksonville, Florida. Assigned to a hurricane-hunting squadron, he flew low-level penetration missions into hurricanes for two years, gathering weather data with minimal equipment, sometimes reading the movement of whitecaps to help track storms.
While stationed in Jacksonville, Sonny met Merle, and the couple married in 1954. They had four children, including their son Larry, whom they lost in 1966 and whom Sonny asked to be remembered. After his service, the family moved to Dallas, which they made their permanent home. Sonny worked briefly in a family retail business, drove a route selling records and toys to supermarkets, and later owned a shoe store. In Dallas, he and Merle became deeply involved in the Jewish Community Center, serving on the board and leading the Membership Committee, and he cherished Sunday mornings at the center with his family. Looking back, Sonny counted his happiest times as those spent with his wife, children, and grandchildren, and his lasting advice was to have fun and not let money rule your life.
Full Transcript
sunny 1931 brooklyn new york that's correct let's go back there tell me about life in Brooklyn when you were just a little kid well first off let me say my given name is Irving and I've been called sunny ever since I was two years old in kindergarten in elementary school straight through the New York school system as a matter of fact even when I was in the service they started calling me sir sunny and to this day the only thing that anybody knew me by Irving what was on my dog tags while I was in the Navy growing up in Brooklyn as you can see
by the day it was depression time right we had no money but as the saying goes I was cool about it in no I was cool until I was maybe six or seven and Mama I said to mama I want an ice cream cone and she says ok at at the time of ice cream cotton was three cents mama said ok I'll buy you the ice cream cone but you can't have one tomorrow bear in mind three cents but it didn't matter to us our life was plain below you have out on the street playing punch bowl or going over to the school yard playing
basketball leaving leaving a house early in the morning coming home at night and believe it or not most of the times missing our lunch and just out there playing one game after another seemingly we never got tired as in New York a bunch of guys no we were not a gang we would call the social athletic club the name of the club was the vultures the codes were maroon and gold good kids but tough kids we didn't take nothing from anybody I don't care whether they were the same religion or whatever anybody said to us they would pay for it that's the way we work
if somebody called us the K word or her or jb they found out what JB we do which I'm very proud of I'm that we were not fooled once but we didn't take any any garbage from if you get if you try to put us down by God we let you know you ain't putting us down most of my young life was playing belong school basketball a very little football because the number one we didn't have the money to buy equipment number two there weren't that many venues for us to play at you know white topic that's about it every Sunday morning was a softball
game usually we come home from a date a date we took a girl and she had an ice-cream soda that was a date before even with a home we went to the school yet to make sure we had the court the reserves so we can play a game so it was a growing up was a tremendous experience like I said we didn't have much of anything as far as materialistic goes but we had ourselves we have love of family and we were a bunch of good kids tell me about your parents what'd your dad do my father was a butcher he worked the personal like
both my parents came from the old country they were originally born in Austria after world would want it became Romania in a little village called bucovina and I'm sure everybody has seen what these little villages are or what not while my father was in Romania believe it or not it was a cowboy daddy used to bring it used to take cattle they were in romania and they were near the Russian border and then used to take the cattle over the Russia to graze and then bring him back so I guess you'd call him a cowboy they left the book they work the second cousins everybody
it seems of you they left bukovina i think it was nineteen twenty-one they went to la france and then they came to Ellis Island they were sponsored by my father's uncle whose name was Leo fella Uncle Leo took most of my father Adolf hacker took him in he was a pharmacist Uncle Leo got daddy a job as a in a meat packing house he worked the meat packing houses slaughterhouses grunt work but honest hard labor a good man daddy always worked didn't drink didn't make a heck of a lot of money but it seemingly mama went to work and she worked at the in the
garment district as a for late entry very proud of the fact when they asked to watch what you do in the a in the garment that was a forelady sounds like a supervisor but anyhow so model went to work boys had bread on the table always with taken care of medically so I don't think that's poor we had what we needed and that was good enough for us does your dad ever tell you why they made the attorney to come over you know I never they never spoke to me about why they came over the only thing I could say is as we read and
heard lately this was the land of golden opportunity right and living in the small town of bucovina they had no opportunity not now that your grandparents come over to or I never knew my grandparents they they didn't make the trip they did not make the shift mom and daddy went by themselves mama my mother had two sisters here over sisters and my dad had my dad had his Uncle Leo who is the patriarch and a fan Emily he owned the drugstore and he was the big man and he when they came over they went to all immigrants go to came in to Ellis Island ended
up in the box for about a couple of about a year and then they went to who everybody else did the lower east side and from their daddy had numerous jobs and packing houses and then he and uncle leo opened up a butcher shop right on kosher butcher shop i might add in Greenwich Village on macdougal street i'll never forget that and that was during the Depression unfortunately it didn't work out they went mahone broke and daddy went back to working in packing houses and slaughterhouses unfortunately I never really spoke to my parents about their parents never sat down with mama or daddy saying how
was it open bukovina how was it coming here you know viola for hog and then going T I never did and I guess on my part was selfish because oh I know I didn't care i just want to go out and play ball right right so and I regret that yeah i would get the fact that i never knew that much about number one my grandparents number two what it was like growing up in bucovina so again I I regret that where did your parents meet I think it was just like the stories I've heard they would they grew up in this little town there
was i I would say it was a you know his Clara his aid off there they get married in period but they loved each other they were good to each other but to say there was a romantic get-together I don't think so i think they just as the years ago why they had a great admiration for each other they came here basically the same time and that's it they got married in states in 1925 my sister was born in 1927 four years later i was born in 1931 and as i said growing up in Brooklyn New York everything was playing ball because we had nothing
else to do we had no money now you're such a big sports fan what teams did you follow who are your teams in nineteen nineteen thirty-nine I was in the bathroom and some guy looked at me turned around and said who you rootin for begin from Brooklyn but my father was not a fan not a sports fan at all anyhow I looked X moment but I root for the Dodgers and that's that's the way i became a Brooklyn Dodger fan in 1939 followed them straight on through and then when they moved I didn't like that I quit on him but at the time I was
lit I was in the service and I was in Jacksonville so what I really didn't follow him that well but I really didn't have you know a team that I hated when they moved to LA I did find a new I did follow the New York Giants as a football team the Robustelli and you know that era I went to the you took high school in Bensonhurst Brooklyn during the summers we didn't have much of anything I mean there was no day camp or not there there wasn't we just couldn't afford they can't our summers were spent playing ball in the schoolyard didn't cost nothing
what when I was 14 years old a very good friend of mine a close friend of on just lost and a great guy David Goodman there were three of us there was me sunny hacker hurry her wits and baby Goodman we were like styria type you could listen to those names oh boy that's New York anyhow goody who is David Goodman we called him good but he says look they need he worked at a hotel the hotel first in Fallsburg New York and he said they need they need a couple of guys in the kitchen well you needed work papers and they had to be
16 and I not only did not look 16 I didn't look 12 salemi I he says I think i can get you and her beyond would going work but you know telling you 16 well they need it helps in a degree that we got on train coming off in Ellenville New York and there was the owner hotel Joe Wasserman and Joey and they and they looked at we i scrunched down the back seat and they said how old are you well I'm 16 well like I say I didn't look 12 but needless to say they hired us we worked that summer I started out of
what they call the middleman and the middleman lost glasses and silverware not with a machine that we put it in two bosses in the sink going up and down alright that was the first year of the mountains needless to say went back home after the Labor Day the season ran for Memorial Day to Labor Day went back to Brooklyn went to school summer came again back to the hotel first this time I got a promotion from the middle man to a busboy i bussed tables did that for two years at the hotel first keeping in mind every summer we went there the farm year I
made it to waiter and that was it the money at the time I thought was fantastic for season we usually made anywhere from two to three thousand dollars for a summer I'm gonna have to tell you that we're talking about nineteen forty nine nineteen forty eight seven so as a matter of fact my wife can show you the ring that was a way to engage your brain came from working at the hotel first not now tell me some of the famous people you bet up there this in the Catskill area this is in the Catskill area called the boy circuit and a lot of the
hotels especially the bigger ones would hire at well it will hire they we either Bell hops or Busboys or weight is most of the bell hops and did nothing but stand around look around and most of these were the college boys from schools like ccny and Yul I you guys like Wilt Chamberlain who was i think pencil a wig Kansas or something but they all came to the mountains that's worth Dolph be ghosts it Tannenbaum Frank man japani these were all guys in honesty it was a hello how are you because I was just a lowly busboy or waiter at the time notta let everybody
know who were these people well Frank man japani seat Tannenbaum fats rule sit Tannenbaum was a great bull American out of n what New York University Dolph bigos was a great college basketball out of Liu also edge woman who was a sinner I met down there was a center of a TCL why now that working in the mountains was an experience I'll never forget I loved it I grew up there it was a fantastic life I loved a fact as I loved it so much when I got out of high school in June a 1949 graduating from a new trick uh I wanted to go
back it was the summer and that's when mama stepped in it says uh-uh you're either going to school college were you going to work you're not going to bum around in the mountains and she called his bowmen oh my well I guess you would call it bumming around for money but the BIA nights to call myself not myself the waiters were like hired gigolos if if on the weekend they didn't get enough guys that came down and it's a bunch of single girls who used to come down for weekends in the mountains and to the Catskills and they had Saturday night dances and if there
weren't enough boys the ladies of busboys couldn't leave the premises we had to stay there to be there s not escort but the dance with them so they'll come back the next time they made a movie about some called dirty dancing that's right yeah that's right it was it's an experience that I'll never forget I will never forget I think of some of the best times of my lighter and I think anybody who worked in the board circuit or the Catskills for any man i will say the same thing you just can't have a bad time here unless your yield guilts never even know so
anyhow that was that was that I I decided to I didn't want to go to college because I told mom isis my look I'm tired of living over you and Daddy as again we live from I say from hand to mouth but how mama did it she always put managed to put something away in the butt in the dime Savings Bank of Bensonhurst oh I know how but she did refrigerator was always full we always had clothes on her back even if we weren't one day at you washed it that night and we work the next day for assembly at the public school PS 186
from PS 186 it was set low PS 96 on to new trick i regress I go back to now or the girl or the garnished and you ish that me an English that means either do something get off the pot or some so I did not want to go to college I felt there was too much money for Mama and Daddy so I went to Drake school of business as every nice Jewish boy got numbers you got to be an accountant I went to Drake school of business while I was there it was a great experience again everything but me was either social playing ball
I didn't care about learning or anything like that being so close to after World War two everybody thought kids who came item in my case they thought I was a veteran from World War two so we have all the girls hovering around us again I look like a baby Heineken think I was a World War two left beside the point but I was 17 years old anyhow instead of getting down grinding it out I was a social butterfly playing boil and being social at night we belong to a basketball league we played at the jch the Jewish community house which needless to say was a
bunch of juice boys and the biggest experience was we played at the YMCA Young Men's Christian Association I don't want to get the with Jewish and Catholic anyway how to make long story short we grip that beat the pieces we were the only Jewish boy playing in the league and we made those I don't know you can cut it off you want we made those go and look silly we I mean we just tore him up first fine I was ever in we made him look so bad one game as we were walking down he the the showers and lockers were down in the cellar
and all of a sudden they were waiting for us at the bottom of the steps and they started jumping us well needless to say like I say we were not who knows what we want sissies either so needless to say we got it quite a scrap ass boys and the lack of another word the gum and we held our own with him for quite a while till they came up broke it up and they said that's it and they told us to go on home well being not you know had not having a lot of money we had no cause whoever went was either public
transportation and walk so they said just walk home and you'll be all right together well we walked home together except for one guy berwyn sack she says I am worried about that I'll go by myself as we were walking to the candy store which we hung out which was called marshes emotions can be still we got two marshes which is about six or seven block from the wine and we went in there as we were walking into the candy store we were going back and back and here comes the big glam try it you know they go but they want they want another shot at
us boy she was going crazy and just before it was ready to erupt the police came in and broke with us or one who worked on by herself got beat up but he had a brother at a brother-in-law one was Merchant Marine war was a marine with a scar across his cheek that looked like a hood and they regretted they beat up Irwin because the two brothers went to wear these guys hang out and they beat the heck out of you a little of them and then after I went to school for Drake for a year and then after that again mama says you're going
to go to work go back to school that's my I don't want to go back to school I took a job with every shop incorporate our me melt the still in business every sharp ends and raises and I was a mail boy there and I work for them for a while they didn't want high because it was way at the beginning of the Korean War and they said well you're going to be drafted what's a sense of hiring and said no I won't be drafted but unbeknownst to them I had enlisted in the Navy but it was so close to World War two there was
no place to put us so I wasn't taken immediately how to wait till bases opened up so we can take our basic training and then a few months later I was drafted and as I stated to them I were what happens now I joined the Navy but you're going to take me in the army and they said whoever gets you first luckily I as far as I'm concerned the Navy got me first two weeks after that I was in Bainbridge Maryland taking bootcamp stayed if by three months I might add a my division we were all about ninety percent of of us with Jewish boys
from the New York area who in the history of boot camp and bainbridge Maryland the entire company had a stand captain's mast so instead of doing 12 weeks in boot camp we had to do an extra week doing nothing but really need Code of Military Justice and spend inspections after boot camp I went to aggregation prep school which is a basic course on learning about aviation and I went at the Naval Aviation took a basic course you have the naval aviation 12 weeks we were assigned to schools what would be our mo the only thing left about when I got there was a parachute rigger
or which was in Lakehurst New Jersey or aerial gunner I wanted to go to be a parachute rigger because I wanted to get back home to Lakers which was on the East Coast but I found out you had a pack your own shooting jump so that was the end of being a parachute rigger I became an aerial i went to aerial gunnery school in jacksonville florida and did that for about 12 weeks and after that I was a I was assigned to a fighter squadron going to Korea aboard the USS ticonderoga carry I said well I got some leave coming kind of go home they
gave me 10 days leave when I got back the squadron had left and they stay put me and they told me to wait they're going to put me in another squadron which ended up being at the time was called Vijay to hurricane honest and they put me in that while it to stall out in the hurricane hunters they didn't really need aerial Gunners at the time so I like every nice boy I was giving out trolling and you know work any offices did that for about a year and then they got some new planes in which we called the p 2 v's new hurricane planes
and they needed aerial Gunners on him why I do not know because we had no armament mean it's a safe flying in in a hurricane you stripped down to make a long story short i did go into the squadron into the group pn2 there were 11 of us and it was like one big family I loved it I never told my parents what I did because I knew by the way they would say you're crazy what he going to do in the interim before going into the heart yes while I was in it I met my wife Merle and how I met it in all
honesty this is where it I really didn't want to go out because being a sailor in Jacksonville Florida I was having a good time I didn't need to end the one but my friends who was Gentile he sits look I got a girl I got a friend a girl I'm going with you would got a friend that back from college and she wants to go out but you would only let go out with Jewish boys I was the only Jewish play the squadron and I told them look Brad his name was I said I got two bucks on me after that two bucks is gone
it's on you I ain't got any money so PS i did i did go out after the movies always have oh he paid for the drinks whatever was coke I'm I did and then after that burrow said to me she said it to me when am I going to see you again I didn't say she did and I was too embarrassed to say I'm broke I have no money you know I so I said well I come see you tomorrow and I borrowed some money took the bus and in all honesty when I wasn't flying hurricanes I slow morrow yeah and that was a wonderful
marriage which is still going on gonna be 60 years it was a wonderful life we had our first child was born two years after we married we lost them larry was born in 1956 you're married in 54 we lost Larry in 66 I don't want liar to be forgotten I flew hurricanes for two years what we call low-level penetration low-level penetration is we went in at anywhere from 200 to 500 feet flying smack into the hurricane to get to the eye many's the time flying this the winds were usually over audit not many of the times flying into we can only go sideways and we
just couldn't go straight ahead and like a bunch of young kids pilots and kids we were laughing not knowing at any time we can go down but that didn't matter we had a good time at that they don't do low-level penetration anymore to go up to 30,000 feet fly down into it it was a good life my parents never knew my wife needless to say do about a huff family knew about it my parents never knew about it but as being a good sigh he's Sunday I'd call and say a plan about how family was and one day my mother said to me somebody what
are you doing in the Navy I said well you know what I'm doing mom on my clique you know I give our clothes on totten for the first time I want my mother my sweet little mother called life I smell what are you talking about you're flying hurricanes well my sister knew I was flying because I wanted somebody to end all right and I said BTW told you she says no I still had to find out the Jacksonville journal which was a newspaper took a picture of us after he came back from a hurricane in Jacksonville and it took a picture of us and they
sent they got our names and addresses and sent letters to all the parents or wives along on if they want pictures of the relation who flew in the hurricane and that's how my mother found out Helen you were flying hurricanes what were you what data were you gathering well needless to say when I was flying hurricanes in nineteen fifty three four and five there wasn't much sophisticated equipment we had we had the radar and that was it we'd fly into our kamo level to find out how fast the hurricane was moving and which way it was going now again we had no sophisticated equipment we
had a meteorologist air all gist i should say sitting in the nose of the plane open up not opening the facto Plexiglas over it but he would look at the Whitecaps by seeing how fast the Whitecaps were moving and which way they were moving that would go back our headquarters was Miami they would send back to whether central in Miami that the hurricane is moving south southwest and a hundred and some odd miles an hour all being read by Whitecaps is the Warner that's how we had it fly solo because we had a look at the white hat needless to say now they're flying these
constellations I got so much equipment on it I don't even know if they ever see a hurricane hood who did Jimmy kill Hodges I met Gil Hodges Gil Hodges was a a ball play the first baseman for the Brooklyn Dodgers in those days ball players without making eight nine ten million a year they were lucky if they were making ten thousand a year so we'll all of them had extra jobs they all lived in the neighborhood they didn't have mansions they hold it then eyes I've lived in a third-floor your pockets and even just one of the guys and I saw him walking down the
street in Bensonhurst I went oh my says your Gil Hodges he's yeah how are we SAT we taught and that was it and that was a great experience I I enjoyed it and you know being a kid meeting at a Bookman Dodger was like I don't know what you can crawl it it was like a mattia I mean oh my god yo and that so that's when I met him there are lots of them that used to go around it was a good eros and I met goody Rosen played for the New York Giants sit Borden said Gordon was a third base those a guy
you know I was basically in a Jewish neighborhood and sig alert was Jewish you have a good ear or so it was Gil Hodges wasn't but they bent on the other side of the street with the guy so it was a it was a great I do not regret how I grew up I think kids are missing something now that we had love they have loved now but a different kind of love we were freelance and fancy free we didn't have a buh buh buh buh you know to do with the cell phones and cell phones and they didn't have it was it was a
good life I came here to Dallas if thy gotta have a service i went for it work for family business for about a year and a half i found out that being in the retail business was not my bag so if a year and a half i left i got a job with a company commercial of New Jersey drove a truck all the toys and records out of the truck went around to different supermarkets and sold them records and toys and want that by white girl went to work I made a living but you know for the extras for at the time got to chill
we lost Larry and to make a long story short we had what we needed the kids had everything they wanted the kids went wherever they want so that was a good life they had something that I I don't regret I didn't have it as long as I can my children had that was good enough for me what was the happiest time in your life the happiest time in my life is when i was with the family when we moved to dallas and we decided this is going to be our home i had my daughter Deborah my son Bradley and then the baby Howard who at
the time was out 12 coming here to the center I mean sunday morning was that's it we say clean up the house straight in the house building to Santa be there by nine o'clock in the morning come home at six seven at night doing everything here at the center playing ball meeting doing everything Merlin I got very involved in the center I was on the board we were ahead of the Membership Committee and we love the sinner the happiest times of my life is other than the fact now when the families together with all the grandchildren was coming here to the center on Sunday morning
with the kids and one big happy family not only my own family but everybody else greatest invention in your lifetime what came along that you went wow I guess I'd like to drive a car because I never had a copper that's growing up so to say kottakkal was there but you know I guess television I'm having traveled on the road quite a bit and didn't like the hoagie I wasn't one that ball hopped the day like that I was intent but sitting sitting in the hotel room loving the sports just putting on the sports and see that's all i guess i would say television yeah
now in your lifetime you lived through so many momentous occasions of course the Korean War President Kennedy assassination something good the moon landing in 69 the first time tragedy of 911 what other national scene came along that you knew exactly where you were when it happened well when Kennedy was shot I was at I I owned a shoe store and I walked out on blanding boulevard and everybody was running around what happened the president was shot now the beginning of world war two and went with my uncle we used to call him our key went to see sergeant york in the morrow theater in bensonhurst
we've walked out for the first time of my life I had seen as you see in the movies news that Japan blondes Pearl Harbor and that was an occasion I to this day 1941 I remember walking out of the morrow theater if the seeing sergeant York with my unki and priming out the world war two would stop now you and Merle have four children you lost Larry of a young age six grandkids what advice does granddad have for the next generation have fun it's probably not to sound this advice in the world because I'm not crying poor mouth I think I could have done much
better with my money than I did but I had a good time I don't regret it and that's what I say to them don't let mommy be your room moving your life have a good time enjoy yourself if it's going to cost a little lecture don't stop and say can I afford it I mean needless is spend it foolishly but if it means going on a cruise go on the cruise do what you want to do have fun and I basically I say have fun don't let money rule your life did a great job today thanks for doing this well it was my pleasure i
like i got a thousand stars I love growing up I don't regret anything I daren't needless to say summary bit in my life but I think basically family is what counts you have your wife your children your grandchildren cherish them because hopefully they cherish you and will be you asked me the greatest times of my life is being with my family good job man thank you Jah you