Voices of the Past Record

Historic Preservation Committee

Oral History

Zach and Marilyn Morfogen were interviewed by John Grossmann at Franciscan Oaks on August 13, 2010.

John Grossmann:	It’s August 13, 2010, and I’m here to interview Zach and Marilyn Morfogen. We are at Franciscan Oaks, where they are renting an apartment for six weeks. Let me start by asking how long have you two been married?
Zach Morfogen:	Fifty-four years.
JG:	And how did you meet? Let me ask Marilyn that question.
Marilyn Morfogen	In high school. He was sitting in back of me because my name was McCormick and he was Morfogen.
JG:	And this was Mountain Lakes High School?
MM:	No, this was Boonton High School.
ZM:	Then she moved to Mountain Lakes.
MM:	Actually, I did not want to got to Mountain Lakes because we were going into our senior year and I certainly did not want to go to a school I didn't know for my last year in high school, so my father said, "Yes, you can go to Boonton High." So I went to Boonton High and I graduated from there.
ZM:	We played sports against one another, but we really didn't know one another very well.
JG:	So tell me where you both were born and then we'll get a little bit of your childhood, where you grew up, and we'll gradually work into the Mountain Lakes memories and experiences.
ZM:	I'm a New York, New Yorker. I was born in New York in 1928, and when I graduated from grade school my parents said, "We're moving to New Jersey." And we moved to Boonton Township, New Jersey. Rockaway Valley Road. And I came here screaming. I didn't want to leave New York. I was 13. My sister didn't have to move fulltime, because she was at the Barnard School for Girls in New York and I had to come out to the Boonies and went to Boonton High School homeroom and sat next to this Marilyn McCormick who was the cutest girl in the class and we became bonded. And then I applied to Brown and got accepted. I went in September and she was put on hold. She got mad when they accepted her, so she went to the University of South Carolina. We probably wouldn't have ended up married if we had gone to Brown together.
JG:	Let me backtrack with Marilyn for a minute. So you were born when, Marilyn? And where did you grow up?
MM:	I grew up in Boonton. I was born in 1929.
JG:	Where in Boonton did your family live?
MM:	In the beginning it was down in the lower...
ZM:	What they call The Flats.
MM:	The Flats. It was a secluded kind of place.
JG:	Do you remember the street address?
ZM:	It's right near Mary Coogan, who's from Mountain Lakes. You should interview Mary Coogan, by the way.
MM:	And then I lived on Ridgeview Place in the Park Section.
JG:	And then your family moved to Mountain Lakes before your senior year in high school. So you were how old?
ZM:	She graduated from high school at 16.
MM:	So I must have been 15.
JG:	So your parents moved to Mountain Lakes when you were 15. What was your street address in Mountain Lakes?
MM:	94 Boulevard.
JG:	What occasioned the move? Do you remember?
MM:	I think my father just wanted a bigger house.
JG:	And did he get one?
MM:	Oh, yes. My father loved the house. He had wanted a bigger house and another thing that he wanted was in the kitchen he had a bar, a regular bar, with bottles in the back and people out on the highways that needed a drink or two or they ran out of it, they would call Al McCormick. And he'd say, "Yes, what do you want?" and he would give them the booze.
JG:	He was a backup package store, in effect?
ZM:	Yeah, her father was a very sociable, very successful man. He was the CFO of Revere Copper and Brass and he was the treasurer of the National American Legion. He had been a naval officer in World War I and he was very social and he was very much involved in Democratic politics.
JG:	Usual for Mountain Lakes.
ZM:	And, actually, when he died -- he died in Morristown -- they were trying to get him to run for governor. But he had a heart attack and died.
JG:	So out of his bar, he would supply people in need?
MM:	Yeah, he would go down to the cellar, that's where more of the stuff was.
JG:	Have you been back to the house since? Does any semblance of that bar still exist?
MM:	Whoever it was who bought the house, they tore out the bar entirely.
JG:	So you moved to Mountain Lakes at age 15 but you still continued to go to Boonton High School. And then the two of you ended up living in Mountain Lakes?
ZM:	No. We got engaged. Big engagement party at 94 Boulevard.
JG:	What year was that?
ZM:	1956 I think. We got engaged and we were going to buy a house in Boonton Park. Then my father died suddenly and my mother said, "Don't buy that house. Why don't you take over my house and I'll move into the guest cottage, and that's what we ended up doing. But before my father died he had a premonition. He said, "I want you to promise me that if something happens to me you don't spoil Al's..." -- we called him Big Al. Her dad was a big man. I said, "What do you mean?" He said, "Well, he's bailing out the Mountain Lakes Club. The Club is almost in bankruptcy. He's going to give the biggest wedding they've ever had. It's going to get them out of debt." I said, "Dad, come on." And sure enough, the next day. I was working at Life magazine and I got the word he had died. So we had this enormous wedding February 11, at the Mountain Lakes Club and it is true, it took The Club out of the red.
JG:	Really? How many people were at the wedding?
ZM:	Over 500.
MM:	He wanted everyone that he knew.
JG:	So that was probably the biggest, fanciest wedding at the Mountain Lakes Club?
ZM:	It probably was. Also very interesting, he was one of the founders of Riverside Hospital. He was the first treasurer. And my wife became a very active volunteer there and I ended up as president of Riverside because she got me involved in health care -- and I got her involved in the arts.
MM:	I'm sorry we don't have as much to talk about in Mountain Lakes.
JG:	We'll still have plenty to talk about, for instance, let's just talk about that wedding. That was a big, splendid affair. What are your memories of that? Where did people come from? Was it Boonton, Boonton Township, Mountain Lakes, and New York?
ZM:	It was all over.
MM:	Yes, all over.
ZM:	It was really a cosmopolitan kind of thing. Most of her bridesmaids were local New Jersey girls. The ushers were classmates of mine from Brown.
JG:	How many bridesmaids?
ZM:	I think you had eight and I had like 12 ushers. We were married at Mt. Carmel Church and the reception was at the Mountain Lakes Club.
JG:	How many piece band and what was the menu? Things like that. What do you remember?
ZM:	Her father loved a soup called Petite Marmite Henry IV. It was a famous French soup and he specified the menu.
JG:	Where would he have had that?
MM:	He always had that, wherever we ate.
ZM:	He had an apartment at the Park Lane Hotel in New York and he would go to restaurants like La Cote Basque. He was a gourmet.
JG:	Okay, that was the soup. What followed the soup?
ZM:	I think it was filet. Then we went to the Park Lane Hotel and stayed in a suite. Then we went to the Virgin Islands and all over the Caribbean. Came back on a ship from Haiti and returned. She said she was seasick. Turned out she was pregnant. So we had a daughter right away.
JG:	So let's talk then, to the extent we can, about Mountain Lakes. You're living in Mountain Lakes for your senior year, Marilyn. But Zach, you never lived in Mountain Lakes, but you're close to Mountain Lakes. This is the 30s, 40s, and 50s, and even beyond -- you two lived in Boonton Township until what year?
ZM:	We sold our house about 10 years ago.
JG:	So that's more than a half century -- and this might still be very interesting -- you're kind of looking over the fence a little bit, into Mountain Lakes, and, of course you have many friends here, and we'll get to the Little Theater in a second.
ZM:	And Riverside Hospital.
JG:	And Riverside. Marilyn, how long did your parents stay in that house on the Boulevard?
ZM:	Another 10 years I think, then my father in law died and my mother in law sold the house and moved to Boonton Township.
JG:	So, they bought the house in what year? You were 15 and born in 1929, so that's 1944, right during the war. And your mother sold the house in?
ZM:	Early 70s, I would guess.
JG:	So, even after you were married you were coming to Mountain Lakes.
ZM:	All the time. And she had sisters and a brother who went to Delbarton and then to Penn. The oldest sister got married from that house. Her wedding reception was also at the Mountain Lakes Club.
JG:	So what then are your memories of Mountain Lakes? Let me ask both of you. Memories? Impressions?
MM:	I can remember when I was out of college and job seeking and was asked to fill out an application for a D.C. government job and they wanted the names of neighbors. I did not know any of our Mountain Lakes neighbors. In the Boulevard house you would not even know you had a neighbor.
JG:	I'm trying to picture where 94 is on the Boulevard. Between what streets?
ZM:	It was a big lot; it went all the way to the other road, because I remember we had the engagement party out in the back lot.
JG:	So it wasn't a knock on the door for a cup of sugar type of thing?
ZM:	Their parents belonged to the Mountain Lakes Club and we used to go there all the time.
JG:	Do you remember eating Sunday dinners and meals there? Tell me about those experiences?
MM:	My father and mother would go to the Mountain Lakes Club every Sunday and one thing they adored was, if Zach and I were going out someplace they could take our little daughter and she could go to the Mountain Lakes Club and have dinner with them on Sunday.
ZM:	They taught her to eat exotic food at the Mountain Lakes Club. The employees at the Club were very indulgent about her, because they knew that Al McCormick spent a lot of money there.
JG:	And what is your daughter's name?
ZM:	Ann.
MM:	We took her down to the shore one time with my parents and we stopped someplace to have lunch and the waitress come up and asked, "What would you like?" Ann was about three at this point. She looked up and said, "I'll have a Shirley Temple, please." She was so used to having something like that.
ZM:	I think our association with Mountain Lakes really bonded socially because of the Mountain Lakes Dramatic Guild that became the Barn Theatre and the founding of Riverside Hospital. So many of the people that were moving forces in both of those institutions were people we became very close to and associated with. Our best friends were Doug McWilliams' parents, Mary Jane and Gordy McWilliams.
JG:	And you knew them from the hospital or the theater?
MM:	The theater, to start with.
ZM:	And Ellie and Roger McWilliams. The McWilliams family had the McWilliams Forge and through them we met a lot of people. But your dad, being one of the pioneers of Riverside was friendly with some of the men from Riverside and ladies like Marian Hawkes, who was then Marian Roberts. And Al Roberts, the lawyer in Mountain Lakes. So we became close to a lot of these people and the Barn Theatre was the Mountain Lakes Dramatic Guild. It was founded in 1928, the year I was born. My association began when the Mountain Lakes Dramatic Guild didn't have a place to perform and so they would perform in the town of Boonton. They would perform in the schools. And finally, we opened the Barn Theatre on Route 46.
JG:	The Little Theater was in an old chicken coop on the Boulevard.
ZM:	But that closed and they were looking for a home. That's when I got involved.
JG:	You never acted on their little stage there. So how old were you when you got involved in the theater?
ZM:	I've been involved all my life, but I got more involved before we got married. I became very friendly with a lady named Estelle Crane who was from Mountain Lakes and Jean Hooper was a blind lady but she was involved in the theater with Mountain Lakes residents and that's how I got to know McWilliams and all these talented theater people. Then I became the president of the Barn Theatre, and when we were moving out of Parsippany we built the Barn Theatre in Montville.
JG:	So it started in Mountain Lakes in that chicken coop and it outgrew that spot?
ZM:	I think it outgrew it. I was not involved then. I remember getting involved when they were doing a show in the town of Boonton in a church hall. I was out of college when I did that.
JG:	And you're working in Manhattan?
ZM:	For Life magazine.
JG:	Doing what?
ZM:	Well, I ended up being the promotion manager for Life magazine in its glorious heyday. I started as a trainee. When I graduated from Brown I had been accepted to Harvard Law School and then decided I didn't want to go into law and broke my father's heart and I ended up saying I wanted to go into publishing. So when the Korean War broke out and I got drafted and when the Korean War was over, I decided I still wanted publishing but I felt that I should take some economics courses, which I hadn't done at Brown. So I got accepted to Harvard Business School. Then Time Incorporated, Life magazine, came after me and said, "We'll hire you now, or if you insist on going to business school, we'll hire you after." Well, I was dating this lovely lady and decided, Nah [to business school]. So they hired me, I was a trainee and had a wonderful career. Moved to Europe. I was in charge of books. I came back and became head of the books and arts division of the company and along the way, but before we moved to Holland, she said to me, "You know, Zach, if our marriage is really going to succeed, I'll get involved in the arts and you've got to get involved in health care." So we continued, both of us, to be deeply involved in the arts and in health care. Next thing I knew she had me elected to the board of Riverside and then I was the president.
JG:	Marilyn, tell me about your involvement in health care, did that start because of your father's involvement in the hospital?
MM:	Yes.
JG:	So tell me what you remember of his efforts to get that hospital going and then how you got drawn into the picture, as it were?
MM:	Well, he had me doing some kind of book that had all this -- I really don't remember what it was -- it was like a ledger. He told me, "Just do this and everything would be alright."
JG:	How old were you at this time?
MM:	I must have been out of college. But he did say after about a month, when he looked at the book "What happened?" I said, "I just did what you said." But it was all the wrong thing. So he decided I wasn't very good at that.
JG:	Not at numbers maybe.
MM:	Not with numbers at all, no.
JG:	So what came thereafter?
MM:	My father wanted the hospital to have a good standing.
ZM:	He was very much involved in fundraising. And St. Clair's became a rival. But for a time, Riverside was it, and I was very proud of my father-in-law's involvement. In fact, my mother was a volunteer there and that was how our parents first got to know each other. Riverside was the in charity with people in Mountain Lakes and it rubbed off on Boonton Township as well.
JG:	But back to the Barn Theatre. You were acting in plays that were put on by the Barn Theatre Company, which is what it was called. The outgrowth of the Mountain Lakes Dramatic Guild, and it was homeless, it was going from stage to stage. Tell me about how that evolved into what it is today, and I'm also curious –and you're probably familiar enough with the organization to know -- if they've maintained records of the early years. Is any of that paperwork still around?
ZM:	I don't know about that, but the Mountain Lakes Dramatic Guild name we were determined to preserve when we opened the Barn Theatre in Parsippany. We said, we are the Mountain Lakes Dramatic Guild.
JG:	Where was that facility located?
ZM:	It was on Eastbound Route 46 near the local newspaper building and near the lake and the park.
JG:	Where Bentley's used to be.
ZM:	Yes. And it was a lovely little Barn Theatre and it was wonderful. People like Johanna Barrett, Dorothy Harnish, old Mountain Lakers, we all were so pleased that we had this little theater.
JG:	How many people did it seat?
ZM:	Couple hundred. No, less that 200. It was an intimate, wonderful facility.
JG:	What kind of productions were you putting on?
ZM:	I directed The Women there -- the Clare Boothe Luce play. It actually was a very successful movie with Norma Shearer.
JG:	Your Time Inc. connection didn't have anything to do with that, did it?
ZM:	Of course, it did. I told Henry Luce I was directing it.
JG:	No wonder you had such a good career at Time Inc.
ZM:	[Laughs] No, the Barn Theatre was a jewel and the key players were all -- I'd say, 90 percent Mountain Lakes people. Estelle Crane, Bob Foth.
JG:	Because there was the volunteer spirit, because there was incredible talent, because what?
ZM:	I think not just volunteer spirit and incredible talent but also it became very social and it was kind of in. And every year we would give parties at the Mountain Lakes Club. We'd have a Beaux Arts Ball.
JG:	How many plays a year would you do?
ZM:	Five.
JG:	And there would be after production parties? Describe the Beaux Arts Ball.
ZM:	Well, the Beaux Arts Ball was a costume ball and it was very gala and very social. It wasn't after a show, it was an event to raise some money for the theater. So that stirred the whole social thing. I can even remember having a tryout for a musical. In the beginning we didn't do any musicals. And then all of a sudden, a guy named Bob Foth. His wife's name was Marta. Marta and Bob Foth, and they lived in Mountain Lakes, I can't remember the street, and he said he was going to do a musical and he did it with Paul Shea, and they did Guys and Dolls. He directed it.
JG:	So you directed some, you acted in many?
ZM:	Yes.
JG:	Did you sing?
ZM:	Well, I ended up singing Fiorello.
MM:	Tell him how it was.
ZM:	Well, because I'm not a singer. But I was taught when I had to reach a high note, to put my arm up, to reach for it.
JG:	Who taught you that?
ZM:	Paul Shea. I also wrote original musicals. I did them at the Barn Theatre. The first one was called Passion Play, and for the bicentennial I did The American Way, the first show I ever saw in New York as a kid. I turned that into a musical. Then I did a musical called Canada.
JG:	Marilyn, were you active in the theater too?
MM:	I became active. I was involved in costuming.
ZM:	Because when we agreed that when I got involved in Riverside she would get involved in theater and you did get involved.
JG:	So, we're still with the theater in Parsippany -- the move to Montville?
ZM:	I was really the force to raise the money for that theater. I knew I had to reach out to people in Mountain Lakes.
JG:	Like Willy Sutton, you go where the money is?
ZM:	We were moving to Holland for Time Inc. I said: I'm not moving until the theater opens in Montville. So we had a marvelous gala and we opened the theater. We had the actress Anita Louise come. It was very glamorous. The Barn Theatre became really a kind of social center.
JG:	I haven't been there, sad to say. But it resembles a barn?
ZM:	It resembles a barn.
JG:	How many does that seat?
ZM:	Oh, 300 or so. A much bigger facility.
JG:	And what year was that gala opening?
ZM:	1965 or 1966.
JG:	So it's been a lot of years now that it's gone on now in that same fashion. Was that your proudest moment, opening day?
ZM:	Yes. It sounds very immodest, because a lot of people worked with me, but I was the president. Then when we moved to Holland they named me founding president. My friends Marsha Mufson and Alan Mufson, Marsha, whose stage name was Marsha Rivers, was a Broadway star, moved to Mountain Lakes and got involved in the Barn Theatre. And then they wanted to become members of the Mountain Lakes Club. We sponsored them and they didn't get in and we resigned.
JG:	What year was that?
ZM:	I really don't remember what year.
JG:	What decade then?
ZM:	In the 70s. We moved back from Europe to Boonton Township, to our house. We rebuilt our house, moved in, our daughter went to St. Elizabeth's Academy. And we were members of the Club -- from day one after we got married. And we met Marsha through the Barn Theatre and Alan. And there were two brothers, Alan and Monroe Mufson, they're both doctors. I knew Alan as a doctor. We sponsored them, they weren't accepted, and we were perturbed because the word that we got was, well, we don't have any Jewish members. And we said, wait a minute.
JG:	The official word or the kind of unofficial word?
ZM:	Non-official. You know. And we said, no, we're not going to be members. So we resigned. Of course, we're bonded with them. They don't live in Mountain Lakes any more. They live in Boonton Township.
JG:	There were no Jewish members at the time?
ZM:	No. Mountain Lakes, in the early days was really WASP. It really was. Even Catholics didn't feel welcome, you know, it was that kind of a community. Now, gratefully it's changed and thank God. I don't think there are many black residents, but... Mountain Lakes was considered kind of a socially snob very WASP establishment. I think we were very friendly with a lot of those very people, indeed. But our friends like the McWilliams and the Foths and others were very open-minded people and they welcomed people who were people of quality and it didn't matter...
JG:	So you quit in protest. What was the reaction, a) from the Club to your reaction; and then b) from other Club members to your announcement, and then possibly c) from the community itself?
ZM:	Well we did it in a quiet way. We didn't make a big magilla out of it.
JG:	But all of a sudden, you weren't around anymore?
MM:	No. Remember, what's her name, she didn't think it was right.
ZM:	Yes, we were having dinner the other night with a guy and his wife that we met downstairs here, and I mentioned that story and she said, "Oh, no, it was something else. They didn't get in for another reason." So, who knows? All we know is that our impression and the word of mouth that we got was that was the reason. So we resigned.
JG:	In your heart of hearts are you pretty sure that that was the reason or do you think now, maybe there was something else?
ZM:	I don't know. I just don't know,
MM:	I don't know.
JG:	But the point was, there weren't any Jewish members.
ZM:	They would have been the first.
JG:	When they applied for membership did they know or even necessarily care that there were no Jewish members? Did they think they were a bit of a test case?
ZM:	No, I don't think so. If it did they never mentioned it to us. They were so active in the community and the Barn Theatre. Living in Mountain Lakes. Their kids in school. It's something, when we moved to Palm Beach and all these private clubs that had the same policy and when we were recruited, we wouldn't join. I mean, I grew up in Manhattan and my friends were Jewish. I went to more Bar Mitzvahs. And I married into this lovely Catholic family that moved into Mountain Lakes and they were kind of pioneers in the sense that they were Boonton people, Irish Catholic, but they were successful. Her mother was a fashion plate.
JG:	So, so far, the real exposure to Mountain Lakes is at the Club, friendships with other Mountain Lakes folks, either through the hospital or through the Barn Theatre but what other memories, visions of Mountain Lakes did you have? Maybe you were invited to people's houses. Would you walk the Boulevard? What are some of your other memories of town? And maybe this question is more appropriate for you, Marilyn.
MM:	We've been to a lot of people's homes.
ZM:	I think on the social side, the McWilliamses loved to entertain and we became very good friends. We traveled to Europe with them; did a lot of things together.
MM:	They came over when we moved to Europe.
ZM:	As did Marian and Al Roberts. He was the legal counsel for Riverside Hospital. So we did go to a lot of wonderful parties. The O'Sullivans always had a great party. Estelle Crane had this gorgeous house overlooking the lake and she would give big parties and help raise money for the Mountain Lakes Dramatic Guild.
JG:	What were those parties like? We hear of kind of big wild parties back in those days, the 50s, 60s, and 70s.
ZM:	I wouldn't call them wild.
JG:	Maybe you traveled in different circles.
ZM:	They were beautifully catered, lovely food. Drink. A lot of drinking. But it was very tasteful. The women were all well dressed. The men were well dressed.
JG:	So at a party at someone's house, not at the Club, you would be dressed how?
ZM:	Well, I would wear a sports jacket from Brooks Brothers and a Brooks Brothers tie. Very pretty.
JG:	And the women?
MM:	Oh, yes, dresses. We didn't wear slacks as much as everybody does now. Beautiful clothes.
JG:	How many people would attend these parties?
ZM:	At Estelle Crane's, 40, 50.
JG:	How do you remember the cars being parked back then?
MM:	All along and everyplace.
ZM:	All along Lake Drive, there would be just streams of cars parked. The other thing I want to talk about, health care. We started the first freestanding hospice in America in Boonton Township. It was under the Riverside auspices. We had a meeting about hospice at Riverside.
JG:	What year are we talking about?
ZM:	In the mid-seventies. I chaired that meeting. It was decided we needed a national organization and I became the first chairman of the national hospital organization. I'm now the founding chairman emeritus of that, but the community, again, took great pride in the fact that we were pioneering hospice care and Riverside was wonderful.
JG:	How big a unit was started?
ZM:	Well, we convinced a family in Boonton Township, the Marrotta family, which has a company in Denville, Marrotta Valve, it's a national company, I think. And he had a beautiful, sprawling home across from the Dixon compound in Boonton Township on Rockaway Valley Road and we convinced him to allow it to become a hospice.
JG:	He had to move out of his house?
ZM:	He had moved. It was a beautiful property with a view of a pond and beautiful setting. And that became the first freestanding hospice in America. We opened it with Senator Clifford Case, with the power structure of Boonton Township and Mountain Lakes and Smoke Rise and really had the right cast. On the initial board were people from Mountain Lakes and Boonton Township and I chaired that board. Jim Hill, who worked for Warner Lambert, was deeply involved. Again, the community support was crucial. It had national impact.
JG:	Why do you think -- and by the way, this is one of the key themes in the centennial history book that has been written that will come out late this year -- and that is the volunteer spirit in Mountain Lakes, which was so important in the sudden, unexpected absence of Hapgood. The town was left in the lurch and people had to pull together and accomplish a lot of what should have been accomplished on his watch. But ever since and in many different ways, the volunteer spirit has been part of the town, so I wonder what your insights might be as to why that might be the case or perhaps some examples.
ZM:	I think there are some of those pioneers, her dad being that kind of person -- American Legion and the church and health care. Al Roberts, and other people like that, who have the wherewithal and the intelligence, and they rallied the community and they did it in a lovely, social way.
JG:	Is that the grease that makes it work, the social way?
MM:	I think so.
ZM:	There was another couple, Charley and Grace Clem. They were the most elegant couple. He was a successful Wall Street person and you know, they got involved because they believed in the community, but they believed in the issues of health care, hospice. I think that really is the spirit. I'm sitting here at age 81 recollecting, thanks to your coming here, some of the most extraordinary people, marvelous friends, who really have that joie --
JG:	Joie de what, joie de vivre?
ZM:	Joie de vivre and energy for being positive about social issues.
JG:	Sounds like almost joie de coeur, of the heart, as well, that desire and willingness to put their time, their effort and their money to good use.
ZM:	The social aspect of Mountain Lakes that we got involved with wasn't just about partying and drinking. It had a base; it was health care or the arts. There was a lady named Frankie Bostelman, who lived on the Boulevard. She was an actress and one of the early creative people of the Barn Theatre. Now she didn't give a social cachet that Estelle Crane afforded the organization, but she really had talent and she was an established Mountain Laker.
JG:	Tell me more about Estelle Crane.
ZM:	Estelle Crane was like a social dowager. Her maiden name was Mead. She lived in this grand house on Lake Drive that had a beautiful pool. It wasn't a deep pool.
JG:	Is it the house with the Spanish architecture?
ZM:	Yes. And she had servants.
JG:	I think that might have been originally a Hapgood, that there are the bones of a Hapgood there.
ZM:	Maybe. So she was divorced, had two daughters, Ann and Roberta. Ann was very interested in being an actress and I think that was one of the reasons Estelle got so involved. When I was president of the Barn Theatre she was vice president.
JG:	Now did any of those Barn Theatre productions act as stepping-stones to talent that then went on?
ZM:	Jane Krakowski who was a Broadway and movie actress and was on television in 30 Rock. She started in the Barn Theatre, her parents were active at the Barn, and they were from Parsippany, not from Mountain Lakes.
JG:	Were there any Mountain Lakes residents who used it as a stepping-stone?
MM:	Marsha Mufson.
ZM:	Marsha Mufson played in Gypsy on Broadway.
JG:	So she went the other way.
ZM:	And her daughter Lauren, who grew up in Mountain Lakes, is a Broadway musical person today. When they were in Mountain Lakes, their house was buzzing all the time. And he's a very successful doctor and is now retired.
MM:	He plays the piano very well.
ZM:	Yes, a marvelous pianist.
JG:	So at the Club, did you take advantage of the lakes or other things in town here?
ZM:	When we resigned from the Mountain Lakes Club we were members of the Rockaway River Club, too. There was a lot of overlap. Also, I don't remember what year St. Catherine's Church opened. Because your mother embraced that church. Mt. Carmel was the church was she was married, but she lived in Mountain Lakes and that was her church.
JG:	So Marilyn, when you were a senior in high school and living in Mountain Lakes you were finishing up at Boonton High, was that awkward? It's obvious why you want to do it -- so as to not leave your classmates and such a handsome guy in homeroom, but I wonder if that posed difficulties. What did Boonton residents think of Mountain Lakes High School back then?
MM:	Mountain Lakes High School wasn't even accredited then.
ZM:	But of course Mountain Lakes High School became the hottest high school in the state. But our son went to Delbarton and our daughter went to St. Elizabeth's but we've had nieces and godchildren who went to the Mountain Lakes High School and we went to Mountain Lakes games. I worked at Life magazine with a gal named Barbara Brennan who moved to Mountain Lakes with her husband, BJ, and they were rocks here for years and their sons were great football players. We went to all their football games.
JG:	And if Mountain Lakes was playing Boonton, you'd cheer for?
ZM:	Boonton. We graduated from Boonton High.
JG:	If you had to describe Mountain Lakes to someone who didn't know it, how would you do so in a sentence? Let me ask you first, Marilyn,
MM:	I think that people would find it very nice and friendly.
JG:	What about you, Zach?
ZM:	Well, I think it's a beautiful community. I mean the lakes, some lovely old Hapgood homes, but now gracefully eased into that setting are some newer style homes. The architecture is very interesting. I love driving around Mountain Lakes. It's picturesque.
JG:	Do you have a favorite street to drive down when you want to get your Mountain Lakes fix?
ZM:	Well, I drive the Boulevard, but today we went up, heading into Boonton and passed the house of people we know, the Younces, people who were very active in Barn Theatre. She was a professional actress and he was a TWA pilot and their next-door neighbors were the Leckies -- Bob Leckie, the famous writer. The film Pacific that HBO did, there's a whole thing about Bob Leckie in there. He's a very distinguished writer. He was a war hero.
JG:	What did he write?
ZM:	History. There were a lot of wonderful achievers in Mountain Lakes. It wasn't just people who were social. There were people who were achievers, like Bob Leckie and Marsha Mufson and Al Roberts. You could go on and on. The head of Holland America lived in Mountain Lakes, and when were moving to Holland he made sure we went over on the Rotterdam and he upgraded us. I think Mountain Lakes had, and I think it still does, an extraordinary range of people who were successful in business and in the arts and that's what makes it interesting. So that's how I would describe it -- it's a wonderful community, and I think it's got a great high school. I would highly recommend it. And it's picturesque. And it's near Manhattan.

End of Interview

Oral Histories and Recollections