Thursday, December 30, 1999 Older Editions

A century of memories: She built a good life, on hard work

By Rebecca Lipchitz

Sara (Mandel) Zimmerman is a living symbol of another time and place, a way of living unfamiliar to many today.

Raised on a farm in Hungary, Zimmerman came to the United States in 1922, and lived in New York City for many years.

Zimmerman, 99, now resides at Academy Manor Nursing Home in Andover. Family members include her nephew, Milton Paige of Nashua, N.H., who with his fiancee, Valerie Hoffman, regularly visit her.

Paige and Hoffman visited with Zimmerman last week, and helped tell some stories of her life to the Townsman.

Zimmerman has lived in New York City, California and New Jersey before coming to Andover.

Her grandfather raised a family by running a farm and a tavern. The second oldest of eight children, in her younger years she worked on the family farm. They picked grapes and cherries, and tended to cows, chickens, horses, and geese, which could be particularly mean, she says.

Given the chance to come to America at the age of 21, she took it, and went on to relish a long life in the city. In the era of sweat-shop labor in America, Zimmerman worked for 20 years at a knitting mill in Brooklyn, sewing sleeves into garments. But her way of life in Hungary was built upon hard work, and she expected nothing less in America. She fondly remembers the busy city life and its opportunities for modern transportation, such as trolleys over cobblestone streets, and modern entertainment.

She also spent time sewing children's dresses, and cooked Hungarian specialties such as butter cookies, blintzes, stuffed cabbage, and a special strudel recipe

But, as some say, you can't take the farm out of the girl. She picnicked in New York City parks. While living in the Bronx, where backyards were often covered in glacial rock, Zimmerman planted glorious gardens that drew viewers from far and wide.

Cultivating her gardens was a pastime close to her heart, Zimmerman says.

"The flowers, they were like my friends," she says.

But her family remains her dearest friends. In the 1930s, when she began to get settled in New York, she returned to Europe with furniture for her parents' home. Today, what she enjoys most are visits with her family, including her niece, Elysse, of California.

While she acknowledges that her life in younger years was hard work, she remains modest today about all she has survived.

Before she left for America, she survived World War I, unlike one of her brothers. But before her brother became a casualty of war, she, near the age of 15, managed to work her way to the front to bring him food.

In 1922, at the age of 21, Sara left for America with her sister, 16, and her brother, 13.

Her parents were reluctant to leave their farm, and later fell victim to the Nazi regime.

At the age of 50, she married Nathan Zimmerman of New York, an expert in refinishing furniture, whom she admired for his hard work.

Until she recently injured her foot, Zimmerman walked extensively on her own after surviving two broken hips. Paige estimates his grandmother's birthday is Nov. 15, 1900.