Uncork the Champagne

Now, I could go into a litany of what exactly this blog is all about but who I am will be right in front of you for your reading pleasure all in good time. And if you can't decipher key aspects of my character from the many blog posts to come, I'm either doing a poor job or it's just not worth my time. Neither of those things I have much faith in. What better way to ring in a new blog with a little family history?


My Great Grandmother and Great Grandfather with my Great Uncles Max on the far right and Otto (the younger). Photo taken some time during the late 1800's in Germany.



My Grandfather George on the far right at a very young age apprenticing as a tailor.


My Grandfather is here as a full fledged tailor in Germany. He is in the back raising a beer bottle to the right. Grandfather later worked for Phelps-Terkel on the Miracle Mile in Los Angeles after moving to America. I still have a beautiful old wooden Phelps-Terkel clothes hanger.



My Great Uncle Max became a shoe maker, as evidenced by this photograph of him on the far right in front of his place of work in Germany.



A formal portrait of Grandfather as a young man.



My lovely Grandmother Catherine, my namesake.



My Grandfather on the left looking very dapper in a hand tailored suit in New York in 1933-34.



Three Polish sisters: Great Aunts Josephine and Genevieve and my Grandmother Catherine.



Catherine and George marry and my Dad is born in 1937. Here he is with his first beloved cat.


All three lived in this modest house in Culver City.


The Dimalla's new 1941 Chevrolet.

Later, the Graham Paige which is very similar to the one my Dad owns and restores today.



Great specimens of period typography, these two report cards belong to my Dad.


My Dad is second to the left in the front row of this mass of equally brainwashed children.


Look! You already know several things about me...including my love for history and my steadfast nostalgic streak. I hope soon to be able to give you a glimpse of the other side of my self from a completely different cultural realm--as soon as I procure some of the pictures saved from a house fire in Manila, Phillipines--the birthplace of my Mother.