Margate's 100-year-old Shana Feldman with her caretaker son, Steve Altman.
MARGATE Jeanette Shana Feldman celebrated her 100th birthday on May 28 with an open house and 50 visitors, including city Commissioner Maury Blumberg, who presented her with a proclamation from the governing body.
Feldman, a resident of Margate since 1957, has shown resiliency and strength after becoming a widow at a young age, and raising four sons on her own Bryan, Marc, Stuart and Stephen.
Born in Baltimore, she had a lovely family life, Feldman said.
All of my cousins still visit me, she said Wednesday in her Amherst Avenue home.
Although she is somewhat confined, her memories are vivid.
When asked why people call her Shana, Feldman said it was a nickname given to her by her parents.
Her youngest son Stephen Altman, who is her main caretaker, said, Shana means beautiful in Yiddish.
The former professional photojournalist looks a lot like his mom.
And she is, and always has been, he said.
After graduating from Forest Park High School in Baltimore, she helped her mom with housework and her dad with his business until age 19 when she married Stanley Altman, a clothing manufacturer.
It was a very nice marriage, but short, she said.
They lived most of the time in Vineland to be near his business, and after becoming a widow at age 35, her mother died a few months later.
That really wracked her hard, Altman said.
She moved to Margate in 1957, and worked hard to raise her four boys, who all graduated from Atlantic City High School.
She went to work selling real estate and jewelry at the old Traymore Hotel in Atlantic City before taking a job selling women's clothing at Ruth's Clothing Store in Atlantic City, where she met her second husband, Louis Fuzzy Feldman.
We had a group we socialized with, including Fuzzy and his wife Ruth, she said. We had a lot of fun and traveled together on holidays.
Altman said that when Ruth was making her final passage, she suggested to her husband that Shana would be a good choice for his second wife.
I would take Mom to the cemetery in Egg Harbor Township to visit the graves where our family members were buried. One day, I noticed she had wandered to an area of the cemetery where none of our relatives were buried, Altman said. When I approached her, I saw she was at Ruth's grave site. I heard her ask for Ruth's permission to marry Fuzzy . She said she just wanted to borrow him for a while, and that she would give him back in the next life. And sure enough, when Fuzzy passed, she buried him right next to Ruth.
Altman said Fuzzy, one of the original Harmonica Rascals, was a funny guy and the two had a happy 33-year marriage, until he passed away in 2000. He was a good stepfather, as well.
He got along very well with at least two of us, said Altman, who returned to Margate to care for his mother after Fuzzy died.
Although she suffered from congestive heart failure about 10 years ago, at age 90 she was the oldest person to receive a trans-catheter aortic valve replacement when the procedure was first approved, Altman said.
It was a new alternative to open heart surgery. It took them longer to prep her than to do the operation, Altman said.
Once an avid walker, as she aged, her walks got shorter and shorter.
She walked all over. She walked back and forth to Casel's, but as she got older, her walks were reduced, first to a four-block area, then two blocks, then around the block and finally, back and forth in front of the house, he said. First it was with a cane, then a walker and now the wheelchair.
Although she cannot walk like she used to, on May 14 she roused her son to take her to the polls so she could vote in the Board of Commissioner's election.
She never missed a chance to vote and cast her ballot twice for her favorite president Franklin D. Roosevelt, she said.
According to the Mayor's proclamation, Shana has always demonstrated fierce independence and community involvement and taught her boys to do the same.
All four were members of the military.
I'm lucky to have such a nice family and all my boys are good, she said.
Margate City Commissioner Maury Blumberg, right, delivered a proclamation to Shana Feldman on her 100th birthday. Also pictured is her son Steve Altman.
