At 105, Norbert Stein has married again

 

By Donald H. Harrison

CHULA VISTA, California – Norbert Stein is a man who likes surprises.  So, at his 105^th birthday party on Thursday, March 8, he had a surprise for everyone.  He married his companion of 45 years, Edelmira Velasquez.

The bride’s son, Pablo, related that Stein had popped the question about two months ago, after coming home from an illness at the hospital.  He announced to Edelmira that he was going to get married.  “To who?” she asked, very surprised.  “To you!” he declared.

When asked by officiant Robert Valko, who had been deputized by the county clerk’s office for the occasion, whether he took Edelmira as his wife, Norbert responded “I do” in a

voice so booming and affirmative that the guests laughed in appreciation.  Edelmira, occasionally blushing at all the attention, assented in a more quiet, reserved voice, then held Norbert’s hand, through much of the rest of the civil ceremony.

The couple had met at a Tijuana dance club called Rancho Grande, where Stein, divorced from his first wife, liked to go.  “My mother said ‘I don’t know how to dance,’ and he said, ‘like the rooster dances, the chicken dances too,’” Pablo related.  He added that Stein speaks very good Spanish, which he learned in Cuba, where he had worked as a butcher after doing an apprenticeship in New York City.  In Chula Vista, Stein owned a shop called “The Butcher of Seville.”

Stein had moved as a young man with his mother and two brothers from Aidhausen, Germany to New York after he, then a 15 year old Jewish boy, was followed and threatened by four Nazis.  His sister and father, who stayed behind, were later murdered in a Nazi concentration camp.  During World War II,  Stein joined the U.S. Army and served in the Pacific Theatre.

According to Charlie Garcia, Stein received the Bronze Star for heroism for flushing Japanese soldiers out of a cave.  He also carried on his back a wounded comrade  to safety, according to Garcia, whose daughter Erica is married to Jeffrey Wallace, Stein’s grandson.  At that wedding, Stein who likes to tell jokes and give speeches, stole the show, Garcia remembered.

Raymond Weber, who like Stein is a sports enthusiast, said the groom was perhaps best known for paying the fine in 1981 levied against San Diego Chargers quarterback Dan Fouts by the National Football League Players Association in a labor dispute.  Fouts refused to pay it, even if it meant sitting out the last game of the season against the Raiders.  So, Stein went on television and announced that he would pay the $1,122 fine for Fouts, which he did.  Fouts played the next game.

In addition, Stein was an inveterate San Diego Sockers fan.  Known unofficially as the Sockers’ “Captain,” he used to regularly go into the clubhouse before games to give a pep talk—usually in his trademark rhyme.  To fire up the players, he also offered a $100 prize to the one who scored the first goal in each game for the Sockers.

Chula Vista Mayor Mary Salas said she was a city councilmember back in the 1990s when she first met Stein, who used to read his rhymes before the formal start of City Council meetings.  She said she suggested to then Mayor Shirley Horton that Stein be named the “unofficial poet laureate of Chula Vista,” a title that he cherishes.  Sometimes people forget the “unofficial” part of the title.

He’d write poems about his birthdays too, remembered Weber.  For example, said Weber:

My name is Stein
I’m ninety-nine

and

It’s really true
I‘m 102.

A plaque at the March 8 wedding, which was conducted at the Living Coast Discovery Center, contained this year’s poem:

I am glad I am still alive
I just passed 105.

To this Stein added:

Nothing too big
Nothing too small
Life is full of surprises
I can handle them all.

Usually it is the bride who gets all the attention, but Edelmira, who has been his helpmate for 45 years, was happy to let her groom bask in all the attention.

Stein was a founding member of the Chula Vista Charitable Foundation, and current members of that organization worked hard to put on the wedding, which included a catered Mexican buffet by Los Chuchy’s, a dance performance by Edelmira’s two granddaughters, and joyful music by Mariachi Estrellas de Chula Vista.

Zaneta Encarcion, who is on the foundation board, noted that Stein always has been philanthropic.  One time a family that had been renting a house from him got into financial trouble,and  Stein decided to make a gift of the house to the family, she said.

Susana Levy Villegas, a public relations practitioner who also is on the Foundation board, said although she had only recently met Stein, “what I’ve heard about him is fantastic.”  So, she pitched in and got several television stations and print media representatives to cover the occasion.

Stein’s daughter, Livia Gail, said she and a sister moved with her parents from the New York area to Chula Vista in 1958, and she grew up in Chula Vista, becoming a song leader and straight A-student at Chula Vista High School, located across the street from her family’s home.

Later, she worked for law firms, and her father, ready always to give deserved praise, would constantly say about her:  “I’m a butcher and she’s sharper than my knife.”

Whether it was sports, politics, or entertainment, her father enjoyed being in the company of celebrities–and occasionally she would find herself meeting the very famous.

She said she told her father that being married at age 105 might qualify him for listing in the Guinness Book of Records.   “He really liked that,” she confided.

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Harrison is editor of San Diego Jewish World.  He may be contacted via donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com