The Markow Family Tree

ExcerpBaltimore Sun Harmonica virtuoso Larry Adler dies at 87 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- By Robert Barr The Associated Press Originally published August 7, 2001 LONDON -- Larry Adler, the harmonica virtuoso who charmed kings, commoners and composers with an instrument once disparaged as a toy, died today. He was 87. He died at St. Thomas's Hospital in London, where he was being treated for pneumonia, said his manager, Claire Evans. Adler played with the greats -- George Gershwin, Paul Whiteman, Jack Benny, Django Reinhardt and, late in life, with Sting. Ralph Vaughan Williams, Malcolm Arnold, Darius Milhaud and Joaquin Rodrigo composed for him. Billie Holiday told him, "Man, you don't play that thing -- you sing it." At heart, Adler remained the brash teen-ager who caused gasps in Britain by striding up to King George V to shake his hand, rather than bowing. When Adler played at the White House, President Harry Truman accompanied "The Missouri Waltz." When the music ended, Adler cracked, "You're a hell of a better president than you are a pianist." He caught the show biz bug growing up in Baltimore, reputedly entertaining players at a local pool hall at age 2, singing "I've Got Those Profiteering Blues." At 10 he was the youngest cantor in the city, and got a place at the Peabody School of Music -- which shortly dismissed him as "incorrigible, untalented, and entirely lacking in ear." At 14 he ran away to New York City, and sneaked into Rudy Vallee's dressing room to plead for a break. "You're a novelty, kid," he recalled Vallee telling him. "Save your money because once they hear you, that's it. They'll never want to hear it again." Vallee nonetheless hired him to play at the Heigh-Ho Club, and helped Adler get a job playing harmonica for Mickey Mouse cartoons. Adler became hugely popular in Britain in the 1930s after playing in a London revue called "Streamline." Fan clubs sprouted all over the country, and the composer William Walton said: "The only two young musical geniuses in the world are Yehudi Menuhin and Larry Adler." Adler teamed with dancer Paul Draper in 1941, a pairing that lasted until 1949, and he toured with Jack Benny to entertain troops during World War II. In 1947 his earlier activity in anti-fascist groups led to a summons from the House Committee on Un-American Activities. "My agent called me and said, 'Unless you're willing to come back to the States, make a complete public, noncommunist affidavit, and then go before the Un-American Activities Committee and name names, it's not worthwhile your coming back,"' Adler said in a 1995 interview with National Public Radio. So he stayed in Britain. Adler's score for the 1953 film "Genevieve" was nominated for an Oscar, though in someone else's name. He was not acknowledged as the true composer until 31 years later. Adler wrote books including "Jokes and How to Tell Them" and an autobiography, "It Ain't Necessarily So." He starred on an 80th birthday album, "The Glory of Gershwin," produced by Sir George Martin, assisted by Cher, Sting, Sir Elton John, Robert Palmer, John Bon Jovi, Meatloaf, Carly Simon, Elvis Costello, Lisa Stansfield, Peter Gabriel and Sinead O'Connor. Adler's two marriages ended in divorces. He is survived by four children, two grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

Excerpt Baltimore Sun Published on August 8, 2001 Larry Adler was a tough little kid from Baltimore with a quick wit, a sharp tongue and an immense talent for playing the harmonica. When he died in London yesterday from cancer and "an accumulation of many things," according to his literary agent, Diana Tyler, Adler, 87, was still a brilliant, testy, raconteur and a nonpareil virtuoso of the harmonica. He had single-handedly made the lowly mouth organ into a serious concert hall instrument, and he remained the instrument's singular master. He was the only harmonica player listed in Who's Who, Grove's Dictionary of Music, the Encyclopedia Britannica and the Oxford Companion to Music, according to his manager. Composers Darius Milhaud, Joaquin Rodrigo, Ralph Vaughan Williams and John Tavener all wrote pieces specifically for him and his mouth organ. Sting, the pop star who joined him and Elton John, Peter Gabriel, Sinead O'Connor, Cher and a host of other singers on the 1994 Glory of Gershwin album, said "He was one of the youngest old men I ever met. He was a great man. Sadly missed." Adler was born on Feb. 10, 1914, on Washington Boulevard (then known as Columbia Avenue) to Louis Adler, a plumber, and his wife, Sadie. He reportedly started out singing in local pool halls in Baltimore at age 2 and in synagogues as a cantor at age 10. He was about 12 and playing piano when he was kicked out of the Peabody Preparatory School. The principal's condescension annoyed him, he recalled: "And what are we going to play today, my little man?" the principal asked. A Grieg waltz was scheduled. Adler played "Yes, We Have No Bananas." "I didn't like that `we' business, and I don't like being called a little man," he said in interviews a few years ago. "That was the end of my academic education."(Although he never lost the edgy toughness that got him bounced from the music school, the Peabody made amends in 1985. Adler was guest of honor and featured soloist at the prep school's 90th anniversary.) The Peabody principal was partly right, at least, when it came to Adler's height. He never got to be very tall - a couple inches over 5 feet, maybe. Musically, he got very big indeed. Adler was 13 when he won the old Evening Sun harmonica contest. "When I saw in The Sun that I was the state's best mouth organ player, it went straight to my head," he said. "That was my trouble in my early years: I believed all my publicity." Hitting the big time About a year later he took off for New York City and the big time: Borrah Minevich and his Harmonica Rascals. Minevich wanted slapstick. Adler played Beethoven's Minuet in G. "You stink," Minevich said, and fired him. And that's about the last time Adler got a bad review. He lost his $18-a-week job with Minevich, but landed a vaudeville gig that paid him $100 a week. He never looked back. One admirer during those years was George Gershwin. Adler recalled that the first time he played "Rhapsody in Blue" was in a duet with George Gershwin at a New York party in the 1930s. "When we finished playing, George got up and said `the damn thing sounds as if I wrote it for you.' " Adler played with all the greats. Billie Holiday once told him, "Man, you don't play that thing - you sing it." Adler first went to Britain in the early '30s when an English impresario signed him to star in the London review Streamline. He became and remained hugely popular in Britain, where his fans included the Duke of Windsor and most of the rest of the royal family. He settled permanently in England in 1949, when he was blacklisted in America for his leftist proclivities. "I was on every left-wing organization you could think of," he said in a 1990 interview. But he said he was never a communist. He could no more knuckle under to a party line than he could to the Peabody principal. But, characteristically, he also refused to name names. "That was never in my provenance at all," he said. "You know as you get older, you're supposed to get mellower. Not me." Adler's last performance in Baltimore was two years ago, where he played "Rhapsody" once again. He was accompanied by a digital piano reproducing a piano roll Gershwin made, a ghostly effect with the keys moving as if the composer were playing. Adler believed that artistically, he was better than ever. "I know I'm playing better today than I did last year," he said, "because I know a little bit more about music." Lots of people agreed with him. He received a standing ovation from the audience, and a Sun reviewer wrote: "Adler demonstrated the sort of musicality and virtuosity that enabled him to elevate his instrument to concert status ... He actually made the work's orchestral part sound as if it had been specifically written for the harmonica." A comment that in effect echoed Gershwin's of more than 60 years earlier. Determined to play Adler's last performance in England or anywhere else - was earlier this year. He was quite ill from cancer and already was in the hospital when he received a request to play for the Duke of Edinburgh's 80th birthday celebration in Royal Albert Hall.(He and the duke had belonged to the Thursday Club, whose members, including the actors David Niven and Peter Ustinov, "enjoyed long, boozy lunches at Wheeler's Restaurant in London's Soho," according to the British Broadcasting Company. ) "He checked himself out of hospital," said his son, Peter Adler, "got himself to the Albert Hall, came on in a wheelchair to a standing ovation, played his pieces and went back to the hospital. A trouper to the end." Perhaps that's because he never lost his zest for performance. He said once: "To me, it's a great joy to play. I don't think there's anything to compare with knowing you're playing a piece of music you love and you're playing it well. "It's better than sex." Adler's two marriages ended in divorce. He is survived by four children, two grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. A private funeral is planned.

The Guardian Obituaries http://www.guardian.co.uk/obituaries/story/0,3604,533361,00.html Larry Adler The man who gave mouth organs their dignity Michael Freedland Tuesday August 7, 2001 Larry Adler, who has died aged 87, wasn't just the world's best known player of the mouth organ (say not the word "harmonica" to him; even his pure silver instruments were simply mouth organs and he was proud of the fact), he was the man who gave it dignity - and earned the respect of serious composers who queued to have him play their work. He was also the best-known raconteur about the great days of Broadway and Hollywood. It would have been nice to say that the little man with the big eyes and incredibly long fingers was the media's "favourite" raconteur about the great days of Broadway and Hollywood. But he was used so often as a witness to those times that to their shame, broadcasters in particular began to tire of him. As he said when he wrote his autobiography: "I thought of calling it 'Name-Drops Keep Falling On My Head' after someone said, "Damn it Adler, can't you even tell me the time without dragging in Sammy Davis, Jnr." In the end he called the book "It Ain't necessarily so" - because "I don't know what the hell I'm talking about and when I play 'It ain't Necessarily So,' I'll be plugging my book." The truth was that he did know what he was talking about. Ignoring that fact was the broadcasters' big mistake - because not only did Adler have first-hand knowledge of the glory years of American showbusiness, well into his mid 80s he told the stories better than anyone else. He was, after all, probably the last living link with George Gershwin with whom he played so often the composer said he wished he had written "Rhapsody In Blue" especially for his mouth organ. Adler was an intimate of Fred Astaire. He played with him on Broadway and there are few, if any, other veterans of that show still surviving. The man who gave him that part was Florenz Zeigfeld. Apart from a very few, very aged "Zeigfeld Girls," he is probably the last in that line, too. Eddie Cador was one of his early patrons. He played for years with Jack Benny. In the 1930s he made a film with Vivien Leigh. He was at parties with all the Hollywood moguls. Were these just the boastings of an old-time performer? That was probably what the more ignorant media producers thought - except that so much of it was documented. Records, theatre bills, correspondence and a thousand photographs give witness to the fact. Anyone wanting an explanation for all that only has to think about the dates involved. Adler was a child star - and, unlike most juvenile performers, went on being a star until the end of his life. In 1994, far into the age of the CD he became the oldest artist ever to be awarded a gold disc for selling a million albums - appropriately of Gershwin melodies, accompanying entertainers from a different generation like Elton John, Sting and Kate Bush. In the same year, he released an album in which he accompanied Gershwin himself - actually, piano rolls made by the composer which are supposed to sound identical to the original. More praise was heaped on him then, although now he was used to getting the plaudits of his public. But when the then 80-year-old entertainer stood to take a bow at one of his numerous birthday celebrations, it wasn't the music industry he was thanking, but the British people. To the end of the days, he sounded American and his memories were practically all transatlantic. But it was Britain that had given him a home 45 years earlier when he became a victim of McCarthyism. Lawrence Cecil Adler was born in Baltimore on February 10 1914. As he said: "The first world war and I began at about the same time, a fact that somebody in the future will, I hope, find to be of significance." It probably wasn't. As for Baltimore, "I spent my first 14 years plotting my escape." His Jewish parents were both born in Russia. In middle age he discovered that the family wasn't called Adler at all. His grandfather who ran the family dairy, came to America with the name Zelakovitch. "He got tired of waiting in immigration queues, always last to be called because his name began with a Z. Thus he became Adler." He was thought to have musical talent early on, which was why he studied piano at the Peabody Conservatory of Music. That was where he first began to exhibit the kind of bolshevism that was to so upset Senator McCarthy. When it came to the end-of-term concert he decided he was being patronised by one of the teachers who asked, "What are we going to play, little man?" That was the point at which he decided to play "Yes We Have No Bananas" instead of a Grieg waltz. He was expelled at just about the time he discovered he could make better music with a mouth organ. Adler entered a competition and came third. But it was a good enough place to act as a springboard that started his career. At 14, he ran away to New York. His parents didn't know either that he went or that he had $35 to take with him - the proceeds of selling subscriptions to Liberty magazine and of a couple of amateur contests. He wanted to play with Borrah Minevitch and His Harmonica Rascals, but failed the audition. "Kid, you stink," said the band leader. It was a big favour, he later reasoned. Looking for work, he landed a 40-week contract playing on a country-wide tour in the intervals for film performances. They were important bookings - he earned $100 a week, huge money for those days and almost unknown for a 14-year-old. His next break was working with Eddie Cantor, then next to Al Jolson - Adler's idol - just about America's most popular entertainer. Cantor didn't employ him as a mouth organ player - but to dress up as a page boy. The point was that Larry looked very much like Cantor himself and the older man thought it was a fact on which it was worth cashing in. "How old are you?" Cantor asked. "Fifteen, sir." "Where are you from son?" "Baltimore, sir." Cantor did some counting on his fingers. His only response then was: "No. I was in Seattle." But Cantor was in the pantheon of great entertainers and the joke got his young foil noticed. - which was how he opened with Fred and Adele Astaire and Marilyn Miller in the Vincent Youmans show Smiles at the Ziegfeld Theatre. He was 17. The show flopped, but full of enthusiasm and self-importance, he was convinced he was a star and lived like one. He bought expensive suits - on the advice of the gangster Legs Diamond, one of the many hoodlums - Al Capone was another - with whom he came into contact at the speakeasies which were now his regular watering holes. From New York, he went to Hollywood. He played at parties. At one, Gloria Swanson asked him how much he wanted. He said $500. She told him to put his mouth organ in a place that might turn out to be uncomfortable. And he tried his luck elsewhere. He made his first film, Operator 13 for Cosmopolitan, a film company which was owned by William Randolph Hearst. Then he played in a picture called Many Happy Returns starring Ray Milland and Burns and Allen, in which he was accompanied by the Duke Ellington orchestra - with whom he had insisted on playing. With typical Adler chutzpah, he said that the originally - signed Guy Lombardo outfit (one of the top 91 bands of the day) wasn't good enough for him. Later, he played the first ever mouth-organ solo of 'Rhapsody In Blue.' When Gershwin heard it he said, 'It sounds as if the goddamned thing was written for you." It was one of his most treasured memories. Years later, Ira Gershwin gave him "Lullabye Time," a suite written by George that had never been published or performed before. It was dedicated to Adler. His film roles were only small parts, but he had become a name. He went to London, where he worked for C.B.Cochran, the biggest British impresario of his day. He made his BBC debut and in 1938 was one of the star names in a British movie, St. Martin's Lane, which featured Vivien Leigh, Charles Laughton and Rex Harrison. He became a friend of the Royal Family. Back in Hollywood, he was featured in the Warner Bros. film The Singing Marine with Dick Powell. During the war, he went all over the world entertaining troops with Jack Benny. He continued to make movies and to star in cabaret performances. It all came unstuck when the UnAmerican Activities Committee started investigating him - mainly because he had been a member of the Committee For The First Amendment, led by Humphrey Bogart, which went to Washington, to protest at the blacklisting of Hollywood writers. He was blacklisted himself, although never brought to testify. When it became obvious that he wouldn't get work in America, he took off for Britain. In 1953 he wrote the music for the film Genevieve, which turned out to be the most successful piece of work in which he was ever involved. It has come to be recognised as the definitive piece of British film music, yet when the film was released in the United States his name was removed from the credits The movie music was nominated for an Oscar - with the credit going to Muir Mathieson, the musical director. "Fortunately, it didn't win," he was to say. Other film work followed. He composed the music for The Hellions (1961), The Hook (1963), King an Country (1963) and High Wind in Jamaica (1964) but none of them was another Genevieve. He had gone back to America in 1952 to play in a concert but he remained blacklisted and could find no permanent work in the country. It was the 1970s before he went to the United States regularly, although he never intended to make his home there again. There was always a great deal of concert, cabaret and broadcasting work in Britain. In later years, he entertained in Africa and Australia and frequently played on cruise ships. He was not a religious man, but his Jewish origins were powerful in his life. For years he refused to play in Germany because of its Nazi past, although he had entertained survivors of the Holocaust there after the war. In 1967, he entertained Israeli troops in the Six-Day War, playing for them their new unofficial anthem, "Jerusalem the Gold" and his own tune, "Sharm El Sheikh," named after the Red Sea port at the centre of the crisis. The man who in Hollywood had driven the best cars, lived in large houses and always wore the best clothes lived exceptionally modestly in a small, untidy and sparsely furnished flat in Hampstead. Indeed, his life from the 1950s on was much simpler, but he seemed to enjoy the full employment that came to him - particularly in his last years. And he was always that great raconteur. With his death those snooty broadcasters who spurned him will get to know what they missed. He was married twice, to the former Eileen Walser by whom he had two daughters and a son, and to the British journalist Sally Cline, by whom he had a daughter.

The Daily Telegraph http://www.dailytelegraph.co.uk/dt?ac=005719064921777&rtmo=Qe9mQQzR&atmo=Qe9mQQzR&pg=/01/8/8/db01.html Lawrence Cecil Adler was born in Baltimore, Maryland, on February 10 1914. His parents, who had both been born in Russia, were fluent in Yiddish. The family name had been Zelakovitch, but Adler's grandfather Zadie, fed up with always being at the end of immigration queues, opted to change it to one beginning with "A". He married, first, in 1938, Eileen Walser. They had a son and two daughters. The marriage was dissolved in 1961. He married, secondly, in 1969, Sally Cline, from whom he was divorced in 1977. They had a daughter. Tribute to Larry Adler - http://trfn.clpgh.org/free-reed/essays/adlertribute.html >From Roger Trobridge, current Chairman of the NHL, "Larry Adler's funeral was held on Friday afternoon, 10th August in London, at a small service for close friends and family. The following message was read out on behalf of mouth organ players everywhere. He was the torch bearer. He lit the way for the many mouth organ players who were inspired by his style, technique and musicality. More than just the best mouth organ player, he was the consummate professional entertainer and performer to the end. He opened many doors through which others have since passed. There can never be another." The funeral took the form of a non religious service as requested by Larry. His son, Peter organized first family members, then friends to give tributes which lasted for about two hours, and were followed by the reading of tributes. Then Peter invited family and friends to join him for drinks at his home. Harry Pitch who was a personal friend of Larry's was the only mouth organ player present and is a representative of the NHL. Harry spoke eloquently about Larry as a mouth organ player. In effect what he said can be summarized as, "Larry Adler equals Mouth Organ." Many obituaries have reported that Larry is survived by a son and three daughters, two grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. His brother Jerry seems to have been largely hidden in his shadow - undeservedly. Where Larry won that contest in Baltimore playing "Minuet in G", his brother, five years his junior played the minuet five years later to win the same contest. Many correspondents on the internet remember a SPAH Convention at which the brothers played together. We listened to a cassette of Jerry's music at our monthly get together on 12th August. It was great. Jerry should not be forgotten. He is family too and admired and loved his elder brother deeply. There will be a special memorial service for Larry, probably some time in October in London. It is for close friends and family and will be by invitation only. The contact is Gloria Leighton, 39 Viceroy Court, Prince Albert Rd., St. Johns Wood, London NW8 7PR.

LARRY ADLER Political Exile Who Brought the Harmonica to Concert Stage, Dies at 87 AUGUST 7, 2001 THE NEW YORK TIMES By RICHARD SEVERO Larry Adler, a harmonica player of enormous sensitivity whose advocacy and artistry helped elevate the instrument to concert status, died yesterday at a London hospital. He was 87 and had lived in Britain since the early 1950's, when he was blacklisted for his political views and his career in America effectively ended. In performances that spanned seven decades, Mr. Adler brought dignity to the harmonica, which was previously regarded as either a toy or an instrument for amateurs. He not only introduced the "mouth organ," as he called it, into the concert hall, but also persuaded important composers, among them Darius Milhaud, Ralph Vaughan Williams, William Walton, Malcolm Arnold and Joaqun Rodrigo, to create works specifically for him. On three occasions, he proved that the unadorned harmonica could provide an eloquent score for an entire motion picture. Mr. Adler and his performing partner, the tap dancer Paul Draper, were denounced as Communist sympathizers in 1948. They sued for libel but were unable to win full vindication. Mr. Adler, a celebrated star who had been earning up to $200,000 a year, suddenly could not find employment. He departed for Britain, where he remained a star of the first rank. He earned household-name status there as much for his lively and humorous public personality as for his musicianship. Although a self-described "left- minded kid," Mr. Adler steadfastly denied he had ever supported the Communist cause but refused to take a loyalty oath or mute his criticism of the House Un-American Activities Committee. "I can't understand Marx," he said in 1971. "Communist literature, brochures and stuff didn't mean anything to me." But he continued to insist that imagined or even real Communists should not be deprived of their ability to earn a living, since being a Communist was not against the law. Lawrence Cecil Adler was born on Feb. 10, 1914, in Baltimore, the eldest of two sons born to Louis Adler, a peripatetic plumber ("Adler's Plumbing Shop on Wheels" was the name of his business) and the former Sadie Hack. His parents were both born in Russia and were brought to the United States as infants. He was fascinated by music from an early age, and sang in the neighborhood synagogue. His parents had an old piano and arranged for him to take lessons. He loved it. So much so, in fact, that he walked into a music store in downtown Baltimore and talked the proprietor into sending a new $2,500 piano to his home. The modest piano on which he had started was no longer good enough. When his father recoiled at the cost, the proprietor of the music store, a man named Levin, replied, "Could you afford 50 cents a week?" And they worked out a time-payment plan. As a youngster, Larry Adler sold newspapers and magazines on the streets of Baltimore to earn enough money to purchase phonograph records and tickets to classical concerts. He enrolled in the Peabody School of Music in Baltimore for piano training, but stayed only a short time. Instead of playing a Grieg waltz, as the school had expected, he made a face and pounded out, "Yes, We Have No Bananas." He was expelled from Peabody, he said, for being "incorrigible, untalented and entirely lacking in ear." (In 1985 he returned to Peabody and received an honorary degree.) The store owner who sold the Adlers the new piano also had given the young man a harmonica as a sort of commission. He taught himself to play it. Some of his friends did the same thing, practicing on time-tested favorites like "Home on the Range" and "St. Louis Blues." The young Adler also taught himself to play classical selections by ear. One day he learned that The Baltimore Sun was sponsoring a harmonica-playing contest and he immediately entered it. All the other contestants played tunes like "Turkey in the Straw"; Larry Adler surprised the judges with a patrician reading of Beethoven's "Minuet in G" and won the prize. The harmonica, he said, "was just a means of getting the hell away from Baltimore." In 1928, at age 14, he said, he left home with $7 in his pocket and headed for New York. He lived in cheap rooms and played his harmonica in the streets around Times Square, hoping a talent agent would discover him. He auditioned for Borrah Minevitch and His Harmonica Rascals, which was the biggest harmonica act in show business, but was rejected. Minevitch listened carefully, looked at young Adler, and said, "Kid, you stink." Undeterred, Mr. Adler persuaded the bandleader Rudy Vallee to listen to him play. Vallee heard something that Minevitch hadn't heard and invited him to appear with him at a Manhattan club. That led to other jobs; at one point, Florenz Ziegfeld hired him for "Smiles," a musical revue. For all his increasing success, Mr. Adler played by ear and from memory after listening to phonograph records; he couldn't even read music until he was in his late 20's and well into his career. He once said that he agreed to learn only at the behest of Milhaud, who explained that unless he learned to understand what all those little notes meant, he'd never be able to perform the music that was being written for him, music that he'd never be able to hear on a phonograph record or the radio. In 1934, Mr. Adler landed a small role in a movie called "Many Happy Returns." That same year, he was booked at the Paramount in New York, where he was seen by C. B. Cochran, a British producer, and hired to appear in a London production called"Streamline." Audiences liked him in London, so much so that the British built an entire revue around him called "Tune Inn." Soon there was a tremendous increase in harmonica sales and there were Larry Adler fan clubs throughout Britain. By the late 1930's, he realized, he was better known in England than he was in his own country. He returned to the United States and got some jobs playing with the pianist Eddie Duchin. The columnist Leonard Lyons helped him find some spots in New York nightclubs. He got a few more movie roles, and his credits included "The Singing Marine" (1937); "The Big Broadcast of 1937," in which he appeared with Jack Benny; "St. Martin's Lane" (1938); "Sidewalks of London" (1940); "Music for Millions" (1945); and "The Birds and the Bees" (1947). He began his association with the dancer Paul Draper before World War II, appearing with him at Carnegie Hall and at City Center in New York, and on a tour of United States Army camps during World War II. During the war he also entertained the troops with Jack Benny and with Ingrid Bergman, with whom he had an affair. Mr. Adler and Mr. Draper began to hear criticism of their political views in the late 1940's, particularly for their support of 19 Hollywood writers, including Alvah Bessie, Ring Lardner Jr. and Dalton Trumbo, who had been summoned before the House Committee on Un-American Activities. In 1948, a club in Birmingham, Ala., announced that it was "exceedingly embarrassed" because Mr. Adler and Mr. Draper had appeared at the club immediately before speaking at a rally for Henry Wallace, who was running for president as the Progressive Party candidate. Mr. Adler and Mr. Draper issued a joint reply: "We have done our best as artists and do not intend to let anything stop us from doing our best as citizens." The contretemps made headlines, and inspired some angry editorials. In December 1948, a Connecticut woman, Hester T. McCullough, sought to prevent Mr. Adler and Mr. Draper from appearing before the Greenwich Concert Association. In a letter to the group, published in Greenwich Time, a daily newspaper, Mrs. McCullough said the two men were "pro-Communist in sympathy" and "exponents of a line of thinking directly opposed to every democratic principle upon which our great country has been founded." As a result of her protest, their performance was canceled. Mr. Adler and Mr. Draper sued for libel, each asking $100,000 in damages. The suit became a cause célèbre, prompting Westbrook Pegler, the columnist, to call for contributions to help pay for Mrs. McCullough's defense. The suit came to trial in Federal District Court in Hartford, and ended in a hung jury on May 27, 1950. The case was dismissed on Sept. 30, 1951. The performers said they lacked the funds for more litigation. By 1952, Mr. Adler had left the United States to live in London with his wife and family and remained there for the rest of his life, performing regularly and making recordings of classical and popular music. After his first return engagement in 1959, Mr. Adler's visits to his native land grew more frequent. In 1975 he and Mr. Draper reunited for a concert at Carnegie Hall. Mr. Draper died at 86 in 1996. Mr. Adler's marriage to Eileen Walser, an English model, ended in divorce as did his second marriage, to Sally Cline. He is survived by a son, Peter, and two daughters, Carole and Wendy, from his first marriage; a daughter, Katelyn, from his second; two granddaughters; and two great-grandchildren. During his years in Britain, Mr. Adler wrote articles for American newspapers and restaurant reviews and articles about food for several British publications. In the mid- 1960's, he wrote a book called "Jokes and How to Tell Them." Despite his efforts to bring the harmonica to the concert stage, Mr. Adler said he thought the instrument would always be grounded in cowboy songs and blues. "I can play it for the next hundred years and it won't change that," he said in 1984. He said he wasn't bitter about his political experiences and suggested more than once that if he had to do it over again, he would have chosen the same course. "Resist the pressure to conform," he would tell young people. "Better be a lonely individualist than a contented conformist."

1920 Census Lived at 774 Columbia Avenue Baltimore, MD Naturalized 1894 From: Russia Census shows children as Lawerence and Hillard ages 6 and 1 2/12 respectively. Also in household were Anna Hack and Rosie Hack- sisters-in-law ages 22 and 19 respectively.

LARRY ADLER MARRIED. Larry Adler (Mr. Lawrence Cecil Adler), described as the "virtuoso of the mouth-organ," was married to-day at Marylebone (London) Register Office, to Miss Eileen Walser