The rugby neighborhood near Church andFlatbush Avenues in Brooklyn, N. Y. was mostly farm land 60 years ago.An immigrant German wood carver bought one of the fields, partly by hisown labor put up a two-story frame house, settled in with his wife andtheir five-year-old daughter. The little girl’s name was JosephineAmelia Claudius. After she grew up, she used to say that she wasdescended from one of the Claudian Emperors of Rome. This statement didnot surprise Mrs. McGee and Mrs. McCormick, who lived near by, norMilton Bruck at the stationery store, nor the people at the LincolnSavings Bank on the corner. They knew Miss Claudius.
According to the considered opinion of the neighborhood, Miss Claudiuswas not insane. She was the smartest person in those parts. Everyoneknew that she “had money.” She also had a niece in North Carolina. OnceMrs. McGee remarked that the niece would certainly enjoy all that moneysome day. “She can enjoy it,” said Miss Claudius. “I like my life.”
Life for Miss Claudius began every day at 5 a. m. She slept on a pile ofthe thousands of old newspapers, some dating back to 1900, which werestacked in the rooms and halls of her house, crammed into brokenwindows. Bottles, broken furniture, boxes, cartons also filled herhouse. The roof was peeling, the paint had long since flaked from theoutside walls. Hedges grew tree-high around the yard. Rigged behind oneof the doors was a bundle of newspapers, a rope and a hammer, soarranged that if anyone entered without Miss Claudius’ permission(never granted), the hammer would fall on the intruder’s head. In thewarm months, as soon as Miss Claudius got up, she repaired to herbackyard, where she kept an old piano, weathering but still tuneful inthe open air. She would play her piano, and sing to the birds. When theneighbors objected, Miss Claudius said: “The birds are up, whycan’t you get up?” Inside she had another piano, which she playedin the evenings. On the piano at the neighbor hood Republican club, oneof her favorite resorts, she sometimes played and sang opera arias. Shecould never pass a piano by. At Moscowitz’s stationery store one day,she had a toy piano taken from the window, played until they made herstop.Occasionally, she played for the Democrats at their club. But shepreferred the Republicans.
Miss Claudius could be mean. She was always chasing children out of herlittered yard, sometimes caught and beat them.Once she saw a man short-cutting through her yard, made him pay 10¢toll. Miss Claudius probably saved the dime. She spent almost no money,had no heat, light, water in her house. For a bathroom she used theLadies’ Room at the Lincoln Savings Bank. At closing time oneafternoon, the employes heard strange noises in the Ladies’ Room. MissClaudius was inside, reading aloud from a law book. She knew and couldquote law by the ream, to the confusion of municipal boards ofestimate, aldermen, tax assessors, policemen.Once she was arrested for having ice in front of her house, obstructingthe sidewalk. She got out her box camera, took pictures of ice in frontof a couple of churches and a police lieutenant’s house.She was acquitted.
Once Miss Claudius used to teach civics and English at Public School 54in Brooklyn. In 1898, three years after she became a teacher, shebought a toy scooter—the kind which children push around with onefoot. She went everywhere on her scooter, except to school, where shewas afraid the pupils might borrow it. But she didn’t walk to school:she bummed rides on the milkwagon.
Old Mr. Claudius died in 1920, in a subway wreck. Mrs. Claudius died in1932. Miss Claudius stayed in the house with her mother’s body for aweek. After that, having been a teacher 37 years, she retired onpension and lived alone. Free now to do exactly what she wanted, shescooted all over Brooklyn, often scooted five miles to & from CityHall in Manhattan over the Brooklyn Bridge. Sometimes she took herscooter in the subway, rode over, scooted where she pleased inManhattan. Frequently she dressed in bloomers. When Tammany Boss JimmyHines was on trial, Miss Claudius scooted to the courthouse, lugged herscooter inside, scooted through the halls until she was ejected.
Every ten years she repainted her scooter. Last time, it was red. Sheintended to make it blue during the next decade. Miss Claudius had toput away her scooter about a year ago. After that the neighbors sawher, little (less than five feet, less than 100 Ibs.), old, noticeablyfeebler, making her rounds on foot. Last fortnight Mrs. McCormick sawMiss Claudius fall down, helped her into the house.
The neighbors worried about Miss Claudius, and called the police. Theycould not get in the front door; she had barricaded it with a greatstack of newspapers, Old Gold cartons, pasteboard boxes, bits offurniture. The officers climbed a ladder to a second-story window. Whenthey touched the curtain the time-rotted cloth crumbled. In one of theupstairs rooms they found Miss Claudius, dressed, hatted and coated,lying on a stack of newspapers. She was dead. One of the neighborsremembered that she had said: “I want to die the way my mother didnobody to see me, bother me.” They could not get a stretcherthrough the precious debris, so they had to carry Miss Claudius out ofthe house on Martense Street, like an old bundle.