The Most Famous Person from Rush
- William Darron
- Feb 17, 2024
- 5 min read
And almost nobody has ever even heard of him.
In 1914 a little boy named Robert Kazmayer was growing up in Rush with just his mom, Viola. Robert's mom and dad were separated, and when his father died, things got even tougher for them. Back then being separated was a worse social stigma than it is now. Robert and Viola counted on family to help them until they wore out their welcome. Back then, Robert went to Rush Union School. (Where the Post Office is today.)
In 1925 Robert moved into the Central YMCA in Rochester and attended West High School from where he graduated in 1927.
A month after graduation, he hitchhiked to New York City and boarded a freighter to Galveston, Texas. Then he sailed to South America on a merchant sea vessel as a deck hand. This started him on an adventure. He sailed to Australia, Asia and India. He made it to Jerusalem and Bethlehem. He made friends who he hitched rides with, got in all kinds of trouble, and returned in 1928 to enroll at the University of Rochester.
After a semester, he was back on a merchant ship, this time sailing to England, France, and Germany. He was even able to sneak into Russia where he worked at an automobile plant (for no pay) before returning to class. He had seen much of the world unseen by others and felt compelled to talk about it.
Back at U of R in 1929 he won a prize for oratory and applied to become a Methodist minister. Robert became the student pastor of the church in Indian Falls, New York. His presence caused the greatest increase in membership in nine years. His ministry included the neighboring Tonawanda Indian Reservation.
With the beginning of prohibition the Schuyler Hotel and Bar, located at the corner of Dewey Avenue and Ridge Road in Rochester fell into hard times. The Genesee Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church bought the building and consecrated it as a church in June of 1921. Back then Ridge Road was called Lewiston Avenue so the Church became known as the Lewiston Avenue Methodist Church.
In 1931, at age 22, and while in his first year at Colgate-Rochester Divinity School, Robert Kazmayer became the pastor of Lewiston Avenue Methodist. It was the poorest and neediest church in the City of Rochester. The church served the growing number of shift workers at the nearby Eastman Kodak factory. The congregation was suffering from wage and hour cuts because of the depression era downturn. Bible school classes were held in a former bar room. The building was condemned and was in desperate need of a furnace. The congregation thrived under his ministry.
In 1934, Kazmayer became the youngest ordained clergyman in Rochester at age 25. He was moved to a different church where he married his secretary. His experiences, combined with a voracious need to read newspapers helped him to polish his oratory skills. By 1944 he had written a book, quit the church, and embarked on a lecture tour that lasted him the rest of his life.
In a time before cable TV news and its never-ending stream of experts and pundits, Robert Kazmayer was one of the first learned equivalents. He was reported on and quoted in dozens of newspapers across the country while speaking at civic organizations and clubs.
His book called “Out of the Clouds” was an overview of the various plans for the world after the end of World War II. Kazmayer may have been one of very few people to travel extensively throughout the world just before the war. As a scholar, he offered his opinion on the various post war solutions plans of others. He was introspective about it:
All intellectuals agree that life is something about which a tremendous amount of penetrating thinking must be done. “If we could only arrive at the right idea,” so they reason, then the Millennium must surely come to pass.” What they overlook is that the transmission belt between the wheels of thinking and the wheels of living is a weak and slippery affair. Thinking about life does not necessarily change life. It merely changes one’s way of thinking about life.
It isn’t always the plans as such which amount to much of anything; it is the men proposing the plans and the men executing the plans who count. Today’s planners are neither typical nor representative of the common man. We must foresee the danger that even the best of plans may fall into the wrong hands, danger that it be “fixed” by ambitious politicians and unprincipled demagogues, danger that it be mutilated beyond recognition and be turned into its very reverse. This has happened before in history; there is no guarantee that it will not happen again.
Interesting how 80-year-old words still ring true today. He made another observation about the post war world:
The creative power of the machine age has in the past worked for centralization. The destructive power of the machine age now works the other way, towards decentralization.
I’m sure the Robert Kazmayer of 1944 could have not envisioned the extent to which the machine age would decentralize civilization, especially when it comes to computers and the internet. We don’t have examples of his later thoughts, but I’m sure they were interesting. Robert continued to send postcards and copies of his lecture programs to my grandfather until the 1990’s. Probably the last time Robert spoke in our area was to the Rush Henrietta High School graduates of 1968.
Robert Kazmayer died at age 82 in 1991. To my knowledge, he is the only person from Rush, NY to ever get his obituary published in the New York Times.
And to think that you probably never even heard of the most famous Rush resident until now.
News Clippings
"West High Graduate back from 'Working World Tour'" Democrat and Chronicle - Rochester, New York Sun, Sep 16, 1928 · Page 19
"Speaks at East Avon" Democrat and Chronicle - Rochester, New York Mon, Apr 29, 1929 · Page 17
"Barred from, Threatened with Jail, Student back from $2 Trip Abroad" Democrat and Chronicle - Rochester, New York Sun, Sep 29, 1929 · Page 22
"Student to Tell of Russian Experience" Democrat and Chronicle - Rochester, New York Sat, Feb 22, 1930 · Page 4
"Kazmayer to Address Youth Rally in Bergen" Democrat and Chronicle - Rochester, New York Sat, Mar 15, 1930 · Page 6
"University Student to Speak on Russia" Democrat and Chronicle - Rochester, New York Fri, Mar 28, 1930 · Page 27
"New Minister has Unusual Background" Democrat and Chronicle - Rochester, New York Tue, Sep 30, 1930 · Page 26
"World Traveler, Minister at 22, Gets Lewiston Avenue Pastorate" Democrat and Chronicle - Rochester, New York Wed, Oct 07, 1931 · Page 17
"Methodists to Take Up Offerings for Hard-Pressed Lewiston Avenue Congregation" Democrat and Chronicle - Rochester, New York Sat, Nov 21, 1931 · Page 5
"Soviet Said Using New Weapon on Religion" Democrat and Chronicle - Rochester, New York Mon, Feb 01, 1932 · Page 15
"YOUTH NEED IS RELIGION" Democrat and Chronicle - Rochester, New York Mon, Feb 22, 1932 · Page 17
Nice article. Thank you very much.
~ Andrew Chase