Bloomberg Bio: Medford Small, Dull; Unfriendly to Jews

NYC Mayor and former Medford resident Michael Bloomberg is pictured at left at John Brewer’s Tavern in Malden in August.

NYC Mayor, Billionaire Recalls Growing up in Medford in New Biography

New York City Mayor and billionaire Michael Bloomberg describes the Medford he grew up in as small, dull, and unwelcoming to Jewish people in a new biography.

In the book, Bloomberg recalls Medford in the 1940’s as “…an uninspiring suburban city with a conventional Main Street that featured Brigham’s Ice Cream Parlor, a funeral home, an armory, a gracious library and two movie theaters, each with a single screen.”

There were few Jews in Medford at the time, and parts of the city were known to be off-limits. The Bloombergs purchased a home on Ronaele Road and were the only Jews in the immediate neighborhood. Bloomberg’s mother Charlotte says that some neighbors “weren’t very happy” when the Bloombergs moved in.

The biography, Mike Bloomberg: Money, Politics, Power by Joyce Purnick had an excerpt published in Sunday’s New York Times. Click here to read the excerpt.

– InsideMedford.com