The Tragic Death of Morton C. Aaronson

Following a thread for information for my next Lifschitz post, I fell into a rabbit hole that landed me in the middle of a story yet to be known by our family or told. So I have taken this opportunity to shift gears and write about

Morton C. Aaronson born 16 June 1917, Bronx, New York. Morton was the son of Samuel C. Aronson and Rachel (Rae) Lipschitz. You may or more likely not, remember that Rae was the daughter of Simon Lipschitz and Annie Dinofsky – Simon was the brother of my great grandfather Benjamin Lipschitz.

Death Certificate for Morton C. Aaronson 

April 21, 1958 

At first glance under Cause of Death I spotted injuries – multiple – extreme; Aircraft accident and then adding that to the above mention of McCarren Field, which I knew as an airport, I was horrified to read further that this was a mid-air crash between a commercial plane and a Military aircraft.

Morton C. Aaronson of Encino, California lost his life at the age of 41. (although reported as 39 in the paper) Morton was the Vice President of the Esquire Shoe Company. I was able to find multiple newspaper articles from genealogybank.com in reference to this tragic United Airliner crash.  Sharing only one, below is the article from the

Milwaukee Journal SentinelWednesday, Apr 23, 1958 Milwaukee, WI – Page: 19

Researching Morton I have not been able to find a wife and family for him. I suspect he

may not have been married. Whether his parents or two siblings, Edith and Lawrence were still alive to witness his tragic death has not been proved. Having come from a family with multiple aunts and uncles, cousins too, I know that this tragic loss was felt by many along with a Nation that seemed to be in shock over this event. Mention of the collision was in papers across the states, stating what had happened and listing the names of all those that had been killed.

In Memory of  Morton C. Aaronson