While transcribing Sonia’s essays, I feel as though I am learning more about her than when I first began her autobiography. This is not in any way to discredit the autobiography, for it’s indispensable, and it holds information that hasn’t seen publication. However, Sonia gave away special little tidbits of herself in the essays that she did not share in her autobiographical writings.

In the beginning of this month, I was transcribing an introductory speech for a celebration that Sonia was hosting after recovering from a six-month long illness. The celebration was held on Sunday, October 24, 1954, and as for the illness she might have been alluding to, was her broken hip. The speech is only four pages long, typed on very small paper. In it, she introduces quite a number of her personal friends, all of whom are very talented singers, artists, and theatre actors. One friend, however, is especially dear to Sonia: Laya Machat-Smyth.

While each one of you is a very dear friend of mine, I must speak of one who was my very first and best after I had left my girlhood home. In fact we were like sisters. Her good husband, after many years of association with the Los Angeles Museum as a scientist, has very recently retired. Besides his vocation as an outstanding scientist in his own field of science his AVOCATION lies in the realm of art; specifically in architecture and construction; his cultured wife, my girlhood friend, is a former Grand Opera star. She was the Diva of the San Carlos Opera Co., The Mexican, and the South American Opera Companies. She too, is now retired. Permit me to introduce Dr. Eugene Graywood Smythe [sic] and his good wife, Laya Machat Smythe. [sic].

Sunday, October 24, 1954.

Laya Machat was born in Ponyri, Russia on May 18th, 1890. Her parents were Max Machat and Fanny R. Machat, and at some point, after Laya’s birth, her family immigrated to New York. Max Machat became a dry goods merchant in Kings County, Brooklyn, supporting his wife and children. Laya had two older siblings, Sadie S. Machat and Jules Machat. In the 1910 census, Sadie and Jules were still living with their parents. At the time of the census, Sadie was a teacher at a public school while Jules was unemployed. Sadie was twenty-three years old, while Jules was twenty-one.

Interestingly enough, Laya was not recorded in that census and can’t be found in any other during this time. According to her request for a passport in 1917, she claimed to have lived in Italy from 1911 through 1915, which could very well be the reason why she was not in the 1910 census.

Although before leaving for Italy, Laya was Sonia’s first and best friend. Originally, I believed Sonia meant Ukraine when she referred to her “girlhood home”, but upon reflecting on her adolescent years as she wrote them, what she actually meant was her stepfather’s home. Mr. Solomon Moseson was Racille’s (aka Rachel) second husband, who she married after living in New York for nearly two years.

Mr. Moseson had three children of his own from a previous marriage, but he genuinely disliked his new stepdaughter. According to her recollections of her stepfather, he harassed Sonia and sought to make her life miserable even while she was sick. Mr. Moseson was eager to send her out and work—and it got so bad that Sonia was forced to live with a nearby family when she was thirteen.

A friend of Racille’s said she would take Sonia into her home until both the friend and the mother could decide what was best for the child. Because after all, Racille could not leave her husband and take care of the children also. Yet whenever Mr. Moseson went on his trips which usually lasted about ten days, Sonia would come back home such as it was, and when the husband was expected, she would hie back to Mrs. Balch. This lady was a widow who had a very large house and a family to match. The youngest daughter, Eva, a girl about the same age as Sonia, was studying music. She and Sonia became very good friends..

Two Hearts That Beat as One, Chapter 8.

Side Note:

I searched through genealogical records in hopes of finding the Balch family. The effort produced one name: Mrs. Josephine Balch. She was a widow, and she had a daughter named Margaret June Balch. They lived in Pennsylvania though, and at some point, between 1920 through 1930, they moved to Elmira. Regrettably, they are not the family that Sonia had moved in with.

Another possibility is Eva could very well be Laya. The surname Balch has a strong visual similarity to Machat, and Sonia was notorious for changing people’s names, i.e., “Stanley Greene” for Samuel Greene and “Samuel Morris” for Solomon Moseson. Moreover, Laya went on to pursue music as a career and was also the youngest of the family.

After her millinery apprenticeship, Sonia went to live in Passaic, New Jersey while Laya seemed to have remained in Brooklyn all through her adolescent years and young adulthood. Sonia was sixteen when she moved in with Samuel in 1899, which would have made Laya nine years old. It does make me wonder if Sonia ever vented to Laya about her marriage to Samuel while in the midst of it.

Laya studied music and became an opera singer. She traveled and performed in various locales outside of the United States. On March 9, 1916, Laya married Eugene Smyth in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Eugene Graywood Smyth was born on July 28, 1886, in Topeka, Kansas. He, too, was the youngest, having an older sister, Edna M. Smyth, and a brother, Charles Smyth. In the 1900 census, his father was a widow, while Edna was already twenty-six years of age, Charles was twenty-three, and Eugene was fourteen. The census also shows Bernard B. Smyth, Eugene’s father, as having worked as a librarian while his son Charles worked as a printer. Eugene ultimately became an entomologist, traveling for his work.

Sonia left New York for Los Angeles on January 6, 1934, in what she believed to be only a vacation. Loving the climate and city, she decided to remain. She met Nathaniel A. Davis late in March of 1936 at a Board of Education lecture, marrying him on April 7, 1936.

Eventually, Laya relocated to Los Angeles as well. By the 1940 census, Eugene and Laya were already living in Sonoma, California. Prior to Sonoma, they had lived in South America. In 1950, Eugene was still working as an Entomologist, which by 1954, Sonia would then introduce him as recently retired from this field.

We can only hope, once living in Los Angeles, Sonia and Laya resumed their sisterly bond as it was when they lived in New York. It is rather sad that as much as Sonia considered Laya as a sister, so little was spoken of her. If it weren’t for this small four-page introduction at a party, we never would have known of Laya Machat-Smyth, specifically of her close relationship with Sonia. Perhaps, once I’ve gone through Sonia’s personal correspondence, we will find more pieces of this friendship.

After Sonia’s celebratory event, information about Laya becomes scarce once more. Sonia would sadly pass away on December 26, 1972, while Eugene Smyth would pass away on July 30, 1975. It is fascinating to see how these best friends, regardless of the different paths they took, their fates inevitably linked again in the end. Their adolescent friendship stood the test of time and proved that when a friendship is true and sincere, it doesn’t matter whether time and space separates them, best friends will always pick up precisely where they left off.