Weissman, Daily Swimmer at Coney for Years, Dead

Nathan Weissman, 78 years old, whose daily dips in the icy waters of Coney Island had given him the title “dean of winter swimmers,” was buried yesterday in Mount Zion Cemtery but those who knew the old man were inclued to say, “He lived a full life.”

The body of Mr. Wesissman, who lived at 2963 West Third street, Brooklyn, had been found clinging to a rock off the foot of Calm street at Brighton Beach by Patrolmen Eugene O’Neill and Harold Pierce, on Wednesday morning. The Coney Island police botter described the incident “died of exposure.”

Mr. Weissman’s rugged health made him the envy of colleagues who stutied the Talmud with him at the solotweiner Synagogue, in the East Side. He used glasses only when reading, and had but a few teeth left in his mouth. He ate little. But old “Nuchem” never caught colds, never had headaches, walked with a firm step and held his head high.

A lumberman in his youth, Nathan Weissman came to the United States from Austria in 1904. He became a salesman of bread and cake. An old European habit he had of bathing daily, the old man brought to America and he was a daily visitor at the public baths in Manhattan. When he moved to Coney Island to live near his Grandchildren, Dr. and Mrs. H. Blicker, 3047 West First street, he would not forego what in Europe had been his “milvah.”

Daily, during the last ten years, Nathan Weissman could be seen at dawn, clad in a bathing suit, headed toward the beach where he would drop the robe and plunge into the surf. Three years ago he contracted pneumonia and survived–because, he said, he had trained himself to fight off sickness.

When friends sought to reason with him, the old man argued away their dissuasion.

He was a deep student of Talmudic literature and taught Hebrew classes at a synagogue at Neptune avenue and Ocean parkway. His pupils were said to have revered him.