Readers Report
It was amazing going through the 99 Brooklyn pages and remembering Brooklyn through the words of people born in the 20s to the 70s, all with a single common denominator . . . love for the Borough of Brooklyn.
I was born in Manhattan in 1936 but moved to the Red Hook section of Brooklyn in 1937....I guess we were poor financially, but we were never hungry and we had a five-room apartment with steam heat. Sometimes my father's shoes went to Mass twice on Sunday at Visitation Church. During WWII we collected paper, lard and bottles so we always had some change in our pockets. . . . Of course if my father hit the number (926) we partied. . . . Every Easter a new suit at Bond's, with two pair of pants.
My teenage years were spent hanging out in Coffee Park, Pioneer Movie House and our Social Club, the Starlight Lodge on Conover Street, so named because there was a hole in the roof. Went to Boys High only because their classes ended at 2 pm. Played CYO basketball and baseball for the Panthers on Sackett Street for a really great man . . . Frank LoPapa.
Many of my friends have passed away. . . . Jimmy Accardi, Sal Amendola, Stevie Lombardi and the others have just faded away. . . . Still talk to Bobby Kelly and Sal Auletti and would certainly be interested in hearing from anyone else from Brooklyn who grew up in Red Hook.
2 October 1998
My Brooklyn is Ocean Hill. The most vivid memories were the sounds from the street early on a Saturday morning. Italian street vendors singing to the tune of those items that he had on his wagon that day. A broom stick hitting a spauldeen. Stoop ball sounds . . . the key and knife sharpener with the bell attached to the rig he carried on his back. The ice man chipping away, ready to carry blocks up many stairs. Icemen were always small guys . . . figure that one out. The neighborhood had roots in Italy—more specifically, Naples, Bari and Sicily. The smell of great cooking in the halls as you went up and down, or even as you passed by windows. The smell of hot tar cooled by a summer shower . . . the smell of the coolness and freshness of a wide open hydrant. . . . Sounds, smells . . . I haven't even gotten to the other senses yet. I miss ya Brooklyn. And as well-to-do as I now am compared to my kids, they were culturally deprived, not me.
2 October 1998
At last, snow. Better yet, it's a Saturday—no school and all day for me. The year must have been 1942 or 1943 and I'm off to Prospect Park trailing my sled. Into the park through the Grand Army Plaza entrance, a few whoops and heys going through the tunnel just to hear the echo. The hill to the left is jammed. Going down toward the end of the meadow there is less of a crowd.
Not too many remember that there were troops stationed in part of Prospect Park during WWII. At the top of the hill I'm against a wire fence separating the Army compound from the park, and there is a GI on the other side of the fence looking at the kids. We talk for awhile and then I'm off down the hill. When I get back to the top, he's gone. Wonder if he's still alive and remembering kids sledding while he was watching.
3 October 1998
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