Readers Report
My Brooklyn was Cypress Hills, that neighborhood squeezed between East NY and Woodhaven, Queens. We had water balloon fights in the cemeteries, walked the neighborhood looking for boyfriends, hung out on the corner come rain or shine. In the winter, we'd sit in apartment house lobbies and just hang out. I graduated from Franklin K. Lane in 1977, and took the "J" train to my first job in Manhattan ("the City"). Eventually I went to college and grad school and lived all over NY, and some in NJ, and now I'm moving BACK to Brooklyn, with my husband and soon-to-be-born baby. My new Brooklyn will be 16th Street between 7th and 8th Avenues, just two blocks from Prospect Park. And yes, I'll have a stoop! I was quite a stoop ball player back when. What I don't understand, however, is why everyone is waxing poetic on Brooklyn, missing it so, but choosing NOT TO LIVE IN BROOKLYN. If you love it so much, why are you all so far away? It's still a great place and I'm glad that I will be raising my children in a place with history, community and character lacking in so many other places. Again, why did you all leave?
1 November 1998
My Brooklyn was Gravesend/Bensonhurst/Sheepshead Bay. P.S. 95, Boody Jr. High School, Lafayette High School. Avenue U . . . Kings Highway. This was in 1960s—summers at Coney Island, Manhattan Beach, Prospect Park with Dad. I miss it more than I can say. If this was your area and era, please write.
2 November 1998
Greenpoint is my hometown and my father was Mr. Greenpoint in the 1950s to 1990s. He was President of the Republican party at the Alpha Republican club and ran for Assemblyman three times. He was delegate to the Republican national convention several times. He was Grand Knight of Fidelity Council 495 and then an active trustee and Past grand knight. He was delegate to the K of C national conference each year in the Catskills. He was on the Greenpoint planning board, President of the Holy Name Society at St. Stanislaus. He was active in the political, social and religious life of Greenpoint for more than sixty years until age 83 when he had a heart attack and moved to Connecticut to be near me. That's my Greenpoint. It's my father's Greenpoint where the peace and harmony in the community was very important. He fought against the encroachment of factories in the residential area. He defended Greenpoint in the highest circles of government. And in the end his funeral was in Greenpoint, at his old friend's place, Rago's.
2 November 1998
My Brooklyn was Waldorf Court, in Flatbush, a "dead-end" (no such term out here in Southern California as every "dead-end" street here is a cul-de-sac), that ended at the Brighton Line between Newkirk Station and Avenue H. Went to P.S. 217, then to Midwood High, class of 1958 (can it really be forty years?). Rides on a bicycle down Ocean Parkway to the beach, Prospect Park, the Brooklyn Museum, high school years working at the library at Grand Army Plaza cutting film for overdue books. Many fond memories of growing up in the best place in the world. Would not change my childhood experiences for anything!
3 November 1998
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