My Brooklyn

Al Durant

I was just thinking about the days of my early childhood on Watkins Street in Brownsville. This was my first home after my parents brought me back from Kings County Hospital in 1955. We lived between Livonia and Riverdale and although I was very young some things stay in my mind. On the same block lived some cousins, my Aunt Janie and my great grandparents, so it was always some family around. We lived across the street from a soda company and trucks would always be going in and out all the time. I remember dad would take me with him sometime when he went to the Bombay, a local bar that I believe was on Rockaway Ave. The dentist's office was on Rockaway and Livonia and the barbershop further down near Chester St. All the black men in the community would stop in the barbershop to solve the world's problems and talk sports. I remember them talking about this boxer Bummy Davis a lot and how he got killed. On Livonia, there was some type of power plant for the El and as you walked by it, you could hear the engines humming. My Uncle Stokes lived on Hopkinson Ave., across from Betsey Head Park. He had a moving business with bright orange trucks (Durant & Sons). Great-Grandaddy owned a restaurant and grill on I believe the corner of Howard & Dean Streets (Durant's Restaurant). We later moved to the Linden Projects in East New York, but still seem to spend much of our time in Brownsville. Does anyone out there have any of these same memories or remember any of the places I've mentioned?

Katie Kelly

My Brooklyn was growing up in Coney Island, attending Our Lady of Solace Grade School and enjoying the rides in Steeplechase Park with my friends. Does anyone remember when George Tilyou opened the park for the benefit of our church one Monday in the summer? My Brooklyn was also sitting on the stoop when it was hot, or going with my mother or father to sit on the pier and feel the cool breezes blow. How about frozen custard. I loved pistachio. My Brooklyn was also going first to St. Brendan High School, then transferring to St. Edmund's. I graduated from Our Lady of Solace in 1950 and from St. Edmund's in 1954. Are any of my classmates out there? I'd love to hear from you. My e-mail is scottish@hhs.net. In Coney Island, I lived at 3065 Cropsey Avenue (last house before the bridge.)

Steve Brennan

My Brooklyn was Sunset Park in the 60s-70s. Playing stickball all day, cork-cork, buck-buck. Having the greatest friends in the world, where every day was an adventure, when life was carefree. When not having money never stopped you from doing anything. Every block had their own softball, basketball, football teams. Everyone had a great nickname: K, Rooster, Fizzo, Pigeon, Whitey, Crackers, Nano and the list goes on. Hitching buses and skitching, hockey at Fort Hamilton Parkway. Eggcreams at Al's, crazy Sam the Shoemaker. In Brooklyn everybody had their own story, and everyone respected that. It was a time when gang wars didn't mean people died. As we got older (12-13) drugs became our way of life and it went on a long time like that hanging out on 47th and 7th Ave. drinking in Sparky's Bar at 15, sorry Sparky & Gloria. Those days are long gone now a lot my friends are dead or would be better off if they were. I guess this was the price we paid. But I wouldn't trade my childhood for anything in the world we learned from the street, form each other and everyone in the neighborhood. Back then a friend was a friend for life and I still keep in touch with everyone I can find. I have been out of Brooklyn for 8 years now, but for the last 20 it was never the same. They say you can take the boy out of Brooklyn but not Brooklyn out of the boy, which is true. But once you leave Brooklyn there is no going back, and that's the way its supposed to be. I know, I could never recapture those magical days. Those were the best days of my life.

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