Readers Report
It was the Bushwick section (Cornelia Street between Bushwick Avenue and Broadway. It was P.S. 56 (Mr. Bueschell, the principal, and the teachers: Miss Cook (kindergarten), Mrs. Barbash (1st grade), Miss Steed (2nd grade), Mrs. Donoeke (3rd grade), Miss Marie Casey (4th grade), Mrs. Alice Burns (5th and 6th grades). It was Halsey Junior High (P.S. 85) and then on to Franklin K. Lane High School.
It was our Lady of Good Counsel RC Church on Putnam and Reed Avenues: first communion (Father Devaney) and confirmation (Archbishop Molloy) and teenage dances at 14 Holy Martyrs RC Church on Central Ave. and Covert Street. Also the Congregational Church on Cornelia Street and Bushwick Avenue and the Methodist Church on Madison and Bushwick Avenues.
It was the Doctors Rosenthal (Harry and Abe) on Bushwick Avenue between Putnam and Madison Avenues. It was the Red Shield Boys Club on Gates and Bushwick Avenues. It was Tell's Department Store, Smilen Brothers Produce, Einhorn's grocery, Sid and George Lieberman's pharmacy and Harry Michael's fur store, all on Broadway. And the RKO Bushwick, Loew's Gates and Monroe theaters on or just off Broadway. The library just off Broadway near Halsey. It was the elevated BMT line along Broadway with a candy store (don't even try to explain a candy store to someone not from NYC) at the foot of every el line staircase. It was the trolley that ran along Broadway until modern times took over and a bus replaced it, leaving the trolley tracks there for many years.
It was the snowball fights along Bushwick Avenue after leaving P.S. 56 at 3 pm, with one side of that wide street against the other. It was stickball where being a "two sewer man" was a proud boast of many a boy, often more talk than performance. It was stoopball, triangle, Chinese handball (AKA Ace-King-Queen), boxball, flipping cards, scully, zig-zag tag, potsy, iron tag, punchball and scooters made from a peach crate, a two by four and a single roller skate.
It was the trips on subways and streetcars and buses that we took without telling our parents. It was walking up Bushwick Avenue to Highland Park to play baseball in the summer or to take your sled down Snake Hill. It was taking the Gates Avenue bus at night to the Bedford YMCA to learn how to swim.
It was growing up in the middle of an ethnic stew pot where all the heritages were maintained while we assimilated, where we knew the difference between disrespect and rudeness and took that knowledge with us into adulthood. It was the values of immigrant parents who loved this country as only immigrants can. It was the patriotism of the daily Pledge of Allegiance followed by an Old Testament bible reading that seemed to offend no one and made sense to all the kids.
It was Brooklyn, and it still lives inside this fifty-eight year old in California.
15 February 2000
From 1939 until 1952 my home was at 2680 Hubbard Street Brooklyn, NY 35 (nowadays 11235)—around the corner from the Coney Island Hospital. Hubbard Street was and is only two blocks long and my street was between the Belt Parkway and Avenue Z. It was an era when no one locked their doors during the daytime, any kid in the neighborhood was welcome in every home on the street. "Come in, have a cookie and a glass of milk."
About five blocks or so west is Lincoln High School. "Doc" Schecter was the coach of the Track Team and the Brothers "Ball" were teaching Physical Education (1948—1952). Dr. Mason (Principal) and Dr. Orgel (Dean of Boys) ran a very tight ship. Luminaries in our class included (then President of the Mathematics Club) now Harvard Law School Professor and TV commentator Arthur Miller. Most memorable event was the "student march" to seek an end to teachers refusing to participated in extra curricular activities (1951). We marched to Midwood H.S. and Madison H.S. (then the school of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Bader-Ginsberg).
Just East of Lincoln High was Brighton Beach Avenue, home of Mrs. Stahl's famous Knishes (under the elevated BMT at the corner of Coney Island Ave. And Brighton Beach Ave. across from the Brighton Baths) — still serving the best knishes in the world. And the Oceana theatre around the corner from Stahl's—where every weekend there would be the double feature plus the serials. What a great childhood.
Z Cozy Corner (at Ave. Z and Coney Island Ave.) was not as big or fancy as other hangouts (like Dubrows on Kings Highway) but it was always lively and served the best chocolate egg creams in Brooklyn. Diagonally across the street was P.S. 209—kindergarten through 8th grade—with concrete playground and walls which served as our stick ball field. Across the street was the Avenue Z Jewish Center. My Dad, Murray Greenwald, was one of the ten charter members and contributors.
Public School 209 was also the Friday night meeting place of Boy Scout Troop 440—with Mr. Bernstein our Scoutmaster in charge. Many of the Scouts attended Ten Mile River Scout Camps during the summer vacation. There they got a chance to test their skills at camping, cooking and pioneering. There they made deep and lasting friendships in the Order of the Arrow and other groups, friendships which have withstood the passage of fifty years and are still flourishing despite separations of 3,000 miles or more. The summers in the City were hot and humid; but Camp (which is near Monticello, NY) offered a wonderful cool respite and swimming in Rock Lake.
Who said, "You can take the boy out of Brooklyn but you can't take Brooklyn out of the boy"?
Encino, CA
15 February 2000
My Brooklyn was Crown Heights.
If anyone remembers me or the things I've mentioned, please let in touch. Would love to hear from you.
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