Quote of the Day
“Your work towards a realistic goal cannot be a ‘sometime thing’ you have to make it an ‘all the time thing’.” -Joe DeLamielleure
I was born on June 7th 1964.
The first place I lived was 665 10th street.
We lived there for 5 years.
I don’t remember much except for a very pretty girl that lived down the block towards 8th avenue. Let me clear that up, years later I saw her on 7th avenue and she was unbelievable!
In the Fall of 1969 we moved to Windsor Place and 9th avenue, on top of Bob’s Hardware Store. We moved from a 3 family home to an apartment. I lived there for the next 25 years of my life.
I’ll admit, I was jealous of my buddies who lived on streets like Howard Place, Windsor Place, Sherman Street and even down on Seeley Street.
Shoot, I was jealous of my cousins that lived at 29 Fuller Place.
When I’d go over their cribs I’d stand in awe of how they had a backyard, a driveway, a stoop and of course a basement.
I lived on the third floor in a railroad, 3 bedroom apartment.
You’d have to walk around a bunch of plastic garbage cans in front of the doorway that Morty Hyman had on display.
Once past the cans I would walk through 2 unlocked doors. Yes, I said unlocked.
Making my way up 2 flights of stairs was always a burden, especially if I was carrying groceries for mom. It really sucked when she would call up to me from the street with a load of laundry that she had just done across the street.
Schlepping the laundry bag up the stairs sucked too.
Inside our apartment we had one small bathroom, a small living room, a small kitchen and 3 small bedrooms.
It wasn’t the dumps, we got by and as a kid, I never really thought about how much it sucked sharing a bedroom with my brother.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention our firescape where we spent many hot nights chillin out listening to the radio.
I’m asking you today, not including your home where you grew up, if you could live anywhere in the neighborhood, where would it be?
My choice of living would be on Prospect Park Southwest between the circle and 10th avenue. My boy Edmund Gallahue lived in one of those sweet spots.
So let’s hear it, tell us where you’d love to live if you could afford any spot in the neighborhood. A street? A certain house? Maybe you’d like one of those apartments on the avenue?
Respectfully,
Steve
Hoops135@hotmail.com
I had a friend who lived on PPW between 12th and 13th st- it was an 8 room apt- I always wanted to live there, we lived in a 3 bedroom on 13th bet 7th and 8th- 2 sisters to a room- those apts on PPW also had beautiful detailing, molding, mantles, etc- not to mention walk out your door and there is the park
oh, and I always wanted to live on the 1st fl- several of my childhood apts were 4th fl walkups!
Thank you…wonder what the rent is at those places, today?
Steve we owned a 3 family house on 16th between 9th and 10th # 460 3 houses after the lot. Would’nt trade that for anything. Near your cousins the Sabbaths.
I have a friend whose parents still live on the same type building, but is between 11th and 12th st- they pay under $500- but the rest of the building is co-op. I also know someone who lives in one of those great pre-war apt buildings on 8th ave bet Garfield and Carroll- they pay about $700 a month for a huge one- bedroom- the apts in that line sell for $900K and up
I always liked Sherman St, between 10th & 11th. I think it was always such a pretty block & the houses are beautiful. But I wouldn’t trade Windsor for the world. That was the absolute best.
Karen, I loved the block you lived on; so many nights I wished I had lived there.
By the way, 57 Windsor was my favorite.
(:
Has anyone seen this book :
The artist used photos of park Slope in his backgrounds. Interesting!
There are three books in the series and my 5 year old has all of them. When we go into Brooklyn to see our family he likes trying to pick out locations from the books.
We moved from Inwood when I was three. My bedroom was about 6 by 9 feet with no closets. We had the three railroad bedrooms. Fortuanately I had run of the whole house since my aunt, uncle, cousins, and grandmother lived downstairs. My dad bought.the house and I thought it was cool to go “upstairs” to bed. We now rent our old apartment and one day I was there, I saw my old room was now a walk in closet.
I liked visiting Sherman Street and visiting my cousins but like Karen said,
I would want to be on Windsor Place … same house too…
We lived in a 4 ROOM apartment on 8th avenue between Windsor and Prospect. Besides the door into the place, there was only one other door (besides the bathroom door !) that seperated the two front rooms from the two back rooms. Every morning, the whole building would shake when the trucks from Empire State Oil rumbled out of the garage next door. Then it was a race to beat my two brothers to the one bathroom. Being the youngest and the smallest, I usually lost.
One comment about Windsor Place. My cousin’s daughter who is growing up on 2 1/2 acres in Northern New Jersey wanted to come to last year’s block party. I told her the whole block is smaller than her yard and her house is about 5 of the houses on Windsor. Anyway, she came and had a blast… playing with kids she just met, singing along with the local musicians,
She saw me taking to Karen and I explained to her that her grandfather and my dad (especially my dad) grew up with Karen’s dad….She was awestruck by that. She had a blast and is coming this year as well….
I agree with Tony 460 16th street was the best. We had so many good times there didn’t we Tony. Cathy,Michael, Frankie Antony, Joey all us cousins playing together. The best times.
I lived on Windsor Place, 300 Windsor, to be exact, from 1965 to 1990. In many ways I wish I’d never left. But really, it was not I who left the neighborhood; it was the neighborhood that left me. Buggy Bill’s was gone; Wetter’s gone; Croake’s, Reenie’s, Ray and Otto’s, Doc’s, Prime Meats, gone. The PS 154 schoolyard is a parking lot, not a strike zone to be seen.
While I lived there, I did envy the folks who lived on Fuller Place. Tree-lined street, porches, little traffic, better parking. And you could play ball in the street without getting beeped at all the time.
I loved a lot about Brooklyn. It’s not the same place though, so I can’t go back. A million bucks for a house that leans so much that we used to race cars on the third floor just by holding them against the wall and letting them go at the same time? A million bucks! No normal family would pay a million dollars to live there. Windsor Terrace should be what it was meant to be: a home for civil servants, post office emps, cops, firemen, small business owners.