What Happened to Our Neighborhoods?

Today I walked through my ole Jackson-Hess neighborhood realizing the sights, sounds and even the familiar smells are long gone. I recall when there was no litter or abandoned houses ram sacked and forgotten. Our Boulevard was lined with maple trees wrapped in honeysuckle vines, sounds of children laughing, and folks talking over the little iron fences about how to help one another through tough times. Our neighbors were of different cultures and spoke languages unknown to each other but somehow they learned each other's words and meanings. We had one thing in common;safety for all. Today there were no glorious smells of home made bread and pies cooling on window sills or rails of side porches. As I remembered my childhood I knew that aroma signaled friendliness as it spread through each ethnic city block.

When I walked past my family houses on Pulaski and Brown St. and my Grandpa's church over at Clay and Van Buren today I wonder what happened to our neighborhoods. I saw no smiling faces, heard no exchange of differences in cultural pride in anyone's homestead. I notices the musky smell of emptiness surrounded by a highway as clunking cars buzzed overhead. It seems that our beloved neighborhoods are lost. Perhaps, its an abandoned because of the highway that replaced the little framed cottages and 2 story storefront brick homesteads. Maybe the changes from brick streets to lifeless paved roads impacted their loss of neighbors.

But for a little while I want to paint a view of what was and hopefully can be renewed neighborhoods. Peaceful, caring, beautiful neighborhood where everyone was safe and mattered to each other. For instance, our homestead was a 2 story red brick with a white front porch rail where morning glories bloomed each morning. There were luscious snowball bushes that covered the front of the porch, peach and apple trees grew in our backyard. They grew close enough to the alley for any one's picking without a fuss. Our family and most of our neighbors had storefront houses and survived doing their handicrafts. We bartered for what we needed and wanted. We had neighborhood visitors like Mr. Red. He was our neighborhood police officer. He walked through our alley at breakfast time everyday and picked out the juiciest peach or pear he could reach from over the fence. He would nod to all of the grownups and they would smile and wave. Kids would ran to him with friendliness. We would walk with him down to the boulevard and say,"Nice to see ya this morning'." and then tell him all the "news" in our neighborhood. Mr. Red would be grinning from ear to ear!! I told him the"neighbors news" on Monday's. For example, I said, "Did ya know that ole Mr. Wayne fell off his roof yesterday?" "He ain't hurt much, just a broken rib and swollen foot. Miss Moore and her son patched him up right quick, and did a real good job." Every Friday he would remind us, "oh yeah, did ya hear that the Wise corner store has sundae's on sale for 15 cents till next Sunday?" He would always tell us what to watch out for, in the neighborhood, on our way to school. "Now, don't you kids go down on the Boulevard at the North end because they are fixing' the bricks in the road, and the big sewers on Hickory St. are backed up, so you will have to cross the street at Jackson when you go home from school. We all laughed and trusted each other, looked out for one another, and were important to each other, back then. Now, no one appears to even know each other's name and rarely speak to each other. What fond memories of neighborhoods will today's children write about in the future? Guns? Fights? Abandoned Homes? drugs?

One of my favorite memories is about our fruit wagon master , never did learn to pronounce his name, so I called him Mr. Fruit. He was a first generation Italian American and loved kids, just like my Father, Joe. Mr. Fruit would ring the bell on his fruit wagon when he got down to the Boulevard down by Green St corner. He always waited there until all the kids came running through the yards, hopped over fences, scurried through the alleys, and got within a block of the back of his fruit wagon. Then, he would secretly tap his horses, Bessy and Moe, and race down the streets. All of us ran after him, laughing, stumbling, and bumping each other trying to be the first one to get to the tail gate. The first one to touch the tail gate got to help him sell his fruit and got one free fruit for every 5th sale. And of course, if you were the last one to his tail gate you got to clean up after Bessy and Moe. But he gave the last one the biggest red juicy apple he had that day. Most all of the kids who could run fast got to help the store owners, the fruit wagon master, and the mailman deliver or do errands for neighbors. We did errands on our way to and from school in the morning at lunch, or after the last bell rang out for the day. The only kids that did not get to help was the flag raisers: little June or Jake; the twins, usually did that chore. The flag raisers were always the ones with the best scores and the best attendance. Beth who lived in the double on Chadwick had rheumatic fever, Pedro had the polio disease, and Leroy had blisters from pushing' himself in his wheel chair, so we all pitched in with their chores and they listened to our stories of the day. Back then I could count on what would happen each day. Routines were the same and just typical of the times.

One example of my typical day was to get up late, run downstairs to the potbelly stove, if it was winter, pull out the wash pan and fill it with water so it would be ready to heat up. Then I laid the clean towels and washcloths on either side of the wash pan. I was the 3rd one to take a bath because my Dad and Mom were first (as they went to work real early), my brothers were next because they had to be at school before me, and I was last for privacy, being a girl , ya know. After bath time, I would go to our kitchen stove and eat whatever was left for me by my brothers. If it was eggs and pork-steaks, there was a lot left. But if Mama and Dad had made donuts or pancakes there was nothing left but the molasses or butter. So, I ate bread sugar sandwiches that day. Next, I would run out and see which yard Mr. Red was picking for his fruit breakfast, hoping' and praying' he picked ours as the best. Then I would fed the dogs, cats and Mr. Lucky; my bunny who lived in our barn, at the back of our yard ,close to the alley. Last, I closed the doors, locked the back gate and ran to catch up with Mr. Red and the other kids on the way to school.

My school days were rough for me, could not read or write real good, because I have partial vision and am dyslexic. Mrs. Brit always took her high heel shoe off and clunked me in the back of the head for turning around and talking' all day. Mr. Thomas always got me slipping notes or skipping down the hall, and everyday paddlings were a common thing because I loved to throw spit wads at the boys. The problem was by the time I got home from school someone had already told my brothers, who told my parents, and I got sent to bed without desert and no playtime, at all. On the days when my school day was a good one, my work was done, I did not interrupt or talk back, and stayed in my seat. My reward on good behavior days was to be a safety patrol girl at the corner of Jackson-Hess. I was so proud to watch out for the other kids; and I did a good job. I even got a certificate for safety patrol to prove it.

After safety patrol, I would go to Ms Edna' s house, two streets over on Long Ave. ,and get her wagon out of the cellar. She was an elder that could not move her left arm very good, so I always went to see if she needed something from the corner store. She usually did. This one day, I got the wagon out for her, knocked on her back door, the one with the pretty flower basket hanging/ beside it. But she did not come to the door. I waited till almost dark. My brothers had been looking for me since I left school but no one could find me. They told me Ms. Edna was in the hospital and that she had fallen off her feather bed when she was changing her flannel sheets. She would be okay, they said. But the doctor's just wanted her to stay the night in the hospital to be sure she was in good shape. That was a sad day for me. I figured that Ms. Edna would always be home and I would always go to the store for her each day. Well, Ms. Edna did not come back home, instead her daughter, Shanta; put her in the old folks home up on Perry Ave. Of course, I went after school everyday to visit her but my life was never the same. Ms. Edna hated it at the old folks home and she cried to see her bed, ole stove, and her flower beds. So the neighbors took her bed to her, and she and I planted flower seeds in the baskets that Mr. Ben donated from his grocery store over on Singer Street. Oh, I guess it was about two summers later that Ms. Edna died in her sleep."Peacefully" ,they said. You know, that pretty lady was 93 when she passed. I still from time to time go up the hill and visit her grave and take her flowers. Shanta had put a little iron bench by Ms. Edna's tombstone so everyone could go and sit with her a while.

My worse memory, was a Monday morning' round about the middle of Spring when I woke up hearing this horrible scraping noise outside our house and the smell of trash a burning. I ran down stairs, then out on the porch and could not believe it. There were three trucks and lots of workers tearing up and stealing our brick street.. They were putting some nasty looking black sticky stuff down in its place. I was furious. I began to scream at them "leave my bricks and my street alone!! I woke everybody in the neighborhood up. "Get away from here, stop, stop, stop, right now Misters, you can not have our brick street!!" I cried.
I ran out back to the fence to see if Mr. Red was picking' fruit and he was no where!! Then, I jumped the fence and ran into Mrs. Perez house to get help to stop the workers from tearing' up our street. Mr. and Mrs. Perez was sitting at their kitchen table with my folks and others from our street. They were all talking loud at the same time in different languages; Spanish, German, Irish, Italian, and English. My Dad told me," Yes, it is sad but we lost our brick streets to progress of the city-modern paved roads; "It disgusts me." Dad said,"What is happening to history, to tradition and to our choices?" I could not stand to see everybody so unhappy so I ran back to stop the workers in front of my house. "What could I do to stop them?" After a few minutes I got an idea. So, I rounded up my brothers and all the neighbor kids that were home. We got our wagons and wheel barrels and took all their shovels, tools, coal, oil, and gasoline so they could not run their machines.

The result was bittersweet because they called the police on us. Mr. Red and his boss came to our house and was not happy with us. The officers said we broke the law and were in big trouble, forever. Then they said, "Your parents will pay for the stolen property and all you kids will go directly to detention center." Oh my God, I thought, if you go to detention center, they beat you and if you cry they send you to the orphanage and you never see your family again." I had never been to detention or orphanages but I heard about them from Mike over on Apple St. I ran so hard I fell many times. I climbed in between the two big buildings next to the school house and hid until dark. I was so scared I wet my pants and cried like a new baby. I was dirty, scrapped up, and hungry so I tried to sneak home through the back bath window. I got as far as the old sink when I heard my Mother say my entire birth name in one breath at the top of her lungs, and she had her hands on her hips. I knew I was a dead child. "What is the matter with you, my brothers screamed at me, "Are you completely nuts?" "Wash up", Mama was crying'". "We have to take you down to the police station, right this minute." I washed up and grabbed a fresh baked donut on the way out of the screen door. My Mama had me by the ear and my Dad had the back of my shirt in his closed fist." i was so scared I could not even speak, cry, or backtalk at that point.

Next we made the dreaded ride to the police station. We sat outside Mr. Red's bosses office on a cold hard bench and it smelled like death in that hallway . After a very long time, Mr. Red came out and he was not smiling for anything. He said nothing to me but told my parents they would pay for the damages. My parents said, "Oh, Annmarie will work to pay the damages for the rest of her life. We do not pay for what she stole or destroyed. She did it-she will pay for it, starting right this very minute." " Then Mama pointed to the bathroom and Daddy took his belt off in a hurry. I thought they were gonna beat me to death and I would be buried out in the woods all by myself. But I got punishment worse than a beating and death. Instead, I had to clean all the sinks, toilets, walls, and floors with an old broken toothbrush; in the entire police station. When I got home, I was told to sweep all the sidewalks and pick up the trash everyday on my whole street. This torture of working off my bad behavior was even at school. I had to do dishes and mop the cafeteria for weeks and weeks until I had blisters on my hands. I finally got my bill of damages paid off without any money .just very hard work. Believe me, I have never interfered with street workers again. But I still advocate for historical buildings and traditional ways. As a result of my childhood I have spent the last 30 years as a Human Rights Advocate. As I left my old neighborhood today, I laid a brick, with the date they tore up our brick street and put my initials on it, near the cornerstone next to my old family homestead. I figure, I worked so hard as a child that I paid for that street. Its a part of my life history so I figure its still mine; brick or no brick, its still mine.

Memories of my old neighborhood, experiencing changes, and noticing that tradition can repeat itself with awareness and dedicated neighborhoods. I see that in some parts of Jackson-Hess neighborhood they are tearing up the paved streets and putting brick back down. I wonder if today's workers even know that our streets were bricked by traditional hard working folks long ago. I read in the paper tonight that they are thinking about bringing back streetcars, and our old beloved Arcade. So it seems some folks do remember our history and tradition that made our city so unique and loved so long ago. Perhaps progress leads back to traditional without us even realizing the connections of past, present, and future changes in our neighborhoods.