Our Block! Life was Sweet but I didn't know it.
I grew up on Bay 25th Street, 1/2 block from the elevator train, or "el" train as we called it. The block was tree-lined and filled with private houses and two large apartment buildings. We lived smack in the middle of the block.
Memories include playing slap ball on the corner and the boys playing stick ball in the street. If the ball hit the "el" train, it was a home run.
Life was sweet but kids do not realize what they have, so I don't think I was any different.
The block was full of Italian families and lots of kids of all ages. I had three siblings and we each chummed around with our own friends. There were a few families of different backgrounds but we made friends with whoever lived there. I had a friend who's family was from Ecuador and we loved to hear her mother speak her native language. 86 Street, where the train ran over, was a commercial street and that is where you did your shopping including the meat store and the fish store, the open markets and Ebingers Bakery. Ebingers is a name that brings sweet memories to those if us who have had their blackout cake and mocha butter cream cake. Yummy!!! There was Howie's Pet shop so wonderfully close to this animal lovers home and I didn't have to cross the street to go there and watch the fish and turtles and birds. I often would bring home injured birds and try to convince Mom that I could make it better and keep it as a pet. She knew better.
New Years and Block Parties were exciting times. Neighbors would join in the fun, cooking, dancing to a DJ's music and celebrating life.
Well, the trees are all gone and newer ones are being raised there now. Newer trees, newer families with new kids and making their own memories.
More to follow.......
Link to Photos
posted by Terie at 5:50 PM
6 Comments:
I only lived a few years in Bensonhurst before shipping out to California, and those 3 years or so were in college, so mostly I remember studying, smoking heavily, reading Playboy magazine (now I read AARP magazine!) and listening to Folk Music. I was geeky before there was a word for it.
Bensonhurst back then was 90% Italian folks (like my family), and the shops on 86th street were reminiscent of Union street in downtown Brooklyn, but slightly more generic . (As a kid I once bought a live chicken on Union street that the guy killed right there and bagged it for me so my grandmother could pull the feathers off and cook it .... none of that primitve stuff happened on 86th street.) I only recall one store on 86th street .... Lenny's pizza place where the pizza was so oily it dripped and you had to fold it in half so it wouldn't slop over ..... mmmmmm Martha Stewart, eat your heart out.
I recall the elevated train line that, today, would send the noise pollution people into convulsions..... you can imagine a train running OVERHEAD! on tracks supported by steel girders .... shouldn't cause too much noise, right?
I went back for visits up until early 1980's and watched the area integrate...... well not really integrate ..... I noticed mostly Asian people coming in and Italians leaving for Staten and Long Islands and complaining about the "immigrants" taking over (the irony of it all). That's not integration, its migration of the various tribes I suppose.
There's no finale to this, I'm just going to stop.
I was only 10 when my family moved to Bensonhurst from Burma. We bought Lenny's Pizza Place and opened the first sushi bar in North America. We kept Lenny on for a while as Chef, but had to fire him, as the customers complaind the sushi was too oily.
We gave Lenny a good severance pakage and he moved to Staten Island and opened a pet shop.
regards,
Sum Young Guy
To my wonderful Anonymous kin...who didn't buy Lenny's, as it still stands there now. TOO FUNNY. We come from a long line of comedians, don't we?
And yes, you folded the pizza and held it on end to let the 4 tablespoons of oil drip off it. Then you sprinkled a ton of garlic salt on it to dry it up a bit. We thought it was great.
But can't not mention L & B Pizza and Spumoni Gardens. STILL THE ABSOLUTE bestest PIZZA IN THE WHOLE U.S. of A.
Hi everyone, I'm Lenny
I owned a pizza place in Bensonhurst way back when..... sold out (1966, after Dave left) to a lovely Burmese family who opened the first sushi bar in North America.... at that time I relocated to Staten Island and opened a pet shop. First, I want to thank them for the very generous severance package they offered me.... it allowed me to invest in more exotic animals for my new shop which generated higher cash flow than the usual dogs, cats and canaries you find in mall shops..
I have many great memories of Bensonhurst, as my grandparents emigrated there in the late 1800's from Hoboken. But I remember one incident that changed my life.... back in the Summer of '64 ...... this skinny college kid comes in and orders a plain cheese pizza with .... extra olive oil ... ! .... do you believe it?
I thought it was a joke, so we put on about 4 times the normal ilive oil ..... and he loved it !
Right off, we called it Dave's special EOO (extra olive oil) pizza and it basically saved us from bankruptcy, paid for dad's heart operation, my girlfriend's apartment and my kid's tuition at Harvard.
Dave.... wherever you are .... thanks.
PS .... I have an overstock of baby snow leopards ready to ship for Christmas..... call for pricing.
Lenny
Hi I'm Sally
I lived in Bensonhurst from 1963 to 1983. It was wonderfull growing up there. I had lots of friends. I remember being on my porch, talking to my friends across the street on their porch, which is called a balcony now. We would play tag, hide & seek, jump rope, it was great. Everyone was so close, we were all like a family. Unfortunently I moved in 1983 to Staten Island, we couldnt afford to stay in good ole Bensonhurst. To this day I still miss it very much. I occassionally go back, & see the old neighborhood, it's not the same as it was, but memories are something we can cherish forever.
Someone mentioned the word "block" with very special meaning for anyone growing up in Brooklyn. I just remembered another...."stoop"
No one here in Florida or anywhere else that's not in NY has any idea what that word means.
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