Last month I gave you all instructions on how to get from my house to the penny candy store. Let me tell you a little bit about my house in “Da Bronx” and the neighborhood where I grew up.

My house was two-story house off Pelham Parkway in the Bronx. It was on a street named Stell Place. This was very unusual street because it was just one block long. Williamsbridge Road was the western border and Laconia Avenue was the eastern border. To the north was Waring Avenue and to the south was Astor Avenue. Stell place had only nine houses on it, all two-family brick. There were five houses on my side of the street and four on the other side, (across the street). Everyone had a small front yard and two of them had medium sized back-yards as well. The others had concrete driveways leading to the garages which were all in the rear of the houses. These concrete places between the garages made great playgrounds except for some of the people who would chase us because of the noise. But the street itself was a pretty good playground because it was only one block long and had little or no traffic during the daytime. All of the houses had front stairs made of brick and concrete and were called stoops. Stoops were a very important thing to have because a good deal of our social life took place sitting ‘round on the stoops.

My house was one of the two houses that had a backyard in addition to the garage. It’s because we were the corner house. Well not really because we weren’t on the corner but we did border the real corner house which had a Laconia Avenue address and was a one family castle like structure made of gray stone. It was owned by the Venetzias and their daughter was our baby sitter. When I was eleven years old they sold it to Dr. and Mrs. Mound. He became our family physician and both sets of parents were trying to make a shiddach between me and their daughter, Lois.

The first floor of my house was occupied by my father and mother, my older sister and my grandmother on my father’s side, (Granma Goldy”. The upstairs tenants we the Semmels. My room was an enclosed porch and was always cold. Perhaps that’s why I still like to sleep with a window open on the winter. I remember a window between my room and my sister’s room which was shared with my grandmother. Late at night we would open the window and share candy or cookies. Our basement was really a cellar with dirt floors and a coal-burning furnace. It was damp, dark and scary and we knew that the boogieman lived down there. Later on my parents converted the house to a one-family with a finished basement . We needed the room as my younger sister and then brother came on the scene.

Next door to us lived the Greens who owned the house and their tenants, the Rosenbaums. They shared a driveway with the Wards who had no tenant but were a large family. Their concrete backyard playground was our best because it was flat and had few cracks. Although two of the Ward’s kids played with us, Mrs. Green’s mother, Mrs. Moscowitz was always at the window or the back porch yelling at us to “get out”. I’m sure she had her reasons but to this day she remains in my memory as just a mean old lady. We nicknamed her “Moscow-Witch”.

Now there were double wide passages between certain houses with steps going up to a small landing and back down again. I still haven’t figured out why they were there at all. I can’t remember the original people who lived in the next house because it was sold when I was very young to Rabbi Gabarsky and his son in law Mr. Kaminetsky. They shared this double wide walk way with the Wards. The next and last house on my side of the street was owned by the Provenzano family. The upsatairs family were the Bregmans. Sally Provenzano and Mona Bregman were my age and part of our group. Sally was one of the three musketeers with Buddy DelVecchio and myself. Buddy didn’t live on Stell Place but his backyard was adjacent to my backyard so we made a hole in fence which served as his portal to Stell Place and my portal to Laconia Avenue. This house had a huge side yard which was nicely groomed and planted by Sally’s mother. Sally’s father owned a liquor store and we used to go down to basement, (which was finished), and look at all the miniature bottles that were on the shelves.

Across the street from the Provenzano’s lived Mr. and Mrs. Westfall whose tenant was Murry Reichback and his wife. Murry Reichback was a good friend of my father’s. The next house were the Lolly’s. Mr Lolly had a workshop in his basement and we were welcome to watch him make things . He used to make ships in a bottle and other neat artsy-craftsy things. Sharing his double wide walkway with steps were the Yellins and a tenant who I can’t remember. The last house on that side of the street was inhabited by the Anano family with the Himmits as upstairs tenants.

Let me tell you about Buddy. I’ve already told you about the hole in fence but there’s so much more to tell you. We literally toddled together. Although he didn’t attend PS 89, we were together almost all the time out of school. We had two cans with a string hooked up from my room to his older sister’s room, which served as a primitive intercom. We would put our Lionel train sets together for Christmas. We didn’t celebrate Christmas at my house but I was always a guest at his. The trains would run under their tree. He in turn would light Chanukah candles at my house and get some Chanukah gelt from my father. He, Sally and I were the Three Musketeers and many times we would sit on my stoop or Sally’s and share a Three Musketeer bar which in those days actually had two lines indented so you could break it into three equal parts.

We played stickball in the street with no problems. We played handball with a Spaulding against my garage door since it was the smoothest surface of all the other doors. We played potsy in the alley and Mrs. Moscowitz would come out yelling. When that happened we would take the chalk and move to another alley.

There is so much more to tell you about, the Borden’s milkman, the Good Humor and Bungalow Bar ice cream trucks, Dugan's bakery trucks and the seltzer man.

Yes we had milk delivered fresh every other day. I don’t know how the delivery was made, but every Friday afternoon the milkman would come to our block driving a Borden’s wagon pulled by Elsie the horse for his collections. It was always a fun thing to wait for him and pet the horse.

Dugan's bakery would deliver fresh bread and other bakery related treats.
The seltzer man brought seltzer and other sodas. And then there were the ice cream trucks that came around every day from early springtime until October or so. There was the Good Humor man and the Bungalow Bar man. The Bungalow Bar truck was actually shaped like a small house with a shingled roof and all. When the ice cream bell rang all the kids on the block, (including Buddy), came running with the coins our parents gave us. Then we’d all retreat to our respective stoops and enjoy the afternoon treat.

I’m not sure where next month might take us but rest assured that you’ll be hearing from Mel. He’s again promised to tell us all about the Frappe.

Shalom and Happy Chanukah to all.