A SUMMER RITUAL - Two Terra Cotta Alley Gangs

New to my blog? To better understand why this story was written. please read “A Child of the Greatest Generation” found in the August 09 Blog Archive.

(Photo) Terra Cotta Street, the kids called it Terra Cotta Alley, was a very narrow street running along the wall of our home and past the garage. Dad’s new 1948 Buick and Smokey’s dog house, stories for another day, can be seen to the left and right of the tree, just sporting its spring blooms.

more reflections

In the late 1940s in our home, the summer evening ritual began when we sat down, as a family, at the dinner table. Father came home from his store at 5:10 PM. At 5:20 PM we were all expected to be seated at the table. On days he had a late customer, we waited for Father.

Following dinner, dad would give me 3¢ (later a nickel) to walk across Main Street to Smitty’s Drug Store to buy his Pittsburgh Press. If he was in a generous mood, and he usually was, I would get 13¢, enough to buy the Press and two 5¢ Popsicles. Because there were two halves to each Popsicle, each of his four sons could share the bounty. The burden of deciding the Popsicle’s flavors was left to me, the eldest, but I got plenty of help from my brothers. Dad was teaching us the gentle art of leadership and compromise.

As the sun set on a warm summer evening, the Terra Cotta Alley gang would meet in the street to decide, not what store to rob or what rival gang member to take out, but rather what games to play: hide and go seek, kick the can (my mother usually furnished a can), red rover red rover, or stick ball. Some evenings we would end up on Colin Church’s driveway shooting baskets and playing horse. For the kids in the ‘40s and ‘50s, sunset meant playtime in the street.

And there was another neighborhood gang. They weren’t our rivals, they were our fathers. For the men of the neighborhood, sunset on a warm summer evening meant spirited conversation with the firemen at the East End fire station.

Like their gang, in our gang there were just guys, although occasionally we would let some girls play too. Everyone went to Linden Elementary, except for Dick (Zeek) Feeney who went to St. Marys. If we were going to play ball, even some of the older kids on the street, Calvin Griffin and the Oliker twins, Dick and Dan would join in.

On my way to Smitty’s, with coins in hand, I passed the fire station and the other gangs’ meeting place, two benches on a small green wedge of ground next to the station. Occasionally, as I passed by, there was a fireman and a neighborhood father already engrossed in conversation. I knew not to stop, but just keep walking, respectfully acknowledging their presence as I passed. After all, they were having a “Big People Conversation.”

Often on my way back home, father had already joined the group and they were laughing about something adult. I just kept on moving; knowing full well what ever they were talking about it wasn’t for my ears.

Most of the time I couldn’t stop, even if I wanted to! I had Popsicles to deliver to my three younger brothers before they melted. After making the delivery I’d often grab a tin can and head out the back door to meet the gang on Terra Cotta Alley.

I would be a teenager before, occasionally, being invited to join in dad’s gang’s conversation to listen to “Big People Conversation.”