As I have written in here before, my parents never owned their own home. As a child we moved from rental house to rental house to rental apartment.  One of those moves was into an old house that at one time was a single home. When we lived there it had been converted into six apartments. I am sure, when it was a single home, it must have been owned by one of Slatington’s slate barons.  It was big and beautiful. But it was always a little scary, when I lived there.

I don’t believe in ghosts. But every time I was about to enter the building, I had a rush of adrenalin that made me run up to our second floor apartment as if someone was chasing me. Every single time.  Maybe it was just the aura of the house itself. For those of you from Slatington, the house is located at Second and Church Streets. A corner lot Victorian. Three stories tall. White. It could easily be featured in a horror movie.

Once I was in our apartment, I felt safe. I lived there from 5th through 7th grades. We were on the second floor. I can still remember the tenants in the other five apartments. Two of them were adult men living with their mothers.  Interesting.  Directly under us was an older couple, the Meaghers, who really didn’t like me.  I believe I may have been the first child to live in this building and I upset their quiet oasis. I was noisy. I was a kid. I had a baseball game I invented in my room. Throw the rubber ball at the bottom molding, try to catch it. If I didn’t catch it, I counted seconds, and the longer it took to get to the ball the farther on the imaginary base path I went.  I played this for hours, especially on rainy days.  No wonder the Meaghers didn’t like me! It’s funny that now I that I live in an apartment, I would absolutely hate that going on above me!

The apartment was very nice. It had a huge bay window that overlooked Church Street. From there I could see the Lincoln  Playground and Smith Hall.  My mom would spend hours sitting at that window watching the world go by or talking to her sister, Lorna, on the phone.  The only other unique thing about the apartment was my room. It was at the very back of the apartment. The slope of the roof was part of the ceiling.  I had my own outdoor entrance that opened onto a back porch and fire escape.  If I had been a teen living there, I could have been sneaking out every night and no one would know. Well, maybe the Meaghers would have known. They seemed to have it out for me!

I drove by this building the other day. It is for sale! It looks a little downtrodden. Maybe recent owners have not shown it loving care.   I am thinking about making believe I am interested in buying it, and getting a tour from the realtor. I would love to see that bay window and especially my old room!  Plus, I wonder, if I approached the entrance, would I still get that adrenalin rush? Has that ghost or demon or evil spirit been waiting  there all these years for my return. Scary House!

 

 

 

 

I know animation is huge today and it has always had a big following. Computer generated animation is simply amazing!  But I would like to make the case for the cartoons of my day. I’m not talking Walt Disney nor Walter Lantz. They were both wonderful, but theirs were not the cartoons that I and most of my friends were addicted to.

I was born in 1952 and started high school in 1966. During that time we watched a lot of cartoons. It was a staple of our television diet! After school and Saturday mornings were invented just for watching cartoons on TV.

We had wonderful hosts to entertain us and to show us cartoons. Who, of my age, doesn’t remember Our Gal Sal, Sally Starr? How about Officer Joe Bolton? Officer Joe also introduced us to the Three Stooges.  Gene London, a quiet and respectful host. He also drew!  Chuck McCann, funny and silly. The Bertie the Bunyip Show! Gloria from that show taught me how to draw a house. I still use that today. Thank you Gloria and Bertie!

I got a little carried away with TV hosts. Let me bring it back to the topic at hand, cartoons of the ’50s and early ’60s. The Patron Saints of back then cartoons were Hanna-Barberra. Those names go together like Lennon-McCartney. They were just as creative, but in a different genre. William Hanna and Joseph Barberra brought joy into our young lives and made us laugh until milk came out of our nose.  (Noses? Grammar Police help me here!)

Look at this list of Hanna-Barberra cartoons. Many of them are still shown today and many of their characters and phrases have made it into our everyday culture. Are you ready for a nostalgia blast? Here goes! Huckleberry Hound, Magilla Gorilla, The Perils of Penelope Pitstop, Quick Draw McGraw, Ruff and Reddy, Secret Squirrel, Top Cat, and everyone’s favorite Yogi Bear!   I am sure I missed a few. They were prolific!

I loved them all, but Hanna-Barberra did not make my absolute favorite ’60s cartoon. That honor goes to Bill Scott and Jay Ward. The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show! Who can see a moose today and not automatically want to call him Bullwinkle? Sherman and Peabody! Boris and Natasha!  Ahead of their time for sure!

It’s funny that today if I have the opportunity to see a popular movie, and I find out it is animated, I will likely pass. But back when I was twelve…

If I missed any cartoons, that were favorites of yours, let me know in a message. I’d really like to hear.  And like Porky Pig (not one of my favorites) said “That’s All Folks!”.

 

 

A lot of families have someone who is “that” uncle. You know what I mean. An uncle who is also a bit of a character.  A little out of the norm. A memorable uncle. During the election season, he would be the uncle who you don’t want to tell that  you are a liberal.

Growing up, in our family, that uncle was Uncle Dave. Uncle Dave Edwards.  If you played little league baseball in Slatington, in the ’50s and ’60s, you might remember him. He was the coach of Slatington Rotary teams. His claim to fame there was that he coached Dinky Schneck, who grew up to be Dave Schneck of the New York Mets!

I knew my Uncle Dave on a more personal level.  He was married to my mom’s younger sister, Aunt Ebby.  He called Aunt Ebby “the Battle Axe”.  I think he called her that with affection. At least I hope so!  They were at our house at least once a week. Yes, back then, people used to visit other people on a regular basis.

Dave was loud. He was tall, a big guy.  He was a shift supervisor at Bethlehem Steel.  He liked to kid. He liked to tease. He liked to pick on children, especially his nieces and nephews.  I will admit it here… when I was young I was a bit afraid of him.

Uncle Dave and my dad were pretty close. They were certainly a mismatch. Like I said, Dave was a big guy and my dad was short and skinny. Dave was more of a man’s man, maybe from being a shift supervisor at Bethlehem Steel.  But whatever their connection was, it showed itself in a few ways.  They were both big fans of the New York Yankees and Ballantine beer. And they both loved burlesque!  They would eagerly check the Morning Call for the Lyric Theatre ads.  Whenever Busty Russell or Virginia Ding Dong Bell were in Allentown, they were sure to  be first in line. Good times!

Because my uncle worked different shifts, he spent a lot of time as the chauffer for my mom and her sisters (most of them never drove). They would go “rutching” ( a good PA Dutch word) and go to fairs, or shopping, or visit family in the coal regions. I always thought that was a little odd that this gruff, loud, man’s man would like spending so much time with the women.  But he did, and he seemed to enjoy it!

Uncle Dave was about 70 when he died. His wife, the Battle Axe, lived to be close to 100. The last time I visited her, she showed me a plant that was from his funeral. She said that she liked to think that Dave was still there with her.  I miss him too. I eventually got over my fear of him. Under his gruff exterior was a truly caring and loving man.  I think of him whenever a waitress asks if I’d like a doggy bag. Every time there was a family gathering, where food was served, he would loudly tell the host to “give me something for the pail!”.  That was Uncle Dave. Our family’s curmudgeon and mensch.

I hope I got you thinking about memorable characters from your family. Don’t let those memories fade!

 

Anyone who grew up in a small town…anyone who went to a small high school…anyone who liked high school sports…probably had a special place to unwind after a football or basketball game or wrestling meet.

As high school students in Slatington, the go to place was Art’s Bar. Don’t worry. We weren’t following George Thoroughgood’s advice to have one bourbon, one scotch, and one beer!  The bar was in the front of the building, right at the corner of Main and Church Streets. We were in the back, the restaurant part. You had to enter a side door, on Church Street. As soon as you were in, you were overwhelmed with the smell cheesesteaks, fried onions, and pizza.

The bar itself was pretty typical. The bartenders were usually the owners, the Deiberts, husband and wife.  There were the regulars, of course.  Norm!!  There was either a shuffleboard table or one of those bowling alley tables along one wall. There was a condom machine in the men’s’ room. 25 cents! (or so I am told).

The restaurant part of Art’s Bar was unusual in that it was not uncommon for two dogs to be running in between tables. That probably wouldn’t be allowed today. These were not therapy dogs. That didn’t exist back in the day.  I remember the cook being a very old woman. Age didn’t matter if you could make a chees steak that good!

At Art’s Bar we celebrated winless football seasons (my freshman year) and undefeated seasons (my senior year). We talked about exciting basketball games that took place in Smith Hall, a few blocks away. Wrestling meets, also in Smith Hall, were talked about less. Wrestling, you either loved it or hated it. Most people hated it!

Smith Hall is long gone.  A wrecking ball destroyed what could have been a great community center. Art’s Bar still exists under a different name, Kurt’s Corner. I don’t know if kids today still go there after games. The social life of teens is very different today than it was in Slatington in the ’60s.

To my readers who share memories of Arts Bar, I hope you enjoyed this visit to our shared past. If you grew up in a different town, I hoped it sparked some similar memories for you. After all, it’s good to have a place where every body knew your name!

This is a not real clear picture of my oldest brother, Don.  I took this picture of a video I made of him. More about that later.  Don was 18, and a few weeks from his high school graduation, when I was born.  He immediately joined the Marines, fell in love with California, fell in love with a woman, and became the sibling I never really got to know.  After two children were raised and on their own, Don got divorced and returned to Pennsylvania. I thought I would finally get to spend more time with him and develop a relationship. I only had a few years. He passed away at the age of 65 from prostate cancer. The picture above is only a few months before his death. I miss the brother I never really got to know.

When I was in grad school, I had a Marriage and Family class in which we were supposed to make a video of an interview with a parent about their time growing up. Since, by this time, I was an orphan,  I chose my oldest brother. He was old enough to be my father! He was gracious enough, in spite of his illness, to sit and answer questions for over an hour. I learned so much about my pre-me family. I learned more about Slatington in the ’40s! There were many things I didn’t know. There were many perceptions and assumptions that I had that were not true. It was a wonderful experience.

I shared the video with my other siblings and with my brother Don’s children.  I got an A in my class!  It was very well received and I told myself that I would do the same thing with my other three siblings. I’ve written before about my lack of follow through. Here was an example of that. I made no other videos. My sister died just two years after my brother.  Opportunity lost.

I write this as a cautionary tale. We are all aging rapidly. When we are gone, our stories and our feelings and our perspectives go with us.  Memories lost. I wish I had followed through on my mission.  I still watch my big brother video on occasion.  It always makes me feel good to know I did this. I know everyone is not as nostalgic as I am. I know a lot of people don’t care about history.  But, I have a feeling that as you get much older, you will wish you had.

 

 

 

I was asked recently if I am different as a parent this time around. For those of you who don’t know, I had kids in 1972 and 1974 and then again in 2002. Yes, a dad to kids in two different centuries! My first answer to that question was that nothing comes to mind. But that flip answer bothered me so I put more thought into it.

People suggest that I must be wiser as a parent now. More knowledgeable, for sure. Wiser, debatable. They also assume that now I must have more patience. Uh, no.

I realize that the biggest difference appears to be my intentions as a parent. Of course, my intention was always to be a good father and to raise fine upstanding kids. Which, I did! But, my parenting today has much more of a focus on the future. Back in the day, I was more or less winging it, taking it day by day. Let’s have fun and learn some life lessons and everything will be fine.  Today, I know how important everything is and how those life lessons learned as a child will make a difference in the life your child will lead.  Even worse, if they don’t learn the lessons, life for them could be hell.

That was probably true back in the seventies too, but we didn’t know that. There are two things that have changed, related to my parenting, since the Seventies. Those two things are me and the times.

I am more knowledgeable. Notice I didn’t say wiser! I have tons of my own life experience to use in parenting Emma. When I was raising Amy and Andy I was basically a kid myself.  I have been a Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) for twenty years. In that role, I have seen first hand the way parents can screw up their kids’ lives. That, in itself, has been an enlightening experience that helps me not make a lot of those same mistakes. That’s a part of why Emma’s mom and I are the best divorced co-parents in the Lehigh Valley.

The other thing that has changed is the time that we live in. Life is way more complicated. There are tons of options in the paths that our children can take. Most of the time that is a good thing, sometimes it is overwhelming. Having grown up in the 50’s and 60’s, I think it is wonderful that my daughter has so many more paths to follow than a girl growing up back then.  But, the world has also become harder, meaner, and less patient with those that are different. In today’s world, you either make it or you don’t. there doesn’t seem to be a safe place to fall. That alone makes the task of parenting even more important. The world is a much faster place. There is not as much time for manners, patience, kindness, empathy, and common courtesy….you know, the stuff that makes up a soft pace to fall.

Why am I writing about this today, instead of about snowstorms in Slatington in 1965? Here’s why. My daughter. Emma, works part time at Wegmans. She is a 16 year old cashier making a retail wage. Last night, an adult woman called her an “ugly do-nothing”!  The woman was upset that she had to wait 15 seconds for a scanner to charge.  Unfortunately, this type of behavior is all too common today. So good parenting is very important for two reasons. You want your child to be able to handle the rude people of the world. Maybe, more importantly, you don’t want your child to become one of those horrible human beings! I’m sure, with my kids, we are safe on both fronts.

Enjoy your snow day!

Interesting title, right? It looks like it’s drawn you in. Racoons, in cages, in trees. Kind of a strange childhood memory.  Not exactly Dr. Seuss. It’s only a small part of a larger memory of a place that played an important part of my Slatington childhood.

Drive out Chestnut Street until it crosses into Washington Township where it changes its name to Welshtown Road. Drive about a half mile and turn right onto a, then, dirt road. Drive about another half mile and it comes into view. The Slatington Skeet and Sporting Association clubhouse. The Skeet Club. I spent many hours at this place with my pool shark dad.  The Skeet Club still exists and there are many people, maybe including some of my readers, who know a lot more about the Skeet Club than I do. I am strictly writing about the early ’60s. Oh, what a wonderful time! The wonder years!

My dad and I used to go to the Skeet Club on most Saturdays. They had a, through the woods, archery course that was amazing.  It is where I learned to shoot a bow and arrow. There were twenty eight targets some a short distance and some far away.  I lost many arrows shooting at Target 6, the longest on the course. Perhaps some of them are still there in the woods?  Or maybe underwater. Part of the course was turned into a fishing lake many years later. One time I was at the course with a childhood friend, John Shirk. His mother brought us there and wandered behind us on the trail. We heard her screaming “Bear! It’s a bear!”. We ran to her aid only to find her yelling at the black tarped back of an archery  target. The three of us had a good laugh. Sadly, Mrs. Shirk and my friend John are no longer with us.

Okay, so I have mentioned fish and bears. Still no racoons. Patience. Just a couple more memories before the racoon in a cage in a tree.  I mentioned my dad was a pool shark, a pool hustler if you will. After archery, we ended up in the clubhouse where he taught me to shoot pool. I wish I could have been as good as he was. After he beat me, he would take on other challengers at the club. He rarely lost. Maybe he was good at geometry. I wasn’t. Maybe it was the Ballentine beer!

It was the Skeet Club, so there was skeet (clay pigeon) shooting. We never tried that but it was fun to watch. The Club held social nights around the first day of hunting and the first day of fishing, My dad and I would attend them occasionally. Sadly, my mom never came along. I remember the food was good and there were a lot of people who had way too much to drink. Not me. I was like twelve!

Racoons!! Every few weeks, especially during summer, the Skeet Club hosted Coon Trials. Animal lovers may want to stop reading here, but no animals were physically harmed. They would take a racoon, in a cage, on a trail through the woods eventually putting it in a tree near the clubhouse. I don’t know where said racoon came from, nor how they got it in a cage! Coonhound owners would take their dogs to the start of the trail and let them loose. The dogs would run, barking and baying, through the woods following the scent of the captive racoon. It was a sound I never will forget.  It took them probably a half hour. The winner of the event was the first dog to reach the tree that held the now very scared, and confused, racoon.  It was a lot of fun and good bonding for me and my dad.  I think back now and feel bad for the racoon. I assume he was let go and found his way back to his woodland home.  Unless he ended up “somewhere in the Black Mining Hills of Dakota”.  See what I did there!   I can fit the Beatles in anywhere.

Thanks for allowing me to share these memories of a special little place. I’m sure you also have a place from your childhood that you haven’t thought of in a long time. I hope this sparked some good memories for you!

 

 

 

I feel bad for kids today having the ever present fear of school shootings. My daughter Emma, in 10th grade, tells me about drills they do in school on a regular basis.  At Parkland High School last year, there was a student who was arrested for having a hit list and a house full of guns.  At least that was the rumor.  The first part was true for sure.

Back in Lincoln Elementary School, especially in fifth grade, we had our own scary times and our own inadequate response to those times.

Let me set the stage. In October of 1962, the Soviet Union was caught moving nuclear weapons onto the island of Cuba.  Supposedly, two of the targets of those weapons were right here in the Lehigh Valley, Bethlehem Steel and Mack Trucks.  I can remember the adults in my life talking about this in alarming terms whenever they got together.  It was a scary time indeed.

I am a little unclear on the timeline of the next few things. I don’t know if the community response to the fear of nuclear weapons started before the Cuban missile crisis or after. But I do remember fallout shelters. Public shelters tended to be in banks or other concrete buildings. They contained a stash of supplies and a modicum of safety in the event of a nuclear attack. You would have food to eat and a shield from nuclear radiation.  I can remember Citizens National Bank, at Main and Second Streets in Slatington, had a fallout shelter. It was clearly marked on the outside of the building. I’m sure there were others, as well.

People of means spent money on building their own private fallout shelters. Dr, Heintzleman, of Neffs, had one built. I can’t remember any others, though I am sure they existed.  Again, these were scary times.

If a nuclear attack occurred while we were in school, we were to get on our hands and knees on the floor and cover our heads with our hands. We practiced that often. Like I’ve said before, in this blog, those were simpler times. I don’t know how much thought was put into that exercise. My guess is that they felt that something had to be done so this was it. After all, is there really a way to survive a nuclear attack?  Better to do something than nothing.

The Cuban missile crisis has faded into history. We don’t really worry too much anymore about nuclear attacks.  I wonder what happened to the fallout shelters. I don’t remember seeing any designated signs anymore. Are there still rooms in the basements of banks that are filled with 55 year old cans of soup and bottles of water? Are the private fallout shelters still being maintained?

Scary times then and scary times now.  I think we should all take the advice of Robert Fulghum from his book, “Everything I Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten.” He learned, and wrote, that when we go out in the world we should make sure to hold each others’ hands.

 

 

Remember when you first learned, in Science class, about the parts of the brain and the nervous system and firing synapses and neurons and all that stuff?  Yeah. That was always way over my head. But there are times when my thoughts go from one place to another and to another still. I guess that’s what Mr. Science Teacher was talking about.

That happened yesterday. A date was mentioned, October 10. My mind said…October 10, isn’t that Yom Kippur? It isn’t, at least not this year. I googled it!  But now Yom Kippur is in my head. Why? I am not Jewish.  I know why. That was my 10 page report back in some elementary school grade. Show the class everything there is to know about Yom Kippur and please use pictures and have a nice cover with your own artwork! And after it is all done and handed in be prepared to give an oral report. Yikes!

Now the word report is in my mind and so is elementary school. I remember one grade having to do a 10 page report on Montana. Everyone was given, or chose, a state to report on. I’m guessing it was given, because why would I choose Montana?  It’s a nice state and all. But Montana, really?  Interestingly, it is one of six states I have never been to. Of course, I don’t really need to visit, because I know all about the state from my 10 page report!

Another year, it was a report on a nation you don’t know much about. My country was Switzerland. I remember spending a lot of time on the cover. Being a stick figure artist, I spent a lot of time trying to draw a guy on skis with mountains in the background. I’m sure, in the end, if my report was getting an A, that drawing would drop it to a certain B!

Eventually my brain says that is all for reports, let’s think about something else…like food!  Or a nap!

We have all done these reports throughout our school years. Do you remember yours? By the way, in case you were wondering, Yom Kippur this year starts on October 8th and ends on October 9th. I was so close!

 

 

What a wonderful song by Jim Croce who left us much too soon in his life.  Here is why that song is on my mind today.

In my bedroom, under a window, sits a medium sized chest. The chest has the Union Jack on its outside. It looks very sixtiesish (I think I just made up a word!), like something from the British Invasion. I got the chest as a Christmas gift a few years ago. Immediately, I knew what I would fill this chest with. I filled it with photographs…and memories.

Every once in a while I open that chest and look back on my past. There are school pictures from elementary school. There are pictures of my dad and my siblings from when I was a kid. My high school class picture is in there (I had hair!). Pictures of my older two children, Amy and Andy, are abundant, As you know, if you read this blog regularly, I have been married more than once. My ex-wives show up consistently throughout the chest. There are pictures I took when I had a job where I got to travel the world.  There are many pictures of my youngest daughter, Emma. Interestingly there are fewer pictures of her because of the way we take pictures these days. That is also true of my grandson Jaxon. There are more photos of my granddaughter, Holly.

I think you get the point. Pictures! Pictures! Pictures! With no organization whatsoever. Just a large heap of photos…that represent my whole life. Maybe that is an analogy of my life! What do I do with these?  I tell myself I should organize them. Then I tell myself that that is way too overwhelming a task. How difficult it would be to decide which pictures to keep and which to toss! Do I keep pictures of ex-wives? They are a part of my history. Do I organize them chronologically or do I organize them by subject?  Do I risk the emotional upheaval of reviewing all of these pictures? Do I do nothing and let my kids do it after I am gone? That is a lot of questions and I have no answers!

You may have noticed that I did not mention any pictures of my mom being in that chest. There is one picture missing from the box and I do not know where it is and I have searched high and low. There was a 5 X 7 picture, in color, of six year old me and my mom and my dad. We were dressed in our finest as it was my sister’s wedding.  So, I have a box full of pictures but the one I want most, I cannot find.  That is an argument for organization, I guess!

I imagine a lot of you have this same problem. If you have any good advice, I would appreciate it. If only we had a Cloud back then!