100 or so Boyhood Memories of the Real West Endies

By Malcolm Lindsay Allen Sr.

This book is written to share some experiences of a person who has survived being born as colored, graduating from high school as a Negro, working half his life in corporate America as a Black, and finally arriving at old age as an African-American. Whew! The paths through those personas have led through many precious persons lives. Their interaction with me may have seemed insignificant to them. But, I cherished each experience as part of the learning-howto-live-and-get-along-with-others life course. Even the places and spaces, the landmarks, the neighborhood haunts, the nooks and the crannies of a wonderful community mentioned in this collection of stories are highly significant in my development as a man, and a husband, a father, a grandfather. All these are cherished in my heart... in my life.
I respectfully salute the West Endies. That is the area in Cincinnati bounded on the south by the Ohio River, on the north and east by the curving Central Parkway and on the west by the Western Hills Viaduct to State Avenue. Thanks for the memories. So, as you readand I feel privileged that you doplease reminisce along with me. Thanks.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jul 6, 2007
• ISBN: 9781514437469

Malcolm Lindsay Allen Sr.

MalcolmAllen was born in 1942. He lived on the ten hundred block of Liberty St. In the Laurel Homes on Liberty St., and the fourth floor of 1532 Linn St. His family moved to 1023 Ninth St. Then to 1127 Dayton St. So he has lived all over the West End and met all types of people. These moves enabled him to attended Washburn, Twelfth District, Heberle, Bloom, and R.A. Taft High School. These experiences are all-true and are only a small part of that era. I am a High School Graduate, in case you wonder about the grammar. My mother did her best, but I didn’t want to sound too square in my “hood”. Thank for reading it.

Book preview

100 OR SO BOYHOOD MEMORIES OF THE

REAL WEST ENDIES

53782.png

Malcolm Lindsay Allen, Sr.

Copyright © 2007 by Malcolm Lindsay Allen, Sr.

ISBN: Hardcover 978-1-4257-7941-2

Softcover 978-1-4257-7927-6

eBook 978-1-5144-3746-9

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Rev. date: 10/08/2015

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

[e-mail]

538604

Contents

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

PREFACE

FROM LAUREL TO LINCOLN

LAWDY, LAWDY, MISS CLAWDY

LAWD! LAWD!

MY DADDY WAS ALWAYS THERE

WHERE’D HE COME FROM?

IT HAD EVERYTHING YOU NEEDED

WOW

WEST END, MY FOURTH-FLOOR PENTHOUSE

CHARLES JR.

MY FIRST BIKE

PARADISE LOST

GETTING MY DUCKS

LAUREL HOMES REVISTED

HOW TO GET TO GRANDMA’S HOUSE

SHOOTIN’ MARBLES

THE CLUB

EMINENCE DOMAIN

ASPHALT JUGULAR

FROM NINTH ST. TO DAYTON ST.

DOWN AND DIRTY

HONESTY

SAFETY PATROL

12th DISTRICT

DAYTON STREET

ZOOLOGY

DAYTON ST. II

BILLY BARTON

FOOTBALL

JOE

LOFELL

MASTER M.

FAMILY PETS

TV REVOLUTION

ME DARRYL AND BUTCH AND BILLY

COOKING

KIBBY-DOG

ROY’S CLOTHING STORE

ST. BARNABAS

SHORT STORY

SHE NEVER SAW ME PLAY

THE NEIGHBORHOOD HOUSE

DR. C. E. DILLARD

CAUGHT IN THE SWITCHES

BASEBALL

CROSLEY FIELD

LOVE THAT GAME!

KNOTHOLE

1127D

RIDING SHOTGUN

WARM AND FUZZY

SHOES

TOOTH FAIRY

STREET OF DREAMS

WESTERN BOWL

BUSSIN’ IT

CHEF BOY, ARE YOU!

DAYTON ST. HOUSE PARTIES

IT AIN’T JUST THE LAND

GHETTO TO GUCCI

DRAWER, A HOOK AND A NAIL

DON’T NOBODY LOVE YOU BUT YOUR MAMA AND SHE COULD BE LYING TOO! SANG B.B.

A MAMA’S LOVE

BUCKTOWN FLU

GRANNIE

UNCLE JOHN

TREASURE ISLAND

SQUIRREL

UNEASY TRUCE

SAWYER POINT

PROMISELAND, PROMISELAND!

COMING OF AGE

DAYTON ST. III

GRANNIE & GRAMPS

UNCLE IKE’S FORD

HITTIN’ THE BIG TIME

CISCO

FLOW-SHINES

THE SKATAMOBILE

HOUDINI

THE ROOM

SCARRED FOR LIFE

SOMETHING WORST THAN DEATH

I REMEMBER

COAL TIME

RAINY DAYS

NOW I DON’T KNOW ABOUT YOU . . . .

CONVERSE

THE BOYCOTT

WRINKLES

DELICACY

CHITTLIN BROWN

SPECIAL EATERIES

TROLLEY TAVERN

LIL’ MALC SAYS

GOING HUNTIN’

DO YOU REMEMBER?

THERE WAS A TIME

GOING TO BURNET WOODS

GOING TO NEW RICHMOND

MY NEIGHBORHOOD

BUCKTOWN

FOLKS AND FRIENDS

SOME ASIANS

UNCLES

UNCLE RED

COUSIN JAMES

DADDY

BROWN OUT

THE RIGHT THING

GOOD TIME CHARLEY

MY DADDY

GRANDADDY

‘BIG PA LINDSAY’

OL’ IKE

BIG WILMA

AINTEES

SCHOOL DAZE

HEBERLE SCHOOL

THE WALL

THE PROM

MELVIN

THE BEAST

BASKETBALL

BLOOM

TAFT CHAPTER ONE

TAFT CHAPTER TWO

SPORTS

COACHES BAG

EL CAPITAN!!

MIGHTY

JEFF

PIGSKIN PREVIEW

FANCY THAT!

BO KNOWS

RUNNING BEN

MAMA

THE SWEATER

THE ROOKIE

TASK MASTER

THE NATURAL

THINNES ANYONE?

THE BOOK

FUN AND GAMES

FREE AT LAST!!!!

TAFT TRIP TO DAYTON

REMEMBER THE SENATORS

TAFT AND THE NFL

MY FIRST REAL JOB

GRADUATION

JOHN Q COLLEGE: A PROGRESSION OF EVENTS

GOING OUT ON THE HILL

STYLIN’

THE BOY THAT BROKE MY HEART

A IS FOR FIRST"

FISH BAR

HAIRCUTS

ST. JOSEPH

RANDOM ANTICS

OH! WHAT A NIGHT!

COPS VERSUS POLICEMEN

YORK STREET

GOING HOME!!

PARKING PASS

ON THE AVENUE

OL’ JOHN CLARK

TRIP TO CAMPBELL COUNTY

HANGING OUT

SR 5907953

ERASE THAT!!

GETTING HITCHED

OUR OWN PAD

THE MEETING

RING AROUND THE ROSY

THE LITTLE LOST BOY

GOING POSTAL

MOVING UPTOWN

WAL . . . . WHAT?!

MY FIRST CAR

WRAMBLING WRECKS

SCHEMING

BOOTS

ELM ST. INN

CULTURE SHOCK ON ELM ST.

WILD WEST SHOW

BAR FLIES

NIGHT TIME IS THE RIGHT TIME

OOPS! THERE IT IS!

MR. LAID BACK

GOOD JAZZ

HOMEBOY HERITAGE

PLAYING CARDS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to thank all of the people who passed through my life, making it so interesting and thank all of you for being so interesting. The stories are all true. The facts may have been skewed to present these truths though.

Thanks T. Barnett for your great aid. You taught me patience.

Then I would like to offer my sincere thanks to Bella Dumay, without such encouragement this entire project may never have come about. Thank you for your prodding and direction so that this is a reality. Thank you for your editing and your re-editing of my material, so that it makes sense.

Preface

This book is written to share some experiences of a person who has survived being born as colored, graduating from high school as a Negro, working half his life in corporate America as a Black, and finally arriving at old age as an African-American. Whew! The paths through those personas have led through many precious persons’ lives. Their interaction with me may have seemed insignificant to them. But, I cherished each experience as part of the "learning-how—to-live-and-get-along-with-others life course. Even the places and spaces, the landmarks, the neighborhood haunts, the nooks and the crannies of a wonderful community mentioned in this collection of stories are highly significant in my development as a man, and a husband, a father, a grandfather. All these are cherished in my heart . . . in my life.

I respectfully salute the West Endies. That is the area in Cincinnati bounded on the south by the Ohio River, on the north and east by the curving Central Parkway and on the west by the Western Hills Viaduct to State Avenue. Thanks for the memories. So, as you read—and I feel privileged that you do—please reminisce along with me. Thanks.

FROM

LAUREL

TO

LINCOLN

Lawdy, Lawdy, Miss Clawdy

They are tearing it down like Sherman’s march to the sea. I saw it with my own eyes. The whole thing is gone accept for some corner piece so they can gloat how they preserved history. Huh. There’s more history underground than they left on top of the ground. See. There are some things you can’t replace. They were built around 1938 as part of the New Deal Using money from the PWA, about $28 million to not only build the Laurel Homes and the Lincoln Courts but also the Columbia Parkway, Millcreek Interceptor Sewer, a new Post Office downtown, an addition to the stadium at U.C., the Reptile House at the Cincinnati Zoo, and schools in Lockland and Maderia.

When they got finished with the Laurel Homes they had 1303 apartments with a little of 264 units set aside for blacks. By 1942, they had finished the Lincoln Courts which was exclusively black. Laurel Homes the second largest public housing project funded by the Public Works Administration was placed on the National Registry of Historic Places in May 1997 . . . So much for history!

Lawd! Lawd!

Lawd! Lawd! Look what they done done down in Promiseland. They to’ it down brick by brick and ground it back to sand. They left one building as a monument so folks could remember that it used to be. Spankin’ brand new, there weren’t nuthin like ’em. Four-story skyscrapers, warm and friendly; the place you talked about when you went down home. And they say ain’t no black folks live in no building that tall! Then they come up for a visit and found out that it was true. Inside toilets that you could flush as many times as you want to and there was still water there. A free ’frigerator so you didn’t need no iceman lugging that ice block up them steps and chippin’ you off a three-cent piece that would last ’til tomorrow. Didn’t have to get no kindlin’ neither. Naw, had one of them deluxe apartment-size cookin’-gas stoves. Mama can wash them curtains in the bathtub and stretch and dry ’em right in the living room ’cause them black tile floors is destruction—proof. Cain’t hardly believe my eyes. Now it’s just big holes standing where all them stores was, right there in front.

image002.jpg

My Daddy Was Always There

Mama said he was there when I was born and called me a little monkey and she cried. That was just like him. He always had that strange sense of humor that we seemed to have inherited.

I used to think that he didn’t care for me until I had children and only two. He had six. Man, I don’t know how he did it. He worked two jobs for twenty years on knees that ached so bad at times Darryl and I would have to help him stand up and off he’d go to work—his fulltime job. That was from 10:00 p.m. to 7:00 a.m. His other job was hauling groceries up and down steps for Harry’s Supermarket six days a week. Whew! It makes me tired talking about it. My Daddy was a MAN!

P19.jpg

Where’d He Come From?

My first remembrance of him is the two of us standing at the window in our smoked-filled apartment looking for our mama. Something had burned on the stove while she had gone down to Linn St. to the store. We saw her running up the walk as the fire truck arrived. We started hollering and crying too. She unlocked the door and the fireman came in with her to get the pot out. She checked us to see if we were alright and said she was sorry. I said it was okay. And the fireman left.

The next time he comes clearly into my memory is when we are hand in hand going home to see this man called Daddy that neither one of us remembered. He was sitting up in her bed with no shirt on. Hey, that’s where Darryl and I slept with her! This was just too much. Not only had this Daddy shown up but my cousin Beatrice who lived with us had moved recently. That was a lot of change for a little boy.

It was decided that we needed bigger digs, so we moved on the fourth floor of 1532 Armory. It was nice to have a little brother to play with as long as he did what I wanted him to. It also made for someone to hold onto at night when they shut our door and it was pitch black and we couldn’t see anything. We got to take hot baths, play on those black neoprene floors, marbles were our favorite. Darryl was left handed and he shot cobbey-thumbed. I always won his marbles. My Daddy would take the train down and play with it for us. He also showed the Charlie Chaplin Movies for us and put the train and projector away telling us not to touch it. Daddy worked hard. He bought mama some nice things but I don’t ever think she was satisfied. He bought her an electric ironer in 1948. She eventually gave it to her aunt. We were the first in our group to have a TV. I remember having it when I had by tonsils out when I was six-years old.

In our building, Milton Fisher and I paired up against Darryl and Hunter Lee Fisher. Charles Jr. lived on the first floor. It seemed like I was always getting in trouble even though it was usually just bad judgment rather than being bad because I always tried to make my mother happy. It was after I had done something to Darryl that my mother threated to put me in a home. She never realized how that fear traumatized me. I had a morbid fear of them not wanting me and saying I was bad, which I didn’t understand.

P21.jpg

It Had Everything You Needed

Yes sir, it had everything you needed. There was steam heat so hot the walls would sweat. In the middle of winter you had to open your windows to cool off. It had a washroom with real washers—no more wash tubs. You could dry your clothes in the big drying rooms, locked so nobody got your clothes by mistake.

Don’t talk about a shopping center; that it was thirty years before the time for those. There was a little sandwich shop next to the smokestack driveway. If you needed your hair done, there was the Poro School of Beauty where they trained on volunteer heads. Earl’s Grocery was next to that, and you could see his little gun through a hole on the counter. Next door to him was the cleaners that did one-hour martinizing. Thinnes’ fruit stand was next to that. Mr. Thinnes had fresh fruits and vegetables all the time. Then there was Pete’s Meat Market. The last store on that block was Park’s Dry Goods. Next, you crossed Armory Avenue and there was Nide’s Drugstore where you got your medicine but also the best dream number books in town. The TV shop with the latest in 7-inch Muntz was next. Groceries came from Diehl’s, and the only store still in existence was next to it: Laurel Five and Dime. It’s still in business right across the street from Hughes High School on McMillan St., near the University of Cincinnati main campus. Howard’s Dry Cleaners was next to the Five and dime; then a Laundromat next to him. Last was Parker’s.

All these stores changed over time. There was even a dairy bar and a record shop before Parker’s Barber Shop opened. My mother would always send me scurrying to get the latest 45s as soon as they came out. Across the street from the record shop was St. Mary’s Hospital where I spent a lot of time getting sewn-up or getting my shots. Up the street from St. Mary’s was Washburn Elementary School. I can still see Miss Cuppy reading Little Black Sambo to us with glee as we laughed out of ignorance. The gem of the area was Aunt Sue’s across the street where you could get your Kits, BB-Bats, Squirrels, Chuckles, and remember the little wax bottles of sweet syrup? Man! Everything was delicious and only cost a penny.

See. What more could you ask for? Everything was right there. Too bad, it stood in the way of progress!

WOW

Wow! Mama. You mean we’re moving into the Laurel Homes like Aunt Sis? They got a refrigerator, Mama, instead of the icebox like we got. The ice man won’t be bringing those slabs of ice up the steps. We won’t need no ice pick no more. And we won’t have to put the milk and the butter on the windowsill in the wintertime. And Mama, we won’t have to smell no coal oil or have that coal dust all over our vents. That place had got steam heat. And Mama, we won’t have to go outside to the toilet no more. I like that. It can be awfully cold sitting on those cold boards in the wintertime. And ain’t no telling what can come out of that hole sometimes. The new place has a shiny new tub to take a bath in, Mama. We don’t have to sit in that zinc tub washing with that Tag soap. We gonna use Ivory, huh, Mama? And Mama, me, and Darryl gonna have our own room? . . . . Whoopee!!!!

Image%202.jpg

WEST END, MY FOURTH-FLOOR PENTHOUSE

It’s with some sadness and bittersweet joy that we watch as our generation of memories evaporates beneath the Reaper’s steel marble ball. New construction covers over those old and massive stone buildings, as if we never played and loved in those cold gray hallways. No more sidewalks covered with hopscotch markings. Gone the playground where we learned to roller skate the asphalt circle. Our secret marble holes covered soon by the elite, when I thought we were the elite, because we survived to live beyond those two square blocks of brick and mortar to see the world outside. The house parties are silent now where we made our first awkward steps as grownups, hoping to be big enough to walk someone home and tell the tales of mannishness. Those Sunday evenings in the park as we waited for St. Joseph’s to open, if we were brave enough to venture across the Parkway. We went filling our heads with dreams of conquest because of that new step we learned or those new Johnny Walkers from Jacks on Central, our first pair of pointed toe shoes. Grandpa’s old hat bowl-rolled, sitting atop that new Quo Vadis cut made each one of us as unique as we thought we were.

Image%203.jpg

CHARLES JR.

I first met him when I was about four years old. We all lived at1532 Armory Ave. We lived on the fourth floor and Charles Jr. and Beetle lived on the first floor. Our other buddies were Milton and Hunter Lee Fisher, Joe and Danny Harper, who lived in the building next to us, and Poochie Nathanael Sales. Across the grass lived Michael Fleming who tore up my bike. We all lived in the same court.

Charles Jr. though was the character and still is. He broke his arm out back on the bar leading to the basement and we took him home so he could get his cast on. He moved up on Armory to the second floor over my cousin Butch. He used to climb out of the window and back up to see if he could do it. We also had a lot of fun on the Monkey bars without breaking our necks.

When I was forty-eight years old I started working for the city at the waterworks. One day I heard this voice in the hallway. It was Charles Jr. He had never changed. He was still talking all the time and telling wild stories. This time he was saying he had hit the lottery and was going to buy all the ladies gifts when he got the money. He was still the same Charles Jr. I knew at four years old from the Laurel Homes. Of course he hadn’t won anything. He was telling one of his wild stories again. That’s Charles Jr.!

MY FIRST BIKE

Every boy looks