Posted on 08/02/2024 6:30:27 PM PDT by DallasBiff
Downtown Brooklyn is above a hell of a lot of Brooklyn.
I remember taking a picture in Nashville decades ago of a Midtown Commons building. Reflected in the window was the West End Bookstore across the street. Never had thought Nashville was so small.
Waving frantically. I was 71-91 South, not far away from South Chicago. Husband was farther north but commuted to U of Chicago Lab school. Met at U of C.
It was a wonderful place to grow up in the 50’s. Safe and with excellent schools. Parks to spend hours in. Flat for bike riding. Cheap taxis for shopping. Wonderous architecture on the adventurous trips downtown. Like living in the suburbs with the advantages of a nearby city.
Auburn Gresham my home turf in 40’s-50’s. Look back on it as the halcyon days. Wife from Edgewater on north side.
https://www.chicago.gov/city/en/sites/invest_sw/home/auburn-gresham.html
Thought that looked familiar.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avalon_Regal_Theater
Also Sears.
I was 88th and high school at 72nd. All near Jeffrey.
https://www.iment.com/maida/friends/josephwarren/index.htm
https://www.iment.com/maida/friends/aquinas/index.htm
We must be about same age and era! It all looks familiar! No way in HELL could I live in such close, claustrophobic neighborhood anymore! Didn’t seem that way as a kid. Cook grammar school and Calumet high. Family moved to Iowa in 1954....thank God!
We moved into Chicago in 1952 and I moved out for work in 1969. Agreed that now I would want more space from the crowding. But then, it was perfect. We were nose to nose with TONS of kids with a park to run around in directly across the street. It had a playground, winding asphalt paths to skate on to the goal of the various water fountains, a small community house with the ping pong tables and just room to RUN!
Neighbors congregated on the front porches after dark. Unless the BUG SPRAY trucks came by, then we were all pushed inside. 4th of July was sparklers and growing worms. During the day, we all played on the front yards when we were too young to cross the street to the park. No one’s front lawn was fenced. We’d race from one end of the block to the other. You could also have the heartstopping fear of racing thru the fenced back yards by climbing those metal fences.
Neighbors knew everyone’s business. Grandmother had been a nurse and was on call for bumps and bruises. When there was a neighborhood problem, like when a neighbor got polio, she’d take a can to collect money for them.
The porch was where I learned my life values, listening to aphorisms as grandmother folded newspaper hats and fly swatters.
It was a wonderful time I cherish.
New Orleans is interesting. Is the commercial center down the river?
New York is a concentration of diverse riff raff and is obsolete
Sort of. There are industrial sites below downtown, but the prime residential neighborhoods are definitely uptown.
Philadelphia has North Philly (no-man’s land), Center City (business and cultural district) and South Philly, also known as Downtown (neighborhoods, roughly equivalent to Brooklyn).
It also has many other distinct sections to the east and the west in the “middle” of the city boundaries, as well as farther out. People from Philly can almost tell where you live by small variations in the Philadelphia accent. If they hear you are born there, they will ask, “Yeah? What corner you from?”
New York has a Downtown Financial District and a Midtown Business District. Most cities have a combined Downtown Financial and Business District, but doing a search, I find a lot of cities claim to have a Midtown. Maybe it’s some real estate marketing gimmick, or maybe it’s just that there’s always some place just outside Downtown.
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