Don Remembers

Christmas Past

2010-12-26T17:28:00.002-05:00

Nowadays everyone has Christmas decorations up right after Thanksgiving. When I was a child, the practice in our house was different. We never had any decorations before Christmas morning. On Christmas Eve we hung stockings on the mantle and put out cookies and milk for Santa. We were delighted on Christmas morning to find that Santa had drunk the milk, left some cookie crumbs and a footprint in the ashes on the hearth. He had also left a decorated Christmas tree in the Sun Porch complete with our Lionel train under the tree and lots of presents.. We later learned that Santa did not put those things there, our parents did. Mother and Dad and Dad's brother Bub and his wife Hazel put up the tree and the train along with our presents after we had gone to bed on Christmas Eve.
Christmas was a big thing with my parents, especially my Mother. She loved the season and did her best to make sure we had a memorable Christmas even though it was in the middle of the depression and resources were scarce.
Several Christmas gifts remain in my memory. In the early 1940's my brother Roger was thrilled when on Christmas morning a little puppy came running into the room as we sat by the tree opening our presents. The puppy was named Butch and Butch remained with us for many years. A year or so later,I got a 20 gauge shotgun at Christmas. That was a total surprise, I never thought my parents would give me a gun. They knew I wanted one because I had often tagged along with my Uncle Earl when he was hunting in the nearby woods. On another Christmas my Uncle Charlie gave me a complex balsa model kit of the steamship Queen Mary. It was beyond my skill level but I thought it was a great gift. I wish I had it now so I could assemble it,

WWII Memorial

2010-11-28T17:26:00.001-05:00

It is long gone but there was once a memorial to local veterans of Worl War Two.. It was mainly for men and women from Yardville Heights and Lakeside who served in World War II. I think it was located on the Yardville Elementary School grounds at the foot of Highland Avenue. I can recognize some of the names even though it is not a great photo. Considering the small population of those two areas, it is obvious that a high percentage of us were in the service.

There was also another such memorial in Yardville where the Yardville National Bank was located on South Broad Street. This looks like a fancier version.

I don't know if there was nay ovelap of names since the Yardville Memorial is a bit hard to read.

Time in Jordan and Israel

2010-09-02T19:32:00.000-04:00

I expect to be traveling to Jordan and Israel from September 3 til September 23. Here is a clock that shows the time in that area. Since it is over 5000 miles away, the clock is showing a time that is 7 hours ahead of East Coast time so it may be for the next day.

Kilroy Was Here

2010-06-29T15:54:00.000-04:00

Kilroy was here. That is a phrase everyWorld War II participant recalls. No one is really sure where the phrase actually started though there are many theories. However, that messge was scrawled on walls, sidewalks, tanks, aircraft and nearly everything else in the early 1940s. It was such a pervasive symbol that is is now inscribed on the National World War II monument in Washington, not once but twice. It is in the rear of the monument on the side facing the Lincon Memorial in stair wells behind the fountains.

The National World War II monument itself is impressive. There are pillars for each state or territory and it is divided into Pacific and Atlantic areas of the war. The inscriptions on the walls tell a lot about the history of those times. When I was there in mid June 2010, it was being visited, as it is almost constantly, by veterans of that war. Many were in wheel chairs or naviagating with canes. There are fewer of us every day. For many it is a reminder of lost friends and family. For others it is a reminder of times when this country was united as it had never been before nor has been since.

Forgotten words

2010-06-18T16:27:00.000-04:00

When I was growing up, we used some words that no longer seem to be heard very often. The words we had used commonly have been replaced by what most of us elders consider as just plain vulgar. Some TV programs,are embarassing to listen too, especially if young children are around..
What ever happened to the use of words like: Golly, Gee Whiz, Holy Smokes, Gosh, Neat, Swell, Shucks, Oh Sugar.
In our house, we never heard any curse word nor any expressions involving the Lord's name. We also could never refer to my mother as "she". My mother insisted on being referred to as "Mother". We loved, apprciated and respected our parents.
I am appalled when I hear the way some grownups refer to their parents in hateful and grossly negative terms. I guess growing up in a loving family must have isolated me from such negative feelings.

Teen age Bedroom

2010-05-28T21:05:00.020-04:00

When I was in my teens, the Second Wold War as taking place. I had a collection of aircraft pictures pasted on the walls of my bedroom.

I had my own room on the second floor of our house. As I recall, it had a double bed, a bookcase and a bureau. Because it was an old house, it had only a small closet. I don't recall where I got the pcitures but all the boys at that time had such collections. Of course we also made model planes out of balsa wood. In high school we also made model planes supposedly to be used for training aircraft spotters. Many towns had aircraft spotters on duty 24 hours a day. They were watching for enemy aircraft - though in those days enemy aircraft did not have the capability of flying to the US from Europe. We also had blackouts from time to time.As far as I know, they were mostly tests rather than the real thing. The nearest we came to enemy actions was at the Jersy seashore resorts. In 1942 there were numerous cases of oil tankers being torpedoed off the Jersey coast. My diary in July 1942 mentions going to Barnegat Light and seeing the remains of a torpedoed ship sticking up out in the ocean. There were also big gobs of oil or tar on the beach from the sunken ships.The war had lots of impact on our lives. Many things were rationed, meat, cigarettes, gasoline,tires, sugar. We had ration books for each item. Gas was limited to 3 gallons per week for ordinary citizens and cars in those days were not very fuel efficient. During the war no new cars were produced for civilian use so all cars were 1941 or earlier vintage. Right after the school day ended many high school students went to work in local shops and store. The parents who normaly would have worked in shops and stores were either in the military or working in war plants. It was a rare high school student who had a car and if he did it was likely to be an ancient jalopy.. We went everywhere by bus or by walking. We even took our dates on the bus or we walked. In retrospect, I think we were happier then than teenagers are now.

Don's Web sites

2009-11-07T17:17:00.002-05:00

It occurred to me that whoever is interested in Yardville Heights might also be interested in my web site concerned with"Growing Up in the 1930s". It is www.donwhiteley.com I also have several web sites relating to travel. www.donstravelpage.com and www.donwhiteley2.com. another is www.iamdpw.com. Click on any one of these links to see the site.

Old Home Movies

2009-11-04T09:03:00.002-05:00

Last week I ran across a VHS tape which had dozens of segments - family gatherings, my Dad's 90th birthday party, our daughters as they were 50 years ago,family weddings, Brandywiner's performances,a Pete duPont gathering, ice skating on Gropp's lake (see below).
Looking at the tape brought back many memories and showed events and people I had forgotten about. When I was taking those family pictures, my little brother used to complain and object. I'm glad I didn't listen to him.
Since I was 10 years old, I have been interested in photography. Over the years, I have owned about every type camera on the market (within my price range). I also got into 8 mm movies and eventually into video. When I started to travel internationally, I kept albums of photos of each trip and later made DVDs of the trips. I have thousands of slides and prints plus hundreds of video tapes.
Once in a while, I look through an album or watch a video tape. What a great way to remember happy times and events.
So if someone complains when you want to take photos at a family gathering or event, ignore them.

Ice Skating at Gropp's Lake

2009-11-02T21:48:00.004-05:00

I ran across some of my videos of ice skating at Gropp's Lake. They must have been taken in the mid 1950's.I don't think the lake has been frozen like this in many years. Maybe it indicates "global warming".

Party Pictures

2009-08-20T10:39:00.004-04:00

In browsing through my photo albums I found several photos of birthday party celebrations of my neighbors in Yardville Heights. The one in which I can identify the people is a party for Honey Totten.

The back row includesMarie Yeager, Charlotte Watts, Roger Whiteley, Jane Martin, Jean Fronley, Alberta Brittan. In the center is Honey Totten. The bottom row includes Donald Whiteley (me) Kenneth Blauth, the Holden twins, and Audrey Blauth.
I wonder how many of these people are still around. If you know, send me an Email.

Another photo was taken in the field across from my house. I think it was a party for one of the Fennimores. I can't definitively idetify any of these people.

Cold Weather, Speeding Cars

2009-08-11T22:31:00.004-04:00

I read in our paper today that State Police stopped a drunk driver going 102 miles per hour on I-495. It reminded me of an article in my Dad's scrapbook about a speeder in downtown Trenton in 1910.

Another interesting item suggests that the climate really is warming up. Here is an article about a really cold winter. I remember that winter, we did a lot of sledding and ice skating that winter.

Yardville School graduation 1941

2009-08-07T16:06:00.006-04:00

After attendig Yardville Heights School for the first 6 years, we were transfered to the new Yardville School to attend 7th and 8th grades. The new school was nice and we got bussed which most of us thought was quite grown-up. Anyway, I still have a photo of the graduating class.

Here is identification of thepeople in the class photo.

The names of the class were also in a news article.

I also gave a speech as President of the 8th grade class. I don't remember how it was recieved nor how I delivered it. I am sure no one except my parents kept any record of it. My Dad was very good in keeping mementos of the things his children did. His files of information about me have been interesting to read and bring back long forgotten successes and some failures. At any rate here is a somewhat faded copy of the speech.

Lakeside Park and Gropp's Lake

2009-08-06T10:33:00.012-04:00

I was going to add some information about our neighbor - Lakeside Park- but found that Tom Glover's blog had reams of interesting items about Lakeside in the early years. My memories of Lakeside Park other than swimming and skating were about the Community House. There was such a structure in Lakeside Park. I don't know it's origin or what it's major uses were but I do know that it was used for movies at one point.
Lakeside of course refers to Gropp's Lake which itself had a long history. As kids, we spent many summer days swimming at the lake. In addition the the beach at the corner of Lakeside Blvd and Broad Street, Yardville Heights had it's own small beach. On the small end of the lake there was a small beach with a rudimentaly dock and ocassionally a diving board. It was used primarily by Height's residents. There was a sandy road that lead down the hill to the beach. Sometimes my Dad would drive down and we would ride back home standing on the running board of the car as it struggled up the hill. There was also a hill leading down from Roy Middleton's home. We called it the Bluff. It was a favorite spot for sledding in the winter. It had a fairly steep incline, a bump about half way down and best of all, if the lake was frozen you could sled right out onto the frozen lake.
We we got older, we could try to swim over to the dam or even over to the bridge.
We also spent a lot of time at the "Corner Store" which was on the Lakeside part of the lake.
It had a decent beach, a fixed diving board, a float, lockers and the store sold food and drinks too.In the winter, the lake often froze enough so that a car could drive on the ice to help clear off the snow.It has been a long time since that lake frose for skating.It was a great lake for skating since you skate for nearly a mile up to the head of the lake. Of course, we also had bon fires on the beach. The skating wasn't fancy, the ice was often a bit rough for that but we did play "crack-the-whip" and tried to jump over barrels. At night there were some flood lights in the area around the store. In my high school days we were even known to skate off into one of the darker areas at night with a girl friend and do a little necking.
In May 1979 the dam which formed the lake broke during a storm. As a kid, when we had hurricanes or major storms we went down to the dam to watch the thundering flow of water over the dam. It had a flood gate which could be opened to relieve some of the pressure.

and the lake was empty for several years.
Tom Glover mentions going onto the empty lake bed with metal detectors to see what was there I don't know if they found anything. I visited it in he mid 1980's to see what the empty lake looked like. It was a sad looking affair.

Eventually someone realized that the lake was a valuable additon to the area and the dam was rebuilt in late 1987. The lake refilled and while many of the features I knew are no longer there. it is an attractive addition to the ares. I have read blogs from younger people who talk about develped areas on the "Sunnybrea" side of the lake. In the 30's and 40's that side of the lake was just wooded. There were no swimming areas or much of anything else For most of it's life, the lake was a favorite fishing spot. My uncle kept a row boat in the lake at the Yardvile Heights end. We often went fishing on the lake but I don't emember catching much of interest except one Oswego Bass about 12" long that I caught. From it's inception in the late 1800's until today what is known as Gropp's Lake has provided recreation for perhaps hundreds of housands of people.

Where's the Tomato Pie?

2009-07-31T21:14:00.005-04:00

I kept a diary in 1942,43,44 and 45 when I was in High School. As I looked through my diary recently, I noticed that our favorite snack after roller skating at Capital City Arena was a Tomato Pie. We usually stopped at Esposito's Tomato Pies located on the triangle where Lalor Street cut off from South Broad Street. We sometimes also stopped at Scotties at the White Horse corner for a soda but Tomato Pies seemed to have been the favorite.
I left high school in March of my senior year to enter the Navy. I was sent to boot camp at Great Lakes Naval Training Center. Since I had enlisted as a radio technician recruit, I was sent to "Primary" radio school in the suburbs of Chicago after boot camp. The Navy had taken over Wright Junior College on Western Avenue. We slept in the gym, had meals in the cafeteria and attended classes in the class rooms. We were pretty much confined to that building for the 5 weeks or so that we were there. We only got off base on Saturdays and Sundays for a limited time.
It was during one of those off base sessions that I decided to get a Tomato Pie. I spent a good part of the day looking all over for a Tomato Pie place. I finally decided that the Tomato Pie had never made it to Chicago. After all one of the first Tomato Pie places in the whole country was established in the Chambersburg section of Trenton in 1910. I was stationed in Chicago for an additional 3 months and never found a Tomato Pie.
It was only years later that I discovered Pizza and made the connection. I had been looking for the wrong thing in Chicago. Technically there are some differences between a Tomato Pie and a Pizza but with so many variations of both it is hard to tell the difference.
If you go Trenton (and a few other places in the US) you will still see signs for "Tomato Pies" but probably not in Chicago.

Never steal Pumpkins

2009-07-28T15:53:00.003-04:00

Mr brother Roger had an unforgetable experience when we lived in Yadville Heights. Here is his story in his own words:

The street we lived on in Yardville Heights formed one side of Mr. Reed's large truck farm. The farm was about half a mile wide and about as long-perhaps 200 acres in all. From my bedroom window, I could look out over the farm nearly to Yardville a mile away.

It was a lazy summer day in late July 1943 or 1944 when the three of us Billy, Sonny and I suddenly found ourselves lounging by the edge of Mr.Reed's pumpkin patch. The pumpkin patch was on the Yardville side of the farm. We had spent most of the day playing in the woods and swamps that bordered the farm on one side and, by late afternoon, we were bored and looking for something to do.

As the country was then in the midst of WWII, playing war was a natural for us boys. And we were in luck. The pumpkins at that stage of growth were just the size of hand grenades! We promptly became engaged at tossing the "grenades" first at nothing and later at each other. Suddenly, it was Billy and I against Sonny and this led to words. Sonny got mad, so Billy and I decided to split and started across the field toward home leaving Sonny behind.

We made our way across the pumpkin patch, then across the bean field into the tomato field. As we entered the rows and rows of tomatoes, we noticed down at one end of the field a group of migrant workers picking the tomatoes under the supervision of Al Reed, the farmer's son. When Al saw us, he called to us, "Come here". We knew we were too far away to be recognized and we had a pretty good idea why he wanted to talk to us, so instead of responding to his call, we ran across the rest of the tomato field and into the corn field. The corn was high enough to shield us from view as we headed safely home.

But it turned out we were not safe. When Sonny following us across the field received a similar call from Al Reed, he immediately went over to talk to him. He then revealed our identities to Al, but used a false name for himself. Sonny always was a little dumb.

Later that evening Mr.Reed confronted my father and Billy's father about the damage that had been done to his pumpkins. We, of course, confessed and implicated Sonny as well. I'm not sure what transpired between Mr. Reed and our fathers, but I understand it was my father that suggested to Mr. Reed that it would be better if the boys could work off the debt rather than have the parents simply remunerate him for the loss. Did he have some jobs around the farm that needed to be done? Well, yes, he did!

Mr. Reed had some chicken houses that needed to be cleaned before they could be used again. In fact, he had a row of 20 or so chicken houses, each 20 by 30 feet. Most of them needed cleaning and had not been used for a year or two. Typically the floor of each of these chicken houses was covered with a 6-8 inch layer of old wet rotting straw and rotten eggs capped by a two inch crust of hardened chicken manure that could only be broken with a pick. The roosting areas were also covered with hardened chicken manure that had to be scraped off.
It took us one full day to clean one house and to shovel the straw and manure into the back of a 3/4 ton truck so it could be spread on the fields. The work was hot, extremely dusty and smelly. I don't remember now just how many days we worked on this job, but I do know we worked through August and into September because we could only work Saturdays after school started.

When we finally finished the job, Mr. Reed made us promise that we would never destroy or steal (for Halloween) any of his pumpkins again. And you know, I never did.

Perry Hall

2009-07-14T14:44:00.008-04:00

I was visiting my older brother last week and ran across a photo in his album of Perry Hall. Perry was two years older than my brother and was not one of my mother's favorites who saw him as a rough neck and a bad influence on my brother Harold. Perry did seem a bit undisciplined. He lived with his father and his father's girlfriend - a no-no in the 1930s in a ramshackled house on the hill overlooking South Borad Street at the entrance to Yardville Heights. At that time there was a dirt road that started at the entrance to the Heights, ran parallel to Broad Street and curved back to the Middleton homestead which stood above the lake. The Hall house stood on a ridge between the dirt road and Broad Street. See map below of "Who Lived Where". The Hall house was # 32.
Perry graduated from Hamilton High School in 1937. He entered the Navy in October 1937 - the photo I saw was of him in his boot camp uniform, He served on the battleship USS Pennsylvania until he entered the U S Naval Academy in 1939. After graduation he served on a destroyer in the Pacific taking part in landings at Guadalcanal and other operations in that area. His destroyer (USS Sterett) was damaged during the batle of Guadalcanal and received the Presidental Unit Citation. Perry was awarded the Bronze Star for his performance as damage control officer. In Dec 1943 he began seving on submarines and was aboard the USS Chopper at Pearl Harbor when the Pacific war ended. He continued to serve in submarines until the 1950's. He retired as a Lieutenant Commander. Not bad for a roughneck.
Perry died on Dec 23, 200 in Milford, DE at the age of 81.

World War II Honor Roll

2009-06-29T15:57:00.004-04:00

An Honor Roll was erected in 1945 to honor those from Yardville Heights and Lakeside Park who were in the military service. Both my brother and I were in the service in WWII. He is listed but I am not because I did not go in until just before the surrender of Germany. My brother Harold served about 26 months, mostly in the South Pacific on islands that are even now hard to find on the map. He was an officer in the SeaBees-Construction Battalion,
He has written a 100+ page account of his experiences. It is a good thing my mother did not know the details at the time. She was worried enough as it was.
Unfortunately the picture isn't the best but there are many familiar (to me) names on the listing.My cousin Calvin Cubberley is there along with Anthony Gorman, Clarence Heaton, several Holzbars, Charles Middleton, John Yeager, Don Blauth. Unfortunately most of them have passed but fortunately, my cousin Calvin and my older brother Harold are still around and active some 64 years after this Honor Roll was erected.

Soden Drive History

2009-06-25T22:28:00.003-04:00

I had a note from Holly Knott mentioning that she grew up on Soden Drive. She mentioned that her parents had built a house on that street in the 1970s when the street was known as Knott's Hill (named after her grandparents).Unfortunately her Email did not come with her message so I could not tell her that the street was renamed from Forest Avenue to Soden Drive in the late 1940s. It was named in memory of Ed Soden a young man whom I knew. He was killed in action in World War II. I remember Ed because he liked to hunt with his home made bow and arrows. On one occasion, we were down at Gropp's Lake and he shot a large fish -about 15 inches - with the bow and arrow. That's a pretty tricky shot because he had to compensate for the refraction of light by the water. I took a picture of Ed with the fish but sadly that photo is no longer around. My recollection is that Knott's Hill referred to the end of what is now Soden Drive where it goes down hill towards the marsh areas. I know that Lousells and Albrechts lived on that hill in my youth (the 1930s). I am looking for an early map of the Heights to see what the offical name of that street was before it was renamed Soden Drive. The earliest map I have found in my files is from 1967 when it was shown as Soden Drive.

2009-06-16T09:59:00.005-04:00

This is the Google View of Yardville Heights NOW. Notice to the right of he yellow marker (My old home) what was a big farm is now a big housing area!

2009-06-15T21:41:00.003-04:00

Aerial Map of Yardville area taken in 1945. Our house is marked by an arrow in the upper center of the map. The area has changed greatly since the 1930's

2009-06-15T21:34:00.003-04:00

Who lived where in the 1930's

Yardville Heights

2009-06-15T21:13:00.001-04:00

YARDVILLE HEIGHTS
Yardville Heights was a fairly isolated little community. It was about 5 miles from Trenton down South Broad Street, one crossed over Gropp's Lake and then on the right side was Highland Avenue which led up to Yardville Heights. The Heights was really "Heights" because it stood on a hill overlooking woods and swamps on 2 sides and the lake on the other. It was a good place for a boy to grow up, there were lots of fields, swamps and woods to play in. From Highland avenue there were two streets that went back and then several more cross streets. I suppose there were 30 or so houses in the 1930's. In my childhood, there was a small grocery store at the corner of our block operated by Mrs. Thompson. I do know that she had penny candy for sale and I suppose other staples. Such a store was necessary because many people did not have cars then and all the mothers I knew stayed at home to care for their children and families. We had a telephone but not everyone had a telephone. Since it was fairly isolated, everyone pretty much knew everyone else by sight if not in more detail. As kids, we were in and out of the houses of our friends. Every Sunday, we made the rounds to Casons, Fronleys and Moores all of whom got different Sunday paper comics than we did. When I was about 8 or so Eddie Cason died from Leukemia so we didn't go there anymore. I dont recall any of the details just that he disappeared from our lives. The Casons later adopted a boy (Eddy Miller) and a girl. In Yardville Heights, there were a lot of people who were related to each other. There were several branches of the Middleton family. The Heights
was surrounded by fields and woods. Across Highland Avenue was farm which was usually farmed with corn, but sometimes pumpkins and other crops. The farm was the full length of Highland Avenue and went almost over to Yardville which was nearly a mile away. It was a good sized farm. I do recall that it was plowed by a horse drawn plow. On the other side of the Heights was South Broad Street and Gropp's Lake and then on the third side was the Little Creek which ran from a dam at the end of the lake out to the Big Crick which was on the fourth side. The Little Crick was bordered by woods and the Heights was on a hill. From the back of the Heights, we had to go down fairly steep wooded hills to get to the creeks. The big creek was bordered by swamps where muskrats lived and during the winter a lot of the local boys trapped muskrats and sold the skins. I never had traps myself but often helped kids who did when they made the rounds of the traps. In the very early spring, usually late March on the first warm day, we always wanted to get the swimming season started. We would go down the hill behind Bunky Middleton's house to the little crick to our swimming spot in the crick. There was a big birch tree overhanging the crick that we used for diving. We would strip and hop in to get our first swim of the season. We didn't bother with bathing suits, girls never went any where near the woods as far as I know. Later in the season, we swam there a lot as well as in the lake. The little crick was a favorite spot. From our swimming spot it was possible to walk in the crick out to where it intersected the Big Crick. The big crick was bigger, wider and faster moving. We didn't do too much swimming in it but there was some great mud out there, real thick and black and gooey. We liked to go out and get all smeared over with it.
I'm not sure now why we did it but it seemed like fun then. It took a while to get rid of the mud when we got back in the water. The woods around Yardville Heights were a favorite playing spot. We had trails all through the woods. We knew them intimately and some were used in winter for sledding, others were just trails along the creeks. We knew where the springs were where we could get a drink of water. At the base of the hill, there were several cisterns. Yardville Heights, when I was very small, had it's own water system. The cisterns were the source for water from the swamp area to filter in to be pumped up the hill to a big water tank. The pump house was at the foot of the hill. When I was still rather young, the city water system reached the Heights and the local system was left to go in disrepair. It was probably a good thing because the people who operated the system sometimes forget to go down to turn on the pumps to refill the main storage tank. People would have no water and they would have to get someone to turn on the pumps. In the winter there were several spots that were favorites for sledding. Bakers Hill near the middle of the back of the Heights was the best. It was longer and had nice curves in it as it went down through the woods. One summer we built sides on some of the curves so they were banked for speed. Lockwood's hill nearby was also good but did not have any curves in it. There were things in the woods that we liked to do, there were always logs across the cricks to walk across. There were certain places were we knew there was a clay bank where we could get clay to try to making pots "like the Indians did". We knew where the nicest flowers grew, dogwood, violets, may apples, wild azaleas, lady slippers, jack in the pulpits. Sometimes we picked them and tried to sell them to some of the neighbors. In the woods we played games like "Release". We had teams and a jail, the object was to capture a member of the opposing team and put him in the jail. His team would then try to sneak up and tag him to "release" him from the jail. The games would last for hours and we roamed all over the woods to hide from the opposing team while trying to release a captive.
Back home at the house, we had a good sized lawn which we cut with a reel type power lawn mower, one of the first in the neighborhood. Earlier, my grandfather had cut it with a push mower. We played games on the lawn. In my ;youngest days, we played Kick the Wicket and Hide and Seek. Later on it was football. We always had a football game going in the side yard. We also had a "basketball court" at an old barn on the lot next door We had a hoop stuck on the side of the barn and we cleared out bushes and weeds to make a bare dirt "court". It was not like the smooth courts kids have now but we spent many hours shooting baskets. Fortunately, we didn't have adults telling us what to do or how to do things. Bicycles were big, we all had bikes. We didn't roller skate because there weren't many good sidewalks. We rode around the neighborhood on our bikes and set up ramps to jump on. The sort of things do now on skateboards. Being near a lake, we did a lot of swimming at Gropp's Lake. The Heights had it's own little beach with a small dock/diving board. I learned to swim at the YMCA, my mother took me up there once or twice a week one summer. At Lakeside we swam across to the bridge or over to the dam. The dam overflow formed the little creek. In retrospect, the little creek probably wasn't the best place to swim. It was fed by the lake but along side the dam was a dump, a lot of the garbage and trash from Trenton was dumped into that dump. It was actively used and you could see rats running around it, sometimes we used rifle to shoot at them. Half the time it was burning and any water that fell on the dump from rain washed right into the little creek so we were swimming in polluted water. The dam itself was fairly sturdy but once in a while in a big rain storm the water would go over the top of the dam in a stream several feet thick and they would struggle to open flood gates to relieve the pressure. After I left home, the dam finally broke and the lake drained. It was empty for several years until a new dam was built.
We did a lot of sledding in the winter, at Bakers Hill and Lockwood but also on the Bluff. The Bluff was the hill that lead from behind Middleton's in the Heights down to the lake. When there was snow and also ice on the lake we could sled down the bluff, which had a nice bump in it, down on to the ice. The lake was a great place to ice skate and we looked forward to the time the ice was strong enough to skate on. We cleared off the snow so we could play hockey.. Sometimes we just liked to skate through the snow. We always careful because there were always a few spots were the ice didn't freeze completely. As a youngster, we spent a lot of time building model airplanes. The first World War hadn't been over too long (15 18 years) so the Boy's magazines had lots of articles about war planes, (G8 and the Flying Aces) and air battles. Airplanes were a big thing they were not very common. If an airplane flew over, we kids would ruin outside to see it. We also got to see dirigibles because we were not too far from Lakehurst Naval Air Station were most Airships were based. We spent many hours building model planes. Clarence Heaton (Clink) had a small room in a garage back of his house where we often did our model building. His house also had a 3rd story attic where we would take or balsa wood tissue airplanes to fly out the window. If a plane didn't fly well or got damaged, the most fun was setting it on fire and launching it from the attic window. As I got older I continued to build models and at one point in High School had a gas engine for a model though I never really got it running in a plane..

Early School Years

2009-06-02T21:49:00.001-04:00

Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Yardville Heights School
Yardville Heights Elementary School was across S. Broad Street from the Highland Avenue entrance to Yardville Heights in Hamilton Township, Mercer County, New Jersey. In the 1930's it had eight grades in 4 classrooms. It was an impresive building (and stilll is) with 2 large rooms on each of 2 floors.

One the first floor in the center was an entrane hall. On the second floor in the center was the "Teacher's Room". Restooms for girls and for boys were located in the basement. The "Reception" grade class room on the first floor had a cloak room and a small bathroom.
Every fall when we entered the school it was freshly painted. It was maiintained by a janitor named Mr. Rich who had a room in the basement. The principal was Annabelle S. Clymer. Mrs.Clymer was a formidable looking person who always wore black dresses - prsumably in memory of her deceased husband. Her punishment for bad boys was a "shaking". She wold grasp the boy by his shoulders and give him a thorough shaking. If he was really bad she made sure his head hit the wall when shaking. Today that would be child abuse but it worked then. Since half the time I was in a room with a higher class, if I got done my "seat work" I listened to the next year's subjects. Seat work was what we did while the teacher was teaching the other grade.
When I was about 5 I got sent home by the perincipal! I wasn't in school yet but had followed my older brother on his way to school. I got to Broad Street and knew I should not cross it so I stood tere and hollered "Harold" "Harold". I guess Mrs.Clymer thoug that might disrupt the classes so she sent an older boy to escort me home.
A year or so later, in Reception Grade (Kindergarden), I got in trouble by climbing out the first floor classroom window and jumping down to the ground. I was escaping but just thought it wuld be a fun thing to do.
A few yeas later I got in trouble again. On the way to school, we walked on Highland Avenue. It had been recently paved and along the sides of the road were left over patchs of tar. When cool, tar is kind of rubbery and we would pick up a chunck and mold it into a balls. I took my tar ball to school and left it on my desk. Later in the day, the sun streamed in the windows and melted the tar ball I had on my desk. I don't recall what the punishment was but I didn't bring tar balls to school any more.
I was a pretty good studen except in conduct. I had the disadvantage of following my older brother who was a top notch student. I think the techers expected me to do as well as he did.
The kids in school were mostly from Yardville Heights and Lakeside. However some kids were bussed in from Crosswicks and the farm country in that area. We could tell the farm kids because they always smelled like cows - which they probably took care of before coming to school. Our classes were quite small, 20 or so. We had several black students in our class though I don't recall them being treated or considered any differently than any of the other kids. My mother reminded me that I did bring the Harvey twins (African Americans) home for lunch on at least one occasion.
I lived close enough so that I went home for lunch every day. I looked forward to rainy days because then I got to take my lunch to school. That was considered a treat.
Our school had an active PTA. We were sent home with notices of meetings and most parents attended the meetings. Sometimes Mr Alexander, the school district Superintendent would come to the school and sit in on a class or two. We were always on our best behavior then.
We had a class play when I was in 6th grade. I don't remember the name of the play or much except that we practiced after school and our teacher Miss Weidbrecht drove us home. I recall that my best friend "Bunky" Middleton played the part of "Speedy".
We also had a minstrel show - not Politically correct these days - I had a joke. I said "Why is the ship the Queen Mary like a fat woman" the interlockner replied "I don't know, Why", my response was "Because neither one can get into a slip without several tugs"
When we were in the sixth grade, we learned that the next years would be spent at the new Yardville School. That meant we had to be bussed. The new school in Yardville was "stae of the art" for those days with even public addres systems in the rooms. I did well in school except for getting kicked out for riding my bike on the school grounds. I ended up as President of the 8th grade class and gave a speech at graduation.