Memories From My Old Neighborhood

Occasionally when I travel to Salt Lake City from Los Angeles and we make it a priority, my siblings will take me over to the area where we all grew up on the west side of the Valley.  When I was surprised last year by a trip there for my 60th birthday, Ann and I had some time to make the pilgrimage.

Armed with my camera, we walked around the immediate neighborhood and I took some pictures.  We drove around to other places that were part of my childhood and I took some photos of them as well.  I realized that I had never posted them here, and because I want my blogs to chronicle my life in order for others, particularly my descendents to know my story, I'm taking the time to show my past, and to write a bit about them.

Before taking this virtual tour, I have to say that these places, and particularly the homes, are from my childhood, many of them were many years older than the 60 years I was celebrating.  Some look remarkably as I recall them, while others, including my own home, have changed--not completely, but they've changed through the years.

This is the home in which I grew up.  It was a two bedroom, one bath, small home.  It had a basement, largely unfinished that included a "fruit room" under the outside front porch, in which food storage was kept and which was a fun place to hide.  It had metal kitchen cabinets like those of that era.  All rooms intersected to a hall that had six doors. The current residents have really made the exterior and interior look very nice (I know about the interior because I asked on another trip if they would allow me to look around inside, and they gladly permitted me to do so).  The chain link fence that blocks access to it was not there when I lived there.

You can almost see from the photo the address is 509 (above the door).  I seem to recall that during my teenage years or maybe a little later, the street numbering was changed by the City.  The streets which had been 800 West/8th West and 400/4th North became 900 West and 500 North.  In my memory, though, my address will always be 509 North 8th West.  My phone number was EL 5-6901.  (EL was short for Elgin, and was dialed 35)

Cornia Home

Next door to the south, on the corner of 8th West and 4th North was the home owned by the Cornias.  They had three children and the youngest, Gay, was a couple of years older than me.  In my early years, Mrs. Cornia would paint on the front window and would have a Christmas scene behind it in their living room during the Holiday season.  For may years, there was not a fence between our properties.  I learned how to ride a skateboard on their driveway.

For some reason I did not take a picture of the home to the west of the Cornias, perhaps because it had been changed so dramatically as to be almost unrecognizable.  It was the Webster home, and where my good buddy Keith lived.  I spent countless hours inside and outside that home, in front and behind.  Their side yard abutted our back yard.  Keith was the youngest of four children.  Of the friends I had in the neighborhood, I spent the most time with Keith, who was two years younger than me.

The street that ran parallel to 8th West was Chicago Street.  I spent many hours on that street, because some of my friends lived there, and because in those days before video games and non-stop TV watching, we often played outside. For most of my childhood, I knew just about everybody on Chicago Street. Below are some of the homes of people and friends with whom I interacted.

Matheson's Home, with a porch that wasn't there when I was young.  Jack was a friend.

Selma Mitchell's Home, where she and her mentally challenged son Roy lived.

The Johnson's Home, across the street from the Call's.  My friend Scott had two brothers, Jerry and Kent.

The Call Home, where my friend Jay lived.

My mom would get her hair done at this home, the Thorpe residence, located on the corner of Chicago Street and 5th North.  One of their children, Van, would later become my Explorer leader.  I remember how exotic the weeping willow tree in front of their home seemed to me.

The Thorpe Home.  The weeping willow was gone.

Behind the Mathesons and the Calls, there is an alley that splits 8th West and Chicago Street.  I spent many, many hours climbing trees, playing wiffle ball, riding Keith's Tote Gote, climbing onto sheds, walking to and from the Calls and Mathesons, and hanging out in that alley that seemed so long and wide back in the day but which now seems so short and narrow.

Because friends weren't always available, and because I was an only child at home, I would sometimes shoot baskets alone on the hoop hanging from the front of Keith's garage.  Inside my home, I created actual board-like games.  I created "stock car" races using Monopoly boards or the braided rug in the hallway (stock car races were run at the Fairgrounds about 3/4 of a mile away every Saturday night, and I knew many of the names of the popular drivers).  I played "starving Bobby" in that hall intersection.  I created a nine-hole par 3 golfing course--in the front, side and back yards of the house, using my dad's golf clubs with cups (cans) in the ground.  For a brief time, there was a basketball hoop to the height of the carport roof (about 8 1/2 to 9 feet high), and I spent hours shooting baskets.  I would play a game with myself shooting foul shots.  I practiced my skateboard skills on the slanting sidewalk from our porch to the sidewalk below.

I created tent forts in the basement by haging blankets and sheets from the clothesline.  I created a "fort" there as well using 2x4 pieces of wood from my brother's work.  This wood fort had lights, a radio, a place to store stuff--a regular little room/womb to hang out in.  I also had a dart board downstairs and I got to be a pretty good dart thrower.

If it rained, I would sometimes go behind the four-plex apartments to our immediate north and connect the puddles.  It was childhood engineering, making a river from one puddle to the next in an attempt to drain it, and my goal was always to have multiple rivers flowing at a time.

Riverside Ward Building

All of my pre-missionary life on Sundays was spent inside this church building on 3rd North and 10th West.  I left on my LDS mission from this buidling and spoke in it upon my return. Though it has fallen into disrepair, what went on inside of that building was a significant part of what molded my childhood.  To this day, I remember all of the hallways and many of the rooms--and the "secret" passageways. 

My very best friend during junior high years was Richard Jacobsen who lived in this house on 7th West near 4th North.  His house was on the way home as I walked from Jackson Junior High and from West High because I couldn't drive. He had all kinds of games, and as I recall we would spend most days after school playing his many games.

Richard Jacobsen's Home

I learned how to play tennis on the courts behind the Fire Station on 2nd North and 9th West. near the Utah State Fairgrounds.  I played against Tom Shaw and Kirk Harmon who were older and would inevitably beat me, but I was hanging out with the cool older kids and that was all that mattered.

The tennis courts.  The Fairgrounds racetrack was just a few hundred feet away.

The building below has all kinds of history associated with it, near the intersection of 7th West and 2nd North.  It was in this home/building, upstairs and down behind the awnings (original from when I was growing up) where my mother grew up with most of her 10 siblings.  It also housed the store and butcher shop where my maternal grandfather had his business, and where my Uncle Bud and Aunt Mary lived.  And the residence to the viewer's left on the ground was one of my sister's first apartments after marrying Bill. I would park my bicycle behind it while attending 7th grade at Jackson Junior High School (which no longer exists).

What memories, what memories are inside (and outside) this home.  It has to he over 100 years old.

Oh the stories my mom and aunts and uncles (and my siblings to some degree) would tell about what carried on in that house!  If those walls could talk, what stories they could tell!

Ensign Peak, where early LDS church leaders placed a pole, and ensign, for all the world to ackneowledge.

The little dome at the top of the hill/mountain above the homes (that didn't used to be there), and to the left of the center pole, is Ensign Peak. If you look closely, you can see a flagpole at the summit. This easily hiked Peak overlooked where I grew up, my high school, the capitol building, Temple Square, all important in my growing up story.  Would we hike it from Beck Street on the west, walk down the south face to the Capitol building, and then eventually make our way back home.

Front of the School.  The back below was not at all like this when I attended.

I attended West High School on 2nd West from 1968 through 1971, where I graduated the day before turning 17.  It was where I evolved from a nerdy, backward, bespectacled kid to a popular, dating, singing, picture taking, basketball managing, radio corresponding, assistant editor of the school newspaper and co-master of ceremonies at the awards banquet.  I don't think it particularly prepared me scholastically for BYU (except for some singing prowess), but West is another important piece of who I became during those teenage years. 

Of course, there would have been no Me, no neighborhood, none of this, without these two, buried in the beautiful Salt Lake Cemetary, high in the Avenues. They provided well for me, gave me a pretty good, stress-free upbringing, taught me values and morals, and loved me as best they could.  I honor them, and am attempting to make them proud up there in heaven.  Thanks, Mom and Dad!