Do you like the new school?

[jackie f taylor]

I love them, efficient, beautiful, safe, state of the art facilities. I went to Scranton Elementary School on the corner of Scranton and W 38th st. It was in 1962, it was an old Victorian, dark brownstone gothic looking structure, it was a beautiful old building, (the Adam's Family could have lived there) I don't know why they didn't preserve it for historic reasons, why they didn't find a new location for the new school, and leave the old one as a historic icon for the Tremont area, but i's gone. There was a mini tornado late in 1962 which tore off half the roof of the old Wagner Awning building, bricks were strewn all over the neighborhood.

There was also an old dilapidated structure in a gully, they called it "the white wash", an old building in a big hole, somewhere around barber avenue, it was surrounded by dirty polluted water inside this great big steel barrel, two stories tall. We used to play there. Off Fulton road, just after the bridge by the Islay Brewing building, near Vega avenue, there was a bakery, we used to go there and ask the receptionist if they had any messed up pies, she always went in back and brought out pies which the crust had cracked or broken, and they couldn't sell them, she gave them to us for free. There was an orchard, before I-71 went in, near Train Avenue, that was our play ground, so unsafe, but we never had a problem, just kids exploring our neighborhood.