My Summer in Brownsville, Bklyn

by Ray Levine

In years past summer vacations provided an escape from home. In those hot and humid days (no air conditioning) I had lots of time to indulge in many physical activities. My two friends - one Polish, the other Italian – and I were always playing ball, shooting marbles, roller skating, jumping rope and picking daisies. My quiet activity, when quite young, was reading fairy tales. As I go older the libraries’ books gave me much pleasure and the library provided a quiet place to do my homework. While in high school my homework and reading were done seated at a table by myself up in the library balcony.
Betsy Head’s Boys’ Park in which I played for 21 years, had swings, a child’s swimming pool, a tennis court, tracks for running, etc.
For five cents we could go swimming for one hour. Sour-faced matrons doled out a towel, soap, and a cotton bathing suit.
We sunbathed on tar roof. An occasional nickel, bought from a vendor outside the swimming pool, a hot dog about 10 inches long!
In high school, at the age of 15, I passed the life saving test given by a member of the Women’s Swimming Association of NY. After swimming a number of laps, diving, treading water for a number of minutes, I had to rescue a fat girl from drowning and by myself pull her into the canoe. I really earned that life-saving patch for my bathing suit.
One day, sitting at the side of the big swimming pool, I saw a girl drowning. My first attempt at rescuing someone taught me to remember the rules. “First break the person’s strangle hold on your neck or you too will be pulled under.” The safety guard rescued the two of us.
I was lucky to live in a neighborhood where people came from many different countries. We all got along well. There were very few black people there though.
The above items merely touch upon a few interesting memories.