Grandmom & Boardwalk Memories

It happens all the time. You're chatting with someone and one little thing is said or you see something that captures your attention and your conversation or your train of thought goes off in a whole different direction. That happened to me the other day. A friend posted a picture of someone at the beach near a boardwalk. That boardwalk reminded me of the summer days I spent as a kid under or close to the Wildwood boardwalk. (Those of course were the days when at high tide the water came up under the boardwalk in Wildwood. People today look at that beach and find that hard to believe.) Those memories made me think of my Grandmother. Since her birthday had just passed she was on my mind.

My Grandmother was a remarkable woman. Far from perfect but strong and unbending to the end. She lived in South Philadelphia, not too far from Second Street,  for all of her ninety-two years with more than sixty of those years spent in the small garden front twin house she moved into with her husband and small son around 1922.  

Ann left school at either twelve or thirteen and got a job working in a tinsel factory. She moved from there to one of the huge sugar houses along the Delaware River where she sewed large bags of sugar shut with heavy white twine. She also used that twine to crochet and made tablecloths and table runners as well as doilies and antimacassars that would grace her home for years to come.

While her husband was off at war she worked sanding Victrola cabinets at RCA Victor Company in Camden and when he came back and went to work at Curtis Publishing she kept house for her son and husband and went to her parents house regularly and took car of that house as well. After her mother died she announced to her husband, my grandfather, that they would be selling their home and moving back to her father's house so she could take care of Pop and her brothers. My Grandfather bought that house from his father-in-law and my Grandmother ran and took care of it until she was the only one left.

Sometime in 1940 my grandparents bought a neighborhood bar. While taking care of her home she took care of cooking for their business too. It was a hectic time and business during WWII, in a neighborhood that served longshoremen and factory workers, was booming. Life was good but it had ups and downs. There are stories about the time my grandparents had a fight and she picked up a bar stool and threw it over the bar at him. Ann was no shrinking violet.

Her son, my Dad, fought in WWII and returned home and went to work for his father tending bar. He married my Mom and they lived in the apartment over the bar while they saved to buy a house. When I came along my grandmother had a girl in the family to spoil and spoil me she did. My siblings do not let me forget that.

My parents moved to a house in Northeast Philadelphia when I was two and with no car in the family it was an hour's trip from our house to South Philly where my grandparents lived but it never seemed to be a problem and my Grandmom would hop the bus and trackless trolley and make the trip often.

As a kid, for me, the highlight of the summer was spending a week at her house. We went to town and shopped and went to the movies and if the timing was right we went to Wildwood to visit her sister Helen who was staying at her son's home there.

And here we are back to the Wildwood Boardwalk. Those days in Wildwood were happy ones for my Grandmom. She laughed a lot and relaxed more than she was ever able to at home. We went to the beach during the day and did the amusement rides with my cousins at night. Basically we all had fun.

She lived a good life and a very long one. She was a tough woman who loved her family and friends. She worked hard and played hard too. She was my Grandmom  and I loved her and whenever I think of the rare summer days I spent near a Boardwalk I think of her.

Ann   Easter 1956