Growing Up on 23 Lawndale
Part II
I believe this is a transcription of the four siblings, Marianne, Jim, Ed and Matt, talking about growing up in Belmont, Massachusetts. This would be from about 1943-1966. We lived on 23 Lawndale Street most of that time. The next street over (parallel) was Pequossette Road. Playgrounds were Chenery, Payson Park School, and Grove Street. This get-together happened at my brother Ed’s house in Clifton, Virginia. My guess is that it was about five years ago in April 2005. Matt McGuire, October 2010.
[Transcriptionist Note: In the beginning I tried to determine which male persons were speaking, but don’t think I succeeded very well. I thought it was Kathleen, Jim and Matt and then somewhere along the way, it appeared Eddie was speaking. So, I leave it to those who would know to recognize and label the comments throughout.]
[Begins with noises of recorder moving around and some inaudible background speaking.]
K:I know I was just saying I was just waiting for ...
J:[inaudible]
M:Yeah. This, uh ...
J:What’s your ankle ...
M:Well, no, this – it’s not the ankle, when, when the knee was replaced, I – I had this for a while. I don’t use it, when the back – which is improving – the whole thing with the nerve stuff, I think I also probably some of the exercise trying to do something else, it might’ve tore a muscle.
J:Yeah.
M:And, uh, so to reach – to get to – especially in the morning and with plenty of arthritis, uh, ‘til that all smoothes out, you just step on this like this and ...
K:That’s cool.
M:I figure why – that’s one of the hard things cause you do – genetically or otherwise do have a lot of arthritis, I have it like in the mornings. Where you put your hands right now I can’t – see this is, this is it, this will be better later, but right now this is, this is it.
K:Why?
J:You know who had a hand like that?
M:No, I know Uncle Frank had that – it’s a trigger finger.
K:You can only go where?
M:Well, this way only wants to close to here. See? But, it may be ...
J:Like when you used to, uh, fold your fist real tight and then you try ...
M:[inaudible]
J:Yeah.
M:This one’s – this one’s better, but this one ...
K:I think I have maybe ...
M:I mean look at your – besides banging them up playing baseball, take a look at the knuckle and stuff.
K:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, see.
M:Look at – see this hand’s the pretty hand, this hand’s my [inaudible] hand. This is my dinged up hand.
J:I think my hands are okay, so are yours. You know, age-wise – for all of us, I think age-wise ...
K:Yeah, we don’t have many ...
J:... they’re not old hands.
K:No.
M:Now, like this stuff, you know ... Well, if you can go like this, Jimmy – here put your hands back – that’s an old hand.
K:Skinny, this stuff right here.
J:So, you’re not an old man.
K:He’s not that old.
M:No, he’s just -- not old. You see when they’re all ...
K:But, my veins, whatever.
J:You see, actually, I, I actually at one time when we – my veins were [inaudible] and I thought that was ...
K:Yeah.
M:Yeah, and these are all – the most that show for me is probably right there, cause I can’t even pop them on this hand.
M:[inaudible]
J:When it’s time to take a shower or something, then they all – they all stand out and you say, my God.
K:Um, huh.
J:It does seem like when your veins are in a certain light, it’s like black light, you know, you look and see, holy moly.
M:What happened to the lady? That girl?
J:Yeah, Candy would like that, that’s her favorite color.
J:Gonna take a shower.
M:Have coffee – down, it’s, uh, it’s Starbuck’s coffee, it’s a Starbuck’s brewer. It’s, uh ...
J:Oh, great. I love coffee.
K:Hey, Jim.
J:Yeah.
K:Is that your computer or our ...
M:That’s Jimmy’s computer. I think.
J:Yeah, it’s mine.
K:Could I go on as a guest?
J:I guess – yeah, you have, uh – you can go on at anytime, the problem is I don’t think he has a wireless setup here, do you?
K:Oh.
M:No, uh ...
[inaudible]
J:With the wireless, you know, you could just plug in anywhere and just do it.
M:Can you do that?
J:Well, you can find out. When you say like a wireless setup, I don’t think it’s set up for – these computers you could – you know, these hand-held computers they have a power source anywhere you want or if you have a battery, you could just run ‘em anywhere.
M:So, we just go onto the Internet – the one I had from work, I didn’t need to –
K:That’s okay.
J:What’s that? Oh, you don’t have a ...
J:That’s Joshua on ...
K:Oh, wait ‘til you see, I brought a whole bunch of pictures that I found that Aunt Kathleen had, uh, of your family [inaudible], you know, pictures that we must have sent to him at sometime and he must’ve sent to me. I brought a whole bunch and I brought a lot of Grandma Connors McGuire. It’s like, I just, you know, I just remember her like a stern woman and I’m looking, I don’t think there’s a picture of her with a smile.
[background noise from recorder being moved]
M:Well, I think – I think she always had one of those poster cover looks, you know, where this guy drew – where you draw the people in the magazine covers that the husband and wife just sort of get along, kind of playing dresses and I don’t think she was laughing and smiling, but she was, she was playful.
K:Yeah.
M:What I didn’t see was the pictures, like when Matt got sworn in as a judge ...
K:Um, huh.
M:... she was an imposing woman, I mean she was ...
K:Listen ...
M:... for me she was just small, you know ...
K:Yeah.
M:... just a small – and grandmotherly, but, but, in those earlier – the pictures when you look at her, she looked like, she looked like quite a force.
J:She was quite a force.
K:Yeah. Well, I don’t know, maybe since I was the oldest ...
J:Maybe.
M:Well, Eddie and I used to do a lot of things, but we, we, sort of – we still had to ignore everything that they didn’t like. We used to play next door and we always climbed over the fence and jumped over the fence and if a garage was there, we’d walk along the top of the fence and then just hop down and Kathleen [laugh], would yell to get off that fence. And, it was barb wire at the top.
K:Oh, yeah.
M:So, you’re gonna get hurt, get off the fence, you know, yeah, thanks grandma, we just kept on doing it.
K:I’m trying to think if I ever got hurt on the fence. I think I probably did at some point.
M:I don’t recall anybody getting hurt.
K:I can still see those little barb wire things, man.
J:Yeah. It was a great tree, too.
K:Yeah.
M:Yeah, just grab the tree, just pop up when you get a little bit older and a little more flexible.
K:All right, let me see this thing, I wanta see how this works.
M:Oh, this ...
K:Shall we turn this thing off, Jimmie?
M:Here’s what you do, you put the ...
J:Turn what off?
K:Your – did you put on the tape?
J:I think it’s, you know, I got lots of stuff to waste, so ...
K:Okay, all right.
J:You guys might say something that I wanted to hear.
K:Okay, all right.
M:Or not.
J:If you want to turn it off, you can turn it off.
K:Oh, hey, we can have – we can dissect a – Jim.
J:Turn it off.
K:What my brother means to me.
M:We’ll pretend that this is a trial and you notice something right away and then it disappears, uh ...
K:Um, huh.
M:... this, this was – I was telling Jimmy, this is, this plastic sleeve for after knee replacement, what you do is you put the sock on it, put it down on the ground, it’s got rope on it, you slide your foot into the sleeve, just pull up the rope and push the sock on.
K:Ah.
M:So, when you’re – if you’re real stiff and, I think, that’s a little bit of a genetic thing.
K:Yeah.
M:You know, other stuff, injuries, maybe, maybe a little bit what we get as children because as opposed to kids today playing X-Box and all that, we used to play Tarzan ...
K:Yeah.
M:... jumping out of trees, climbing on trees, going up with – and trees in the neighborhood ...
K:Right.
M:... all the kids, uh, Jimmy included, but particularly with Johnny Sullivan and T.J. O’Connor and, and all those other kids around the neighborhood, we used to jump off of roofs. We jumped off of everybody’s garage roof. We jumped off the front porch, so we would ...
K:Oh, my God.
M:... [inaudible] jumping and when we used to, uh, play with the Pines and the Currans that were maybe a half a mile from where we lived down by a place that’s now well developed – it was just called the [name] ...
K:Oh, yeah.
M:... they had new construction when they started building that and we used to all go in to the new construction sites and we played in houses when they were building the foundations ...
K:Really?
M:... jumping off into the basements and stuff and through the windows and, uh ...
K:But, you know what, guys had so much more fun than girls.
M:Yeah. Jimmy and I got caught with, uh, somebody else by the local Belmont policeman and this was when Dad was a probation officer. And, I can still remember the ride with the two of us going, please, please, don’t tell Pop. No, I’m gonna take you boys home, you’re in a lotta trouble. No, no, please, don’t take us home. Cause you know, we didn’t want to, uh – I suppose we didn’t want to really embarrass Dad ...
K:Sure.
M:... it wasn’t so much getting in trouble ...
K:Yeah.
M:... and, uh ...
K:So, what happened?
M:... there was a lotta problems, uh – what happened was, he dropped us off at the bottom of the street, he didn’t take us home. He let us off ...
K:Um.
M:... and, we were fine and I think one of the reasons why they, why they were doing that, we weren’t looking at us kids as being protective, but one of our friends that was playing in there had jumped off and he broke his collarbone in one of the houses, so it was maybe a protective thing. The, uh, the, the not too surprising news for, for Jimmy and, uh, probably me, who Jimmy do things noticeably, audibly and, and I would probably do them quietly, but same things. Jimmy and I were back playing in those foundations in like two days, so I guess – it was a lot of fun, so we, we could have everything playing.
K:What was the, what’s the name of the playground that’s opposite where Mom and Dad are buried?
M:Um, let’s see, it’s Grove, Grove Street playground?
K:That doesn’t sound right.
M:It doesn’t. Grove Street.
K:But, I remember, you know, that was much further to go to as a playground and, um, on the way back from there, there was a farm and they had one of those old, um, Coca-Cola chests, you know ...
M:That was, that was – that was in [name] Farms, and that, that was ...
K:And, I can remember buying Orange Crush there. Yeah.
M:Yeah, Orange Crush was, was a great drink that was real popular. They also had a drink back then that was the worst drink that was ever made called Moxie.
K:Oh, yeah, oh my God. That was horrible.
M:Tasted like [inaudible], how they marketed it, I don’t know. [name] Farms was between the grocery – playground and School Street. In fact, it was just a little bit in off School Street where the [name] and the Currans lived and it was like a long, uh, like a hanger store ...
K:Right.
M:... it was like a straight line ...
K:Yeah, I remember that.
M:... all one level and you could get everything there and the thing, you know, it’s funny ...
K:Candy, too, right?
M:... yeah, candy, right, cause you could get that penny candy and you could get what you kinda get now, like penuche fudge [white fudge], little squares of it ...
K:Oh, right, right.
M:... and all those little penny candy stuff and ...
K:It was great. I keep remembering Orange Crush.
M:I do, too, I ...
K:Loved that.
M:... candy bars ...
K:Concord punch, yeah.
M:Concord Grape.
K:Yeah, yeah.
M:What happened with the boys in that [name] Farms, you know ...
K:The people that owned it, you mean?
M:No, no, just, just like friends we knew ...
K:Um, huh.
M:... the Pines, there were two, three boys there, there was Phil Curran, there were the O’Connors ...
Yeah.
... where we went and did things as children, there were probably at least 10 or 15 boyfriends, sometimes up to – you know, just guys, kids ...
K:Um, huh.
M:... you do stuff with or 20 or 25 because there were just so many boys and, uh, we’d play, play at the playground and we’d go down [name] Farms and we’d skate and sometimes we’d come back from [name] Farm and we’re always trying to get some deals from the guy and he was, you know, and we probably really pestered him, but the thing that we, we would do as kids is we would take the empty bottles, what was left in them and put them all – cause, cause they collected the glass – we would put them all into one, so the kids would make, uh, you know, a ...
K:Like a punch drink.
M:... yeah, like a punch of bottles of somebody else’s glass and drink them and ...
K:Ohhh, gross.
M:... and I don’t know that anybody ever got sick doing that.
K:Oh, my gosh.
M:So, I think probably, uh, somewhat from a boy’s point of view, you had to figure your immune system must be pretty good cause that was not unusual.
K:Oh, yeah.
M:And, that was, that was ...
K:I’m wondering why, why we went down there, there must’ve been something – I can remember going to ballgames there.
M:Little League Baseball was played down there.
K:Yeah.
M:They had, uh, tennis courts, they had a pretty good playground and it was probably, it was the closest playground and it had more things to do. [name] was probably equally, equally close, but it, it didn’t have as, as many things especially for ...
K:Umm..
M:But, it didn’t have as, as many things, especially ...
K:Right.
M:Especially for, for younger people and the tennis courts, uh, they, they put in there, then later in the winter, they’d flood it.
K:Um, huh.
M:... so, we could skate there, so – and, that froze pretty quickly and if it was colder and we had a lot of cold winters, if it was colder, we’d go further, we’d go down to Fresh Pond and it was always, always a pick-up hockey game there, always a pick-up hockey game.
K:Wow, this is so – isn’t this so nice here? Kitchen just turned out gorgeous.
M:Yeah.
K:Love your knobs.
M:Thank you. Yeah, it was all kind of designed – pretty, pretty much more or less a design that we wanted, we had a designer, but like almost everything in the house is, is a reflection of our choices for things, so ...
K:I’m just looking at, at your oriental {oriental rug] and I never even thought of putting an oriental in the kitchen. It’s a good idea.
M:Yeah, well ...
K:Cause I have hardwood floors, too.
M:... yeah, the wood floors around the kitchen, there’s no way you’re not going to splash water ...
K:Oh, yeah, and, well ...
M:... and if you’re going to add a dishwasher to the ...
K:Right, right, I’ve already dropped cans, and, you know, I’ve got dents in it already. Oh, this is nice. Oh, very nice.
M:[inaudible]
K:Yeah.
M:They’re a little bit more [inaudible].
K:I’ll bet they are.
[inaudible]
[discussing and fixing a leak]
K:Oh, isn’t this pretty.
M:Oh, yeah, that was specially ...
K:Very pretty.
M:We had that specially made, you know, Candy always wanted to have a, you know, like a vent, or a little front stile over the ...
K:Yeah, yeah.
M:... thing with the ...
K:Very pretty.
M:So that was interesting and doing the pewter ...
K:Yeah.
M:... just for a little bit of – you know, just to pick up the kitchen a little bit ...
K:Right, right.
M:... without putting a lot of in it.
K:Yeah. Yeah.
M:... and the last thing was putting the black as an accent, which ...
K:Yeah, it makes it stick out.
M:Yeah.
K:Oh, and look at this.
M:It’s different.
K:This is cool. Oh, and, it opens even, too.
M:Yeah.
K:Oh, gosh. Cool, cool, cool.
M:We placed this and had to put Corian in ...
K:So, we had something else and it’s really nice with the Corian.
K:Well, it’s great with you have all the plants there. Cool.
M:You know, then, the view is to the back so you might as well ...
K:You might as well enjoy it.
M:... well, the view is okay to the front, too, but ...
K:Yeah, but, I mean, you’re out here more probably. Right?
M:Right.
K:Is there ...
M:What are you looking for?
K:[inaudible]
M:[inaudible] – right there.
K:There you go.
M:We like that, too, that slide away tracks drawer. It’s just nice to have. It, you know, for that ...
K:Oh, yeah. This is your cutlery – oh, that’s nice. Man. How do you ...
M:That won’t, uh, the knife’s so big it won’t ...
K:So, you just ...
M:... on that piece of wood, it’s not grooved enough.
K:Yeah, right.
M:On the bottom, so ...
K:Now, these are just – these are your drawers for your, uh ...
M:Cookware.
K:Cookware. Nice and deep, huh?
M:Yeah, yeah, and the lower ones are the same thing – you get the full pullout so it just makes everything easier.
K:Yeah. Cool.
M:Go ahead and roll, see how big those things are. They look small from the door, but they’re actually massively big.
K:Cool. I never even thought to ask you, do you – you do have a, uh, pie plate?
M:Yeah, probably.
K:If this is going to become too much of a ...
M:Is this too deep, probably is.
[lots of falling pots and pans noise]
K:Um, it’s a little deep.
M:Might be too deep.
K:Yeah.
M:If we’re going to go out and get apples, we can get a pie plate.
K:Yeah. We can, I just thought you might have one. You know, Marianne’s always asking me for things you don’t have.
M:Here’s a ...
K:That’s not going to work.
[lots of crashing of pots and pans throughout this part of the recording]
K:There you go.
M:Don’t force it.
K:I’m not going to force it. Here.
[more crashing pots and pans and mostly inaudible conversation]
J:They’re all kind of European cabinets.
K:So nice.
J:Yeah.
K:Okay, I’m just getting my ...
J:And, the marble, it’s like soapstone or ...
M:No. It’s, it’s marble, it’s, uh ...
K:It’s really nice isn’t it?
M:Kind of like with a “b” something or other.
J:Botticelli?
K:Yeah, right.
M:Botticelli – not quite that.
K:The quality of these, uh, hinges.
J:Yeah.
K:This is good stuff.
J:So, there’s coffee
M:Yeah, there’s some – you can go like this ...
J:Oh ...
J:Matthew, we really like your coffeemaker.
M:Oh, but it’s, uh, it’s leaking somewhere so ...
J:Let me try a couple things. You pushed this before ...
M:No, you know what it was? Part of it, well, it’s not going in the filler thing.
J:That’s the problem. Just empty the whole thing and then ...
M:Well, look at that, it’s not going in there somehow it’s blocked through the top. That’s what it is cause it’s not a full, uh ...
J:Okay, why don’t we have soda?
M:Oh, yeah, this, this will stay hot forever.
J:I just want coffee.
M:I know you do. I know what you want.
J:I just want to know what, where the problem is. I’m beginning to see that the problem is the top. The top somehow is blocking the, uh ...
M:That is close to special ...
J:Yeah, that’s what I’m looking at. I don’t know how ...
M:At the espresso level ...
M:Wow, that is strong.
J:The way that they make it in Europe ...
M:Geez, whoa.
J:... in Europe they make what they call Americano, which is taking espresso ... oh, I just put some orange juice into my coffee.
M:I guess you need some more coffee. Here take this one.
J:Any milk here?
M:There is, uh, some half and half and there is Coffeemate, cinnamon vanilla, crème brule.
J:No, I said just milk, you did say there was half and half. Coffee, coffee, crème brule, French vanilla. I’m okay. That a couple of your favorites?
M:No, I like – I used to like [inaudible]. I like Irish cream and I like hazelnut now, with this stuff, I like the French vanilla.
K:Yeah.
J:I like the French vanilla.
K:Cinnamon.
J:Beautiful, beautiful refrigerator.
K:Yeah.
J:So, shall we wake up Matt?
M:No. You can try this, see if you like the French vanilla. Go ahead. You gotta experiment.
J:I’ll be glad to experiment. Challenges.
M:Here you go.
J:Challenging, one way to describe my brother, challenging. So, uh, you never jumped from a 120 foot bridge before, are you afraid to do that? No.
K:We were talking about, um [name] and, um, getting Orange Crush and ...
J:That’s at that playground down there by, uh, [inaudible] it’s Grove Street Playground.
K:[inaudible]
J:Yeah, yeah, Grove Street.
K:All right, you’re always right – when it comes to memories, you can’t beat it.
Well, actually, I remember Grove Street Playground cause that’s where someone skated over my finger.
That’s at the ballpark – that’s one of the memories cause you got your finger cut up, had to go home and get stitches, cause you couldn’t get it done there.
Well, I remember ...
You know, some of these ...
That – was it intentional?
I don’t think it was intentional, was it?
No, I just kind of fell on the ice and somebody skated by ...
Skated on your hand, yeah. I remember that, I remember your concussion [inaudible]. I remember me running into a tree cause we used to play ...
The place that I ran into a tree was, uh [inaudible] ...
[inaudible] I was just gonna say ...
Yeah, you hit a tree there, you also got clobbered somewhere near Belmont Street and we used play at Mount Trinity, you know, red rover send so and so over and you break through the arms, I could always break through the arms, so people started – stopped blocking, so I came over and just like the regular thing they just opened their arms up and there was a tree behind it and I ran smack dab into the tree. It’s like, pow – I was knocked out, so ...
I was telling Mary Ann when we went down to Little Fresh Pond there was always so many boys there – always 20 boys to do stuff with in the neighborhoods, you know, play games, hockey, but, uh, on the street when we were kids, there was the [name] and the Regans, and the O’Connors, and stuff ...
MA:I remember playing ...
... and the Morrows and the Sullivans, we had those – I remember [inaudible] acorn and bean blower and all those kind of – we had like whole armies of people. You know, two different ones and nobody – I know, Dad didn’t like the bean blowers cause you could lose your eye and the acorns and [inaudible] chestnuts were for throwing and they never got hurt, I guess we were probably doing it in the winter – in the fall, so your coats were heavy enough that it really didn’t hurt that much, but we, we had those fights going. We used to play ...
Pinecones, too.
Huh ...
We threw pinecones, too, but ...
Chestnuts.
... chestnuts would really ...
M:They’re hard.
Yeah. And, uh, we played football sometimes at Regans because they had a big yard, but the most we played was over Bragg’s yard and Dr. Bragg was straight across ...
Oh, right.
... and he had that big redwood tree in the yard and the nice thing about them was they had no children and they always ... they always let the kids play football in the yard. They always let us do that and I think when they – we were all crying when the sold the house.
Yeah.
They sold the land and there was two other houses put in ...
McDonalds would have been ...
McDonalds and another family, I don’t know who the other one was.
Never knew.
And, I think McDonalds bought both houses.
Yeah, they built one and ...
Yeah.
... sold one.
Yeah, yeah.
M:Do you ever remember going down to the, the, uh, Kennedy’s or whatever – Mary Kennedy and ...
Yes.
Yeah.
M:... that house? That was sort of like off-limits kind of, too.
It was.
M:Who lived over on the Quonset Road? Was that, was that Tom Kennedy and then ...
But, what – was it Kennedy or Mahan?
Mahan. They were Mahan. Because ...
M:The Kennedy’s I think maybe lived on [name] and ...
Oh, Eddie Kennedy?
No.
M:No.
Eddie Kennedy lived up by [name].
M:They were relatives of Aunt Eleanor’s.
Right.
Well, the Mahans were relatives, I thought.
M:They were and they ...
And, they were, they were next to the Morrows. They lived in that big brown house with two-car ...
Yeah.
M:Upstairs or downstairs?
Upstairs and downstairs. I think maybe in that time, maybe the, the mom was divorced and nobody ever talked about that. She was kinda ...
Actually, I also thought that there was a sense that we not their intellectual ...
Well, it wasn’t – no, I don’t think it was any intellectual level.
Well, I’m just saying how it was presented.
Oh, okay, yeah.
M:Oh, oh, yeah
I think it was – she always stressed, uh, and like a person that was supposed to be stepping into a limousine.
Right.
They had two children ...
Little bit Fauntleroy?
Alex? Yeah, Alex looked like Alice in Wonderland and, uh, Charlie – I think – was it Charlie?
I don’t know.
No, wait, whatever his name ...
Charlie didn’t sound right.
M:No, it was [inaudible] and ...
It wasn’t Clare.
M:I know that, where did they – I know they used to come – we used to come to visit.
Actually, they lived down the street and, and to my knowledge, the time we lived there, the only time we’d ever have any contact with them is when maybe Eleanor was around, but we did very, very little time there.
We did go there a few times and we did play with them a little bit.
M:I remember being in that house once.
We were up – we were up in the – all the way up to the backyard – we probably weren’t in the house. Alice would play once in a while, um, the son was – he was very introverted ...
Yeah, I think ...
... they weren’t exposed to, to people – it gets more interesting later on.
M:Are you thinking about Paul? The one that became ...
Yeah, maybe it was Paul.
I think it’s Paul.
It wasn’t Charlie?
M:No, that’s Clare’s brother.
Oh, Paul, yeah. Okay.
And, what about him?
M:He became a pedophile.
Right.
And, I think he came by and the boy that they had there was very – not that – it was a strange life, very introverted.
Who lived next door to us downstairs, uh, who was always a little bit drunk and his mother – he lived with his mother before the Olaveries [sp] ...
M:Oh, I don’t know.
He used to come over and try to play catch with us when he was – when we were like 12, 13 ...
Um, I remember the Olivaries and the Weavers more.
M:Well, I remember Peter Middleton.
That was Matt’s friend.
M:Living downstairs from – Matt’s friend – the thing I remember particularly ...
I did not like that kid.
M:Oh ...
Well, he was Little Lord Fauntlroy.
Curly hair, chunky and ...
M:Matt ...
... not pleasant.
M:... play with him.
He caught his finger in the door.
M:Yeah, and, I can remember him coming home and being told that he was going to lose the tip of his finger.
Yeah, he went down there to play and he didn’t hurt his finger there ...
M:She shut the door on his finger.
She slammed the door on his finger and, and he cut the top notch of his baby finger and ...
M:Yeah, right.
... and got a bunch of stitches and, uh ...
M:Oh, man ...
... and she had some little ...
I felt terrible.
M:I got so made and I just – I can remember that to this day, just feeling awful that he was going to lose his – the top ...
I felt I was responsible for it, I mean ...
No, you had nothing to do with it.
M:No.
But, sometimes you can feel responsible for things you had nothing to do with.
Yeah, no, he had – that was with them and ...
M:I always get the sense that, that he – they didn’t think they were good enough for us or maybe that’s just ...
You thought that who ...
They – the Middletons?
M:They – that the Middletons ...
No, the other way around.
The Middletons and the, uh, Kennedy’s, uh ...
M:Were too good for us, I probably put it the wrong way.
You did.
Well, I’m not so sure that they were too good for us, they were, they were – they landed in a place that they thought they ought not to be. They should be living somewhere else – not better, but they thought they were supposed to be furs and mink coats and up on Beacon Hill [a very rich area of Boston with three-decked brownstone houses] or something ...
M:Yeah.
... both, both, and, uh, I guess both of them were, uh – no dad – I don’t know whether Peter Middleton’s dad died. I don’t remember, just know there was no Mr. Middleton, so there was her and with Kennedy, there was no Mr. Kennedy.
M:Right, right.
It was just her. And, it was, it was strange because those people like kept in the house and weren’t allowed to play with, with, with anybody and I think it was ...
I think of Peter like a caricature ...
M:Yeah, yeah.
... and I think maybe your description of the Mahans is also similar, that there was a – there were thin, there was not – there’s not a lot of substance to ...
M:Well, what I’m trying to remember is, I knew there was a connection to Mary Kennedy there, but I don’t know – I’m wondering if Clare and Paul lived in that house, I think they did at some point.
They might have, but there was also ...
Clare later used to come to Matt and all the time
M:And, Clare Mahan went Emmanuels [A women’s Roman Catholic college in Boston]. She was one of the most brilliant girls at Emmanuel. She and another woman, uh, Barbara McNeil were the two top scholars and, um ...
I’m trying to think of ____ because there was the other Mahan, which was Harry Mahan ...
M:That’s what I was thinking of ...
On Pequossette Road [next street over running parallel to Lawndale Street] and he lived up near the top and he loved everybody. That buy was – we used to deliver his newspapers. He was one of our biggest tippers.
Right.
He was always friendly, we used to shovel his driveway for him sometimes when we were kids. And, Harry Mahan was, um, he was, sort of – to me he was like Ted Knight in, uh, Caddyshack, but much more personable and friendly, but had that kind of look about him and he was just a nice guy, friendly guy, and it was sort of like, with the two Mahans and the two Streets, it was like Jekyl and Hyde.
M:Yeah, yeah.
But, he was Mr. Friendly and the other one was – you probably would – you’d probably be afraid to go into that house, wondering what strange things might be occurring inside or what – that house – if I ever thought there might’ve been a haunted house, it would’ve been that house with the Mahans, not, uh ...
M:Yeah, yeah.
... not the one across the street then?
There’s another guy up at Pequossette Road whose father – [name] or – there was a kid who was a little bit older then us, a guy, I think the kid actually went into the priesthood. They were on ...
M:I just remember being one street over was like ...
Another country.
M:Yeah, it was like another universe.
Yeah. Yeah. But, you know what, you knew what you – what you won’t know later, is you knew everybody on the street, like – the other family, the Nelsons, they had two boys ...
Yeah.
... and they were a little bit older and they were a little ...
M:They were up the street, right?
... and you know what was different there – no, they were diagonally across.
M:I thought, who were the Nelsons ...
They were next door to the [name].
M:Yeah.
No, the Nelsons were ...
Straight across, okay.
Who were the people that were two doors up?
Uh, Hurleys. There was the Hurley family and there were they, um, um, [name].
Okay. Cause I think [name] and then Hurley. [name] was on the top level on the other side.
And, the Nelsons were across the street and they’re actually and they were good Protestants.
Yeah, they were great and they were – well, that’s where – they knew we were Catholics and we knew that they were Protestants and for other – and most of the street were Catholics.
Right.
M:Yeah.
And, at that time, uh, there was – it was like all these different religions were a great mystery and like the Demolay was like some secret society ...
Demolay was the devil.
Yeah, that was the devil, you know, and then CYO [Catholic Youth Organization] was the devil for the, for the other thing and I remember for Beverly Weaver, uh, they had the Episcopalian, which is like first cousins, even closer for Catholics, that was just like, oh, that’s a whole, that’s a whole different religion, but we all ...
He killed all his wives ...
Yeah.
M:Henry. [I believe this is a reference to Henry VIII of England.]
Yeah. Right. We all played, you know, we all played together, but there was sort of a little bit of something in the religion and Mr. Weaver next door was – he was the nicest guy, he always brought, uh, scraps of meat and everything cause we had the dogs, he’d bring them over and feed the dogs these things – or bring ‘em over and everybody, everybody really, really got along, but it was a funny thing because religion, uh, it wasn’t a barrier to friendships, but it was always in existence and I don’t think it was until we were really in college when we had the, uh, Ecumenical Council [Vatican II] and stuff, you really started, you know, eliminating some of those, those barriers, but it was amazing on that street, everybody was, uh ...
M:Well, you know ...
... was tolerant and friendly, but religion, to date – like you said Beverly Weaver was dating a Catholic – non-Catholic – dating outside your religion, it was like, whoa ...
M:Oh, yeah.
Well, there are the kids who lived next door to Payson Park School and there were two brothers and one of the brothers, um, got a young girl pregnant and she was Jewish and he was Catholic and ...
M:Wow.
... what I remember is that her family disowned her and his family didn’t like it very much. Not that you would.
No, and I think probably those are two ...
Bobby Wilson is another person that I’m thinking of is – we’re talking about this McPartland ...
Yeah, yeah.
M:Well, I had friends because ...
McPartland, do you remember that name?
Yeah, I remember the name. He was on [name].
Was he or was Eddie down by Payson Park School?
I get him up by [name].
I got him down by Payson Park School. Maybe down Fairview Avenue a little bit.
That’s another country.
M:Yeah, oh, yeah. Way, way ...
Well, that’s again, so many boys and the McPartlands that they – the Hurleys ...
I hadn’t thought about that that there were so many guys around.
It was all guys. Think about girls, there was, there was Rosie ...
There’s Johnny and David O’Connor.
Tucker O’Connor.
M:Tucker, yeah.
He’s the youngest one, right?
Yeah, Tucker was the youngest of the boys.
There were the Rooney’s.
The Rooney’s are the people I’m talking about.
Yeah, yeah.
School, school friends.
The hotties in grade school used to take out their photos and pass ‘em to you – Elizabeth Rooney and Cathy Sullivan, they were a bunch and they used to ...
Cathy Sullivan?
Yeah, not down the street, not that Cathy ...
Redheaded Cathy, redheaded Kathy Sullivan over, uh, over by the reservoir [Belmont water reservoir], very, very [inaudible].
M:Did any of you ever hear about Mary Sullivan dying [Mary Sullivan lived one door down and was a good friend of my mother’s]?
No.
No.
M:Not any of you?
No.
Actually, I was thinking of words – Johnny Bentencourt was another person ...
Who got you to fight with Johnny and Stevie, so there you go, more brothers again.
M:Who was the one that you had a big fight with down at the pool?
Uh, Nickie [name]. Nickie Mahoney also known as Nickie [name]. One of the two gang leaders in Belmont, that and [name].
Paul Haley was the other person.
Well, that was just, that was just school fights, that wasn’t at school. You’d fight with Paul Haley everyday at school.
Used to fight everyday with him, uh, scraps and ...
Joe [inaudible]?
No. No.
The kid in your class?
Well, there’s two guys, not in my class, I fought up. I fought up in class. There’s Dougie Linnehan and Joseph Sentori. Joe Sentori and Dougie Linnehan and the sixth grade teacher that I had, cause we used to have all these wrestling and king-of-the-hill fights and they were kind of bullies and I would take ‘em on and, and be king-of-the-hill or – we got into scraps over that, but Sister Alexandrine liked the boys, she liked that I stood up to those guys cause they were, they were both bigger and, uh ...
M:So, your ...
So, I never got in trouble for that – well, speaking about Dad, uh, I never really thought I – I don’t think of Dad as angry. I don’t think I was ever afraid of Dad, you know, Dad would get mad and he’d get disappointed when he’d come into a room and if it wasn’t – [saying] didn’t look good or we were – had wrecked it, you know, it’d be like – Dad was always, [saying] “Jesus, Mary and Joseph."
M:Um, huh.
It was like a blah, blah, blah, you know, whatever or something. And, he’d get upset about that, but I don’t think I ever – I don’t think I ever was afraid of Dad, but Dad was kind of like quiet and tough and I think the best thing – well, not only the best thing, but one of the things maybe early on before we were old enough, uh, to be like second, third grade at Mount Trinity, up there, so that was only maybe one, one grade or so, Dad was teaching us how to box. And, he used to teach us in that little square area right next to the church and we’d get out there and Dad would just show the moves and stuff and, uh, and when he would show the boxing skills, you know, Jimmy and I would both be taking him up on it and there was, there was – when I was up at Mount Trinity, there was a guy that was like twice my size and it was like Jimmy’s Paul – later on, I used to have him fight with me everyday down at the end of – the bottom of Mount Trinity, they guy – mother called the house cause she got tired of me fighting with him, but I wanted to try out Dad’s boxing skills cause I liked to [slap, slap] – liked to dance around and, and, Jimmy did, too, but you had just had brute super strength. You were, you were like a ...
M:A bull.
... and, but for that thing, what Dad did was, he sort of taught us how to take care of ourselves, really at an early age and when you talk about boys and girls, I think it was particularly true of our – when you’re a boy, you just get thrown into – people are going to insult you, they’re going to challenge you, they’re going to do other things and you really – it’s really helpful to be able to feel like you can take care of yourself and I think – I don’t know about you, Jimmy, but I think probably Dad did a great job on that and his, his bit of advice that, uh, never – well, I never felt like we were gonna disappoint Dad if you got in a scrap. I’m not out there looking for ‘em, but Dad’s comment and I always remembered, he said, don’t ever come home and tell me that you were in a fight and you didn’t hit whoever you were fighting with, that’s one thing. And, the other thing that Dad said, is every bully is a coward. Every bully is a coward.
Dad said that?
Yeah. Every bully is a coward and I think when you got a little bit of scrapping, you were sort of – as brothers Jimmy and I had plenty of scraps. And, you know, until I could cream him ____ and then we didn’t have a scrap anymore, but, uh, but, but, he had the strength, but you sort of – you got used to that and actually in life, you need that. When I was, uh, when I was on, on the ship in the Navy, I had two guys that were getting picked on and the other thing Dad told me is, look, if somebody’s pushing you all the time, you can’t always avoid it, just step and have it out – especially if you won, but even if you didn’t. They’d respect you, you’d never had a problem, sometimes you become close friends and I remember Dad telling me that and I had this guy from Wisconsin on the ship and he was really a nice guy. All the guys would hit the pier and he would, uh, they’d hit the prostitutes, that’s the first thing they wanted to do. And, he was like the – liked to go to museums and he wasn’t, he wasn’t sweet or anything, but he just had different interests and they used to pick on him. And, there was this one guy in the division – they were both good guys, but he used to pick on him all the time and I said, look, you just have got to go toe-to-toe with this guy. And, this is – you know, maybe as a division officer, you’re not supposed to be saying this, but I told him, look you gotta go toe-to-toe. And, they had a fight in one of the pump rooms and they became the best friends on the ship. That was, that was it, and I had another guy the same thing. He was a real bully and, uh, actually they got in a fight. He hit a guy and broke his jaw in three places and this guy was a real bully, but, you know, hey, you cannot let somebody step on you all the time and you, you need to move ‘em back and I think, I think that pretty much came from Dad and I think, uh, I don’t know about you Jimmy, cause I, I never saw fear and you were in scrapes all the time and I had some scrapes and I think maybe once, either through there or high school was ever – maybe once I got caught by surprise on something, but the rest of that, I never – I was never afraid of, of getting in a fight with anybody and I don’t think I ever lost one, except to you. I lost ‘em all.
J:Well, yeah, uh, there was, there – I think you and Dad shared – I, I was not – never, uh, afraid of Dad, but I certainly believed that if I ever challenged him that either he or I would be dead before the fight was over. There’d be not – that, that there was an issue of respect and that there wasn’t, you know – and, and I don’t think that he would ever do that, but I had the sense that no matter – I, I saw Dad, um, you know, one – he sent me back to whoever those people were and with the idea that Mom was gonna no longer live with him, you know, I went back to the McNamara’s clubhouse and hit the kid in the face cause he told me I couldn’t do this anymore. Uh, and ...
M:You couldn’t hit the kid or ...
J:No, I had to.
M:Yeah you had to.
J:Had to. There were two brothers and, and he said, you know, if you don’t – you have to go back and I felt really backed up by him, that if he gave you his word he was gonna do something, you know ...
M:Um, huh.
J:And, and, so I, I – and, and he, then casually would mention that Joe Minahin was his best friend and he was in the Golden Gloves in Massachusetts and I had no question that he would, uh – that he knew how to handle himself really well and that, that ...
M:He, he worked on the docks.
J:Okay. I also had – I had this experience with you, I’m not sure how old we were and maybe this is the reason why I know decided to quit when I was ahead was that we were having a snowball fight and we were coming up around the corner and we were picking up boulders, throwing at one another ...
E:Yeah.
J:... and I thought you were so mad at me that I was gonna be dead if ...
E:I was, but I think I was probably ...
J:I had, I had this sort of epiphany that, you know, and I also had that in high school, you know with, you know at BC High [Boston College High School, a Jesuit boys’ college preparatory school in Dorchester, MA] when, you know, the first year or two – but, then people really – when you were younger, you, you didn’t get badly hurt, but I had this real sense and I think another part of that was is that the time where the, the reinforced – that whoever the guy was that at Walden Pond who says, you know, you think you’re tough, McGuire, you know, and I have a wrestling match with him and he has a heart attack.
M:He did?
J:Yeah.
M:Wow.
E:Did he die?
J:No, he didn’t die.
M:How old was he?
J:He was fifty, I was fifteen
E:He was probably doing something he shouldn’t.
M:Fifteen or fifty. [The answer was the guy who wrestled with my brother Jim was 50 when Jim was 15.]
J:Yeah, cause I, I have, uh, I think there was a part like smart ass, I mean ...
E:Well, yeah, everybody – that’s why, we talk about the gang leaders. There were only two gang leaders in the town and they both hate Jimmy. [name] because he had the sister Peggy and she liked you and you didn’t like her and that was, that was bad news and the only other gang – it was like a small dumb one – two gang leaders, that’s it, you know. Anywhere else, you have maybe a hundred ...
M:Oh, my gosh.