Newark neighborhood reunion is reminder of great memories, harsh reality

The more they talk, the more their childhood memories flow like water running off a cliff.
They were poor and didn’t know it. Blacks, whites, Italians, Jews and Poles — a mosaic of culture bound by friendship at a Newark public housing complex built just after the Great Depression.
Families made potluck meals and no one went hungry. There was always room for one more at someone’s dinner table.
This was a time where parents yelled from the window looking for their kids, chastising others doing wrong. Frank the cop kept them in line, too, with a swift kick to the rump for smart aleck teens who didn’t move along fast enough when he told them to.
"When I got home, I told my father," said Teddy Vitolo, 65, who felt the shoe leather. "You know what he did. He booted me in the (butt). He said he’s right and you’re wrong."
And no matter what time of day it was, there was always somebody outside playing at Seth Boyden, a sprawling three-story development of 530 apartments that today sits nearly vacant off Frelinghuysen Avenue.
The reunion committee of old-timers is saddened to see their old neighborhood this way — barren and lifeless. But every 10 years or so, former residents like Vitolo gather to remember a rich past. They’re doing it again this year — and it’s possibly the last hurrah — when they converge on the Woodbridge Hilton in September. The call has been put out through e-mail and Facebook, but they’re looking for more to come out through this missive.
Ron Dubrow, owner of a graphic design printing business in Springfield, put together a nostalgic picture book the last time they got together. There were classic black-and-white images capturing life in the projects. On every other page, students in class photos from 1951 to 1967 smile at you. The girls wore dresses; the boys, jackets, shirts and ties.
"We had so much fun," he said. "It’s the things you enjoyed as kids."
Dubrow, 66, of Point Pleasant is doing another memory book, asking for pictures and written recollections that take him and committee members back to that innocent time in their lives.
They could sit out on the stoop and play cards until midnight. If you were at home and wanted to talk to somebody in the apartment above, you’d tap the steam pipes twice for the second floor and three times for the third.
"Whoever you were trying to reach would look out the window and say, ‘Yeah, whaddaya want,’ " said Sandi Medvedich, Dubrow’s sister.
Larry Russell Brown, who also grew up at Seth Boyden, co-wrote a song about it — "Knock Three Times," made famous by Tony Orlando and Dawn. Dubrow said Brown will be at the reunion, singing that tune and another biggie he co-wrote — "Tie A Yellow Ribbon Round The Ole Oak Tree."
The neighborhood, bordered by Weequahic Park, was a playground of imagination. Friends kicked the can and climbed each other’s backs for a game of "Johnnie Jump The White Horse." They played football in dirt fields next to barrels filled with chemicals, oblivious to the dangers. And somewhere near the Hillside-Newark border, they walked through the woods to swim in a polluted river that changed colors each time they went.
"We’d go back and and it would be yellow," Vitolo said. "The next time, it would be blue. We didn’t know. We were kids having fun.’’
No one got sick, not even when they plucked and ate berries and crab apples that fell from park trees. Kissing it up to God three times always works. On nice days, they sunbathed on the rooftoop, then ran through the basements below to get from one side of the development to the other. When they reached street level, they’d walk along railroad tracks behind factories and jump on slow moving freight trains for adventure.Kids earned money the old fashioned way — whatever way they could. They shined shoes and sold Kool-Aid through the fence to golfers at Weequahic Park. Whenever Frelinghuysen Avenue flooded, they’d push stranded motorists out of the dirty water. Some hustled free circus tickets, helping workers spread sawdust and set up show tents. The A&P warehouse let them unload watermelon trucks, too.
The loot they made or got from their parents took them downtown, riding the bus for 10 cents to check out the movies. Three flicks, the newsreel and cartoons cost 35 cents, entertaining them for hours. On the way home, Vitolo had enough left for a box of Bon-Bon ice cream and Juju beans. Whoever didn’t have money could get free cookies from Burry’s Biscuits. Mayflower Doughnuts let them sneak a few off the conveyor belt.
Dayton Street School is where they learned and partied at the canteen. It’s where Dubrow tried to get out
of going as much as he could. Remember "Red Hots," the small candy that sets your mouth on fire? He would put them under his tongue, then go to the school nurse and say he wasn’t feeling well.
"It made my temperature go up and she would send me home,’’ he said.
The reunion committee toured the school recently, talking with staff, telling them about their upcoming shindig. Everything was clean and neat, much like what they remember. Even the blue bench to the left of the main office was still there, the one where students sat when they got in trouble.
"My (butt) print is still there," Vitolo said. "That’s how many times I got sent to the office."
This was their childhood and they cling to it like Linus does his blanket in the Charlie Brown series. They could talk all day about Seth Boyden, their hearts racing with each thought. But Dubrow wants everybody to take it down a little, so they’ll have enough energy in the tank at their age for the fall affair.
"Please take a nap,’’ he said, laughing. "We’re going to be up well past midnight.’’






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