I was bowled-over by the photos and text about this key piece of history! It is MY history because I spent my school years, elementary through college, in or near the Brighton Beach Bungalow Colony described in the linked story! NOTE: Brooklyn is the southmost of the five boroughs of New York City. Brighton Beach is in the southmost part of Brooklyn.
OUR BRIGHTON BEACH BUNGALOW
Here is the latest Google Street View of our bungalow (red arrow - second house in from the street - Brighton 6th Street). Although the linked story says most bungalows did not have basements, ours did have a full basement. As the inset photo shows, the front door was several steps above street level.
Most recent Google Street View of the bungalow at 21 Brighton 5th Lane, Brighton Beach, Brooklyn, NY. I lived here with my parents, my brother, and my grandparents during my High School and College years. Our bungalow is the second one in from the street (red arrow). The inset is a 1965 view of my in-laws (Gilbert and Clara Stark) and my parents (Ruth and Morris Glickstein) standing on the steps leading up to the front door of the bungalow.
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My parents did not buy the bungalow until I was in High School. I remember how it looked when we bought it. The floors were uneven and they creaked. However, with the help of a wonderful Italian neighbor who had floor jacks, my Dad and I jacked the floor back to level and ran two new support beams across the house. The basement floor was covered in Kentile and we had a nice recreation room and laundry in the right half and a shop in the left half. Thus, our 30 x 30 foot home had almost 1800 square feet of living space.
OUR BRIGHTON BEACH APARTMENT HOUSE
During my elementary school years, our family lived in an apartment house in Brighton Beach. Here is a Google Street View of the apartment house. The inset shows my brother Lee and me on Brighton 5th Street, with our apartment house on Neptune Avenue behind us.. Our apartment was a one-bedroom second-floor walk-up in the rear of the building. My brother and I shared the single bedroom. Our parents slept on a fold-out couch in the living room.
OVERVIEW OF NEW YORK CITY AND THE BRIGHTON BEACH AREA OF BROOKLYN
Here is a Google Earth image of the Brighton Beach area of Brooklyn, located between Coney Island and Sheepshead Bay.
The inset is an overview of New York City that shows the five boroughs. The Bronx is the northernmost borough with Manhattan to the south and east, Queens to the east, and Brooklyn to the west. The eastern tip of Staten Island is shown to the south-west.
The inset indicates the locations of my high school and college. I took the BMT subway to Brooklyn Technical High School, one of the four special high schools in New York City at the time. Brooklyn Tech is located in the part of Brooklyn closest to Manhattan. For my college years, I took the BMT subway to Times Square, in the middle of Manhattan, and then the IRT subway to 137th Street to City College of New York (CCNY) in Harlem. (If my first class was in the southern area of the campus, I'd take the BMT to 34th Street and switch to the IND subway to 125th Street, the "Main Street" of Harlem.)
The main part of the map above shows BRIGHTON BEACH located between CONEY ISLAND and SHEEPSHEAD BAY. It shows the location of our apartment house on NEPTUNE AVENUE and our bungalow on BRIGHTON 5th LANE. It also indicates the locations of my elementary schools, PS253 for grades K-6 and PS209 for grades 7-8.
As a point of interest, one of my classmates in the 4th grade was Neil Sedaka, already a piano virtuoso. His family lived in Sheepshead Bay in an elegant apartment (from my point of view) overlooking the west end of the bay (under the letter "B" in the above image). He invited me to his apartment and played on his grand piano. He also visited our humble apartment and played on our upright piano, which was probably out of tune, but he did not complain.
As mentioned above, I worked with my father fixing up our bungalow. (In addition to his main job for the Post office as a Letter Carrier and later a Field Forman, my Dad was an expert wood-worker and also did plumbing and electrical jobs on our bungalow, our paternal grandmother's nearby bungalow, and neighbor's homes, often with my help.)
In addition to working with my Dad, I helped my paternal grandfather, who had a news-stand on a subway station. Once a week, I'd do the paperwork involved in returning unsold magazines. I also worked at a nearby shoe store one summer.
When I turned 13 and was able to get working papers, I spent my summer vacations selling Good Humor Ice Cream and Orange Drink on Brighton Beach. I'd walk on the sand, with an insulated box on my right shoulder filled with ice cream pops and Humorettes (their version of Creamsicles), kept cold with dry ice, and another insulated box on my left shoulder with orange drink containers. As I walked I'd drum up business by loudly shouting "HEY ICE CREAM HERE, GOOD HUMOR ICE CREAM AND ORANGE DRINK!" I credit that job for my strong speaking voice.
I also worked the summer after my high school graduation as an office boy and clerk in Manhattan at LF Domerich, a financial factor company. (To get that job I had to lie and claim I was not going to leave for college at the end of the summer.)
Later, during the summer between my Junior and Senior years at college, I worked as a Technical Writer for ITT Federal in Paramus New Jersey, where I learned a great deal about writing and publishing, which helped me greatly throughout my engineering career.
As a point of interest, one of my classmates in the 4th grade was Neil Sedaka, already a piano virtuoso. His family lived in Sheepshead Bay in an elegant apartment (from my point of view) overlooking the west end of the bay (under the letter "B" in the above image). He invited me to his apartment and played on his grand piano. He also visited our humble apartment and played on our upright piano, which was probably out of tune, but he did not complain.
As mentioned above, I worked with my father fixing up our bungalow. (In addition to his main job for the Post office as a Letter Carrier and later a Field Forman, my Dad was an expert wood-worker and also did plumbing and electrical jobs on our bungalow, our paternal grandmother's nearby bungalow, and neighbor's homes, often with my help.)
In addition to working with my Dad, I helped my paternal grandfather, who had a news-stand on a subway station. Once a week, I'd do the paperwork involved in returning unsold magazines. I also worked at a nearby shoe store one summer.
When I turned 13 and was able to get working papers, I spent my summer vacations selling Good Humor Ice Cream and Orange Drink on Brighton Beach. I'd walk on the sand, with an insulated box on my right shoulder filled with ice cream pops and Humorettes (their version of Creamsicles), kept cold with dry ice, and another insulated box on my left shoulder with orange drink containers. As I walked I'd drum up business by loudly shouting "HEY ICE CREAM HERE, GOOD HUMOR ICE CREAM AND ORANGE DRINK!" I credit that job for my strong speaking voice.
I also worked the summer after my high school graduation as an office boy and clerk in Manhattan at LF Domerich, a financial factor company. (To get that job I had to lie and claim I was not going to leave for college at the end of the summer.)
Later, during the summer between my Junior and Senior years at college, I worked as a Technical Writer for ITT Federal in Paramus New Jersey, where I learned a great deal about writing and publishing, which helped me greatly throughout my engineering career.
Ira Glickstein
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