On Lewis and Grand you had to walk up a flight of stairs to get to the now-luxurious-but then-barely-middle-class roof penthouse, a one bedroom affair quickly outgrown when I arrived and could no longer fit in a bureau's drawer.
But until my arrival, that penthouse was a sure fire way to beat the heat during the dog days of August. A metal bucket big enough for my sister and any breeze off the East River and stirred by the trains on the Williamsburg Bridge usually did the trick.
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From the "Big Apple" to the heart of the Ontario countryside, kids will be kids. Both my husband and myself have photos of ourselves sitting in our mothers galvanized wash tubs on a hot summer day. How else did you beat the heat? My gram (who lived with us) would make homemade ice cream. I used to sit on the retaining wall with my dad and grandad and have watermelon seed spitting contests. The cellar opened from outside the house and if it was really hot I would take a blanket and go down there to cool off. No ac back in the day, just the good old seabreeze fan that could take your hand off if you weren't careful. What were your cooling off tricks?
Lots of fans and the sprinkler in the park across the street, sometimes the Pitt Street pool and of course those glorious visits to Coney Island.
But mostly fans. Lots and lots of fans.
CO - Lordy, what did we do before we had air-conditioning (I'm sitting right in front of the air-con as I write this)?
I was lucky in that we were out in the country most of the time - big lakes, big trees, lots of shade. Nice wading pools in the back yard for when we couldn't get to the lake . . .
Or maybe a day down in the cellar . . . I never even though of getting air-conditioning until I came to New York . . .
T.
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