I attended Carnell Elementary School from 1956 (Kindergarten) to 1963 (6th grade). I'm sure much has changed since then. There are a few things that stick out in mind from way back in those days. On some occasions during recess, I would see coal trucks delivering coal to the school. The trucks would unload their coal into large metal chutes accessible from the outside of the school building in the schoolyard. Coal was the fuel used to heat the building. As a matter of fact, I think that Pennsylvania required schools to use coal back then. Makes sense, since Pennsylvania was a major resource for coal. I wonder if that's still the case today. I also remember that teachers would ask kids to take erasers filled with chalk dust down to the boiler room to clean them by clapping them together. I'm sure today those chalkboards have been replaced with whiteboards.
Nowadays most kids commute by school bus, but back in the 1950s/60s, most kids walked to school. Only handicapped students would take the school bus. Along the path to Carnell from my home, I remember there were couple of old street vendors selling soft pretzels from their white pushcarts to kids near the school. I'd also pass by Tarken playground. Those were days when the playground was clean and a decade or two before they build a hockey rink there. I played baseball in a "peanut" league when I was perhaps around 7-8 years old.
I attended Carnell Elementary School from 1956 (Kindergarten) to 1963 (6th grade). I'm sure much has changed since then. There are a few things that stick out in mind from way back in those days. On some occasions during recess, I would see coal trucks delivering coal to the school. The trucks would unload their coal into large metal chutes accessible from the outside of the school building in the schoolyard. Coal was the fuel used to heat the building. As a matter of fact, I think that Pennsylvania required schools to use coal back then. Makes sense, since Pennsylvania was a major resource for coal. I wonder if that's still the case today. I also remember that teachers would ask kids to take erasers filled with chalk dust down to the boiler room to clean them by clapping them together. I'm sure today those chalkboards have been replaced with whiteboards.
Nowadays most kids commute by school bus, but back in the 1950s/60s, most kids walked to school. Only handicapped students would take the school bus. Along the path to Carnell from my home, I remember there were couple of old street vendors selling soft pretzels from their white pushcarts to kids near the school. I'd also pass by Tarken playground. Those were days when the playground was clean and a decade or two before they build a hockey rink there. I played baseball in a "peanut" league when I was perhaps around 7-8 years old.
13 comments:
That looks kind of like the school that was near my grandparents' store/rowhouse on Wyoming Ave (I forget the cross street, there was a Christian Science reading room on the corner though).
Even back then (pre-1968) the playground was unsafe because of all the broken glass, she only took us there once or twice.
I think that school may have had a fenced-in basketball court on the roof though, I know I remember seeing those in Philadelphia. There is an old school building near Johns Hopkins Hospital that has one of those.
The thing I liked about Tarken was the water ice truck in the summer (late 60's/early 70's).
Marilyn Perrone used to sell that waterice,
Do you remember "F**ty Artie"? He sold pretzels ($.05) and water ice. How about "Nate", the "Jack & Jill" ice cream guy? ...and "Monterey Braves" baseball with Ronnie Hoffman?
"I'm buying men's clothing!!"
I lived right across the street (actually caddycorner) from Carnell at Frontenac & Benner. I attended Carnell from 1950 to 1957 and was a safety the last 2 years.
I remember that after our morning safety duties but before the start of school we would meet in the cafeteria for a free cup of hot chocolate; it was made with water and pretty thin but on cold days was still pretty good.
If it had rained and our pants got soaked, we would go down to the boiler room to dry off before class.
I remember my 3rd and 4th grade teachers were Mrs. Goldsmith and Mrs. Miller. The new wing of the school had recently been built and the desks were bigger and more comfortable. Both my 5th and 6th grade teachers were men, but I can't remember their names.
Living across from the school was great. There was a baseball diamond where the portable classrooms are today and a small hill from which we'd start our sleds on snow days and glide all the way down Benner to Castor.
The schoolyard had a basement stairway outside the auditorium building and we called it 'the pit' and used it for bathroom breaks during games.
BTW, does anyone remember Klein's Lunch Bars? They were chocolate bars, like Hershey's, but sold for 3 cents instead of the nickel that the Hershey Bar went for.
I remember that the chocolate wasn't as good, though.
I grew up on Fanshawe, between Longshore and Frontenac. I remember hearing "buying men's clothing" being called. The old man was from Europe.
I pitched for Ronny Hoffman and the Monterey Braves. I was terrible. Hoffman was a jerk, but a really smart guy. He had his eyes on the management side of baseball. I wonder if he made it.
I went from Moore, to Fells, to Washington, to NorthEast, where I got my varsity letter. I studied at Penn State and the New School for Social Research in New York.
Now I live between Duke U. and UNC in Durham, NC. I've got two kids, a son studying at UNCA and a recently engaged daughter. Great kids. Love'em.
Tarken was a great place to play baseball.
Every thing on these posts is a great memory. I went to Carnell, did the safety thing, the eraser thing etc. I played at Tarken playground in every baseball league from little to Monterey. What great memories.
Lived on Langdon Street from, 1954 t0 1969.
Mr. Elser 1955 56
anyone have class pictures carnell 1956 57? Charles Kovler charles441@verizon.net
Mr. Larkin
I remember the green coal trucks backing up to the rear of JH Brown Elementary School and the coal rushing down the chute making a monstrous sound. We would run out of the house and watch the delivery and when the truck left, we would pick up any loose pieces and write with them on the sidewalk or thrown them at each other. Those were the days!
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