Binghamton Press Article - Published 9/11/2016

An old coot earned ink privileges in third grade the hard way.

By Merlin Lessler

It’s that time of year again; school is back in session. It was over 60 years ago when I was a kid heading back to start my prison sentence in 3^rd grade at Longfellow Elementary School on Binghamton’s south side. It was with mixed feelings that I left the playground and ran to the side door as the morning bell rang. I was sorry, because summer vacation had come to an end, yet excited to see my fellow classmates and to make the transition from pencil to pen & ink. We’d been working toward this transition for two years, filling pages and pages with letters of the alphabet, various size loops, endless coils and other shapes, imprinting writing skill patterns into the cortex of our brains. Those exercises were carried out under close supervision of the teacher who roamed the aisles, observing and correcting our pencil holding technique, and "tsking" when the coils or loops started to wander outside the lines. We did this every day, working toward the payoff that would ultimately come in 3^rd grade. Ink day!

It started one month into the term. Our teacher, Mrs. Babcock, walked over to Alex Palmer’s desk holding a quart bottle of black ink, a tiny nozzle protruding from the top. She slipped open the flap on an inkwell recessed into the upper right hand corner of Alex’s desk and filled it with that black magic. We sat in awe as she handed Alex a wooden penholder, a pen point, a small wiping rag and a blotter with an advertisement for Gardner Motors, the Olds dealer on Front Street. Alex’s face was bright red with embarrassment. Our faces were dark green with jealousy.

Alex now did her schoolwork in ink. All of a sudden, those loops became important; we wanted ink! Little by little, the inkwells around the room began to fill up. Finally, came my turn. By that time, the ink filling duties had been handed over to the students. It joined hall monitoring, eraser cleaning, blackboard washing and other classroom tasks on the chore list by the door. Teacher’s aides didn’t exist in that era. The school staff consisted of a single teacher for each classroom, a principal and a janitor (Mr. Vanick) who took care of the three-story building, inside and out by himself, except for the chores we handled in the classroom.

Blots and spills were common sights on the papers handed in from the boy’s side of the room. The girls, on the other hand, proved yet again, that moderation is best. Like the rest of the boys, I dipped deep and filled my pen point to the max. I didn’t want to bother dipping it into ink every few seconds. As a result, my paper was decorated with a variety of blobs and blots. I didn't know that ink privilege could be withdrawn if I was too messy. I wasn’t the last kid to get ink, but I think I was the first to have my ink well removed and told to use a pencil again. I’d spent too much “discipline” time standing in the hall, the cloak roam and the principal’s office to make the required progress in my pen and ink skills.

I still remember the thrill of dipping the pen point into ink that first time, and even more, the agony I felt when I lost the privilege. I couldn’t produce a single page that didn’t contain at least a blot or two. And, when I tried to use an ink eraser to remove the evidence, it usually tore a hole in the paper. I eventually mastered the technique and by the time I graduated from 6^th grade and entered West Junior I was pretty proficient. But, that’s when we put the inkwell, wooden penholder and steel pen point behind us; we moved on to fountain pens. My first one was an Esterbrook. Later that year I ascended to fountain pen “nirvana. I bought the “Cadillac” of pens, a Sheaffer Snorkel. You didn’t have to dip it into an ink bottle and have the point become a dripping mess; you manipulated a mechanism that pushed a snorkel out the end of the pen point, and then dipped that into the ink, pushed a small lever on the side and the ink was sucked into an internal bladder. My messy days were behind me.  

Writing with was a big deal back then. It wasn’t called cursive or script. It was just called writing, an important aspect of public education. The Binghamton School System employed a Penmanship Director, Elizabeth J. Drake. She oversaw and audited the writing curriculum in all six of the Binghamton elementary schools. At the end of each semester we submitted our best writing sample for evaluation. It was pasted in a "Penmanship Progress Folder and sent to Mrs. Drake.  When we graduated from Longfellow we received a diploma for class work and a penmanship certificate. We also got to keep our writing progress folder showing how much we’d improved from 3^rd grade to 6^th grade. I stumbled upon mine a few weeks ago and all those ink memories flooded back. My proudest accomplishment was getting the highly prized gold seal on my writing certificate. Today’s kids don’t need to bother with what was once an educational requirement. Keyboard skills have replaced writing skills. I’m so jealous. School life would have been so much easier.

 

  

Binghamton Press & Sun Bulletin Article June 12, 2016

Silt piles, a sure sign of spring. 

by Merlin Lessler (The Old Coot)

A silt pile by the curb. It was a sign of spring! You’d see them all over town. Oh sure, robins started showing up long before the silt piles, they were the proverbial early birds, but I didn’t put my faith in them when I was a kid growing up on the south side of Binghamton. Not while enduring a biter cold April and seeing them sit around on snow-covered branches.

But, the silt piles! That confirmed it! Spring was really here.

I lived on Chadwick Road during the silt pile era. There was a storm sewer grate right in front of our house. Something I was well acquainted with since it gobbled up a half dozen of my baseballs, tennis balls and rubber balls every summer. I kept a look out for a city truck to pull up to the curb. When a worker hopped out of the bed of the truck with an iron bar and a long handled, spoon shovel I made my move, ran out the door, crossed the yard and stood by the curb as he pried off the grate with the iron bar started pulling up silt with his shovel.

He was there for the silt; I was there for the balls. The ones I’d tried to retrieve with a hoe or a long stick with a nail sticking out the end. My attempts failed most of the time; the sewer won. The city worker would grunt as he lifted out a shovel full of silt and placed it in a pile next to the curb. I watched for a ball, reaching over and grabbing it when he turned to dip his shovel back into the catch basin. Eventually he lifted out all the silt, left the pile behind and moved on to the next one. I followed. There were two of these ball-eating storm sewer grates on our street.

The neighborhood was eventually dotted with silt piles, awaiting the arrival of the pick up crew, who drove up in the same truck they used in the winter to spread ashes across the road after a snowstorm. The same guy who spooned out the silt in the spring, stood in the bed of the truck tossing long swashes of ash, mixed with sand and cinders across the road in the winter. This combination was the primary source of the silt that ended up in the storm sewer.

We always begged the ash crew to leave a strip along the curb so we could ski and ride sleds down the hill. Sometimes they did, but most often they ignored our pleas. One of the times they left us a strip, my mother skidded her car on it and smashed into a brand new demo in a neighbor’s driveway. I thought I was in for it; I had not only begged for and received a snow strip, I’d bragged to her about it. But, she didn’t blame me; she blamed my father. For buying a car with a “new fangled” automatic transmission (a 1954 ford hardtop). “You can’t control the darn things!” she complained. “It just goes where it wants!”

Anyhow, the silt piles are long gone, as are the city workers with long handled spoon shovels. A giant vacuum machine has taken over the task. All we have now are the robins. And again this year, their prediction of spring weather was premature. 

My sister patsy finishes up clearing the driveway on the 

ill-fated day my mother's car slid down the hill and into a neighbor's car.

Highway to heaven on a pair of ball bearing roller skates (Published May 15, 2016 - Binghamton Sunday press)

Highway to heaven on ball bearing roller skates.

by Merlin Lessler

Roller skates were a big deal for kids who grew up in the 40’s and 50’s. We slipped into our first pair when we were kindergarten age. No big deal. No big skill needed. We schlepped about, pretending to glide along like the older kids who had ball bearing in the wheels of their skates. The wheels on our  “baby” skates barely turned at all.

Then came the big day. Move up day. To “ball bearings.” Like most of the toys that came our way back then, they only came on a special occasion: Christmas, Easter or birthday, unless you were lucky enough to break an arm or leg in a bike or tree climbing accident. Then, you could cash in on it. Pity paid. A new toy was a perfect way to speed up ones recovery.  

I received my first pair of ball bearing roller skates on the Easter when I was seven. I still remember that cold April day; I sat on our front step and put them on using a skate key to tighten the toe clamp and buckling a leather strap around my ankle. I stood up, took one step and was instantly airborne. My arms flailed, my legs kicked, and then, WHAM! I fell back to earth, HARD! I knocked the wind out of myself. I thought I was dying. I crawled over to my father and squeaked, “I’m dead!” There wasn’t enough oxygen in my lungs to speak above a whisper.

It took a few weeks, but I eventually got the hang of it. I could glide along a sidewalk like my older sister Madeline and her friends, often sporting a huge scab on one knee or the other. It was freeing, this newfound ability to cover ground with so little effort. It wasn’t on a par with a bicycle, but a close second. That world was different from today's world. If you looked around a

residential neighborhood in Binghamton, or any small town in America, you’d see kids everywhere: gliding by on skates, playing in school yards, whizzing along on bicycles with baseball cards flapping in the spokes, bouncing on pogo sticks, walking on stilts, tossing baseballs and footballs back and forth. Kids, kids, kids! Outside! Moving! Unsupervised!

And, when we were inside, it wasn’t in front of a TV. Our sloth time came when we lay down on the living room rug in front of the radio, listening to Suspense or Captain Midnight. More often than not though, we were in our bedroom or down in the basement when we couldn’t go outside. A basement that bears no resemblance to the finished rec rooms and man caves of today. There was room to skate in mine, as long as I avoided my mother’s ringer washer and the wet clothes hanging from a line strung along the ceiling. It was a good place to “hang out” on a rainy day. It didn’t matter to us what we did, skate, play games, read comic books, as long as we were out from under the thumb of adults. Kids and adults resided in separate worlds back then and both camps liked it that way.

Ball-bearing roller skates expanded our arena. They took us out of the neighborhood to other parts of the city. Most often, mine took me downtown. I lived on a hill, the third house from the top of Chadwick Road on the south side so I had to walk down to Vestal Ave before I put on my skates. And, like all kids, I skated without a helmet, elbow or kneepads. My route downtown took me through the fifth ward shopping district, past Armand Emma’s Drug Store, which was kitty corner from the Grand Theater where Hop-a-long Cassidy and Roy Rogers graced the silver screen most Saturday afternoons. Past the Baby Bear Market, the Busy Bee 5 & 10 cent store and the Fire Station #5 (now the Number 5 Restaurant). Kids from Longfellow and Lincoln Elementary Schools went there on field trips, and once a year, we lined up in front of an open bay with our dogs to get a free rabies shot. (The dogs, not us) I left the south side, crossing the Washington Street Bridge, which carried cars across the river back then, past the statue of a soldier standing on one leg holding a rifle in the middle of Memorial Circle and on to the center of town.

Planter’s Peanuts on Court Street was my first stop, for a free sample from a guy in a giant peanut costume, then on to McLain’s Department store for a ride on the demonstration saddle in the equestrian department and finally to the soda fountain at Woolworth’s or Kresge’s. Kids had freedom in those days. How different it is now. My friend Woody (Walls) and I took it a little too far one Sunday afternoon when we were about five years old; we decided to walk to State Park. We made it across town to Clinton Street before deciding we’d gone far enough. Our parents never knew we left the neighborhood. If a kid did that today his parents would be charged with child neglect. Even dogs had freedom in those days. My dog, Topper, so named because he was the first of seven puppies to climb the basement stairs, accompanied me wherever I went, even downtown. He patiently waited for me on the sidewalk outside a store or movie theater, while I was inside enjoying a special double feature: two cowboy movies and ten cartoons.

I eventually outgrew the roller skates. They weren’t macho enough. I took them apart and nailed them to a couple of boards to make a hot rod. If you couldn’t afford a set of wheels it was another way to get you racing down the steep south side hills. Sometimes making it to the bottom with the vehicle still intact. It was a male right of passage in the 1950’s. I’d love to strap on a pair of those skates today, but I’m sure I’d be airborne all over again. And, this time I might really end up dead.