Month: February 2017

I was born in Jackson Memorial Hospital where my mother recalls laboring while Seminole Indian women squatted to deliver their babies. In the late 1940s through the ’60s, we lived in the Shenandoah neighborhood in a modest home where the police often patrolled around on horseback. We shopped at Katz’s Kosher Meat Market as well as Food Fair on Coral Way. We also filled in groceries by selecting fresh produce from a truck that came around, the milkman who delivered to our door, or by walking to Willingham’s Grocery on Southwest 22 Avenue and 16th Street.

Miami was a quiet, clean, safe, small and segregated town. We had a party line at home or could make a phone call from a telephone booth for a dime. Children walked to school unattended. We rode the buses alone and my friends and I often went downtown by bus to shop, eat at Burdines’ Tea Room or go to the Olympia Theater. In elementary school, we took our salami sandwiches to the Tower, Trail, Tivoli, Miracle or Parkway theaters to attend movies for 25 cents. We spent a lot of time at Shenandoah Park where we had a library, swimming pool, tennis courts and a free kindergarten. I was a Brownie and Girl Scout in elementary school and we camped out at Camp Mahachee near Matheson Hammock.

My family often went to Policeman’s Park on Sunday afternoons where there were various rides. Sometimes, we drove across the Rickenbacker Causeway to Crandon Park. While crossing it, we always noticed Virginia Beach (the only beach where “colored “people could swim). We would grill or swim at Crandon Park and sometimes visit the zoo which was located there. Our schools were not air-conditioned and neither were most homes. We were so thrilled when my parents won a room air conditioner at an auction.

At Shenandoah Elementary, the principal, Miss Eloise Hatfield, read from the New Testament every morning over the PA. We were to recite psalms and sing Christmas carols even if we were Jewish. Girls had to wear dresses no matter what the weather. There was a green bench near a staircase in front of the principal’s office where children, usually boys, sat when they misbehaved. We were not allowed to chew gum, smoking was for the “hoods” and parents were involved in the PTA. I never had a “colored” classmate, teacher or neighbor. I did, however, march during the civil rights movement at the University of Florida in 1963-64. Also, when Dade County schools were integrated in 1970, I was sent to teach at all-black Frank C. Martin elementary.

My family attended synagogue at Beth Kodesh on Southwest 12th Avenue and 12th Street. On a few occasions, I remember the sounds of bombs that were thrown on the “shul.” We would go and see the broken chandeliers and windows and the fear in our parents’ eyes. My father emigrated from Poland in February 1939, six months before Hitler marched in and killed the rest of his family.

I went to Shenandoah Junior High where we had P.E. every day and girls had to take up home economics and the boys took shop. Students that misbehaved were paddled by “Mr. K.”

I will always remember the teachers crying during class after they learned on TV that the Russians had launched Sputnik. We had subsequent duck-and-cover drills where we had to get under our desks and cover our heads. Years later, during the Cuban missile crisis, we were terrified as we witnessed American troops marching down Flagler Street.

By high school, most of the Jews at Miami High (approximately 20 percent to 30 percent of the student body) stuck together. The service clubs at the school were predominately Christian, but we had our own clubs through the “Y” on Southwest 17th Avenue or the B’nai B’rith Organization. We hung out before and after school on the east outdoor patio known as “L.J.” (Little Jerusalem). We rarely dated outside our religion and although most of our parents were not college educated, most all of my friends finished college.

One of my painful recollections at Miami High was that the High Holy Days for Jews were unexcused absences. (They later made them teacher work days.) Sometimes, the rabbi at Beth David would write notes asking the teachers to not penalize us for observing our holidays. My friend Miriam and I were in the same Spanish class and were each given an F on a test that was administered on one of the holidays. We went to the department chair and pleaded our case and were permitted to take a make-up exam.

Overall, these were the best of times. Innocent in every way (no birth control yet), we had a blast at the Red Diamond Inn, Jahn’s Ice Cream Parlor and formal dances at famous hotels on Miami Beach. We saw Johnny Mathis, Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme among other star performers. We went to drive-in movies and often stuffed some friends in the trunk to avoid paying for entry for all of us. I met my husband, Steve, in 11th grade TV history class. He was a great athlete for Miami High and is in the Miami High Sports Hall of Fame. We had pep rallies before football games, which were held at the Orange Bowl. Unfortunately, it was later demolished. At Miami High, the school spirit in that architectural giant of an auditorium was unforgettable. We wore jinx dolls to spook the opposing teams and took pride in our school, which won a national championship. The Stingarees won big in sports and while there, we actually had the first Jewish homecoming queen. We were required in our senior year to take a course called Americanism vs. Communism, which reflected the fears that eventually took many of our classmates to Vietnam, some of whom never came back. However, being kids, our life was simple, people were respectful and we had no clue that almost one-third of our graduating class was made up of newly arrived Cubans.

I love this cosmopolitan city with its beautiful beaches and diverse culture. I also feel so grateful to have raised both of my wonderful sons here. Additionally, I have been blessed with teaching ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) both in Dade County Schools and now at Miami Dade College for over 40 years. My students from all over the world and many different cultures have taught me so much. Miami has changed a lot, but my heart is still here in this balmy metropolis with ocean breezes and life-long friends and memories.

Growing up in South Dade in the early years was a great time. I was born in 1923 at home in Redland. My father came to Florida from West Virginia in about 1917. My mother came from Massachusetts.

My father tried tomato farming for about a year, and failed. He then began growing avocadoes. We had about 25 acres where our home was built. My brother John was born in 1920. When I was 5 years old I was sent to Redland Elementary School. They put me in the first grade class, and when I transferred to the Homestead Elementary the next year, I was put in second grade.

We took the bus from Redland to Homestead. We walked about a fourth of a mile to catch the bus. I had great teachers; including Neva King Cooper, who was my sixth grade teacher.

We used to swim in the many rock pits around Homestead. There was a particularly good one west of Avocado Drive. They kept digging out more coral rock for construction, making the pit larger. The town also had a pool east of of Eighth Street.

On weekends, we would go to the beaches around Miami. A favorite was Tahiti Beach. I think it was near Coconut Grove. There was an admission charge, but it was a great place for us little ones. We also swam at the Venetian Pool in Coral Gables.

My aunt lived in the Gables. When I was about 5, we spent a few weeks on Miami Beach in an apartment near Eighth Street. It was a short walk to the beach. When I was six, I was sent to summer camp in Alabama with my brother. The camp was owned by L.B. Sommers, who was the principal of Homestead High School. Later he founded the Miami Country Day School with C.W. “Doc” Abele.

In 1938, we rented a house on 88th Street in Surfside. We were a few blocks from the Surf Club. It is hard to believe that in those days so many places, including large hotels in Miami Beach, were restricted based on religion or race. Key Biscayne and Crandon Park came a little later. Virginia Beach was created for the non-white residents.

We had an annual festival in the Spring in Homestead. The fairgrounds were west of Route 1 off of Campbell Street. A lot of the farmers and growers had exhibits, as well as the commercial establishments. There were sideshows, rides and other amusements for the younger crowd.

My father always had a booth to show his nursery and grove planting business. (He, like many others, became a real estate dealer during the boom years of the 1920s. He had an office in Miami at 28 S.E. First Ave. It, of course, closed at the end of 1929). This festival in Homestead lasted for many years, and I think it was replaced by the festival at Fruit & Spice Park.

When I entered seventh grade, I moved across the street to Homestead High School. When I became a freshman I got a job at Brown’s Drug Store. I worked there after school and weekends until I graduated from Homestead High in 1940. My brother and I took music lessons for several years. I played the clarinet, while he played the trumpet.

I was in the high school band. We always marched in the Orange Bowl Parade and played at the Orange Bowl games. This was quite an honor for us kids from Homestead.

In 1935, one of the worst hurricanes struck the Florida Keys. There were many fatalities and the railroad to Key West was destroyed. The roadbed and the bridges were converted into a highway that was opened in 1940.

My Aunt & Uncle and my Mother and I drove to Key West and spent the night at the La Concha Hotel. We also went to the Aquarium, and that was about all there was to see. It was a very small town in those days. It was quite a trip.

I spent one year at college and returned to Homestead. I worked at the Dixie Drug until 1942. A friend and I went to a camp to study sheet metal work, so that we could get a job in the aircraft industry. We got a job with an aircraft company in Miami. I lived in a boarding house on Southwest First Street.

I enlisted in the Army Air Corps in 1942, and spent three years in the service. I was in North Africa and Italy. I was discharged in 1945 in Boise, Idaho, and went to Connecticut to visit an old classmate.

I stayed in Connecticut after I found employment with a department store. I retired in 1980. We still go to Florida in the winter. We rent a condo in Venice. I still visit Homestead now and then. I plan to go down there again soon.

The Homestead High School still has a reunion every year. The last class was in 1950, so it probably will end soon. I miss my old classmates, and each year there are fewer. It is true that everything changes with time, but that is the same all over this country.

Vivid memories of Miami in early 60s

I arrived in Miami with my mother on Friday, July 7, 1961 a little before 7 p.m. I consider myself Miamian, Dade-ian, South Floridian, Southeastern, all of those demonyms.

Bus fare was 20 cents. Newspapers were on wire racks at sidewalk curbs on the honor system with a cigar box or a tin can. The main post office at Northeast First Avenue and Third Street was open until midnight. Domestic postage was 5 cents an ounce and national air mail, 8 cents.

The closest supermarket was a Kwik Chek. Supermarkets gave trading stamps, Kwik-Chek gave yellow Top-Value. I got many gifts with them at Northwest 27th Avenue, including china, luggage and a Bible. Publix didn’t open on Sundays.

Service stations sold Dade and Puritan milk at 98 cents a gallon. “Home” milk, on Northwest Seventh Avenue, had a carton spinning in front and it advertised, “If it were any fresher, it’d moo.” The Walgreens drug store on East Flagler Street and Second Avenue served food on four floors.

Some self-serve cafeterias were Tyler’s and Polly Davis. At the White Castle on Southwest 27th Avenue and Flagler Street, a square hamburger was 14 cents, root beer 9 cents. Richards Department Store on Northeast First Street and First Avenue had six floors, a bargain basement and a coffee shop with green ivy and trellis pattern wall paper. I worked part-time at their jewelry counter in the 1963 Christmas season. The wages were $1.15 an hour.

Homes didn’t have air conditioning. Roberts’ Drug Store on West Flagler Street and Sixth Avenue was open all night and it had a television set in a wooden box in the parking lot across the street with benches for the viewers. Television was black and white, and there were five channels, 4 CBS, 7 NBC, 10 ABC, 2 WPBS and 6 Independent.

My favorite radio station was WIOD 610; others were WGBS, WINZ, WQAM. The main library was in Bayfront Park on Biscayne Boulevard and Flagler Street, and it had an open Bible in a glass case under a banyan tree in front. Vendors sold bags of peanuts to the people to feed the pigeons in the park.

I learned how to drive on the parking lot of the Orange Bowl. Drivers’ licenses were issued by the Florida Highway Patrol, on West Flagler Street at 26th Avenue, and they were pink, typed, and didn’t bear a photograph. I bought my first car, a used cream-colored 1961 Falcon with 5,000 miles, at the Joseph Abraham Ford dealer on Southwest Eighth Street and 27th Avenue.

Gas was around 32 cents a gallon, and the oil companies were American, Standard Oil, Texaco, Atlantic, Gulf, Pure, Shell, Sinclair, Sunoco, Cities Service, Hess, Phillips 66, Union 76. Most gave street maps of Miami and road maps of Florida. The parking meters took nickels. The overtime parking fine was $1.

The telephone company had an office on Northeast Second Street and Miami Avenue where you could consult out-of-town telephone books and place long-distance calls. There were seven movie theaters on Flagler Street, Town, Paramount, Florida, Olympia, Miami, Flagler. In Coral Gables were the Miracle, the Gables, the Coral and Riviera. Federal savings & loan associations gave 5.25 percent interest on their savings accounts and stayed open until 3 p.m., state commercial banks gave 5 percent and were open until 2 p.m.

In the summer, two girl friends and I spent every Saturday and every Sunday at Indian Beach Park on 46th Street. In the evening, we went to the amphitheater in Pier Park on Ocean Drive by Pier 1 to dance. We went to dances at the Police Benevolent Association, the Hungarian-American Club, the Polish-American Club.

There were no shopping malls. There were three arcades downtown on East Flagler Street. There were juice stands. The nearest shopping center was Central Shopping Plaza at Northwest Seventh Street and 37th Avenue.

The population of Dade County, according to the 1960 census, was 935,047.

There were two bus stations, Greyhound on Northeast First Street and Third Avenue, and Trailways across the avenue. There were three railroad stations, Atlantic on Southeast First Street and Second Avenue, Florida on Southwest First Avenue and Third Street and Seaboard on Northwest Seventh Avenue and 22nd Street. Northwest 36th Street was lined with car dealers.

On Fifth Street in Miami Beach, there were many car agencies that would give cars to people to drive up north for, and deliver to its owner, and in one direction, going up in summer or coming down in winter. They provided a tankful of gas. Little booths on Bayfront Park sold boat rides on the bay.

Postal zones had two digits. Is there anyone left who remembers the old telephone exchanges? I remember CEdar, EMerson, FRanklin, JEfferson, MOhawk, MUrray, NAtional, NEwtown, OXford, PLaza, TUxedo, UNion and WIlson.

I got married at Sts. Peter & Paul Catholic Church on Southwest 26th Road. My son was born at Mercy Hospital on South Miami Avenue.

I got an associate in arts degree in business administration at Miami-Dade Community College New World Center, and worked as a corporate banking assistant at Southeast Bank in Miami Springs.

April is National Poetry Month. In South Florida, that means the month-long annual O, Miami Poetry Festival. As part of the 2016 festival, students from all over took part in programs that encouraged them to write and share their own poetry. These Miami Stories feature poems from some of those students. The poems are based on their lives in Miami-Dade County.

 

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PUT THE GUNS DOWN! THIS NEED TO STOP!

I pray for the children who woke up this morning and lost their life to gun violence
As soon as a tragedy happens the person you call is God
Now people obeying’
They praying’
I’m sayin’.
It’s odd.
Look at the world now
How you going to say it now?
We out here
Just living life
Music is life now
What are we doing for the life of people that’s gone now?
They never coming back
Music is our life now.
My loved ones lost are in the sky with God
Angels with wings on their back
Living a new life
This is why music is life
You got the trap boys living the life
This is a cold world
Music is life
It’s our life now
Too many boys out here
Living this life
Losing their life
We’ve got to come together as one
And make it for our love ones
They are gone and never coming back
Now I’m rapping for y’all and writing these poems
Because I believe in y’all
Music is my limit, while for y’all the sky’s the limit

— Kayla Ingraham, 15, eighth grader at North Dade Middle School

 

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Maybe

I wish I could change my name
Or the frame on the picture that everyone is looking at
From the outside in
They swear they lookin’ deep with
And all they could see is my skin
Maybe I’d change it to something pretty “Lisa” or “Mary”
And then people would approach me and then
Maybe then I wouldn’t look so scary
I could get out my story
Then I wouldn’t have to worry
If I would have to eat alone
Maybe I’d change it to something brave like “Johann” or “Melissa”
Maybe the I could’ve scared away the monsters under my bed
Then they wouldn’t have crawled inside of my head
Or maybe change the frame
I’d put sparkles so you’d think I was pretty
Sign it with X’s and O’s so you’d think I was nice
So tell me when you look at me what do you see?

— Yazzmine (YazzTheGreatest) Brown-Livingston, 14, eighth grader at North Dade Middle School

 

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DREAMS ARE ILLEGAL IN THE GHETTO

DREAMS ARE ILLEGAL IN THE GHETTO
YOUNG KIDS CAN DREAM BIG BUT
THEY ARE INFLUENCED BY DRUGS GUNS
AND VIOLENCE.
PEER PRESSURE
AND THE DEVIL IS THE MAIN FACTOR.
SCREAM LOUD LET EM KNOW
HIT EM WITH THE FOLKS!
SPIN AROUND!
CLAP TWICE!
DREAMS ARE NOT ILLEGAL IN THE GHETTO! CRIPS
BLOODS, GANGS, GANGBANGERS, IS ALL I KNOW BUT
I DO BELIEVE IN GOD AND THE DEVIL CAN’T BRING
ME DOWN.
I WILL DREAM AND I WILL DREAM BIG.
I WILL SUCCEED I WILL NOT FAIL BECAUSE DREAMS
ARE NOT ILLEGAL IN THE GHETTO.

— Da’Juan Bethel, 14, eighth grader at North Dade Middle School

 

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Where I Am From

I am from Miami where the waves go swish,
and people chat, and the highway
sounds like an elephant stampede.
I live in an orange building
that has four stairways and 18 apartments.
My street is near the school (only 3 blocks away),
and a corner store
where I shop for food for the next day.
I am also from Haiti where the people party all night
and use a pool to celebrate birthdays.
And the food tastes like spaghetti with meatballs.
I lived with my grandma and inside it is freezing,
more freezing that the arctic pole.
And my grandma’s cooking smells better
than hamburgers and vanilla ice cream cake.

— Dieneka, fourth grader at Orchard Villa Elementary School

 

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This Is My Home Town

I am from Liberty City
where sometimes the temperature is just right.
I am from a place where the balls
dribble, dribble, dribble all day.
I am not from a place like yours.
I live in a dangerous place.
I am not from a place with bad people.
I hear police sirens screeching.
We also have many parks with red slides
and hurricanes with strong winds.
I am from a place where flowers like to bloom.
and the sky is blue like God loves you.

— Francklin, fourth grader at Orchard Villa Elementary School

 

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What Miami is Like

I am from Miami
where the rain pops

— Jaykayla, third grader at Orchard Villa Elementary School

 

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Ode to the Beach

Yellow sand, blue waves.
The water is so wavy, so wavy
it looks like the spikes of a boy’s Mohawk.
It feels like I am taking a vacation.
It feels like peace and quiet and making
a sand castle with my mom.

— Mia, Culter Ridge Middle School

 

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Odes to the Ocean

Flying up to the sun, falling through
the air like leaves falling from the tree branches,
rain jumps off of the umbrellas onto the ground
cold as the frozen pole, warm as water sweat
as the body movement moves from the pores
running through pipes out from sinks,
sipping water from the water bottle, tastes
like it’s healthy for the body, this is the life of the ocean.

— Tony, Cutler Ridge Middle School

 

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It’s softy wave, calm
is blue.
I get in the ocean
and feel like I’m going
into the world of donuts.
It has fish made of donuts
and shark friends.

— Justin, Cutler Ridge Middle School

 

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“I am warm, wide, I need someone to jump in.”
I jump in.
I see urchins and starfish.
I taste salt.

— Zamare, Cutler Ridge Middle School

In early 1941, Europe and Asia were at war and the threat of United States involvement was growing exponentially. Not to be deterred, the Bennett family (Mom, Dad and 5-year-old Billy) stuffed its belongings into a cream-colored 1937 Packard convertible and set sail for the land of coconut palms and sea breezes.

With Miami the ultimate destination, the odyssey launched from Upper Montclair, New Jersey, but was impeded by a six-month hiatus in Wilmington, Delaware, for Dad to work and refurbish the family fortune.

On the move again, the 1,161 mile-trip south dictated two motel stops; it was not unusual in 1941 to travel all night and not find an open gasoline station, even on U.S. 1. The first morning, motoring below the Mason-Dixon line, I savored, for the first time, grits for breakfast (I never made that mistake again).

Mission completed, the trip terminated in the Magic City in August 1941, where we immediately checked into a Miami Beach hotel. And what was the first thing a red-blooded American kid would do next? HIT THE BEACH! And Mom and I did — for more than five hours.

All the exposed parts of our bodies were lobster red and we were splotched head to toe with Noxzema and looked like a couple of cherries jubilee. Welcome to Florida.

After a month on the beach, we found a house in Coral Gables, Mom and Dad got jobs, I was enrolled in school and we settled in as Miamians — for the next 50 plus years.

The first marine went over the fence, parlez vous

The second marine went over the fence, parlez vous

The third marine went over the fence

And milked the cow with a monkey wrench.

Hinky, dinky, parlez vous!

Mozart it wasn’t, but this little ditty was an integral part of my musical education in the summer of 1942.

I was 7 years old, living in Miami Beach at 87th and Harding Avenue, one block from Collins Avenue, hotel row and the Atlantic Ocean. The world was at war and the military had commandeered all the hotels on Miami Beach.

Each day, I arose early, ensuring an opportunity to march with the Army soldiers down Collins Avenue. What a thrill and what an experience. I learned all their march cadences, sang their songs and, though young, shared a sense of belonging and camaraderie with them as well. Also, it didn’t hurt that those same soldiers treated the “marching kids” like gems.

The nights, black as charcoal, were marked by darkened street lights, the few cars running with only slits of headlights visible, blackout shades in every home drawn and constant rumors of Nazi subs offshore. A small light from your house earned a visit from the air-raid warden.

A trip to the movies? Gasoline rationed, we walked the several blocks to the Surf Theatre. Of course, in those days we enjoyed a feature, a newsreel, a cartoon and maybe a sing-along where we followed the bouncing ball over the onscreen lyrics.

I lived the remaining years in Miami proper — without blackouts, military exercises and the rumors and much of the fears. But I missed being a part of the training and excitement of our United States military — and, of course, my unparalleled musical education.

I moved 12 times during my 12 years of public school in Miami. The year 1947 found me living with my parents on a wooden 31-foot cabin cruiser at Pier 4 1/2, adjacent to Bayfront Park in downtown Miami. That location placed me smack dab next to Pier 5 where the charter boats plied their trade, taking tourists deep-sea fishing in the nearby waters of the Atlantic Ocean. In the late afternoon, when the fishing fleet had returned, I would walk over to Pier 5 and check out the various small fish tossed on the dock. Occasionally, Mom would purchase a dolphin for that evening’s dinner.

Just as you entered Pier 5, and a little to the left, sat the Tradewinds Restaurant. I remember one night I was perched on a bollard at the end of a dock listening to the Tradewinds’ juke box with strains of “Heartaches,” played by the Ted Weems orchestra, drifting across the shimmering moonlit water. Other nights, I would walk over to the Bandshell in Bayfront Park and join the crowd enjoying a free concert. Not a bad life for a 12 year old.

My only other year living on the boat was up the Miami River just below Musa Isle Indian village and tourist attraction. Not my finest hour, but I would row to the river side of the village, sneak in and without benefit of an admission ticket, watch the alligator wrestling.

Boat living? Bittersweet. Lots of fun going out on Biscayne Bay most weekends and rowing on the Miami River — but little privacy, miniscule closet space, midget head and, regardless of the season, icy cold on-dock showers. Fun for a while but, truth be told, kind of glad to get back in a house.

In the late ‘40s and early ‘50s, the Citrus Grove older elementary and junior high kids, when not playing school sports, played park ball at the Annex. Annex Park, located on the south parking lot of the Orange Bowl, housed a softball field and a basketball court. A well-hit softball to left field might tag an Orange Bowl ticket booth.

Depending upon the season, we played football, basketball and softball, doing fierce battle against other City of Miami parks. Uniforms? Pants, T-shirts, and most of the time, bare feet.

The park supervisor, a local character, answered to (I kid you not) “Itchy.” The kids loved Itchy Schemer, but his greatest claim to fame was probably his brother, “Lefty.” Lefty Schemer played briefly in the “bigs” (New York Giants). Occasionally, Lefty would drop by the park and, farther than we had ever seen, rocket some balls out to right field which was deep and where the Orange Bowl wasn’t. Of course, we were in absolute awe.

The Annex eventually yielded to the need for more Orange Bowl space and the Orange Bowl itself would, not long ago, disappear from the Miami skyline. But for many of us, what will never fade is the memory, in a simpler time, of those youthful and playful Annex Park Days.

I am the youngest of the Wood brothers — Hayes, David, Hugh “Hooty” and Tom — all born between 1926 and 1931. We were very close and shared many things together in Old Miami. We all were born at Victoria Hospital on Northwest 10th Avenue, which still exists as a nursing and rehab center.

We were raised on a truck farm on Southwest 19th Street, about five acres that is now part of Shenandoah Park and middle school. We were always playing ball in the park. The park had many famous supervisors who went on to play pro ball, including Al Rosen with the Cleveland Indians and Lefty Schemer with the New York Giants. My only buddies still around are Lester Johnson, Fred Kirkland and Ed Woitke.

We attended and were baptized at the Riverside Baptist Church on Southwest Ninth Avenue and First Street (the congregation moved to Kendall in the 1970s and the church sanctuary now houses the Manuel Artime Theater).

As kids, we worked with the farm’s chickens and vegetables and created Wood Brothers Poultry and Produce Co. We sold the products to Wrights Market on Southwest Eighth Street and 22nd Avenue. My brothers and I all attended Shenandoah Elementary and Junior High schools. I also went to Coral Way Elementary when it opened in 1937 on Southwest 19th Street and 13th Avenue. We all went to Ponce de Leon Senior High School on U.S. 1 in Coral Gables. My brothers Hayes and Hugh and I were president of the student council. I met my beautiful wife, Virginia, in high school in 1949 and in June we will have been married 60 years. Ponce is now a middle school and the high school is now Coral Gables Senior High on Bird Road.

My brothers and I founded a band and played at high school dances, New Year’s Eve parties and other events. Hayes played saxophone; David and I, trumpet; and Hugh was on the trombone.

Someone gave my brother Hooty an Indian Pinto horse. He would hop on bareback and pull me up behind him and we would ride all the way down 22nd Avenue to the bay, where we would swim in cold, ice-blue water so clear we could see the bottom and the fish clearly.

We watched the roller derby at the Coliseum on Douglas Road. It is now a Publix and eight-story condominium. John Rosasco was the star of the team. He later ran Venetian Pool in Coral Gables, where everyone loved to hide in the caves. Fader’s Drug Store on 22nd Avenue and Coral Way was a popular spot for milkshakes and root beer floats. I remember watching Pan Am Clippers on the bay in the Grove on the site of what is now Miami City Hall.

It was only a bike ride to the Tower Theater on the Trail and for nine cents I could see two double features, a cartoon and a live amateur show. We could hop the Dunn bus at the corner and go downtown to various theaters — the Rex, Town or Paramount — and have a grilled-cheese sandwich at the counter of the Red Cross Drug Store, or a hotdog at Woolworth’s for a dime.

There were many favorite eating spots: Rosedale Delicatessen, owned by the Pont brothers (I would have corned beef on rye with a slice of onion and mustard, a big kosher dill and some potato salad); Kitty and Jean’s on the Trail; hotdogs at the Pig Trail Inn on Miami Beach. Who remembers the Mayflower Doughnut Shop on Biscayne Boulevard sporting a sign that read, “As you wander through life in search of your goal, keep your eye upon the doughnut and not upon the hole.”

Sometimes all four of us would take a long bike ride to the deserted University of Miami skeleton campus, where we would swim in the lagoon. Today, UM is one of the finest private universities in the country. I am honored to serve as a member of the Board of Trustees. All four of us worked our way through UM. Three of us graduated with juris doctor degrees and one with a master of engineering.

All of us served in the armed forces: three Naval officers and one Army Air Corps technician.

One of my favorite memories was riding on the handlebars of my oldest brother’s bicycle on a Saturday morning as we and my other brothers went to the Ringling Brothers Circus in the vacant lot on the northeast corner of Coral Way and Douglas Road. There, we watered the elephants until the matinee started. We got free admission plus money we spent on hotdogs.

My brothers always looked out for me and I will never forget them as I am blessed to still live in Miami, the Magic City.

My family moved to Miami from Philadelphia in August 1959 as I was nearing my 6th birthday. My father, Nate Adelman, owned a successful furniture store in Philly and at the ripe old age of 40 decided to hire someone to run the business for him while we would live in sunny Miami and enjoy the beautiful weather and sandy beaches. After spending our first year in the Shenandoah neighborhood we moved to a beautiful new house in the Skylake section of North Miami Beach.

North Miami Beach was a wonderful place to grow up. The neighborhoods were very safe and kid friendly. You could play outside at all hours of the day without any fears and there were many fun and interesting activities to partake in. At the back of our home was Sparling Lake. We would swim and fish in the lake and my older brother and sister, Nolan and Linda, would go water skiing in our 15-foot Boston Whaler boat. We lived just a few blocks from Greynolds Park and you could spend the day there hiking through the trails, fishing, and riding on the paddle boats.

My mother, Zena Adelman, would roast the most amazing rotisserie chickens and the family would enjoy our lunch sitting on the picnic tables in one of the park pavilions overlooking the lake. Each Sunday the family would spend the day together at nearby Haulover Beach along with my grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. We would grill burgers and hot dogs, go swimming in the ocean, and play games of horseshoes in the sand.

The 163rd Street shopping center was an open-air center back then and was the place to go. Besides Burdines, Richards, JC Penney, and Woolworths there were the movie theaters and the little amusement park full of rides for the children. It was also the home to such wonderful eating places back then as Corky’s, Wolfie’s, Mr. Coney Island, Mr. Donut, and Figaro’s Pizza.

Back in the 1960s the public schools in North Miami Beach were not air conditioned or heated. In the winters you would really have to bundle up to stay warm and the rest of the year you had to battle the heat. I can remember the sweat running down my forehead onto the papers I would be writing on throughout my years at Ojus Elementary, JFK Junior High, and Miami Norland Senior High.

North Miami Beach had a very large Jewish population during the time I grew up there. I attended Hebrew school at Beth Torah and later on at Temple Adath Yeshuron. These were both wonderful congregations and along with my magnificent parents they taught me important family values that have stuck with me throughout my life.

As I got to be an older teen I experienced the wonders of downtown Miami. My best friend and I would take an hour-long bus trip to Flagler Street to check out the stores and restaurants and take in a movie or two before taking that long trip back home. It was like visiting another country for us back then with all of the Cuban cultural things we would find there that were so different than what we were accustomed to at that time in North Miami Beach.

After graduating high school I began what was to be a temporary weekend job as inventory help at the new JByrons department store at the Skylake Mall. That temporary job ended up lasting 25 years. I worked as a stock boy and salesperson while attending Miami-Dade Community College and later FIU. After graduating from college in 1975 I went into their management program and was the store manager at many of their locations from 1977 until they unfortunately went out of business in 1997.

During my 20 plus years in retail management I worked in numerous areas of Miami-Dade County, such as Allapattah, Suniland, Cutler Ridge, Homestead, Kendall, Skylake, Hialeah, and Coral Gables. I was very fortunate to work with so many outstanding people during those years of all different races, ethnicities, and cultures that help make Miami the incredible city that it is. It also allowed me to meet my beautiful wife, the former Susana Suarez.

We have been married now for over 38 years and have the pleasure of living a multi-cultured life of American-Cuban, as well as Jewish-Catholic. We, along with our loving daughter, Michelle, son-in-law Lu, and new baby grandson, Angel, speak in both English and Spanish, celebrate a number of diverse holidays such as Hanukah and Christmas, and cook and enjoy foods like matzo ball soup and arroz con pollo.

We get to attend the bar mitzvahs and bat mitzvahs of my sister Linda’s beautiful grandchildren and also Noche Buena celebrations with all of the wonderful members of my wife’s family who have been very loving toward me from the very first day I met them. I wouldn’t want to have lived my life in any other way.

As mentioned earlier, these are just some of the things that make living in Miami so unique and I am so happy that I was able to grow up and live here the vast majority of my life.

In 1937, when I was nine months old, my parents, Thomas J. Lee Smith and Lila Smith moved from Tampa to Homestead, Florida so my Dad could pursue a sales position with Kilgore Seed Company.

My dad was orphaned at a young age, so settling into an old wood-framed house in a small farming neighborhood seemed like a perfect setting—family, community, and for Mother, church down the road.

Growing up in Homestead, where everyone knew your name and who your parents were, placed an indelible mark on my perspective of life. Deals could be made with a handshake. Your word was your bond. Trust, loyalty and commitment were a part of your core values and beliefs and each of those were equally embraced and sustained.

In 1943, my world of innocence was turned upside down. World War II had reared its ugly head all the way to Homestead, Florida. Dad was drafted into the Army and shipped off to the Philippines. I was seven years old, and Mother was left to raise me and somehow find a way to keep our family intact and financially secure.

Mother got a job in my school as an assistant to the principal of Neva King Cooper Elementary. We walked together to school every day, waiting for Dad’s return so we could once again return to life as it used to be, but it would take three more years before everything returned to normal.

Dad was back home, unscathed by the war, and working once again at Kilgore selling to vegetable farmers.

As the years passed, Homestead started rising above its small town standing with increased construction of strip malls, restaurants and paved roads.

The Homestead Air Force Reserve Base brought in a military population and there was enough of a surge in residents that old Homestead High and Redland High were merged into the brand-new South Dade High School. My parents bought a house behind the First Presbyterian Church—where I sang first bass in the church choir—and I was part of South Dade’s first graduating class.

In the 1950s, my Dad borrowed money from a friend and founded S & M Farm Supply, Inc., with his partner, A. McIntyre. They rented a wooden building for tomato packing on the southwest corner of U.S. 1 and S. W. 248 Street and next to the F.E.C. Railroad tracks. Not long after that they had a concrete-block warehouse and sales store erected right across from the Homestead Electric Power Plant.

After graduating from the University of Florida with a Bachelor of Science degree in Agriculture, I joined my Dad at S & M. Years later we acquired Woodbury Chemical Company of Homestead, and both corporations were the local base for the agricultural, pesticide, and fertilizer industries in South Florida.

It’s been a long time since Woodbury was sold and S & M closed its doors. My parents have been gone for years. Homestead is different not only because of time and growth, but also from the tragic destruction of Hurricane Andrew.

Our old house is now bank offices and the church is no longer on the corner. I’m quite sure business contracts have replaced the handshake and the farming industry has waned. But I know that one thing still remains the same: I can stop by a roadside stand, pick some strawberries, close my eyes, and remember what it was like when everyone knew my name.

Like every other night, I sit by my window to finish my homework, but tonight the light of the full moon distracted me. It was a beautiful night, but I could only see the full white moon, not the stars. Then I started to remember a time during my childhood when watching the stars was possible every single night.

I also remembered this girl catching cocuyos (fireflies), playing hide and seek with her cousins and friends from the barrio (neighborhood). It was me as a child, with the people I love and whom today I miss the most. Since watching the sky brought me some good memories, I decided to look at albums of photos and videos I had from when I lived in Cuba.

Going through the pictures, I could smell the soft aroma of the jasmine flowers, feel the breeze from the open field, and the sound of the small waterfall near my home. I could hear the woodpecker doing his work on the tall palm tree, the tractor in the far distance plowing the land to plant the sugar cane later in the year, and see the cows passing by the house, which provided me with the milk I drank for 16 years.

I grew up in the countryside of Cuba, in Villa Clara, in Viana, a very small town, and when I say small I mean it. We were roughly 1,000 people. There was only one main road with a broken surface, and the other roads were covered with an orangy dust and when it rained you’d better wear rain boots or you could lose the only pair of shoes you owned.

There was also only one school from pre-kindergarten to sixth grade, and when you got to middle or high school you had to travel to another town. We had one library, where new books came once a year, and the dust and humidity of the place damaged them. There was one clinic, one pharmacy, one food store, three or four clothing stores, and restaurants were 20 kilometers away from where we lived so we had to travel there. And when I say travel I don’t mean go in your car. Cars were a luxury for only a few, so we had to go on buses when they came. It wasn’t easy but somehow we survived. I love the place where I grew up, and I wouldn’t trade it for anything in this world.

As I viewed the pictures, one caught my attention because it brought one of the best memories I have with my uncle, grandfather, and dad. In the picture, we are seated in the green chairs around our dinner table in our old house, watching our Samsung TV of the year 2000. That was our first color TV and we took care of it as if it were gold. We wore orange shirts and we were watching a baseball game. And you’ll have to ask, why is that picture so special? Anyone can have a picture like that one. But since I was little I developed a passion for every televised sport because I saw my dad, uncle, and grandpa watching them; that’s how my passion was born.

My favorite sport of all time was baseball. Every time the season started, my uncle, my grandpa, my dad, and I stayed up until 1 or 2 a.m. watching the games. Obviously I was an Orange fan, that was my Villa Clara team, and we always supported them. The rush of adrenaline, our hearts pumping out of our chests, our sweaty hands, but above all, that moment we all shared together as a family. Now it’s so different; we are 90 miles apart from each other, and every time the season starts my grandpa and my uncle tell me, “¿Vivi, cuando vamos a ver el juego juntos?” (Vivi, when are we going to watch the game together?).

Now, my heart drops because we are close, yet so far apart and I can’t see them as much as I want to. That moment is now in our memory.

I continued looking through the albums, keeping in mind the magical power of pictures. I found more from Christmas. Christmas in Cuba is very different from those here. There are not many decorations in houses or parks. You’ll see a small Christmas tree in most houses with the manger scene, and that’s about it. We celebrate Nochebuena (Christmas Eve) on December 24 and New Year’s Eve on December 31. All the family comes together — Mami, Papi, brothers, sisters, grandpa, grandma, cousins, uncles, aunts, and close friends that are like family. We celebrate with lots of food, rice and beans, and the best puerco asado ever, salads (tomato, cucumber, lettuce, cabbage, and avocado) with lime and a little bit of oil on top and salt, and sweet and salty fried tamale. Yum!

There is nothing better than that, and the dessert time: flan, pudding, grapefruit (and if you eat it with cheese it would be a hundred times better), peanut brittle, fritters with a sweet salsa, and the list keeps on growing as people come. All of the desserts and food are homemade, which make them so much better. While the food is being cooked most of the men in the family start playing dominos, a tradition in our family. Every time we celebrate something, the domino table is around. After everything is cooked we set the table and we eat. The Cuban coffee comes right after.

Then the real party starts. We put on the music and dance from salsa to reggaeton and every genre in between. Everyone has a good time.

Children don’t get to open presents on the night of the 24th because we celebrate “El Día de los Reyes Magos” on January 6. On that day, children open their presents. December 31 is the day that we celebrate the end of a year, and we kind of do the same as on December 24 with lots of foods, sweets, and drinks. We burn the old year by making a scarecrow that symbolizes the old year, and exactly at midnight, we burn it so the New Year can come with prosperity, health, and happiness. We kiss and hug every family member and wish for a better year, and for all the dreams to come true.

One picture was hiding beneath the blanket, the last picture we took before coming to the United States. Suddenly, my heart felt as if it had been ripped out of my chest. It has been four long years since I’ve seen the people in this picture, since I’ve hugged them. The picture was taken at the airport in front of the automatic doors, where once we went in we couldn’t come back. There we were: my mom with her twin brother, Tio Luis, my dad, my brother, and my cousin Yuni, who was like a sister to me. My mom, dad, brother and I were the only ones leaving. The time to say goodbye was the hardest one, but that is another story.