Audio File
Transcript
Does anybody know the corner of Morgan and Webster, the big church there? It would be across from Francis St. I was born there in the 1940s, at the end of World War 2. At the end of World War 2, they built Army barracks on that corner for the men coming home from World War 2. So that’s where my parents lived when I was born. We lived there until 1954, when they finished building Whiteside Rd. Whiteside Rd. was brand new when we moved there. But most people don’t know about those Army barracks. I lived there, I guess, until kindergarten, and the friends that I grew up with in those army barracks are literally still my friends today. No matter where they live in the United States, we all still connect almost every year, whether it’s for somebody’s funeral, somebody’s wedding, somebody’s birthday, whatever, we still have family reunions with our Whiteside Rd. family. That is the family that I call my family, the Whiteside Rd. people. And, as I say, we are still friends to this day. Like I said, no matter where they move to, you know, in the United States, a lot of them went to California, to Atlanta, wherever, but they still come home for our family reunions. I lived in the Hill from, like I said, when I was born in the 1940s till 1965. But they’re still the best memories of my life. I remember when we could do all our shopping right here on Center Ave. We didn’t have to go to downtown Pittsburgh, we didn’t have to go to East Liberty, we didn’t have to go anywhere. We could buy clothes on Centre Ave. We could buy food on Centre Ave. Almost anything we needed was right here in our neighborhood. When I moved to Homewood in 1965, we could still shop in Homewood like that, too. Homewood still had its own shopping district, where we could pretty much shop for anything we needed so that we didn’t have to go to town because unfortunately, in the 1950s, we weren’t welcome downtown, even though I look like I’m white, I’m not, and they knew I wasn’t white, so I couldn’t shop downtown either. My mother probably could have got away with it because she looked more white than me. But in the 1950s, we couldn’t go to town too often. You know, there were only certain stores that they would let us in. But we didn’t really need to. Like I said, because we could do almost everything we needed to do right here in the Hill District. One of my best memories in the Hill District was for the 4th of July. Every year, they were shut that block down right there from this corner to Devilliers-Wylie would shut down, and we would have street dance, where all the stores would put out stalls and sell stuff. People would come and sell food or clothes or whatever, and at Devilliers-Wylie they would put up a stage, and then they would have contests, sort of like the Apollo, where people could come or sing or dance or do whatever they wanted to do on the stage, and we’d get to either boo them or cheer them on. A lot of people got booed off. And at the end of the evening we would all go up to Kennard Field for the fireworks. That’s the way we usually spent our 4th of July. But like I said, a lot of good times, a lot of good times at Ammons Recreation Center, a lot of good times at what was once Hill City. I don’t know what they call it, but it was called Hill City when we were growing up. That’s where we used to hang out, between there and Ammons Recreation Center. I think we still had Ozanam Center down on Knox Street too, or K Boys club. The library, of course, used to be on Wylie Ave. As a matter of fact, where this is, was a gas station. Lots and lots of good times here in the Hill, and as I say, I grew up with eight, a family of eight, and out of the eight of us, five of us are still here in the City. 2, the oldest 2, left, one to California, one to Delaware, and they never came back, but then out of our children, between that eight of us, there are 16 grandchildren. There are, I think, 4 still here. They all left. They didn’t want to be in Pittsburgh. They didn’t want to be a part of… I would like to see that change. I would like to see the younger generation stay here, get their education, invest their time, buy these houses, buy these businesses. Hopefully you will all do well with whatever it is you do in this life. And if you do well, stay here. Don’t have to be in the hill, but stay here in Pittsburgh. You know, I would like to see the flight from Pittsburgh, everybody said, “Oh, no, we’re going to Atlanta.” “No, we’re going to Detroit.” “We’re going to New York.” “We’re…” Stay here. We got everything they got. We just don’t have as much of it. Atlanta isn’t better than Pittsburgh. It’s just bigger. They got probably a lot more black people than we got, but they’re not better. Pittsburgh is as good a city as you are ever going to live in, and the Hill District is as good a neighborhood as you are ever going to live in. It just needs its people back.