PRELUDE

Growing up on one of the Bay Street neighbourhood streets meant growing up on all of them.  It was a good life back in the 1960's as  a little kid no more than 10 years old.   The streets were quiet, tree-lined with families up and down.  On any given day you could see  children from so many different age groups that when you woke up in the morning you knew there would be someone to play with.    Often we would play as a group.  The usual gang consisted of kids from Court Street, Machar Avenue, Johnson Avenue, Bay Street  and Algoma Street.  Some days we would wander to the other streets or children from those streets would venture into our area.  A  few would come from Secord, Ontario, Banning and Crown.  Most often they had their own group and stuck closer to home. 

Tag and  hide-and-seek were old time favourites.  We climbed trees, raided gardens (until we were caught), biked, and often were so wrapped  up in our play that we forgot to go home for supper.  We played farm, cowboys, police and explored every nook and cranny of the whole neighbourhood.  We ran in back alleys, climbed  on tires behind the Bay Street tire store, waded in knee deep water, from the spring thaw, even though our boots  filled up.  There was  never a spring that we did not try to build a raft of some sort to make the adventure more thrilling, if not more dry. Television was left  for Saturday night hockey, Sunday night Ed Sullivan, Red Skelton and Bonanza.  There were a lot of fun tv shows to watch, but more about that later.     

In  those days parents were not afraid for their children.  We were allowed to play to our hearts content.  Sure we had chores and school work, but the payoff was when we could hit the streets in the neighbourhood or loll away our time at a friend's home.


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