(Excerpt from book “Belmont-Arthur Avenue: Little Italy in the Bronx”)

Love Letter To A Neighborhood
By Paula DeMarta Mastroianni

Misty water-colored memories of the way we were…

What was it like, growing up in this neighborhood during the 1950s and ’60s, back when we were called “the kids from Fordham” or “A-HUN-187th Street and Arthur Avenue,” and not “Belmont” as it is known today? If I were to paint it on a canvas, I would have to use only the warmest of colors, cast in an amber light. What was it like, indeed?

With the passage of time, one acquires (it is hoped) wisdom and knowledge. The decades that have come and gone since those halcyon days have instilled in me a deep appreciation for growing up in a place known as “Little Italy of the Bronx” during its final years of innocence. It was, in retrospect, a privilege not too many kids had. Like the television show “Cheers,” it was a place where everybody knew your name (or, more likely, your nickname.) It was a safe and trusting place and time, a family neighborhood that was one big family. It was golden.

By the 1950s, Little Italy of the Bronx was firmly established. The small cluster of Italian immigrants who bravely made their way to this new territory early in the century saw their lineage grow larger with each generation. Then, all of a sudden, BOOM! (as in “baby”) there we were, the newest crop, ready to take our place in its history. But this time in overwhelming numbers, because kids were everywhere, from Southern Boulevard all the way over to 182nd Street -- it didn’t matter, we were all part of the same neighborhood. Separated perhaps by age or interests, but linked to each other by brothers, sisters, cousins, best friends, schoolmates. In our little corner of this microcosm, we shopped at “The Market,” Izzy’s, Feingold’s, Nat’s, Anolik’s, Ray’s Shoe Store, Louie the Jew (now there’s a name to remember,) B&G Clothes, Fabucci Records (where my sister and I bought “Be-Bop-A-Lula” by Gene Vincent. On the way home, I said, “Now we have all the records in the Top Ten!” Characteristically, she answered, “Big deal. That’ll change in a week.”)

Sunday mornings we awoke to the heavenly aroma of meatballs frying and “gravy” cooking for the traditional afternoon meal. At least two of my mother’s younger brothers would invariably stop by for a meatball-and-gravy-Italian-bread “breakfast.” Ten o’clock Mass at Our Lady of Mount Carmel, and then stop for bread on the way home. The indescribable, mouth-watering fragrance of freshly baked panÈ at Addeo’s, Madonia’s, Campobasso, Terranova, and Patsy’s. Then Sunday afternoon softball games at Grace Dodge schoolyard.

Rock & roll was born in the ’50s and we were there to greet and grow up with it. On almost every street corner, a cappella groups were harmonizing, adding their own unique sound to this exciting new music.

During the enormous period of transition, our ever-present, battery-eating portable radios were playing everything from Patti Page (“…you’re sure to fall in love with Old Cape Cod…”) to the Tommy Dorsey Band belting out “So Rare” to catch Latin numbers like Prez Prado’s “Patricia.”

But one flip of that radio dial and, to our parents’ horror, out came flying You ain’t nothin’ but a hound dog, cryin’ all the time! Elvis Presley had arrived. But, with all the sea changes going on, Frank Sinatra still musically ruled and defined the era. If Elvis was destined to be “The King,” then Sinatra would forever be “The Chairman of the Board.”

In 1958, with the release of “I Wonder Why,” our own Dion and the Belmonts made us an irrevocable part of rock & roll history. We were home to one of the greatest groups ever to form the very foundation of rock music, and I was fiercely proud of it. Attending P.S. 32 at the time, I switched my regular route home, by-passing Crotona to Prospect and 183rd Street, so I could pass Dion’s house every day, hoping to catch a glimpse of him!

Today, every “oldie” instantly evokes a place, time, or person…Searchin’ by The Coasters (Gonna find her…): A hot August night in 1957, sitting on the front steps of 2420 Prospect Avenue with the “older kids,” listening to Allan Freed; Johnny & Joe’s Over the Mountain (across the sea, there’s a girl waiting for me…): Leaning on a car fender with my red portable radio, telling my friends “This is gonna be Number One!” (I was right.) My Prayer: Mickey Altieri singing along with The Platters (When the twilight is gone…) The Everly Brothers’ Bye-Bye Love, Bye-Bye Happiness: Vinny Grosso’s favorite song. Anthony Borello loved Where are you, little star…? and Mack the Knife. And of course, my sister Donna’s fave was Ritchie Valens’ Donna (later followed by Dion’s Donna the Prima Donna.)

For all the romanticism, there was also gritty black-and-white reality. We grew up street-wise, smart-mouthed and, to most outsiders, “tough.” Growing up here wasn’t exactly what we were seeing on TV in those days. We all knew we weren’t “Leave It To Beaver” material. When one looks back, seeing everything as “misty, water-colored memories” is inevitable, but I do remember a very special time, in an extraordinarily special place. Here, in no particular order, are just some of the things that made it so…

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