The House at 2421 Baronne Street

       This is from an e-mail I received from Gail Wasserman in answer to my request for information about the house at 2421 Baronne Street.  It was not part of the original family reunion booklet, but I felt it belongs here.

       We moved to 2421 Baronne in 1940 and moved from there to 2106 Baronne in 1946.  It seemed that we were there a lot longer than that because so much happened while we were there.  World War II began and ended during that period.  Aunt Fay died in 1944. By the time we moved, Sarah and Isadore had 4 grandchildren...Brian, Marsha, David and Wesley.  That was my favorite house.  It was bigger and nicer than any house I had lived in.  We paid $27.50 a month rent.  I remember that so well, because often I was given the money to deliver on my bike to the landlord who lived  near Washington Avenue.

       There was a spacious front porch which had a swing on it and could convert to a cradle.  The porch was like a cement and painted medium brown.  I remember a kid in the neighborhood once asking me if it was really rubber.  But we couldn't bounce on it that's for sure.  There was a front door on one side and a window the size of the front door on the other side. Salesmen would knock at one door and then go knock on the window which appeared like a door...what a nuisance!  There was a convenient side entrance which we usually used. There was a living room, dining room (which was usually not used  but reserved for a bedroom in case Aunt Tillye or Aunt Mimi came home) and it had a closet that looked like a phone booth.  (These were the things that made it interesting).  There was a bedroom for Uncle Leon, bedroom for grandma and grandpa and another bedroom with 2 double beds for most of the girls.  And the one and only bathroom was off of the girls' bedroom.  It was pretty much of a shot gun house in that you had to go from one room to get to the other.  The kitchen was next to Uncle Leon's room. The back porch was amazing...it was a small square porch and yet 4 doors led out to it....one from the bathroom, one from the girls' room, one from the kitchen, one from a small storage room of the kitchen.   

       The ice-man came every other day in the winter and every day during the summer to keep our small ice box equipped. Someone had to be home to let the ice-man in or he would leave it on the back porch...50lbs. is not easy to carry in.  In back of the house was a small concrete yard and shed. There was a small house in back and someone rented it.  It was similar in arrangement to 2106 Baronne where Mrs. Rosenstein lived.  Our house was only 2 doors away from Mc Donough No.10.  It was difficult to play hooky because they could see from the school window to our house.

       I probably gave you more detail than you wanted, but it was my favorite house and if you were here I would probably draw you a picture of the floor plan with the black wrought iron fence.  It is a permanent photo in my mind.