High School Days - Memories

My first girlfriend was Phyllis. I don't know where I met her but I guess she was in my high school - James Madison. She lived on Ocean Avenue near Avenue U and her parents liked me. Although her father earned a living as a carpenter, he was a college educated man and they were a pretty intellectual family. Nor do I know what we had in common but she was definitely the first girl I kissed. I guess I did this pretty well probably because I watched a lot of Clark Gable movies.

This relationship lasted a while and although she was quite young, she was apparently very mature. The kissing led to heavy petting and finally one day she invited me into her bedroom. She openly invited to me have sex with her and there she was stark naked on her bed. I had no idea what to do - in fact I was embarrassed. I later worked on and worked out that problem in psychoanalysis.

When that became obvious she got dressed and I went home. We had a group of friends and before long I discovered she had another boyfriend from among those friends. Apparently he did know what to do. Later I found out she married him. So much for my second chance at marriage.

I came over her house again and ended up having a chat with her parents. They actually understood something about what happened, maybe she even told them. This was not the kind of family I came from for sure. I remember her father commiserating with me and telling me "sometimes that's the way it goes."

I was very confused and probably suffered my first bout with a depression after that. I was very immature and unprepared for life. I knew mostly about test tubes and chemistry sets.

Faith was my first serious chance at being married. She was quite attractive and we went out together a lot. My parents really liked her. I met her through a mutual friend Henry Lewy who still lives in Brooklyn with his wife Bernarda.

I met Henry at the ping-pong table in school. I was a pretty good ping-pong player. I don't remember whether Henry played or watched, but we got to talking and I found out he loved opera. Eventually we became regulars at the old Metropolitan Opera House in Manhattan, sometimes arriving early in the morning and spending most of the day on line to get the best of the two dollar standing room spots on the rail just above the orchestra. The old Met had standing room all around the main orchestra seating section, so we could see and hear almost as well as those rich patrons who spent ten dollars for a ticket. Henry also started coming over to our apartment on Bragg Street and we listened to classical music and opera on my "Hi-Fi" set.

I also spent a lot of time at the Lewy apartment and remember his parents well. The played cards and his mother chain smoked. Their card playing was so obsessive that games sometimes lasted from Saturday night to Sunday afternoon - non-stop. They were very nice folks who had survived the German holocaust because Mr. Lewy had some money. He had a small business in millenary, possibly making uniform caps as he was doing now in this country. They worked very hard and made wonderful caps. One time I fixed their television set and Mr. Lewy said, I must pay you. I said no, this was for my friends, but he insisted and so I said, well, I do like to sail so he could make me a sailor's cap. He soon presented me with a beautiful "captain's cap" complete with exchangeable white or black tops. I could be captain Blye or captain Nemo with a change of cover. I still have the cap but only with the black Nemo cover.

I guess I got over that and started to become active in my high school extra-curricular activities. Around this time I got my amateur radio license (radio ham license - K2SMG), and thanks to our physics teacher, Mr. Julius Schlakman, myself and my two best friends, Robert (Bob) Kanner and Joel Ross, we established the James Madison High School Amateur Radio Club.

Joel Ross, Me, and Bob Kanner at a reunion in Brooklyn. The photo has several other people to the right of Joel cut out.

We got a club license and the call (letters) of the station was K2UXR. This was quite a privilege as Mr. Schlakman arranged for us to use one of the rooftop stairwell rooms as a ham radio "shack." I am sure we were the only students that actually had keys to the roof of the school.

One day Joel and I decided to erect a high antenna. It required that we climb up on the edge of the roof which for some reason did have a storm fence on it topped with a barbed wire barrier (I guess to prevent people from jumping!). So Joel and I got a ladder and we climbed up to the edge to mount one of the antenna poles on the storm fence.

Now Madison High School was at least four stories high, but school floors are much bigger than residential floors so we were way up high, probably as high as a six storey apartment house. The school was also "U" shaped and the side of the roof we were on faced into the inside of the "U" at the end of one arm. In the middle of the "U" on the top floor of the school was the staff dining room. And just when Joel and I got up on the fence, Mr. Schlakman sat down to have lunch with the school principal, a Dr. Max Newfield.

We heard all about this later as Mr. Schlakman related, "I almost had a heart attack, and it's a good thing Mr. Newfield was sitting with his back to the window. Of course I was sitting across from him and saw you guys up there like monkeys" and "Don't you ever do anything like that again. That would have been a quick end to your radio club!"

Another advantage of the radio club was that some of our members were women. One had the same last name as my first name - Joyce Leslie. Joyce lived down Bragg Street at Avenue U in a house. Her dad was an M.D. and I remember walking her home one day and meeting her dad. It seems impossible now, but I can swear she looked and his shoes and they were covered with dried blood - presumably from being in surgery. She said "Dad, how disgusting, you could at least have changed your shoes." I know this is impossible because in surgery I don't think you can wear your street shoes, and blood doesn't drip all over the place but that's what I remember. Maybe it was after a surgery and they removed their scrubs. Maybe it was a for a different reason altogether but I swear I remember this conversation.

Anyway, I never developed a relationship with Joyce, but I did date another woman from our radio club whose name whose name was Dorothy Vazquez. Dorothy was quite attractive and she also was a very good ice skater.

One day we all stayed pretty late in the rooftop "radio shack" and they locked up the whole school with us inside. Yes we were locked IN. You could open the doors from inside but there was a very high gate around the school which was also locked. I remember we had to climb over this gate probably by standing on each other. I don't know how we all got out but I remember Dorothy was among us.

I know I had several ice skating dates with Dorothy, going to the "Wollman Rink" in Central Park in Manhattan. I liked her but we remained just pals and somehow sex never became an issue. Eventually - after she graduated she joined a military organization - I think through R.O.T.C. I seem to remember seeing her in a blue uniform, so I think it was the Air Force.

My First Girlfriend

Faith and Henry Lewy

Back to School - The School Radio Club