There's been much talk lately about the former Little Italy section of Troy. I remember it well since I grew up there. Congress Street, Third to Fifth Avenue, partially up Ferry Street, and running south to South Troy, is the original Little Italy.

My favorite section was around Havermans Avenue, a little enclave of 3 or 4 streets nestled against Mt Ida. We walked there each day to visit Sherry Everson and her sister. You could smell garlic and sauce boiling everywhere. Little old ladies would hand you buttered Italian bread, or tomatoes, as you walked by without asking. During wintertime, our cardboard sleds, doctored with wax paper, flew down many a slope.

Living in Little Italy meant you attended catholic school. I was sentenced to St Anthony's, a small building on Fifth Avenue, across from the Stanton Brewery. I remember a proud moment when I wrote a perfect "O" in Kindergarten and showed my mother in the schoolyard. In 1956, a new school was built next to St Anthony's church at the corner of Third and State. My cousin Dave and I were altar boys there briefly. The only thing I remember about being at St. Anthony's is visiting Sister Superior once too often.

Little Italy had its own gangs, simply groups of kids from specific blocks that hung around and played together. I belonged to the 4th Street gang - several kids that lived on Fourth between Congress and Ferry, and a few we "let in." Linda Kenney, Paul Klink, Dawnie Bauer and her sister Carrie, Gary Taylor, the Jesmains (Kenny, David, and Donnie), Arum Kaprielian, and Sammy Angus, a full blood Cherokee from the King St. area. After catholic school, we attended School 5, now the county office building, tutored by Mrs. Cleary and Ms. Franklin. However, our real education was on Troy's streets.

It was a time when telephone numbers began with Ashley or Bedford, You shopped at olive-smelling grocery stores on the south side of Ferry, bought your meat and fish from Troy Pork, Lavalley's, Helmbolds, Atlantic or Fulton Fish Markets, and baked goods at Stenards. For a dime, you watched two movies and cartoon at the State Theater near the Trojan Hardware. We could always find our parents either at the Senate Tavern, Woodchucks, Parkview, or Custo's.

We all hung out at Marty DiVito's "Archway." Pete Peterson, a muscular black man, to us "Hercules," was our guardian angel. Pete had a white 57 T-Bird always parked in front. Whenever there was trouble, he would literally pick Paul and I up by the back of our necks, deposit us outside, and tell us not to come back in. After the door closed, chairs would start flying. Paul and I would bet a nickel on who would get knifed that day. I also played my first set of drums in the back room, where they had a stage and weekly performers. One trio let me sit in and I was hooked. Years later, playing drums in a rock and roll band helped me finance college.

All of us were poor but we thought that was normal since everyone was poor. In between the rumbles at the Archway, we played "1,2,3, Russian Bulldog," a form of tag in the parking lot between "Doc's Newsroom" and the Army & Navy store. Adults on the block looked out for all of us and we often heard, "I will tell your mother if you don't stop that."

Our daily traditions were eating at the Miami Lunch, Hot Dog Charlie's or the Famous (10 dogs for a buck), and Manory's for their homemade ice cream. We purchased our comic books at Doc's or Joe's Newsroom next to the Famous. They had a wooden Indian in the front. I loved Doc's because he sold "Special" magic novelties. One day I purchased these little exploding sticks and stuck them in my Mother's cigarettes. When she lit one, it blew up in her face and I couldn't stop laughing. She chased me around the house for a good 15 minutes before I made it out the door.

Not all memories are pleasant. I remember my babysitter getting stabbed at the Miami Lunch and bleed to death on the pavement. I was awakened one morning by my five-year old sister Sandy standing in front of me - on fire. I extinguished the flames with my hands, but she died a month later from complications. Sammy Angus and Donnie Jesmain also died way to young.

The remaining 4th Street gang members are doing just fine and several of them bowl together on Saturday nights. Me? I'm just trying to put this stuff on paper. Memories are all we have of the place called Little Italy.