I’m finding it difficult to travel back and forth on Madison Avenue while going through our old neighborhood. My family’s old house (which later was the home of the Longacre bar) located on Madison Avenue, just North of Thompson, is now completely gone. Even the basement is filled in and the ground is bare.
I was a couple of years old when we moved into that house located at 4813 Madison Avenue. At that time, it was well out of the city. The property came with a fenced in area and a chicken coop.
It was a three-bedroom home with a full basement. We lived there for about 14 years. My father operated a milk route that picked up the milk from dairy farms and transported it to the dairy to be processed. Early on, that was our only means of transportation. My mother had yet to become a driver. Any shopping that was done further than a couple of blocks from our house during the day was done on a bus that went downtown.
The property was large enough that my mom’s father built a small house near the back for my dad’s mother to reside. I remember him and some of his friends constructing it. I also recollect my mom making lunch for them several times.
I really enjoyed it when my grandmother moved into her new house. It was almost like camping. The house had electricity, but no running water. She would come to our house to use the facilities. I enjoyed hanging out with her and listening to the radio. With her living with us, we also had visits from other aunts, uncles and cousins.
The property just to the south of ours was a never-completed section of a street. Elbert Street doesn’t cross Madison Avenue, nor does it cross the railroad tracks. Mrs. Ethel Thompson was our neighbor in the house across the field. She was the widow of Mr. Edwin Thompson, the gentleman that built Longacre Pool and Park. His middle name was Elbert.
Mrs. Thompson was in charge of Longacre for many years. Mr. Thompson was an attorney and was always busy with his legal work. I never met him because he had passed before we moved to the neighborhood.
Mrs. Thompson’s house was about the same size as ours. She lived alone. I remember a couple of her spare bedrooms being filled with large cardboard boxes. My guess now is that they were full of Longacre past paperwork and history.
Mrs. Thompson had a television very early in television history. My sister, Kathy and I were always invited over to her house to watch television. There was only one channel, and it didn’t come alive until about 5 p.m. At that time, it was connected to a network and was only very local programming.
Mrs. Thompson also loved to feed the wild birds. She had several bird feeders and I remember sitting with her and she would explain the breed of bird we were watching and what they liked eating.
Madison Avenue was a single lane highway in each direction at that time. I believe the speed limit was 40 MPH. I was not allowed to cross the road for any reason. For several years, I was the only boy around my age on the east side of the street. I was very excited when the Leser family moved in on Morgan Drive. Their property and ours connected by our backyards.
My first duty that took me away from our house was to walk to Heath’s Market with a small grocery list. I remember pulling my Radio-Flyer wagon with me to carry the groceries home.
Now it’s all gone. Except the memories...!!
Shonk is a 1960 graduate of Southport High School, a ’63 grad of Indiana Central College (now the University of Indianapolis) and a retired bus driver from Beech Grove Schools. He can be reached through email at fdshonk@aol.com.