I was recently talking with a friend and our discussion turned to our first jobs. I delivered newspapers for The Indianapolis News when I attended Edgewood Grade School. 

Last week I drove one of those routes exactly as I had ridden my bicycle to deliver those papers. I was amazed that I could still name a lot of the families that resided in those houses on my route.

This route covered streets between Epler Avenue and Thompson Road and east of Madison Avenue. Two of my Edgewood teachers resided on Epler Avenue, and about 10 of my classmates lived in the area.

All of The Star/News carriers picked up their papers at a blue metal building behind the drugstore at Epler and Madison avenues. The Rev. Walter Barth, pastor of the church at Dudley Avenue and Shelby Street, was in charge of our paper station, which was equipped with a wood-burning stove. He always kept the building warm in the winter. 

We went directly to the paper station after being dismissed from school. I’m sure that our customers kept an eye out for us as we ran our routes.

Since we didn’t have plastic bags to protect the papers from bad weather, we put them on covered porches or between a storm door and the solid front door. We never tossed papers onto yards or driveways.

The fall and winter holidays were lots of fun for us carriers. We always did a dual visit close to Halloween. We collected the 30 cents for the paper and would often trick-or-treat at that time. Sometimes  we received special treats.

Delivering papers on Thanksgiving always took a lot of extra time. Some of my customers invited me in for something to eat. By the time I was finished with my route, my saddlebags, which normally held newspapers, were full of goodies, including turkey and pie. 

Christmas was also special. Our customers always took good care of us carriers. I got cards with cash presents and boxes of chocolate-covered cherries; I remember having more than a dozen boxes stacked on our kitchen counter one year. I always purchase chocolate-covered cherries at Christmastime because they bring back so many special memories. (Editor’s note: Some of those boxes were dropped off to staff members at The Southsider Voice.) 

A few years later several of my friends, Larrie and Mickey Johnson, and I had morning Indianapolis Star routes. I didn’t have the same close connection with my customers that I did with my afternoon route. No one was awake when we delivered those papers, and it was still dark for better than half of the year when we were peddling papers.

Larrie told me that Mickey didn’t really enjoy being out early in the morning when it was dark. One morning we finished our routes extra-fast and rode our bicycles a few blocks south on Madison to hide and see what Mickey was doing.

He came riding past us, and I was surprised to hear him talking to himself. He was saying, “Come on Mick, only five more stops. You can do it.” 

I think our original plan was to frighten him, but we were so surprised to hear him conversing with himself that we stayed quiet ... at least until he was out of hearing range so that we could start laughing.
Those were the days!

I am amazed at how fast time flies ... guess it’s because I’m always having fun.

I enjoyed two reunions in September: the Edgewood all-school gathering and the one for my Class of 1960 at Southport High. My therapy dog, Stuart, attended the Southport reunion picnic so he could visit with the folks he has met over the years.

My good friend Richard Smith and his wife, Marsha, who were at their summer home in northern Indiana, came down for the reunion. A few weeks ago I was showing a picture of Marsha with the Southport Cardinal, who “flew” in for our picnic.

A week or so later, Marsha and Richard were back in town for a couple of days, visiting family and friends while on their way home to Austin, Texas. We usually get together for breakfast – often at the Lincoln Square Pancake House – when they are passing through.

Richard and I have messed with each other for many years. He was the person who tricked me into meeting him at my family’s old house (now The Longacre Tavern) on the evening that my friends and classmates held a roast in my honor there. Richard told several “Fred stories,” claiming that he was getting even for a couple of “Smith” stories shared in this column.

On the morning of our breakfast, Lyn was running a little late so I decided to get to Lincoln Square a few minutes early in case there was a wait for a table. While sipping my coffee I thought about the breakfast that we had there in other years. That got me thinking about some of Richard’s goofy eating habits.

He often ordered just one slice of toast. A couple of times I saw the “Why me?” look coming from our server. 

When my server stopped to check on my need for coffee several weeks ago, I told her about Richard. I asked her if she could fix a slice of burned toast and serve it to him on her first trip to the table after he arrived.

She loved the idea and was laughing as she headed back to the kitchen. After Richard and Marsha and Lyn were seated, our waitress came to our table served him a burnt slice of toast. 

He looked a bit shocked for a few seconds before seeing my “gotcha” smile. I glanced around and noticed that several tables and the staff enjoyed the antic.

I am now frequently looking over my shoulder because I know he’s going to get me.

A week or so after the reunions, Stuart was scheduled as the main speaker for the Perry Township/Southport Historical Society meeting. But he got a little nervous at the last minute and asked me to fill in for him. I showed some slides and talked about his work as a therapy dog.
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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. 

A few weeks ago I was talking with one of my neighbors about the different buildings that had housed post offices in Perry Township throughout the years. 

My first memory of a post office was the one in Southport. I remember taking a field trip to the facility when I attended Edgewood Grade School. Our bus driver drove past the post office because it was on the other side of the street. 

The driver knew of a church parking lot where he could turn around and head back so he could stop in front of the post office to let us out. The little building was and still is located on the northeast corner of Southport Road and Main Street, right across from Long’s Bakery.

We walked into the small post office and were greeted by the postmistress, who was probably the only person on duty. She guided us through the building and quickly directed us to an open door in the back. As the door opened we saw our bus pulling up to meet us. In the time that it took him to pull around to the rear of the building, we had seen the entire post office. It was a quick field trip.

A second post office was constructed a few years later on Madison Avenue, just north of Epler Avenue (the building is still there), and it was known at the Woodcroft branch, a combination of the neighborhoods of Edgewood and Homecroft. Shortly thereafter, some businesses started using the name. Pat Moriarty opened a drug store just north of the post office and named it Woodcroft Pharmacy.

With the Woodcroft post office came improved postal service on the Southside. At that time there were many contract carriers who worked out of their private vehicles. Steve Schulz, a former Southport High School classmate of mine, had one of those routes for several years. 

At some point the post office started providing three-wheeled motor scooters to its employees. My dad’s Sunoco station was contracted to provide fuel, and in cold weather we had to provide a warm place to house the scooters at night. 

The redesign of Madison Avenue to a four-lane divided road eliminated most of the parking at the Woodcroft post office, so it was closed, and a new one was built on the south side of Southport Road.    

The name Woodcroft sort of drifted away after the post office and the drug store closed. The new facility in Southport was in operation for many years before being replaced by a new one on Edgewood just east of Madison. 

The building on Madison is now known as the Cherry Asian Store. The old post office on the south side of Southport Road is now Sophia’s Bridal, Tux and Prom Shop.

I still have memories of having to squeeze those scooters inside our service station on cold winter nights so that they would start the next morning.

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. 

It is amazing how quickly time seems to pass. One of the things that I enjoy about Facebook is a feature called “Memories,” which depicted something that I posted six years ago.

That item was the Perry Township/Southport Historical Society’s “An Evening to Celebrate Longacre Pool & Park. David Dodrill, son of Rufus Dodrill, who owned Long Acre during the 1950s and ’60s, spoke about his family and Longacre. We had more than a 100 pictures to look at, and there were almost 300 folks in attendance.

The original owner of Longacre was Edwin Thompson, an attorney and a Southside developer. We learned that Thompson Road and Elbert Street were named after him. Elbert was his middle name. One of his best friends was named Morgan. Elbert is the first street north of Thompson, and Morgan Drive is the second street north of Thompson.

Our family house during my early years was on Madison Avenue between Elbert and Morgan. Elbert was never developed between Madison and the railroad tracks, which are about a block east of Madison. If Elbert had been there, we would have lived on the corner of Madison and Elbert. 

Our next-door neighbor who lived on the south side of what would have been Elbert was Mrs. Ethel Thompson, the widow of Edwin Thompson. 

Mrs. Thompson was a special person. She lived there alone for several years. My sister, Kathy, and I were frequent visitors to her home. We never met Mr. Thompson, and I’m thinking it was many years before I was informed of her husband and their past ownership of Longacre.

Mrs. Thompson was an avid bird watcher and protector. She had several different types of bird feeders in her backyard. I remember visiting with her in all the different seasons of the year and she would tell us about the breeds of birds in her yard at the time. I really enjoyed those sessions and have always had several bird feeders in my yards. Mrs. Thompson taught me well.

She owned the first television that Kathy and I ever saw that wasn’t in a store that was selling televisions. It was a rather large wooden box with a small screen. As I remember, there was only one channel available in the Indianapolis area – WFBM. It is the oldest station in Indiana, and it went on the air in 1949.
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Television wasn’t available to watchers as much as it is these days. In fact, broadcasting didn’t begin each day until around 4:30 p.m. The test pattern was all that was visible on your television for about an hour each afternoon. I remember visiting Mrs. Thompson on lots of afternoons. We would watch the test pattern and enjoy homemade cookies. One of the first shows that came on after the test pattern was a children’s show called “Kukla, Fran & Ollie.” We also enjoyed “The Howdy Doody Show.”

I have so many great memories of visits to Mrs. Thompson’s house. I remember lots of large cardboard boxes stored in spare rooms in her house. I’m sure now that those were wonderful pictures and papers from their construction and ownership of Longacre Pool and Park.
Madison Avenue is full of memories for me.