Comments on: Let There Be Fandom, Part 3: A Brooklyn Boyhood

By: M.E. Staton

M.E. Staton — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 13:16:39 +0000

Love to read about growing up in Brooklyn. Myself, I was born in Spanish Harlem in the early 70\’s but we moved to Park Slope when I was in second grade. I\’ve spent many years in and around the environs of South Brooklyn and many of the places you mentioned. I live in London now (I\’m an SF writer although still a damon knight toad and no yet published) but when I go back to NYC I always go to Brooklyn to have pizza and walk around the old neighborhoods I used to haunt as a child. I actually got into Brooklyn Tech but opted for Brooklyn College Academy instead.

By: Al Bogdan

Al Bogdan — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 16:28:35 +0000

My grandparents were in Queens and the Bronx, and I spent every summer wandering New York. It\’s one great city. My grandfather never owned a car. He took us everywhere on subways, buses and foot. My uncle Richie was also a subway conductor, so I have memories of riding up front with him.

I would always fall asleep on public transit coming home late at night, only to wake up one stop before I had to get off. It\’s like you could feel your destination approaching. Never got lost, which is something I can\’t claim driving around in a car.

By: George Berger

George Berger — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 12:42:23 +0000

Dear Mr Pohl–I was born in Far Rockaway (Queens County, NYC) in 1942. It was a great place to grow up, as I’m sure you know. The Subway–A Train–arrived there in 1958, having been extended from Euclid Ave. right across Jamaica Bay, where it split into 2 branches, one with Mott Ave (Far Rockaway) last stop and the other 116th St (Rockaway Park). I became a subway fanatic, just as you did earlier. What a fantastic system. I was thrilled not only by the various routes but by all the passageways, e.g. at 42nd street. It was a delight to discover some new connection between lines and even, I’ll admit, an underground barbershop or restroom. I was dismayed when I heard that the 5 cent price would be hiked upwards. So we have something in common.
Another common element is my devotion to the best in SF since 57 or perhaps 56, and that includes many of your works. I discovered SF and Astronautics in the great Carnegie Library of Far Rockaway, when I had only a card for the Children’s section. So I was stuck with Heinlein’s juviniles, which did not excite me. Later on I got an Adult card and was able to read Stapledon, Asimov and Clarke. I have written about this briefly here: http://www.farrockaway.com/georgebergerlibrary.html . I am now retired, after an academic career spent almost entirely in Europe. I live in Uppsala Sweden, whose fans follow your work, especially the fine Johan Anglemark, who told me about your blog last night. I shall now attempt to post this and then read on. The book whose title partly graces your blog is my favorite memoir in American SF. It’s as interesting, elegant, and evocative as Alfred Kazin’s “A Walker in the City.” Indeed, I admire both so much that I bought them online earlier this year. I lost them during one of my moves, which have taken me farther and farther from NYC and its subways. I don’t mind this too much, since the few friends I have who live there all tell me that its soul has been taken out of it. I have thought that since the 8th Street Bookshop closed.

By: Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey

Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 16:50:46 +0000

Wow. Rudy Vallee, Bert Lahr, and Ukulele Ike on the same stage! Wish I could have seen it with you.

By: Joe Fodor

Joe Fodor — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 18:53:45 +0000

The Avenue H station on the BMT line is the city’s only shingled wooden cottage turned transit station house– also one of the only ones that is a registered historic landmark. Just last week the Coney Island-side was closed until late next year for renovation….one hopes that the decades-old scourge of six-year-old fare evaders has finally come to an end!

By: Jeff

Jeff — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 13:35:04 +0000

I’m afraid that, had you been growing up today, you would have been removed from your parents’ custody and put in foster care.

By: dubqnp

dubqnp — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 21:12:09 +0000

Thanks for writing an interesting blog Frederik.

I really enjoy your stories about growing up in NYC. I spent a couple of years on Long Island myself and also didn’t graduate from high school. My brother introduced me to your science fiction stories, made me a fan of the genre and you are still among my favorite writers. (PKD might beat you - but it’s a close call).

Thanks for making me remember roaming NYC as a kid even if it were 50 years later.

/an European fan.

By: Stefan Jones

Stefan Jones — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 05:30:59 +0000

It would be hard to get too many stories about NYC kidhoods.

Keep them coming.

I’m just old enough to remember ten cent subway fares; I was really little but I do remember that from visits to family friends and relatives who lived in Greenwich Village, where my grandparents once had a restaurant.

Also remember great big civic swimming pools that I recall costing a dime . . . there was one a few blocks south of my cousins’ apartment on Carmine street, near Bleecker.