Growing Up in the Bronx: 5 Memorable Childhood Experiences

Growing up in New York City is an experience unlike any other. Growing up in the Bronx, in NYC, is an entirely different experience unto itself. There is the good, and there is the challenging in it. You will have some amazing experiences, and some that are best left in the past.

Today I will be sharing with you 5 of the most memorable things about growing up in the Bronx, right here in New York City.

Friendships and lifelong bonds

One of the greatest and coolest things about growing up in the South Bronx, in the 90s, were the bonds and friendships that you made. There would be hundreds of kids living in the same building, across the street, up the block, down the block. We all attended the same schools, played at the same arcades, and shopped at the same bodegas for those 25 cent “little hug” flavored waters!

With that many kids in such a small radius, you were bound to encounter some really cool kids, as well as some who weren’t the easiest to get along with. But one of the coolest aspects of growing up in that neighborhood environment was definitely the friendships that one would make.

All that being said, in no particular order, here are five awesome things that we used to do growing up in the South Bronx!

Number one: Gaming!

Yes, gaming! Before online gaming was a thing, we’d actually play together, in person! Can you believe that concept? We would all grab our game controllers, grab our games, and head over to one of our buddy’s houses for hours of gaming. This is the way it was done back in the days. To this very day, this is one of the things I truly miss most about that time period. There was nothing like waking up that Saturday morning, and spending the day hanging out with your friends beating each other in video games.

Well, let me tell you kids, even I have become extremely dependent on email, social media, and all of the other modern methods of communication. I love them, and I’m not sure how I would survive without them today. However, I have not forgotten the way we used to do it back then. It was quite simple: if you wanted to hang out with Stefano, you would go to your window, if it happened to face the same direction as Stefano’s, or you’d have to go downstairs by their window, and then call out their name.

STEFANO! YO STEFANO!!!! COME OUTSIDE!

Back in those days that’s how we communicated. You go to the window, and you call out. Then your friend would show up and you could plan your day while shouting at each other from the window. In some cases the parent of your friend, or one of your other neighbors from the block would stick their head out the window and remind us to keep it down because they were trying to sleep. On those occasions, we would try and actually use the phone, but that was quite rare.

Number three: Hanging in front of the building.

I don’t know if this is still as common today. When I go to my old neighborhood, I do see kids hanging outside and playing. So I do believe it still happens, but I don’t see that around here. That is strictly a neighborhood thing. These kids in this quasi-suburban neighborhood will never know this particular kind of fun.

There was nothing as awesome as simply just hanging out with your buddies playing tag, talking, watching the girls walk by, joking around with each other and making everyone laugh all day. Just having a grand old time.

Now, hanging out in front of the building could become unpleasant when some troublemakers came around. It was not always the safest place to be when disputes would happen, and on occasion things could get complicated if you simply found yourself in the wrong place at the wrong time. However, even with all that, this was definitely one of the most memorable parts of growing up in the neighborhood. It was one of the few things I would consider a local perk, hanging out with your buddies in front of the building just kicking it.

Number four: Cruising!

Basically my little group would all get together with skateboards, bikes, scooters or whatever rideable device you had at the time. We would coordinate and then ride to other neighborhoods where there was less car traffic.

A whole bunch of us would ride our bikes down the block, and across Jerome Avenue. We used to go to this one place we called “Peace Land.” In hindsight, this wasn’t a very safe area for kids, but it was sort of like an industrial space. We called the area “Peace Land” because it was so desolate and seemed somewhat peaceful. The area was very quiet, with maybe one or two houses, and the people there never really bothered us. The rest of the space was occupied by lots, factories and a few small businesses. It was a nice, quiet road where we could ride our bikes mostly uninterrupted by oncoming traffic.

(Inwood Avenue in the Bronx. Google Maps shows me that this area is much busier now. Times have certainly changed!)

On the next block over we had another spot we called “Doggie Biscuit.” This side housed a bunch of mailing and what I think were garbage trucks. I think they used to park there. The reason we called this one “Doggie Biscuit” is because every time we went there and rolled by on our bicycles we would get chased out by the local guard dogs.

I still remember the time that one of my friends lost his balance and fell off his bike. He was fearless and stood there fending off the dogs with his bike! That was absolutely hilarious, but it showed us all that this kid had some guts. I think he eventually made the dogs go away, and he walked out with his head held high. He wasn’t scared, or at least he didn’t let on.

(Cromwell Avenue in the Bronx. Google Maps shows that there is a “Cubesmart” there now. Garbage trucks still sleep there though.)

One block further in and you had what we called “Killer Hill” and “Snake Mountain.” This is probably the steepest hill I had ever seen in the area at that point. Only later in life when visiting San Francisco, and even here in NYC did I find steeper hills. However, to my young mind, this was a killer hill! Anyway, we would walk our bikes to the top of the hill, get on the road and then ride down at full speed! We’d come to the bottom and then merge into the four-lane highway which we had named “Snake Mountain” because it had so many twists and turns.

Thinking back to this time, we are so very lucky that we didn’t get hurt back then. (This was Edward L Grant Highway, and the hill was on West 169th Street.) Seriously, we are lucky! As a parent today, I can’t imagine my son doing this, the risk was immense.

This is the top of Killer Hill.

The bottom of Killer Hill connects to a 4 lane highway. What were we thinking?

I remember this one time one of my buddies lost control of his bike and couldn’t make the turn from Killer Hill into Snake Mountain. So he ended up going across Snake Mountain with cars coming from the left and the right! Dude just went straight across a four-lane highway! The fact that this guy did not get hit that day was absolutely miraculous.

The downside of Cruising.

You may be wondering how cruising can go wrong? It’s quite simple. Sometimes we’d get a flat tire while we were far away from home, and we’d have to walk the bike back. Of course at that point you increased the risk of losing your bike. There were always people trying to take bikes, and if you couldn’t ride the bike to get away, you had a greater chance of losing it.

The most memorable time for me was at Crotona Park. I was much younger and naive. I was invited to hang out with a group of kids, so I joined them. Next thing I knew, I was surrounded, threatened, and things got physical fast. That day, they succeeded and took my very cool bike. I still remember my family rushing over to help. They were long gone by then, those kids were bigger, faster, and apparently quite skilled at riding a bike with one hand, and carrying a stolen one with the other. Such were some of the challenges of the neighborhood.

I remember another time I was riding my bike while the Grand Concourse was closed off for bicyclists, and some guys started launching tree branches at me trying to make me fall off my bike. By then I was a bit older and wiser. Though the branch hurt, and I did stumble, realizing that I was in their area, and greatly outnumbered, I didn’t stop. I kept going and managed to get away.

Another time one of the guys from my own block was trying to take the inner tubes from my bike! I let him borrow my bike for a “ride.” It was quite common to have someone say “Yo, let me get a ride.” He was gone for a while, which wasn’t uncommon with this particular person. He was one of the local bullies, and I figured it was best to comply rather than risk having him or his group take it from me. So I was going to go home for a while and come back later, when I entered the building, the guy was emptying my tires attempting to switch my functional inner tubes with his broken tubes. I took my bike back and walked away, there wasn’t much I could do about it at the time.

So all that is what we used to call “cruising.”

Number five: Going on “adventures.”

This was kind of like the movie “Stand by Me,” but the neighborhood version. For instance sometimes we would take the long walk from 169th St. and the Grand Concourse over to Highbridge pool in Manhattan. To get there you would have to walk on highways, and cross bridges, and we would do all that on foot. Times were so different back then!

There is a bridge called High Bridge; it was out of service back then. It seems like they are working on, or have reopened it to pedestrians now.

However, back in those days, it was closed. Now that didn’t stop some creative individuals from using supermarket carts to build a pathway in from the Bronx side of the bridge! You would cross the bridge, and then on the other side someone had tied ropes so that we could get over the barricades and wall that they built.

Understand the magnitude of what I’m telling you. We were teens, unarmed, during a time when cell phones were unheard of. We used to cross an abandoned bridge to get to Highbridge pool. This was an area where you were pretty much separated from main society once you were in there.

When I think back to that, and consider the risk and danger that we put ourselves in, it’s mind-boggling to me. I can’t believe that I made it out of there unscathed! Not only did I climb the rope, I remember hanging from it upside down, and making faces! Imagine if that thing snapped and I fell! I’d be done! Not to mention that we could have gotten hurt or worse, and no one would know what happened! At least not until someone found us!

Another risky thing that we used to do during our adventures was rooftop jumping. We used to go to a roof and make our way over to the other building’s roof. Sometimes they were connected and you could just climb down from one side to the other, and other times there was a gap and you’d have to jump.

I remember one time we jumped from one roof which was higher, and we dropped really hard on the other rooftop! The picture above shows the actual buildings I’m talking about, take a look. So the guy who lived on the sixth floor came upstairs upset and threatening us because we were messing up his chandeliers while jumping. Back then situations could escalate quickly, today we write letters to co-op boards! How things change.

On a side note, apparently they are leaving this Friday, I’m counting the days! Interestingly enough, I just heard some commotion in the hallway, guess who just walked into their apartment? Right now I’m blasting “Home” by Daughtry to drown out their incessant noise. This is an appropriate song considering I’m writing about my old home.

One of my buddies actually fell down six stories from a rooftop. Thankfully, this guy is still around today! We can laugh and joke about those days, but there was nothing funny about falling from a roof. My man is extremely lucky to be alive today. In fact, considering some of the things that we used to do, many of us are lucky to be here!

No memorable growing up in the Bronx story would be complete without talking about the POMPA!

The fire hydrant provided us with much needed cooling down during those hot summer days. I also recall drivers would stop in front of it to get a quick wash! Not everyone was happy with this practice though, clearly we were using water freely, and the water pressure in the buildings would sometimes drop because of this. Many times someone from the neighborhood would ask us to close the hydrant, and we’d wrap things up and move along.

Most of these stories I’m sharing with you took place while we were still relatively young, and for the most part we were still innocent kids. Though inevitably life did become more complicated as we got older, and things started to change. Some of us moved to new neighborhoods, and though we tried to remain close, friendships are affected by distance. Thankfully I am still in touch with most of my close friends from that era, and thankfully most of us went on to lead safe and productive adult lives.

These few personal experiences that I have just shared with you are some of the memorable experiences I had growing up in the neighborhood. This was the South Bronx back in the 90s.

If you have any memories or stories that you would like to share with us, please do so in the comments and we will share any outstanding ones in a future post.