The crime in a small area of lower Belair-Edison continues to draw comments. Here are some recollections of the way the neighborhood once was, reprinted with the writer's permission:

I was saddened to read your article in the Baltimore Sun titled “One man’s difficult campaign to clean up Belair-Edison” I grew up at the corner of St. Cloud Ave and Elmora Ave.  There used to be a family owned store on the corner called “Shicks”, whether the owners were named Shick or not is a mystery, but they used to provide us with candy to quit playing curb ball or bouncing our ball against the side of their building.  The hours of constant bouncing would drive them crazy.  I remember going into the store and getting a loaf of bread or a quart of milk on the books until payday, no questions asked.

The biggest harassment the police ever gave us was either for playing too close to the railroad tracks near Ravenwood Ave or for sitting on the church wall at the other end of the block from Shicks.  The police foot patrol would sneak up the alley behind us and whack us on the ass with their night sticks. We would set a lookout, but the lookout would get tired or bored and leave, along came the cop and his ever present night stick and if you could not run fast enough, whack, got you again.  

I remember the young high school girls leaving the Catholic High School for Girls. They would walk down Elmora Ave on the way to the 15 streetcar on Belair Road; gosh they were beautiful to a 10 year old.  I remember the trees along the streets and my mother climbing one, 7 months pregnant trying to get her pet parakeet back after we had left the front door open.  I remember the old people sitting on their porch swings in the summer and paying a young boy to shovel the snow from their walks in the winter. I especially remember the guys I hung out with that died in Vietnam, Bob Twist, Gerry Wernsdorfer, Bob Johnson, and others, their faces forever etched in my mind. I remember my first crush, a girl named Linda who lived up the block; I wonder whatever happened to her.

What has become of the neighborhoods that we grew up in? Is this what the future holds for us?  I left the neighborhood in 1963 to begin my 20 U.S. Navy career, only to return to visit my mother and friends years later, all who have moved now. 

As I said earlier, it saddens me to see my old neighborhood and my memories tarnished by the needless deaths that happen there now. 

Sincerely,

Jim Farrow