How can I remember so much?
Lynne Coppoletta b. 1940
I was born in 1940 in Newark and then moved to Union where the memories of the war click in. How can I remember so much?
The dark green light blocking shades.
Daddy’s head lights half blocked.
The running board and rumble seat.
The excitement in the streets on VE and VJ day.
Mixing the ‘butter’ at my neighbor’s house. (Don’t know what we used)
Saving the ‘tinfoil’ from gum wrappers.
Party lines at Unionville 2 5057 J
Mom giving me twenty five cents to walk to the store (Heavens, she’d be in jail today) for a few slices of bologna.
Johnny ride a pony – hide and seek – kick the can – sleigh riding on the street in winter – freedom to roam all over the neighborhood.
My first portable radio – looked like a big lunch box.
Climbing and falling out of many trees…..guess I was a real tomboy.
Oh, and I do remember going to the old, old, Newark airport to mail packages to my Uncle Joe who was a cook (chef) in the Navy in the Pacific. (I still have his hat from 1939.) I remember all the things he brought home….a piece of a Japanese Zero, a hand grenade, a bloody Japanese flag.
Wow, as I said I born in 1940. It’s now 2017. That’s a lot of years!
remember ration books for everything from sugar to shoes to stoves. We saved tin foil and poured fat into tin cans. We saw cars up on blocks because tires weren’t available. My mother delivered milk in a horse drawn cart.
We are the last to hear Roosevelt’s radio assurances and to see gold stars in the front windows of our grieving neighbors. We can also remember the drama of “D Day” and the parades in August 1945; VJ Day.
