Wilmington Delaware (part 1)....New School, New Friends, Catholic Discipline and a 8mm movie

                                                                                                                                                                           Well, we have left Washington DC along with America (my Nanny), her husband George, Stephen (my best friend) and my juvenile record and we are putting down roots in Wilmington Delaware. While in Washington, apparently my Dad did well in his chosen profession and got to know many influential people. One of these people (by the way, in some cases I will not use names because I do not have their permission) was one of the DuPont daughters. Along with her husband, they came up with a new idea for a business and got ahold of my dad to see if he would be willing to run it. Apparently he said yes because the new business was going to be based in Wilmington and that's where we were moving to. For those of you who don't know....the state of Delaware at that time was owned by the DuPont family...and probably still is. This has to be around 1956 or 1957...putting me at 10 or 11 years old. I didn't realize it at the time, but my Dad, working for this family was going to have a lot of perks.


We moved to a neighborhood called Stonehaven. This neighborhood was built on the highest point in Wilmington. The name of the hill where this neighborhood was built was called Penny Hill. Both my sister and I have great memories of the Penny Hill sub shop, the Penny Hill donut shop and Brown's Drug Store.

Because this neighborhood was so high, we always looked forward to the winter snows because it would allow us to sled from the top of the hill in our neighborhood down for almost a mile before we reached bottom. The ride down was a blast but the walk back was a bitch. Lucky for us my dad and other "grown-ups" in the neighborhood, would wait for us at the bottom of the hill with cars and trucks and give us a ride back up the hill so we could do the sledding all over again.

This was also a Catholic neighborhood full of young Catholic families and what do young Catholic families do for entertainment on cold winter nights....they make babies and lots of them. The reason that was so cool was that both my sister and I now had lots of kids to play with....unlike Washington, where there was hardly any kids to play with!! I had two best friends....one was Michael and the other was Robbie. Robbie  

did not live in our neighborhood, he lived in the neighborhood behind us. There was a big woods that separated us but as we grew up, that wooded area would become our friend.                                                 .
                                                                                                                                                                    I attended three public schools in Wilmington along with one Catholic school (there is a story here). I attended River Road Elementary School, St. Helena Catholic School, Mt. Pleasant Junior High and Mt. Pleasant Senior High. Apparently I wasn't the model child for River Road Elementary because not long after my enrollment, the principal called my parents and asked them to take me out and put me in a private school where I could be watch more closely and disciplined more often (I guess my Washington "wild" streak was still with me). My parents had a decision to make...they could either put me in a private school that was close to our neighborhood or they could send me away to military school. For awhile there it looked like military school was going to be the decision because there was a well known military school in Gettysburg and it just so happened that my Grandmother's brother had a big farm in Gettysburg. I remember even driving up there one weekend so my parents could look it over. In the end, my parents opted for St. Helena Catholic School because it was close to home and the nun's (penguins to me) had a bad ass reputation for discipline. Well, I stayed there through the sixth grade and made it out alive. I did seem to get into trouble while at St. Helena but not as often and not for anything to bad. I do remember more that once getting my knuckles rapped with a ruler and my butt smacked with a paddle!!                                                                                                   

                                                                                                                                                              Now it was on to Mt. Pleasant Junior High....wow, I made it out of grade school in one piece and now I was going to get to play with the big boys (and girls). This is where I will recount some of my junior high memories but will save all but one for the next blog. The one I want to write about here is the most vivid and was to set the tone for later years.

One day, after school, my mom received a phone call from the principal of Mt. Pleasant Junior High. Those type of phone calls were not an unusual occurrence in our household. She was told (mind you, TOLD) that there was going to be a special meeting if the Jr. High PTA the next night to discuss some "outrageous" behavior that was happening at the school during lunch hour and the meeting was to discuss how to put an end to it. She was also ask to bring my dad if it was at all possible and to bring me. Remember, this was in the late 50's and I was around 12 or 13 years old. Well, she hung up the phone and ask me what I had done THIS TIME to deserve this type of phone call. I told her I didn't know what they were talking about and I was telling the truth. Ever since leaving the hell that was Catholic school, I was pretty much on the straight and narrow.

Well, the next night my mom, dad and I went to this meeting and I was surprised to see some other kids I knew, both boys and girls. One was my best friend Robbie and the other was a girl we both knew who was named Lucky.  The principal was the one running the meeting. He thanked us all for being there (yeah, right) and explained that there were some activities going on with some students that needed to be addressed. He said that before they started the discussion, he wanted to show a short movie. It turned out to be a homemade 8mm movie...for those of you who remember those. He lowered the lights and this movie came on showing the playground, a small grove of trees and various groups of boys and girls not only kissing, but learning a little bit more about the "birds and bees" than our parents were willing to teach us. It panned around and clearly showed Robbie and I getting to know Lucky a little bit better and also getting to know the "ins and outs" of a training bra and Lucky learning the complicated workings of zippers.  The lights came back up...there was a discussion among the parents about what kind of discipline was appropriate and what further action to take to put an end to such vile behavior on the playground. It was decided that the parents would handle it in their own different ways and that there would be more teachers assigned to the playground area. The meeting was over and we all walked out together, the parents talking among themselves and us kids talking among ourselves. I remember my mom and dad saying "what a waste of time....at least he didn't burn anything down". Then my dad turned to me and said...."the next time you and Robbie decide to do something like that....make sure you both were completely BEHIND the tree"!! I think at that moment, my dad and I became best friends....at least until the late 60's. That statement also turned out to be the metaphor for my life!!