My Grandmother's old building, 930 Grand Concourse, peeks through the trees of Joyce Kilmer Park.
All Photographs by Glenn Mann.
Thanksgiving Eve found me in one of my most treasured places in the world – 163rd Street and the Grand Concourse. Yes, the legendary, some might even say infamous, South Bronx.
I felt a familiar thrill from childhood when the 4 train abruptly escaped the confines of being underground and burst like a supercharged rollercoaster onto the elevated tracks at 161st St and River Avenue. As the familiar silhouette of Yankee Stadium loomed from behind the station walls, it took all of my energy to contain myself. Memories came flooding back. How many times as a little girl did I take that subway ride? How many hours over the years had I stood on that seasonally sweltering or freezing platform waiting for the train to take me from the Bronx to the City, as we called Manhattan?
Pinstripe Blues: The Original Yankee Stadium
Statue in Joyce Kilmer Park
Maybe I am suffering from a classic case of good old days nostalgia. I haven’t lived in the Bronx in 20 years and even though it is a short subway ride from my home in Harlem, I don't get to visit very often. But I have vivid memories of jumping Double Dutch in front of my Grandma’s old building 930 Grand Concourse, eating coconut ices in Joyce Kilmer Park, and clumsily flirting with boys outside Yankee Stadium.
The Grand Concourse really does live up to it’s name. Expansive, elegant and lined with Art Deco buildings, this tree-lined boulevard is known as the Champs Elysees of the Bronx.
Blue Skies Over the Grand Concourse
All of the accompanying photos of the old neighborhood were shot by my brother Glenn. If you’ve never been to the Bronx or only go for baseball games, you are missing out. Click here for a great walking itinerary of the Bronx that recently appeared in Time Out.
