“Rosemere Street is a legend in our time,” proclaimed Gene Kelley — my old neighbor, not the song-and-dance man. Our neighbor did possess some theatrical talents, but they were more in keeping with Seinfeld with a touch of Archie Bunker thrown in.
By Karen T. Butler
“Rosemere Street is a legend in our time,” proclaimed Gene Kelley — my old neighbor, not the song-and-dance man. Our neighbor did possess some theatrical talents, but they were more in keeping with Seinfeld with a touch of Archie Bunker thrown in.
Tree-lined with 1920 vintage homes, on mostly 50- by 100-foot lots, Rosemere Street has, in various innocuous ways, influenced Rye’s enduring history. Those who’ve lived there know this well. For most of Rye, the question is: “Where is Rosemere?” The answer: in Ryan Park, which also encompasses Sanford, Adelaide, Horton, and the north side of Wainwright Street.
As newlyweds, we moved to Harrison, attracted by cheaper rents. As graduates of Rye High, inculturated in the lifelong hard-fought Rye/Harrison football rivalry, our allegiance was always to Rye.
A couple of children later, our small apartment was really cramped. Our standard poodle Brandy was the deal breaker for the landlord. It was the dog or move. We chose to move.
With little money, we sought out a house in Rye. My mother sold real estate at the time but never had the heart to say to her son-in-law, “How much money do you have for a down payment?” The truth was we had close to none.
Miraculously, we scrambled and came up with the 25 percent down payment of $5,000 by waitressing and waitering part-time at Shenorock Shore Club and the like. We moved into our dream home on Rosemere with barely $100 in the bank.
We purchased our home from Oscar, who was famous by Rye’s standards, because his son, Eric, a World War Il pilot, reputedly buzzed the village with his plane, courtesy of the United States government, coming uncomfortably close to the tall pointed chimney that still fortunately graces Blind Brook Lodge apartments. Mind you this is legend, or should I say unsubstantiated folklore.
Oscar was shrewd, offering us the leftover contents of the house, which included a large green rug with two substantially worn spots we quickly disguised with dark green spray paint to accommodate guests for a wedding reception we threw three weeks after we moved in. None of our guests seemed to notice our paint job. Oscar threw in some thoroughly used bureaus and tables for the total sum of $250. We jumped at the offer for our furnishings were next to nil.
Youthful creativity helped us turn our first house into a sweet home — we were trailblazers in shabby chic. Maureen, my neighbor across the street, and I would wave to each other from our respective garages as we industriously sanded and painted our latest finds. As a group of neighbors we enrolled in a woodshop class held one night a week at Rye High. Our comical neighbor, Gene, made a small coffee table. The legs were uneven, so he had to continue shortening them to make the table level. The result: a very low coffee table. All of our homes had a charm and originality born out of financial necessity, eclectic imaginations, and a sense of humor.
We thrived in our new home and neighborhood. Evenings we sat on what our neighbor Potsie the Paster (a sheetrock taper by trade) called his stoop, really a porch, laughing away the evenings, relaxing on wicker chairs once owned by Yankee great Lou Gehrig, or so we were told. The Rye Chronicle, in 1933, described a visit by Gehrig to address the Father & Son Banquet at Resurrection School. Autographing baseballs, the legendary first baseman spoke profoundly of the “value of boys having confidence in their dads and their dads making companions of their sons.”
There were evenings we were so boisterous that neighbors a block away on Horton Street came over to complain. They undoubtedly were feeling left out of the fun.
We knew spring had arrived on Rosemere when the aroma of “sheep manure” permeated the air, and permeate it it did. It was a collective executive decision by various neighbors that sheep manure would produce green, lush grass in the shaded areas of our yards under the limbs of the spreading maple trees that lined the street. The aroma was profound; whether the grass was greener is a matter of conjecture.
Bill, our postman and neighbor, strolled home bent from years of carrying the heavy shoulder mailbag as he went door-to-door delivering Rye’s mail, no vehicles for him. Doc GiaQuinto gave a wave as he left early and returned late from his pharmacy (Rye Beach) a few blocks away on Forest. Les Gedney and his boys hustled off to do tree work, leaving his two daughters behind who were always eager to babysit for our children. These are only a smattering of our wonderful neighbors.
Frank received celebrity status for his moment of fame with his picture on the front page of the Daily Item, when “Rye’s Finest” rescued him by rowboat when his car was partly submerged on the flooded Playland Parkway under the bridge of the Boston Post Road.
There was also fun-loving Dorothea who worked in City Hall for many years, but most notably whose steadfast perseverance inspired the creation of the fountain and honor roll at City Hall of those from Rye who served in the armed forces during World War II, the Korean conflict, and the Vietnam War.
My neighbor’s dog, Happy, made everyone on the street happy except one neighbor, Joe Cigar. Joe, so named because he wore a sweatband around his head and always had a large cigar hanging out of his mouth, methodically cut his lawn using a non-motorized mower. With his grass neatly trimmed, he placed two pink flamingos elegantly and precisely to the right of his front door. To keep Happy from leaving his calling card, even though he was not supposed to run loose but occasionally did, Joe meticulously sprinkled hot red Italian pepper around the perimeters of his yard, which proved a most effective deterrent.
On balmy evenings, we sat on Potsie’s stoop waiting for pretty Wendy to return from her evening date, imagining we could hear the springs creaking in her beau’s hot rod as they had their goodnight kisses under the watchful eye of their neighbors.
Our kids, without fail, alerted us to the first rumble of the Dragon Coaster at Playland, reminding us of dthe park’s impending opening if by some incredible chance we failed to hear the noise. To calm them, they were promised one visit in the late spring and one before it closed in the fall.
After years of being two semi-derelict amusement parks called Paradise Park and Rye Beach Park, a beautifully rebuilt Playland opened in 1928. The new park sported two wooden rollercoasters. The Dragon Coaster was over 3,400 feet long, plunging 80 feet in places. The Airplane Coaster, built at the same time and originally called The Airplane-Dip, was sadly torn down in 1967. The screaming riders and the evening fireworks could always be heard on Rosemere, when the breeze blew in the right direction.
Wherever I meander and say I’m from Rye, the response is almost always predictable: “Oh, I’ve been to Playland. I had so much fun there when I was a kid.”
Playland was a big draw to city folks, especially during the years of the day boat, which was much like a small ferry. It arrived from Manhattan at noon sounding its horn as it pulled up to Playland Pier. At 5 p.m., for the return trip, the horn blew once more. The John A. Meseck charged $1.75 round trip for adults and 75 cents for children. The price went up to $2 on Sundays and holidays.
Larry Byrne, whose family has lived on Rosemere since 1923, owned Playland’s renowned Fun House, whose two huge side-by-side slides we rode down sitting on burlap sacks. You had to keep your hands on your lap, because if you touched the side of the slide you got a friction burn. Once you were in The Fun House, you could stay for the day. There were “shock benches” that gave you a small electric jolt. Girls mostly wore skirts, and the guys got a thrill when the hidden “air shots” pushed up the girls’ skirts.
Larry’s family had been in vaudeville, so Playland was a natural “show-business” progression as vaudeville faded. With his father, he wrote a special theme song, “Playland,” for the 1928 opening pageant and performed in the show. They wrote this song under their vaudeville names: Larry Sylvester Jr. and Sr.
‘Fascinating Playland sets all hearts aflame
Beautiful like my best girl
Playland has my brain a whirl
From baby land way back to Noah’s Ark
Oh say when can we meet again at charming Playland Park.’
Sadly, in July of 1966, the entire northeast quadrant of Playland was burnt to the ground, leaving a pile of ashes and bringing The Fun House and all its fun to an end.
Playland was also a convenient drop-off spot during Prohibition for alcohol brought in by boat. Some streets off Forest Avenue, close to the beach, were rumored to have had a “speak-easy” or two. One’s imagination run wild could visualize one in the Rosemere Street neighborhood.
The rafters in the basement of our Rosemere Street house were full of empty liquor bottles, deep between the floor joists for good hiding. In the mid ‘20s, The Rye Chronicle reported: “Rye police (under the direction of William H. Ball, Rye’s Police Chief from 1904 until 1938) had their first encounter with rum-runners —you will remember that the 18th amendment was passed in 1920 — when a bold party anchored their schooner off Rye Beach by night and transferred three hundred gallons of liquor by launch and rowboats to Manursing Island. Our (police) men took them by strategy and conveyed them to the Police Station where they were duly turned over to the proper authorities.” The story ends there, failing to say whatever became of the stash.
In 1930, another newspaper wrote that, “Rye has the doubtful distinction of possessing one of the biggest distilleries in this section of the country;” a second significant distillery was discovered in Rye a few years later. In areas near the beach as well as other rental areas, furnished nicely on the first floor, usually with draperies that obscured the goings on in the house. But the upper floors were used to create “hooch.” Neighbors eventually complained about odors, which gave away the whereabouts of the well hidden “still.” Now, I am not saying that such goings on definitely happened on Rosemere, but then again there are a few who believe it was not beyond the realm of possibility. The Hamptons and Coney Island were famous, but Rye Beach was also a very popular summer destination, attracting tens of thousands, so one can imagine many a wild evening had by the summer crowd. The 18th Amendment was repealed in December 1933, but Rye’s reputation as a law-abiding community had been badly tarnished.
The true highlight of the summer on Rosemere Street was to barricade each end of the street and have our annual block party. Neighbors who during the rest of year gave a passing wave, pulled their lawn chairs onto the curb of the street, came with picnic food, ready to join the crowd. Potsie the Paster made delicious pizza fritz on his outdoor grill (fried dough sprinkled with confectionary sugar). Potsie did go on to have another career, as proprietor of The Cove East bar on the corner of Dearborn and Forest. Reggie was a fortuneteller in her gypsy outfit. It was a very memorable part of the Rosemere Street legend.
Fast-forward to the early 1960s, a time of breaking down the establishment, the Civil Rights movement, the Vietnam War. It was on Rosemere Street that the grunt work was done that brought two-party government to Rye for the first time in its 300-year history — as the political spin postured it although some splinter candidates over the years had been victorious. Both national political parties had their headquarters in the Village, even though the issues were of local concern. The backroom headquarters on Rosemere, with phone lines streaming into the dining room, resembled a bookie joint more than a campaign headquarters.
Having almost no money but lots of enthusiasm, volunteers called every home in Rye once, and sometimes annoyingly more than once, to get out the vote. “Hello, Tom Butler and John Carey asked me to call and ask for your vote for two-party government in Rye. Thanks so much for your vote on Election Day.” Butler and Carey were both registered Democrats. With some thanks to Rosemere Street, “two-party government” came to Rye on Tuesday, November 5, 1963, when Butler and Carey were elected to the City Council.
So “dear hearts and gentle people who live in my hometown,” give Rosemere Street the respect that legends deserve.
— Photos courtesy of The Rye Historical Society, Knapp House Archives, and the family of Larry Byrne
