MONEY CAN'T BUY HAPPINESS — Sharon Mark Cohen

The place was Roselle, New Jersey; circa 1963.

There I am, happy as a lark in my Lincoln School (Roselle) T-shirt, practically all covered by a sweater-jacket. My bright smile shows the front tooth I chipped “up the mountains,” where my family vacationed at the bungalows in the “Jewish Alps” each summer of my childhood.

In this black and white beauty of a photograph, I’m riding my homemade bicycle on the cracked pavement outside a wooden-clad flat-roofed four-family apartment house. My family rented a flat on the second floor of the two-story building at the corner of Chandler Avenue and Grand Street. We lived there until January 1, 1965.

The fondest memories surfaced of spending countless time making mud pies with that “clean” dirt surrounding the foundation of the building. My mind’s eye drifts to the faded red-colored plastic cup and large, well-worn metal soup spoon my mother pulled from the cabinet time after time before sending me off on my fun solo adventures.

That bicycle I learned how to ride on was lovingly built before my eyes by my father, a letter carrier by occupation. The epitome of the jolly mailman, he always worked more than one job to keep his large family fed. To this day, I remember him putting the finishing touches on the bike using multi-colored tassels on the white hand-grips along with a bell and rear-view mirror.

Those fancy accessories were all plucked from the random inventory at his “new and used” car and bicycle parts shop. For a short time, with limited business hours, he owned and operated the small store down Chandler Avenue, near St. George.

Oh, the glorious memories. When I pulled the above childhood photograph from my collection, it was in hopes that my friends from those Roselle days might recognize their Lincoln School classmate and a neighborhood friend. Shout out to Ila, Carrie Jen, Deby, Lois, Linda, Sharon K., Sharon V., and Sharon J. Notice that my given name was quite a popular one in the 1950s.

To my Roselle friends, which classes did we attend together? My teachers at Lincoln School were:

Miss Cohn - Kindergarten

Mrs. Bogart - First Grade

Mrs. Lillian - Second Grade

Miss Solo - Third Grade

Mrs. Adams - Fourth Grade

Mrs. Butchko (permanent sub) - Fifth Grade

Mrs. Hirsch - 6th Grade - I moved to Elizabeth after the first half of the school year.

Small store my father owned and operated on Chandler Avenue in Roselle, N.J. in the early 1960s

I got much wear out of that Lincoln School T-Shirt. Photo on left my mother talking with my Aunt Fannie (sitting in car) and my brother Stu and me. Photo on the right, my father, me and my mother. Early 1960s. Roselle, N.J.