Letters from Readers

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A Call for Letters

I never intended to collect any "letters" from people when I launched this web site...I really just wanted to keep it to simple and post the fun little memories like you see on the home page.

That was until I received the letter below from Berta Johnson of Mansfield, TX.

Wow, what a recollection from days gone by!

If you feel led to send in a "letter" that would be great. Please try and follow the following guidelines as best you can:

1) Try to keep it to one subject, i.e...Leonard's Department Store, a particular restaurant, an event, a school you attended, your neighborhood, etc...

2) Paint the best "picture" you can for us about this topic. Give us as much detail of your memory as you can.

3) Keep it clean and don't offend. No, we don't want to rewrite history, but lets face it...there are some things you just wouldn't share in certain company. We don't want to share them here either. Let's have fun!

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A Visit to Leonard's Department Store

I was born in San Francisco, CA in 1945 and came to Fort Worth, TX about 1948. My first memory of Ft Worth was being dragged to the back of the bus. I was used to sitting right behind the motorman on the subway in Frisco.

My favorite memories of Fort Worth are about downtown, it was wonderful, there was the largest store in the world, as far as I was concerned Leonard Brothers Dept. Store my favorite place in the whole wide world. You could buy anything you needed to live in TX at Leonard's or it's sister store Everybody's. Leonard's probably had the first and largest Supermarket in the United States. There was clothing for everyone in the family both the most beautiful and the kind every one needed to work in. There were coats and dresses, and pants for the ladies and suites and coveralls for the men of the families.

Then there was the farm and ranch store where every farmer and his family could buy everything and anything that you needed for their ranch or farm including tractors, mowers, hay baylors, animial feed, a variety of seeds and all sorts of things.

Leonard's had a pet shop where they sold small pets and the food they needed.

The greatest department was the toy department at Christmas. The entrance was a long black hall with indentures in the wall painted with floresent paint of all bright colors with dancing puppets and clowns also painted with bright colored florecent paint and they moved and danced that was on left side of the wall. On the other side of the wall were food stands with candied apples, cotton candy, popcorn, soda, and hot dogs.

As you entered toyland, which opened the day after thanksgiving, and looked to the right there were dolls of every description and from every country taking up one whole wall of the very large room. There were dolls going around the celing and dolls on shelves filling the wall then there was a counter that took up the width of the wall full of dolls and more dolls, all sizes, and all descriptions. It was a dream world for my Mother and myself.

There was a train that traveled around the celing on the sides of the wall in a dark tunnel where there were floresent painted indentures in the wall and ballarena dancers danging and all kinds of moving toys at regular intervals in the indentures, and lots of angle hair of all colors all around the wall it was like a wonderful Christmas dream.

The rest of the room was filled with bikes, wagons, games and toys of every dexcription. There was a talking Rudalph the red noised rain deer and of course a large Santa in the middle with elves all around him.

Leonard Brothers toyland was supposed to be a replica of Macy's toyland in New York but to me it was a city set aside just for me and children just like me.

Of course there were other great stores downtown The Fair of Texas, the store for the millionaires, Striplings, Coxes and my favorite other store Meachums. These stores exlemplefied class, class and more class. Yes growing up in Fort Worth was a great adventure even though we had colored water fountians and colored toliets we had class.

I would like to mention Ms. Lucy Gist of the Methodist Womens Association who came to Fort Worth just to build a recreation center just for us called the Bethlehem Center on New York Street in Sunny South Fort Worth, TX. Ms Gist was a wonderful Missionary lady who took us under her wing and taught us to cook and live out doors before letting us cook in the kitchen. She took us to the 1st Methodist Church Rec Center to Skate and took us to camp all over Texas and some of Oklahoma before aquiring Camp El Torsoro for us. I was a Bluebird, a Campfire Girl, a Horizan and a Jiver , a club for boys and girls to socialize with adult supervision at all times at the Bethlehem Center, which my classmate is the director of now. I am so proud of Mrs Lucy Gist and will always be thankful for her.

My maternal family has lived in Fort Worth Tx sinse the later part of the 1800's. My Great-Grand-Mother Ms Minnie Lynch Carther and her mother walked to Fort Worth from Tennesee immeadiatly after slavery was abolished. My Grandmother, Mother, Bertice Hardin Bates, her sister Westell Hardin and Brother Wesley Harden and myself all attended and graduated I M Terrell High School.

I grew up at 914 E. Hattie St. and I attended James E. Guinn Elementary and Jr. Highschool and I was also in the first Black class of East Van Zandt Elementary School.

--- Berta Johnson, Mansfield, TX

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Centennial Celebration, Dancing, Casa Mañana and Such

I was born and raised in Fort Worth and we were living on W. Berry when the 1936 Texas Centennial Celebration was in progress. It was in celebration of Texas winning its Independence from Mexico 100 years earlier. I was eight years old and Daddy and Mother decided my older sister and I needed to learn to dance so we could go to Casa Manana with them and go down on the stage and dance with Daddy between the dinner and the show. We would practice with Daddy in the dining room to either the radio or the Victrola. A Victrola was a record player that was in a cabinet about four feet tall and was square. I would say about 24 inches on all sides. We had to stand on a stool to be able to put the record on the turntable to play it. You had to turn a crank on the side to wind it up. It would play a 12" record at the proper speed. We had to wind it up again for every record you played. It was wonderful.

Daddy was a good dancer and we both learned very quickly. Because of those early dancing lessons we were able to shine when we finally started formal dance lessons later at James Leito’s Dance Studio. We both enjoyed dancing and to this day we get great pleasure out of the rhythm of dance music.

So far, the Texas Centennial was the most enjoyable thing to come along in our young lives. We would go to Dallas, TX and attend the "official" Centennial. It was to be the greatest show on earth as far as Texas was concerned. I remember the little town that was built just for midgets and dwarfs. Today we refer to them as "Little People." The streets and the little houses were all built to scale for them. The furniture and kitchens were all small to be used by them. It was fascinating to a child because it was actually to our scale too. I will never forget it. I think the “Little People” who were there were also the same ones used in "The Wizard of Oz." three years later.

The Centennial in Dallas was neat. They had so many exhibits and shows and the rides were fun. We were able to ride some of them. That was the year that Ritz Crackers were introduced. They may have already been in other parts of the country but I just remember that was the first time I had seen and tasted them. They were so good when you could get some for a sample.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt visited the Centennial Fairgrounds in Dallas and also made trip to Fort Worth. We went down to a park on 21st Street on the Northside and watched him ride by in his Presidential Limousine.

Now, back to the Fort Worth part of the Centennial Celebration. We were excited to have our own show here in our hometown. The Casa Manana was built especially for a large stage show called Billy Rose’s Revue. There were singers and dancers and showgirls galore. Big bands were to play for the show and before and after dinner. One of the Dorsey brother’s bands was here and Paul Whiteman and his orchestra were here almost all of the time. For some reason or other it took me many years to like the sound of a saxophone. Someone in Paul Whiteman’s band played one and I just didn’t like the sound. The music was wonderful and very suited to dancing.
The stage at the Casa Manana was a revolving stage. It would turn around and there was a wooden dance floor. On the other side of the stage they would be changing the scenery for the show. When it was time for the show to begin, they would have people leave the dance floor and a wall of water would shoot up to form a curtain while the stage revolved back around. That is when the magic would begin. The music and all of the performers were pros and the showgirls were fabulous. They were all about 6 feet tall and gorgeous. They wore the most glamorous costumes and head pieces that anybody had ever seen. There was a staircase that was used in the finale that was covered with beautiful women. I can still see it to this day. We went to see the show a number of times while it was here.

There was a dancer by the name of Sally Rand who supposedly danced nude with only a pair of large feather fans. She would come out just before the water curtain would go down and the lights were very low with just a tint of blue in them. Sometimes she would use large see through bubbles. They were forerunners of plastic, I am sure. I imagine Sally wore a full flesh colored suit, but back then everybody thought she was nude. She had another show called Sally Rand’s Nude Ranch. Of course we were not allowed to go there. It was supposed to be a strip club. The girls working there were to be totally nude. Now that one may have been true, but Sally, on the Casa Manana stage, had to be covered, somehow. Some kind of ordinance, I’m sure. Anyway, it was fun to go.

There was another large building on the grounds. It was called The Pioneer Palace. It was more of a bar and dance hall rather than for a big stage show production. It followed the Western theme of "Cowtown." There was a large, long, very ornate bar with a stage built above it with mirrors. This is where the "Six Tiny Rosebuds" would dance and sing. They were dressed as barroom girls of the old west. More like can-can girls. The one unique thing about them was their size. There was not one of them that weighed less than 300 pounds. They could dance and sing like angels. I do not know when they tore down the Pioneer Palace, but I do know it was still there in 1943 or 1944. We were still going there for parties when I was in high school. In fact, they had some sort of show there where anyone who sang or danced could go and participate. I went and sang something. Have no idea what it was. I was very active in the music classes at Arlington Heights then. One time when we had a party while we lived on Locke, Clyde Kurtz got mad at me and told me that I would make the Six Tiny Rosebuds look sick. I was fat and I guess he couldn’t think of anything else to say to me. He made me mad and I slapped him. I saw him about ten years ago and I reminded him of that. We got a big laugh out of it.

As I said, this was the greatest event to come along in my young life and will remain in my memories until I die.

--- Charlotte Grizzle, Fort Worth, TX

The Old West 7th Tamale Man

My wife Pat and I had dinner the other evening at the new Montgomery Plaza on West 7th Street. From “Monkey Wards” to an Asian fusion dinner. A span of a lifetime. So before it’s all gone, I need to tell you a story.

Most kids growing up on the West Side of Fort Worth in the ‘40s knew about the old tamale man. He was an old Mexican that stood on the Northeast side of the West 7th Street Bridge, about where the beautiful, new Cash America building is now, selling homemade tamales his wife had made out of what looked like a small ice-cream cart that I guess he had constructed.

The old tamale man waved at every kid coming by in the back seat of the family sedan, Daddy driving, Mama sitting up front. He’d sell us tamales by the dozen wrapped up in old Fort Worth Press or Star-Telegram newspapers and tied neatly with string. We’d take ‘em home behind Montgomery Ward’s and open ‘em up all steaming hot and eat ‘em with crackers. I had lots of treats when I was a kid but those tamales had to be the best.

Mr. Bryant, our next door neighbor, had a dog that he said he’d trained to bark at only the Mexicans that lived on Weisenberger Street behind us. But, I saw that dog bark at anyone walking by. I think it was Mr. Bryant who only barked at Mexicans. About that time there were signs in downtown stores that said “Whites only” and “Coloreds only” so Mr. Bryant wasn’t the only one that barked at anyone different. Some still do!

I learned a lifelong lesson growing up behind Montgomery Ward’s. Every fall the Ringling Brothers, Barnum and Bailey Circus would set up their tents in that huge vacant lot across Carroll Street from us. Finally I was old enough to join the other boys in setting up the circus. Our pay was to be a free ticket. Well, I got there at the crack of dawn and they worked us hard, along with the elephants. Every time we’d finish one tent the boss would say, “One more tent, boys, and you’ll get your tickets.” You know, he kept us going a long time that day teasing us that way. I never fell for that trick again except maybe two times when I was in the Marines and another when I was a country music dj on WBAP radio. But, those are other stories.

My Daddy, Oscie Perkins, Senior, who worked at the lumber company across the street from Monkey Ward’s, would eat his lunch in Trinity Park. One day he said a kid, who lived in those Quonset huts on University Drive that they built for returning GIs and their families, came running by with a bunch of dead squirrels slung over one shoulder and a shotgun over the other. The boy told him, “We just moved here and I never seen so many squirrels. I’m agoin’ back home to get some more shotgun shells.” My Daddy liked to have died laughing. But, he did gently tell the kid that Trinity Park was a refuge for all wildlife.

All of us kids went to West Van Zandt elementary. It was on the corner of Lancaster and University drive and we’d walk up there and back. They’ve torn it down now, but if I’d known I was going to grade school in what was to be known later as the “cultural” district I’d have tried a lot harder. It was there in 1948 when our teacher, Ms. Walsh, came in one chilly November morning and said “Children, Mr. Truman’s been re-elected President.” When the rodeo and fat stock show was in town at the coliseum every January we’d just sit there and gaze out at the carnival rides across the street.

The tamale man went out of business, I guess, when the West 7th Street bridge was washed away in the May, ’49 flood and we had to cross the Trinity River on a temporary pontoon bridge. I grew up and joined the Marines so maybe that’s what put him out of business, all of us growing up and going away. But, I don’t know, though. There’re always tamale men and there’re always kids.

Because, now that I’m as old as the old tamale man, when I think of that old man and him waving at us kids, I get to thinking about the past saying a sweet hello to the future and the future smiling back. The dreams of the past mixing with the hopes of the future to give us the joys of today. We all have tamale men that we remember.

--- David Perkins, Fort Worth, Texas

Left my Heart in Old Fort Worth

I was born at St. Joseph's Hospital in 1935 and raised on the south side mainly.

Fort Worth was the best place to be a kid back in the 40's and 50's. There were free movies at the neighborhood parks each week during the summer. We took a quilt and a nickel for a snow cone and watched many an old cowboy movie and we were safe to walk there and back home. Mr. Melton, who was Santa Claus at Mrs. Baird's bakery each Christmas lived across the street from our house and we would see him come out wearing his suit and get into his huge black LaSalle car to go to the bakery every night just before Christmas.

We lived in the Faimount area and every Saturday we walked to the Parkway movie theater to watch all the movies and cartoons at the kid show. My younger brother won the Tom Sawyer Contest there in 1947. We went to Lily B. Clayton grade school and I remember catching a bus once a week in the 3rd grade to go downtown for a violin lesson. What is remarkable is that an 8 year old little girl could do that by herself and it was okay. Each Saturday we would ride the bus to town and go to the public library for "Story Hour".

Our grandmother took us to every parade held in downtown Ft. Worth when we were kids and it was so much fun. We always saw Mr. Peanut in front of the Planter Peanut store handing out samples and a street photographer took our picture every time. At Christmas we were taken downtown at night to see all the animated toys on display in all the stores which was so delightful. I remember seeing the big flood in 1949 from the Lancaster bridge and Montgomery Ward was in water up to the second or third floor. We walked from our house on Fairmount to the big swimming pool in Forest Park almost daily when we were kids.

Years later my sons had the joy of growing up in Fort Worth as well, and my youngest son is now in his 40's and he told me he had the greatest childhood growing up in Fort Worth and being able to ride his bike anywhere and grow up with the friendliest people. I feel the same way. I live in Dallas these days, but my heart is in Fort Worth and I will return someday.

--- Margie Zimmerman, Dallas Texas

Kleinschmidt Cake Shop

I worked at Kleinschmidt Cake shop next door too the 7th Street theatre.

I was 18 and was my first job. I quit a little less than a year ( around 1972-1973) I was young and stupid and regretted leaving because I have warm memories with the Kleinschmidts.

Mama ran the register, and Papa only came early in the morning and baked all the wonderful bakery goods. The son who I do not remember his name ran the bakery and was a baker himself. His wife was an artist and made wonderful cakes for special parties. She could draw or carve any thing on a cake.

To find out any of their recipes you would have to get a hold the family, they protected and did not share their recipes I would love to have their eclair custard and their Boston Cream pies recipes. I have never found any to compare or as good as theirs. Good luck with your search. I also have a request to find a recipe for Eggplant casserole made at the Wyatt's cafeteria at the old Seminary South Shopping Mall, it was delicious and taste like dressing. My family always ate there after a long day of shopping.

--- Pam Smith, Fort Worth, Texas