Recorded in Forest City, Florida.
This snapshot was gathered in conjunction with the Museum on Main Street program at the Smithsonian Institution. Their "Stories from Main Street" initiative is intended to capture Americans' impressions and stories about their small-town and rural neighborhoods, waterways, traditions, and personal experiences.
What is your favorite memory of growing up in a small town?
Up on Main Street in Dobbs Ferry, New York, was going across the street to the Sons of Italy. My grandfather was the president of that for many years. Going to the bakery to get fresh Italian bread to bring home. Walking to the post office with my grandfather and walking up the street on Main Street and down Cedar Street with my grandmother to go shopping at the local A&P and just seeing so many people that we knew there. It was just really great.
To walk down the sidewalk and realize, "Wow. When my grandmother was a little girl, she walked on this sidewalk. And my mother and I were born in the same hospital. And my mother walked up the same sidewalk. My mother grew up in the same apartment with my grandparents that I grew up in with my grandparents."
Asset ID: 7477
