Field Experiences: Interviews & Observations

Notes from and poems inspired by a slide show/storytelling performance by Carol Goroff about Frances Street in historical Greenbush

Frances Street is a very popular street. Over a million people lived on that street over the years until urban renewal came. They tore that street down like it was an ant getting crushed.

—Unnamed Student

There was this bigger than normal house that had over 18 kids and grown-ups that lived there. There was only one shower, one bathroom instead of the outhouses in the backyard, and they only got to shower about two times in two weeks.

—Unnamed Student

One day a little girl named Annie was playing outside. She went inside her house for a glass of water. Then out of nowhere, she was hit on the head with a beer bottle by her drunk father. He carried her up to her bed, but she died a few minutes later. The family paid $35.00 to a man named Davis to throw Annie’s body in Lake Mendota.

When the maid went to clean Annie’s sheets and Annie’s nightgown, unaware of her death, there were blood stains on them. The maid, doing her job, put the gown and the sheets into the tub to wash them but Mrs. Lembruger snatched them out of the tub and burned them.

“Dogskin” Johnson was accused of the murder of little Annie because he had done some pretty bad things in the Bush. He was then sent to jail. A lot of people think that it was the father but the State still thinks it was Dogskin.

—Giulia

Someone framed Dogskin Johnson. Someone stole a dog and skinned it and everyone blamed him and that’s how he got his nickname.

—Cole

There was a guy named Spike Johnson and he could take a railroad spike and with a fist he could pound the spike into a 2×4.

—Cole

On Frances Street everyone had kind neighbors that were loyal to the Greenbush. Before urban renewal, the mail business was exceptionally good. There was no junk mail and there had never been an undeliverable letter.

—Noah

The families at #24 believed that girls shouldn’t have an education. So when the truant officers came, the girls were locked in the attic until they left.

—Micah

Herman Jenkins grew pears and an Osage orange tree. He took a male and female Osage and twisted them together. That orange tree was the only living plant left in the Greenbush after Urban Renewal in 1960.

—Micah

This neighborhood, like all in the Greenbush, was close-knit. They didn’t even have addresses on their houses. If someone asked where they live, they would say, “I live ‘something’ doors down from the Catini house.

One day a girl went off to camp for a week. When she got back, her family was gone so she asked her neighbor if she knew where they had gone. She said they had moved to a different street. The little girl had to knock on every house on that street until she found her family.

—Maddy

People from Europe came to train for the war and they brought the Spanish flu which spread over Madison. It affected the people living in the Greenbush the most. Because they had so many people living in each house, it spread quickly.

—Maddy

Frances St., Frances St.
trampled ‘neath the city’s feet.

Once the streets were full of happy people there,
but now the tar is black and bare.

With no one happy living there.
Once it was full of trees abundant
but now is full with houses most redundant.

It used to be on Frances St.,
you knew the people you would meet.

But they tore the houses down
and everyone you knew left town.

New apartments aren’t the same,
As places that you knew by name.
New designs sad and graceless
Left the Greenbush almost faceless.

—Colin

On Frances Street the mailman knew everybody on the street
even the dogs.

Actually, the mailmen probably knew the dogs a lot better
than they knew the people.

—Sam R.

All the little houses, one by one lined up close together.
Someone yells, someone laughs.
It’s just the kids of Frances St.
Fun all around
Relatives all around
Always people there to help
Nobody left out
Children everywhere
Intelligent people
Something worth fighting over in the Urban Renewal
Somewhere in the Greenbush
Truthful people
It’s Frances St.!

—Danny

Rodney Court had no sidewalk. The houses were close together and small, yet it seemed a comfortable place to live. Most were one story, a few were 2 stories. A lot had porches – some screened, some not. The yards were in back. It struck me as a place similar to the old Greenbush.

—Rosa

When I saw some old houses from the Greenbush (these must have survived urban renewal) I noticed that they were old, paint was chipping, and one had a “for rent” sign sitting in the window. These are signs of poorness.

—Sam R.

In the Greenbush, and everywhere, someone always makes a choice about what is going to be there. What tree type? What color? What size? We learned you could tell if something was used a lot by behavior traces; these little signs of trash or worn grass and other things that help you make a guess if it is used a lot.

—Noah

When we went to Bayview, we saw that there was a bare spot near the stairs. Sam Dennis told us that when he was there with his students, they saw kids rushing out and instead of walking down the steps; they ducked under a gap in the railing and ran down the slope. That’s why there was a bare spot. He asked us how we could prevent that from happening. My idea was that we could put some bars in the gap and put grass seed on the bare patch. If we barred the gap nobody would be able to get through and tear the grass.

—Elena

In Bayview, there were two large mosaics, one a triangle, and one a square. The triangle mosaic was done by the children in Bayview. There are many intricate tile designs and some simple ones. If you follow one of the points of the triangle, you will come to one of the three corners of “The Triangle” (the center of the original Greenbush). The mosaic was designed to fit in like that.

The second mosaic is by the bridge that goes to Brittingham Park. This mosaic is square and was done by people with special needs. In the center, there is a circle, which is in the center of a cross spreading out from the center of each side. It is pretty nice.

I think that these tiles were done to sort of bring everybody together and to sort of bond as a community. It would be nice if my neighborhood did that sort of project.

—Micah

Another thing I liked about the trip is how we walked and got to see everything unlike when we were on the bus where we could only see stuff from our window. It was amazing at how much more I could learn by just walking places.

—Sam B.

We then went to Rodney Court which had many houses left from the old bush. The houses were very small and close to the street. The street itself was narrow without sidewalks and had no drainage. Instead there were sloped gutters that cornered the rainwater down to the lake.

—Marley

Questions

Who owns the building?
Why is their logo blue and red?
Why does it look weird?
Why is there a fence, but no gate?
Why is there no grass?
Why is there video surveillance?

—Eben

Old almost forgotten street
with houses that are close to one another.
Neighbors waving, playing and talking to one another.
The Greenbush.

—Sam R.

Many different stones
Cut to squares and triangular shapes
All in beautiful colors
Granite to glass
The mosaic shows the tree points
Of the Greenbush triangle.

—Lulu

Garden

Raised beds with
Jalapeño peppers
Tomatoes
Lettuce
Bokchoi
And many other diverse veggies.
Flowers too.

—Lulu

One of the other things I thought was interesting was the community of Bayview. I was surprised at what they had. They had a center where they offered afterschool programs and playgrounds and courts where the kids would have a place to play. They also have a garden and a lot of other activities they can do as a group. They also offer senior or disabled care, providing food and also group activities.

—Sam B.

Bayview is Madison’s multicultural neighborhood. It is 70% Southern Asian (Hmong, Cambodian and Chinese), 24% Latino and 10% African American. Bayview is a really nice place and it has a lot of benefits for the people who live there. Bayview offers a summer camp, an afterschool and a preschool program.

—Rosa K.

Bayview is a set of apartments in the new Greenbush. The families that mostly live in Bayview are Hmong, other Southeast Asian ethnic groups, African American, and Latinos. The largest group of people who live in Bayview are Hmong. You can usually tell if a Hmong or Asian family lives in an apartment building if you see a garden in front of it.

A lot goes on in Bayview. There is no skateboarding or rollerblading allowed on the rails or cement walls at the back door of the Bayview community center. They have this rule to prevent injuries in Bayview.

I noticed that in the Bayview gardens, most people have hot peppers and a special kind of plant that people brought from Laos. There was one garden that had two different plants that helped take care of peoples’ bodies.

—Blair

I noticed that on all sides in the front side of Bayview they had different types of fence. The one that was tallest looked like it was supposed to keep someone or something out. And the two fences that were facing the street were a shorter, metal chain link, and a wood fence about as tall as the metal chain link fence. There was also a sign that said, “Video surveillance beyond this point,” which suggests that they had a problem with people doing illegal things. A couple of years ago they installed five surveillance cameras in the parking lot, which made less bad things happen. Also, kids who were in Bayview for afterschool care made them a mosaic tile shaped in a triangle and with several smaller triangles in it.

—Aaron

There are one hundred and two apartments where each of them has a little block of garden by the front. You can tell what kind of people live there just by their gardens. Lots of Hmong people, the biggest group  living in Bayview. There is a peach tree and it is twenty years old.

—Marcus

When we went to the Greenbush, we stopped first in Bayview. Bayview was comprised mainly of Hmong citizens. The buildings were small and suggested limited space in the new Greenbush. A man named Paul Lee said that about 70% of the Bayview population was Hmong but there was a few scattered Latino, African American and other families in the neighborhood.

—Marley

On our Greenbush tour, we stopped to play some bocce ball. The person who showed us how to play was Mr. De Luna. How did Mr. De Luna got interested in bocce ball? Mr. De Luna told us that he was at a party and his wife pulled him over to play bocce ball. He did not really want to play. Then, his wife finally got him to play bocce ball. He loved it so much. He owns at least ten sets of bocce ball equipment at home. He also has at least four sets of bocce ball equipment that he carries around. Mr. De Luna also enjoys dancing with his wife.

—Riley

We played bocce in a grassy area near Bayview. Raul De Luna brought the sets and taught us how to play. Bocce originated around seven thousand years ago, probably in Greece. The Romans saw them playing it and liked it, so they brought it back to Italy and called it their game. Raul De Luna said that bocce is the third most popular game in the world, after golf and soccer.

—Elena

The pallino makes a whooshing sound
as it swiftly soars though the air.
Then, quickly it plops down on the ground.
Then the bocce ball is followed up, but only goes
a little way up in the air, like a bowling ball being hurled.
Finally, the bocce ball lands gently on the ground
but still rolls off the leaves and twigs.

Bouncy
Outrageously fun
Closest ball
Challenging
Exciting
Blue? Red? Yellow? Orange? It doesn’t matter. Any color works.
After the pallino is the bocce ball
Little ball=pallino. Big ball=bocce ball in Italian
Loads of fun

—Danny

To play bocce ball you first need at least two teams. First, someone on one of the teams will throw a little ball, called the pallino, which means “little ball” in Italian. Then, that person will follow up by throwing a ball (three times the size of the pallino ball), called the bocce ball, which means “ball” in Italian. The person who throws their bocce ball wants to get it as close to the pallino as possible. After you have thrown the bocce ball, one of the players from another team goes and throws their bocce ball. If their ball is closer to the pallino than yours, the next team goes. However, that happens only if you are playing with three or more people. Otherwise, if you are playing with only two people, the team which started off would go again. This happens throughout the whole game until all of the bocce balls are used up.

—Danny

When everyone on both teams have thrown their bocce balls, it is time to start counting points. The rules for counting points are very simple. Let’s say there are two blue bocce balls closest to the pallino and then, the next closest to the Pallino is a red bocce ball. The blue team would get two points and the red team would get none because they did not have their bocce ball closest to the pallino.

—Ava K.

Playing bocce ball was a good experience for me because it was fun and because it showed me the cultural diversity in games.

—Henry

This arguably, was the best part of the day. A man named Raoul de Luna, who was a member of the Italian Workman’s club (though he was of Spanish descent), taught us to play.

—Marley

People throwing balls of all colors and sizes.
The “Thwack” of the balls when they hit each other.
What?
I won!

—Sam R

PALLINO
Little, while, heavy
Easily lost in tall grass

BOCCE
Large, red, textured.
Easily thrown out of bounds.

COURT
Green, oblong, flagged.
Easily too grassed and skinny!

—Lulu

The origins of bocce ball date back 7,000 years ago when the Romans played a game that involved a small heavy ball and larger balls that tried to hit the smaller one. This is almost surely where bocce ball comes from, as well as a French game called “Boule”. The rules:

1. Divide into teams.
2. Select a player to throw the small white “Pallino.”
3. Player throws pallino then tries to hit pallino with his/her “bocce..”
4. First player on other team throw their bocce.
5. Second player on first team tries to get even closer to pallino with his/her bocce.
6. Play continues in a like manner until all balls are thrown. Teams get 1 point for each ball that is closer to the pallino than the other teams.
7. Games continue until one team (or both) has 5 points.

—Lulu

Meriter Hospital was originally called Madison General Hospital, when it was first created a long time ago. The reason I know it was a long time ago is because Meriter is the oldest hospital in the city and Madison is one hundred and fifty years old. We met with Liz Schumacher who is the Director of Government Relations and Planning Department for Meriter Hospital. Liz told us all about Meriter. She told us that Meriter does a lot of care and services like elder care and helping out someone who just moved here from another country.

Meriter Hospital used to be only a half-block building. By the end of the year it was opened, it was completely full and needed more space. The people who owned Meriter started making the hospital bigger and by now, it is about five times as big as it originally was. Meriter Hospital used to use Longfellow School as a daycare place for employees who had little kids.

—Danny

Meriter Hospital is a very nice place. They have the largest birthing center in Madison and have over three thousand workers. Meriter Hospital tries very hard to be good neighbors. They are very involved in the neighborhood. They own Longfellow School and the Braxton Parking Lots. Meriter Hospital gives money to help support the Bayview Center and helps support Neighborhood House.

—Ava Key

More people than any other hospital in Madison.
Three thousand people work here.
Everywhere there are people.
Rooms everywhere.

—Danny

When I went to Meriter Hospital, I was surprised at the changes they made. They have a huge fountain and a gift shop. From what I heard from the lady, Meriter delivers more babies than any other hospital in Madison.

—Sam B.

On Friday, we went to South Madison and the first place we went to was the Boys and Girls Club. When we got to the Boys and Girls Club, we went straight to the gym and met with Adrenna Squires and Peaches Lacey. After we sat down, they started to talk about the first large mural. This mural showed some helpful and famous people. Adrenna Squires is in the mural with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Betty Franklin. The mural also showed a boy and a girl at each ending, resting on religious African statues to represent the Boys and Girls Club.

We then moved to the second mural, which represented the first block party at the Boys and Girls Club. There was music and games for the children. Six years later, in 1979, by accident the center burned down but then it was rebuilt. Peaches remembered a time when the military came and brought a helicopter for the children to see. It was quite amazing for the children to experience that because they probably had never seen a helicopter.

—Sam B.

One of the murals showed the first block party. They would have food, drinks, games for the kids and music. The kids sometimes got in groups and performed a talent show.

—Maddy

There are four murals in the Boys and Girls Club. They went in order from what the Greenbush used to be before urban renewal. One of the stories made me feel bad for the people living in the Greenbush. Back then, there was a group called the Ku Klux Klan. They used to terrorize the people living in the Greenbush. One of the things that they did was to burn crosses. In the mural, the KKK members were shown with white sheets over their heads. This was so their identity was unknown.

—Maddy

The fourth mural showed a family tree. Some of them were Sadie Pearson, Leotha Stanley, Betty Franklin, Emily Walker and Peaches Lacey. Almost all of the people mentioned above have either lived in the Greenbush or a had a relative who lived in the Greenbush.

—Maddy

David Giffey painted murals for the Boys and Girls Club. David Giffey is an artist and a journalist. He started painting in 1986. He called his murals decades. The second mural that he did represented the time when black people weren’t allowed to buy houses in the old days. Some of the banners that hang up in the gym are from the past years. They have good memories, like when Rosa Parks put her foot down and sat in the front and not in the back of the bus!

—Emma

Bruce Knox was killed in the Vietnam War in 1962. Bruce Knox was a very good friend of the Boys and Girls Club. The military is very helpful to the Boys and Girls Club. They can call them for anything.

—Blair

The first ever block party held at the Boys and Girls Club was in 1973. Every year, more people came. The block party has food, music and games for the kids. The block party is held every year. One year, the club asked the military to send a helicopter and they sent military people and a helicopter. Oh, the block party is fun. I go every year. The block party is such a fun hangout place to play with everyone.

—Rosa K.

In the basement gym of the Boys and Girls Club there are murals of African Americans and things that happened, like the Boys and Girls Club burning down. There are also some paintings of people in the murals like Martin Luther King Jr., Peaches Lacey and Adrenna Squires (Super Grandma), the lunch lady at Randall School. The person who painted the beautiful murals was David Giffey. I will tell you he is a really great painter. When I looked at the objects and the people in the mural, I thought that they were real, and it looked to me as though the bicycle in the mural was going to fall out of its mural and hit someone right in the head!

—Sam R.

The first mural that we saw had in the center about twenty or so people’s faces in yellow circles. A few of the people in there were Adrenna Squires and Martin Luther King Jr. There were a few faces from the Greenbush but mostly faces from the whole Black community.

—Sophie

The second mural we saw had a picture of Dr. Anthony Brown and Kenny James, but those were just a few. This time, there were people standing in a group. There was also a picture of Bruce Knox. He was a black soldier and was killed in combat in Vietnam.

—Sophie

GEC, Genesis Enterprise Center, is an incubator for small businesses. On the website it said, “Primary Mission is to act as a catalyst for economic development and revitalization in South Madison by attracting businesses that create challenging, well-paying jobs.”

—Sophie

GEC is a company that helps people who want to open a small business or store. Dr. Richard Harris works there. His uncle owned a tavern called Tuxedo Cafe. It was one of the last Greenbush buildings to be torn down during Urban Renewal.

—Aaron

Dr. Richard Harris’s uncle Zachary Trotter had a bar in the Greenbush on West Washington. He had the bar for 22 years. Then the city tried to force him out, but he stood his ground and didn’t leave until they found another place for a bar. Then he had a heart attack and died. His wife had it for a few years and then she sold it.

—Unnamed Student

Zachary Trotter was the first black man in Madison to have a tavern after the Greenbush was torn down. It took him years to find another place for a bar, but he finally got one. A few years later he died of a heart attack. His wife kept the tavern for 3 years, then his 2 sons kept it open for 10 years before selling it.

—Rosa K.

Dr. Richard Harris’s uncle had to keep moving his tavern because of Urban Renewal. When Jews and Blacks moved, the real estate people knew people would be moving in and out of houses and they would be making money off of that. They almost tripled the house prices. Dr. Harris went to Franklin School and has over 100 photos of the Greenbush.

—Blair

Some blacks settled in Cheyenne Valley. When white children’s parents died, blacks took them in. There was a lot of intermarrying, and if you didn’t know that Mike was African American, you wouldn’t be able to tell with a glance.

—Rosa D.

Mike Shivers has a skin tone of white but he has African American ancestry, which proves that you don’t have to have black skin to be African American. When Mike moved into a mostly white neighborhood and they found out he was African American, they started a petition to get him out. But when they went to his neighbors, they said they wouldn’t sign the petition because Mike was a good neighbor and friend.

—Aaron

Mike’s mom was a jazz singer. His dad was light-skinned and his mom dark-skinned. His dad was African American. That was new to me because I thought all African Americans were dark.

—Elena

The Shivers family came [north] by the Underground Railroad. There was Tom Shivers and his son was Algae.

—Riley

Algae Shivers was a very successful farmer. He invented the famous round barns around Hillsboro and was the first farmer [in that community] to use electricity.

—Rosa D.

Every day Mike’s grandma would go to the backyard and tell jokes to her next-door neighbor. Mike’s grandma knew how to speak fluent German and English, and her neighbor knew how to speak Italian. Her neighbor would tell a joke in Italian and then they would both laugh. Then Mike’s grandma would tell a joke in German and then they would both laugh. But they didn’t know what the other person was saying.

—Marcus

When Mike was little the neighbors threw eggs at their house and made petitions to get them out of the neighborhood. When the petition came around to their German neighbors, they refused to sign and said they were nice people. So they stopped and the Shiverses stayed.

—Elena

In the Madison area the blacks would go in one place and the white would go somewhere else. The only place that didn’t have that was the Greenbush, and even there the same ethnic groups tended to group together. But that was mostly so that they could understand their neighbors’ language.

—Eben

People in the Ku Klux Klan hated many people because of race or beliefs. They hated Jews and blacks and others. They burned crosses in people’s yards. There were even cross burnings in the Greenbush. They tried to scare people by wearing white sheets.

—Lia

Half the police force was part of the Ku Klux Klan. Mason and Gray were especially bad, harassing the neighborhood worse than others. One man was barbering illegally without a license in his basement at 113 Park Street. For some reason, he never got caught. But he made it known that there was a 38-caliber pistol under his barber chair.

—Rosa D.

Philip Falk was the superintendent of schools for a while. Mike Shivers always wondered why he hated African Americans. His question was answered when he found out he was a member of the Ku Klux Klan, who were the worst fear of the Greenbush at that time. There was no way to fight it as half of the police force was in the Klan. And then the city got a school named after him in his “honor.” Now that they know who he really was, Falk School should get another name.

—Eben

People said that Philip Falk was filled with hate for the Bush. A few times he visited Longfellow School, the main elementary school there. Mike Shivers recalls a time when Philip Falk came. They were in music class. He came in and beat a friend of Mike’s up, who was black. They were only in fourth grade. Everyone was stunned. Mike Shivers always remembered the look on his teacher’s face.

—Rosa D.

The Greenbush was a much friendlier community than most of Madison is today. As Mike Shivers said, “You could leave a ten-speed bicycle—not that you would have a ten-speed bicycle in those days—out in the yard, leaned against a fence overnight, and come back in the morning and it’d still be there.”

—Lulu

There was one thing about the Bush that wasn’t as harmonious and [community-minded] as the rest. The old Italian Workmen’s Club on Regent Street would refuse to take blacks or Jews into the organization. The club was strictly Italian. Even if you had Italian backgrounds, you wouldn’t be able to join. Neighborhood House, though, was different. The preschool was the first in Madison. At the start only three children attended—a black girl, a Jewish boy, and a little Italian girl.

—Rosa D.

Buffo was born at 811 Regent Street. Buffo’s real name is Joseph. But his uncle Nick named him Buffo, which is the Italian word for clown.

—Riley

In the Greenbush, where Buffo was born, there were lots of grocery stores and junkyards. His father worked in a shoe store, while his uncle worked for a tobacco factory. Many people who ran family groceries had homes connected.

In the Greenbush, it was considered rude to not offer food to a kid if they had come during dinner. Once, somebody went over to an “American” kid’s house (“American” was anything except Italian, black, or Jews) during dinner and was not even offered water. The parents thought it was unacceptable.

—Unnamed Student

Buffo has some wonderful stories to tell and, lucky us, he is also a wonderful storyteller. One of the first stories Buffo told my class is a story about Duke Ellington and other black stars. Because of racism, there were a lot of places that blacks could not go. But in the Greenbush, blacks were welcome. When blacks came to visit Madison, a lot of them stayed in Miss Harris’s house overnight. Once a ballplayer [Satchel Paige] from the Negro League stayed in Miss Harris’s house.

—Rosa K.

Tom Intravaia once got a trumpet lesson from someone at the “colored hotel.” He never knew who it was. He grew up to be a musician, playing in bands and teaching music.

—Unnamed Student

As a boy, Buffo and his friends used to hike up the old tracks where the Kohl Center is now. As they were hiking, their motto was, “No rain or snow will keep us from going up the Santa Fe Trail.”

—Blair

Buffo told us that there were three junkyards in the Greenbush. I wonder why. There must have been a lot of trash. He said he and his friends used to go there almost every day after school.

—Sam R.

One thing Buffo did not look forward to was that every spring, they would dump lots of horse manure, then he and his brother had to put on galoshes and spread it on the garden.

—Sophie

Buffo said that in the Greenbush you could lean your bike against a tree and then go into your grandma’s house for a couple hours or something, Your bike would still be leaning against the same tree. He said there was a sense of security in the Bush and when they tore down the town, they tore that down, too.

—Sophie

The people in the Greenbush called Buffo the mayor of Regent Street.

—Marcus

One night when Buffo’s uncle and cousin were closing up the shop, they saw a man that was homeless crawling into the back of a truck across the street. His cousin went out and asked the man what he was doing, and the man said he needed a warm place to sleep because it was winter. So his cousin said, “You’ll freeze to death, come with me.” And so he fixed the man up with an old Army cot and coat and the man stayed with them while doing odd jobs until he was hit by a car and died.

—Henry

When urban renewal happened, and they had to move out, Buffo’s aunt had a nervous breakdown. Buffo and his siblings had to watch their home getting torn down. Workers told them to move, but they refused.

—Unnamed Student

I wonder what it would be like to have my house destroyed. I wonder if the Greenbush would have changed even if the urban renewal hadn’t happened.

—Elena

The Greenbush was not, as a member of the Ku Klux Klan once said, a disgrace to Madison.

—Unnamed Student