Tag: Written

The year was 1944. My stepdad, Charles Beatty, and my mom, Margaret, and sister Blanche and I lived in an upstairs duplex on 11th Street and Jefferson Avenue in Miami Beach across from Flamingo Park, where the U.S. Army Air Forces trained our boys to serve. My name was Jeanette Seligman at that time.

I used to go to Joe’s Broadway Delicatessen at Washington Avenue near Española Way with my friends to eat quite often. While we were in a line on the sidewalk waiting for a table, we met two young men in uniform. They started a conversation, and we were called in. My girlfriend and I ate a lovely meal.

We went to see a movie on Lincoln Road, and when we left the movie theater, we saw the two nice soldiers we had encountered earlier. This good-looking soldier approached me and asked if he could walk me home. He was so handsome in his immaculately starched uniform that I could not refuse his offer.

His name was Nathan Siegel from Boston, Mass. He told me he was a staff sergeant working in the Army Records Office at the Versailles Hotel.

From then on, we went to dances at the Versailles on Saturday nights to dance under the stars. Tony Martin was in Nathan’s barracks, so I fixed Tony up with one of my friends and we all went together to Saturday night dances.

Then Nathan was shipped to Madison, Wisc. We really missed each other, and after a while, Nate asked me to marry him and go to Madison to do so. He spoke to my mother and asked for my hand, and told her he would take care of me and she would never have to worry! He was such a gentleman.

I did go to Madison, and we were married by a rabbi. Two of his army buddies were our witnesses. Not long after, Nate was shipped overseas to Germany. I flew home to Miami Beach and lived on Michigan Avenue with my mom and stepdad, who owned the Clay Hotel on Washington Avenue and Española Way.

The Clay was a hotel, but there were apartments on Española connected to the hotel, so we moved there. Our first child, Alan, was born in Miami Beach after Nathan was discharged from the Air Force.

Nathan went into the building business and became very successful. We moved to Coral Gables, and then we built a beautiful home on Meridian Avenue and 43rd Street in the Nautilus section of Miami Beach. We lived there with our two sons.

When the boys were older, we moved to Bay Harbor Islands, where Nate had built many apartment buildings.

Eventually, he and I moved to a condo “on the ocean” in Bal Harbour. Our boys were out on their own at this point, and settled in Beverly Hills and Aspen.

We had a wonderful, full life. Nathan passed away at 75, so nothing is the same anymore. He was the problem-solver. I thank God I met such a wonderful soldier.

As for my roots in Florida, my mom, sister and I moved here from New York after my mom became a young widow at age 29. Her parents were living here, and her mother helped her take care of me and my sister. I was 8 and have lived here now all these years.

I’m practically a native, as I’m 95, and have been living here for 87 years, and still love it.

My father, Louis Pallot, arrived in Miami from Massachusetts in 1924. He was not prepared for the big 1926 hurricane that was to come. During the storm, he went to check on his little tire shop on Flagler Street and got caught in the lull, thinking the hurricane had ended. It came back with a fury.

When life in Miami settled down, he sent for my mother, Gertrude, and my toddler brother, Norton. They arrived when people thought the streets of Miami were paved in gold, but it was not long before the stock market crashed and those streets became tarnished.

The Norton Tire Store, named after my oldest brother, did well with all the new highways going south and people following the sun. Plain old hard work was also an ingredient. My family established themselves in the shadow of the Orange Bowl.

I was born six years later in October 1934 at Victoria Hospital. These were simple times, until the Sunday of Dec. 7, 1941, when my family moved across the causeway to Miami Beach and my brother Norton went off to war. Soldiers were in training on Miami Beach and marched in front of our house on 50th and Alton Road to Polo Park.

The late 1940s and 1950s, after the war, were the best of times. Miami and the beaches were thriving. My life at Miami Beach High School was special. Students bonded, there was lots of school spirit, and we danced the “lindy” in the school patio. I met my future husband, Howard Katzen, at age 16 at my best friend’s sweet 16 party. Having lived in Miami all my life, I am able to keep many of my same friends since childhood.

Howard and I both graduated from the University of Miami, as did my two brothers. Brothers Ronald and Norton each married two Glorias, and they graduated from the U. of M. In 1956, with a new baby, Lynn, in tow we moved to newly developing South Miami before there was Dadeland or the Palmetto Expressway. Howard and I went on to have two more children, Bruce and David.

Norton Tire Company thrived after the war. Norton arrived home from military service and assisted my father in developing our family business. We were one of the first businesses to rent cars to tourists out of our second outpost on 15th{+S}t{+r}{+e}{+e}t and Alton Road on Miami Beach. Business boomed as tires became available.

Ronald joined the business and then my husband Howard to round out the management group. Louis Pallot began to take life easier. Norton Tire grew, selling, servicing, and wholesaling tires. We became the largest independent tire dealer in the United States, with 16 stores in the state.

We also were involved in many civic, business, and fraternal organizations. Norton Tire Co. thrived, but there were difficulties as well. In May 1980, the McDuffie riots erupted in the neighborhood. My mother, Howard and I went to Boston for son Bruce’s college graduation that weekend. Flying home on Sunday and landing at Miami International Airport, we saw our main headquarters, warehouse, and business center burning to the ground. The smoke reached up to the sky. Norton Tire Co. recouped, not a day of operation and full customer service was lost, despite the fact that our 80,000 square foot facility – including executive offices, warehouse, accounting department, retread facilities, and retail store – were lost.

Temporary headquarters were established until a new building could be built west of the airport. This trio of my two brothers and husband showed as much capacity for hard work as Louis Pallot did in the early days. With the help of third -generation family members joining the business, trustworthy employees and loyal customers, Norton Tire Co. prospered. We opened a new facility in 1983.

After 70 years in business, we sold our company in 1986 to Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company. We had 40 stores in the state.

Retired life has been good. For over 50 years Howard and I have been a part of the boating community and enjoyed the coasts of Florida and the Keys and the Bahamas. When I see the skyline of Miami from the vantage point of Biscayne Bay, I am reminded of how this city has grown and changed over the years. For 35 years Howard and I have played tennis at Royal Palm Tennis Club, not too far from our home in Coral Gables.

In appreciation for all this community has given to my family, I wanted to give back. I have been a devoted volunteer at Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden for over 30 years. Our three children, daughter-in- law, and four grandchildren thrive here and our future is here.

My father, for whom I was named, brought his family to Miami in 1935, the last of several moves he was forced to make as he struggled to make a living as a life insurance agent during the bleak years of the Great Depression.

He had made a fortune in Lakeland developing and selling real estate in the delirious economy of the early 1920s, had $250,000 in the local bank, and was planning to retire and enjoy life as a gentleman farmer. In 1926, the year of the bust in Florida, the bank suddenly failed; no federal deposit insurance protected its customers, and my father was ruined, his properties taken by mortgage foreclosure. I was born in that year, and my sister Judy in 1929, adding to his burdens.

In the years following our move to Miami, Dad somehow managed to support the family against all odds by selling insurance to folks who had very little money to spare. My mother, Helen, performed miracles in the kitchen, feeding us with potatoes, cornmeal, an occasional fish, and meat perhaps once a week. We almost literally lived by the cracker slogan of “Grits and Grunts and Coconut Pie.”

My sister and I enrolled in a series of public schools as we moved about the county, finally settling in 1941 near Red Road, the western boundary of Coral Gables. Bird Road was rocky and full of potholes from there, but my teenage buddies and I enjoyed bouncing to the end at Krome Avenue, where we used our BB guns and .22-caliber rifles to shoot garfish and snakes in the canals.

Miami in the 1930s had all the virtues and prejudices of Southern culture. People were friendly, doors of many homes were left unlocked, the few fancy hotels in Miami Beach closed and boarded up for the summer once the tourist season ended. Elite restaurants were very few; dining out was more often in casual and inexpensive places, such as the Mayflower Café, which boasted a huge neon sign: AS YOU TRAVEL ON THROUGH LIFE BROTHER, WHATEVER IS YOUR GOAL, KEEP YOUR EYE ON THE DOUGHNUT, AND NOT UPON THE HOLE.

However, blacks had to endure insults and constant reminders of prejudice in the white social structure: exclusions from employment or memberships, signs in public buildings setting aside separate toilet facilities for “Colored Only.”

In May 1940, I had a taste of fame as the winner of the third South Florida Spelling Bee, sponsored by The Miami Herald. The annual spelling contest, staged in the Bayfront Park band shell arena, had become a big deal with the newspaper. Henry Cavendish was named the Herald Spelling Bee Editor, and his stories appeared for weeks as the preliminary contests were held. Fortunately for me, an eighth-grader at Coconut Grove School, the principal, B.H. Hayes, was determined to have a winner from his school, so he had drilled me relentlessly in his office several times every day. The day after I won the district final, The Herald ran a front-page story and a picture of a grinning big-eared 13-year-old next to the other important story, headlined: “NAZIS 60 MILES FROM PARIS.”

My mother and I were flown to Washington for the National Spelling Bee, lodged in the historic Willard Hotel and escorted by Mr. Cavendish. He wrote daily stories and spent a decent amount of time in the hotel bar. I was close to winning, until misspelling “synchronous” sent me to the showers.

The school system had no residence boundaries for students, and I became a Miami Senior High “Stingaree,” made the invincible football team and studied under wonderful teachers like Miss Lamar Louise Curry, who, now at age 104, still attends alumni events.

After graduation in June 1944, the boys in the class were quickly drawn into World War II, either by enlistment or draft. With many other classmates, I joined the Navy V-12 officer-training program and was assigned to the University of Miami. The University was shedding its image as “Suntan U” and had attracted many excellent professors. Dr. H. Franklin Williams was a historian who spoke with the true accents of his training at “Hahvahd” and was a kind and generous mentor.

Released from the Navy and after earning a degree from the University of Miami, I was accepted by the Harvard Law School, possibly because the mandarins there wanted to see if a graduate of that raw little college in Miami could survive. I did so, returned to Miami and was hired by Dixon, DeJarnette, Bradford and Williams, then considered a large firm (7 lawyers).

There, and in my own firm, my legal work was varied, until retirement more than 50 years later. For over 20 years, my largest and most visible client was the Dade County School Board; as school board attorney, I worked with many serious and dedicated people, among them elected board members Holmes Braddock and Janet McAliley, and strong administrators including Superintendent Ed Whigham and Eldridge Williams, formerly one of the famed Tuskegee Airmen, with whom I worked on the difficult problems posed by the desegregation of schools.

I was recalled to duty by the Navy during the Korean War, and as an officer spent two enjoyable years on the island of Guam. Best of all, I met and courted Emiliana Perez, who became my wife. Our daughter Elizabeth grew up and still lives in Miami with her husband and our three grandchildren. So continues our Miami story, which began in 1935.

Blending a born-in-Miami beginning with only one adult job as a Miami police officer and a special piece of property that has a rich Miami history of nearly 100 years might seem like a lot to digest. However, my Miami story blends all of the above and more.

My Miami story begins before I was born. In the 1930s, my grandfather came to Miami to relax in the winter months with other family members. Coming from New Jersey, they were part of the blue-collar Jewish community in South Florida that was here in the winter and gone in the summer. They flourished in certain parts of the South Florida scene and were less than welcome in others.

Downtown Miami and some of Miami Beach were our family’s stomping grounds. Our family was far from being wealthy, so a lot of Miami and Miami Beach were off-limits. Our family members were hard-working small-business owners. In the mid-1940s, my uncle owned a small snack bar and orange juice stand in downtown Miami, near Walgreens. We think the name was “Juicy Juice.”

During the World War II years, downtown Miami was a major staging and marching area for Allied soldiers. Thousands of soldiers trained in Bayfront Park and on Biscayne Boulevard. The orange-juice stand was a big hit. Fresh Florida orange juice was a special treat for the “plow boys” from the Midwest who were experiencing it for the first time, along with the foreign Allied soldiers from Europe and the Far East.

Our family’s orange-juice stand was an important part of my life, even before I was born. My mother, Clare J. Kovach, was in the U.S. Coast Guard and worked in downtown Miami at the USCG office. Mom was a Western Pennsylvania coal miner’s daughter who joined the USCG as a 20-year-old.

It was at the orange-juice stand where my mother met my father, Harold J. Green. Dad had just gotten out of the Army and was working there. Dad said it was love at first sight. Dad started a short courtship, and when mom was transferred to New York, he followed and proposed. After a short stay there, it was back to Miami.

Miami was recovering from the war years, and changes were happening to the way folks lived. One of the biggest changes for the Green family was that the food-ration years were over and beef was back on the menu for our country. The problem was my dad and mom were taking care of a chicken farm in the Redland for the family, and no one wanted to eat much chicken. So with a cold winter blast and 10,000 chickens that no one wanted, the chicken-farm business came to an end.

In 1948, I was born at Jackson Memorial Hospital, and our first home was a wood-frame house on Southwest 22nd Avenue near West Flagler Street. In 1950, mom and dad – using their G.I. benefits – qualified for a G.I. loan to buy a new house in the Flagami area, near Southwest Third Street and 68th Avenue. The house cost $6,800, and the deal was $50 down and $50 a month.

Dad and mom had five boys, with the last birth being a set of twins. The Green boys grew up to be a Vietnam-area Army helicopter pilot who was awarded a Silver Star and unfortunately soon after was killed in a training crash; a Miami police officer honored in the ’70s as an Officer of the Year; one teacher for Dade Schools; and two electricians.

Miami in those days was much more compact than it is today. There were no large suburban areas such as Kendall, Doral and Miami Lakes. Our family enjoyed outings at Crandon and Matheson Hammock parks. We also enjoyed trips to the Venetian Pool in Coral Gables. The pool’s caves were my favorite part.

The old Pier 5 was a special treat. We frequently went to the old Pier 5 to watch the fishing boats come in, buy fresh fish and people-watch. Movies were in downtown Miami and Coral Gables.

Seeing Roy Rogers and Howdy Doody on stage at the Olympic Theater and Christmas trips to the roof of the Burdines building for the rides will always be a special memory.

Being on the Skipper Chuck Show at the old TV Channel 4 was a big time for me. I watched the Orange Bowl Parades from a curb on West Flagler Street. We had many afternoons at Dressel’s Dairy on Milam Dairy Road for soft ice cream and pony rides.

In the mid-1950s, my dad opened a restaurant in Hollywood called the “Corral Bar BQ.” Later, he built the “Tomboy Club” on Northwest 119 street and, lastly, before his death, “Chick N Sub” restaurant in Opa-locka.

In the early ’60s our family moved to the Norwood/Norland area, and I became one of the “60s Norwood Boys.” Norwood Boys from the ’60s were an interesting group of guys. We had our fair share of lawyers, businessmen, firefighters, police officers and lots of everyday honest folks … along with a side group of criminals, dope-dealers and murderers. Not everyone made it through the ’60s alive or out of prison.

High school at Norland Senior High was full of football, girls and a small amount of schoolwork. Cloverleaf Bowling Lanes, Haulover Beach and Sunny Isles were our major hangouts. We spent countless hours playing in the big field where the Dolphins’ stadium is today. We called it the “Ponderosa.” We loved to water-ski on Snake Creek Canal.

My connection to the Miami Police Benevolent Association (Miami PBA) at 2300 NW 14th St. started early in my life. The Miami PBA’s property was one of the few “party” locations in Miami during the 1950s. The Miami PBA had a small children’s amusement park with rides. Besides the large swing, wooden-horse carousel and other small rides, the Miami PBA had an operating miniature coal-fired children’s train.

The park had room for birthday parties, and each year there were special parties for underprivileged children where police officers helped out. Being lifted on a uniformed Miami police officer’s horse was a great treat. My biggest memory was my 5th birthday party held at the Miami PBA Park, 58 years ago.

Presently, I am the president of the Miami Police Benevolent Association. The Miami PBA is a special PBA that has been connected to the Miami Police Department since the mid-1930s.It is not a police labor or bargaining organization, and there is no direct connection between us and the other PBAs. We might be one of the few PBAs in the nation that is truly a benevolent association.

My parents came to Miami in November 1944 from Massachusetts. My father, Demosthenes John Mekras, had just graduated from the seminary and married my mother, Exacousti “Toula” Panagiotopoulos.

My father was ordained into the Greek Orthodox priesthood in January 1945 at the Saint Sophia Church in downtown Miami. They worked together to perpetuate Greek Orthodoxy and in 1948, the magnificent Saint Sophia Cathedral that stands today was built on Coral Way and 24th Road.

I was born in 1946 at Jackson Memorial Hospital (my brothers George and John were born there, too). We lived in the parish home next door to the cathedral until 1959 when we moved into our own home on 22nd Road. We three still live in Miami and so do all of our children! We are native Miamians.

We grew up going to Bayfront Park Pier 5, where boats would come in with fresh fish. Fishermen would clean their catch on wooden tables and we would watch the really big fish be weighed on the hook. We grew up going to Crandon Park with friends for picnics. While on Key Biscayne, we would swim late into the day, go to the zoo and have fun on the rides.

Saturday was the day for the Parkway Movie Theatre with a bagged lunch and yo-yo contests during intermission. Afternoons were spent with a hammer and screwdriver trying to crack open coconuts, playing with the water hose, gathering insects in jars, climbing trees and riding our bikes everywhere.

Christmas was Burdines downtown on the breezeway with Santa, cotton candy and the ferris wheel. New Year’s Eve was the parade down Biscayne Boulevard with beautiful girls twirling batons, artistically decorated floats, high school and college marching bands and lots of fun. New Year’s Day was the Orange Bowl football game and parking our car at Ahern-Plummer Funeral Home for free.

Easter was a photo with the bunny and picking out brightly colored chicks at the Five and Dime to take home as Easter pets. The religious aspect of Easter was Holy Friday with Coral Way closed to traffic for a procession symbolizing the funeral of Christ as observed in the Orthodox Church, and midnight services for the Resurrection. I mention these two services not only because my father was the celebrant, but because so many non-Orthodox Miamians would gather on the sidewalks to observe this beautiful tradition. Our church still celebrates these services today.

My mother owned Cynthia’s-Coray on Miracle Mile from the mid 1950s to the mid 1960s (before malls) and my Saturdays were spent trimming the display windows and going to Jahn’s and Cookies with friends. Dean’s Waffle Shop across from Sears was a favorite, too.

My brother George raised homing pigeons. He would take the bus on Coral Way to the public library at Bayfront and let the birds go, get on the bus and go home to wait for the pigeons to fly home. They always did! My brother John delivered the Miami News weekday afternoons on his bicycle.

Our schooling was at Coral Way Elementary, Shenandoah Junior High and Miami Senior High. Both of my brothers are University of Miami medical school graduates. Our mother chaired many school carnivals in the beautiful garden area of Coral Way. We learned how to swim at Shenandoah Park swimming pool. My brothers played football for Miami High. Those were the days when the Orange Bowl stadium was filled to capacity with Miami residents attending games with good sportsmanship and great half time shows.

Old Cutler Road was covered with crabs on rainy days. A wonder was to see manatees come up to the sea wall on South Bayshore Drive (now Brickell Bay Drive) and feed them veggies. The snakes at the Serpentarium were huge! It was a treat to go to the Big Wheel and Hot Shoppes drive-ins and have your food brought to your car window. It was fun going to Royal Castle and counting how many little hamburgers (now called sliders) you could eat for 15 cents each.

Gas “wars” were when gas was down to 19 cents a gallon and lines would be around the block at Brooks Gulf on 20th Road. WEDR radio station did foreign language programming and on Sunday mornings my mother hosted “Grecian Melodies,” the first and only Greek language radio program in Miami. There was no I-95 and driving to Sunset Drive from our home in the Roads was an excursion. South Miami seemed so far away! US-1 was a lazy drive.

I love Miami. My parents loved living in Miami and always said how fortunate they were to be assigned here and able to raise their family in this City Beautiful. Old Miami offered me a wonderful childhood. So many great Miami memories! After the death of my father in 2005, the City of Miami designated the street in front of Saint Sophia “Rev. Demosthenes J. Mekras Way” and my family is appreciative of this honor.

Miami was a wonderful place to grow up and I am sad that many of our childhood highlights and traditions are no longer. It is a much different city today from the one we had in my youthful days, but it is still a great city to call home, especially since my seven precious grandchildren, Ariana, Joana, Jonathan, Natasha, Kristian, Evana and Ella, also call Miami home.

There’s a saying by Aristophanes: “A man’s homeland is wherever he prospers.”

I have felt “at home” in the many cities where I have lived and worked, but I have never known a city like Miami, with its strong culture of giving and responsibility mixed with care.

My love for Miami developed many decades ago. My family began visiting Miami Beach in the 1940s, and we fell in love with the area, eventually moving here when I was a young boy in 1954. We settled in the Pinecrest area.

Along with my three older brothers, I loved to fish and dive, and often rode my bike to our favorite spots in the area by Old Cutler Bay, known today as Matheson Hammock and Gables Estates.

Back in the day, my friends and I would sneak into Arthur Vining Davis’ estate (at the time) to get to the stretched canal on his property that led to the bay, where we could catch snapper, grouper and lobster. Davis was an industrialist and philanthropist with extensive real-estate holdings in Florida, and would often come out in his wheelchair to greet us with a warning to be safe.

I attended Pinecrest Elementary School, Palmetto Jr. High School, and graduated from Palmetto Sr. High School in 1970. This was a very special time for me because I met the love of my life – my wife, Dawn.

I can truly say that I had a very happy childhood growing up in South Florida.

I left Miami in 1971 to go to college, and after one year, following my brothers, I joined the armed forces. Three of us were in the 82nd Airborne Division of the U.S. Army. Two of us, including myself, were helicopter pilots, while my other brother was a Green Beret.

Military service was followed by a move to Atlanta, where I completed college and received an MBA at Georgia State University, both with honors and as part of the GI Bill. It was there that one of my professors secured an interview for me at Merrill Lynch.

This is where a new professional journey began.

At Merrill Lynch, I was a stock broker and later a producing sales manager, which led to a full-time managerial role. After several years, my wife and I left the South and spent the next 4 ½ years in the Windy City, Chicago, where my responsibilities included managing several Merrill Lynch offices.

After a successful run in Chicago, I was transferred for the next two years to Princeton, N.J., at Merrill Lynch’s corporate headquarters.

A few years later, I was thrilled to head home to Miami to oversee Merrill Lynch’s Miami-Dade operations. After a 30-year absence, we were back and couldn’t have been happier. We bought our beautiful home in Gables by the Sea and our first boat, which we named “Miami Twice.”

My first day back at work in Miami was Sept. 11, 2001, the day of the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. It was a difficult time wherever you were in the world, but certainly here in Miami there was a peculiar vibe. Everyone was looking for an outlet to express their emotions. Our employees channeled theirs by building a house for Habitat for Humanity in Naranja in south Miami-Dade.

Week after week, we had unbelievable volunteer turnouts. There were so many volunteers that we had to buy extra hammers. The house was built in record time. Dawn and I were there with a packed crowd every Saturday, ready to take on any job, despite learning that I was not destined to be a roofer! This endeavor launched the “Culture of Community” among the Merrill Lynch family in Miami that lives on today.

After being promoted to regional manager for the South Florida area in 2006, I was asked once again to move – this time to New York City. However, in 2009, the chance to lead the Latin American division brought me to and through Miami frequently, and I returned permanently at the end of 2010.

I retired this year, ending my 31-year career with Merrill Lynch, I’m proud to have dedicated my entire professional career to one company. When reflecting on my life, I’ve always said: “One wife, one job!”

Dawn and I are thrilled to be home in Miami, for the third time in the same house with the same boat we bought in 2001. We can’t think of a better place to celebrate our 37th wedding anniversary.

While there are more chapters to write, we are looking forward to some well-deserved time off for fishing and diving in the warm, beautiful Miami waters and to continue a frequent topic of discussion: Should we rename our boat “Miami Thrice?”

My family came to this country in 1959, three months after Castro took power. We lived at Northeast Second Avenue and First Street for three months. We used to love it there as it was very close to the Post Office and Central Baptist Church, where we attended.

Afterwards we moved to where all the newly arrived Cubans were living – Southwest 14th Avenue and Second Street. I went to Ada Merritt Jr. High. At that time I didn’t know a word of English but I was eager to learn. In a few months I was getting excellent grades and by the time I graduated in June 1961, I was a member of the National Honor Society and graduated in the Top 20. I also received the American Legion Award. I was the first female and Non-American to receive it.

My father bought his first car a year later – a 1953 Pontiac in three shades of green. Before getting the car we would walk or take the bus downtown. We especially loved going to the basement of Richard’s Department Store on Thursday nights. One of our outings was going to Bayfront Park (now Bayside) on Sundays to watch the boats coming in with the catch of the day. The library, a band shell and the Japanese garden in the park also were great places.

I remember walking to the first McDonald’s in Miami on Northwest Seventh Street and 32nd Avenue, where you could get a whole meal for under $1. And who could forget the Royal Castle deals – two small hamburgers, a birch beer and a doughnut for 99 cents.

Once a week we would go to Shell’s City, where for $20 we would fill up two carts of food. Funland Park on Northwest 27th Avenue and 79th Street and the drive-in on 27th Avenue were very popular at that time. Restaurants like Ferdinand’s on Seventh Avenue and Seventh Street (now a hardware store), Mansene’s on 37th Avenue (now a funeral parlor) and Day and Night, which was opened 24 hours (now a CVS store) were some of our favorite places to eat. Chesapeake on 36th Street and Le Jeune Road was famous for seafood.

My father worked at the Top of the Columbus Hotel, where a steak dinner cost you $5 – at that time very expensive! Diamond’s Novelty store was one of the few buildings past 42nd Avenue and Seventh Street.

In 1962 my parents managed to save $350 and put it as a down payment for a house east of the airport (Grapeland Heights). They still live in the same house. I had to take three buses to get to Miami High – I graduated in 1964.

My first job was at Coppertone Corp. on Le Jeune Road and 24th Street. I was making $1 an hour as a secretary, which was considered a good salary as others were making 75 cents an hour. My mother would take my sister and me to dances at Miami Beach hotels where there was always a small Cuban band playing. We went practically every Saturday and to the beach at Eden Roc Hotel on Sundays. We also loved to go to the Miami Beach pier on Sunday nights to dance. The entrance was 25 cents.

In June 1968 I moved to New York City and lived there for almost five years. Although I loved living in New York, I missed the Magic City and came back in 1973. I have lived here ever since, three blocks from my parents’ house, the same neighborhood I moved into when I was 17. Miami has really changed and it has become a metropolitan city but I still prefer my “old” Miami.

In 2002 a school friend contacted me and she and I went on a mission to “find” the people who graduated with us from Ada Merritt Jr. High in 1961. To date we have contacted close to 60 people, including the principal and two teachers and have had several reunions. Mr. Ruben Blumstein died three years ago but Mr. Joseph Marmar, our math/algebra teacher is 92 and I visit him often.

I Love Miami!

I was working as a waiter at the Netherlands Hotel on Ocean Drive in 1941.

I loved Miami Beach and came down every winter to work and play. War broke out, and I decided to join the Army Air Corp.

Fast-forward to 1963 in St. Louis, Mo. I met my wife, Audrey. We married in ’64 and moved to Miami Beach in ’65. Finding it hard to get a job to my liking, I decided to try my hand at the News and Book Store on Alton Road.

After a couple of tough years, I turned it into the “Joe’s Stone Crab” of the news business. Miami Beach had a reputation of being a tough place to do business. I found it just the opposite. Success is so often achieved by welcoming your customers, getting to know them by name and establishing a rapport.

Although so often many celebs crossed our threshold, my regular customers created my success. Now I’ll drop a few names: Sports figures: Roy Rubin (basketball), Eddie Dibbs (tennis, my favorite), Lou Thesz (Wrestling), Bear Bryant, Rony Seikaly, Brooks Robinson and the Rolle brothers. Politicians: Robert Rubin, Abe Ribicoff, and Alcee Hastings. TV/Movies: Larry King, all the Bee Gees and Michael Caine.

Author Ayn Rand and the artist Roy Lichtenstein, among others. The gifted author Tom Harris graciously autographed all of his books in my store one day, Silence of the Lambs, Black Sunday and Red Dragon. The cast of Miami Vice came in frequently when they were taping next door. Meyer Lansky would often call on Sunday mornings from a nearby deli offering to bring me a corned-beef sandwich and to see if the New York papers had arrived.

A memorable time in business was the 1968 Republican National Convention in Miami Beach, when I rented the loft upstairs in my building to the “Chicago 7.” Another time was the 1980 Mariel boatlift, which caused a downturn in business for a few years. When business is good, always remember to put something away for the bad times. During my time in business, I put four children through college – two of them are doctors, and the other two are successful in their own fields.

I closed the store after 30 years in ’95. I enjoyed every day. I miss my daily visits with so many, and I’ve kept close connections with a few. We moved to Quayside in ’98, and I resumed playing tennis, going to the track until foot surgery in ’08 curbed my activities. Now I’m heavily into spectator sports.

Thinking back on my life, I was born in Connecticut, served two and a half years in the China/Burma/India campaign during World War II, settled for a time in St. Louis, then decided to return to the place I always loved and wanted to call home: Miami Beach and now Miami.

It was 1944 when my parents, Harold and Ruth Ingoe, moved our family – my brother Fred and me – to Coral Gables from Oklahoma City to a 1930 Spanish-style house on Pizarro Street.

The house was quite inviting with front and rear courtyards. The screened-in back porch gave a perfect view of our garden, complete with a small pond surrounded by coconut palms and orchids. I kept large goldfish and a few sea horses that delighted everyone. The 1947 hurricane destroyed the aquatic life in the pond.

I remember feeding hibiscus flowers to a beautiful tame deer that was our neighbor’s pet. Being close to Southwest Eighth Street, I frequently saw Seminole women dressed in their native, colorful blouses and skirts shopping at nearby stores.

Our house was on the Coral Gables bus route, where I caught a ride to Coral Gables Elementary, Ponce de Leon High and later to Coral Gables High. At Gables Elementary, our principal was Abigail Gilday, who led with an air of authority that was easy to do since she was a six-feet tall, wore long black skirts and ugly black shoes. By contrast, Harry Rath, principal of Coral Gables Senior High, was a milder more approachable leader. My favorite teachers at CGSHS were Miss Ions, English/grammar, Miss Patterson, Spanish I, II and III, and Miss Prettyman, biology.

With my friends Sue Lockett, Judy Guadagno and Judy Parham, we would go to the Coral Gables Theater on Ponce de Leon where we saw movies and ate copious bags of buttered popcorn and drank Coke floats! Later, the Miracle Theater opened, which provided a little competition between the two cinemas. We would travel to the Venetian Pool and Matheson Hammock for swimming and practice for life guard certification.

One year, I was in a water ballet. We trained at the Venetian Pool to perform with Esther Williams in Miami Beach. Some who were brave – my brother Fred was one – would dive from the cliffs while others explored the cave. At Matheson Hammock we biked through the mangrove paths and had many picnics by the water.

I don’t want to skip over the Girl Scout Little House on Granada Boulevard; it was there that we were assigned Girl Scout cookies to sell. One year I sold the most cookies, thanks to my father who took them to work and coerced many to buy a box.

The War Memorial offered modeling lessons and the Coral Gables Country Club was the site for cotillion lessons. I don’t know how the others felt, but I was scared to death at dancing with a boy and forgetting the right steps. The Gables was a small family-oriented community where my friends enjoyed their youth.

My great-grandfather Andrew Christian Frost was born in Denmark and migrated to the United States in 1873, settling in Wisconsin by 1876. He was approached by James Ingraham, who worked for Henry Flagler in promoting the East Coast Railway, to come to Florida and become a land developer. He had a reputation as a colonizer, having started up the towns of Frostville, Mountain and Armstrong in Wisconsin.

My great-grandfather first refused, but in the 1900s he relented and moved nine of his 10 children, his wife and himself to Modello in South Florida to develop land for the Model Land Company. He eventually talked many of his fellow Danes into coming to South Florida, land of promise and sunshine. (He didn’t tell them about the swampland, mosquitoes, alligators or snakes.)

He was instrumental in changing the name of Modello to Dania because of the number of Danes he brought down here to live. Dania was incorporated in November 1904 and is the oldest city in Broward County. My great-grandfather is considered the founder of the city.

My grandfather, Sheridan Christian Frost, was his seventh child. My mom, Clara Broward Frost, bears the middle name Broward because she has birth certificate No. 3 born in Broward County. Broward County was separated from the middle of Palm Beach County and Dade County at the urging of Andrew Christian Frost and others. Broward County came into existence on Oct. 1, 1915, her actual birthday.

My mother’s mother died just two days after the 1926 hurricane swept through South Florida as a result of running from house to house during the storm trying to reach safety. My grandmother and great-grandfather are buried next to each other at the City of Dania Cemetery, which he plotted out for the city.

My mom and dad, George Morris, married and lived around Northwest Seventh Street near the Orange Bowl. I was born in 1936 in what we called “Miamah” at Victoria Hospital. My brother, Jimmy, was born three years later in 1939. We spent the first five years of my life there.

My dad wanted to join the service when World War II broke out but couldn’t because of having two children. He was working for Florida Power & Light at the power plant in downtown Miami. To join the war effort, he became employed by the Tennessee Valley Authority at the Watts Bar Dam power plant.

I can remember my mom gathering enough gas and tire-ration stamps to pull a trailer up to Tennessee to join my father. I remember the lights out, the covered windows, the test air-raid sirens, and that we kids couldn’t buy bubble gum. When I could get it, I always saved mine on the bedstead.

When the war ended, we all came back to South Florida. We landed in West Palm Beach. There was a housing shortage due to all of the service men who had trained in South Florida and moved here after the war. By this time, I had a sister, Calista. My dad bought a piece of property in Lake Park that had no power lines, no road into the property and no buildings. We lived in an army surplus tent for about four months until he could build a frame house.

We still had no electricity, I did homework by kerosene lamp or gas lantern, mom cooked on a kerosene stove, and we had an icebox that held a block of ice. It was my job to empty the pan of water after it had melted.

In 1952, my dad transferred back to the Miami Power Plant on the MacArthur Causeway. I attended Miami Jackson High. I was at the Thanksgiving Day football game where Edison beat Miami High for the first time. (Miami Jackson had beat Miami High the year before.) The goal posts were displayed at the entrance of the school.

I got my first job working at a card and candy shop, The Treasure Chest, around the corner from the Olympia Theater. I was paid 50 cents an hour, but I got to eat a lot of candy.

I remember when Elvis Presley was appearing at the Olympia. There was a long line in front of our store of girls and women waiting to get backstage to meet Elvis. My boss asked if I wanted to get in line. I said, “No,” as I didn’t know who he was or what he did.

Guess who I got in line for? Julius La Rosa. Anybody remember him?

We went swimming at Crandon Park or Haulover Park. I remember the zoo and the train ride at Crandon Park. The 25-cent Saturday movies. Schools without air-conditioning.

I became engaged in my senior year to Charles Rory Eggleston at the Ross’ Frosty Freeze across from Miami Jackson. He worked for Pan American, and we planned to get married in the summer. He bought a home for us in Hialeah, then the bedroom community for the airlines. In order for him to get the loan for the mortgage of $10,500, I had to sign an affidavit that I was truly going to marry him. Apparently, banks didn’t trust single men.

While we were dating, my husband and I spent every Tuesday and Saturday night at the stock-car races at the Hialeah Speedway and sometimes took in a drive-in. We liked to go to the amusement park at 27th Avenue and 79th Street. Hialeah had two bowling lanes and were busy all the time. These were really some good old days.

Well, our family now has four daughters, four grandchildren and two great-granddaughters – all of whom were born here and live in South Florida, most of them in Hialeah. I’ve seen a lot of changes, some good, some bad. I used to pick strawberries where I currently live in Hialeah. There were also unpaved roads and horse ranches.

But I have traveled to all 50 states, and I would not want to live anywhere else but South Florida. We are now up to the fifth generation who are native South Floridians.