Guest Post ~ "Old Days"

Tooner's Schooners of South Philadelphia, late 1940s.
Anthony "Speed" Schiavo is top row, third from left.

Presenting a retrospective guest post from Anthony P. Schiavo, Sr., written over a decade ago when he was about 75. Anthony, or "Speed" as he was known in South Philadelphia, passed away earlier this week after a full life at the ripe old age of 87.

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I look out the window and watch them play in our circle, “the boys” as my wife calls them. When not in school, neighborhood boys regularly play baseball with a hollow bat and wiffle ball or ball hockey on inline skates with hockey sticks, goals, and goalies with pads and masks. It's a small field so I park our car in our driveway to give them room to play. My wife would prefer I park in the street, away from bird droppings and debris from monstrous Christmas trees, planted yearly by our house's original owner. But she's a good neighbor and I'm ... well they don't know it and I don't look it, but I'm one of the boys.

Once, a very long time ago, I played with my friends in our 'ballpark'. We were luckier than these boys, we had 'Abbotts', a dairy maintenance yard at the end of my street in South Philly, bigger and less traveled than the circle they play on. And though my sons on visits ridiculed its size as the place I've told them held epic athletic contests, we were extremely lucky to have it. The best part was that there were few Abbotts vehicles in the yard on weekdays and none on weekends. The place was ours except for occasional visitors who parked there. Even that was hardly ever a problem since cars then were parked unlocked in neutral, there was no 'park'. We simply pushed them into empty parking space out of our way. Cars left unlocked, empty parking space, in South Philly? Yes, it was very long ago.

We played 'halfball' with a broomstick and halves of 'pimple' balls, 'miniature ball' in a ten by ten yard chalked baseball field (ball slapped underhand must hit in the field), and two-hand touch football with a real football or a rolled up and tied newspaper. We played often and long, sometimes into the darkness, as long as we had a critical mass of players, as few as two for halfball and even football. My friend Yogi and I sometimes played football one on one, where we had to pass to ourselves. I was quicker but he was smart and made it hard for me to get started. And he was bigger and muscle counted when the ball was in the air. Yogi is gone now but writing this brings him back clearly, facing me, blocking my way to the goal.

Abbotts was also an informal casino with gambling from pennies to big money. On a concrete platform along a wall with a protective overhang, we played penny ante poker, old men (seventies and eighties) played hilarious pinochle for change with angry outbursts and blatant cheating, and in the center of the yard, returned WWII veterans played dice for enough money to attract hustlers from distant places. They had a lookout for cop cars but with big games, nobody ran, the organizer, who took cuts from big pots, went over and explained the gathering to the cops who always left satisfied.

But my favorite memories of Abbotts were the football games we played against the veterans. Barely past our mid teens, we were no match physically for them and to make matters worse, hitting these guys like we hit each other was unthinkable – they were heroes to us. They slaughtered us but we always looked forward to another game hoping they wouldn't tire of the ease of it. Finally we lured them into a schoolyard to play where speed trumped size and we beat them. Sadly some never played again – it was the end of their youth.

Anthony P. Schiavo, Sr.
1932–2019

I'm not going to try to persuade the boys outside that I'm one of them, me playing in their games is too grotesque to imagine – especially after my spectacular flop on the first pass I had them throw me. But if I could get a message through the age communication barrier, it would be this: enjoy playing but also take it all in, the games, the plays, and especially the faces, not to tell others, they won't care, but to recall how good it was, when they are old men watching new boys play.

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Even to his final days, "Speed" felt he was one of the boys, always up for a game of frisbee with his grandkids.