Before the highway: rochester, new york

As kids, we used to play sports and games against each other street by street. We played against Woodward Street. Woodward Street played against Ontario Street. Ontario Street played against

Lewis Street. Lewis Street played against Davis Street, and so on. So that was what we did. "ON OUR STREET, FAMILIES USED TO VISIT WITH EACH OTHER ALL THE TIME. BUT SLOWLY, SLOWLY, IT

DETERIORATED WHEN THEY STARTED BUILDING THE LOOP." _— David Everett_ On our street, families used to visit with each other all the time. But slowly, slowly, it deteriorated when they

started building the Loop. Families started moving out. We moved to a new house, a bigger neighborhood, better school. The Wegmans supermarket opened on Portland Avenue, then grew into the

chain they are now. That took away the little corner stores, the mom and pop stores. So, we no longer had the corner stores anymore. Then we had to go out of the neighborhood. The people who

didn’t have transportation had to move closer to places where they could shop. Downtown Rochester seemed miles away growing up in the 16th Ward.  AARP: _HAVE YOU ALWAYS LIVED IN ROCHESTER?_

PEDRAZA: I was in the army during the Vietnam War, serving on a chemical, biological and radiological warfare unit. Among other places I went to were Fort McAllen in Alabama, Fort Lee in

Virginia, and then Alaska, Hawaii, Washington state and Vietnam. During my stops I noticed how different each place was from the other. When I left the service, I had the rank of PS4

Specialist. EVERETT: I left Rochester in 1971 after graduating from what was then Edison Technical High School to attend Grand Canyon College in Arizona on a full scholarship, to play

basketball and study behavioral sciences and math. I wound up injuring my knee so I had to redshirt for a year. I ended up getting drafted by the Portland Trail Blazers and was on the team

that won an NBA championship. I bounced around a bit after that. My journey to Grand Canyon College had been a difficult one. I didn’t want any kids from the neighborhood to be unprepared

the way I had been when I left the community as a teenager. So, I came back in 1976 to work at the Lewis Street Center. AARP: _WHAT WAS IT LIKE WHEN YOU RETURNED?_ PEDRAZA: Originally, after

I came back from the service, I bought a house on the west side of the city. Everybody there was a little snobby but the neighbor next to me was great. He had already raised his kids and he

helped me be a homeowner. You know, older people have a lot of knowledge. You just gotta listen to them. But it wasn't like my old neighborhood, you know? It was quiet. And I’m

thinking, “I don't know if I like this. I'm not really used to this.” I like to hear noise, people yelling this and that. I was there for about five years before returning to the

neighborhood where I grew up. MEET THE NEIGHBORS The Rochester-based nonprofit Hinge Neighbors is working to connect residents and community groups that were separated by the Inner Loop

North. In 2021, an AARP Community Challenge grant helped the organization close off the Silo Street Bridge for a gathering called Live on the Loop.  By the time I moved back the Inner Loop

had been built. I went to school for optics, making glasses. I eventually wound up working at Kodak. I worked there for 25 years and four months. I raised two boys and one girl. All were

raised in the neighborhood where I grew up. The neighborhood by that time had changed from being mainly Irish and Italian to Spanish and Black. We had the Lewis Street Center, which was one

of the places I hung out when I was a teenager. It was great growing up with that. A lot of neighborhood places we had are gone and the kids don’t have as much to do.  EVERETT: If you spoke

to some of the younger kids with whom we worked, they’re now grown, and can tell you stories of what the Lewis Street Center meant to the neighborhood. It was like we were creating a perfect

childhood for them, building friendships and hope. The Catholic and suburban schools started picking at the talent we had in the 16th Ward, so the schools deteriorated too after the Loop. 

Today, you ask somebody about growing up going to the Lewis Street Center, they will almost start crying. You have to see one of our reunions of folks from the center. We have an alumni

association, a picnic. Emotions are high every year when we come together. The memories just flow, and you wouldn’t believe the stories! ABOUT THE AUTHOR _JIMMIE BRIGGS is a documentary

storyteller, writer and advocate for racial and gender equity. He is the co-founder and executive director emeritus of Man Up Campaign, a global initiative to activate youth to stop violence

against women and girls, and the author of Innocents Lost: When Child Soldiers Go to War (Basic Books, 2005). A native Missourian, he is the author of an upcoming oral history of Ferguson,

Missouri, in the wake of the 2014 police killing of teenager Michael Brown Jr. Briggs’s articles have appeared in Vanity Fair, The Guardian, Huffington Post and The Root, among other

publications. _ MORE 'BEFORE THE HIGHWAY' ARTICLES VISIT THE "BEFORE THE HIGHWAY" LANDING PAGE FOR INTERVIEWS WITH IMPACTED COMMUNITIES IN FLORIDA, MINNESOTA, OHIO,

TENNESSEE AND TEXAS. SEE THE "BEFORE THE HIGHWAY: LEARN MORE" PAGE FOR LINKS TO ARTICLES, VIDEOS, HISTORIES AND MORE ABOUT THE COMMUNITIES IMPACTED BY THE INTERSTATE HIGHWAY

SYSTEM. _Additional research by Kathleen Benedetti-Fisher, AARP New York_ RELATED LINKS _Page published February 1, 2023_