(1954-55: my grandmother’s house on Thompson Drive, two lots off Portage Avenue. She owned a cafe at the corner. Our upstairs bedroom had the wide window on the front. The house was torn down after the 1980s. I started grade 1 there in 1955.)
(1957-63: our own first house–on the right, of two houses built on Wallasey St. (one block over) in 1913, one year before WWI started. No garage. We sold the house in the summer of ’63 and moved out in September while I was in grade 9. My mother had me check the mail for the buyer’s cheque, then come to her workplace downtown to meet her for lunch so she could put it in the bank before the buyer changed his mind, as she put it! My room was in the back, upstairs, with an attached upper veranda which could be opened in summer months. There, I listened at night to my 2 transistor radio which brought in some big U.S. radio stations. My Dad decorated the veranda walls with stencils of Walt Disney cartoon characters.)
(1963-1970: we lived in 3 different suites: one in the front facing Portage Ave., two on the side facing Rita St. as shown here. We lived first on the second floor, two windows and balcony on the left of a 1 BR; then the far right windows and balcony of a 2 BR, same floor. It was a relatively short walk across the field behind Billingsley to my high school in ’64-’67, but, man, that field was frigid in winter! My friend Brad lived below the suite on the left on the first floor and we briefly would climb the balconies to go from one place to the other! Billingsley was nice and new compared to the old house and I was more comfortable entertaining and meeting friends there. When we go back to Wpg., we stay at a hotel conveniently located across from the block on the other side of Portage. One of the best features of the block was a fenced-in section on top which had a good view toward downtown. One summer, in grade 11, I was the caretaker, briefly, while the regular guy went on holidays. The furniture in the lobby was periodically re/stolen; I once called the police about one theft I witnessed. I moved out to Edmonton with my fiance after 2nd year u in the spring of 1970. My parents moved to another, smaller walk-up. Capri Apts. after that.)