The view from our old Portsmouth North End home: Splaine

It's gone now. Along with some 300 other families who long ago called Portsmouth's North End home, I lived there with my family − mom, dad, sister Betty, and brother John. To enjoy boyhood in the 1950s in a neighborhood like ours was fascinating.  

Our small 30-acre neighborhood had great diversity with a tremendous mix of cultures as people from Greece and Italy, France and Canada, and Irish, Jewish, Asian, African-Americans and others settled during a dozen decades of immigration. Our neighborhood was an array of homes, apartments, rooming houses, dozens of businesses, garages, restaurants and trains. 

Here I offer a view of what we saw from our family home on the corner of Deer and Bridge Streets, where Statey's micro-housing and parking area is under construction.   

Looking eastly.  Our home was on the edge of downtown. Until he left for college, my brother and I shared a third-floor room with unobstructed views of downtown.  We saw the rooftop of the YMCA, the old high school, the North Church, and during Christmas we could see colored lights on Congress Street. Hourly church bells kept us on time day and night. Our third floor had no heat, so sunrises were a sweet bonus on cold winter mornings.

A wonderful Greek family lived next door. They often heated with wood and their chimney smoke was fun to watch on windy days as it swirled around. An Irish family lived next to them, with a boy who was my best friend. An Asian family was just beyond them. The father drove to Boston every day to work in a restaurant.

Westerly view. The train station and tracks were at our doorstep. A lot of immigrants during the 1800s and early 1900s arrived in Portsmouth from Boston. It was a busy travel spot through the 1950s. As a little boy I remember being with my mother listening to President Harry S. Truman speaking from his railcar. I also remember helping my brother carry his trunk from our house to the train station across the street as he went off to college in Florida. I cried, waving goodbye. On the other side of the tracks was the historic cemetery where Portsmouth's early residents rest. I enjoyed playing hide-and-seek there.  

Northern.  From our top floor we could make out the Piscataqua River. That area was dense with a couple of hundred buildings, most of them homes with TV antennas. The Farragut School for elementary students was four blocks over.  We had a glimpse of the Navy yard where a lot of our neighbors worked. If we looked carefully, we'd see one open area that was our neighborhood junk yard. Neat rusting old cars to play in and catch spiders to scare parents. 

Southern. The train yard was busy with loading and unloading shipments almost every day. But at night it was wide open for us to play baseball or ride our bicycles. Sometimes freight car doors weren't fully locked and my friends and I would squeeze in to explore. In summer, we'd enjoy bananas and broken watermelons left on the ground which slipped out of the hands of loaders.  

The railroad cars and tracks were endless adventures for us, as was the North Mill Pond where we dared to swim. I never told my mom about the day a friend and I snuck aboard an empty caboose and went to Boston and back. Me being 14, my mom wouldn't want to hear that.    

Oh, the sunsets. Seeing the summer sun set over the North Mill Pond from our top window was sometimes family time. A time to slow down just a bit. 

That's the view of 75 years ago. Today it's condominiums, costly apartments, some stores, and a giant garage. What it will be in 75 years at the turn of a new century is for those who follow us to decide.   

North End gold?  Is gold buried in the North End? That's my story for another time.

Today's quote:  "Portsmouth's a great place to live, if you can afford it."  — I hear that often nowadays.       

Next time: Time for a Portsmouth annual tax cap?  

Variously since 1969, Jim Splaine has been New Hampshire state senator for six years and state representative for 24 years. He was Portsmouth assistant mayor for 12 years, city councilor for 18 years, and served on the Police Commission and School Board. Say hello: jimsplaineportsmouthNH@gmail.com.