Who is James David Huff ???

Everyone needs a best friend in their childhood.  If you don't have one, you make one up. 

God blessed me with a real friend that was more awesome than any I could make up myself.  We would have many adventures together and learn much about life in reality and imagination.

Carl Austin Niebauer, "Skip" to me, lived three houses west of mine and we were best friends from as early as I can remember.  Skip's dad was a contractor and built many of the Catholic Churches in Erie as well as anything else that could be constructed.  His mom was from Canada and was the nicest woman in the neighborhood.  She was born in Loggieville, a small town near Chatum, New Brunswick, Canada and welcomed me into her home as if I was Skip's brother.  Skip's sister was enough years older than us that we seldom saw her.  I only remember her as being a pretty girl like you would hope to find when you got older. 

Skips house was built of brick and had a large front porch that we could play on even in the rain.  The best part was the barn out back.  Even though we lived in the city, his father had kept the barn on the property and its loft would become our secret club house. 

Directly behind his house, facing the opposite street, was his Uncle and Aunt and a their parakeet who drank beer from the bottle cap.  Hey, I remember what I remember.  Skips uncle was a barber who's shop was four blocks away next to an old movie theater that became the source for us to acquire real old silent film and a hand cranked projector that would play in many adventures.

Skip and I were inseparable and had free run of the neighborhood.  In those days it really was a village raising the children.  We were safe and watched over by everyone on the block.  Neighbors knew each other and took care of each other.  The down side was that by the time I got home Momma already knew where I had been and if I had done something I should not have.  How many times I walked in the front door to be greeted by Momma saying "Jimmie, get the switch" before I figured out how she knew......

Skip was a few months younger than I and it was not long before I was labeled the instigator in any trouble we got into.  Often the adults did not approve of the things we did and sometimes rightly so for many of our adventures could have had disastrous results.  If we had guardian angels I could picture them saying "Lord, not Jimmie and Skip, please."  "Couldn't we have some one easier, just for today?"    Seriously, God protected us from ourselves and so many other dangers....

Brown Avenue ran diagonally (from northeast to southwest) between Cascade St. on the East and Raspberry st. on the West with 22nd St. on the North and 23rd St. on the South.  We will start at the pointed East end and walk around the block meeting the neighbors.

next -  a walk around the block

(cntd)