By Joan Bunting, October 24, 2019 — My husband, my children, and me, myself, we all lived here in South Philly. We raised our children and that’s where a lot of my grandchildren were raised.
During that time, there was a section in the Daily News announcing that soon there would be a change in the neighborhood.
We lived in the ten hundred block of South Nineteenth Street between Washington Avenue and Carpenter Street. The change was to take place between Washington Avenue and South Street and between Nineteenth and Twenty-Third Streets.
I think three or four years passed, my husband and I were asked if we wanted to sell our three-story house. Well, we lived in a Philadelphia Housing Authority (PHA) house. I said no because I knew I couldn’t afford to buy a house or take care of it if anything that might stop functioning or break.
Not long after that, the PHA moved us to a smaller place around the corner from where we just moved from. In two weeks, they sent us to the Wilson Projects near Twenty-Fifth and Jackson Streets.
One day, I was on the Seventeen bus on my way home and as I looked out of the window, we were going passed where we lived for thirty years.
The neighborhood was hardy recognizable. The whole neighborhood had changed. I didn’t even see my old address, 1016. I wanted to cry. I told my husband that they had gotten rid of it. Later on, the address still existed, but they put it in a different position, that’s why I didn’t see it at first.
There is a small street between Carpenter and Washington Avenue named League Street. That street had no houses on it for years. I was so surprised when I saw that houses had been rebuilt.
There has been so any changes, even in the areas that had not been announced in the Daily News the years before. In fact, I see changes everywhere.
The condominiums have taken over. Not only here in South Philadelphia, but everywhere.
I don’t feel heartbroken anymore because I realize that changes are to happen.
I just hope that where I live now will continue to be. I’m happy, content, and I feel safe.