'The sweet memories come back'

I have a lot of good memories of downtown Waukegan and walking everywhere in the '50s and early '60s. I attended Washington School from fourth to sixth grade and remember walking to the corner of Washington Street, where Waukegan Bible Church used to be, to catch the bus that took me downtown. When I got off the bus, I walked to the YMCA where I had fun learning to swim and dive. I did this for several years.

I loved going to the Genesee Theatre to see the Disney movies, and thought it was as beautiful then as it is now. I was in the first graduating class at Jack Benny Junior High and remember the excitement of his TV show being at the school. We all thought that was the greatest thing.

When I was a freshman in high school at West Campus, we lived a couple of miles away, but I loved walking home after school. Sometimes I would even walk to school instead of taking the bus. During my junior year at East Campus, I would walk to work at Neisner's downtown after school on Monday and Friday and work all evening. I worked at the lunch counter there, plus all day Saturday. My friends would pick me up after work on Friday and we would head over to hang out at the YMCA to dance. The Y was always great fun. I remember in high school, whenever I could scrape up 12 cents, I would buy a Suzie Q for dessert after lunch.

I have other great memories of Waukegan's downtown besides the YMCA and the Genesee Theatre. I attended Christ Episcopal Church where I enjoyed singing in the junior choir in grade school. I loved to read and got my books mostly from the bookmobile when it stopped in our neighborhood, but whenever my mom took me to the library downtown it felt like a magical place. It was a beautiful building, filled with many books. In high school it was a treat to share fries and a cherry Coke from the fountain with friends at Walgreens. The Cokes were the best tasting, so different from what we get now. Afterward, we would shop in the many stores downtown. My clothes were bought mostly from the Montgomery Ward and Sears catalogs, but I loved looking in Hein's and Globe.

My grandmother always had all of the family over to her house for every holiday, birthday, and picnics in the summer. My grandfather, John Vleck, and my uncle Jack, or John Hoen, were both policemen in Waukegan. My stepdad, Ed Holm, was a Waukegan fireman. Many times they would be off in an area by themselves swapping their stories of the latest Waukegan news. I loved being with them listening to their stories. It was much more fun than being with the women in the kitchen.

I moved on and married another Waukegan resident, Mike Mitchell, at the Waukegan Bible Church where I used to wait for the bus years ago. We now live in Antioch, but whenever I'm in Waukegan, the nostalgic sweet memories come back.

Val (Holm) Mitchell