Page 95 - WhyAsInY

GaMes PeoPle PlayeD
Good Humor ice cream was so important in the fifties that Good Humor salesmen, dressed all in white and wearing long pants, would make the rounds of Brighton Beach or Coney Island Beach, braving the heat and the often difficult-to-negotiate sand, with large refrigerated chests, which contained their ice cream sandwiches and cones and hung heavily from a strap around their necks. These Good Humor men didn’t have any bells that I remember. Rather, they got attention and space to maneuver by shouting, “Guhjoomah,” as they made their way from blanket to blanket. I never saw the pretzel man selling at any place other than the schoolyard. For that matter, I never heard the pretzel man yell- ing at all.
Other familiar outdoor sales sounds in my youth were the screech- ing of the wheel of the knife and scissors sharpener who “came around” fairly regularly in his truck and, more confusing to me, the occasional singing out of a phrase that I heard as “ah-gay-hoo” but was in fact “I cash clothes,” incanted by a man carrying used clothing that he had purchased from people in the neighborhood. He was therefore the “I-cash-clothes man.” I have no idea whether he attempted to resell the clothing or wear it. In any event, I never saw or heard an I-sell-clothes man. There were no milkmen making deliveries that I can recall, but— no surprise—there was the “seltzer man,” who made daily rounds in his truck. But I digress again.
When summer arrived, a number of families, such as the Rosens (my friend Michael’s parents), had memberships in clubs in Brighton Beach or even the Rockaways, where, so far as I could tell, they were provided with nothing special other than access to a beach that would not be used by the public, and a locker, which meant a place to change and perhaps to sit. My family did not join clubs (and neither do I), but did, on one occasion—and maybe only once—go to the public portion of Brighton Beach with me. My only clear recollections of that trip were the Guhjoomah men, of course, the surprisingly hot sand, the number of what I referred to as “naked” feet that were in evidence, and the wave that engulfed me and left me with a mouthful of seawater, something that kept me away from beaches until my first honeymoon. I
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