Eastchester Road Stores – The Bronx We Knew

Associated Food Store

As the northeast Bronx continued to develop, the small shops near the northeast corner of Mace Avenue and Eastchester Road gave way to a supermarket originally established by the Kruger family. Taken over by a succession of chains over the years, its various names included Pioneer, C-Town, Met Food, and Associated.

Most of the neighborhood kids were handed a short shopping list and sent there pretty much every day after school, sometimes twice a day during summer vacation. As a result, we all developed an intimate familiarity with every crevice of the store’s cramped, narrow aisles. We came to know the workers pretty well, too.

The deli department, managed and run solely by Louie, occupied the area to the immediate right of the entrance.

Soft and round, with a soft round head, ruddy cheeks, and warm brown hair that wrapped the back of his head—ear to ear—like a fur collar, Louie was middle-aged and spoke with the accent of many of our Jewish neighbors. Affable and ever smiling, always eager to be of service, he made you feel as if he’d been waiting all day just for you. He welcomed all who approached his deli counter with a hearty greeting: “What can I get for you today?” Then he’d scuttle away to fill the order.

With characteristic enthusiasm, Louie answered a curious kid who had inquired about an orange slab displayed on a platter inside the refrigerated deli case. He explained that it was called lox and that it tasted great with cream cheese on a bagel.

“Would you like to taste it, darling?”

She certainly did not, and declined politely.

Taken aback, he persisted. “You should always try something new. Here, have a little taste.”

With that, Louie lopped off a slice the size and shape of a cat’s tongue, and held it out.

The child took the cold, slippery piece and held it tentatively. “What, I should eat it for you? Taste it already.” Louie’s face lit up with the anticipation of seeing a joyful reaction to a delicious first treat. As she put it into her mouth, Louie’s expression of delight instantly changed to one of concern.

“You don’t like it. That’s all right, darling. It’s a taste you grow into. Here,” he said, handing her a piece of deli wrap. “Spit it out.”

Louie was so genial, and so much like a friend, that this same child soon broached him with another question that had been dancing around in her mind forever.

“What are those?” she finally asked, pointing to a stack of small rectangular blocks on his countertop. With their brown and white wrappers, they looked like candy bars. But why the depiction of a mysterious man in a turban and moustache on the label? And what did HALVAH mean?

“You don’t know what halvah is?” Louie seemed disappointed. “It’s like candy. You want a taste?”

She was astonished to think he would open up the merchandise just for her. “No…no thank you, Louie. I don’t want to try it.” She tried to sound firm, but a meek refusal was all her shyness would allow.

“You don’t know what you’re missing,” Louie said, gleefully unwrapping a bar and slicing through the chocolate coating to reveal the off-white insides of the confection. With a beaming smile he handed her the piece, explaining that it was made of ground sesame seeds sweetened with honey. Then he watched closely for her reaction.

His expression changed in an instant.

“You don’t like it.”

She didn’t want to hurt Louie’s feelings again. But there was no use pretending. “It’s…okay.” she gasped out. “Not bad.” She didn’t like it and he knew it.

Back in the days of Louie, there was also Richie, who stocked the shelves. From the vantage point of two ten-year-old girls, Richie was 20ish and tall, with dark longish hair, dark eyebrows, and a quiet demeanor. His head was always down, his attention always on his task, his hair falling across his eyes as if to hide from the world—or to shield the world from what those eyes might reveal.

With great discretion the girls observed Richie from afar, learning first-hand what those clichés of song and story meant about someone who was “tall, dark, and handsome,” and “the strong, silent type.” One day when the girls worked up the nerve to ask Louie about him, Louie’s smiling face turn somber. Whatever sad story Louie related is lost now, but it touched them and made them look at Richie with new eyes.

On their frequent trips to Associated the girls walked up Mace Avenue, passing the side of the store where an overhead door was often open to accept deliveries. At those times they would have to wind their way between the truck ramps and the off-loaded crates. Sometimes Richie would be out there in his gray smock, helping to unload. But most often the girls would find him near the dairy case stacking quarts of milk or Dannon’s yogurt—plain, strawberry, and dutch apple. Seeing reliable Richie was uplifting, despite his sad silence. There was a feeling of security in finding him always there, until the day he wasn’t.

In this neighborhood of mostly first- and second-generation German, Irish, and Italian immigrants, the homemakers of the neighborhood—always the women back then—did the big shopping once a week. Most of them didn’t drive. The rare woman who did drive did not have access to the family car on weekdays because her husband drove it to work. (Later, as more women and the teenagers of the family started driving, two-car households became more common.) The no-car women either towed their brown bags of groceries home in wheeled, upright carts or they requested delivery at checkout. For home delivery, items were boxed, not bagged. Within minutes of getting home, the groceries would arrive. Sometimes the groceries made it to their front doors before they did.

When we were old enough to get working papers, many of us applied to Associated for a summer or after-school job. By that time the classmates we had gone from kindergarten through grade 8 with had scattered to the various high schools around the Bronx. The store then became a place for meeting up with old friends as well as for making new ones.

Villa Maria Pizzeria

Eastchester Road at its intersection with Mace Avenue is a commercial district, with small businesses on both sides of street. You could walk the eastern side of Eastchester Road with your eyes closed and know which shop you were passing by the one trait that characterized each from the other: its smell. Continuing on this olfactory tour, we come to Villa Maria, Sal’s next-door neighbor to the south.

The sign above the restaurant looked something like this.

The atmosphere surrounding Villa Maria captivated you as the aroma of baking bread mingled with the rich scent of melting mozzarella until you could almost taste those elastic strings that stretched like fili telefonici (telephone wires) with every piping hot bite. It called out to you, luring you in for a hot slice.

Most of us could scrape together enough babysitting or allowance money to buy a fifty-cent slice, served on a sheet of deli wrap, and a Coke to go with it, so we came here to mark occasions great and small.

An ordinary Saturday turned special when a group of us decided to meet at Villa Maria for lunch. When school dismissed early during exam week, we headed to the pizzeria for lunch. When someone had their braces removed, we celebrated at the pizzeria with lunch. After a shopping trip to Westchester Square, we left the Number 9 bus at the corner and headed straight to the pizzeria for lunch. When we were older, we met at the pizzeria to rehash all we had discovered about high school after a morning of freshman orientation.

On summer nights when the group hanging out on the front stoop inevitably started to think about food, our thoughts turned to Villa Maria. Even as late as 10:30 p.m., we could order a pizza and have it delivered for free. Still wearing his flour-dusted apron, the baker and proprietor himself would struggle out of his compact car with the large, flat box. As he lumbered toward us, we would be rummaging through our pockets for bills and change to pay the man and offer a decent tip.

The boys of the neighborhood found Villa Maria to be a convenient and inexpensive place to take a girl for something resembling a date. In New York City you had to be 18 to get a driver’s license; 17 if you completed the driver’s education course. Going on dates by bus was an option, but not always financially possible. Taking a walk to Villa Maria was often the solution, and never a disappointing choice.

The southward walk along Eastchester Road ends here for now. Next, we turn north, cross Mace Avenue, and arrive at our supermarket, Associated Food Store.

Sal’s House of Good Foods

Further south on Eastchester Road, about midway between Mace Avenue and Williamsbridge Road, there was no escaping the odiferous air surrounding Mrs. Weinberg’s Kosher Chopped Liver factory. But the stores on Eastchester Road near Mace Avenue also influenced the air quality (for better or for worse) in that immediate vicinity.

First you would pass Mace Chemist Shop at the corner, then Vinnie’s candy store, which emitted the scent of fresh coffee. Walk a few more paces toward Paul’s hair salon, and delight in the fragrance of hair spray and shampoo as the door swept open, or choke on the acrid stench of perm solution. Passing the last two stores that occupied the ground floor of the apartment building led to another strip of small businesses: the liquor store and then another odorous establishment, Sal’s House of Good Foods.

Sal’s opened door startled the whole outdoors. It exhaled a breath ripe with the aroma of provolone and other pungent cheeses and salumi that hung over the counter, suspended from ropes. Below the countertop, the glass-front refrigerated case held the colorful display of black and green olives, roasted red peppers, marinated mushrooms, red and green pepper strips, artichoke hearts, giardiniera, potato and macaroni salads, cheese cubes, mozzarella balls, ready-made antipasto, and a vast array of other store specialties ready for dispensing into cardboard containers. Premium mustards and other gourmet condiments huddled on the countertop beside loaves of Italian bread and boxes of hard Kaiser rolls, club rolls, and hero rolls.

Despite the prevailing opinion that Sal’s prices were too high, people preferred to buy their cold cuts here rather than at the supermarket. Sunday evenings were especially busy as customers picked up enough sliced meats and cheeses for a week’s worth of brown bag sandwiches. We did too, but not only for the week’s lunches. Besides the cold cuts, we also bought hard rolls and a variety of cold salads for our much-anticipated Sunday night supper. (On Sundays we ate dinner in the afternoon.)

Depending on how many people were helping behind the counter, customers could be served two or three at a time. Each person inevitably had a long list.

“I’ll take half a pound of hard salami…”

“What else?”

“Half a pound of mortadella, a pound of sliced provolone, half a dozen hard rolls. Give me the ones with the sesame seeds.”

“I only have poppy seed left.”

“Okay, poppy seed. And I need…”

It all took time. Everyone knew it, and no one waiting on the long line grumbled. Patiently they stood by, ears alert for the words that meant things were finally moving along: “Who’s next?”

The olfactory tour of the stores continued with Villa Maria, the pizzeria, right next door to Sal’s.

The Hair Salon

Two doors down from Vinnie’s, Paul’s hair salon functioned as another social gathering place. Brilliantly lit and reeking of perm solution and hair spray, Paul’s vibrated at a frenetic frequency created by the endlessly ringing telephone, the droning of the hair dryers, and the sloshing and spraying at the shampoo sinks. Then there was the routine shouting, necessary to be heard over the din or when an argument was going on.

Mr. Paul, a tall, slim, older gentleman with thick, silver-gray hair and moustache, wore dark-rimmed glasses and perfectly pressed pinstriped shirts. His trousers were similarly pressed, with a razor-sharp crease down the front. Mr. Paul found favor particularly with older women. Young children liked him, too.

Maria, petite and slender with Mediterranean-toned skin, moved briskly and efficiently, her espresso-colored, shoulder-length hair swinging luxuriously with every turn of her head. She had no time for small talk, but when she did speak her words flowed melodiously with a subtle accent of Italy. With total concentration Maria focused on the task at hand, whether it was trimming, rolling, teasing, waxing, or tweezing. Teen and preteen girls particularly liked Maria, and many from the other generations requested her as well.

Mr. Victor, Paul’s son, completed the staff. Fiftyish, portly, and shorter than his father, with thinning hair and a serious demeanor, Mr. Victor captured the “dad” image that eluded his father. Like Maria, smiles rarely crossed his face, but his manner was courtly and pleasant. His clients included children, the matronly, and the elderly.

Paul’s catered to females of all generations. In the 1960s, women of near-middle age and older had their hair “done” once a week, filling the styling stations that faced the wall of mirrors, then moving to the bank of hooded hair dryers at the opposite wall. Younger women, teens, and children came for haircuts, then those of preteen age and older went home to manage the styling themselves. Everyone possessed the necessary equipment, available inexpensively at Woolworth’s: curlers in a range of sizes, bobbie pins to secure them, hairclips for creating pin curls, a portable bonnet-style hair dryer, a teasing comb, and the indispensable can of hair spray. By the 1970s, teens and younger women had replaced all their hair paraphernalia with one single essential item—the blow dryer—as they shifted from weekly wash and sets to daily shampooing and blow drying.

But back in the 1960s, if these younger girls and women were preparing for a special event like a wedding, the prom, a bat mitzvah, or the eighth-grade graduation dance, then they too would get their hair “done.” This meant enduring the laborious wash, set, and sweltering stint under the dryer, followed by the unraveling of the curlers, the comb-out, the teasing, the anchoring of the up-do (if that was the style chosen), the clouds of hairspray, the mandatory presentation of a hand mirror with which to admire the back and sides of the head.

Middle-aged and older women frequently came for perms, although sometimes a mother would request one for her young daughter. Anyone coming for a perm planned ahead, knowing they would be sitting in Paul’s for up to five hours or more. Not only was the process itself a long one (washing, rolling, applying the eye-smarting perm solution, neutralizing, setting, drying…) but the stylist squeezed in other clients during stage transitions. The only stage that had to be attended to exactly on time was the rinsing or neutralizing of the perm solution before damage could be done. Aside from that, it was wait…wait…wait.

Most styles of the 1960s required a wash and set only, not a perm. In one popular style called the Artichoke, hair was cut very short in the back. Longer hair at the crown was set on large rollers. Wisps of hair at either side of the face were wound into pin curls at ear level. After drying, the hair was then teased (also known as backcombed) to a great height. Full or side bangs completed the look. This helmet-like creation, lacquered into preservation with billows of hair spray, lasted the entire week if the person under the helmet took precautions when sleeping or showering.

Similar lacquering attended other styles as well because of the teasing that created the bouffant (high on the head, full at the sides) look. For jaw-length hair, many older women favored the style similar to the one Queen Elizabeth has worn for years—off the forehead with softly curled ends. Height and fullness varied according to personal preference.

Younger women with longer hair wore it teased on top with the ends flipped up. Sometimes they opted for the French twist, where hair would be teased for height at the crown, then blended into the rest of the hair and rolled sideways into a long bun in the back. For the beehive, another ubiquitous style, hair at the crown was elevated to unnatural heights, often with the help of an insertable hair piece. An optional French twist could be fashioned from the hair left hanging down the back.

Most Eastchester Road stores were in-and-out places. You got what you went for and left. But like Vinnie’s candy store, Paul’s was a place you wanted to visit. Something good happened to you there, whether it was getting a cream soda or an attractive new hairstyle. You looked forward to sitting and staying, all the while absorbing the atmosphere, catching snippets of conversations, and taking in those fascinating stories of life that traveled through the neighborhood grapevine.

The Corner Drugstore

Soon after the Second World War, local truck farmers Tom and Louie Forte completed construction of an apartment building on the southeast corner of Mace Avenue and Eastchester Road. The residential entrance to the building faced Mace; the side that faced Eastchester Road offered retail space at ground level for six small stores, beginning with Mace Chemist Shop on the corner.

A. J. & R. F. DeFilippis, R.Ph. read the small letters printed on the plate glass window next to the recessed entryway, which cut across the corner of the building. In contrast to the high energy emanating from Vinnie’s, this shop exuded a hum of calm. Light traffic and soft lighting enhanced the aura of serenity.

It took only a few steps to span the distance from the entrance to the counter, or to any of the fully stocked shelving units lining the walls. Behind the counter, tall shelves overflowing with more health and beauty items shielded the rear of the store where the pharmacists filled prescriptions. Low shelves at the base of the counter held smaller personal care products. This cozy nook of a shop stocked all the essential drugstore merchandise, but each product at its most basic rather than in every variety available.

Mr. DeFilippis was the elder pharmacist. A sliver of a man with a pencil moustache and a gray lab coat worn over his shirt and tie, he was courteous but solemn, clipped and formal. His son Ronnie, robust and of average height, smiled easily and greeted customers by name.

As you stood at the counter waiting to pay for your purchase, you had no way of knowing which of the DeFilippis men would emerge from behind the shelves to help you. As a young girl, I sagged inwardly when confronted by the stern countenance of the elder gentleman. But seeing Ronnie approach, smile sliding across his face, brought forth a smile of my own. Ronnie, with eyes as blue as the wild chicory that squeezed through the cracks in the sidewalk, dense dark eyebrows and eyelashes, and thick black hair brushed back from his forehead, made the business transaction enjoyable.

The prices at this independent pharmacy were high, but the shop filled prescriptions and met other needs of a loyal customer base. Saving a few cents at one of the larger chain drugstores was not always the priority, especially if it meant a trip by bus. Eventually, one of those chain stores did open further down the street, advertising low prices and weekly specials. Nevertheless, Mace Chemist Shop continued to serve the community for many more years, closing for business on December 13, 1983.

Wild chicory photo by Mariclare Cole. (Photosbymariclare on Instagram.)

The Candy Store

Push open the door, and feel the fragrant cloud of coffee and newsprint surround you like a warm, familiar welcome. The grill sizzles and snaps, interrupting voices of every range and pitch that tumble together in crisscrossed conversations along the crowded lunch counter. With a couple of paces, you step across the black and dingy-white linoleum squares, hop onto the slick, blue vinyl top of a silver stool, and wait for Vinnie to notice you.

The sign over the doorway read Luncheonette, but back in the 1960s and ’70s everyone called it Vinnie’s or simply, “the candy store.” It was the second store from the southeast corner of Eastchester Road and Mace Avenue in the uppermost reaches of New York City, the northeast Bronx.

Stretch out your arm to your immediate right as you entered, and you could touch the tiered candy rack—fully stocked with all kinds of confections—without moving from the doorway. To the left of the entrance loomed the telephone booth, a sturdy box constructed of heavy dark wood with a folding door of thick glass. Back in the days of one phone per household, Vinnie’s telephone booth provided solitude and the strictest privacy—a priceless commodity.

On the other side of the phone booth, beneath the plate glass window, stacks of weeklies and dailies ensured that the store’s signature scent of ink and newsprint would never fade: the New York Daily News, the Bronx Press-Review, The New York Times, and smaller specialty papers. Late in the afternoon, as the stacks of morning editions diminished, bundles of the New York Post and the New York World-Telegram hit the pavement outside the door, and Vinnie added those to the newsstand.

Vinnie’s greeting-card section needed improvement, but you could ferret out a decent one if you were desperate enough. His magazine stand was lacking as well. You might find your favorite magazine one month—but not necessarily the next.

A rear corner of the store drew kids like a magnet. In that shadowy space near the school supplies you would find wonderful things: comic books, jump ropes, construction paper, poster paints, craft kits, jacks, yo-yos, Mouseketeer ears, Mexican jumping beans, and small pink rubber balls, each one stamped with the word Spalding, essential for playing catch, stoop ball, stick ball, king queen jack…

With salt- and pepper-colored hair that sprung like brush bristles from his scalp, Vinnie stood at average height in a stocky build. Wearing his ubiquitous white T-shirt with an apron tied around his middle, he grilled burgers, toasted muffins, made BLTs—but we kids paid little attention to the food menu. For us, Vinnie’s was mostly for treats, rarely for nourishment.

Vinnie’s was where the barber next door stopped for coffee and a toasted corn muffin (“with very little butter”) in mid-morning; it was where the cashier from the Associated Food Store bought cigarettes; where commuters heading for the Number 9 bus stop picked up their morning newspaper; where we kids found hot chocolate in January, class packs of Valentine cards in February, flipflops in July, notebooks in September, and cardboard witch masks in October. It was where, as eighth graders, we stopped for reinforcements—gum or a bag of M&Ms—on our way to take the three-hour high school entrance exam, and where we stopped for an egg cream (for consolation) on the way home.

Vinnie turned a pained expression on us kids when we’d bluster in, making it clear he was not delighted to see us. Yet, despite the perpetual scowl framed by fierce dark eyebrows, we weren’t afraid of him. As we grew out of childhood, and especially later as our teens turned into our 20s, his scowl softened a bit as he stopped perceiving us as potential trouble.

At some point we noticed that Vinnie had acquired a rotund, white-haired helper. Dressed like Vinnie in a white apron over a white T-shirt, the elder gentleman’s main purpose—it seemed to us—was to stand guard at the candy display. You couldn’t linger for long when you stopped to survey the vast, colorful array. A decision was coaxed out of you by luminous blue eyes, inches from your face, that didn’t blink until you had made your selection and handed over the money.

Vinnie turns his pained expression on you as you spin around on your stool. Sliding a dime, a nickel, and a penny toward him, you ask for a chocolate egg cream. Without a word, he nibbles the buttered roll he holds in one hand while his free hand reaches for a glass to place under the fountain. He pumps out a few squirts of chocolate syrup, adds a splash of milk. Shifting the glass to the seltzer dispenser, he fills it up, stirring constantly with a thin, long-handled spoon. You watch closely, impressed by his one-handed style. Slowly, a creamy white foam rises atop the mocha-colored drink.

With a final flourish he plunks in a straw, then sets the glass before you.