Our House, In the Middle of the Street

My side of Vine street was a little higher than where the cattle trucks parked on stock day. The sewer drain which collected all the rain water run off was in front of our house. This low point was where the asphalt road and sidewalk joined, and a thick metal grill kept you from falling into the drain. It was the lowest point on our side of the street, but the road raised slightly to the middle of the street, so about half the drainage would go to the other side, and half would come to our drain. [I suspected this is also where the water passing through our basement would end up.] You came up a slight incline from Broadway to where Vine Street leveled for a while right in front of our house. It then climbed more sharply, to Washington Street. The top of the hill offered a side walk which could be used to great advantage on a tricycle except, there were several places that were broken apart, and made navigation somewhat difficult. I was ordered not to ride in the street and that was generally a good idea, so I got pretty successful at maneuvering around the broken bits of concrete.

There were seven houses on our side, and five houses on the opposite side. Old man Elkin's house actually faced Broadway, but it was so far back from Broadway, it's back fence ran along the Frazer's house next to our house. Mr. Hill's house was next to ours, followed by the Well's, Powell's, and Hatton's houses. Occasionally there was a trailer placed at the end of the street, and would be tucked behind a 5-6 foot retaining wall that made a perfect spot for throwing snowballs at passing cars during the winter "out of school" days. We would have several days a winter where school was canceled, and this was always a bonus living in Kentucky.