(Learn more by reading aU.S.
Department of Transportation/Federal Highway Administrationarticle about the project.)
AARP:What do you remember about your childhood in Rochester and the construction of the Inner Loop?
Martin Pedraza:Its a totally different world between Puerto Rico and here.
I thought Rochester was an amazing, totally different world.
I noticed a lot of farms.
The bus we rode on to get here seemed like it had so many seats and lights on it.
I never even saw a bus like that till I came here.
We moved in where a lot of the Hispanics lived, which was around Clinton Avenue.
After about a year we moved to Marketview Heights.
I was in my late teens, early 20s when the Inner Loop was built.
I had a paper route then and was able to walk the route.
I remember that time well because that was the year they started building the Inner Loop.
That job only lasted a year!
David Everett:My parents came from Fort Valley, Georgia.
They came from Jim Crow segregation.
The oldest of my three siblings was born down there.
His birth certificate says colored.
Thats the way it was back then.
In Rochester, my parents moved into a three-family house.
There was a family in the back, one upstairs and we were downstairs in front.
Whatever we needed for the family was right there in the 16th Ward.
We had two elementary schools, three surrounding high schools.
I was eight years old when the construction started.
Our house was a couple of streets down from the Loop.
It was a small Italian neighborhood when we moved there.
There was always something festive in that neighborhood.
You could always tell what day of the week it was.
Especially if it was Wednesday, which was the day for homemade spaghetti sauce.
You could smell it in the entire neighborhood.
On Fridays, it was fish.
As kids, we used to play sports and games against each other street by street.
We played against Woodward Street.
Woodward Street played against Ontario Street.
Ontario Street played against Lewis Street.
Lewis Street played against Davis Street, and so on.
So that was what we did.
“On our street, families used to visit with each other all the time.
But slowly, slowly, it deteriorated when they started building the Loop.”
David Everett
On our street, families used to visit with each other all the time.
But slowly, slowly, it deteriorated when they started building the Loop.
Families started moving out.
We moved to a new house, a bigger neighborhood, better school.
The Wegmans supermarket opened on Portland Avenue, then grew into the chain they are now.
That took away the little corner stores, the mom and pop stores.
So, we no longer had the corner stores anymore.
Then we had to go out of the neighborhood.
The people who didnt have transportation had to move closer to places where they could shop.
Downtown Rochester seemed miles away growing up in the 16th Ward.
AARP:Have you always lived in Rochester?
During my stops I noticed how different each place was from the other.
When I left the service, I had the rank of PS4 Specialist.
I wound up injuring my knee so I had to redshirt for a year.
I bounced around a bit after that.
My journey to Grand Canyon College had been a difficult one.
So, I came back in 1976 to work at the Lewis Street Center.
AARP:What was it like when you returned?
Everybody there was a little snobby but the neighbor next to me was great.
He had already raised his kids and he helped me be a homeowner.
You know, older people have a lot of knowledge.
You just gotta listen to them.
But it wasn’t like my old neighborhood, you know?
And Im thinking, I don’t know if I like this.
I’m not really used to this.
I like to hear noise, people yelling this and that.
I was there for about five years before returning to the neighborhood where I grew up.
The Rochester-based nonprofitHinge Neighborsis working to connect residents and community groups that were separated by the Inner Loop North.
By the time I moved back the Inner Loop had been built.
I went to school for optics, making glasses.
I eventually wound up working at Kodak.
I worked there for 25 years and four months.
I raised two boys and one girl.
All were raised in the neighborhood where I grew up.
The neighborhood by that time had changed from being mainly Irish and Italian to Spanish and Black.
It was great growing up with that.
A lot of neighborhood places we had are gone and the kids dont have as much to do.
It was like we were creating a perfect childhood for them, building friendships and hope.
You have to see one of our reunions of folks from the center.
We have an alumni association, a picnic.
Emotions are high every year when we come together.
The memories just flow, and you wouldnt believe the stories!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jimmie Briggsis a documentary storyteller, writer and advocate for racial and gender equity.
Additional research by Kathleen Benedetti-Fisher, AARP New York
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Page published February 1, 2023
