Sandy Adams' memories of being an Air Force wife living in primitive Jaulny, France in 1963

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Sandy Adams in 2007 with her grandsons Liam and Tristan

By SANDY ADAMS

Class of 1960

My lunch for my first several weeks in France was a loaf of ‘French’ bread, a variety of cheeses and a glass or two of wine from the local shops. Stores in the town opened early in the morning before breakfast, again from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. and then from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. Homes didn’t have refrigeration units.

The top photo is of me coming down to street level from a friend’s home. This area of France, Metz to the north and Nancy to the south, saw very heavy fighting during WW2 and damaged parts of the towns were never repaired. The area near our base, Chambley Air Force Base, was farm country. As evident in the top photo, walls were still in a crumbled state from nearby bombings and machine gun fire.

The second photo was taken in our apartment. The ‘heating system’ was a coal-burning firebox. The fire was first started with kindling and newspapers, What fun (not)! My stove was two burners with a propane tank underneath. The sink was made of cement and ground stone and only had cold running water. Note the glass of wine on the table.

The photos are from May 1963, three years after my high school graduation. This stay in France was certainly not what I’d imagined when we (Eddie Fink and I) learned we were being assigned there. One of my first thoughts was that I wished I’d taken French with Mr. Kalinowski at Division Avenue High School in Levittown rather than my four years of Latin.

I was pregnant with my twins and am so thankful that General Charles de Gaulle kicked us (NATO and American Forces) out of France a month later and we were evacuated back to the States (Holloman AFB, New Mexico) before the twins were born.

Photos from 1952 stirs memories for Sandy Adams

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Sandy Adams remembers that her house at 83 Horn Lane in Levittown "held the first TV set that I had ever seen – a 12-inch set in the wall under the stairs – wow. Heated floors, stainless-steel sink and counter top, a Bendix washing machine and a fireplace open to both the kitchen and living room." The Adams moved into the house in 1950. Ten years later, she graduated from Division Avenue High School.

Sandy notes that one picture shows an unimproved carport and another an upgraded back patio area. Most early Levittowners gradually improved their homes as money became available.

Until recently, Sandy "hadn’t looked at these pictures for quite a few years. It’s always surprising how big our yards, as well as our houses, seemed to us at that time. With each improvement – bushes, flowers, the ever popular 1950s rock garden, driveway, patio, making the carport into a garage, finishing the attic – our home seemed like such a special place and something to be proud of.

"How I hated the floor-to-ceiling picture window in the living room with its separate sections that each had a small ledge. My mother collected knick-knacks and it was my job to clean all of them and the entire wall/window on Saturdays." She swore that "when I grew up, I’d never have things like this in my house! That is actually an oath that I adhered to all my life – no clutter around my home for me. Now, about the clutter in other areas of my life..."

What does the current eastern Long Island resident see in these photos that others might miss? "I find it noticeable for girls to be outdoors playing in dresses, but it was common back then. I’d bet that more girls had scraped knees and shins than the boys did."

Vintage photos of Sandy Adams and her home on Horn Lane

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Sandy Adams, who was born in Canada, moved to Levittown in 1950. Her family lived in a spanking new ranch model at 83 Horn Lane. One of the photos above is of Sandy with her new bicycle soon after arriving.

She was a city girl when she moved to Levittown from Saint John, New Brunswick. Levittown was quite rural in 1950 compared to now, or even when she graduated from Division Avenue High School 10 years later.

Several photos survive from Sandy's early days in her new home and she has kindly shared them with us. The pictures on this page, except for the one mentioned above, are from around 1952. She is seen, in separate shots, with her friends Linda Kenley (in a dress) and Carol Howell. The photo with Linda Kenley shows a yet undisguised cesspool cover.

Linda and Sandy graduated together from Division. Carol went to a Catholic high school and they drifted apart during those years. According to Sandy, "Last summer a few of us met Carol for lunch while she was here on Long Island for her 50th high school reunion.

Our next blog post will feature more 1952 pictures of Sandy and her Horn Lane home.

Division Avenue High School's dress code did not permit female students to wear slacks even on cold days

By Sandy Adams '60

Something in one of the blog stories by Dewain Lanfear triggered a memory about snowy school days in young Levittown.

There was a dress code at Division Avenue High School, and slacks were not permitted to be worn by female students. Slacks were not in style yet during our early high school years. The slacks that we young ladies owned were mostly ‘dungarees’ – ‘jeans’ were not yet in our vocabulary.

I don’t believe that any of us were bused to DAHS after ninth grade, so many of us had quite a hike in bad weather. On snowy, very cold days, we would wear our slacks underneath our skirts or dresses. We were permitted to enter the building, but we had to use the ladies room immediately to remove the slacks and put them into our locker for the day.

I don’t remember if this dress code changed before our senior year. Perhaps someone else has another recollection of this practice.
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Canadian transplant Sandy Adams' memories of her early days in Levittown

Sandy is a 1960 graduate of Division Avenue High School. This 1950 photo is of Sandy in front of her home at 83 Horn Lane.

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Q & A with Sandy Adams
Tell us about the photo: Me with my brand new big bike! The house is so new that a number tag – 1270 – is still attached to a shingle on the house. The name on the house was that of my step-father. I had just arrived days before from Canada to join him and my mother. The new school year was about to start – apparently an addition was being added to Northside School, but it was not yet completed, so we were bussed to a Quonset hut set up at Wisdom Lane.

What do you remember about the house: It held the first TV set that I had ever seen – a 12-inch set in the wall under the stairs – wow! Heated floors, stainless-steel sink and counter top, a Bendix washing machine and a fireplace open to both the kitchen and living room. I remember that my mother had the fireplace closed up on the kitchen side – there was a problem with ashes and sparks whenever the front door was opened. The oil burner was between the fireplace and the washer – its cover was about 3 ½ or 4 feet high. Behind the oil burner and washer were open shelves to the ceiling.

Address of house: The 1270 number was apparently a reference number for building purposes – the address was 83 Horn Lane.

Do remember the landscaping, was there a lot of mud, or had a lawn been put in: The landscaping consisted of dirt and a couple of small shrubs. I remember grass seed, sidewalks and curbs being added after I arrived.

When did you move to Levittown and why: My parents first moved into the house while I stayed with my grandmother and great-grandmother in Canada. My step-father was an American (from Massachusetts) and had recently been discharged from the U.S. Navy. They moved to Jamaica, Queens in 1949 to get settled in the States, while I stayed in Canada for the second grade, and while in Queens came the opportunity to buy a Levitt house.

What year did you/your family move to Levittown, like was it a big adventure: I joined my parents at end of summer 1950, very shortly after they moved into the house. I was surprised to see an area that was so flat and plain looking.

You were how old: I guess I was 8 years old and going into third grade. Canadian schools had the same age/grade set-up as the States.

Where did you come from in Canada: My home was Saint John, New Brunswick, not to be confused with St. Johns, Newfoundland. This city sits where the Saint John River meets the Bay of Fundy, at the Reversing Falls, and the area is home to the highest tidal changes in the world – info is available online. I was a city girl, not from a rural area of the province.

Were you excited about moving to the United States: I was excited about being re-united with my parents. Another new and exciting part of moving to Levittown – my first family car! I was used to riding buses and trains with my grandmother. So using a car, instead of public transportation, on a seemingly daily basis was a very new experience. I think that this was probably a new experience for many of us back then.

Compare the winters your experienced in Canada to a typical Levittown winter: I grew up with very snowy winters – living at the end of a dead-end street made reaching the main thoroughfare a chore in the deep snow – traveling on the sidewalks almost felt like being in tunnels. I tobogganed, sledded, skied and ice skated through the winters. Being a coastal town, we certainly didn’t get the amounts of snow that fell inland.

Who were some of your first friends in Levittown: They were Linda Kenley, Carol Howell and Bob Joyce – I recently connected with Bob via email and Carol made a visit to Long Island this past summer.

You have said that you were shy, so was making friends a problem: I said some words very differently when I was new to Levittown – a Canadian accent raises the ‘ou’ vowel sound to ‘oo’ in many words and ends most sentences with its own idiosyncrasy, the word, “eh ?” (equal to “right?”). As we all know, kids are very adept at focusing on what is different about others, and my accent was a big target which made me more shy than I already was, so I spoke less and less for quite a while. But time eventually changes things, doesn’t it?