Knickerbocker

Posted on by Thor

After my mother died when I was ten years old, my father quickly re-married and we moved to 363 Knickerbocker Road Tenafly, New Jersey. It was a Brady Bunch type of situation with two families quickly merging. Sons and daughters in both families were of the marrying age so not every sibling moved into the new house.

One of my older brothers stayed in the basement of our former home in Dumont, New Jersey. That home was rented out and the renters completely demolished the place from what I heard. One of my older step sisters was having a shouting match with her mom the first week we moved in. Shortly after she moved to California. All told, there were ten brother and sisters including myself. I don’t think all ten ever lived in the home together. If I remember right, an older step sister lived inn the attic while my step brother, who was just about my age, and I shared a bunk bed. My younger sister had her own bedroom.

There was another bedroom at the top of the stairs and an older sibling must have been there. I took that bedroom while I was going to the School of Visual Arts in NYC. After commuting to college each day by bus, and working at a mail sorting facility to pay for it, I had a bit of a meltdown and had to leave home. I bought a tent, panniers, a sleeping bag and a bike and started camping in the back yard to test out the tent.

In the middle of winter, I left to bike across the country. My older brother had gotten a job out in Seattle and that became my final destination. This was my way to leave the nest and take flight. It wasn’t an easy flight, but now every choice was my own. If I could make it across the country I could accomplish anything I set my mind to.

Birth Place

Posted on by Thor

As an exercise with my online students, I asked them to find their home via Google Street View and do a sketch of it using one point perspective.I found the home at 239 Larch Avenue in Dumont, New Jersey where I had been born. I lived in this home until I was ten years old. The house had been vastly renovated by 2022. A second story was added above the garage and the second story dormer was replaced with a much higher roof line creating a very boring looking cube of a home.

After sketching what the home looked like in 2022, I went back to old family photos and tried to piece together my memory of the home from when I was ten years old. I showed that sketch to my brothers and sisters and their feedback helped me refine the sketch. I had put two dormers on the second floor but there was only one dormer. I also thought the home was a pretty warm color, but it was actually a military steel grey.

I did remember the bright red front door correctly but a photo helped me put on the screen door with the letter T surrounded by metal scroll work. I first was taught to tie my own shoes on those front steps. My shoes still come untied no matter how hard I tie them. A family photo had a random ladder leaning up against the garage, so I included it. By brother figures my dad must have been cleaning the gutters. I was shocked by how manicured all the hedges were back when we lived there. My dad must have been out there with clippers every weekend. I don’t ever recall the lawn being mowed but that must have been happening while I played inside.

 

 

Grant School Dumont, New Jersey

Posted on by admin

I am teaching online students how to draw using two point perspective. I have decided to combine these tutorials along with the idea of sketching building from my past and my families past. Since my students and I are not on location, I encourage them to look up a building in their hometown on Google maps and then find a street view of the building to work from.

I attended Grant School 100 Grant Avenue in Dumont, New Jersey, from kindergarten through 1971 when my family moved to Tenafly New Jersey. I recall getting in trouble in kindergarten for refusing to take nap time. Some of my earliest art work was exhibited on the fence in front of the school. I used to sketch the Mercury space capsule over and over again as a child. I knew how to draw every knit bolt an rivet on the capsule.  It is a shame none of those space capsule sketches survived.

I remember it being a big deal when I was finally able to ride my bike to school.

The school is named for General Ulysses S. Grant who led the Union Army to victory in the American Civil War in 1865 and thereafter briefly served as Secretary of War. Later, as president, Grant was an effective civil rights executive who created the Justice Department and worked to protect African Americans during Reconstruction.