On Being Bicoastal: Or, My Never-Ending Brooklyn Nostalgia

TypePad is featuring "Only The Blog Knows Brooklyn," and...it's making me homesick.  I lived in Brooklyn for 19 years, mostly in Park Slope, which this blog features, including the Armory, which I lived across the street from, and is being...lordy, lordy, gentrified/renovated/perhaps even turned into a sports center! 

When I was a Brooklynite, the Armory went through lots of changes.  It stopped being a training center for reservists.  I think I saw that last gasp...or at least, the last few tokes of grass the reservists used to take during their breaks on my street.

Then, it was a homeless shelter, protested mightily at first because the shelter was promoted as a place for women and children, but the first residents appeared to be men.  The protest was particularly Park Slopian...the protesters didn't reject the shelter entirely, but they did want to know why the homeless men had been moved in without any apparent announcement.  Later on, it went back to being a shelter for women.   Remarkable gardens sprouted on the Armory's front lawn, tended, I believe, by the residents.

Then, the Armory developed a little side business, serving various filmmakers as a set and prop facility.  From my window, I could see the prop crew making fake gold bricks for the Woody Harrelson's vehicle "The Money Train,"  stacked higher and higher on a fold-out table perched on one of the loading docks.  Later on, much less happily, the movie "Meet Joe Black" moved into the Armory, only to discover that the HVAC and electrical were woefully below par for, you know, cinematic production.     This was during the Rudy years, and I heard rumbles that the Armory needed renovations that he wasn't willing to pay for.   I think he was too busy suing the Brooklyn Museum that year. 

After the movie began shooting, the Armory was suddenly encircled with brutally noisy generators.  I worked at home at the time, and when I think of those days, all I can hear is a gigantic mechanical roar.  I never saw Brad Pitt, but I heard, frequently, that Anthony Hopkins was just a regular guy.  Park Slope being Park Slope, there was picketing.  Moviemaking being moviemaking, the shooting continued until it was done.  I've worked in the film business, and I generally root for movies to succeed, knowing how hard it is to even make a bad one.  But I do  have to say, I felt a certain amount of glee as "Meet Joe Black" tanked.   But I am glad to hear that the Armory might be returned to a certain kind of community glory. 

Comments

[Martha Garvey]

Good for you for staying involved!

I loved hearing your personal history of the Armory. I just remembered another one..the Brooklyn Academy of Music used it as a theatre a few years ago!

[mad]

Growing up across the street from the armory was an adventure for me, my friends and I used it as a handball court, homeplate when we played stick ball and base when we played tag . At about seven years old I climbed the armory from eighth avenue to seventh avenue and celebrated that like I had just scaled Mt. Everest. I even went to second base for the first time while my "boyfriend" and I hid in its shadow. I've seen drug users, women abusers and most recently a handful of homeless men have built an encampment across the street from my door. One of my earliest memories is when I was about four years old and my mother and I lined up againt the graffitied wall for about an hour so we could get this huge block of cheese...for free. Seriously though one of my fondest memories is when they started filming in the armory. I was in awe when I saw Bruce Willis for the first time while filming "Die hard". When they started filming "Meet Joe Black" I got to know the night time security guards pretty well thanks to my friend and her flirtacious nature. One night they invited us inside to see the set. I never thought it would all look so realistic. ( At that time I was about 17 years old and had barely left Brooklyn. )Right now no one really knows whats gonna become of the armory but I will stay involved with it since I'm part of the block association.