Read Online The Turnaround: How America's Top Cop Reversed the Crime Epidemic by William Bratton, Peter Knobler - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: William Bratton, Peter Knobler
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and passed the exams to get into the most prestigious public school in the city, Boston Latin.
The best part of Boston Latin was getting there. I walked up Meeting House Hill and then down to Kane Square, and every day I passed the same police officer at the same crossing. His car was always parked in exactlythe same spot and was one of the first I'd seen with the new-style rotating gumball-machine light, so that fascinated me. Every morning, this red-faced Irish cop with a cigar in his mouth had the police radio running through his loudspeaker so he could hear his calls while he was on his post. I'd hear the crackle as I crossed the street. I never talked to him.
Kane Square was a turnaround for the trackless trolley. I got on and rode through Upham's Corner and into Roxbury, the all-black neighborhood of Boston, to Dudley Street station, a big hub of trolleys, trains, and buses. At Dudley Street, I fought a thousand other kids to get onto rickety old Mack buses, the oldest and most dilapidated in the fleet. Those buses were already riding on their rims and were serving their final days jam-packed, creaking, and chugging up and down hills, shuttling schoolkids to Boston Latin and to English High School. English was for rough-and-tumble types, dead-end kids; Boston Latin was for us smart guys, and those rides were filled with hard rivalries.
You had to study hard at Boston Latin. I was used to getting good grades and not putting in much effort, but that didn't work here. I did okay in most classes, but I found I had absolutely no proficiency with foreign languages, particularly Latin, which was a requirement. I just could not pick up the language, and in eighth grade I flunked out.
It was humiliating. I had been the boy wonder, off to conquer the world, and now I was back at Grover Cleveland Junior High School with the rest of the kids from the corner. The only saving grace was that Boston Latin had been all boys but Grover Cleveland was coed. Having girls in class was a big improvement.
Not that I was a great success with the girls. I spent one full school year pining for Camille Grasso. Camille was a pretty girl who lived around the corner, and I passed her house every day. I'd see her and never know what to say. I never got up anywhere near the nerve to ask her out.
In ninth grade, I passed the exams and got into Boston Technical High School. Boston Tech was so named because it was a multiple-career-path school. You could graduate with technical engineering and shop skills, or you could take an academic curriculum with machine shop and engineering on the side. I chose academics.
Boston Tech was in Roxbury, and this was my first significant exposure to black people, or Negroes as we called them in those days. I had seen blacks on my train expeditions with Franny McNulty and out the window on the trolley to Boston Latin, but if a black person walked past our corner in Dorchester, all of us really took note. We didn't see black peopleoften because there were no black residents in the neighborhood and little-to-no work for outsiders.
Boston Tech was about 10 percent black, and while there were tensions and a growing awareness of race conflicts—this was 1962 to 1965, a volatile time in race relations—by and large we all got along pretty well.
Race was never really an issue for me. While I was not one of the white kids who hung out with a black crowd, I had enough black friends to the point that it didn't make a difference. A lot of the people I grew up with didn't have the opportunity to interact with blacks, which sometimes led to unfortunate generalizations and misunderstandings. I didn't think of it at the time, but going to high school in the middle of Roxbury turned out to be a positive influence.
On occasion, I walked home from school, about a mile total. It was a distressed area, and I did feel uncomfortable—even in those days Roxbury was a high-crime neighborhood—but I never had an incident. Mostly, I
The best part of Boston Latin was getting there. I walked up Meeting House Hill and then down to Kane Square, and every day I passed the same police officer at the same crossing. His car was always parked in exactlythe same spot and was one of the first I'd seen with the new-style rotating gumball-machine light, so that fascinated me. Every morning, this red-faced Irish cop with a cigar in his mouth had the police radio running through his loudspeaker so he could hear his calls while he was on his post. I'd hear the crackle as I crossed the street. I never talked to him.
Kane Square was a turnaround for the trackless trolley. I got on and rode through Upham's Corner and into Roxbury, the all-black neighborhood of Boston, to Dudley Street station, a big hub of trolleys, trains, and buses. At Dudley Street, I fought a thousand other kids to get onto rickety old Mack buses, the oldest and most dilapidated in the fleet. Those buses were already riding on their rims and were serving their final days jam-packed, creaking, and chugging up and down hills, shuttling schoolkids to Boston Latin and to English High School. English was for rough-and-tumble types, dead-end kids; Boston Latin was for us smart guys, and those rides were filled with hard rivalries.
You had to study hard at Boston Latin. I was used to getting good grades and not putting in much effort, but that didn't work here. I did okay in most classes, but I found I had absolutely no proficiency with foreign languages, particularly Latin, which was a requirement. I just could not pick up the language, and in eighth grade I flunked out.
It was humiliating. I had been the boy wonder, off to conquer the world, and now I was back at Grover Cleveland Junior High School with the rest of the kids from the corner. The only saving grace was that Boston Latin had been all boys but Grover Cleveland was coed. Having girls in class was a big improvement.
Not that I was a great success with the girls. I spent one full school year pining for Camille Grasso. Camille was a pretty girl who lived around the corner, and I passed her house every day. I'd see her and never know what to say. I never got up anywhere near the nerve to ask her out.
In ninth grade, I passed the exams and got into Boston Technical High School. Boston Tech was so named because it was a multiple-career-path school. You could graduate with technical engineering and shop skills, or you could take an academic curriculum with machine shop and engineering on the side. I chose academics.
Boston Tech was in Roxbury, and this was my first significant exposure to black people, or Negroes as we called them in those days. I had seen blacks on my train expeditions with Franny McNulty and out the window on the trolley to Boston Latin, but if a black person walked past our corner in Dorchester, all of us really took note. We didn't see black peopleoften because there were no black residents in the neighborhood and little-to-no work for outsiders.
Boston Tech was about 10 percent black, and while there were tensions and a growing awareness of race conflicts—this was 1962 to 1965, a volatile time in race relations—by and large we all got along pretty well.
Race was never really an issue for me. While I was not one of the white kids who hung out with a black crowd, I had enough black friends to the point that it didn't make a difference. A lot of the people I grew up with didn't have the opportunity to interact with blacks, which sometimes led to unfortunate generalizations and misunderstandings. I didn't think of it at the time, but going to high school in the middle of Roxbury turned out to be a positive influence.
On occasion, I walked home from school, about a mile total. It was a distressed area, and I did feel uncomfortable—even in those days Roxbury was a high-crime neighborhood—but I never had an incident. Mostly, I
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