The Greatest Neighborhood: Hank Turowski Locust Point Stories (Hank Turowski - An Interesting Life)

Several years ago, Locust Point in Baltimore was named as the City’s Safest Neighborhood. It was no surprise to the inhabitants of the area – present or past. It’s always been a somewhat isolated enclave in a rough and tumble city.In the 1950s and 60s it was an ethnic, blue-color neighborhood – heavily influenced by Catholicism and by the mantra of the World War II returnees. “Work Hard. Take Care of the Family. Live the American Dream.”But there were many neighborhoods in Baltimore and throughout the nation that harbored the same mantra and identical dreams. How did the place where I grew up bring those dreams to fruition? Interestingly, it was mostly a quirk of geography.Locust Point is a peninsula. On three sides is the Baltimore Harbor, fed by the Patapsco River. On the land-connected side are a perimeter conglomeration of industrial facilities that ring the peninsula and block most access to the water. The center of the peninsula is fed by a single road – Fort Avenue. Not unlike the many inhabitants of those famous row houses where I grew up, trouble that comes into Locust Point has a hard time getting out. Some might say this caused the neighborhood to stagnate; but I believed it made it stronger – and especially safer.There was a sameness in the attitudes of the parents of my friends. Most were Democrats, but not the Democrats of today. Transgenderism and political correctness were things scoffed and ridiculed. Instead, my parents’ liberalism was founded mostly in the assurance that the Government they supported and the groups they belonged to would always support them when they needed it. Hence the reliance on the ultimately false promises of labor unions, Social Security, and a well-defined path to salvation. If they were alive today, they would be moderate Republicans.It was that sameness of opinion that embodied a generalize fear of outsiders. Houses in Locust Point were passed on to children and their children. New blood was not welcome back then – no matter the ethnicity, culture, or race.When I lived in Sicily during my Navy years, I felt the same suspicion from my nearby neighbors on the pumice slopes of Mt Etna. Who were these Americans in the villa just outside of town? What did their presence mean to the rest of the town? Would they somehow affect us? Could they be trusted? I knew that someone was aware of all our comings and goings, and that this awareness was a good thing that protected the village.So it was in Locust Point. We had our peninsula and we knew Fort Avenue, and if need be, we could all rally on the bridge over the CSX Railroad tracks and keep out any intruders that might want to do us harm.“On Ne Passe Pas” Like the Spartans at Thermopylae. We could hold off the aggressors and keep our families safe and our neighborhood culture pure. “They Shall Not Pass!” would be our rallying cry like the French at Verdun.But of course, over time, they did pass. Television and the Internet broke down the peninsula, and ideas and new concepts breached the once solid physical barriers, and, for better or worse, the old neighborhood is much more open to cultural change than it was when I was growing up there. The unions have died, Catholicism no longer has a death grip on the population, and Trump is the new Kennedy.But it remains a peninsula and there are still a limited number of ways to get in and out, and consequently it is still a very safe place to live.There is something to be said about growing up in what could have been the safest place in the city – maybe in any big city. Safety embodies freedom. Freedom allows inquisitiveness. Inquisition often leads to restlessness. And for me at least, restlessness unleashed exploration and growth. Hence Annapolis, the Navy, engineering, writing, and ultimately the world.All because of safety and a peninsula.