Living in City Housing

Sunnydale City House was only a few blocks from the Cow Palace, where all kinds of sporting events were held. It was a windy, foggy, cold area. The buildings were made of cement and they were two stories high. There were about 10 townhouses in each building. The inside walls were thin sheet rock construction and you could hear between the walls. They were very cheap and included electricity and water. They were made for the poor people like us. Most of the people living there were black, but a lot of dental students lived there too.

I had some interesting experiences the four years we lived in city housing. The first year I was a process server for another senior dental student. All of the students were required to pay any unpaid bills of their patients before they could graduate. I went into some very scary parts of San Francisco to serve his supeonas to his patients. One day, early in the morning Kaye and I heard these black guys banging and working on a car in the parking lot in front of our apartment. As I left for school I walked by and said hello to them. When I got home the car was completely stripped. I guess they had stolen the car and brought it there to strip it.

A nice black nurse lived next door to us with her two little kids. The boy was about ten years old and had a broken arm. About 11:30 pm I heard a thud and then I heard someone yell, "Don't you hit him." I went down stairs and around to her front door and I had my arm up to knock on the door. It sounded like a battle going on inside. At that same moment, the door opened up and a black woman about twenty years old whom I had never seen before ran around me and into my apartment. I followed her in and she shut my door and locked it. She said, "Don't let him in." Someone started banging on our door. I pulled out a 300 Savage rifle I had an pointed it at our door. I said, "If you kick the door one more time I'll blow your head off." He didn't kick it again. She called the police who came soon. The next day our neighbor came over and apologized and told us what had happened. The twenty year old girl was her older daughter who had 5 children. She came over to her mother's house to wash her hair. Her husband who was drunk came over there after her and she hid in the closet. He kncoked the little boy down the stairs. While I was at the door she ran out of her mom's closet and out the front door into our house. The funny thing was I didn't have any shells for my gun. I just pulled a bluff.

The black man who lived on the other side worked at Fisherman's Wharf. He was really nice to Cathy and Cindy. He brought them two knitted bottle covers that looked like poodles.