In Old Milwaukee, Streetcars Were the Way to Go

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Photo by William C. Hoffman via thetrolleydodger.com

Milwaukee streecar interior, 1954

Milwaukee streecar interior, 1954

Milwaukee born and bred, I learned at an early age to get around town on red streetcars. They were cheap, efficient, friendly and fun. Largely uncrowded, they merrily rolled along on steel tracks embedded in the street.

Over the years, my family always lived in Black neighborhoods within easy walking distance of North Third Street, where those wonderful street rail lizzies regularly clanged by my stops at the corners of Walnut, Vine, Garfield and Clarke streets. Children in the 1950s didn’t mind spending time to take a streetcar downtown to movies. Thus, there rarely was a week when my pals and I didn’t plunk down a nickel in the coin box to hop one.

Part of the fun, I recall, was drivers calling out the stops in a twang they all seemed to use. Some injected a bit of entertainment into the routine. After passing Third and W. State, one driver intoned: “Lorilei Kilbourn, alimony alley”_—channeling the name of a character in a popular radio show as we neared wide Kilbourn Street dominated by the courthouse. 

Most of us would get off at Wells Street, a few steps from the White House (later the Mid-City and Atlantic), Princess and Miller (later the Towne) theaters—each a half-block from W. Wisconsin Avenue. Then it was just a short walk east on Wisconsin to the Warner and Riverside theaters, and west to the Tele-News, Alhambra, Strand, Palace and Wisconsin theaters.

In another popular route, we’d get off at Third and W. Vliet St., for a west-bound streetcar—passing Schuster’s Department store at North 12th—on the way to the Colonial Theater at 16th Street for movies and R&B stage shows. Happily, they ran late at night, accommodating our return ride home.

Missing that Clankety-Clank

As time passed, the steel tracks were removed, and smoother-riding buses began to replace streetcars. And like many Milwaukeeans, I haltingly embraced the new technology. Yet, I soon found myself missing the fun and clankety-clank of my previous way of getting around town. 

Years later—with the pleasant memories of timely, friendly and clean public transportation—I relocated to New York City, via Columbus and Cleveland, to experience subways. They were crowded, unfriendly, dangerous, far more expensive and, every time I boarded, it was with some trepidation. 

In the mid-1980s, this included regular rides from Grand Central Terminal to my mid-Manhattan office, kitty-corner from Carnegie Hall, at W. 57th St. Involved was boarding a jammed subway shuttle (made famous in 1971’s The French Connection ) to Times Square, and then a N, Q, or RR train two stops—about 19 blocks.

Unlike Milwaukee streetcars, it always was a challenge to find an empty seat and even to find enough room to comfortably stand. The only real positive was arriving at my destination at underground, breakneck speed.

On top of my uneasy time on subways, the nadir of my New York public transportation days was in Spring 1983. Along with 84,999 other Metro-North commuters, I endured an ignominious six-week railroad strike. Perhaps the most vexing was taking the infamous No. 1 Broadway local in the North Bronx—a subway train barely fit for man or beast. In subway parlance, a “local” stops at many stations—usually every six or seven blocks to board more passengers. It was excruciating.

Old Streetcar Routes

Throughout it all, I found myself yearning for the old days back in Milwaukee riding my beloved streetcars. “What am I doing here,” I’d say to myself. “This is madness.”

As a result, these days, whenever visiting my Milwaukee hometown, I make sure to drive those old streetcar routes in which I frequented and delighted. I stop, get out of the car, and peruse the once familiar landscape, much of it almost unrecognizable. 

Sadly, they are no more, reminding me of what Sam Jaffe told Sterling Hayden in John Huston’s 1950 film-noir classic The Asphalt Jungle. To wit: “Listen Dix, you can always go home. And when you do, it’s nothing. Believe me, I’ve done it. Nothing.”

Could be, but I can’t help myself. And I’ll keep coming back to my Milwaukee.