I Was There, and So Were They

This week’s annual meeting of the U.N. in New York reminds me of my own little box seat on world events as I was growing up in the city.

We lived on the second floor of an apartment building which had a good view of Park Avenue (yes, the average person actually had a shot at affording such an abode in those days). I was right across the street from Hunter College, but more importantly, my bedroom window had a beautiful view of the USSR mission at 680 Park.

That building was the frequent target of demonstrations, mostly by Hungarian expatriates protesting the Soviet Union’s use of tanks to suppress freedom movements in their country. Sometimes there were only a few demonstrators; other times the crowds were large, so much so that New York police on horses were there to keep the peace. The crowds were not violent – they made noise and carried signs, but it was the late 1950s, after all.

The Soviet mission had a wonderful architectural feature: a good-sized balcony overlooking Park Avenue. It was not uncommon for Russian and other dignitaries who were staying or who were invited there to appear on the balcony and wave at the crowds, even unappreciative ones.

On more than one occasion, then-Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, when he was in town, would appear on the balcony. Sometimes this was in the evening, when my parents were having people over for dinner. Not to miss an opportunity, my mother would bring the guests back to my bedroom, open the window, and look out. It didn’t really matter to them whether I was actually in bed or not. Once, Fidel Castro and Mr. Khrushchev had a meeting at the mission. My memory is bad on this point, so I don’t know whether they appeared on the balcony together, but if they did, I’m sure my mom and her dinner guests were craning their necks out the window. My mother would sometimes go downstairs to invite the police on their horses to come upstairs for a drink. No ma’am, they said, we’re on duty. And then there was the issue of what to do with the horses.

Even our side street adjacent to our apartment building was useful, because limousines carrying important people on Park Avenue would sometimes use it to escape heavy traffic. Once, the limo carrying French President Charles de Gaulle turned down the street while I was looking out the window, and I could swear that he saw me wave at him and waved back. But maybe that was just my first childhood delusion of grandeur.

Right across the side street, as I mentioned, was Hunter College, and carved into the wall was this saying by Ralph Waldo Emerson: “We are of different opinions at different hours, but we may always be said to be at heart on the side of truth.” I saw it every morning when I got up and looked out the window.

Which tells me I better not make too much stuff up here, historical or not.