The Way We Were: Steven Apple, Bill Tate and Jim Cheatwood

Growing Up Granada

For Steven “Beaver” Apple and his friends Bill Tate and Jim Cheatwood, Granada in the 1960s was the place to be.

“We enjoyed complete unimpeded freedom of movement, there were no helicopter parents,” Beaver explained.

Beaver lived in the same house on Barcelona Avenue where he still lives atoday, while Bill and Jim lived a few doors down from each other on Alhambra Drive North. Each member of the trio moved to Granada in elementary school: They met playing games on the neighborhood streets and soon became inseparable friends.

As Beaver says, he and his friends did “whatever we wanted–respectfully of course.” This included playing in neighbors’ front and back yards, even those on the river. They played football until dark in Granada Park–and sometimes in one neighbor’s lawn, chosen specifically for its healthy Bermuda grass.

“The concept of private property didn’t apply to us,” Bill joked.

They would grab their dads’ drivers and send golf balls bouncing down the streets of the neighborhood, assisted by their “caddies” on bikes. They even set up the short-lived “Granada Hills Golf and Country Club” in Granada Park, complete with several holes and tee boxes.

“There were some pretty good divots taken out of yards in the neighborhood,” Bill recalled.

They even invented their own games like “tennyball,” where one player would hit a tennis ball as high as possible and all the other kids would run after it trying to recover the ball. And of course there was “skeeter fogger,” a game that involved biking behind the mosquito fogger truck while trying to avoid getting engulfed by the noxious chemicals it emitted.

When they got tired of playing in Granada, Beaver, Bill, and Jim would hop on the city bus and take their shenanigans elsewhere. They’d often make their way Downtown to visit the department stores and the Florida Theatre, where they’d catch Saturday morning cartoons and a Disney movie on the big screen.

“When we would go to the theater, we’d always sit up in the balcony and throw popcorn down on people,” Beaver laughingly said, though Bill and Jim deny having participated in any popcorn throwing.

Other days, a big group of kids would walk to the Coley Walker Drugstore, located where the Gate gas station on San Jose Boulevard is located today. With a dime amongst the group, they would buy penny candies and Chum Gum bubblegum. Norman’s Pharmacy was another favorite hangout to play pinball and get frozen Cokes.

Seemingly everyone had a nickname. Bill was “Bate,” while Jim “the Dancing Booger” and Beaver, “the Stagnant Leech.” Each nickname was based on their respective ping pong stances. Other neighborhood friends included “Quneo,” “Hookey,” and “Nell Nerr.”

As Jim puts it, their childhood was something special.

 “You don’t realize how great it was till you’re older than you realize how idyllic it was growing up there,” said Jim.

Bill agreed.

“We formed lifelong friendships that were born out of the neighborhood, and I lament the fact that it’s harder and harder for kids to do that today,” said Bill. “I recognize now how special it was.”

Beaver, Bill and Jim attended Hendricks Avenue Elementary together–the same elementary school all their children would ultimately attend as well.

They went on to Julia Landon College Preparatory and Alfred I. duPont Middle School, Samuel Wolfson School for Advanced Studies, before attending University of Florida together. Each of them has lived in Granada at some point in their adult lives, and Beaver still lives there now.

Though the three don’t see each other every day as they did when they were children, their friendship remains solid. According to them, they’re the type of friends who could not see each other for 10 years and pick up right where they left off, and they will never forget the neighborhood where it all began.