Thanks for visiting 20 Prospect. I appreciate your patronage. If you are interested in contacting me for publishing content from this blog, cross posting opportunities, book deals, screenplays, interviews, documentaries, inclusion in your will, offers of generous financial support, or motivational speaking engagements, please contact me by posting a comment on this page, or email me at 20prospectmailslot@gmail.com and I will respond to you via email.
PS – I am also available for weddings and bar mitzvahs, schedule permitting
20 Prospect 
I’m like to print an excerpt from one of your posts in the Pioneer Press. Please contact me as soon as possible if you are interested.
Thank you,
Alleen
Are you willing to sell/license one of your images to our company to use on a back cover ad to a community guide in the Vernal area? We are willing to credit you with the photograph as a local photographer. Let me know ASAP as I need to complete this ad in the next few days. Thanks.
i wanted to respond to your comment on my blog, but you don’t have your email linked to your profile so i couldnt….. and i don’t want to comment here cause it’s too personal and shit, right?!?! anyway.. 🙂
I came across your Blog by accident. I write articles for the Holland Land Office Museum about Old Batavia and I was looking for a fitting definition for Urban Renewal and I came across your writing which by the way is excellent. It is hard to put into words what Urban Renewal did to Batavia. I also went to St. Joseph’s School and Notre Dame. Thank you for the memories of Old Batavia from your porch.
AM
Thanks Anne Marie!
Feel free to look around. Lot’s of stories about Batavia here.
hI writers, I am a direct descendent of the Johnston Harvester family.
I’d love to connect on material you have Thanks, Sharon
Pingback: Life after the Muckdogs? « 20 Prospect
Hello from the present 20 Prospect avenue in good old Batavia. Yes that’s right we are the people who bought 20 Pros’ about 9 years ago and alot has been done since you were here last. We have had two sons born while living here and this house will carry the same meaning to them as does with you about where and how they are maturing.
The stone driveway is now paved (and alot shorter)and the pricker shrubs along the edge are gone. The pool in the back has been replaced. There is now a pull down ladder with a new opening to the attic. We have electricity in the shed out back. Slowly I am replacing the windows in the house as time and money allows.
We have a white picket fence along the property replacing the chain link fence.
The ductwork in the basement remains with the yellow stripes painted on them to remind me to “duck” (I still forget sometimes) Ouch!!
There has only been one problem since living here and that as you may remember was that this street is a speedway for youngsters taking a shortcut from Oak to North street and they fly driving through here.
But all in all it is one of the most comfortable and easy going streets in Batavia.
Have a great day as it is time to wake my sons up to tackle another day.
Rog
Roger,
Thank you for the note. It means a lot to know that 20 Prospect is in good hands, and will provide wonderful memories for another generation of kids.
Peace,
Tom
G’day Tom,
Firstly, I must thank you for putting my little blogging effort on your blog roll. That was right neighbourly of you. At this stage, I am not sure if I will extend the life of threemonthsinmoresby beyond the three months. It is a bit of test exercise for me, but I am quite enjoying it.
Secondly, I have to thank you for some great insight into what it was like growing up in Batavia. Marrying a girl from Batavia was the best decision I ever made in my life – I often tell people that I “married well”. Still, the fact that we have always lived on the other side of the world hasn’t afforded me the chance to understand what her growing-up years were like. Your stories have helped build some kind of impression. So thanks.
Cheers,
Anthony.
Thanks Anthony,
I’ve been enjoying your posting on life in PNG. I find it a fascinating place, unlike any place that I have ever had the pleasure of visiting. Keep up the good writing.
Peace,
Tom
I just stumbled onto your blog. It caught my eye initially because it is an address. So is mine, except it’s in Albert Lea and I still live at it. Nothing else in common.
Take care and be well.
Great minds think alike.
Albert Lea! My 9 year old says the best Pizza in the world is at Jake’s in Albert Lea.
I know the owners well enough to get free pizza. I still don’t go there.
But the best hamburgers in Minnesota may be a the Elbow Room on South Broadway. Seriously.
Gunnar
http://oakwoodlife.blogspot.com/
You really should have your email address listed somewhere, you know, because some people really dislike leaving comments, and generally only do so on the Internet Places of people they already know in some conversational capacity, when they don’t have the energy for a real letter (or they happen to know that those particular people really get off on having comments left for them, and who are they to argue with that?). But the rest of the time — most of the time — they prefer to send a nice quiet, private email to one specific person, and not light up a huge message in the sky that goes out to the entire world. As it were.
That is just to say that there are at least _some_ people like that out there. *ahem*
How did I get over here? Someone lead me out gently by the hand to the other posts because this is like seeing behind the green curtain of the Great Oz.
And you wonder why I don’t offer you drinks?
I just found my great aunt and uncle in the newly released 1940 US Federal Census living at 22 Prospect. I didn’t notice a 20 Prospect on the survey. Th e addresses jumped from 16 to 22.
Hey Sean,
I’m not sure why it doesn’t appear on the 1940 census. We moved there in the late 60’s. The house itself was built in the late 1800’s.
Do you happen to know the surname of the folks living there at the time? It is just possible that the house was empty at that time.
My great uncle was a prison guard at Attica and only lived there (next door) for a short time. He ended up buying a big farm outside of town on Alexander Rd. to live out his days.
I do not. Sorry.
You might want to try to property records from the Genesee County Parcel database. Here: http://gis.co.genesee.ny.us/PHD/Viewer/
Hello,
I stumbled across your blog when I Googled, “The Linden Murders.” I am working in a similar novel. I am writing “The Linden Murders” as a novel. I have been in contact with Bill Brown over the years and he has read the first few chapters. I hope to have the first draft completed by the end of the summer.
Sue
Sue, have you finished your book? I would be very interested in reading it!
I also wanted to add, my novel is based on the facts and details of the murders with a fictional family woven into the story. My story is being told in 1st person by a fictional young boy who lives in Linden. The novel is considered creative non-fiction which sounds like what you are doing with the story of the Rowell Murder.
Thanks for stopping by. I’ll look forward to seeing your book when it is done. Does your story include any occult/haunting link to the nearby County Home? That place has always creeped me out.
I make reference to the County Home, but that’s it. I’ve never been there. I heard someone took a “ghost” child home with her so I do not go on tours there.
I’m working on the triple murder scene right now. I went to the history department to see the photos so that I could describe it accurately. I had a hard time getting those images out of my head when I went to bed last night. As a writer, it even bothers me to write the scene because I am feeling the emotions of my main character. It is intense. I didn’t expect to feel it as much as I do.
I know what you mean. After spending over a year with these characters as I’ve been writing the book, I feel like I have come to know them personally. Which is strange, considering that they are just fictional representations of the actual people.
Tom, go to the Richmond library and ask for a novel written back in the 80’s by a Batavian about the old County Home. I can’t remember the writer’s name (no, it’s not John Gardner haha), I think it’s William or Robert something. The title is something like, “The Elm at the Edge of the World.”
Thanks Mary! I’ll have to see if I can find a copy.
I remember the Blizzard of ’77. I am from Batavia NY and lived at 43 Prospect Ave during the storm. At the time I was six years old at. I have many great memories of Batavia, including Pontillo’s Pizza and Robert Morris Elementary School. Great stories, thank you for sharing them!
Dan Emory
Thanks for visiting Dan. I can remember kids living at 43 Prospect for awhile back then. I’m sure we crossed paths.
This is wonderful reading! Took me right back in time, like I felt being there again. I grew up at 30 Oak st. Right by the corner of Mix Pl. And Prospect
Thanks Karen! What years were you growing up there?
We were there from the late 60’a through 1980. There were 6 of us. Jimmy, Don, Bob, Kim, Karen and Scott.
I went to school with Dan Carmichal. We knew the Bobo’s, the Kratz’s, the Ditzel’s, the Mingles who moved away when we were young.
So we did overlap a little. I was the same age as Dan’s little brother Peter, so I was a little bit behind you.
Hi Tom. I was sorry to see that comments are closed on your Rowell house entry. It seems one of the posters knew which in house on Bank Street Rowell killed his wife’s lover. The articles I was able to find didn’t go so far as to name it. Do you know?
Hi Anne,
Sorry about that. I apparently have been getting a lot of traffic to this post in the last 24 hours. Can I ask where you found the link?
Oh, yes. The house where the murder occured was 123 Bank Street. It took me quite a bit of research to find that out because there was conflicting information in the papers at the time. But a little research of property records, and some cross reference work with a Genesee County Historian confirmed that the murder occured at 123 Bank Street.
Hi Tom. That was fast. =) I found your link through a Facebook link and post made by the husband of a friend of mine who lives in Corfu. I worked at the Blind School 3 years ago and had looked up the story myself. The link being posted stops short of the posters reading enough comments to learn that the actual murder occurred on Bank Street. I’ll say this, that house is so distinctive, I wonder if Rowell knew how it would perpetuate what he likely considered his distasteful tale?
I wonder too. After his divorce he sold the house and lived in an Apartment on West Main until he remarried some years later. He built the Mansion on Richmond Ave for his 2nd wife in the 1920’s.
Hello, I found your site searching for information on my family tree. Your article on Pietravairano, Caserta, Italy related to Francesco DeBottis who is my 3rd great uncle. I was wondering where you got this information? Are you related to this person? Thank you.