A Million Stories

[ a million stories ]

This winter, after breaking the news that the city could no longer afford to keep all its public pools open, Mayor Nutter announced a fundraising drive (cleverly titled the "Splash & Summer FUNd") to raise the $1.2 million needed to ... keep all the public pools open. Unfortunately, in the five months since, the fund (phillysummerfund.org) has accrued just about half of the required amount.

Last Saturday, I visited Barry Park on 18th and Bigler to take a look at one of the 35 closed pools. Although the day was overcast, the humidity was so unbearable that there was hardly anyone out on the streets or sidewalks. When I got to the park, the pool was corroded, with only a small puddle of dirty water at the deep end.

"My son and I came here one day to go swimming, and there was no water," South Philly resident Erica Perry said, walking by. Her friend Lindsay Hudgins agreed that "it's very hot this summer and [the pool] was a good place to get cool."

But is everyone really longing for the pools? "The problem with the pools is that they used to be really crowded," Hudgins explained to me. I asked her daughter, Isabelle, 8, if she missed the pool at all — the best answer she could muster was "a little." Maybe it just hasn't been hot enough.

–Laura Paragano

Eighteen-year-old Marcus Brown stands 6-foot-4, and will be attending East Stroudsburg University this fall to play basketball on a full athletic scholarship. He's preparing, this summer, by singing operettas in The Pirates of Penzance.

"When I was 11, my mom was trying to find a camp to take me to. Of course, I wanted to go for basketball. But she knew I can speak well because I used to give speeches at my church ... so she enrolled me in this camp."

The camp Marcus speaks of is the Young Performers Theater Camp, run through the Philadelphia Department of Recreation. Since his mother enrolled him, Marcus has come back every year. There are 51 other high-schoolers in this summer's comedy opera; Marcus is appearing as the sergeant, and has to fight the pirate king, played by his friend Denzel. "It's a 25-second fight and [Denzel] wins quickly," Marcus says. Asked if Denzel could beat him on court, Marcus smiles. "No, I don't think so."

–Laura Paragano

Bryan Cohen and Zack Rosen have gotten used to the fact that many people don't know the Maccabiah Games. "[The games] are definitely unknown, and it's hard to describe exactly what it is," says Rosen, a New Jersey native. "It's pretty much like the real Olympics, except you have to be Jewish," says Cohen, a Philadelphia native.

The two college students recently returned home from Israel with the gold medal for men's basketball in hand. "It's the highest accomplishment for a Jewish athlete," says Cohen.

"There's not that many Jewish athletes out there. Anywhere else in the world, you, as a Jewish athlete, are a minority," Rosen says. "[At Maccabiah] you are the majority."

Winning the gold isn't so bad, either. "Everyone doubted us. We were the underdogs," says Cohen, reminiscing about the championship game against Israel. "It was an overtime game that we weren't supposed to win."

–Morgan Davis