The sukka at 615 West 186th Street was made of green aluminum walls that hooked into each other. It was originally a hut used as an office at construction sites (before trailers were invented?). 

My father was most instrumental in retrofitting it to a sukkah. 

He created a pully attached to its door to ensure it remained closed. He also steadied the sukkah by having the main Schach beams reach the walls of the building’s rear courtyards. 

Mr. Adler owned a vinyl shower curtain and barbershop apron factory on Ft. George Hill. He would provide the sukkah with plastic tablecloths and window shades. 

About a month before Sukkos, a “Sukkah meeting” was called in the apartment of one of the Frum residents. A date for erecting the Sukkah was chosen, and jobs were assigned. The last such meeting, and perhaps the only one I was old enough to attend, was in Benny E.’s apartment in the early 90s. 

The young folk- (which included my father and Benny, as well as Mr. Zitter and several YU-affiliated families who passed through the building over the years) would assemble on a chosen Sunday morning to carry the Sukkah out of the building boiler room to the rear courtyard. The older neighbors (like Mr. Fulda-who had a watch repair shop on St. Nicholas Avenue, and Mr. Martin Lehmann, who worked for a butcher on the Upper West Side), would be given lighter jobs like bringing up the chairs and washing the walls with a garden hose. 

The Sukkah could hold eight families at once and, in the building’s Jewish heyday, had two ½ shifts. The families who ate quickly and came home from Shul early were in the first shift. My father greatly disapproved of how these people ate their meals so quickly. As I remember, the Third shift had only one or two families—ourselves and the Zitters.  

Shortly before Yomtov, the building youth would arrange to hang decorations, some from years past, and new homemade items such as paper chains and illustrations each year. 

Entry to the Sukkah was via an alleyway or via a window in the building’s lobby, but the window required a short climb over a ten-foot drop. 

The Sukkah was put out of use as the families in the building slowly moved out. My brother used part of it as his own for several years. Today, two small Schach rolls remain on my Sukkah as I write this. 

Some Sukkah memories I have: 

My mother knew Mr. Adler could not stand the smell of fried fish. To irk him a little, she would always serve this on one day of Sukkos. 

My father’s birthday was at this time of the year. Some ladies in the building would grace the occasion by making him his favorite dessert: A German-style Linzer Torte. My father would rave about how intricate the process of baking this cake is and how many fine ingredients it contains. Because he cherished it so much, and it was so rich, we could all only have a slither of the cake, then it was committed to the freezer where it would wait to be eaten one slither at a time over several months. 

For someone reading this who has never lived or eaten in a shared Sukkah, it is an experience of community and bonding. Of course, for us, it was the only way we knew.