Small world. We've been writing again lately about our childhood stomping grounds in the Ironbound, or "Down Neck," section of Newark. Just the other night we got a nice comment from a guy who lived on the next street over from ours. This fellow, who now lives in Venice Beach, California, attended our grammar school a short while after we graduated from there. He even remembered quite a few of the same teachers.

One of the things that I asked him when I e-mailed him back was whether he had been a member of the Ironbound Red Shield Boys' Club, where my brother and I hung out many a year. Indeed, our correspondent had been, and he says he even has his black-and-white membership card lying around.

Ah, those were the days at the "Red Shield," so named because it was operated by the Salvation Army. Frank, the guy who ran the place, was a fixture. There were all sorts of activities, from endless basketball in the gym to a trampoline to board games galore to a big TV (black and white, of course) where we used to catch "Batman" a couple of nights a week. Kids even boxed in a ring in the basement. I remember being in the ring once -- just once. Upstairs in the game room, I can distinctly remember the boy band I was in, "the Breakaways," performing one afternoon at a party, with me on vocals. Every once in a while the grownups would invade the place for a benefit game of donkey basketball, in which the men would play the game riding on donkeys. Good times.

Anyway, that nostalgic wave had barely passed -- it was just a few hours later -- that an alert reader sent us a link to this story. Well, I'll be darned. Good for them.