Karen Maldonado

Karen Maldonado

On the corner of Monument Street and Bunker Hill Street stands an old brick building housing a streetside market. An ATM is advertised in the window, but most prominently featured is a laundry-line of “Charlestown Townie” merchandise, seen in the attached picture. Sweatshirts, shirts, and hats bearing hockey sticks and clover leaves are sold by a man named Johnny Kelly, who has lived in Charlestown his entire life. He has great pride for where he lives, and involves himself in the lives of the poor neighborhood kids. The map shows the location of Johnny Kelly’s shop and folks met throughout my observation as well as interesting notes. The map also displays the observed locations of “Drive Slow, Children/Elderly” signs scattered throughout the neighborhood. John Kelly’s care for the kids of the neighborhood is reflected in the street signs. This is a neighborhood which wants to keep its children safe, and therefore shows some formal and informal methods of social control to do so.