Author Muriel Simms remembers living on Lake and Dayton streets as a little girl, where many students from the University of Wisconsin-Madison now reside. She played with the neighbor’s children during the week and with the church youth on Sundays.
“That neighborhood was a predominantly white neighborhood,†she says.
Simms understood skin color; however, at the time, she did not quite understand racism or racial prejudices. She lived a normal life of a young girl, although she describes her playmates as “sometimey.†Simms does remember playing and dining with a young Jewish girl in her neighborhood.