Well, if you read obits, you learn of Ralph Hall, 95, Who Ended 36-Year Career as Oldest Member of House of Representatives.
Mr. Hall was from Texas, born in 1923 with the distinct memory of working in a drug store when Cylde Barrow and Bonnie Parker would come in, "buy two cartons of Old Golds, two Coca-colas and all the newspapers we had." If you remember scenes from the movie, the pair liked to read how they were portrayed in the newspapers after one of their bank robberies.
Old Gold was a cigarette of the era that I remember people smoking even in the 1960s. Each pack had a coupon on the back, and a carton had an extra four coupons inside the carton's lid. Coupons were redeemable (I don't know where) for household merchandise. It would seem with their cigarette habit that Bonnie and Clyde could have easily accumulated many Old Gold coupons. Redeeming them was probably something they had no patience for. Why collect coupons to get a free toaster when you're knocking over banks and shooting people?
One mention of Bonnie and Clyde would be just that, one mention. But today's movie review section gives us 'The Highwaymen', a tale of the two ex-Texas rangers who are pressed into service by the governor to end the scourge of the Barrow gang.
The ex-Rangers are played by Woody Harrelson and Kevin Costner, and the governor is played by Kathy Bates. So, in 1930s Texas, the governor was a woman, Miriam "Ma" Ferguson. It was her second term in office, 1933-1935. She had previously served as the first female elected governor in 1925-1927. Her husband John was an impeached governor serving in 1915-1917.
Apparently when she was campaigning she openly flaunted her association with her husband, even having him make the speeches after her introduction. Texas would get "two governors for the price of one," echoes of Bill Clinton extolling his wife Hillary's virtues as he was running, and George Wallace's wife Lurleen taking over the helm in Alabama. Must be something about the south.
"Ma" Ferguson has disbanded the old Texas Ranger network and replaced it with a state police that mimics J. Edgar's Hoover's nascent F.B.I. The two old-timers are brought out of moth balls to lead the pursuit the old fashioned way. Drive around in a car wearing their hats and grumbling. It is a Netflix release.
Incidental to the obit of Ralph Hall is the nugget that the record for the oldest member of the House of Representatives was previously held by Manly Stedman of North Carolina who died in office in 1930, at the age of 89.
Eighty-nine in 1930. Do the math and you have a man who was 19 when the Civil War broke out and became the last veteran of the Civil War to serve in Congress. He fought for the Confederacy.
Imagine, somewhat deep into the 20th-century there is someone serving in Congress who was carrying a musket under the Stars and Bars battle flag.
Obits and crime hold our interest. Consider the killing of Francesco Cali, the reputed leader of the Gambino crime family outside his Todt Hill Staten Island home the other evening. That particular section of Staten Island houses a fair number of reputed mafiosi.
It was either an example of extreme road-rage when someone in a pickup truck backed into Mr. Cali's vehicle parked in front of his house at about 9:30 P.M, or it was a planned hit. Mr. Cali, sensing an act of "disrespect" came out of his house and confronted the individual. Perhaps not immediately, but after some jawboning, the individual pulled out a semi-automatic and killed Mr. Cali with 12 shots, striking him at least 10 times. If anyone remembers a scene in the movie 'A Bronx Tale', that's some reaction to a parking space.
Road-rage, or gangland hit, Mr. Cali was dead, and New York had its first mob rub out of a top figure in several decades. And this is just a day after two reputed Bonnano associates were acquitted in Brooklyn Federal Court of conspiracy and extortion charges after the defense successfully presented a case of selective prosecution of Italian-American who might talk with their hands, but who otherwise do not qualify as being gang members, because basically there is no such thing as organized crime. Was it the novel novel defense that secured the acquittal? Something convinced the jury to let them walk.
If organized crime doesn't exist, then we are awash in fake news, because even the New York Times devotes two full pages today to the Cali killing, with an extensive story of the events, complemented by two more stories, one of which describes the area of Staten Island where reputed members live, the very upscale Todt Hill section. The area must be authentic to something, because the wedding scene in in the 1972 movie 'The Godfather' was filmed there. With permission, of course.
In addition to the two adjacent stories is a recap of the greatest hits, starting with the 1957 rub out of Albert Anastasia in a barber chair at the Park Sheraton hotel in 1957 in Manhattan. My manager in the fraud unit at Enpire BlueCross BlueShield told me the story of his father, who was a detective at the time, who was supposed to be following Anastasia at the time. Even police presence in the area couldn't prevent the more than close shave Mr. Anastasia endured under the hot towels. When your face in covered in warm, wet towels, you see nothing in the mirror. It's something you might need to remember some day.
Thumbnail sketches of four more hits are recapped, along with photos. What strikes me about the spread is that I remember all of them. Just think of the age I've attained. I can remember all the hits that go back to 1957. I am an old guy.
Not included as a hit is the death of Carlo Gambino, the aged Don who strode through his Brooklyn neighborhood in his trademark fedora and full-length overcoat, looking every bit the courtly eminence gris that he was.
Carlo is reported to have died of natural causes at 74 in 1976. Or, perhaps it was the flu shot he succumbed to that his eager-to-assume-command associates might have convinced him to take, hoping the side effects would topple the Don who was already in poor health. When there was a fuel crisis and President Ford was telling Americans to forgo Christmas tree lights, the streets of Little Italy shone bright during the San Gennaro festival in the '70s, courtesy of what was referred to as 'Gambino oil.'
The best, and largest photo shows Carmine Galante being carried out of Joe and Mary's restaurant in 1979 on a stretcher in a body bag. I forgot the collateral damage there was to that one, with the owner of the restaurant getting killed, along with his 17-year-old son being seriously wounded.
I can never get over the irony of the restaurant's sign that is over Mr. Galante's body as he is being carried out.
Joe and Mary's
Italian-American Restaurant
We Give Special Attention To Outgoing Orders
Pete was reminiscing about his rowdy days of drinking there, and how on this evening of its closing he wasn't going to be there because he has since given up drinking. The '50s and '60s saw many folk groups get launched there, the Irish group Clancy Brothers for one. I was never there.
Apparently, Pete remembers one evening when a nearby patron just plain dropped dead at his table. Face down, massive heart attack. Not to miss a beat, someone told the waitress they didn't want to have whatever if was he was having. How unlike 'When Harry Met Sally.'
The Paul Castellano hit, the oldest one in the recap, will forever give free publicity to Sparks Steak House, since that's where Paul and his entourage was headed when he was gunned down. Sparks is still there, just off Third Avenue on 46th Street, a high-end steak house that I remember was once just west of Pete's Tavern on 18th Street, where my father and I went at least once.
It has been at its Third Avenue location for decades now, and I'm sure gets a ripple of conversation through it whenever it is mentioned as being the location for Mr. Castellano's pink slip. Because after all, it might be argued that organized crime doesn't exist and that it merely resembles corporate America, but you have to admit there is a rather permanent outplacement policy in effect.
http://www.onofframp.blogpsot.com
No comments:
Post a Comment