| Chapter 3: | Stores, Houses |
This is a limited free preview of this book. Please buy full access.
Cadets, a youth club linked to the Boys’ Club and housed in the same building. I wore a sailor outfit and participated in marching drills.
Joey Cardillo was a sick kid but he was included in all of our activities. Joey, Johnny Jew Boy, Louie Jap and I enjoyed playing Poker at Johnny’s flat. I sometimes played Poker with Louie Jap’s family, the Maniacci’s, in their apartment. Louie’s father, a bookie called Cary Grant, never participated but Louie’s mother Rose did along with Louie’s sister. I felt a part of the family. I was so close to Louie that members of his family called me his “mother.”
Frankie Carbo considered himself our leader. Lefty believed he was destined to replace Stan Musial of the St. Louis Cardinals when the great baseball player retired. Jimmy knew everything there was to know about professional sports and Maxie knew everything there was to know about sex. Mondo was our authority on comic books. After school some of the Braves worked. Lefty, Johnny and Bobby were newsboys. Only three Braves, myself included, graduated from Benjamin Franklin High School. Most of the kids went to vocational schools.
Following World War II a few families from San Fratello migrated to the United States and some of these families settled on One Hundred and Seventh Street. Among the newcomers were two boys my age and they joined our gang. Alfred and I were fluent in the language of the San Fratellesi and we greeted them in our dialect. We were surprised that we were more fluent in the dialect than they were. They couldn’t believe that Alfred and I were born in the United States and had never visited San Fratello. In Fascist