April Fools' Day 1958

On April 1, 1958, I was twenty-four years old and working in the public relations department of United Fruit Company on Pier 3, North River, New York. The North River was the Hudson, and the street Pier 3 was on was West Street at the tip of Manhattan. The pier was razed when the World Trade Center was built; the location is now called Battery Park City.

It was lunchtime. I was the only one in the office to answer the phones. Shortly after noon, the phone rang. The caller said he was Colonel Hubert Fauntleroy Julian, also known as the Black Eagle of Harlem. I had heard of him-everyone had heard of him. He was an infamous arms dealer, who, it was said, could provide not only the arms but also the armies of soldiers of fortune who knew how to use the arms, including cannons, aircraft, gunboats, and other matériel necessary to wage, and win, wars. Colonel Julian himself was a fighter pilot and soldier of fortune who had made his first big mark on his profession during the Ethiopian War. He so impressed the late Emperor Haile Selassie that he was given the contract to create the first Ethiopian Air Force, supplying the planes and training the pilots. He once challenged the German ace Hermann Goering to an aerial duel. He was smart, tough, and cool.

I have to admit I was impressed-me, talking to the Black Eagle of Harlem.

Colonel Hubert Fauntleroy Julian

He told me he asked the switchboard operator to connect him to the president of United Fruit Company, and she explained that the president was based in Boston and she thought he should start with me. He asked my name and said, "Tom, I would appreciate it if you would assist me in getting an important message to your president." His voice was cultivated, with a hint of a West Indian accent.

He explained that he represented some people who had a large amount of money in Cuba. He told me that Castro had placed a ceiling on what people could spend in that country, and that Cuba was in the process of converting from one kind of currency to another. I knew about the situation: The Batista regime had printed enormous quantities of paper money during its last few months in power; much of the money had been hoarded or expatriated by profiteers. Castro's plan was to switch from green currency to money printed in bright pink. The profiteers' money would become worthless, and hoarders still in Cuba would not be able to convert to the new paper without explaining how they happened to have so much hidden away. Nor could they make any large purchases.

Colonel Julian said that the people he represented wanted to sell their green currency to United Fruit Company, and we in turn would be able to distribute it through our weekly company payrolls on the island. I asked him how much money was involved. He said the amount was a hundred twenty million Cuban pesos, which at that time was traded at par with the American dollar. I took a deep breath. A hundred twenty million dollars is a lot of money now; it was an enormous amount of money then. He added that there would naturally be a substantial discount on the transaction: His people were willing to sell at a fraction of the money's face value.

I told him I would get back to him and then called Boston. At first, I was told the company had no interest and then that management wanted to think it over. A little while later, I was called back and told to turn down the offer.

Probably the element that made up management's mind was the risk. If it became known that United Fruit was involved in a plot to undermine the Cuban economy, who knew what consequence might follow? It was even conceivable that Castro would expropriate the company's land holdings and throw us off the island. Far-fetched, but possible.

Besides, the Cuban economy had already been turned into a house of cards under Fulgencio Batista, and all that remained was for it to collapse. History does not always make the fine distinctions between causes and their effects, and when Castro uncovered the real state of the country's finances, many economists in the United States were quick to say that Castro himself was responsible. But United Fruit knew that Batista and his cronies had stolen the guts out of the country, and doubtless realized that it would be too risky to involve United Fruit Company as an accomplice to the final act, despite the opportunity for profit.

I got my final call early the following morning. Before I had the chance to give Colonel Julian the company's answer he told me the thought had crossed his mind, after we had spoken the afternoon before, that perhaps I had not taken his message seriously because it was April Fools' Day.

I told him that had not been the case, but the company had decided to turn down his offer. He thanked me very graciously, and that was that.

I have often wondered since whether his friends were able to unload their money, or if they were stuck for a hundred twenty million dollars.

Happy Birthday, Rocco

Rocco would have been eighty years old in a few days. It is hard for me to imagine what my friend would be like now or even what he'd look like because we were both so young when we met. It all happened so many years ago. . . . But Rocco had a profound effect on my life.

Last year my book Charity Case and Other Stories was published (Exeter Press, Boston, 2011). One of those stories was "Rocco." It was the most difficult one to write. I have received more mail about it than about any other story in the book. Last winter I was invited by a literary group to a talk about and read something from the book. I chose the Rocco story. My wife, Joan, suggested I read another story. I wanted to read Rocco. She was right; I was wrong. I'll never make that mistake again. I could barely get through it before my voice cracked and my eyes filled with tears. Somehow, I managed to finish the last two paragraphs in a voice that did not sound at all like my own...

Horsemeat

My doctor at Mass General Hospital (who treats me for one of my many health problems) recently told me that a blood test revealed very low iron. She advised me to make an appointment with my PCP (primary care physician) who would “treat” my iron deficiency. I like, respect, and obey her despite the fact that she is just about half my age, and all of my children are older than she is. I got over age and gender issues long ago when I realized what a great doctor she is. This is a young woman who was born to be a physician. But—you knew there was a “but” coming—I know what my primary care physician would do if I went to him. He, too, is a very fine doctor who would order more blood tests and possibly other kinds of tests, and in the end I would wind up taking more pills (I already take too many for a variety of conditions). I am tired of taking tests. So I decided against running to my PCP right away. Instead, I would try to raise my iron level on my own.

I read a lot of the literature on iron and discovered that good sources were green, leafy vegetables; legumes; iron-fortified bread and certain cereals; red meat; beef, calf, and chicken liver (my source specified “cooked liver”—how else could you eat it?); prunes and prune juice; and blackstrap molasses if you have some around. Also oysters.

The problem with some of those foods is that they have unpleasant or even harmful side effects for a man my age. For example, red meat is not good for my cholesterol, for which I’ve taken a pill each day for the past twenty-five years and just hope it does not rot out my liver. Beans can have an unpleasant effect on digestion as can prunes and prune juice. Then there are the oysters, and we all know the effect oysters have on men . . . and some recent research says perhaps on women, too.

Reading further, I discovered that horsemeat is a wonderful source of iron and it is low in fat—a lot lower than beef. However, I also discovered that horsemeat is not sold in the United States for human consumption. I checked in my Stop & Shop, Shaw’s, and Market Basket, and called around to butcher shops in all sorts of neighborhoods. Some were nice to me when they said they did not carry horsemeat. Others just hung up. One can buy oxtail, brains, and pig’s feet, but not horsemeat.  

I was a kid during WWII, but I remember meat rationing and some talk of feeding Americans horsemeat. People were outraged and disgusted at the thought. They even suspected certain butchers of mixing horsemeat in with chopped beef.  

In a way, this aversion to horsemeat is understandable because most Americans don’t see cows, pigs, or lambs, but many have come in contact with horses through books, movies, songs, and even mythology. When I was growing up, horses pulled carts of fruits, vegetables, ice, coal, and even garbage in certain neighborhoods. Media has certainly played a big part in giving the horse a special place in the American animal kingdom. Just think back to Black Beauty; Flicka from the movie My Friend Flicka; The Pie from National Velvet; Rocinante from Don Quixote; Silver, the Lone Ranger’s horse; unicorns; Pegasus, the mythological winged horse; the centaur, the fierce-looking half-man, half-horse of fable; Gene Autry’s horse, Champion; Trigger, Roy Rogers’s horse; Tonto’s Scout; Mr. Ed, television’s talking horse; the songs “Back in the Saddle Again” and “The Old Gray Mare”; and Zorro’s Tornado. There were even the mythological Mares of Diomedes, which fed on human flesh. Currently, there is the book, stage play, and movie War Horse.

So, one can understand why most Americans cannot bring themselves to eat horseflesh. Not so, however, in other countries including France and Germany, where people love horsemeat. But Europe was a long way for me to go to get a low-fat, iron-building meal.

Then I remembered the Harvard Faculty Club story told to me about twenty years ago by a man who was manager of the Club for twenty-five years. His name was Charles Coulson. Horsemeat had been on the menu of the Faculty Club for more than a hundred years. Not much of it was sold, but the faculty would not allow him to take it off the menu. He would buy ten pounds a month, and most months he would throw away ten pounds. Occasionally, they would get an order for a horsemeat steak, and his chef would have to disguise the meat’s bluish cast with a dark-brown gravy and try to get away with cooking it well done. He said one old professor, a Nobel Prize–winner, would order it every two or three months along with another entrée. He would never eat the horsemeat: He just wanted to make sure it remained on the menu and that members and club staff knew he was the one who ate it.

One day Mr. Coulson received a letter from the Midwestern meat packer that delivered it to the back door of the Faculty Club every month, advising him that they could no longer deliver the horsemeat to the Club because the eighteen-wheeler trucks could not negotiate the narrow streets of Cambridge. The letter also informed him that the minimum order was being changed from ten pounds to twenty-five pounds, and if he wanted to get his horsemeat each month, he would have to arrange for pickup of the twenty-five pound package at an unloading platform in Chelsea, Massachusetts. Coulson told his bosses at the Harvard Faculty Club that it looked to him as though they could finally take horsemeat off the menu. He told them it did not sell and the old professor had recently died. They told him to go over and pick up the package at the appointed time and place each month.

After a few months of picking up the horsemeat, Coulson got to know the truck driver and asked what else was in that big truck. He was told it was all horsemeat—thousands of pounds of it. Coulson then casually asked who his customers were for all that horsemeat. The driver replied, “Mr. Coulson, I have three customers for all that horsemeat in the Boston area—the dog track, the zoo, and the Harvard Faculty Club.”

I remembered that story and also that the Faculty Club finally gave up serving horsemeat, I believe in the mid-eighties. So even if I wanted to, I could not get a horsemeat steak there. Even if they still had it, they don’t let just any Tom, Dick, or Harry into the Faculty Club. And I certainly was not going to travel to France or Germany for a horsemeat sandwich or a horsemeat hot dog.

So I continued to eat my liver whenever I could get it, ate red meat (cholesterol, be damned) more often than usual, more beans, prune juice, iron-fortified bread and cereal, and even more raw oysters.

God knows what all that did to all my other “numbers,” but my iron level rolled back from the red line to normal, and I did it without having to see my PCP.

My Father's Hands

My father died thirty years ago. He faced his imminent death very well. I hope when my time comes, I can handle it as well as he did. In fact, he may have dealt with his death better than he did anything else in his life. For the year it took for him to die, knowing that he was terminally ill, he waited for death calmly and bravely. I was told he never said anything like “Why me?” He never once complained about pain—although he had pain—or expressed any fear of death.  Perhaps he welcomed death because his life was very unhappy, a lot of it of his own doing. He had problems with alcohol and gambling. In fact, the last thing he did on this earth—just hours before he died—was to place a bet with his bookie, Charlie Numbers, over the phone from the hospital. He never had any money. Never owned a house or a car or had a good job despite his intelligence and good humor.

My father and I were estranged for a good part of my life after I reached age eight or nine. Before that, I thought he was a good dad and better than most fathers in our neighborhood. I didn’t see much of him, but when I did I remember the only thing I really didn’t like was his breath. I didn’t know what the smell was; I later discovered it was beer and whiskey and cigarettes, all of which contributed to his death. I also didn’t like it when he took me into Brady’s Bar and Grille on the corner of the street where we lived—I was four or five—and he sat me up on the bar. The bar was always wet with beer, and the wetness would seep through my short pants. I was afraid that people would see it and think I’d wet my pants. Even worse than the wet bar was the bathroom at Brady’s. The handwritten sign on the door read “Used Beer Department,” which says it all. It was a foul place. I can’t begin to describe the smell. I’ve been in a lot of really dirty bathrooms all over the world, but Brady’s was by far the worst.

As I grew older I became less tolerant of my father, cared less about him, ignored him whenever I could, and eventually became very angry at him. In my twenties I moved away to another city, and we rarely spoke or saw each other, sometimes for years. My children did not know their grandfather.

When I got the news that he had died, I felt nothing. I remember thinking that I should feel something. A couple of days later, looking down at his frail body in its coffin in a New York funeral home, I still felt nothing. For the next couple of hours on that first day of his wake, I walked up to the coffin with visitors, including the bookie, Charlie Numbers, who made it a point to tell me that my father’s last bet “ran out of the money.” I began to feel guilty about not feeling even the slightest bit of sadness. I started to wonder what was wrong with me that even standing in front of the body of the man who gave me life, I felt no emotion, no sadness for a wasted life, no relief that it was over . . . not a single tear.

When the funeral home was closing for the night—about nine o’clock—I walked up to the coffin for the traditional last look of the day, and I noticed for the first time that my father’s hands looked very small. They were folded across his waist, with Rosary beads entwined in his fingers. I had never seen him in that position in life and certainly never saw Rosary beads in his hands. His hands looked so small to me—almost half the size of mine—and I thought back to the time when his hands did not look small to me. In fact, they were nearly twice the size of mine. He took my small hand in his, when I was about five years old, as we crossed Liberty Avenue, a busy Brooklyn street, with two sets of trolley tracks, heavy trucks, passenger cars, and even horse-drawn carts. The year was probably 1939. I remembered that day and the feelings I had. I felt very safe holding my father’s hand. I didn’t have to look both ways as I was taught to. I had my hand in his, and I knew that he would do the looking for both of us.

I remembered another day, a couple of years later. I was about seven or eight and was getting washed and dressed to go to school. It was cold outside. And inside. We had to boil water in large pots on the gas stove. Three pots produced only about three inches of water in the bathtub. That morning, my father came into the bathroom as I was about to put the cold cloth to my face to wash my face and neck. Without saying a word, he took the facecloth from me and held it tightly in his hand for a minute, or maybe two, and then he switched the facecloth to his other hand and held it tightly. When he handed it back to me, it was warm. My father made his hands cold so I could put a warm cloth to my face. I had forgotten about those two incidents involving his hands until I looked down and saw them. Those two memories reminded me that there was a time when he cared about me more than he cared about the things that drove us apart.

Looking down at those hands and remembering those times, I felt very sad. I cried for the first time, as a son should do when his father dies.