Urban Legend?

Mark, the Galvans and I were inseparable for that short span, which lasted little over a year though proving one of the most eventful times in our adolescence. The Butler Street Jets made quite a name for themselves in the ‘hood as kings of the gridiron, and they established a vital link between the Butler Street Wrestling Club of the Reyes-Yodice era and the BSWC of the 21^st century. We had also secured our position as the dominant force on the block, prevailing against the Yodels for the Butler Aces’ legacy and holding our place intact until the rise of the Spoiler a couple of years later. Though we’ve lost contact over the years, it’s one of my fondest memories and I’ll never forget them.      

I was about fourteen years old in the Summer of ’69 when I decided I had to create an enduring image for myself that would hold fast throughout the turbulence of my teen years, and hopefully beyond. The other hockey players at Loughlin and on the Stars were calling me Turk (after my Derek Sanderson Bruins #16 jersey), so that seemed a plausible option. I was still referring to myself as Broadway Joe on the asphalt field playing football with Mark and the Galvans. So, I decided, why not Broadway Turk? It had a magic ring but needed a finishing touch, and the inspiration came from my favorite rock opera of all time, the new sensation “Jesus Christ Superstar”. Begging the Lord’s forgiveness, Broadway Turk Superstar was born, and I immediately stenciled it onto my hockey stick where it somehow lasted for over twenty years. The name and the character, as you can see, did endure.

The Yodels moved to Long Island that summer after a couple of skirmishes that indicated Ginny may have avoided a blood feud should they have lingered much longer. One time they staged a ride-by on their road bikes and fired paper clips at me, Mark and the Galvans. We responded with a barrage of empty soda bottles that ran off the Yodelss and left the street covered with broken glass. Another time Paulie came around and got in an argument with Ismael, who punched him in the face. There was a sitdown between our cliques but nothing came of it. Finally, John came by one time and trapped Israel’s arms in a rear waistlock. They tussled briefly and I think Israel’s strength made an impression. Then, one day, poof, they were gone. I wouldn’t hear from them until Spoiler VI at Los Panchos about seven years later.

The winter of ’69 was when I established myself as the greatest hockey player of the decade in South Brooklyn. Even though my best weight was 147 (as listed on my draft card), I was like greased lightning on wheels. I had an instinct for the game matched only by my hockey skills. I also loved to hit and could give and take better than the rest. I made contact with the Wilkies and ended up joining their team, which we soon began calling the Stars. I played center on their second-string line as a matter of choice, selecting Steven Duffy and Julio Gary, a black kid, as my linemates. In a short time we were outplaying their first line which featured Anthony and Peter Vega, another of their best players who was also one of their football mainstays. I scored countless goals and leveled just about every player on the team that first year, establishing a reign of terror patterned after the Big Bad Bruins.

It was on that fifteenth birthday when my Mom consented as I embarked on a lifelong pattern of substance abuse. I pulled all the strings and pushed all the buttons to get her to agree that I should be allowed to have some liquor at the party. To be fair, one’s fifteenth birthday is often considered a rite of passage in many cultures. Only she should have realized that, coming from an alcoholic Mom and a borderline alkie Dad, and having an Irish-Spanish bloodline and a willful spirit to boot, she exposed me to far greater risk than a responsible parent should have. 

Taking sole ownership of Butler Street resulted in a testosterone explosion amongst the Butler Street Jets, as we now called ourselves. Israel grudgingly butted heads with me like a couple of rams at every opportunity, as did Ismael and Mark. We went from touch football to British Bulldog, and after we tore almost a whole wardrobe of T-shirts from each others’ back, we decided our best option would be to take it up to Memorial Park and the football field. It was there that we came into our own and truly set out on our individual paths to manhood. 

(To be continued...)

Columbia Park Chaos?

I redeemed myself at Loughlin on the intramural hockey team. The Rangers were in a rabid playoff series against the Boston Bruins that spring, and their top enforcer, Derek Sanderson, became the new ‘someone I loved to hate’. Just like Von Erich, I became fascinated by this new rogue and eventually began channeling the Bruins’ Wild Child. Sure enough, I showed up at Loughlin on game day wearing Sanderson’s No. 16. Although everyone assured me I was a goner, all that came of it was my new nickname: Turk, after Sanderson himself. So, now you know. Actually, I wasn’t the only one enchanted by the Terrible Turk. Not many people realize that the New York Yankees’ All-Star shortstop was named after the Bruins’ center: Derek Sanderson Jeter.

John Yodels and I had gone permanently on the outs by then. Harold eventually turned on me and joined John to become my bitter rivals. Both of them realized during my Nazi episode that I wasn’t about to get bullied anymore. John was always the cunning type and probably saw how things would end up in a power struggle on Butler Street. I didn’t have that foresight, and was still thinking of them as the Wild Bunch, like the new Peckinpah movie. Only I wasn’t the gang leader anymore, and became a lone wolf for a while before building a new crew of my own.

  As the Yodels began expanding their sphere of influence, taking their bully act to Douglass and Degraw Streets, I became more withdrawn and spent time riding my three-speed around the neighborhood. Eventually I began building my leg strength and endurance, unbeknownst to me, until my crossover into adolescence and the resulting testosterone rush began manifesting itself in unheralded episodes of brashness. I was backtalking all the neighborhood bullies to their consternation and soon making a new mark on the sports field. Things changed forever at the beginning of hockey season #3, when I ushered in our checking era by knocking Harold on his ass. He left the team shortly afterward and I became the new cock on the walk, so to speak. I kept the team going and remained the big fish in the little pond until the Strong Place All-Stars drifted along.

Anthony and Robert Wilkie were blond-haired, heavy-set twins living on Strong Place who were a lot like a pair of Baby Hueys. I found out later that they had played in a band with Ed Colander before turning their focus on sports. Around the time I had met them they had developed quite a reputation west of Court Street, so it was natural that our twains would meet. They saw us playing one afternoon and introduced themselves, asking if we would like to play against their team on Strong Place sometime. I readily obliged, setting the stage for a momentous home-and-home series.

During the first game it was pretty much Turk vs. the All-Stars, and I learned a hard lesson about the necessity of wearing groin protectors on the playing field. Lacking anyone worthy of passing the puck to, my entire strategy revolved around firing the puck up the court and using my speed to beat everyone to it. The Stars began adopting the tactic, and one of their best players, Peter Vega, let a wrist shot fly that caught me square in the groin. Bear in mind that we were still using ice hockey pucks instead of the plastic iceless pucks. That put an extended halt to the game until I somehow managed to skate it off. We got beat pretty bad, and invited them to Butler Street for a rematch.

That game was pretty much the last hurrah for the Blues. We threw everything at them but the kitchen sink, including a one-skated Harold Yodels, who couldn’t play on two skates anymore. We ended up winning 4-2, which included a controversial goal strenuously upheld by our referee, Anthony Scala, and lineman Richie Aceto. The Wilkies weren’t happy when they went back to Strong Place, but were elated weeks later when I told them the Blues had disbanded and I wanted to join the Stars.

  We got pretty close during the one season I played on Strong Place. They say that twins look alike but often have different personalities, and this was the case here. Robert, who I got along with very well, was easy-going and playful. Anthony, who grew very resentful of me over time, was competitive and goal-oriented. While I was playing center, he and I and Peter Vega were unstoppable as linemates. I got bored with the monopoly game and decided to move back to defense, teaming up with Robert as the Maginot Line.

The games grew far too competitive for Strong Place to contain, so we moved the team to Columbia Park along the waterfront. It gave me a chance to open up, and the games grew extremely competitive as I was blazing up and down the court at breakneck speed skating rings around everyone and everything. Unfortunately, I had adopted the Bruin mentality, and I got chippier as the season wore on. Robert, who was a standout football player, liked to hit as well and we constantly schemed on catching our opponents in cross-blocks and sandwich jobs. At other times, it would turn into shooting matches between Anthony, Pete and I, who had the heaviest shots on the team.

Socially, we spent most of our time managing our fantasy hockey league, which consisted of about five different board games, one of which I created myself. I was maturing rapidly, however, and the wanderlust that would possess me for most of my life began to take hold of me. I tired of sitting around the house and wanted to take long walks, which wasn’t the Wilkies’ cup of tea. By the end of hockey season, we went our separate ways, and I started hanging out with Mark Roman again. Only this time, he had made friends with a couple of newcomers, the Galvan brothers.  

(To be continued...)

Hitler Youth?

My football days began on the afternoon when a precocious rookie quarterback, Joe Namath, shocked the sports world as deeply as Muhammed Ali years ago in guaranteeing a victory over the feared Baltimore Colts in Super Bowl III that Winter of ‘68. My first teen romance with Christine Jurczak was in full bloom, and she and her chaperoning Mom were on hand along with Harold as we all began to realize that Joe Willie was leading the Jets to a world-class upset. Harold and I had been shanghaied into games from time to time but now, as adolescents, street football would soon become a new Butler Street tradition. For me, the Jets had become the Knights of the Round Table and Broadway Joe their Lancelot.

It was during the Spring of ’68 when my insecurity would lead to the manifestation of an exquisite self-defense strategy that would, unfortunately, resurface at different times throughout my life. Over the winter, having read all the Sherlock Holmes books in the Loughlin library, I began reading about Nazi Germany. Let me point out that, fundamentally, I was anything but a neo-Nazi. Our best family friend, Baron Sanders, who I would’ve given my life for, was a Russian Jew. Plus, the SS philosophy as dictated by Heinrich Himmler had become increasingly anti-Christian. My whole spin was on the Aryan ‘superman’ concept. It was just another way for me to be Superman.

What set the game in play was the return of Waldo Von Erich to the WWF. He had been one of my heroes when I first discovered wrestling, but as a Storm Trooper he became someone I loved to hate. After he left the WWF, it hit me with one of the ‘aftershocks’ I would experience throughout my life in picking up on concepts after the fact. I began channeling Von Erich and astounding both my schoolmates and friends in the ‘hood with this weird heel turn.

Paulie bore the brunt of this aberration, taking a few licks from the wooden spike I toted in imitating Waldo’s swagger stick. Ginny blew a fit and I got a dressing down from Bobby, but nothing came of it. In retrospect, I think it was comeuppance for their failure to intervene as Harold bullied me over the years. Up the block, most people thought I lost my marbles. Ismael fashioned a swastika lapel button for me which was not making friends or influencing people.

This angle played out at Loughlin, where the black kids were getting fed up with the racial overtones of my routine. One kid named Moorehead began baiting me in Maryanne Montesano’s class (fittingly enough!), and when we squared off, Mike Jensen rose to the occasion. He caught me in a headlock in the locker room after class and I tapped out, largely because the whole thing had ballooned way out of proportion. Mike and I made friends afterwards and my days as a neo-Nazi came to an end.

Maryanne was another one of my fantasy girls. She had just started teaching at Loughlin and came on as a real hardcase until the guys finally saw through her. After that, they put her through the wringer. My big angle, going back to Religion class, was being able to use class time for my ‘special project’, which was working on one of my manuscripts, Carole and Butch. I met with her on that and she agreed to let me work outside of class in the school newspaper office, The Loughlinite. They had even given me a key to go in and use the typewriters.

The novel was about a juvenile delinquent falling in love with a neighborhood girl and going off along with friends on an interstate crime spree. Maryanne would meet with me once a week after class and she would spend time editing the manuscript. She always wore dresses to class and had an awesome pair of legs. When she took off her shoes while reading my work, my heart skipped a beat! Of course, she was way out of my class but it didn’t keep me from fantasizing. I went back to Loughlin for a visit with Al Catraz when he first joined the Spoiler as a high school senior, and she seemed pleased to see me when I stopped by. Of course, I was as from another planet at that stage, so that was the end of my aspiration for more Montesano time.

Ironically enough, it was Maryanne who kept me from getting class honors in English upon graduation. When she came in playing hardball, I got hit with a mid-80’s score during my first semester under her. It was hard to believe that the one low score could have cost me so dearly, but when all was said and done, it was enough to drag my score down enough to lose the top ranking. It would have been overcompensation for her and the Department to have helped solicit my manuscript as an upcoming young author, but that didn’t happen either.

Looking back at the Jensen incident, it did a lot to help reconcile the xenophobia of my earlier days that I had mentioned. People tend to fear things they don’t understand, and in demonizing different races, religions and creeds they turn them into larger-than-life bogeymen. Once you start trying to understand the other person you start realizing how much you actually have in common with them. For one, the biggest bullies are the people who are the most insecure. They feel they have to overwhelm others in order to gain their respect. This is why lots of minorities group together in gangs, using the power of numbers to assert themselves amidst the majority. When white people feel threatened, they also seek out those of like mind in order to retaliate against those they are afraid of. Once I learned that black people were no threat to me, my xenophobia was cured.

Another altercation with a black fellow helped improve my perspective and self-image after the Jensen affair. Roddy Hasson, the son of the Negress cashier at the Cobble Hill Theatre, was making big noise one night after having words with Lea that continued on with Jesus Figueroa as the three were hanging out at the theatre. Apparently Jesus escalated the issue into a question of messing with Lea’s big brother, and Roddy announced he was more than glad to face the challenge. Needless to say, within minutes we were throwing down right in the middle of Butler Street. It was a matter of one being unable to fight and the other glad he couldn’t, and after about a half hour we agreed on a draw. It made me feel better about the Jensen loss and helped me improve my position on race relations. Guys like Mike and Roddy proved to me that young men of character came in all races, colors and creeds.

(To be continued...)

Loughlin Days?

 Another new arrival on the block was the Galvan Family, and they would have an even greater impact with lasting repercussions. Ismael Galvan was a skinny little kid who I nicknamed Gopher during the Summer of ’68 because of his resemblance to a cartoon character who wore a baseball cap and sunglasses like he did. He liked to play catch with Mark and we soon began putting stickball games together. He had a short fuse, though, and one time he came at me and I ended up bitch-slapping him. He disappeared after that and I didn’t see him again until next summer, when he and I joined forces to create the Butler Street Jets football club as well as becoming the first BSWC Tag Team Champions.

By the time Fall ’68 rolled around I was in the midst of another personality crisis. John was going to John Jay High School and spoke little about it. Looking back, he may have been dealing with as much turmoil as I, and resorted to bullying and pranksterism back in the ‘hood as a way of coping. I was still channeling the Sheik (and sometimes his manager, the garrulous Grand Wizard) as one of the real ‘characters’ in my freshman class, with a fun-loving Irishman named John Hickey acting as my foil. On the home front, Harold and I were still friends but it was evident that we were beginning to drift in different directions as our tastes and attitudes grew more adolescent.

John Hickey and I hit it off from the beginning, but unfortunately our friendship didn’t develop any further than constantly ribbing one another. I also made friends with a black kid, Mike Hanson, who learned of my xenophobia during a couple of classroom discussions and backed off as a result. He embraced the black activist movement thereafter and left some disturbing remarks on his senior yearbook profile which I hope weren’t inspired by yours truly at any time. Ribbing was part and parcel of the growing-up process at Loughlin, and one of my fiercest ribbing pals, Ivan Zamora, also became a good friend. He actually came out to visit Butler Street once though he had his own life and the twain was not going to meet with us.

Two other good friends were Rich Mc Curry and Remus Labutis, both of who were hockey players at Loughlin. Rich came out and played a marathon game one afternoon with the Stars on Columbia Street. Remus invited me to his neighborhood for a highly competitive (though non-hitting) game, after which we watched the Rangers on TV with his Dad. I made quite a few friends during my time at Loughlin, and only wished I had been more involved with campus activities that would have created fonder memories and a richer history of scholastic accomplishment. Unfortunately, most of my time was consumed by the Jets, but my stardom on the street far exceeded anything I could have achieved at Loughlin. Looking back, I can see how the Lord made everything work out to perfection according to His purpose.

Another close friend was Pete Halpin, a second-generation Irishman who had a fantastic personality, an incredible character and a serious drinking problem. We got together during my senior year and he came to the house a few times for drinking sessions, football games and just hanging out together. Unfortunately, his problem was far greater than anyone suspected, and the last couple of times I saw him on campus he was totally plastered. I never knew what brought his demons on, and I only hope he found victory through Christ and is enjoying a happy and prosperous life.

(To be continued...)

Manny and the Mob?

Manny was always hobnobbing with Mob guys, all because of his rep as a 50’s boxing star. Mimi London, a capo with the Colombo Family, gave me a red-marked silver dollar as a child, which I was to return after my eighteenth birthday. Unfortunately, one of Lea Shithead’s druggie friends robbed Manny’s and snatched the coin, so there went my chances to join the Mob. Another big name was Toddo Marino, who owned a restaurant in Bay Ridge and loved having Manny and his friends from the Veteran Boxers’ Association come by. I didn’t think much of it until he was shown on the Gambino family tree in the HBO movie, Gotti, during the 90’s. Two others who would be seen around the Mafia bar, Angelo’s, where my parents hung out on Court Street were Crazy Joe Gallo and Tony Anastasia, the kid brother of the Mad Hatter, Gambino overlord Albert Anastasia. Talk about a lively neighborhood!

Years later, after Crazy Joe was assassinated outside of Umberto’s Clam House in Little Italy in Manhattan, they came out with a movie of the same name that rekindled my fascination with the Mob. Jerome Browne and I decided to wander down President Street while making our rounds carousing one Friday night after work. We took in the sights sometime around midnight, deep in Gallo territory near Columbia Street. We didn’t see any gang activity, Mafia or otherwise. What was most noticeable was an enormous searchlight (the kind you see in prison movies) perched atop one of the tenement roofs, its beam aimed discreetly out into space until needed. It remained as a testament to the vicious Colombo drive-bys that occurred during their internecine gang wars of the 60’s.

I never had any real aspirations to get connected, though I did play the role more than a few times in my life. The reason was that the three types of people who get the most respect in public, even more than businessmen, politicians or actors, are wiseguys, pro wrestlers and rock stars. It’s not the reason why I got into rock or wrestling, but it may help explain why I gravitated towards those industries. Plain and simple, those kinds of people are larger than life, and most of the time, take big risks to get where they are. Some dedicate their whole lives to those vocations, like yours truly. I would never have sworn myself over to a criminal life, but I’ve never gotten upset by anyone mistaking me for that type.

At any rate, I had no idea how quickly my early sports career would flash before my eyes. Most of it was due to the fact there were no organized sports teams in the area, and I was turning into the proverbial kingfish in the goldfish pond. There were only a couple of high school football teams back then, and at 5’9”, 147 pounds, I didn’t stand a chance even if I’d gotten a shot. There was no hockey whatsoever, and Bishop Loughlin discontinued its roller hockey program right at the time I had mastered the game. Neither were there any wrestling or martial arts programs other than the judo team, which didn’t hold my interest me at the time. Sadly, the doors kept closing in my face in the sports world, and it wasn’t until I reached my thirties until the opportunities began appearing.

Another problem was the lack of competition, even in the neighborhood, after the Yodels left. I was getting stronger and faster, and the other kids either couldn’t keep up or had put sports well behind them as their lives moved into the fast lane of sex and drugs. Things were slowing down athletically and I began spending more time by myself, reading and working on my manuscripts. Actually it was a point in time where I began developing my writing skills, leading to a lifelong writing career which produced this book and four others before it. Outside of my musical endeavors, I would consider this my most positive contribution to our American society and culture.

During the hiatus, I began hanging out again with Mark, who introduced me to his new neighbor Louie and his brothers. The Matos Family moved into 263 Court Street upstairs from Mark, and they began to have a three-dimensional impact on my life. Anibal (“Papo”) was the oldest, a studious introspective type who had a romance with Lea that inspired our friendship. Funnily enough, it was her latino romances that led to a number of strong friendships that also gave me insight into the Puerto Rican community and lifestyle. The middle brother, Luis (“Afro”), was the real Latin lover of the family and grew to be one of my biggest rivals on Butler Street. He threw in with Kenny Reyes, and I have a strong feeling that Kenny had a lot to do with the rivalry. The youngest brother, Peter, was a peripheral figure due to his age but fooled around for a short while with our street hockey scrimmages and even played a couple of football games with the Jets. Upon reaching adulthood, he turned into a capable fighter who forced me into my bag of tricks to come up with a martial arts win against him years later.

Kenny Reyes’ social development was, in retrospect, quite an interesting study. He began embracing the Latino lifestyle and built his own little counterculture along the periphery of my budding sports clique. He began working in Manhattan and was soon able to afford the best in Latino finery: knit shirts, plaid pants and highly-buffed, pointy-toed shoes. Luis’ Dad was an amateur salsa musician who let the boys fool with his percussion instruments, and soon they became the only band on the block before the advent of the Spoiler Empire. Kenny grew to be a heavyweight, and taking him on physically was generally considered a suicidal notion. Yet there was a lot of insecurity about him, as with most bullies. Besides having no education in having ditched school, he was also beleaguered by premature hair loss that got to him about the same time as Lea Shithead. I myself would be fighting the same battle just a few years later.

(To Be Continued...)

Broadway Joe and Derek the Turk?

It was another Manny-centric moment that turned hockey into one of the great loves of my life. He refused to let me watch wrestling one Saturday in the Spring of ’68, and Mom told me I could have the TV after his ball game ended. Crestfallen and spiteful, I switched on Channel 9 regardless and sat sulking as the New York Rangers game commenced. As time elapsed, I found myself mesmerized by the quick skating, the intricate plays, the hard hitting and the booming puck that dominated the game. I began asking Manny so many questions that he bought me a book on ice hockey which I kept all the way until Lea and her daughter Tasha threw out or sold all my books on Butler Street in 2009.

I idolized the New York Rangers from the very beginning. They got kicked out of the NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs by the Montreal Canadiens in four straight games but it didn’t stop me from doing my homework over the next three months of summer before next season. I went up to Madison Square Garden and bought a Rangers puck and a yearbook which became lifelong treasures that were also lost during the Hyatts’ spring cleaning of 2009. After that I began going to Gramercy Park, which was closer, and became a regular customer all the way until my last days of street hockey in NYC around 1976, nearly seven years later.

Even though I was a diehard Ranger fan, I could not help but admire the Boston Bruins after a time. The Big Bad Bruins were the terror of the league, a reputation they would carry until the Broad Street Bullies, the Philadelphia Flyers, began taking it to them a few years later. The problem with the Rangers was that they couldn’t back themselves up. They had a couple of tough guys who didn’t take shit, but not enough of them. Not only that, but top-scoring center Jean Ratelle and All-Star defenseman Brad Park just weren’t in the same league as Bobby Orr and Phil Esposito.

The one fellow that no one had a match for was Derek “Turk” Sanderson. He was a bad-ass street punk from Canada whose reputation as a fighter overshadowed his skill as a center, one of the best face-off men in the game. He was the fashion plate of the NHL and hung out with my football hero, Broadway Joe Namath. I was like every other fan in NYC wishing him a slow death in the late 60’s, but in time both he and Namath became the role models that gave birth to Broadway Turk Superstar.

It didn’t take me long to start my own hockey team, the Butler Street Blues. I spray-painted a rink between manhole covers and even fashioned a St. Louis Blues-like logo at mid-field. Harold and Paul Yodels were the mainstays, and we also had puny Johnny De Losa on defense, who would play a role in the formation of the Spoiler almost seven years later. We played street hockey until the dog days of Summer ’68, then took a break until that fall to resume operations. During that time, Harold became a much better player and actually beat me for the scoring championship and team record in ‘69, exceeding my spring total by one goal! I recounted my stat book dozens of times to reach the same sorry conclusion.   

When it got too hot to play, we sat around on the steps of homes in the neighborhood sipping sodas and ribbing one another. Paulie was one of my main stooges, and he, in turn lorded it over Danny O’Connor, the dreaded O’Connors’ younger brother, and Richie Aceto, who would become one of Osama Bin Laden’s victims in the World Trade Center over thirty years later. The age difference was too great between us, and I began spending less and less time with the stooges as the summer crept along.

Paulie was the last of the Yodels that I had a good friendship with. He was about Lea’s age and loved playing my homemade board games. He was always the brunt of my ribs and took it out on the kids his age, as I mentioned. I never fully realized that he had probably the most explosive temper of all the Yodels, and my ribbing really took a toll on him. Nevertheless, he became the goalie for the Blues and did a pretty good job in net for us. After the Yodels moved away, he came to visit one last time but apparently he had outgrown his tolerance for my ribbing, and I never saw him again. I heard he went on to a good job as a sky marshal and grew into a two-fisted, pistol-packing son of a gun.                

                                                                             

One claim to fame that Harold and Paul would have was during Harry’s brief stint as a club owner in Queens. They bought a club on the Gambino Mob’s turf during the reign of John Gotti, who had a couple of the boys stop in to shake down the Yodels. Paulie took exception to that and got a bit of a hiding from the Gottis. I’m sure Paul has put it behind him by now, but I must admit I’m proud to know that one of my old friends stood up to the bastards.

(To be continued...)

BSWC Begins?

Eventually Mom bought a weight set, a tarpaulin, four 4x4 posts and some clothesline during the winter of ‘67, and we went about constructing the trappings of the Butler Street Wrestling Club. Georgie, the psychologically stronger yet younger brother, was out chasing girls while Kenny and I plotted to usurp his position as BSWC champion. When John and Harold Yodels helped form our new clique, George was on his way to Puerto Rico around the Summer of ’67 and the rest of us were left to determine a new champ. By this time, Kenny was following George’s lead as neighborhood Romeo and was reluctant to test himself against John on a mat-covered dirt floor. John and Harold mauled each other for almost an hour on our debut card before Harold conceded the bout, and John became the new champ.

The next show was a baptism of fire from which I took my first step on the road to wrestling superstardom. We managed to sell tickets at five cents apiece, and who should end up in the front row of wooden chairs but my old pals, the Colander brothers! The main event was scheduled to be John vs. Kenny for the championship, but Kenny volunteered to act as referee for my match with Harold. After Harold mauled me for the better part of an hour to no avail, Kenny called the match a draw and declined to participate any further.

The match with Harold was a major turning point of my wrestling career. It consisted of him trying to hit me with a knee thrust and slam my head into a ringpost, drawing a warning from Manny that the show was over if that were to happen. I managed only one takedown during the bout, and we were broken up as Harold easily made the ropes in the miniscule ring. It was the most humiliating experience of my career at that point, topped off by the heckling of the Colanders throughout. Harold was surprisingly humble after the match though letting everyone know later that he had the upper hand. I decided then and there that the pecking order would soon change.

My friendship with the Yodels was predicated on the rivalry between John and Harold. They would use me as leverage against one another, and when one made peace with me the other would turn on me. After the match with Harold, he joined forces with Kenny against John and I. It was all badmouth, talking trash against one another, mostly a competition between John and Kenny. During this time, I really began learning how to wrestle as John and I spent most of our time tussling wherever we could.

He delighted in the fact that I was developing the strength and skill to compete with him, even though he outweighed me by over fifty pounds. I was learning to copy holds from the pros and could now employ leg takedowns and armlocks to gain ground position over him. I was also channeling off the Sheik, the legendary Detroit kingpin who recently came to the WWF to challenge Bruno Sammartino. When John would ambush me on the street, I would try and bounce his head off every surface nearby. By this time he and Harold made the peace and the three of us reunited. I was beyond the point where Harold could bully me anymore, though he tried at every opportunity.

By 1968, I had come out of my shell, and John and I had a reputation for being rowdies upon graduation. Unfortunately, his family problems combined with teenage angst to cause major changes in his personality, and he started seeing me as a major rival in his plans to rule Butler Street in the void left by the Butler Aces. It was like a constant triple threat match between John, Harold and I, and soon John formed alliances with the borderline delinquents in the neighborhood to move along the pecking order. I stuck to my sports fantasies and it put me on the road to one of my biggest personal achievements: nearly twenty years later, Broadway Turk Superstar would make his pro wrestling debut.

            As with all adolescents, my life began taking some major twists and turns after graduating 8^th grade and leaving St. Paul’s School for Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School. I never dreamed that, in a short space of two years, my circle of friends would change completely, my personal image would undergo a series of dramatic overhauls, and even my religious life would be transformed. 

(To be continued...)