Chicago, Illinois
Hastings Street
Christmas Eve, 1929
My Father had been to Johnny Spadafores apartment,
drinking bootleg whiskey and consorting
with the local ladies of the evening. As the midnight hour approached, he decided
to go home.
He stumbled down the stairs, almost falling several times before finally falling onto Hastings
Street.
As
he picked himself up and began staggering towards his car, two men drove slowly by. They
stopped a short distance away.
The air was cold and there were snowflakes swirling in the
constant breeze. The street light had long been shot out, the
windows of the apartments covered
with blinds and curtains and newspapers.
Father told me, many years later,
that he did not hear the sound of the machine gun. He said he
didn't even feel the spray of bullets that left large scars
upon his back, cascading down to his
buttocks, leaving an easy to count number of bullets that had hit him. There were
seven in all,
some larger than the others. Scars are scars, no matter the size and bullets are bullets, no matter
how
many there were.
Johnny took him to the hospital and left him laying at the feet of the attendants there.
Father
would be okay, but he would be questioned, found out, and spend several years in prison. While in lock up he
learned that the man he had shot off the running board of the near hijacked truck in
1928 had not died. For that he was
thankful.
While in prison, he learned to become a barber and began reading the bible.
His gangster days soon
became of the past. He vowed he would become a preacher once he got
out of prison. Besides, as prohibition came to an end
in 1933, everyone he knew back in those
days was either dead, in jail, or running from the law. Even so, he still had a
few more issues
involving his gangster ideals. Besides shooting old Doc Shipley, in the middle of the street in
Springfield,
Mo.( he never made known why or when that happened ), he also practiced
dentistry, without a license, until the 1950’s.
He finally past licenses testing in 1955 and went to
work in a large dental office where he was a specialist in bridgework
and making dentures.
Oh yes, he became a minister alright and was a devout Christian from the 50’s until his death
in
the 80’s. He died the “good guy “ he had always dreamed to be
.
I remember him as the
toughest, the most violent, and the wariest preacher I had ever known.
As these pages continue, perhaps you will come to
know him as well.
