Free Sleepers by Lorenzo Carcaterra Page A

best brawler ever to walk the streets of Hell’s Kitchen, this despite the fact that he was a tubercular and couldn’t go more than fifteen minutes without spitting up thick wads of blood. Dr. Thomas “Lookup” Evans was an ex-conturned abortionist who took care of any brothel hooker who found herself pregnant. He committed suicide, allegedly after one of his abortion attempts ended in a woman’s death.
    Martin “Bully” Morrison was the first self-anointed king of Hell’s Kitchen. He and his two sons, Jock and Bull, preyed on neighborhood Catholics, stealing everything from their pocket money to the chalices in their churches, out of which they greedily drank down buckets of beer.
    By the time Owney Madden arrived to lay claim to his criminal throne, a sturdier brand of order had been restored to the streets. During Madden’s reign, which stretched across the 1920s and ’30s, more than 300,000 people lived in the area, mostly newly arrived German and Irish immigrants. The majority found work along the suddenly expansive waterfront, loading and unloading cargo inside the bellies of an endless supply of ships that fed into the harbor. Others sought work in the slaughterhouses that still dotted the neighborhood, killing cattle, goats, and pigs for low wages and one two-pound package of take-home meat a week. Still others opened saloons and diners, which would serve as watering holes and haunts for the laborers and their families.
    Proceeds from each business made their way into Madden’s pockets, in return for which he introduced the rules that kept the neighborhood in line. He helped turn it into a place where families could live, a place that was safe to everyone except strangers.
    Johnny “Cockeye” Dunn took over after Madden’s time passed. Under his leadership, the underground economy of Hell’s Kitchen thrived, fed by stolen goods from all areas of the city. Prime cuts of meat and fresh fish were available at bargain prices. Off-the-rack jackets and slacks, price tags still visible, hung seductively in open trunks parked in friendly warehouses. Henchmen like Big John Savona took orders for shoes andleather belts, shipments that were hand delivered on the last Thursday of every month.
    There was always work to be had in Hell’s Kitchen and the age of the employee was never a serious consideration. The better-paying jobs were illegal. In a neighborhood where fathers were always late with the rent or behind on loan shark payments, kids went for the easy money, dropping off paper bags at the precinct house or picking up numbers at the end of the day.
    Petty larceny among the Hell’s Kitchen young also had its historical roots. At the turn of the century, children were sent out by their parents to steal coal and wood from the nearby rail yards and docks. Lifting the wallets of sailors on shore leave was a practice passed down from one generation to the next. Walking across town to steal groceries from the better-stocked markets was a habit that persevered well into the 1950s.
    Corruption was a way of life in Hell’s Kitchen and no profession was left unblemished. There were three resident doctors who worked the neighborhood, each making house calls on a regular basis. The fees, $5 or $10 depending on the doctor, were paid in cash. The insurance claim that was then filled out and signed by both the doctor and one of our parents listed the fee as $30. When the check arrived from the insurance company, the doctor was given a cut of the action. Again, in cash. The same practice, only in different form, held true for the pharmacists and dentists who worked the area.
    “I saw the doctor at least once a week,” Tommy once told me. “When I was sick and when I wasn’t. He’d come over, sit at the kitchen table, have a cup of coffee, a piece of cake, and figure out what was wrong with me. Half the time he didn’t even check me out. It was a great system. My mother would buy groceries from her end of the