Tom Garrett
Recent stories
- Depression kids were the very soul of private enterprise, Part II
- March 19, 2010
- Last week I left off at the point where some teenagers from my neighborhood were out scouting for valuable scrap metal and found a fat brass railing running uphill beside a set of abandoned concrete steps. With Petey Disarro working as the anchorman at the bottom of the railing, they put everything they had into hauling on it to get the uprights to give way. Which they did, sending several hundred pounds of brass railing, which ended in a three-inch round ball, crashing right into Petey’s — well, you know, the worst possible place.
- Depression kids were the very soul of private enterprise
- March 12, 2010
- A couple of weeks ago I mentioned how well Italian immigrants in New York City integrated themselves into the American society in the first half of the 20th century. While I was writing it, I thought of something else I need to tell you about. Here it is.
- Ross McDowell was the military man’s version of a genius
- March 5, 2010
- One thing I discovered in the military was that every once in a while you come across a guy who knows exactly how to handle any situation — sort of a military man’s genius.
- Believe it or not, I speak fluent Italian
- February 26, 2010
- Yes, it’s true. I speak fluent Italian …
- Who says dreams can’t come true? Part II
- February 19, 2010
- Last week I was talking about how much I always wanted to own a microscope, knowing the chances of it were very slim. A decent one cost a year’s pay. Let me put that in perspective for you.
- Who says dreams can’t come true?
- February 12, 2010
- One of my earliest memories is the day my oldest brother Bill let me have a look through a little microscope he’d just gotten from somewhere. From that moment on, I wanted one.
- During the war, we were one people
- February 5, 2010
- I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating. When I was a kid in New York City, you could have looked high and low trying to find someone who thought of himself as Italian-American, German-American, or whatever-American. You’d have had no luck. None at all. We were all just Americans.
- To a city kid, rain can be a great thing
- January 29, 2010
- Country kids take rain for granted. In fact, country kids are not particularly fond of rain. If you live out in the country, and you get up on a sunny morning, the number of things you can do is almost unlimited. But if it’s raining that same morning the list is cut down to a nub, and one worrisome part of that nub is the possibility that Mom will remember the list of inside chores she’s been after you about for the past three weeks.
- Some changes are definitely for the better
- January 22, 2010
- Scratch an old person, or if you insist on being politically correct, scratch a senior citizen, and you’ll find someone who will be only too happen to look you straight in the eye, spit, and tell you that things ain’t what they used to be.
- Everyone needs a Miss Briggs in his life
- January 9, 2010
- In a shady graveyard in Connecticut lies a spinster lady named Edith Briggs. Edith Briggs never had any children of her own. She spent her life helping other women’s children grow into fine upright adults. I met Miss Briggs at a time when bad luck had yanked the rug out from under me.
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