Murderers, Scoundrels and Ragamuffins

by Richard Sullivan

  Everyone laughed except Dan.

  “What’s the matter, Danny?” asked Katie.

  Katie and Danny had been friends since kindergarten. They sat together facing the plate glass window that looked out onto the lively bustle of Derby Rd.

  “Yeah, what’s gotten into you?” echoed Mike Shea. “We all came over here for some fun and now you’re just sittin’ here sulkin’. Liven up!”

  “I ain’t sulking. I’m worried,” murmured the habitual worrier.

  “Hey, pass the vinegar, Sully,” said Tim Hartnett. Tim and Rose sat so close together beneath the portrait of a stern Queen Victoria that they may as well have been glued to one another. The old battle axe glared her moral judgment down upon the young lovers. They passed the bottle back and forth between them, sprinkling vinegar into the darkening newspaper cones that cradled the bounty of crunchy fried fish and potatoes. The others watched quizzically.

  “Cuts the grease,” explained Tim to nobody in particular.

  “Whatever for?” giggled the pleasingly-plump Katie. “Grease is the best part.”

  “I’m still worried about the fire we saw,” said Dan. “I’m afraid that might’ve been my Pop’s place. That maybe I overlooked something before closing up. I keep retracing all my footsteps in my head.”

  “Oh jeez almighty, just relax, won’t you? Don’t be silly, Danny. You never forget to check nothin’,” encouraged Katie, trying to lighten his mood.

  “Nothin’ you can do about it now anyways, Dan,” said Mike, “so calm yourself. If it is in fact your Pop’s place the firemen will already have it put out by now, right? And anyway that’s what fire insurance is for. Just relax and have some fun, and deal with the outcome later, whatever it might be. No use cryin’ over spilt milk, if indeed any was spilt to begin with.”

  ◆◆◆

  Sparks from the icehouse inferno floated on the wind for an improbable distance, even igniting wood pilings in the Buffalo River. It would be four hours before the stubborn icehouse inferno could be fully extinguished. The cause of the fire was not known. It was conjectured that sparks from a locomotive passing behind the icehouse fell upon the building and smoldered for some time before finally igniting into a blaze. Damages were estimated at $50 to the Lehigh dock, $300 to Hurd’s dock, and $50 to the flagman’s shanty.

  Only two years previous one of the earlier incarnations of the Sullivan icehouse built in the exact same spot was damaged by a minor fire. It had been promptly repaired only to be blown apart twice thereafter, the second time completely leveled in a historic January storm so furious that it had beached a number of giant Great Lakes ships. The icehouse’s timbers were shattered at that time into kindling at a loss of $20,000. The Alderman’s response to that calamity was to boast “I own the most expansive icehouse in the world! It stretches all the way from Buffalo to Erie Pennsylvania!” Nonetheless, ice cutting went forward, with the harvested ice blocks stacked in place out in the open and the new icehouse erected around the piles. This time it was constructed so much more strongly than its previous incarnation that it was felt the new structure could withstand any storm.

  The rather fortunate occurrence of the fire erupting at the time of day it did probably saved half a dozen saloons on the north side of the turnpike. Less than an hour previous the wind had shifted from the south. With a south wind carrying the icehouse’s firebrands multiple saloons and homes would have all been in flames before the fire department managed to arrive.

  Damage to Sullivan’s building and machinery was $20,000. Additionally the 15,000 tons of ice stored within was valued at $5 a ton. The alderman had neglected to insure either the building or its contents.

  His displaying a characteristic lack of concern in his reactions to serious circumstances was the Alderman’s habit. When reached by telephone to inform him of the blaze in progress, JP refused to travel to the scene, saying he would “come around to have a look” sometime the following morning.

  ◆◆◆

  “Fire sale!” the jolly Alderman hollered into the telephone at daybreak. “Spread the word. I got thousands of tons that has to go right this minute! Come and get it!”

  He called in as many wintertime employees as were available for work that day. Thomas and Daniel too rallied to their father’s cry.

  “The firemen say it was them flying sparks and cinders from that damned passing Lehigh train what set it afire, Danny. It wasn’t your fault. Not one bit,” JP comforted son number two.

  Trains pulled up behind the ruins relentlessly over the next two days, one after another, snatching up ice at ten cents on the dollar. The sawdust that covered the ice, which would normally help insulate it to maintain its form into the early fall under the cool confines of the icehouse, still provided some protection to the now-exposed jumbled mountain. However, the glacier was melting fast in its exposure to the sweltering August sun.

  Teams of Sullivan men were so adept at pulling ice into rail cars that one could fully load a car in less than an hour. In his rush to beat the heat the alderman enthusiastically supervised, overseeing and cautioning men with picks and crowbars clambering over charred and broken planks intermingled with formerly 300-pound ice cakes reduced now to 200 and less. Their feet slipped and slid, imperiled by protruding nails and the odd smoldering hot spot here and there. They could save only so much of the stuff with the scorching heat thirstily lapping it up.

  Wagons and drays belonging to restaurants, breweries, other local ice companies, the east side slaughterhouses and the larger food markets competed for parking space to load up with the discounted ice. Skirmishes among competing bargain hunters broke out much to the Alderman’s delight. So many vehicles converged on the scene that through traffic on the Hamburg Turnpike was halted. Newspaper men arrived, predictably alerted by JP, part and parcel of his unquenchable thirst for publicity. They had been excited by his boasting of open fistfights erupting between competitors. He was having a grand old time overseeing the pandemonium and reveling in a circumstance that to anyone else would surely be regarded as a tragedy.

  Fingy Conners’ Magnus Beck Brewery wagons arrived in a caravan, followed by none other than Himself. Fingy bullied and intimidated his predecessors out of the way claiming, as always, first dibs.

  “Hell of a thing, this here, Sully,” he deplored unconvincingly. “Hell of a thing. That reminds me. It’s official. Charlie Feldman’s decided to run fer mayor. He’s comin’ after us good ‘n’ hard, so’s we gotta put a stop to that fuckin’ Jew. Yous and me and Kennedy and Gorman, we gotta get together later this afternoon if we’re gonna end ‘im. We can’t delay.”

  Up until that very second, Aldermen Sullivan, Kennedy and Gorman had been reliably united in a more or less perpetual war against their dependable enemy Fingy Conners. Now Fingy was proposing an alliance, temporary as it might prove to be, so that history might be served.

  “Got my hands full at the moment in case you hadn’t noticed, Fing,” smiled the Alderman.

  “I kin see that. That’s why I’m bringin’ in twenty o’ me best men to help out. Won’t cost yous a penny’ neither. Meet me at my saloon at four.”

  Fingy turned and began walking away.

  “All right, then,” agreed JP, ”four o’clock. When can I expect your men to show themselves?”

  “Open yer eyes,” Conners said, nodding toward the northerly direction.

  At that moment a small but determined army of Fingy’s longshoremen with picks and shovels was seen marching down the turnpike toward the blackened ruins.

  “I’ll figger a way how yous can thank me later, Sully.”

  Charlie Feldman, Savior

  ◆◆◆

  City District Attorney Charlie Feldman was running for the office of mayor against Scottish-born James Adam. Fingy despised both equally. He hated Feldman for what he intended to do if elected. And like fellow Irish Alderman Sullivan, Conners hated Adam because he was a Scot—and “a dolt.”

  Adam had emigrated to
Buffalo from Scotland back in 1872. He did not consider it of any importance to obtain the citizenship of these great United States until his political ambitions had made it mandatory, almost twenty years into his residency.

  To the Waterfront Aldermen Gang headed by Sullivan, Kennedy, Gorman and Collins, both mayoral candidates, Feldman and Adams, were reprehensible. Adams, a fellow alderman, had besmirched Sullivan by demanding that bids on city contracts be made public, thus ending a lucrative source of income from bribes for both JP and his cohort Fingy Conners. But Feldman’s stated goal of eliminating the Board of Aldermen altogether was most abhorrent; it was primarily the fearless District Attorney Charles Feldman who struck terror into their crooked little hearts.

  Fingy and Alderman John Kennedy had once been thick as thieves in their early years, working aboard Great Lakes steamers together as boys. Kennedy—taller, charismatic, much handsomer—was at the time the object of Fingy’s infatuation. It was Kennedy who could do no wrong in Conners’ eyes who chopped off Fingy’s left thumb with a meat cleaver on an audacious dare, providing Conners with his infamous nickname. It was Kennedy’s Uncle James, an early grain contractor on the docks, who lit the spark under Fingy and provided the inspiration and know-how that made young Fingy Conners’ fortune for him.

  Of the city hall group it was Alderman Kennedy who had most often solicited the cooperation of District Attorney Charles Feldman in the past. Although having a good understanding of what strange bedfellows politics make, Feldman in Kennedy’s case was nonetheless taken aback by how abruptly yesterday’s ally could transform into today’s opponent.

  It hadn’t been so long ago that a New York Central train had been parked across Jersey Street, completely blocking it. Entreaties made to the rail employees by local residents to move the monstrous obstruction were met with scorn, and the obstruction wreaked havoc on traffic and local businesses for four long days. A relative living there called on Kennedy at the city hall and together they returned to the site, where Kennedy’s demands for the train removal were ignored.

  “We got our orders from headquarters,” was the engineer’s dismissive response, “and the cars will have to remain where they are until the superintendent of the road countermands the order.” Kennedy, whose authority as alderman coupled with his good looks usually allowed him his way, was flummoxed. He quickly consulted then-Corporation Counsel Feldman, who advised summary action.

  “If they refuse to move the obstructing cars, take a force down there and shove them out of the way, and if necessary have a squad of police stationed at the crossing to see that it is kept clear in the future!” exclaimed Feldman. Kennedy, freshly armed with this prosecutorial authority, got the tracks promptly cleared and gladly took all the credit. Once the problem was resolved he extended little gratitude to Feldman, and would not do so until the next unresolvable problem presented itself.

  As for Fingy Conners’ hatred of Feldman, among other things it was attributed to his promise to put away two of Fingy’s bank-looting German allies, Schelling and Georger. Schelling especially had long been Fingy’s go-to source for sage and often ruthless political and business counsel. The German Bank had recently “failed” on December 5th, 1904, leaving its former officers very wealthy and the bank’s depositors ruined. Most were German immigrants who’d placed their trust and their life’s savings in a financial institution conducted by, it turned out, unscrupulous countrymen.

  The German Bank’s Director Mr. Georger had sold his shares to a recent penitentiary guest named Mr. Appleyard for $330,000, then immediately approved Appleyard a bank loan of $662,000 after which Georger promptly resigned his directorship.

  Former Erie County Auditor Neff, whose name was frequently mentioned in connection with numerous County scandals past and present, drew $33,000 from the German Bank just hours before the institution closed its doors for good. Other friends and allies of Schilling and Georger acted similarly.

  Feldman, a German himself whose relatives had lost their life savings and who felt a special sting at the gross betrayal by members of his own national group, was going after the German Bank officers with a vengeance commensurate to that of Fingy’s determined efforts to rescue the culprits.

  As for the Aldermen Gang, led by the First Ward’s powerful representative John P. Sullivan, they despised and feared Feldman for his pledge to do away with the Aldermanic Board altogether. Feldman had long been active and aggressive in opposing the aldermen, their many schemes and their colluding with corporate interests to their own personal financial profit.

  JP trembled as he read the Buffalo Express with his morning coffee and toast:

  “Corporation Counsel Feldman, the Republican candidate for Mayor, has had some experience with the Board of Aldermen. He knows just as every other well-informed citizen knows, that there is a little gang that runs the lower house, and has always run it. It is a gang that protects the corporations and represents the contractors, and that receives in return all kinds of favors and emoluments from campaign contributions to passes and jobs. He has seen the Board of Aldermen stand up, week after week, and year after year, for private interests, and block the efforts of the city to establish and maintain its rights whenever the assertion of those rights happened to conflict with the interests of the corporations. Every citizen knows that this is true. And Mr. Feldman has long since publicly taken the position that the legislative branch of the city government which has been a handicap and a disgrace to Buffalo for so long should be purified and cleaned out, even if it became necessary to have the Legislature abolish the Board of Aldermen.”

  It was Charlie Feldman who first proposed the idea of doing away with the Board of Aldermen in the name of decent government. It was Feldman who drew the bill that was introduced in the Legislature by the Municipal League which provided that the people of Buffalo should be given the opportunity to vote on the question. Ever since his campaign to rid the city of the aldermanic nuisance commenced, Charlie Feldman had continually declared that the gang aldermen must go. He served notice on the waterfront aldermen that they need expect no mercy from him.

  Sullivan, Kennedy, Gorman, and Collins would rather have had Satan in the Mayor’s seat than Feldman. Their opportunity to get even with him had arrived and they celebrated the chance. They were willing to join hands with Conners, or anybody else for that matter, for the purpose of getting rid of the thorn in their side.

  Conners wanted his candidate, Frank A. Abbott, for District Attorney. Abbott as first assistant district attorney had charge of the German Bank criminal cases. Conners was dead set upon protecting his bank-looting associates. Fingy struck a deal with Abbott but required the help of the waterfront aldermen to nominate and elect him. And so the historic fight between Conners and the waterfront aldermen was, for the time being, called off.

  The four aldermen topmost in the smear campaign against Feldman had reaped rich rewards in their positions as decision-makers regarding how, and at whose behest, the city tax monies would be spent. It was they who fought to prevent telephone competition. It was they who delivered the Traction company franchise. It was they who made an electric light contract at one price, then at another when the upper house had thrown the original contract back.

  Alderman Sullivan especially, whose ice company relied most heavily on the railroads as customers for fully 90% of his frozen product, all too reliably took their side and did their bidding.

  A crusader for the people, Feldman had Fingy’s own reckless urban railway company in his sights and just about anything else that Conners touched. Included was Fingy’s shady burial vault concern that was presently peddling prepaid funerals door-to-door in a shameful and aggressive manner.

  Fingy Conners’ urban railroad company along with the big railroad corporations including the Lehigh, the Pennsylvania and the Lake Shore had for all intents and purposes taken possession of the Hamburg Turnpike, the highway running parallel to the lake shore’s contours, the highway on which Alderman Sulliv
an’s giant ice storage facility sits. Audaciously, Conners through his company even claimed to own that public thoroughfare outright. The railroad corporations too claimed their share of real estate along with the valuable waterfront rights attached to ownership.

  Charlie Feldman appealed to the courts to dislodge both Conners and the big railroads, insisting correctly that it was the city, rather than the Corporations, that owned the turnpike and adjacent waterfront rights.

  In their brazenness the same railroads had boldly usurped entire city streets and vast tracts of property, closing avenues, impeding access or outright denying Buffalo’s citizens their right of passage on thoroughfares that their own taxes had built and maintained and along which their hard-won houses were constructed.

  After each lashing gale finished its work on the city season to season, the area’s poorer citizens flocked to the beaches to claim the storms’ bounty in the form of errant lumber, driftwood, and whatever kinds of flotsam might best be put to use building or expanding a shanty. Hundreds of shanties lined the shore in undeveloped lake front and riverfront areas of the city, including the turnpike. To lay new track for his urban rail system, Fingy Conners’ thugs routinely invaded and physically pulled horror-struck families out of their homes so that the gangs could reduce the structures to rubble to make way for new rails.

  The large railroads further terrorized shanty dwellers by loading telephone poles into boxcars horizontally so that as the train raced through their claimed territories, any dwelling within the poles’ reach would be smashed to pieces, as too would any unlucky skulls so unfortunate as to be within the poles’ trajectory.

  Additionally, Feldman entered into the courts to assert the city’s ownership of Front Street which was in actuality the mile-long dock running east and west of the terminus of Main Street. Its ownership would include most of the valuable water frontage. Charles Feldman’s research found that Front Street originally was a public highway that belonged to the city. But the city, claimed the corporate rail interests, had failed to assert its rights and to preserve it as a highway. The Lackawanna Railroad Company thus claimed possession of it and an arduous court battle between the two interests ensued. As he pursued the case Feldman was remindful of the railroad’s stony resolve in its audacious outright theft of the Federal Government-owned North Pier at the lake entrance of the Buffalo River in 1870. Undaunted as they were back then about stealing from the United States government, he well knew what kind of steely entitled opponent he was up against.