Hometown history Little Chicago by Dennis L Marsilli

To appreciate this book, you would have to be from New Kensington, Pa and have lived there or grown up during the best of times, it's heyday when employment was full and the city was a population of some 20,000. the 1950's and 60's as I did.   We lived there in the American Dream, but e didn't know it.  The book back cover states it is the story of how two Italian American brothers from a small Pennsylvania "factory town" became influential power brokers as part of the most successful criminal organization in US history.  The Mannarino brothers, Samuel and Kelly, their family ancestral history, reaching back across the ocean to Italy as well as their influence and some admit control of our town, New Kensington  are the focus of this book  written by a retired New Kensington police detective, Dennis Marsili.  Today New Kensington is not even a good slum, no downtown businesses although from time to time a few try to establish themselves. The steel mills closed and Alcoa left, employment disappeared along with many people.  Homes were sold, the  old timers who stayed lock their doors and  try to maintain their homes.  I worried constantly about my mother living there but she would not move and now all my family is dead and residing in Greenwood Cemetery.  Most of us who lived there left long ago, after high school or college for many other parts of the country.  We return sporadically for family visits, funerals, perhaps class reunions.   I doubt there will ever again be a thriving New Kensington, it is not even a good suburb of Pittsburgh, although now there are highway bypasses and people commute to parts of Pittsburgh to work.  It is a ghetto overrun by druggies and  prostitutes, filth and unorganized crime.  The mob ran things well, clearly organized crime is different from the unorganized. The streets of that town were safe, day and night.  The available evening entertainment for the adults was first class at a time when men wore suits to go out and women dressed up in their finest.  The best of times. Problems were dealt with expediently and justice was swift. Charity happened anonymously often and when needed.  The author mentions that old timers are defensive of the mob days, yes for good reasons, no fright but respect and appreciation for what once was.  We grew up knowing about the mob, but thought nothing of them.  They were respectable church going people, and as Marsilli reveals, they controlled everything even the politicians from local to the state level.  I awaited the publishing and release of  this book for years and followed the author's occasional Facebook posts.  He has filled it with research and history back to the 1920"s and before.  Parts made me laugh,  the humorous explanations by Monsignor Fusco of the St Pete's ( the Italian) Catholic church about how "gambling is not a sin."  The town had 3 major Catholic churches when I grew up there, St. Mary's where I and those of Polish descent attended, St. Peter's for the Italians, and St. Joseph for the Irish and all the rest of the Catholics.  There was often almost an envy among the churches of the majesty and magnificence of St. Pete's compared to our parishes, and it was easily explained, "the mob goes there."  This book raises that speculation again about how they supported their church and how their church indeed supported them.  In only 174 pages there are fascinating tidbits.  It starts slow but then drew me in to where I had to read it in a  couple evenings.  Today when I visit "home" and talk with friends, we agree, "The boys ran a good town."  It was also amusing to read the names of the local politicians affiliated, "on the take" owing to the Mannarino's.  I suppose because some of those last names were relatives of some school mates who thought they were the high class of the area, I had to laugh.  Still I enjoyed this book, nothing shockingly revealing but insights and names.  I recommend it to anyone from "home."  5 *****

No Ordinary Time by Doris Kearns Goodwin

This historical work of 636 pages,  along with 72 pages of notes, a bibliography of 13 pages and a 28 page index is a monumental work that consumed my attention and  kept me reading all through the cold winter month of January.  I have been interested in the Roosevelt's  ever since I can remember. I have read other books about them and the era,  including "Too Close to the Sun"  by grandson Curtis, but  wanted a factual work devoted to FDR and Eleanor.  Since  McCullough has not written on them I searched to find a notable author and struck gold with this work. .  Doris Goodwin delivers  depth, detail, historical fact within  a treasured reading experience of biography about this historical time of our country, evidenced by the Pulitzer prize awarded her for history.  This book was right up my alley and will remain a keeper in my personal library.  First published back in 1994 it is a timeless reading experience. 

See my review on this blog of Too Close tot he Sun"
http://patsbooksreadandreviewed.blogspot.com/2013/03/five-books-read-reviews-pending.html

"No Ordinary Time" takes its title from the inauguration of FDR and a phrase Eleanor used.  It hones in a specific era,  the home front of our country immediately before  World War II  up to the death of Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) as  chapter by chapter unfolds the personalities, ideals, intents and  guile of the two main characters, FDR and Eleanor.  Accompanying this in an excellent narrative of the attitudes of the population of this country, the influence of Stalin and Churchill and the WWII era with historical perspectives and analysis that contribute to understanding how the country elected FDR so many times.  It has taken me too long to post it here to my reading blog but reflecting I still savor its reading.

 Although FDR is known as the father of the New Deal, an initiator of socialist programs

Back cover

especially urged by Eleanor, his human side and weaknesses are fully explored.  His  relationship with his mother, Sara, who adored her only child and controlled their lives until she died  is fascinating.  His affair with Lucy Mercer Rutherford, that impact on his marriage. and the later complicity of his and Eleanor's  daughter, Alice, with later time spent with Lucy in his final days paints a not so devout picture of him.  After reading all this I wonder  today how he would fare under the guise of media, surely he would have been adored but how venomous would the political attacks be?  Was he simply brought up to not demonstrate emotion and there by unable to provide warmth and support to relationships, turning his back on those who could no longer give him the adoration and attention he wanted.  His personal assistant, Missy Le Hand who  suffers strokes after devoting her life to  his needs is but one significant victim of his aloofness or inability to offer comfort.  FDR is shown to be a rather needy person who revels in the company of people while Eleanor is the opposite.  He always wanted someone at hand even if ey simply sat and  watched him work on his stamp collection.   Eleanor is another distinct case study in personality without answers, was she simply crushed by her husband's  affair so that she could never again allow herself to be set up for hurt?  Was she really a lesbian or did she simply enjoy the company of intellectual women? It is fascinating from all perspectives.  She certainly was above all else, curious, committed to her ideas and generous with others.  Her almost comical pursuit of information for FDR as she  was his eyes and ears around the country is a source of political cartoons such as her descent into a coal mine to see conditions for herself, captioned by "Here comes Mrs. Roosevelt."  Eleanor was a very intriguing multi faceted person.  

Although I  wrote eight pages of notes to the book, I will not go into that depth here.  Suffice it to be a first class 5 star ***** read, a keeper, excellent scholarly historical non fiction.  

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

I heard about this book from a local friend  almost a year ago; her grand daughter had passed it along to her. First published in 2005, Knopf released the paperback, 550 pages in September, 2007. Because the movie is now underway,  touted for December release, and I prefer to read a book before I see a movie, I picked it up and read it in a few evening in November.  It is a different book, told by Death personified, set in Germany WWII era, it begins in 1939, and traces the experiences of a young girl, Liesel Meminger who is adopted by her foster family after her brother dies and  her mother can not care for her.  It is one of those books known as a crossover, because it was written for  younger readers, adolescents, juniors but is being avidly read by adults, the genre of books I have found to be clearly and well written with good information and emotionally moving.  It takes a  bit of perseverance to get used to Death as a narrator in what could be a gloomy tale but what becomes historically illuminating.  Reviews compare it to Anne Frank.   This era is of great personal interst to me and having just been through a series of Holocaust lectures at the University of Wisconsin, my interest was reignited.

Leisel's foster family shelters a Jew, Max, who was previously known to her father in their basement.   Leisel who is definitely "slow" learns to read through her nightmares as her father begins to spend evenings and nights with her to soothe her when she awakens screaming. Books are not readily available and Leisel begins to still books, odd ones, those she can save from the incineration piles of the gestapo.  

Listen to Death on pg. 491, "It's probably fair to say that in all the years of Hitler's reign, no person was able to serve the Fuhrer as loyally as me.  A human doesn't  have a heart like mine.  The human heart is a line, whereas my own is a circle, and I have the endless ability to be in the right place at the right time.  The consequence of this is that I'm always finding humans at their best and worst.  I see their ugly and their beauty, and I wonder how the same thing can be both.  Still, they have one thing I envy.  Humans if nothing else have the good sense to die."

I give this a solid 4 ****