My parents divorced when I was a kid and for years my dad lived in the city on 12th between 5th and 6th, while we were in Brooklyn so we had the best of all worlds NY-wise. It was a different city and what's happened to it is depressing.

Dante, that place is right off fulton and nassau. It was operated by Big John, not sure if it still is he just went away for a couple of years and got out recently. My dad had a bar around the corner on Ann Street and would send me there to get a laugh. The bartenders would wear bikinis or skimpy outfits and I would be like 12. Before it was the nassau it was called Kenos. That was a great neighborhood, it sure has changed a ton

Dante, that place is right off fulton and nassau. It was operated by Big John, not sure if it still is he just went away for a couple of years and got out recently. My dad had a bar around the corner on Ann Street and would send me there to get a laugh. The bartenders would wear bikinis or skimpy outfits and I would be like 12. Before it was the nassau it was called Kenos. That was a great neighborhood, it sure has changed a ton

I had it somewhat similar childhood. I grew up in Belmont (187th and Hoffman). But my Dad was from East Harlem, and when they died, my grandparents were among the last Italian immigrants left in the neighborhood. They lived on Pleasant Avenue, just off 118th. They lived until the late '80s, so I spent thirty years going back and forth. My Dad's going on 86 and he's still on the Giglio at Mount Carmel, so we're still there a few times a year. But forget about that neighborhood altogether today.

Then there was my favorite uncle who owned a building on Baxter Street, directly opposite the back entrance of Most Precious Blood, and another building on West 8th Street, which I currently co-own. So you can see my close affiliation with the Downtown area, and how much the changes have saddened me. I've spent almost 56 years in and out of these neighborhoods. It breaks my heart.

Then there was my uncle in East New York on Pacific Street. We spent one Sunday a month there. I loved it there. But even back then in the '60s and '70s, East New York was already starting to change. You see, on my Dad's side, there were eleven brothers and sisters on his Dad's side, and they immigrated one or two at a time, so they ended up all over the place. My Mom's side pretty much just settled in the Bronx.

Yeah, 2k for a studio instead of $2500. Let them stay wherever the fuck they were born. You have no idea how many blue-collar people have been driven out of Lower Manhattan. No idea whatsoever. But that's probably because you don't understand what it means to be blue collar anyway.

I'm not being deliberately mean, Mighty. You know I like you. A lot. But Lower Manhattan used to be as blue collar as some of the nicer parts of the Old Bronx. And you have no idea how much it annoys a true New Yorker to see this shit happen. No idea at all.

And I'm in real estate. Buildings that I fucking OWN with my family, and one of them is half a block from Washington Square Park. So if I feel this way, can you imagine how these poor families felt about getting chased from their own neighborhoods, where they've lived for generations, by a bunch of midwesterners and suburbanites who think they deserve a New York City birthright because they're gay or call themselves hipsters?

It's just a very sore point with me. It's nothing personal. Like I said, I like you a lot.

How does a nice Bronx boy like yourself end up a Mets fan? It must have been the source of much schoolyard strife when you were a kid

Pizza, you know I'm a New Jerseyan that works in Midtown Manhattan, but A LOT of the old timers I talk to that OWNED their places sold them and made a fortune and thats what was the catalyst to spring generations of their families out to the suburbs of Jersey, Staten Island, Connecticut, Westchester, Etc

^^ in some areas yes, that's true, but that's less likely for people in alphabet city or the LES. These were mostly rental areas, walk up tenements, pretty low income.

That's okay, I've had to explain that here a few times before. As I said, my Dad was from Harlem, where the Polo Grounds were located and the Giants played. They pulled out on him and headed west when he was close to thirty years old. He resented them for a long time for the move (although he was happy when they won three of the last five World Series because Bonds was gone and he hated him).

Anyway, like a lot of Dodgers fans (who suffered the same experience), in '62 he adopted the Mets. And he instilled it into me. And to ne honest, there are more Mets fans in the Bronx than you might think. I mean, it's probably no more than 15%, but we're here.


But yeah, growing up around Fordham a Mets fan wasn't easy .

Pretty much what I just posted above.

Pizza, you know I like you and hold onto you in the highest regard, so I was asking if this was the case downtown as well? Now I know the cops and firefighters aren't paid what they get paid in Jersey, but it seems a lot of families sold and made millions or hundreds of thousands downtown that moved their families out to the suburbs for generations as well?

PS you never answered my question if you've ever hung out at the Nassau Bar before (great Mets bar BTW) LOL???

Not really. Like Helen and I both said, the heart and soul were the renters. And NYC fireman earn comparable money with overtime, but it's still impossible for them to afford Manhattan. One of my many gripes about gentrification. They can't live where they protect and serve. And that's obscene.


I've been there a few times. And like Padrone, I remember when it was Keno's. Different neighborhood now, though.

And I like you, too, Dante. You're a nice, respectful kid. And don't be insulted by kid. Anyone young enough to be my son will always be a kid to me .