The house still stands, wrecked, silent, blackened and charred. Once the flames were extinguished an excavator ripped off part of the roof and flattened walls on the second floor to expose enough of the house so that the last ember could be put out. Now the second...

            My grandma believed that birds were the souls of the dead. She would throw out bread soaked in water for the sparrows, grackles and stray pigeons from the nearby coops. She also believed in olive oil as a universal cure and that certain people possessed...

He was born in 1916 in a dirt road town off the Appian Way. His mother died in the Spanish Flu pandemic soon after. He came here at seven, grew up in Hell’s Kitchen, quit school at sixteen - it was the depression - worked at who knows what, became a city fireman, then...