MANHATTAN LIGHTS IN WORLD WAR II

By Linda Lee Greene, Author & Artist

Since the maiden descent from the top of One Times Square of the New Year’s Eve Ball, only in 1942 and 1943 was the tradition put on hold, and then it was due to the wartime “dimout” of the lights of New York City. While during those pivotal years of World War II crowds still congregated at the head of the forked square, they were eerily quiet compared to previous years, and a moment of complete silence at the stroke of midnight punctuated the poignancy of the ringing chimes atop the 25 story building.

On the night of January 13, 1942, the lights of Manhattan are still alight just enough to make of her an irresistible target to those wishing her harm. As the eyes of the unsuspecting, never-sleeping city are turned westward toward their Japanese enemies in the Pacific, a deadly-hungry German U-boat lurks off Manhattan’s eastern shore. Smelling choice meat, silently it surfaces, and its commander, like an overjoyed kid let loose for the first time with his daddy’s hunting rifle, takes aim and fires a whistling torpedo into the hull of an American oil tanker moored at Gotham’s watery fringe. His Aryan face flushed red with the adrenalin-rushed blood of his coup d’ état, with an all but silent hiss, his sleek submarine breaks the frigid skin of the water once more. Stealthily it slips back down into the murky sea, noses to the warmer waters of the south, and hunts for another twelve hours off the Atlantic shore of dazzling America. The German commander of that vessel stalks his quarry well. He adds seven more defenseless American ships to his kill-score by the time the night is through.

The many years of the Great Depression hollowed out the coffers of the United States, a condition worsened by its program of providing war supplies to Great Britain, the Soviet Union, and other allies during their several years of fighting Germany and its war partners. Following Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor, and Germany’s subsequent declaration of war against the United States of America, a sense of near hopelessness clouds the nation’s war effort, a despair owing to an American military that is almost non-existent, and what there is of it is ill-equipped and ill-trained to take on two formidable enemies in two separate theaters of war. In addition, Japan at Pearl Harbor crippled critically America’s Pacific air and sea fleet, involving the loss of life of 2,500 servicemen. In addition, Japan captured both American and British territory throughout the Asian Pacific, as well as the independent kingdom of Thailand. Between December 1941 and the spring of 1942, the Japanese are the dominant force in the Pacific and impose their will against a stretched and an anemic Allied military.

Prior to the bombing of Pearl Harbor, American military commanders believed Hawaii to be beyond the reach of the fighting forces of Japan, and the same attitude held true regarding the continental USA. But if Japanese naval and air forces are destroying Allied interests in the Pacific and German U-boats are blowing up ships on the east coast of America, what might they do to Seattle, Sacramento, San Francisco, and San Diego? the American populace asks itself. Shaken to its core and in fear of a fate similar to that of Pearl Harbor, western Americans shroud their dwellings with blackout-curtains, issue official air-raid instructions, and stack the exterior walls of buildings from their foundations to rooflines with sandbags.

            His country barely holding on against German Luftwaffe bombings, in London, Great Britain’s Prime Minister, Winston Spencer Churchill solicits greater material aid from the United States and an increased number of escorts of Allied merchant ships as they maneuver the supply lanes of the frigid North Atlantic. Made perilous by wolf-packs of deadly German U-boats, like the oil tankers moored along America’s eastern shore, the merchant ships are easy prey for the cunning submarines.

Engaged in the bulk of the fighting against German troops along her lengthy and frozen front, General Secretary of the Soviet Union, Josef Stalin resents his place at the bottom of the food chain of American aid, even as he revels in his role as the savior of the west at that time. It is a position he plans to use to his advantage at the end of the war when it comes time to divvy up the conquered territory. In his only resemblance to Stalin, other than hatred of the Nazis, Churchill has his eye on some choice new territory as well. Only Roosevelt bears no interest in gaining territory, even though his country will finance and supply the bulk of the equipment and the warriors of the conflict.

            America’s fighting men, most of whom are still in late-stage adolescence according to modern-day definitions, are called to service in the war through the first draft in the history of the country, and the people – bewildered – fearful – saddened, drop to their knees in prayer, and stunned mothers and fathers console one another as their homes systematically and rapidly empty of the brightest and best of their beloved, young sons. Reliance on their families, neighbor/friends, and faith in FDR sustains them, as well as the creed of their souls that “there never has been – there never can be – successful compromise between good and evil,” as their commander-in-chief reminded them from Washington, DC in his State of the Union Address at the opening of 1942. His cultured voice, reaching out across the radio waves and into the living rooms of his people, reassured them and inspired their commitment to the war effort.

Thus, America begins the long and torturous journey toward victory on the battlegrounds of World War II, the conflagration that is perceived by the force of its very magnitude as the lowest point in the history of the world.©

Image: Manhattan Skyline 1942

Multi-award-winning author, Linda Lee Greene’s eBooks and paperbacks are available for purchase through Amazon.com. A CHANCE AT THE MOON, her latest multi-genre novel featuring romance, intrigue, and paranormal elements is described below:

Amid the seductions of Las Vegas, Nevada and an idyllic coffee plantation on Hawai’i’s Big Island, a sextet of opposites converge within a shared fate: a glamorous movie-star courting distractions from her troubled past; her shell-shocked bodyguards clutching handholds out of their hardscrabble lives; a dropout Hawaiian nuclear physicist gambling his way back home; a Navajo rancher seeking cleansing for harming Mother Earth; and from its lofty perch, the Hawaiian’s guardian spirit conjured as his pet raven, conducting this symphony of soul odysseys.

Was it chance or destiny’s hand behind the movie-star and gambler’s curious encounter at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas? The cards fold, their hearts open, and a match strikes, flames that sizzle their hearts and souls. Can they have the moon and the stars, too? Or is she too dangerous? Is he? Can their love withstand betrayal? Can it endure murder?

While the cards at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas fail to distract them from their troubled pasts, on the side, the actress and the gambler play a game of ‘will they won’t they’ romance. Meanwhile, an otherworldly hand also has a big stake in the game. Unexpected secrets unfold brimming with dangerous consequences, and finally, a strange brand of salvation.

Amazon Buy Links Paperback - Kindle

A CHANCE AT THE MOON - FIRST CHAPTER - LINDA LEE GREENE'S NEW NOVEL

TITLE: A CHANCE AT THE MOON

AUTHOR: LINDA LEE GREENE

GENRE: ROMANTIC THRILLER

PURCHASE LINK: 

https://www.amazon.com/CHANCE-AT-MOON-Betrayal-Murder-ebook/dp/B07Z44YN9X/

One

C

olumbus, Ohio, October 7, 2002—The broad tree-lined avenues leading to the courthouse in the heart of downtown Columbus were crammed bumper-to-bumper with cars of spectators blowing their horns and thrusting middle fingers at one another through open windows. Traffic cops were busy maintaining order. The trial of the person charged the year before with the fatal shooting of one of the city’s most prominent citizens, businesswoman and philanthropist Inez Montoyo, was the enticement for the swarm. Ms. Montoyo’s daughter, acclaimed Broadway and Hollywood actress Olivia Montoyo Simms, was to give her testimony on this the opening day of the proceedings, and was the prime quarry the C’bus citizens had in their sites. It was the job of Nicholas Plato and his twin brother Tobias to shield her from the throng. As the watch on his wrist marked off minutes perilously close to the slated time of the commencement of the trial, Nicholas was growing concerned about whether or not the driver of their limousine would get them to the courthouse on time.

The judge thwacked her gavel on the little pad on her desktop and opened the trial officially. “Crack, crack, crack,” like gunshots the sound brought the room to attention, and Olivia jerked in the chair beside Nicholas. Just like Judge Judy on TV, Nicholas thought to himself, and then he gathered Olivia’s pale cold hands in his large palm and felt her settle into his reassuring touch. He had been worried about the skills of the limousine driver needlessly, as it turned out. The man had pulled some maneuvers that could have won him a spot as a stunt driver with a Hollywood movie studio, and had delivered them to the designated entrance of the building with time to spare. At that point, Nicholas and Tobias had worked for Olivia as her personal bodyguards for more than a year, duties that required their presence 24 hours a day, under her roof, and at her beck and call. The brothers occupied a separate wing of her home in a posh suburb of Las Vegas, a sprawling ranch she had purchased a few weeks after the death of her mother on July 13, 2001. Later that same year, she had sold her flat in Manhattan and her home in Los Angeles. She appeared content to set roots in Las Vegas, leaving behind her acting career, it seemed, as well.

Having to be practically nose-to-nose with the assassin for the first time since the murder, and reliving its retched details in the courtroom testimonies, of course proved worse for Olivia than the awful anticipation of it had been. It was an age-old story of an aggrieved employee taking revenge on his employer. A guilty verdict was brought in late that afternoon. Olivia elected to return to Las Vegas that same evening rather than staying in town and visiting with relatives and friends, some of whom had positioned themselves among the courtroom spectators and had exchanged glances and nods with her throughout the long day. A shaken Olivia and her solicitous bodyguards boarded the private jet one of her wealthy cronies had provided for their roundtrip flight, and departed Columbus as nightfall swallowed the horizon. Upon takeoff, she lowered the shade on the jet’s window that gave view below of the tight cluster of buildings and streets alight with the late hour, and wished never to be called back to her hometown again. She put the thought of Columbus and the trial out of her mind, and wondered if “Nicky” and “Toby,” as she called her bodyguards, would be up for a late-night jaunt to one of the casinos upon their arrival in Las Vegas. She pulled the vial of pain pills from her handbag, shook two of them into her palm, and popped them into her mouth—no chaser required. His tired grunt preceding his movements, Tobias pushed out of the seat next to hers, found a bottle of water in the jet’s galley kitchen, and delivered it to Olivia, its top twisted open. “Thanks,” she said, and then took a delicate sip. Cupping her hands over her aching belly, she laid her head back and closed her eyes.   

All through the following months, the tragedy cloyed with little letup in Olivia’s psyche. As July 13, 2003, the second anniversary of her mother’s death, drew near, Olivia’s body had long been displaying undeniable indicators of her soul’s reckoning with her, most notably in chronic abdominal distress and changes to the left side of her lovely face, in a drawn corner of her mouth, a sleepy eye, a narrowed nostril, features faintly askew as if she had recovered imperfectly from a slight stroke. Oddly, rather than detracting from her beauty, the imbalance in her face rendered her beguiling in a way different than before, fascinating in the way a freeway pile-up transfixes onlookers, both of them having death, or at least, mayhem in common. There was more to it than that, however. Loss was plain to see in her face, as was guilt from time to time—yes, guilt, because a determined vein of speculation threaded through the population as to whether or not she had had a hand in shaping her mother’s death, with or without intention. The investigation of the case had revealed that Olivia and her mother had been estranged from each other for several years, only to have reached a truce in the months prior to the murder. A sidebar to the situation was the fact that the murderer had been Olivia’s lover when she was only sixteen, a relationship to which her mother had put a stop. While Olivia had managed to put it behind her and move on with her life, the boyfriend had not done so, it seemed clear. That he had stayed on as an employee of Madam Montoyo’s after the fact unleashed rampant conjecture regarding the meaning behind it. Subsequent to the murder, the issue pricked Olivia like a thorn in her conscience now and then, but usually languished there, unexamined, and therefore, unresolved, as indeed it remained an unanswered tidbit among followers of the case.

In the face of all that had transpired, the essential life lessons the tragedy had to teach Olivia seemed to have failed to penetrate her conscious mind, at least in the aspect of amending her behavior, apparent in a stubborn ignorance or defiance unmistakable in the backward thrust of her shoulders, the high tilt of her chin, and her nightly pursuit of Las Vegas distractions. There was no hint that her best self would win in the end, due in no small way to her reliable attraction to risk-taking. Her youth and her penchant for recklessness had paid off big time in the past, markedly in her determined, meteoric rise in the film industry while still a teenager, but with the murder and its consequences, life had placed heavy odds against her.

The stakes notwithstanding, it had to be played out. It had already begun—something had been building in the atmosphere, something of moment, some extraordinary event about to be set in motion—some deciding factor. Like air pressure rising, clouds banking, seas roiling in advance of a menacing storm, it churned around Olivia. Nicholas understood that it had long been decided that he and Tobias would play supporting roles to her central one in the coming affair. In wary expectation, Nicholas waited in the wings for the remaining actors to appear.

Lights!      Camera!       Action!

A New Yorker at Green Gables Drive-in Restaurant in Columbus, Ohio©

By Linda Lee Greene

When in the early 1960s I met my former husband Bobby, his driver’s license gave an address of Cambria Heights, Queens, New York City, a relatively placid neighborhood a mere stone’s throw from the Nassau County, Long Island line. It was his parent’s address, a place to which they had moved soon after Bobby’s senior year in high school. Born in Manhattan, and as a toddler had moved with his parents and older brother to the Bronx, New York City’s northernmost borough, they remained there until Bobby’s pre-adolescence. The family relocated at that time to Flushing, Queens. It was there that Bobby received most of his schooling, and is the place he considers home.    

It wasn’t that the little family was unstable…they were upwardly mobile. Bobby’s beautiful Spanish/Puerto Rican mother Paquita, and his movie-star handsome father Eusebio (Americanized as Frank) were always on the hunt for a better life for their little family. Both of them had immigrated to Harlem originally, Paquita from Ponce, Puerto Rico, and Eusebio from Barcelona, Spain. A seamstress in a “boiler room,” as she called it, Paquita commuted every weekday by train and subway to the garment district in New York City, a musty room in a highrise in Manhattan located between 5^th and 9^th Avenues to 34^th and 42^nd Streets. Frank was also a daily train/subway commuter to his job as a kitchen worker at the Chase Building in midtown Manhattan. I knew that I was an accepted member of the family the day that Frank carted home to me a special disk-like pan from that famous kitchen, a pan with the name of Chase Manhattan engraved on its bottom, a piece of equipment that I use to this day, and each time I do, I recall with great affection my long-deceased father-in-law.

At the time that Bobby and I met, he was the saxophonist, clarinetist, and comedian with a five-piece combo that traveled cross-country on one-night to eight-week-long gigs at every type of venue imaginable; I was a dance instructor at an Arthur Murray’s Dance Studio in Columbus, Ohio. Fate brought us together at a nightclub, the infamous Club Rubu, in Columbus where his group was appearing and where my dance-instructor buddies and I often headed after the studio closed in the evenings. Subsequent to some stops and starts in our relationship, I went on the road with him, and absent the benefit of having met each other’s families, we married in Palo Alto, California in the spring following the year we met.

Bobby’s biographical background is an important element to my story, especially as it relates to the geographical and cultural aspects of it, for it points out differences between us that were always sources of humorous situations, as this one demonstrates. Before I proceed, I will list just a few of our dissimilarities: to Bobby, white castles are repeaters; pop is soda; lunch meat is cold cuts; mayonnaise is Hellmann’s; gingerale is Vernors; and Houston Street is pronounced like “house” with “ton” tagged to its tail-end. As multi-dimensional as was his upbringing within the borders of the five boroughs of New York City, as well as his cross-country travels, at the same time, he remained oddly unsophisticated in many ways. It was an innocence that theretofore I wouldn’t have associated with what one would expect to be a stereotypically “jaded” New Yorker. It allowed him a refreshing capacity to be captivated by new experiences. For instance, never in his life had he seen, or had knowledge of, drive-in restaurants, an enormously popular American phenomenon from sea to shining sea in the 1950s and 1960s—other than those spots that had been Bobby’s turf, apparently.

St. Louis was the home-base of the other four boys in the band, and when our work in California dried up, we headed east with them, camping out in the home of the parents of the leader of the group for a week or so, a week or so until some work materialized and we would be on the road again. But homesickness bit all of us fatally instead, which was the death knell of the band. The only choice available to Bobby and me was packing up our electric skillet, our ironing board, our iron, and our clothes (our only worldly possessions at the time, other than his horns) and to head to Columbus in our old Chevrolet. It was time for Bobby to meet my family and friends for the first time.

The introductions went swimmingly—everybody loved Bobby and Bobby loved everybody in return. I called my friend Carol Richardson, who was Carol Treadway by then, and she and her husband Dick, and Bobby and I, planned an evening together. Dick picked us up in whatever boat-of-a-car he owned at the time (Dick always owns a boat-of-a-car), and Bobby and I climbed in the roomy back seat. The early part of our evening is a blur to me, but we ended up at Green Gables Drive-in Restaurant, the favorite haunt of all of the teenagers and twenty-somethings of our area of Columbus when we were growing up, and judging by the steady flow of traffic in and out of the place that evening, it was still going strong.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the drill of such places, you would park your car, roll down your windows, and a carhop would walk, or in some cases, skate up to the driver’s side window, and take your order. Presently, she would return with your food balanced delicately on a tray that she would attach to the driver’s side door and window, and then she would fade away until it was time for her to return to fetch the tray at meal’s end. Well, that was the purpose of such places for the older folks, but not for the younger crowds that frequented them. The real function for them was for the young motor heads to show off their automobiles, their 1950s concept cars, classic cars of today, and for the girls to hang out of the windows of the cars and wave and shout to all of their friends. Around and around like an endless carousel the cars would circle, passing up open parking spaces with abandon.

My husband was fascinated! While the other three of us in our car chatted away, Bobby was so caught up in, and befuddled by, the parade that was unfolding before his eyes that he failed to contribute a word to our discourse. You must take into account that this is a person from New York City, where a parking space is golden, and never remains empty for more than a second or two. Street fights and turf wars break out over parking spaces in New York City. At Green Gables that evening, there happened to be an empty spot right next to our car, the side where Bobby sat, a spot that had been passed up by the same cars time and time and time again. 

Finally, Bobby just couldn’t take it any longer. Thrusting his entire torso out of his open window, and his free arm jerking wildly like a frustrated traffic cop’s, in his New York accent, Bobby shouted to the driver of a particular car on which he had kept his eye, “Hey Buddy, what’s the mattuh with you? There’s a pahkin’ spot right heuh? RIGHT HEUH!!!”

Original posting on September 17, 2012 – Updated on January 8, 2019

http://booksbylindaleegreene.gallery-llgreene.com/

To date, Linda Lee Greene has authored five novels: “Jesus Gandhi Oma Mae Adams” (http://amzn.to/VazHFG); “Guardians and Other Angels” (http://goo.gl/imUwKO); “Rooster Tale” (http://goo.gl/vNq32g); and “Cradle of the Serpent” (http://amzn.to/VazHFG), which was designated as a finalist in the 2018 American Fiction Awards Competition. It was also awarded a 5 Star Review by Readers’ Favorites. Scheduled for release in early 2019, her latest novel titled “A Chance at the Moon” will be available in soft cover and eBook at Amazon.com. An extensive exhibition of Greene’s artwork can be viewed at www.gallery-llgreene.com. 

A New Yorker at Green Gables Drive-in Restaurant in Columbus, Ohio

When in the early 1960s I met my former husband, Bobby, his driver’s license gave an address of Cambria Heights, Queens, New York City, a relatively placid neighborhood a mere stone’s throw from the Nassau County, Long Island line.  It was his parent’s address, a place to which they had moved soon after Bobby’s senior year in high school.  Born in Manhattan, and as a toddler had moved with his parents and older brother to the Bronx, New York City’s northernmost borough where they remained until his pre-adolescence, again the family moved, that time to Flushing, Queens.  It was there that Bobby did most of his schooling.  It is the place he considers home.    

It wasn’t that the little family was unstable…they were upwardly mobile.  They were always looking for a better life than had been available to them in Harlem, and before that in Ponce, Puerto Rico, the place from which Bobby’s beautiful Spanish/Puerto Rican mother, Paquita had immigrated, and Barcelona, Spain, the homeland of his movie-star-handsome father, Eusebio (Americanized as Frank).  A seamstress in a “boiler room,” as she called it, Paquita commuted every weekday by train to the garment district between 5^th and 9^th Avenues to 34^th and 42^nd Streets in Manhattan, as did Frank, to his job as a kitchen worker at the Chase Building in midtown Manhattan.  I knew that I was really a part of the family the day that Frank carted home to me a special disk-like pan from that famous kitchen, a pan with the name of Chase Manhattan engraved on its bottom, a piece of equipment that I use to this day, and each time I do, I recall my long-deceased father-in-law with affection.

At the time that Bobby and I met, he was the saxophonist, clarinetist and comedian for a five-piece combo that traveled cross-country on one-night to eight-week-long gigs at every type of venue imaginable, and I was a dance instructor at an Arthur Murray’s Dance Studio in Columbus, Ohio.  Fate brought us together at a nightclub, the infamous Club Rubu, in Columbus where his group was appearing and where my dance-instructor buddies and I often headed after the studio closed in the evenings.  Subsequent to some stops and starts in our relationship, I finally went on the road with him, and absent the benefit of having met each other’s families, we married in Palo Alto, California in the spring following the year we met.

Bobby’s biographical background is germane to my story, especially as it relates to the geographical and cultural aspects of it for it points out differences between us that were always sources of humorous situations, as this one demonstrates.  Before I proceed, I will list just a few of our dissimilarities:  To Bobby, white castles are repeaters; pop is soda; lunch meat is cold cuts; mayonnaise is Hellmann’s; gingerale is Vernors; and Houston Street in Manhattan is pronounced like “house” with “ton” tagged to its tail-end.  As multi-dimensional as was his upbringing within the borders of the five boroughs of New York City, as well as his cross-country travels, at the same time, he remained oddly unsophisticated in many ways.  It was an innocence that theretofore I wouldn’t have associated with a “jaded” New Yorker, and it allowed him a refreshing capacity to be captivated by new experiences.  For instance, never in his life had he seen, or much less experienced, a drive-in restaurant, an enormously popular and visible American phenomenon from sea to shining sea in the 1950s and 1960s, other than those spots that had been Bobby’s turf, apparently.

St. Louis was the home-base of the other four boys in the band, and when our work in California dried up, we headed east with them, camping out in the home of the parents of the leader of the group for a week or so, a week or so until some work materialized and we would be on the road again.  But nostalgia for home bit all of us fatally instead, which was the death knell of the organization.  The only choice available to Bobby and me was packing up our electric skillet, our ironing board, our iron, and our clothes (our only worldly possessions at the time, other than his horns) and to head to Columbus in our old Chevrolet.  It was time for Bobby to meet my family and friends for the first time.

The introductions went swimmingly…everybody loved Bobby and Bobby loved everybody in return.  I called my friend, Carol Richardson, who was Carol Treadway by then, and she and her husband, Dick, and Bobby and I planned an evening together.  Dick picked us up in whatever boat-of-a-car he owned at the time (Dick always owns a boat-of-a-car), and Bobby and I climbed in the roomy back seat.  The early part of our evening is a blur to me, but we ended up at Green Gables Drive-in Restaurant, the favorite haunt of all of the teenagers and twenty-somethings of our area of Columbus when we were growing up, and judging by the steady flow of traffic in and out of the place that evening, it was still going strong.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the drill of such places, you would park your car, roll down your windows, and a carhop would walk, or in some cases, skate up to the driver’s side window and take your order.  Presently she would return with your food delicately balanced on a tray that she would attach to the driver’s side door and window, and she would fade away until it was time for her to return to fetch the tray at meal’s end.  Well, that was the purpose of such places for the older folks, but not for the younger crowds that frequented them.  The real function for them was for the young motor heads to show off their automobiles, their 1950s concept cars, classic cars of today, and for the girls to hang out of the windows of the cars and wave and shout to all of their friends.  Around and around like a carousel the cars would circle in the place, passing up open parking spaces with abandon.

My husband was fascinated!  While the other three of us in our car chatted away, Bobby was so caught up in, and befuddled by, the parade that was unfolding before his eyes that he failed to contribute a word to our discourse.  You must take into account that this is a person from New York City where a parking space is golden, and never remains empty for more than a second or two.  Street fights, turf wars break out over parking spaces in New York.  There happened to be an empty spot right next to our car, the side where Bobby sat, actually, a spot that had been passed up by the same cars several times. 

Finally, Bobby just couldn’t take it any longer.  Pushing his entire torso out of his window, and his free arm gesturing like a traffic cop’s, he shouted to the driver of a particular car on which he had kept his eye, “Hey Buddy, right heuh?  There’s a pahkin’ spot RIGHT HEUH!” 

 

Many thanks to my fellow Franklin Heights High School alumnus Don McCarty for permission to use the drawing of Green Gables in this posting.

Linda Lee Greene's latest book GUARDIANS AND OTHER ANGELS is available at

http://www.amazon.com/Guardians-Other-Angels-Linda-Greene/dp/1897512562/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1338336762&sr=8-1

To view Linda's online art gallery log onto www.gallery-llgreene.com