My Brother Phil: And Other Memories

By Paul E. Pepe

The author opted not to provide the The About the Book information.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jan 30, 2023
• ISBN: 9781669863731

Paul E. Pepe

Paul e. Pepe is retired after a long career in marketing. He has been a newspaper publisher and editor and college professor. He lives in laurel hollow, New York and Sarasota, Florida with his wife, Miriam. He is currently working on a new novel. His previous published works include: Strangers By Day, The Sleeping Giant,The Old Man, Footsteps and Travels with Mimi and children’s voices, Marie Elena and Five Women I Love. Cover illustration by Eva and Carina Lewandowski

Book preview

Copyright © 2023 by Paul E. Pepe.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 01/30/2023

Xlibris

844-714-8691

www.Xlibris.com

838119

CONTENTS

Introduction

Dedication

Foreword – My Brother Phil

One – Music

Two – Holidays and Birthdays

Three – Aunts and Uncles

Four – Vacations

Five – Paulie

Six – World War II

Seven – The Room

Eight – The Brooklyn Times Leader

Nine – Growing Up

Ten – Mom and Dad

Eleven – Radio Days

Twelve – Nursing World

Thirteen – Moving Day

Fourteen – From the Beginning

Fifteen – Last of the Ninth

Grandpa Mike

Prologue

Grandpa Mike

Paulie

Introduction

My Son

Baseball

Vacations

Mad Box

Driving

Notes

That Summer

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Thirteen

Fourteen

Fifteen

Sixteen

ALSO BY PAUL E. PEPE

STRANGERS BY DAY

(as Vickie Malone)

THE SLEEPING GIANT

(the story of Hunter Mountain)

THE OLD MAN

(a novel)

FOOTSTEPS

(a family history)

TRAVELS WITH MIMI and CHILDREN’S VOICES

MARIE ELENA

(a biographical novel)

FIVE WOMEN I LOVE

(poems)

DEADLY DUO TRILOGY

(three novels)

BROOKLYN BOY

(a memoir)

BITS AND PIECES

(musings)

A.jpg

Nightfall

And now

We stare

Into the sunset

Watching

As the long day

Slowly disappears

Waiting

For that

Final

Flash

And then

Blackness

But there

Is still time

To make amends

And remember

The sunrise

That had been

Brilliant

The long day

Filled

To overflowing

Time well spent

But

As it always

Happens

The long day

Ends

At nightfall

And we do not know

What there is

Beyond blackness

But soon

Sooner than we want

We will know

And

We can only hope

That there is more

More sunrises

More

Introduction

*          *          *

When I first started this project, it was to talk about, and in a sense, honor my brother Phil.

It was also to illustrate how our lives interconnected.

When I finished that story, it occurred to me that I should include something about our paternal grandfather, Michele (Michael) Pepe, which I did.

Then came the section about Paulie, who left us much too soon.

And, finally, to finish it all up, That summer, which tells the story of the most memorable summer of my life, the summer of 1945 when World War II finally ended and how those of us in the Gravesend section of Brooklyn celebrated that notable event.

This book has turned out to be the fourth in a series about the Pepe family experiences in America.

It started with Footsteps, which traced our ancestry in Italy to the early 1800’s. It was followed by Marie Elena, a novelized version of my mother’s life in Little Italy. The third book was called Brooklyn Boy, which described Phil’s and my growing up in Gravesend.

*          *          *

Dedication

*          *          *

For the Pepe family

For his friends

For his fans

And for the legacy

He left behind. He will

Live forever

*          *          *

Foreword

My Brother Phil

*          *          *

It seems difficult to believe that Phil has been gone for more than seven years.

He was eighty years old, and I truly believe he had many more productive years ahead of him.

But, it was not to be.

Strange things happen and very often we have no understanding of why they do.

Phil and I were just two and a half years apart.

I came first, then Phil, then John and Michael and finally, Carol.

And while I never said so, I always admired the career he built for himself.

And while I was older than he was; in many ways he stood taller than I did, which made me both envious and proud at the same time.

*          *          *

We lived in a modest brick attached home on a tiny, unpaved street called Lama Court, in the Gravesend section of Brooklyn. There were nine houses on our block. At one end was a large dirt lot which had been christened Lama’s Field.

Facing it was the imposing bulk of P.S. 95, the kindergarten to sixth grade school we all attended.

It was a calm and peaceful time when we grew up, almost bucolic in a way, with several small farms surrounding our house.

I don’t remember too much of those early years, in fact, my earliest memory was of Christmas, 1937, when I made my first public appearance on stage reciting A Christmas Carol at the annuals P.S. 95 Christmas Gala.

But, this is about Phil, and we will go there now.

When he was five or six he began to show the first gleanings of his intimate knowledge of baseball.

I know, sounds impossible, but living in Brooklyn we were both enamored with the Brooklyn Dodgers, rooted for them, sped home after school to turn on the radio and listen to Red Barber detail the exploits of Dem Bums.

Mostly, we were disappointed, but that did not in any way diminish our love for Duke Snider, Carl Furillo, Pete Reiser, Pee Wee Reese and all the others who fought valiantly (mostly to no avail) for a chance at the World Series.

Just an aside, one of the things that really irked me had to do with my best friend, Bobby Benintendi. We were the same age, were in the same class all through Grammar School.

He was a good kid, smart (eventually became a doctor), but he had one huge failing.

He was a Yankee fan.

That was, to us, so very wrong. Everyone who lived in Brooklyn, we assumed, should be a Dodger fan.

What made it worse was that it seemed as if the Yankees won the World Series every year. Obviously they did not, but it was always a burr in our saddle.

But, as things turned out, Bobby’s grandson, Andrew Benintendi, became a professional baseball player and played for the Boston Red Sox, the Yankees perennial enemy.

So, Bobby, take that!

As I said, from the age of five or six, Phil was a rabid baseball fan. He knew the batting average of every baseball player in the major leagues.

Granted, there were, fewer teams back then, but still, he knew more about baseball than most adult fans.

Our love for baseball continued unabated, and when World War II broke out, baseball helped keep us on an even keel.

What amazes me now is that when I was ten (1942) and Phil was seven, we were allowed to travel from Gravesend to Ebbetts Field to attend ball games all by ourselves. Just so you know, the subway cost five cents.

Anyway, that couldn’t happen today. It meant riding two separate subway lines to get to the ballpark. Think of it, two young kids, no fear, no danger, no problems, riding the subway alone.

During that time, we were privy to two outstanding events concerning the Dodgers.

The first was a No-Hitter we witnessed, tossed by a pitcher named Ed Head. Most people have never heard of him, but we were delighted to be at the ballpark for this momentous event.

The next major event, as far as we were concerned, happened in the Spring of 1947. We were off from school for the Easter holiday and travelled to Ebbetts Field to see the Dodgers play a pre-season game against the Montreal Royals, their number one farm team.

Playing second base for the Royals was an up and coming star named Jackie Robinson.

He was the only African-American to play in organized ball, and two days later he was a member of the Dodgers.

Obviously, he broke the color line.

And it meant nothing to us. He was a really good baseball player, would help the Dodgers and his color was of no consequence.

Another baseball aside:

One summer afternoon during this same period, Dad decided to take us all (included mom), to see a Yankee doubleheader at the stadium.

We went, perhaps a little reluctantly, but after all it was baseball and we were okay with that.

The best part that during what would turn out to be his last season, perennial star Joe Dimaggio hit three home runs that day.

A stounding.

Baseball continued to be a driving force in our young lives.

That, and writing.

Phil and I were both budding writers.

Case in point.

One summer, with time on our hands, we decided to write (and publish) our own newspaper.

We wrote stories, then hand copied a four page newspaper, creating a dozen copies, which took most of a week as I recall, then distributed the papers to our relatives.

Don’t remember their reaction, but it was the first time either of us scratched the writing itch.

I suppose I had always wanted to be a writer, and for the most part as a publicist I made my living that way. Only much later did I begin writing (and publishing) books, but Phil outstripped me in that way, starting with his first book, No Hitter.

He went on to publish more than fifty books on baseball, along with some of the biggest names in the field.

But that was only part of his success, and for the next pages I will try to outline his career.

*          *          *

One

Music

*          *          *

Just so we’re clear about this. This will not be a literal biography of Phil, mostly because there are things about his life that I was not privy to.

Out of necessity, I will jump around, moving from one part of our lives together, to another.

I promise, it will all come