Hanging on the Ledge of Life

By Sonny Lyall

Out of the ranks of the middle class, wise honest leaders will rise.

Truckers, labourers, bikers, night club bouncers, football players and soldiers.

Read this book to see how such people who once lived by a code can make North America great again by embracing new careers in religion and or politics.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Release date: Mar 28, 2024
• ISBN: 9781035814848

Book preview

Introduction

Google the Oct 8, 2012 Globe News headline Khrushchev prediction slowly coming true It goes on to quote Khrushchev: We can’t expect the American people to jump from capitalism to communism, but we can assist their elected leaders in giving them small doses of Socialism, until they waken one day to find that they have communism.

I see what the police have done to pastors who were expressing their freedom of speech in North America. I plan to stand up for these pastors not only because I am a Christian, but also because some police in my life chose to trample on my rights.

Since January 30th 2020, North American leaders in politics and policing have been clamping down on our rights in North America. This date coincides with the World Health Organization declaring the COVID-19 outbreak a Public Health Emergency of international concern.

The COVID emergency, the introduction of sexual ideologies into school curriculums, and the ideology for clean battery, wind and solar energy to replace oil have ramped up since January 30th, 2020 in North America.

Google the National Post June 7th 2021 Fraser Institute headline: Bill C-10 threatens free speech in Canada. Speaking of Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms in this article Bruce Pardy Professor of Law at Queens University says the Charter has not so much become a bulwark against government interference as a flexible judicial instrument for managing the priorities of the pervasive administrative state.

My father along with his brother- in -law and his older brother owned a nightclub in White Rock BC Canada called Birdcage aka The Purple Monkey. They also owned two hotels in Vancouver’s East side with Pubs in them.

I do not know the relationship that my dad’s brother-in-law had with gangsters, however on one occasion he was beat up and left locked in the walk-in cooler fridge. After he was found, he was suffering from internal injuries and hypothermia.

On another occasion at the family hotel known as the Carlton AKA The Cambie, the following event where gangsters helped my uncle happened as quoted from https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/the-cambie-pub-history Jul 5 2019,9:00 AM article.

Google this headline: "The spectacular drama and booze-filled history of The Cambie: " After being refused service for being drunk, a disgruntled patron tried to attack a waiter with a broken glass. The waiter threw him out, but the inebriate returned with an axe and smashed the windows of the bar."

The Province reported that about 40 people –mainly bikers, but a few straight people too, including bar staff and at least two women – chased the axe-wielder and beat him unconscious.

The City finally took action in 1977 when the Health Department ordered the owner to relocate the tenants to his other hotel, the Balmoral, and renovate the Carlton to bring it up to standard.

As a condition of its license, the bar could not operate without a functioning rooming house. Since the bar generated the bulk of the owner’s profit, this was a powerful enforcement incentive.

Vancouver’s East side once was an area where wealthy travellers visited the Balmoral Hotel. By the 1970’s the hotel still had a successful Saloon, but we could only attract monthly renters to the rooms as the neighbourhood became populated with drug users and homeless people.

The Saloon attracted sailors who anchored their freighters on the nearby harbour. These sailors liked our Saloon’s atmosphere because my dad’s brother-in-law offered free drinks to women that he found to be attractive and who danced with the sailors.

When the sailors drank too much and became overly flirtatious with our waitresses and other women, the policy was friendly but firm. Our six-foot, eight-inch bouncer was called to carry the sailors to taxi’s that we called, bound to take these patrons back to their ships.

On one such afternoon at the Balmoral a captain of a freighter ship called the Mosness. invited me to spend the day on his ship. A Norwegian sailor who was about my age showed me the galley and the games room. We played games of ping pong and poker.

Google Lenore Locken Oct 16th 2021 article https://www.flickr.com/photos/alphabetsoupst dio/51593541926 headline: The Hotel Balmoral was once a jewel of downtown Vancouver. It opened for business back in 1912 as a high-end hotel. Our family sold the Balmoral and our other holdings during the 1980’s recession.

The Purple Monkey nightclub was located south of Vancouver close to the USA border in the town of White Rock BC. I enjoyed watching some of the best Canadian bands who played there. The band that was most fun to socialize with was called Sparkling Apple.

I could write a book about my father’s days at his Purple Monkey nightclub, because a diverse clientele including Hells Angels motorcycle gangsters hung out there.

My father’s friends from Vancouver’s Ray and Leo Jewellery store was burglarized a day after they were showing rings to my father at our Cabaret.

My father was suspicious of someone who left our club at the same time as Ray the Jeweller left.

Google Purple Monkey Cabaret White Rock BC and quoting the Nov 2010 Sparkling Apple Official Blog: Our very own Bird Cage aka Purple Monkey up on King George Highway and the article speaks of the nightclubs that were our competition that competed to book the same bands that we booked.

My granduncle worked helping the owner of a live entertainment nightclub in Vancouver called Isys. He also worked days as a bridge builder.

79 workers including my granduncle fell into Burrard Inlet when the Second Narrows bridge collapsed during the construction. My granduncle died when he fell.

19 diseased workers are mentioned on a memorial plaque where the Second Narrows Bridge now stands.

The bridge is now called the Iron Workers Memorial Bridge. I wonder why my granduncle’s name is not on the memorial plaque. Did not more than 19 workers who fell into Burrard Inlet that day drown?

My dad’s father was a well-known boxer and night club manager of the Cave nightclub from 1951 until 1956. When Isy Walters took over in 1956, my grandfather then moved to work at the Penthouse Club in Vancouver.

Before being a club manager, my grandfather was a police officer and before that, he was a shore patrol military police officer.

My dad and his brother grew up learning to fight. My grandfather owned a boxing gym and helped my dad do well in boxing. My father even held his own, fighting an ex- Golden Gloves champion.

In 1982, I brought dad to see the Larry Holmes and Gerry Cooney heavyweight fight at the Caesar’s Palace Hotel in Las Vegas. Ryan O’Neil and Farrah Fawcett sat near us. I paid for all the expenses on the trip including rooms, food and shows.

My father was no stranger to seeing famous celebrities. Leana Horne, Lucille Star, Keray Regan and other performers were some of the visitors at my grandfather and father’s home in Lynn Valley, after their performances in my grandfather’s Cave Supper Club in Vancouver, BC,

In recent years my father traveled to Las Vegas to stay a few nights at Lucille Starr and Bob Regan’s home. The home was impressive and had a swimming pool that was shaped like a guitar.

Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Fats Domino, Lena Horne and other entertainers from the 1950’s preformed at the Cave when my grandfather worked there. Grandfather told me that the club’s orchestra sounded great as the sound bounced off the stalactite filled curved cave like ceilings and walls.

I visited the Cave Nightclub many times between 1977 and 1981. By then my grandfather was no longer the manager. In my time, I did not see the iconic performers from above, but I did enjoy seeing Doug and The Slugs and the Village People.

Quoting the 2017 book, Liquor Lust and The law by Aaron Chapman: The after-hours watering hole for the famous and infamous, the Penthouse was opened in 1947 by brothers Joe, Ross, Mickey and Jimmy Filippone and soon became the place to see and be seen in Vancouver in the 1950s and ’60s.

Acts like Sammy Davis Jr. , Nat King Cole and Duke Ellington regularly performed on the Penthouse stage and audiences often included visiting stars such as Frank Sinatra, Errol Flynn, Gary Cooper and many others.

Today, the Penthouse Nightclub website shows it as a female striptease establishment.

I have never been there, so I do not know when that form of entertainment started, but according to my father, it was a classy place when my grandfather worked there.

My father told me that my grandfather’s photo with Lena Horne remained on the wall, the last time he was there in 2021. A relative sent me a photo of that picture on the wall in November 2022.

Quoting Vancouver Courier Newspaper columnist Grant Lawrence’s Nov 20, 2017 article: Everyone from Ella Fitzgerald to Sting has hung out at the Penthouse. More than 65 movies and TV shows have been filmed within its glittery walls.

Local historian and author Aaron Chapman published Liquor, Lust and the Law: The Story of Vancouver’s legendary Penthouse Nightclub.

The book was an immediate hit and a No. 1 bestseller in BC It showcased the club in a new light for a wide audience, many of whom had never set foot inside.

Chapman portrayed the Penthouse as a historically relevant site, a building that holds a thousand stories and the setting for the saga of the rags-to-riches immigrant Filippone family.

I owned a gym between 1983 and 1986 and managed other gyms until 1995. Between 1986 and 1995, I managed gyms while selling advertising specialties that my father’s factory produced.

Part of being an advertising executive sometimes involved organizing sponsors and monies for charity walk, run or lift marathons.

One such event involved me donating imprinted T-shirts to BC Lion’s footballer, Sammy Green’s Skid Road outreach. Mr. Green was a former 4th round draft pick of football’s Miami Dolphins. Later he became a BC Lions football star.

Mr. Green and I worked the radio station interview circuit to raise money. A CFUN radio Host helped us to reach his listeners by talking about us selling our event T-shirts. After interviewing us on his show, many callers purchased our shirts.

I donated the money to my Church, who leased the Lux Theatre on Vancouver’s Skid Row. Drug addicts from the Skid Row area came in for free hot-dogs and listened to Mr. Green’s messages.

Mr. Greene’s messages were about how addicts take drugs for emotional pain and athletes take pain killers for physical pain. On the pulpit, Mr. Green said: physiotherapy is better than pain killers for football injuries, just as God is better than drugs for emotional injuries.

This message worked and many addicts got off drugs and alcohol. They also started to regularly attend our Skid Row satellite church.

Sammy Greene and I became friends. We worked out at my gym and went jogging together several times. He even paid me to write an outline of a book about his life. I lost contact with Mr. Greene, so I do not know if he published his book.

Another friend of mine from my gym management days was Bob Birdsong. Mr. Birdsong was a Mr. Universe Champion and a Christian Evangelist.

If you are ever at Muscle Beach Outdoor Gym at Venice Beach California, take a look at Bob Birdsong’s plaque, it is next to Arnold Schwarzenegger’s one.

I was fortunate to be the master-of-the-ceremonies at the Sun Run after party on their event main stage, so I invited Bob Birdsong to share that honour with me. We took turns introducing the musicians.

A gym that I managed was a sponsor of the Sun Run. The Sun Run is an event that occurs once a year. Over 40,000 runners take part yearly in this charity event.

As a sponsor, I had access to a booth where Sun Run T-shirts that I produced were available for purchase and I made sure that the profits went to my Church.

My father ran Nashville Sun Records Promotions for Canada at the time. My father was instrumental in me getting a Nashville Sun recording artist band called The Marlaine Sisters to volunteer to perform for 40,000 Sun Run participants.

Mr. Birdsong and I took turns introducing the Marlaine Sisters and a couple of other amazing singers from my church at the Sun Run Plaza of Nations stage.

Any company with a good name, could go through my father, to pay to have their logo imprinted on Sun’s Records. These companies would give away these cassettes, or records, in their promotions.

My father was the distributor for Sun Records for many years, for this purpose.

My father arranged for a commercial video to have the Marlaine’s music added to the track that advertised images of the Vancouver Sun Run.

The Marlaine’s manager gave us one song without charge owned by the Marlaine’s and not Sun Records, to be used for this charity event video.

My son, Dexter was accepted to sing at the Sun Run every year because of the favours that my father and I did for the Vancouver Sun Newspaper Group.

Visitors at gyms that I worked at included Engelbert Humperdinck, Charlton Heston, Tom Selleck and others. I enjoyed talking to Tom Selleck while he rode on a Lifecycle Bike. Tom Selleck is a very nice person.

I owned one European Spa Fitness Centre in a chain of 200 locations. I also managed one of their locations in a hotel. The show lounge in the hotel could be viewed from our tropical pool area that was under a glass dome.

The show lounge featured bands like The Nylons, Gerry Marsden and many others.

The Vancouver Mayor Mike Harcourt also visited my gym. Mr. Harcourt gave me a nice letter of appreciation for holding an event called, Lift- For Life.

Tom McGee a WWF wrestler, movie actor and worlds Strongest Man Champion and other athletes competed in our Lift for Life weight lift-athon.

My staff, my gym partner, Hammer, and I received donations totalling $25,000 that we gave to Mr. Harcourt for his African Famine relief project. Mr. McGee belonged as a member of our Gym. This link tells his story:

https://www.dawrestlingsite.com/wrestling/flashback_reviews/wwe/misc/surreal-saga-tom-magee.php

My book should be interesting for people to read who want improvement in their lives. Besides writing about my personal and family history, I write about