Tag Archives: Mafia

The origin of Johnny Four Fingers

6 Apr

Nicknames

By Lanny Morgnanesi

On Facebook, I saw posts listing 10 people “I’ve met,” with one being a lie. I decided to play and put up these 10.

  1. Johnny Four Fingers
  2. Frank “Two Meatballs” Ferretti
  3. Bing Bang Ciao
  4. Joey Lollipops
  5. Pauli “Rembrandt” Scungeel
  6. Spinach Face Tommy
  7. Tony Loud Cry
  8. Pasquale “Dog Shoes” Maroni
  9. Vincent Steam Breath Bug Eyes
  10. Nathan the Nickel

Then I realized the more curious readers might want to know how these men got their names. So here at NotebookM I’ve decided to provide that information.

Johnny Four Fingers – As a child, his big hands prevented him from reaching inside a soda machine to steal Cokes. So he used his father’s power saw to remedy that.

Frank “Two Meatballs” Ferretti – Always thin, his grandmother said she’d give him a quarter if he gained weight. To look heavier, he stuffed a meatball into each cheek.

Bing Bang Ciao – Upon leaving a drinking establishment, he would always bang his left fist on the bar, then bang his right, then say good night.

Joey Lollipops – He robbed a corner store but took only candy.

Pauli “Rembrandt” Scungeel – The best forger in Brooklyn.

Spinach Face Tommy – Chronic acne.

Tony Loud Cry – A rival gang caught him and threatened to cut off his testicles and shove them up his rectum. His lament was heard three blocks away.

Pasquale “Dog Shoes” Moroni – The heat went out at a cheap motel where he was staying with a hooker. He took her fake fur and fashioned it into slippers.

Vincent Steam Breath Bug Eyes – He survived a garroting, but it was not pretty.

Nathan the Nickel – He lived on Fifth Street, as opposed to Nathan the Dime, who lived on 10th.

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Should hit men get medals?

26 Jan

Author Gay Talese

Mafioso Bill Bonanno

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Like many Americans, and certainly many Italian-Americans, I have a mild fascination with the Mafia. So when I came across an old copy of Gay Talese’s “Honor Thy Father,” I started reading it. Talese was an early and very successful practitioner of something called The New Journalism. Now it’s just called writing, but it caused a big stir in the ‘70s.

The book was one of the first to take a human look at Mafioso, specifically Bill Bonanno, whose father was a New York don. Talese provides a somewhat sympathetic look at the Mafia. Talese says this about Bill:

When he went to ROTC camp, and later into military service with the Army Reserves, he was trained in the technique of legal killing. He learned how to use a bayonet, how to fire an M-1 rifle, how to adjust the range finder of a cannon in a Patton tank. He memorized the United States military code, which in principle was not dissimilar from the Mafia’s, emphasizing honor, obedience, and silence if captured. And if he had gone into combat and had killed several North Koreans or Chinese Communists he might have become a hero. But if he killed one of his father’s enemies in a Mafia war, where buried in the issues was the same mixture of greed and self-righteousness found in all the wars of great nations, he could be charged with murder.

In the post-Soprano age, I’m curious how people might react to such a statement. Please comment. Was Talese accurate in his analysis, or was he trying to sell a revisionist image of beastly men?

By the way, if you would like to sample a shorter-form piece by Gay Talese, I suggest: “Frank Sinatra has a cold,” said to be the best piece of non-fiction ever published in Esquire magazine.

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