NEIGHBORHOOD MEMORIES.

NEIGHBORHOOD MEMORIES. The first GODFATHER movie had a lot of early problems with the Mafia. Joe Colombo, who was known as the head of one of the five Mafia families in New York, had formed the Italian-American Civil Rights League, which had as one of its goals the elimination of the word “Mafia” from the language. The Mark Seal article I linked to yesterday describes the negotiations between Colombo and the producers of the GODFATHER about the making of the movie. This wikipedia article describes how the Italian-American Civil Rights League had some 150,000 people in Columbus Circle for its first Italian-American Unity Day rally in June 1970. At the time I was living on Downing Street in Greenwich Village. Downing Street ran for two blocks between an intersection with Sixth Avenue, Carmine Street and Bleecker Street on the East and the large commercial buildings of Varick (Seventh Avenue) on the West. Looking East from my apartment building, the street was covered with green, white and red pennants, and liberally applied green, white and red paint. There was a festive atmosphere. Looking West, the street had mainly the backs of buildings,. There were no social clubs and no older ladies sitting on folding chairs, and there was no decoration. I met a fellow tenant on the stoop, and he looked up and down the block and said, “I hope the protection runs all the way to the end of the street.” The next year there was a second Italian-American Unity Day celebration, and the day before, the Eastern part of my street and the neighboring streets were even more festive. At the celebration the next day, Joe Colombo was shot. When I got home from work, the streets were very quiet and some of the pennants were already gone.