Grant Street in a central Ohio town was the home of prosperous citizens when the town was founded - the managers and specialists in many of the manufacturing industries that started up in the area. They built sturdy and roomy row houses near the city’s business center. Each house sported at its entrance a flight of stone steps that rose from the street to its second floor where the parlor and dining room were located. The polish and cleanliness of these stairs of granite or marble was a cultural tradition of the Grant Street residents.
After the town had existed in its current incarnation for over one hundred years the Grant Street homes were no longer filled with wealthy people but a working class population where everybody that could work for pay did so, and often several jobs. The community continued the tradition of pride in clean, polished, entrance stairs even in rental houses.
Three boys, all in the same grade in public school were sitting on one such flight of stairs. The stairs were old and slightly worn but still they were of superior quality to the cement stairs on bigger, costlier homes across town in the new suburbs. That distinction didn’t occur to the boys but they did feel a buzz from the elegance of their seats that would make the more prosperous kids from across town envious.
The three boys didn’t look at all alike and they were each being coached in different religions. Each was a third generation immigrant with a name that was a large clue to their ancestor’s origins; Lloyd -Wales, Fritz - Prussia,
Riley - Ireland.
Today, in the 1950s, they discussed their grandfathers, all of whom were from the “old country”.
Lloyd’s grandfather had left the underground terrors of a Welsh coal mine as a young man. He ended up handling the same material above ground in the inferno of a Carnegie blast furnace. He repressed the hatred for his employers that paid a pittance for his sweat and the degradation of his body. Lloyd said the twelve hour shifts that his grandfather worked during WW II left him a broken man that now spent most of his time with his buddies in a bar.
Fritz said that his grandfather had been a mathematics professor who had been wounded and captured by the British early in WW I. He had learned to speak English while in captivity and he emigrated to the United States during the 1920s. Unable to get a teaching position, he became a book keeper for a bootlegger mobster. His boss was liquidated by the Capone Gang and only the book keeper knew the location of his boss’s wealth. Fritz’s grandfather left Chicago, cleaned out the whiskey money and retired to this town with a new name. He started making wooden toys for his grand children and then branched out to toys for charities. He opened up a little shop and hires veterans to make free toys to be given away at Christmas. Fritz had a collection of every style his grandfather had designed. Originally they were small wooden trains, cars, trucks and the likes but now the grandfather is hiring carvers and makes small wooden animals too.
Riley was the last to talk about his grandfather. He had a rather confidential attitude as though he was leaking a secret. “My Dad’s father guards our house. My father asked him to take care of the family.”
Riley’s father had been a policeman in the town. He had been murdered over eight years ago by a prison escapee that he had confronted. The grandfather had been a policeman too, the chief of the town police force. He had been executed by a mob over twenty years ago. The other kids knew that Riley’s father and grandfather were dead. They were startled by Riley’s statement.
“When my grandfather was police chief, he equipped the force with Smith & Wesson revolvers and ammunition that were US Navy surplus. The Navy’s revolvers were replaced with Colt 45 automatics. The revolvers used the .38 S&W cartridge which wasn’t very powerful. Most police forces had abandoned the less powerful sidearms because the .32 S&W and the .38 S&W cartridges couldn’t shoot through a car door. Grandpa got a lot of surplus Navy ammunition for the revolvers and it all had a full metal jacket. It was almost free and the police force could do a lot of target practice. The .38 S&W cartridge was adequate if it was properly placed.
During prohibition, grandfather was ambushed a number of times and he always hit his attackers right between the eyes. After grandfather was murdered, the mob boss that had him killed was found shot between the eyes with a .38 S&W full metal jacketed slug. They compared the slug to the ones that had been dug out of the target backstop at the range position grandfather used and it was from the same gun. Months before, Grandfather’s gun had been buried with him.”
”When my Dad was shot, he asked grandfather to take care of the family. The man that shot my father was also found shot between the eyes with a .38 S&W full metal jacketed slug. It was from the same gun buried with grandfather.”
“The mob tried to get even - there was only my mother and I to punish. Several months later a thug was found hanging out of our second story window. The window sash had been slammed down and broke his neck as he tried to crawl into my bedroom, his head was in and his body hung out. The ladder he came up on was still there. I was only seven then.”
“Two months later, the son of the gang boss who had taken over, was found shot between the eyes. It was a .38 S&W full metal jacket. It was from grandfather’s revolver. The gang scattered and we have never been bothered since. Grandfather must still be watching.”
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