Atlantic City Quotes

For Jenn At 12 years old I started bleeding with the moon and beating up boys who dreamed of becoming astronauts. I fought with my knuckles white as stars, and left bruises the shape of Salem. There are things we know by heart, and things we don't. At 13 my friend Jen tried to teach me how to blow rings of smoke. I'd watch the nicotine rising from her lips like halos, but I could never make dying beautiful. The sky didn't fill with colors the night I convinced myself veins are kite strings you can only cut free. I suppose I love this life, in spite of my clenched fist. I open my palm and my lifelines look like branches from an Aspen tree, and there are songbirds perched on the tips of my fingers, and I wonder if Beethoven held his breath the first time his fingers touched the keys the same way a soldier holds his breath the first time his finger clicks the trigger. We all have different reasons for forgetting to breathe. But my lungs remember the day my mother took my hand and placed it on her belly and told me the symphony beneath was my baby sister's heartbeat. And I knew life would tremble like the first tear on a prison guard's hardened cheek, like a prayer on a dying man's lips, like a vet holding a full bottle of whisky like an empty gun in a war zone… just take me just take me Sometimes the scales themselves weigh far too much, the heaviness of forever balancing blue sky with red blood. We were all born on days when too many people died in terrible ways, but you still have to call it a birthday. You still have to fall for the prettiest girl on the playground at recess and hope she knows you can hit a baseball further than any boy in the whole third grade and I've been running for home through the windpipe of a man who sings while his hands playing washboard with a spoon on a street corner in New Orleans where every boarded up window is still painted with the words We're Coming Back like a promise to the ocean that we will always keep moving towards the music, the way Basquait slept in a cardboard box to be closer to the rain. Beauty, catch me on your tongue. Thunder, clap us open. The pupils in our eyes were not born to hide beneath their desks. Tonight lay us down to rest in the Arizona desert, then wake us washing the feet of pregnant women who climbed across the border with their bellies aimed towards the sun. I know a thousand things louder than a soldier's gun. I know the heartbeat of his mother. Don't cover your ears, Love. Don't cover your ears, Life. There is a boy writing poems in Central Park and as he writes he moves and his bones become the bars of Mandela's jail cell stretching apart, and there are men playing chess in the December cold who can't tell if the breath rising from the board is their opponents or their own, and there's a woman on the stairwell of the subway swearing she can hear Niagara Falls from her rooftop in Brooklyn, and I'm remembering how Niagara Falls is a city overrun with strip malls and traffic and vendors and one incredibly brave river that makes it all worth it. Ya'll, I know this world is far from perfect. I am not the type to mistake a streetlight for the moon. I know our wounds are deep as the Atlantic. But every ocean has a shoreline and every shoreline has a tide that is constantly returning to wake the songbirds in our hands, to wake the music in our bones, to place one fearless kiss on the mouth of that brave river that has to run through the center of our hearts to find its way home.

I get the urge to feel it, too, so when she takes her hand away, I turn her toward me and I feel the edges of New Jersey. I kiss Hoboken and Atlantic City. I kiss Newark and Trenton. I kiss Camden, and then I follow the road west, over the Walt Whitman Bridge into Pennsylvania. And I kiss home.

I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving, hysterical, naked... who passed through universities with radiant cool eyes hallucinating Arkansas and Blake-light tragedy among the scholars of war... who vanished into nowhere Zen New Jersey leaving a trail of ambiguous picture postcards of Atlantic City Hall... who wandered around and around at midnight in the railroad yard wondering where to go, and went, leaving no broken hearts...

If there is one word to describe Atlantic City, it's Big Business -- Or two words Big Business." -- ("President"(!)) Donald Trump

Once, coming back on his plane with a billionaire friend who had brought along a foreign model, Trump, trying to move in on his friend’s date, urged a stop in Atlantic City. He would provide a tour of his casino. His friend assured the model that there was nothing to recommend Atlantic City. It was a place overrun by white trash. “What is this ‘white trash’?” asked the model. “They’re people just like me,” said Trump, “only they’re poor.

A fortuneteller at a magicians' convention in Atlantic City once told him that when he fell in love it would be forever, and he laughed at the notion, but now he sees that reading was completely on target.

Never been here before. It's like something on the top floor of a luxury high-rise casino in Atlantic City, where they put semi-retarded adults from South Philly after they've blundered into the mega jackpot" Hiro Protagonist - Snow Crash

Possible outfits rolled in her head like a slot machine in Atlantic City.

It's better to live one day as a lion than a thousand as a lamb." -- Nicodemo "Little Nicky" Scarfo (boss of the Philadelphia/Atlantic City Mafia Family)

There is a whirlwind in southern Morocco, the aajej, against which the fellahin defend themselves with knives. There is the africo, which has at times reached into the city of Rome. The alm, a fall wind out of Yugoslavia. The arifi, also christened aref or rifi, which scorches with numerous tongues. These are permanent winds that live in the present tense. There are other, less constant winds that change direction, that can knock down horse and rider and realign themselves anticlockwise. The bist roz leaps into Afghanistan for 170 days--burying villages. There is the hot, dry ghibli from Tunis, which rolls and rolls and produces a nervous condition. The haboob--a Sudan dust storm that dresses in bright yellow walls a thousand metres high and is followed by rain. The harmattan, which blows and eventually drowns itself into the Atlantic. Imbat, a sea breeze in North Africa. Some winds that just sigh towards the sky. Night dust storms that come with the cold. The khamsin, a dust in Egypt from March to May, named after the Arabic word for 'fifty,' blooming for fifty days--the ninth plague of Egypt. The datoo out of Gibraltar, which carries fragrance. There is also the ------, the secret wind of the desert, whose name was erased by a king after his son died within it. And the nafhat--a blast out of Arabia. The mezzar-ifoullousen--a violent and cold southwesterly known to Berbers as 'that which plucks the fowls.' The beshabar, a black and dry northeasterly out of the Caucasus, 'black wind.' The Samiel from Turkey, 'poison and wind,' used often in battle. As well as the other 'poison winds,' the simoom, of North Africa, and the solano, whose dust plucks off rare petals, causing giddiness. Other, private winds. Travelling along the ground like a flood. Blasting off paint, throwing down telephone poles, transporting stones and statue heads. The harmattan blows across the Sahara filled with red dust, dust as fire, as flour, entering and coagulating in the locks of rifles. Mariners called this red wind the 'sea of darkness.' Red sand fogs out of the Sahara were deposited as far north as Cornwall and Devon, producing showers of mud so great this was also mistaken for blood. 'Blood rains were widely reported in Portugal and Spain in 1901.' There are always millions of tons of dust in the air, just as there are millions of cubes of air in the earth and more living flesh in the soil (worms, beetles, underground creatures) than there is grazing and existing on it. Herodotus records the death of various armies engulfed in the simoom who were never seen again. One nation was 'so enraged by this evil wind that they declared war on it and marched out in full battle array, only to be rapidly and completely interred.

Stephanie had been raped, beaten and left for dead on the Atlantic City Boardwalk several times. You'd think she would have hit rock bottom after those experiences. But no. None of that made her quit. It just made her want to use even more drugs, to forget her miserable life. As long as she could get high, she didn't care if she was being raped in a dark alley. At this point in her life, a lethal overdose probably would have felt like her salvation.

I got a little carried away one day and sold my entire load of meat on my way to a delivery in Atlantic City. I put the seal on my lock after the whole load of meat was transferred to the guy. When I got to Atlantic City the seal was broken by the manager and there was no meat inside and I was mystified.

If you find someone who makes you feel like you're complete, you need to fight for them.

Costello must have been the guiding genius behind the 1929 Atlantic City gathering when Al Capone came to confer with the bootleggers of the East Coast.

If there's one word to describe Atlantic City, it's Big Business. Or two words--Big Business.

her feelings were complicated. Not since Atlantic City had she lowered her guard enough to let someone else get so close, and that ended up being a nightmare.

In the early 1990s, Trump made a disastrous foray into the gambling business in Atlantic City, and his empire nearly collapsed in multiple bankruptcies.

In Atlantic City about to get my crunk on. I don't know what that means.

Well now everything dies, baby that’s a fact. But maybe everything that dies, someday comes back. — Bruce Springsteen, “Atlantic City

I was lost, all right. Lost in 1955, in this Atlantic City version of Pleasantville.

New Rule: America must stop bragging it's the greatest country on earth, and start acting like it. I know this is uncomfortable for the "faith over facts" crowd, but the greatness of a country can, to a large degree, be measured. Here are some numbers. Infant mortality rate: America ranks forty-eighth in the world. Overall health: seventy-second. Freedom of the press: forty-fourth. Literacy: fifty-fifth. Do you realize there are twelve-year old kids in this country who can't spell the name of the teacher they're having sex with? America has done many great things. Making the New World democratic. The Marshall Plan. Curing polio. Beating Hitler. The deep-fried Twinkie. But what have we done for us lately? We're not the freest country. That would be Holland, where you can smoke hash in church and Janet Jackson's nipple is on their flag. And sadly, we're no longer a country that can get things done. Not big things. Like building a tunnel under Boston, or running a war with competence. We had six years to fix the voting machines; couldn't get that done. The FBI is just now getting e-mail. Prop 87 out here in California is about lessening our dependence on oil by using alternative fuels, and Bill Clinton comes on at the end of the ad and says, "If Brazil can do it, America can, too!" Since when did America have to buck itself up by saying we could catch up to Brazil? We invented the airplane and the lightbulb, they invented the bikini wax, and now they're ahead? In most of the industrialized world, nearly everyone has health care and hardly anyone doubts evolution--and yes, having to live amid so many superstitious dimwits is also something that affects quality of life. It's why America isn't gonna be the country that gets the inevitable patents in stem cell cures, because Jesus thinks it's too close to cloning. Oh, and did I mention we owe China a trillion dollars? We owe everybody money. America is a debtor nation to Mexico. We're not a bridge to the twenty-first century, we're on a bus to Atlantic City with a roll of quarters. And this is why it bugs me that so many people talk like it's 1955 and we're still number one in everything. We're not, and I take no glee in saying that, because I love my country, and I wish we were, but when you're number fifty-five in this category, and ninety-two in that one, you look a little silly waving the big foam "number one" finger. As long as we believe being "the greatest country in the world" is a birthright, we'll keep coasting on the achievements of earlier generations, and we'll keep losing the moral high ground. Because we may not be the biggest, or the healthiest, or the best educated, but we always did have one thing no other place did: We knew soccer was bullshit. And also we had the Bill of Rights. A great nation doesn't torture people or make them disappear without a trial. Bush keeps saying the terrorist "hate us for our freedom,"" and he's working damn hard to see that pretty soon that won't be a problem.

I am an Ivy league graduate. I have a Harvard MBA. I’ve opened casinos in Las Vegas, Atlantic City, and the French Riviera. I’ve worked for the Santangelo’s, the Lucchetti’s and the Gambino’s.

Most travel experts recommend that even if your final destination is Miami, it's better to fly to an airport in some other city - if necessary, Seattle - and take a cab from there. Or, as Savvy Air Traveler magazine suggests, 'simply jump out of the plane while it's still over the Atlantic'.

when we were all boarding his helicopter for a trip to Atlantic City, the airlift facility refused to fuel the helicopter. One of the guys took out his own Mobil card and charged $2000 worth of gas.” Donald has said, “Once you have enough to eat and live, money is about ego.” To survive, he had to let others manage his affairs, which was humbling enough. Harder still was giving up the fantasy,

I didn't have a choice." "Are you saying...What are you saying?" Is he...could he be talking about me? He runs a hand through his hair. I've never seen him this emotional before. He's always so controlled, so sure of himself. "I'm saying you're what I want, Emma. I'm saying I'm in love with you." He steps forward and lifts his hand to my cheek, blazing a line of fire with his fingertips as they trace down to my mouth. "How do you think it would make me feel to see you with Grom?" he whispers. "Like someone ripped my heart out and put it through Rachel's meat grinder, that's how. Probably worse. It would probably kill me. Emma, please don't cry." I throw my hands in the air. "Don't cry? Are you serious? Why did you come here, Galen? Did you think it would make me feel better to know that you do love me, but that it still won't work out? That I still have to mate with Grom for the greater good? Don't you tell me not to cry, Galen! I...c...c...can't h...h...help-" The waterworks soak me. Galen looks at me, hands by his side, helpless as a trapped crab. I'm bordering on hyperventilation, and pretty soon I'll start hiccupping. This is too much. His expression is so severe, it looks like he's in physical pain. "Emma," he breathes. "Emma, does this mean you feel the same way? Do you care for me at all?" I laugh, but it sounds sharper than I intended, because of a hiccup. "What does it matter how I feel, Galen? I think we pretty much covered why. No need to rehash things, right?" "It matters, Emma." He grabs my hand and pulls me to him again. "Tell me right now. Do you care for me?" "If you can't tell that I'm stupid in love with you, Galen, then you aren't a very good ambassador for the hum-" His mouth covers mine, cutting me off. This kiss isn't gentle like the first one. It's definitely not sweet. It's rough, demanding, searching. And disorienting. There's not a part of me that isn't melting against Galen, not a part that isn't combusting with his fevered touch. I accidentally moan into his lips. He takes it for his cue to lift me off my feet, to pull me up to his height for more leverage. I take his groan for my cue to kiss him harder. He ignores his cell phone ringing in his pocket. I ignore the rest of the universe. Even when headlights approach, I'm willing to overlook their intrusion and keep kissing. But, prince that he is, Galen is a little more refined than me at this moment. He gently pries his lips from mine and sets me down. His smile is both intoxicated and intoxicating. "We still need to talk." "Right," I say, but I'm shaking my head. He laughs. "I didn't come all the way to Atlantic City to make you cry." "I'm not crying." I lean into him again. He doesn't refuse my lips, but he doesn't do them justice either, planting a measly little kiss on them before stepping back.

New Orleans will be the new Las Vegas or, more like it, Atlantic City: a big gaudy façade for all the high-rollers, controlled by mobsters and businessmen who live far, far away and destroy everything they touch,

This trip to Atlantic City was multi-purpose, which was not unusual for government operations in which I was forced to participate. I had a major cocaine transaction involving Noriega to attend at the airport; a message to deliver to Philip Habib pertaining to the Contras, and another programmed in by Habib in answer to Reagan; country music "entertainment" 4 aspects; and prostitution to Habib according to Reagan's instruction.

Vinny was flying on Learjets all over the country to gamble. The fact is, Vinny Gorgeous was the mirror image of John Gotti. The two mob bosses were degenerate gamblers. Vinny even got himself barred from Atlantic City.

When Paris is asked to judge the three goddesses, says Jane Harrison in her wonderful book Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion, it amounts to a male put-down of the Goddess. For here were the three major classical goddesses, the three aspects of the one Goddess who is manifested in these three modes, and here is Paris, a languid young man, judging them as though in an Atlantic City beauty contest! And they are vying for his vote by giving him bribes and promises.

On my way out of [Atlantic City] at quarter after seven in the morning, a young pump jockey at the gas station [...] mentioned that another man had lost $20,000 at Trop World a few hours earlier and had to be dragged out of the casino kicking and screaming. I asked if this happened a lot. "Man," he said, "there's a whole world of losers out there, and sooner or later they all end up here. Only they don't think they're losers. When they find out, it's like the surprise of their life.

Someday I’d like to go to Atlantic City with you not to gamble (just being there with you is enough of a gamble) but to ride the high white breakers have a Manhattan and listen to a baritone saxophone play a tune called “Salsa Eyes” with you beside me on a banquette but why stop there let’s go to Paris in November when it’s raining and we read the Tribune at La Rotonde our hotel room has a big bathtub I knew you’d like that and we can be a couple of unknown Americans what are we waiting for let’s go

[T]he hyphenation question is, and always has been and will be, different for English immigrants. One can be an Italian-American, a Greek-American, an Irish-American and so forth. (Jews for some reason prefer the words the other way around, as in 'American Jewish Congress' or 'American Jewish Committee.') And any of those groups can and does have a 'national day' parade on Fifth Avenue in New York. But there is no such thing as an 'English-American' let alone a 'British-American,' and one can only boggle at the idea of what, if we did exist, our national day parade on Fifth Avenue might look like. One can, though, be an Englishman in America. There is a culture, even a literature, possibly a language, and certainly a diplomatic and military relationship, that can accurately be termed 'Anglo-American.' But something in the very landscape and mapping of America, with seven eastern seaboard states named for English monarchs or aristocrats and countless hamlets and cities replicated from counties and shires across the Atlantic, that makes hyphenation redundant. Hyphenation—if one may be blunt—is for latecomers.

Cruise through the gargantuan sites—YouTube, Amazon, Yahoo!—and it’s as though modernism never existed. Twentieth-century print design never existed. European and Japanese design never existed. The Web’s aesthetic might be called late-stage Atlantic City or early-stage Mall of America.

The Teamsters pension fund organized by Hoffa almost immediately became a source of loans to the national crime syndicate known to the public as La Cosa Nostra. With its own private bank, this crime monopoly grew and flourished. Teamsters-funded ventures, especially the construction of casinos in Havana and Las Vegas, where dreams come true for the godfather entrepreneurs. The sky was the limit and more was anticipated. At the time of Jimmy Hoffa’s disappearance in 1975 Atlantic City was about to open up to legalized gambling. Jimmy’s cut was to get a finder’s fee off the books.

The consequences of this amassing of fortunes were first felt in the catastrophe experienced by small farmers in Europe and England. The peasants became impoverished, dependent workers crowded into city slums. For the first time in human history, the majority of Europeans depended for their livelihood on a small wealthy minority, a phenomenon that capitalist-based colonialism would spread worldwide. The symbol of this new development, indeed its currency, was gold. Gold fever drove colonizing ventures, organized at first in pursuit of the metal in its raw form. Later the pursuit of gold became more sophisticated, with planters and merchants establishing whatever conditions were necessary to hoard as much gold as possible. Thus was born an ideology: the belief in the inherent value of gold despite its relative uselessness in reality. Investors, monarchies, and parliamentarians devised methods to control the processes of wealth accumulation and the power that came with it, but the ideology behind gold fever mobilized settlers to cross the Atlantic to an unknown fate. Subjugating entire societies and civilizations, enslaving whole countries, and slaughtering people village by village did not seem too high a price to pay, nor did it appear inhumane. The systems of colonization were modern and rational, but its ideological basis was madness.

The interracial MFDP came to Atlantic City and requested to be seated in place of the regular Mississippi delegation, which everyone knew had been elected through fraud and violence. The MFDP’s electrifying vice chair, Fannie Lou Hamer, riveted the nation in her live televised testimony at the convention. “If the Freedom Democratic Party is not

By day, contrary to common wisdom, you probably won’t see the Great Pyramids at Giza, and you certainly won’t see the Great Wall of China. Their obscurity is partly the result of having been made from the soil and stone of the surrounding landscape. And although the Great Wall is thousands of miles long, it’s only about twenty feet wide—much narrower than the U.S. interstate highways you can barely see from a transcontinental jet. From orbit, with the unaided eye, you would have seen smoke plumes rising from the oil-field fires in Kuwait at the end of the first Persian Gulf War in 1991 and smoke from the burning World Trade Center towers in New York City on September 11, 2001. You will also notice the green–brown boundaries between swaths of irrigated and arid land. Beyond that shortlist, there’s not much else made by humans that’s identifiable from hundreds of miles up in the sky. You can see plenty of natural scenery, though, including hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico, ice floes in the North Atlantic, and volcanic eruptions wherever they occur.

businessmen learned quickly that working-class tourists had money to spend, too. What they lacked in sophistication they made up for in numbers.

Never been here before. It's like something on the top floor of a luxury high-rise casino in Atlantic City, where they put semi-retarded adults from South Philly after they've blundered into the mega-jackpot. It's got everything that a dimwitted pathological gambler would identify with luxury: gold-plated fixtures, lots of injection-molded pseudomarble, velvet drapes, and a butler.

Antidepression medication is temperamental. Somewhere around fifty-nine or sixty I noticed the drug I’d been taking seemed to have stopped working. This is not unusual. The drugs interact with your body chemistry in different ways over time and often need to be tweaked. After the death of Dr. Myers, my therapist of twenty-five years, I’d been seeing a new doctor whom I’d been having great success with. Together we decided to stop the medication I’d been on for five years and see what would happen... DEATH TO MY HOMETOWN!! I nose-dived like the diving horse at the old Atlantic City steel pier into a sloshing tub of grief and tears the likes of which I’d never experienced before. Even when this happens to me, not wanting to look too needy, I can be pretty good at hiding the severity of my feelings from most of the folks around me, even my doctor. I was succeeding well with this for a while except for one strange thing: TEARS! Buckets of ’em, oceans of ’em, cold, black tears pouring down my face like tidewater rushing over Niagara during any and all hours of the day. What was this about? It was like somebody opened the floodgates and ran off with the key. There was NO stopping it. 'Bambi' tears... 'Old Yeller' tears... 'Fried Green Tomatoes' tears... rain... tears... sun... tears... I can’t find my keys... tears. Every mundane daily event, any bump in the sentimental road, became a cause to let it all hang out. It would’ve been funny except it wasn’t. Every meaningless thing became the subject of a world-shattering existential crisis filling me with an awful profound foreboding and sadness. All was lost. All... everything... the future was grim... and the only thing that would lift the burden was one-hundred-plus on two wheels or other distressing things. I would be reckless with myself. Extreme physical exertion was the order of the day and one of the few things that helped. I hit the weights harder than ever and paddleboarded the equivalent of the Atlantic, all for a few moments of respite. I would do anything to get Churchill’s black dog’s teeth out of my ass. Through much of this I wasn’t touring. I’d taken off the last year and a half of my youngest son’s high school years to stay close to family and home. It worked and we became closer than ever. But that meant my trustiest form of self-medication, touring, was not at hand. I remember one September day paddleboarding from Sea Bright to Long Branch and back in choppy Atlantic seas. I called Jon and said, “Mr. Landau, book me anywhere, please.” I then of course broke down in tears. Whaaaaaaaaaa. I’m surprised they didn’t hear me in lower Manhattan. A kindly elderly woman walking her dog along the beach on this beautiful fall day saw my distress and came up to see if there was anything she could do. Whaaaaaaaaaa. How kind. I offered her tickets to the show. I’d seen this symptom before in my father after he had a stroke. He’d often mist up. The old man was usually as cool as Robert Mitchum his whole life, so his crying was something I loved and welcomed. He’d cry when I’d arrive. He’d cry when I left. He’d cry when I mentioned our old dog. I thought, “Now it’s me.” I told my doc I could not live like this. I earned my living doing shows, giving interviews and being closely observed. And as soon as someone said “Clarence,” it was going to be all over. So, wisely, off to the psychopharmacologist he sent me. Patti and I walked in and met a vibrant, white-haired, welcoming but professional gentleman in his sixties or so. I sat down and of course, I broke into tears. I motioned to him with my hand; this is it. This is why I’m here. I can’t stop crying! He looked at me and said, “We can fix this.” Three days and a pill later the waterworks stopped, on a dime. Unbelievable. I returned to myself. I no longer needed to paddle, pump, play or challenge fate. I didn’t need to tour. I felt normal.

Many great and wonderful deeds are recorded of your state in our histories. But one of them exceeds all the rest in greatness and valour. For these histories tell of a mighty power which unprovoked made an expedition against the whole of Europe and Asia, and to which your city put an end. This power came forth out of the Atlantic Ocean, for in those days the Atlantic was navigable; and there was an island situated in front of the straits which are by you called the Pillars of Heracles; the island was larger than Libya and Asia put together, and was the way to other islands, and from these you might pass to the whole of the opposite continent which surrounded the true ocean; for this sea which is within the Straits of Heracles is only a harbour, having a narrow entrance, but that other is a real sea, and the surrounding land may be most truly called a boundless continent. Now in this island of Atlantis there was a great and wonderful empire which had rule over the whole island and several others, and over parts of the continent, and, furthermore, the men of Atlantis had subjected the parts of Libya within the columns of Heracles as far as Egypt, and of Europe as far as Tyrrhenia. This vast power, gathered into one, endeavoured to subdue at a blow our country and yours and the whole of the region within the straits; and then, Solon, your country shone forth, in the excellence of her virtue and strength, among all mankind. She was pre-eminent in courage and military skill, and was the leader of the Hellenes. And when the rest fell off from her, being compelled to stand alone, after having undergone the very extremity of danger, she defeated and triumphed over the invaders, and preserved from slavery those who were not yet subjugated, and generously liberated all the rest of us who dwell within the pillars. But afterwards there occurred violent earthquakes and floods; and in a single day and night of misfortune all your warlike men in a body sank into the earth, and the island of Atlantis in like manner disappeared in the depths of the sea. For which reason the sea in those parts is impassable and impenetrable, because there is a shoal of mud in the way; and this was caused by the subsidence of the island.

In Atlantic City, Bernie Hayesman looked at the plate of ribs, and he was not happy. He had asked for an omelet, a simple omelet to be sent up to his office, and they had sent ribs. He couldn't understand it. He'd spoken to the chef personally. They'd discussed eggs, if briefly. There was no earthly way "omelet" could have been misconstrued as "ribs". He looked at the plate of ribs, and the ribs looked back. Neither he nor they were overjoyed at the situation.

Frank Sinatra behaved himself around Russell Bufalino. One night at the 500 Club in Atlantic City I heard Russell tell Sinatra: “Sit down or I’ll rip your tongue out and stick it up your ass.” If he had a drink in him Sinatra was an asshole. He’d put on a gorilla suit when he got drunk. He’d go to fight some guy knowing somebody would stop it. He was a bad drinker. Me, if I drink, I want to sing and dance. I guess he figured he was already a singer and a dancer.

Late at night, on April 14, 1912, an English ocean liner was making her first voyage across the Atlantic Ocean. She was going to New York City. Carrying 2,200 passengers, the ship was four city blocks long. Most people believed the ship was unsinkable

I turn on my heel, which is no easy feat in a gravel parking lot. Not losing eye contact with Galen, I stare him down until I get to the door he's opened for me. He seems unconcerned. In fact, he seems downright emotionless. "This better be good," I tell him as I plop down. "You should have returned my calls. Or my texts," he says, his voice tight. As he backs out of the parking space, I yank my cell out of my purse, perusing the texts. "Well, doesn't look like anyone died, so why the hell did you ruin my date?" It's the first time I've ever cursed at royalty and it's liberating. "Or is this a kidnapping? Is Grom in the trunk? Are you taking us on our honeymoon?" You're supposed to be hurting him, not yourself, moron. My lip trembles like the traitor it is. Even though I'm looking away, I can tell Galen's impassive expression has softened because of the way he says, "Emma." "Leave me alone, Galen." He pulls my chin to face him. I knock his hand away. "You can't go forty miles an hour on the interstate, Galen. You need to speed up.” He sighs and presses the gas. By the time we reach a less-embarrassing speed, I’ve abandoned my hurt for rage-o-plenty, struck by the realization that I’ve turned into “that girl.” Not the one who exchanges her doctorate for some kids and a three-bedroom two-bath, but the other kind. That girl who exchanges her dignity and chances for happiness for some possessive loser who beats her when she makes eye contact with some random guy working the hot dog stand. Not that Galen beats me, but after his little show, what will people think? He acted like a lunatic tonight, stalking me to Atlantic City, blowing up my phone, and threatening my date with physical violence. He made serial-killer eyes, for crying out loud. That might be acceptable in the watery grave, but by dry-land standards, it’s the ingredients for a restraining order. And why are we getting off the interstate? “Where are you taking me? I told you I want to go home.” “We need to talk,” he says quietly, taking a dark road just off the exit. “I’ll take you home after I feel you understand.” “I don’t want to talk. You might have realized that when I didn’t answer your calls.” He pulls over on the shoulder of Where-Freaking-Are-We Street. Shutting off the engine, he turns to me, putting his arm around the back of my seat. “I don’t want to break up.” One Mississippi…two Mississippi…”You followed me like a crazy person to tell me that? You ruined my date for that? Mark is a nice guy. I deserve a nice guy, don’t I, Galen?” “Absolutely. But I happen to be a nice guy, too.” Three Mississippi…four Mississippi…”Don’t you mean Grom? And you’re not a nice guy. You threatened Mark with physical pain.” “You threw Rayna through a window. Call it even?” “When are you going to get over that? Besides, she provoked me!” “Mark provoked me, too. He put his hand on your leg. We won’t even talk about the kiss on your cheek. Don’t think I didn’t hear you give him permission either.” “Oh, now that’s rich,” I snort, getting out of the car. Slamming the door, I scream at him. “Now you’re acting jealous on behalf of your brother,” I say, spinning in place. “Can Grom do anything without the almighty Galen helping him?

Whatever else a modern feels when he looks at the night sky, he certainly feels that he is looking out--like one looking out from the saloon entrance on to the dark Atlantic or from the lighted porch upon dark and lonely moors. But if you accepted the Medieval Model you would feel like one looking in. The Earth is 'outside the city wall'. When the sun is up he dazzles us and we cannot see inside. Darkness, our own darkness, draws the veil and we catch a glimpse of the high pomps within the vast, lighted concavity filled with music and life. And, looking in, we do not see, like Meredith's Lucifer, 'the army of unalterable law', but rather the revelry of insatiable love. We are watching the activity of creatures whose experience we can only lamely compare to that of one in the act of drinking, his thirst delighted yet not quenched. For in them the highest of faculties is always exercised without impediment on the noblest object; without satiety, since they can never completely make His perfection their own, yet never frustrated, since at every moment they approximate to Him in the fullest measure of which their nature is capable.

Douglass laid aside his pen for a moment, opened the curtains to the still dark. No sounds at all. On the street, a lone man in rags hurried along, hunched into the wind. He thought then that he had found the word for Dublin: a huddled city. He, too, had spent so many years huddled into himself.

The thought is of the chain of corpses stretching across the Atlantic Ocean to connect Lagos with New Orleans. New Orleans was the largest market for human chattel in the New World. There were twenty-five different slave markets in the city in 1850. This is a secret only because no one wants to know about it. It was at those markets that buyers came to bid on the black men and women who had survived the crossing, but that is a history that is now literally submerged. Actually, it was submerged long before the recent flood, the city’s slaving past drowned in drink and jazz and Mardi Gras. High times: the best cure for history.

Everywhere we turn we encounter the language with which Orwell was so concerned. It's not an economic recession but a "period of accelerated negative growth" or simply "negative economic growth." There's no such thing as acid rain; according to the Environmental Protection Agency it's "poorly buffered precipitation," or more impressively, "atmospheric deposition of anthropogenetically-derived acidic substances," or more subtly "wet deposition." And those aren't gangsters, mobsters, the Mafia, or La Cosa Nostra in Atlantic City; according to the "New Jersey division of Gaming Enforcement" ( a doublespeak title which avoids the use of that dreaded word "gambling") they're "members of a career-offender cartel.

Laziness is a trait in Blacks”: John R. O’Donnell, Trumped!: The Inside Story of the Real Donald Trump—His Cunning Rise and Spectacular Fall (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991). O’Donnell is the former president of Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City. In his memoir, he quoted Trump’s criticism of a Black accountant. Here is the full quote. “Black guys counting my money! I hate it. The only kind of people I want counting my money are short guys that wear yarmulkes every day….I think that the guy is lazy. And it’s probably not his fault, because laziness is a trait in blacks. It really is, I believe that. It’s not anything they can control.” Trump at first denied he said this, but later told a Playboy reporter, “The stuff O’Donnell wrote about me is probably true.

Though I work in New York City, in an office about a mile from the World Trade Center, I was not in New York City when the planes struck. I was on a plane above the Atlantic Ocean, heading back to New York from a family reunion and celebration in Europe. I had said good-bye to my husband in London; he was staying for a wedding of a business friend. I couldn’t wait to see my kids and my parents, who would be waiting for me at a Little League game in our town, about thirty-five miles from New York City. An hour and a half into the flight, I suddenly had the feeling that the plane was making a slow turn. Nobody else seemed to notice. I sat nervously, hoping I was imagining it. But then a stewardess made an announcement. “There has been a catastrophic event affecting all of North American airspace,” she said. “We are returning

When Gene Crutchfield brought his troubled friend to Hopkins in 1938, Hopkins was twenty-four years old and in charge of LeKies Memorial, the Methodist church in the Atlantic City neighborhood. He had taken over the parish the year before and wore a mustache to try to make himself look older. It complemented his horn-rimmed glasses and added a bit of distinction to an otherwise unimpressive medium height and build. Hopkins’s father and grandfather had been Methodist ministers, but tradition was not the reason he had dropped out of law school and entered the ministry. He had been attracted by the ideas then being promoted within the Methodist Church in Virginia. They were ideas of the kind that are now taken for granted in American life—nutrition and welfare support for dependent children; free medical care for the impoverished and the aged; the right of workers to organize a union, to receive a minimum wage, to strike; interracial cooperation.

William Stead recognized the power of the fair immediately. The vision of the White City and its profound contrast to the Black City drove him to write If Christ Came to Chicago, a book often credited with launching the City Beautiful movement, which sought to elevate American cities to the level of the great cities of Europe. Like Stead, civic authorities throughout the world saw the fair as a model of what to strive for. They asked Burnham to apply the same citywide thinking that had gone into the White City to their own cities. He became a pioneer in modern urban planning. He created citywide plans for Cleveland, San Francisco, and Manila and led the turn-of-the-century effort to resuscitate and expand L’Enfant’s vision of Washington, D.C. In each case he worked without a fee. While helping design the new Washington plan, Burnham persuaded the head of the Pennsylvania Railroad, Alexander Cassatt, to remove his freight tracks and depot from the center of the federal mall, thus creating the unobstructed green that extends today from the Capitol to the Lincoln Memorial. Other cities came to Daniel Burnham for citywide plans, among them Fort Worth, Atlantic City, and St. Louis, but he turned them down to concentrate on his last plan, for the city of Chicago. Over the years many aspects of his Chicago plan were adopted, among them the creation of the city’s lovely ribbon of lakefront parks and Michigan Avenue’s “Miracle Mile.” One portion of the lakefront, named Burnham Park in his honor, contains Soldier Field and the Field Museum, which he designed. The park runs south in a narrow green border along the lakeshore all the way to Jackson Park, where the fair’s Palace of Fine Arts, transformed into a permanent structure, now houses the Museum of Science and Industry. It looks out over the lagoons and the Wooded Island, now a wild and tangled place that perhaps would make Olmsted smile—though no doubt he would find features to criticize.

Eli Willard just looked at her for a long moment, and then he announced, 'Lady of the Lake strikes iceberg in mid-Atlantic; 215 drown. New York City fire destroys 700 buildings. Japanese earthquake kills 12,000. Worldwide cholera epidemic kills millions. Wages rise, but prices rise faster. Financial crash occurs on Van Buren's 36th day in office. Nation begins first great depression. Bank failures and closings spread like plague. 200,000 are unemployed. Business bankrupt; only pawnbrokers prosper. Van Buren declares ten-hour days on all federal jobs. There. Does that make you feel any better?

Johnston wrote how by 1990, “Trump’s inability to pay his debts had put him at risk of losing his casinos.”64 The rules of the New Jersey Casino Control Commission required casino owners to have enough liquidity to pay their bills or see their ownership license revoked. Trump would either get a government rescue package or declare bankruptcy. Casino regulators, Johnston wrote, documented that Trump was down to his last $1.6 million.65 He had obligations to make payments on more than $1 billion worth of bonds every ninety days on his three casinos in Atlantic City. Johnston wrote: Trump’s obvious difficulty complying with the financial stability requirements of the Casino Control Act raised a glaring question: Had regulators been monitoring Trump’s finances since he got his casino license in 1982? The answer was no. The regulators had been too busy with work they deemed more important. There was, for example, the predawn arrest of a cocktail waitress named Diane Pussehl, who was pulled from bed and charged with a felony for picking up a $500 chip on the floor of Harrah’s casino. A judge tossed the case out, so the casino regulators filed a misdemeanor charge. It also was tossed. Then they went after Pussehl’s license, arguing she was morally unfit to work in a casino. Pussehl kept her license.66

Little heard of, Dakar with a population of over a million people is the capital and largest city of Senegal. Counting the surrounding area, the population would go well over 2,000,000. This would be our last landing for fuel, before our arrival in Liberia. Our DC-6 took a long turn over the Atlantic and made a slow decent to the runway of the “Aéroport international de Dakar” just north of Dakar. The Portuguese founded Dakar in 1444, as a base for the export of slaves. Dakar came under French rule in 1872 and was the capital of the Mali Federation for a year after 1959. On August 20, 1960, it became the capital of Senegal. It is here that the sand dunes of the North African desert, gives way to the dense tropical rain forests of Equatorial Africa.

Genes, oddly, compromise only a minuscule fraction of it. An enormous proportion-a bewildering 98 percent-is not dedicated to genes per se, but to enormous stretches of DNA that are interspersed between genes (intergenic DNA) or within genes (introns). These long stretches encode no RNA, and no protein: they exist in the genome either because they regulate gene expression, or for reasons that we do not yet understand, or because of no reason whatsoever (i.e., they are "junk" DNA). If the genome were a line stretching across the Atlantic Ocean between North America and Europe, genes would be occasional specks of land strewn across long, dark tracts of water. Laid end to end, these specks would be no longer than the largest Galapagos island or a train line across the city of Tokyo,

No more Boston! This comes on the heels of Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that Miami’s days are numbered: apparently that city is projected to be underwater in “a few years.” And Astra Taylor warns that the flooding of coastal cities and even inland towns and farms may force people to “escape to New Zealand, to the moon, or to Mars.”12 But here’s an anomaly. The Obamas recently acquired property in Martha’s Vineyard for nearly $12 million.13 Very interesting! The property, purchased from the owner of the Boston Celtics, doesn’t merely have ocean views; it sits right on the Atlantic Ocean. The Obamas know about the literature on disappearing coastlines. Obama himself has repeatedly warned of rising sea levels engulfing coastal properties. And presumably everyone who lives on the coasts has access to this literature and has heard these dire warnings.

So much of the most important personal news I'd received in the last several years had come to me by smartphone while I was abroad in the city that I could plot on a map, could represent spatially the events, such as they were, of my early thirties. Place a thumbtack on the wall or drop a flag on Google Maps at Lincoln Center, where, beside the fountain, I took a call from Jon informing me that, for whatever complex of reasons, a friend had shot himself; mark the Noguchi Museum in Long Island City, where I read the message ("Apologies for the mass e-mail...") a close cousin sent out describing the dire condition of her newborn; waiting in line at the post office on Atlantic, the adhan issuing from the adjacent mosque, I received your wedding announcement and was shocked to be shocked, crushed, and started a frightening multi week descent, worse for being so embarrassingly cliched; while in the bathroom at the SoHo Crate and Barrel--the finest semipublic restroom in lower Manhattan--I learned I'd been awarded a grant that would take me overseas for a summer, and so came to associate the corner of Broadway and Houston with all that transpired in Morocco; at Zucotti Park I heard my then-girlfriend was not--as she'd been convinced--pregnant; while buying discounted dress socks at the Century 21 department store across from Ground Zero, I was informed by text that a friend in Oakland had been hospitalized after the police had broken his ribs. And so on: each of these experiences of reception remained, as it were, in situ, so that whenever I returned to a zone where significant news had been received, I discovered that the news and an echo of its attendant affect still awaited me like a curtain of beads.

After four years, he stumbled from the steamy jungles exhausted, his clothes in tatters, trembling and half delirious from a recurrent fever, but with a rare collection of specimens. In the Brazilian port city of Pará, he secured passage home on a barque called the Helen. Midway across the Atlantic, however, the Helen caught fire and Wallace had to scramble into a lifeboat, leaving his precious cargo behind. He watched as the ship, consumed by flames, slid beneath the waves, taking his treasures with it. Undaunted (well, perhaps just a little daunted), Wallace allowed himself a spell of convalescence, then sailed to the other ends of the Earth, to the Malay Archipelago, where he roamed ceaselessly for eight years and collected a staggering 127,000 specimens, including 1,000 insects and 200 species of birds never before recorded, all of which he managed to get safely back to England.

When I saw them on the beach, perfectly tanned, or when I watched them twirling in the waves, I grasped the transcendental element in surf music. It was all about freedom from the rules of life, the whole of your being concentrated in the act of shooting the tube. For several years after that trip to L.A. I subscribed to Surfer magazine, and I practiced the Atlantic Ocean version of the sport, though only with my body and on rather tame waves. With my voice muffled by the water I would shout a line from “Surf City.” To me, this was the ultimate fantasy of plenty: “two girls for every boy,” except I sang it as “Two girls for every goy.” Fortunately, Brian has survived the schizoid tendencies that seemed close to the surface when I met him. He’s still performing and writing songs. But it was his emotional battle and the intersection of that struggle with the acid-dosed aesthetic of the sixties that produced his most astonishing music.

It was my father who called the city the Mansion on the River. He was talking about Charleston, South Carolina, and he was a native son, peacock proud of a town so pretty it makes your eyes ache with pleasure just to walk down its spellbinding, narrow streets. Charleston was my father’s ministry, his hobbyhorse, his quiet obsession, and the great love of his life. His bloodstream lit up my own with a passion for the city that I’ve never lost nor ever will. I’m Charleston-born, and bred. The city’s two rivers, the Ashley and the Cooper, have flooded and shaped all the days of my life on this storied peninsula. I carry the delicate porcelain beauty of Charleston like the hinged shell of some soft-tissued mollusk. My soul is peninsula-shaped and sun-hardened and river-swollen. The high tides of the city flood my consciousness each day, subject to the whims and harmonies of full moons rising out of the Atlantic. I grow calm when I see the ranks of palmetto trees pulling guard duty on the banks of Colonial Lake or hear the bells of St. Michael’s calling cadence in the cicada-filled trees along Meeting Street. Deep in my bones, I knew early that I was one of those incorrigible creatures known as Charlestonians. It comes to me as a surprising form of knowledge that my time in the city is more vocation than gift; it is my destiny, not my choice. I consider it a high privilege to be a native of one of the loveliest American cities, not a high-kicking, glossy, or lipsticked city, not a city with bells on its fingers or brightly painted toenails, but a ruffled, low-slung city, understated and tolerant of nothing mismade or ostentatious. Though Charleston feels a seersuckered, tuxedoed view of itself, it approves of restraint far more than vainglory. As a boy, in my own backyard I could catch a basket of blue crabs, a string of flounder, a dozen redfish, or a net full of white shrimp. All this I could do in a city enchanting enough to charm cobras out of baskets, one so corniced and filigreed and elaborate that it leaves strangers awed and natives self-satisfied. In its shadows you can find metalwork as delicate as lace and spiral staircases as elaborate as yachts. In the secrecy of its gardens you can discover jasmine and camellias and hundreds of other plants that look embroidered and stolen from the Garden of Eden for the sheer love of richness and the joy of stealing from the gods. In its kitchens, the stoves are lit up in happiness as the lamb is marinating in red wine sauce, vinaigrette is prepared for the salad, crabmeat is anointed with sherry, custards are baked in the oven, and buttermilk biscuits cool on the counter.

We will always be black, you and I, even if it means different things in different places. France is built on its own dream, on its collection of bodies, and recall that your very name is drawn from a man who opposed France and its national project of theft by colonization. It is true that our color was not our distinguishing feature there, so much as the Americanness represented in our poor handle on French. And it is true that there is something particular about how the Americans who think they are white regard us—something sexual and obscene. We were not enslaved in France. We are not their particular “problem,” nor their national guilt. We are not their niggers. If there is any comfort in this, it is not the kind that I would encourage you to indulge. Remember your name. Remember that you and I are brothers, are the children of trans-Atlantic rape. Remember the broader consciousness that comes with that. Remember that this consciousness can never ultimately be racial; it must be cosmic. Remember the Roma you saw begging with their children in the street, and the venom with which they were addressed. Remember the Algerian cab driver, speaking openly of his hatred of Paris, then looking at your mother and me and insisting that we were all united under Africa. Remember the rumbling we all felt under the beauty of Paris, as though the city had been built in abeyance of Pompeii. Remember the feeling that the great public gardens, the long lunches, might all be undone by a physics, cousin to our rules and the reckoning of our own country, that we do not fully comprehend.

Sleeping on the Wing Perhaps it is to avoid some great sadness, as in a Restoration tragedy the hero cries 'Sleep! O for a long sound sleep and so forget it! ' that one flies, soaring above the shoreless city, veering upward from the pavement as a pigeon does when a car honks or a door slams, the door of dreams, life perpetuated in parti-colored loves and beautiful lies all in different languages. Fear drops away too, like the cement, and you are over the Atlantic. Where is Spain? where is who? The Civil War was fought to free the slaves, was it? A sudden down-draught reminds you of gravity and your position in respect to human love. But here is where the gods are, speculating, bemused. Once you are helpless, you are free, can you believe that? Never to waken to the sad struggle of a face? to travel always over some impersonal vastness, to be out of, forever, neither in nor for! The eyes roll asleep as if turned by the wind and the lids flutter open slightly like a wing. The world is an iceberg, so much is invisible! and was and is, and yet the form, it may be sleeping too. Those features etched in the ice of someone loved who died, you are a sculptor dreaming of space and speed, your hand alone could have done this. Curiosity, the passionate hand of desire. Dead, or sleeping? Is there speed enough? And, swooping, you relinquish all that you have made your own, the kingdom of your self sailing, for you must awake and breathe your warmth in this beloved image whether it's dead or merely disappearing, as space is disappearing and your singularity Frank O’Hara, The Collected Poems of Frank O'Hara. (University of California Press March 31, 1995)

To decide how great the danger was that this oldest civilized continent in the world would be overrun this winter will be left to later historical research. The unfading credit that this danger is over now goes to those soldiers whom we are commemorating today. Only a glance at Bolshevism’s gigantic preparations for the destruction of our world is sufficient to let us realize with horror what might have become of Germany and the rest of the Continent, had not the National Socialist movement taken power in this state ten years ago, and had it not begun the rebuilding of the German Wehrmacht with the determination that is so peculiar to it, following many fruitless efforts for disarmament. After all, the Germany of Weimar with its Centrist-Marxist democratic party politics would have been swept away by this Central Asian invasion as a straw would be by a hurricane. We realize with increasing clarity that the confrontation that has taken place in Europe since the First World War is slowly beginning to look like a struggle which can only be compared with the greatest historic events of the past. Eternal Jewry forced on us a pitiless and merciless war. Should we not be able to stop the elements of destruction at Europe’s borders, then this continent will be transformed into a single field of ruins. The gravest consequences of this war would then be not only the burned cities and destroyed cultural monuments, but also the bestially murdered multitudes, which would become the victim of this Central Asian flood, just as with the invasions by the Huns and Mongols. What the German and allied soldiers today protect in the east is not the stony face of this continent or its social and intellectual character, but its eternal human substance, whence all values originated ages and ages ago and which gave expression to all human civilizations today, not only to those in Europe and America. In addition to this world of barbarity threatening from the east, we are witnessing the satanic destructive frenzy of its ally, the so-called West. We know about our enemies’ war objectives from countless publications, speeches, and open demands. The babble of the Atlantic Charter is worth as much as Wilson’s Fourteen Points in contrast with the implemented actual design of the Diktat of Versailles. Just as in the English parliamentary democracy the warmonger Churchill pointed the way for later developments with his claim in 1936, when he was not yet the responsible leader of Great Britain, that Germany had to be destroyed again, so the elements behind the present demands for peace in the same democracies today are already planning the state to which they seek to reduce Europe after the war. And their objectives totally correspond with the manifestations of their Bolshevik allies, which we have not only known about but also witnessed: the extermination of all continental people proudly conscious of their nationality and, at their head, the extermination of our own German people. It makes no difference whether English or American papers, parliamentarians, stump orators, or men of letters demand the destruction of the Reich, the abduction of the children of our Volk, the sterilization of our male youth, and so on, as the primary war objective, or whether Bolshevism implements the slaughter of whole groups of people, men, women, and children, in practice. After all, the driving force behind this remains the eternal hatred of that cursed race which, as a true scourge of God, chastised the nations for many thousands of years, until they began to defend themselves against their tormentors in times of reflection. Speech in Lichthof of the Zeughaus for the Heroes’ Memorial Day Berlin, March 21, 1943

There were two sets of similar people arriving in Chicago and other industrial cities of the North at around the same time in the early decades of the twentieth century—blacks pouring in from the South and immigrants arriving from eastern and southern Europe in a slowing but continuous stream from across the Atlantic, a pilgrimage that had begun in the latter part of the nineteenth century. On the face of it, they were sociologically alike, mostly landless rural people, put upon by the landed upper classes or harsh autocratic regimes, seeking freedom and autonomy in the northern factory cities of the United States. But as they made their way into the economies of Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland, Milwaukee, and other receiving cities, their fortunes diverged. Both groups found themselves ridiculed for their folk ways and accents and suffered backward assumptions about their abilities and intelligence. But with the stroke of a pen, many eastern and southern Europeans and their children could wipe away their ethnicities—and those limiting assumptions—by adopting Anglo-Saxon surnames and melting into the world of the more privileged native-born whites. In this way, generations of immigrant children could take their places without the burdens of an outsider ethnicity in a less enlightened era. Doris von Kappelhoff could become Doris Day, and Issur Danielovitch, the son of immigrants from Belarus, could become Kirk Douglas, meaning that his son could live life and pursue stardom as Michael Douglas instead of as Michael Danielovitch. ... Ultimately, according to the Harvard immigration scholar Stanley Lieberson, a major difference between the acceptance and thus life outcomes of black migrants from the South and their white immigrant counterparts was this: white immigrants and their descendants could escape the disadvantages of their station if they chose to, while that option did not hold for the vast majority of black migrants and their children. The ethnicity of the descendants of white immigrants “was more a matter of choice, because, with some effort, it could be changed,” Lieberson wrote, and, out in public, might not easily be determined at all.

WALKING WITH ANGELS IN THE COOL OF THE DAY A short time later I felt someone poke me hard in the left arm. I turned to see who it was, but there was no one there. At the time, I dismissed it and returned my attention to my thoughts. After a minute I was poked again, only this time the poke was accompanied with an audible voice! The Holy Spirit said, “I want to go for a walk with you in the cool of the day.” I jumped up totally flabbergasted. I quickly left the room and grabbed my coat, telling everyone that I was going for a walk in the “cool of the day.” It just happened to be minus 12 degrees Fahrenheit (or minus 24 Celsius)! The moment I walked out the door, the presence of the Holy Spirit fell upon me, and I began to weep again. The tears were starting to freeze on my cheeks, but I did not mind. God began to talk to me in an audible voice. I was walking through the streets of Botwood in the presence of the Holy Ghost. I could also sense that many angels were accompanying us. The angels were laughing and singing as we strolled along the snow-covered streets. It was about 8:00 A.M. The Holy Spirit led me along a road which was on the shore of the North Atlantic Ocean. For the first time since leaving the house, I began to notice that it was very cold. However, it was worth it to be in the presence of the Lord. I was directed to a small breezeway that leads out over the Bay of Exploits (this name truly proved to be quite prophetic) to a tiny island called Killick Island. As we were walking across the breezeway, the wind was whipping off the ocean at about 40 knots. Combined with the negative temperature, the wind was turning my skin numb, and my tears had crystallized into ice on my face and mustache. THE CITY OF REFUGE I said, “Holy Spirit, it is really cold out here, and my face is turning numb.” The Lord replied, “Do not fear; when we get onto this island, there will be a city of refuge.” I had no idea what a city of refuge was, but I hoped that it would be warm and safe. (See Numbers 35:25.) The winter’s day had turned even colder and grayer; there was no sun, and the dark gray sky was totally overcast. Snow was falling lightly, and being blown about by a brisk wind. As we walked onto Killick Island, it got even colder and windier. The Holy Spirit whispered to me, “Do not fear; the city of refuge is just up these steps, hidden in those fir trees.” When I ascended a few dozen steps, I saw a small stand of fir trees to the left. Just before I stepped into the middle of them, a shaft of brilliant bright light, a lone sunbeam, cracked the sky to illuminate the city of refuge. When I entered the little circle of fir trees, what the Holy Spirit had called a “city of refuge,” I encountered the manifest glory of God. Angels were everywhere. It was 8:50 A.M. As we entered, I walked through some kind of invisible barrier. Surprisingly, inside the city of refuge, the temperature was very pleasant, even warm. The bright beam of sunlight slashed into the cold, gray atmosphere. As this heavenly light hit the fresh snow, there appeared to be rainbows of colors that seemed to radiate from the trees, tickling my eyes. Suddenly, the Holy Spirit began to ask me questions. The Lord asked me to “describe what you are seeing.” Every color of the rainbow seemed to dance from the tiny snowflakes as they slowly drifted

One day in 1998, a real estate broker called Offit: “Would you make a loan to Donald Trump?” Trump at the time was a casino magnate known for his occasional showbiz hijinks and his on-and-off dealings with organized crime figures. He also was a deadbeat, having defaulted on loans to finance his Atlantic City casinos and stiffing lenders, contractors, and business partners in other projects. Quite a few banks—including

One day in 1998, a real estate broker called Offit: “Would you make a loan to Donald Trump?” Trump at the time was a casino magnate known for his occasional showbiz hijinks and his on-and-off dealings with organized crime figures. He also was a deadbeat, having defaulted on loans to finance his Atlantic City casinos and stiffing lenders, contractors, and business partners in other projects. Quite a few banks—including Citigroup, Manufacturers Hanover (a predecessor of JPMorgan), the British lender NatWest, and of course Bankers Trust—had endured hundreds of millions of losses at the hands of Trump.

One thing more makes these men and women from the age of wigs, swords, and stagecoaches seem surprisingly contemporary. This small group of people not only helped to end one of the worst of human injustices in the most powerful empire of its time; they also forged virtually every important tool used by citizens’ movements in democratic countries today. Think of what you’re likely to find in your mailbox—or electronic mailbox—over a month or two. An invitation to join the local chapter of a national environmental group. If you say yes, a logo to put on your car bumper. A flier asking you to boycott California grapes or Guatemalan coffee. A poster to put in your window promoting this campaign. A notice that a prominent social activist will be reading from her new book at your local bookstore. A plea that you write your representative in Congress or Parliament, to vote for that Guatemalan coffee boycott bill. A “report card” on how your legislators have voted on these and similar issues. A newsletter from the group organizing support for the grape pickers or the coffee workers. Each of these tools, from the poster to the political book tour, from the consumer boycott to investigative reporting designed to stir people to action, is part of what we take for granted in a democracy. Two and a half centuries ago, few people assumed this. When we wield any of these tools today, we are using techniques devised or perfected by the campaign that held its first meeting at 2 George Yard in 1787. From their successful crusade we still have much to learn. If, early that year, you had stood on a London street corner and insisted that slavery was morally wrong and should be stopped, nine out of ten listeners would have laughed you off as a crackpot. The tenth might have agreed with you in principle, but assured you that ending slavery was wildly impractical: the British Empire’s economy would collapse. The parliamentarian Edmund Burke, for example, opposed slavery but thought that the prospect of ending even just the Atlantic slave trade was “chimerical.” Within a few short years, however, the issue of slavery had moved to center stage in British political life. There was an abolition committee in every major city or town in touch with a central committee in London. More than 300,000 Britons were refusing to eat slave-grown sugar. Parliament was flooded with far more signatures on abolition petitions than it had ever received on any other subject. And in 1792, the House of Commons passed the first law banning the slave trade. For reasons we will see, a ban did not take effect for some years to come, and British slaves were not finally freed until long after that. But there was no mistaking something crucial: in an astonishingly short period of time, public opinion in Europe’s most powerful nation had undergone a sea change. From this unexpected transformation there would be no going back.

Sometimes I think I’m crazy. I’m sitting at a casino table in Atlantic City, and everyone around me is motionless. I call this the Quiet, as though giving it a name makes it seem more real—as though giving it a name changes

As far as I know, no one ever burned a bra. At the 1968 Miss America Contest in Atlantic City, several hundred feminists protested on the boardwalk by putting girdles, steno pads, aprons, dust mops, and other symbols of the “feminine” role into a trash can and threatening to burn them; it was an echo of Vietnam draft resisters burning draft cards. However, they couldn’t get a fire permit and never burned anything. 4

Lucinda laughed. “That’s the beauty of contracting––I can work from wherever I like so long as there is WiFi or cell signal. Jamaica, Bora Bora, Fiji, Atlantic City––wherever! Now, you tell me where that is––birthday girl.

If you want to know the truth, it started with a dream. The Pacific Rim was on fire and something that looked like a Crystal City was rising from the Atlantic Ocean. The West Coast of the United States was crumbling and the Eastern seaboard had moved inland by hundreds of miles. I woke up startled and heard the words distinctly, emanating from deep within my core: “Go to the center.

Their subsequent journey to Europe took them to New York City, where they boarded a converted passenger liner and set off on a harrowing trip across the North Atlantic, during which German U-boats hunted for ships just like theirs. Finally, they landed in Britain, where, to their delight, they were welcomed by people who had never heard of segregation. The freedoms they experienced there were life-changing. In villages in Wales and Oxfordshire, they lifted pints in pubs alongside white men for the first time and danced with white girls. This warm welcome infuriated many white American soldiers, particularly southern ones, who tried, and failed, to poison the Britons against the “Negroes.

The castle overlooking Alfama and the rest of the city is perhaps Lisbon’s most emblematic landmark, and the view it offers is staggering. As the sun sets over the Atlantic—if you sailed that way, the first land mass you would come to is North America—the electric blue sky shifts through a kaleidoscope of colours. The sun fades to apricot, followed by more delicate hues: candy-pink and lilac, before a triumphant dying blast of violet, magenta and crimson.

Tengamos en cuenta, por ejemplo, el famoso (al menos en el mundillo aeronáutico) choque del vuelo 052 de pasajeros de la compañía colombiana Avianca en enero de 1990. Este accidente de Avianca ilustra tan a la perfección las características del accidente «moderno» de avión, que se estudia en las escuelas de aviación. De hecho, lo que ocurrió en aquel vuelo es tan parecido a lo que pasaría siete años después en Guam, que es un buen punto de partida para nuestra investigación del misterioso problema del accidente de avión de Korean Air. El capitán del avión era Laureano Caviedes. Su copiloto era Mauricio Klotz. Realizaban la ruta desde Medellín (Colombia) al aeropuerto Kennedy de Nueva York. Aquella tarde, el tiempo era malo. Soplaba noreste en toda la costa oriental, y llevaba consigo niebla densa y fuertes vientos. En el aeropuerto de Newark se retrasaron 203 vuelos: 200 en el de La Guardia, 161 en Filadelfia, 53 en el aeropuerto Logan de Boston y 99 en el Kennedy. A causa del tiempo, Avianca fue retenida tres veces por el control de tráfico aéreo durante su trayecto a Nueva York. El avión dio vueltas sobre Norfolk (Virginia) durante 19 minutos; sobre Atlantic City durante 29, y 65 kilómetros al sur del aeropuerto Kennedy, durante otros 29 minutos. Tras una hora y cuarto de retraso, Avianca obtuvo permiso para aterrizar. Cuando realizaban la aproximación final, los pilotos se encontraron con un cambio brusco en la velocidad del viento. Iban volando con un fuerte viento en contra, que les obligaba a utilizar más potencia para seguir planeando hacia abajo cuando, sin previo aviso, el viento cesó de manera radical y se encontraron volando a demasiada velocidad para poder tomar la pista de aterrizaje. Normalmente, en una situación así, el avión habría estado volando con el piloto automático, y habría reaccionado de inmediato y de manera apropiada al cambio de viento. Pero el piloto automático del avión funcionaba mal, y lo habían apagado. En el último momento, el piloto enderezó el avión y ejecutó un «motor y al aire». El avión describió un amplio círculo sobre Long Island y volvió a acercarse al aeropuerto Kennedy. De repente, uno de los motores del avión falló. Segundos más tarde, un segundo motor falló. —¡Muéstreme la pista de aterrizaje! —gritó el piloto, confiando desesperado en estar lo suficientemente cerca del Kennedy para conseguir de algún modo realizar un aterrizaje seguro para su decrépito avión. Pero el Kennedy estaba a 25 kilómetros de distancia. El 707 chocó contra un terreno perteneciente al padre del campeón de tenis John McEnroe, en la lujosa localidad de Oyster Bay, en Long Island. Murieron 73 de los 158 pasajeros a bordo. Tardaron menos de un día en determinar la causa del choque: «agotamiento del combustible». El avión no tenía nada malo. El aeropuerto tampoco. Los pilotos no estaban bebidos ni drogados. El avión se había quedado sin combustible. 4.

By the end of spring 1942, New York City had begun to rise from a gloomy run of months. The United States Navy had won its first major victory at the Battle of Midway. Losses in the Battle of the Atlantic were horrific and still being censored, which was a good thing, as the Allies lost 213 ships in May and June alone. In New York City, however, business was beginning to boom, as a major boost in government spending cut unemployment in half. Servicemen from all over were beginning to filter through the city and spend their government paychecks on local entertainment.

He saw El Lagartijo—“The Lizard”—one of the most famous bullfighters in Spain, and he met Cara Ancha, the celebrated Andalusian matador. When he was only nine years old, Pablo completed his first painting, Le Picador, a portrait of a man riding a horse in the bullring. Two years later, Pablo’s family moved to a new town, La Coruña, on Spain’s Atlantic coast. Don José got a job as an art teacher at the local college. Even though he was much younger than the other students, Pablo enrolled in his father’s class. He also took courses in figure drawing and landscape painting. By the time he turned thirteen, Pablo’s skill level had surpassed his father’s. Don José was so impressed that he handed his son his brushes and vowed never to paint again. When Pablo was fourteen years old, his family moved again, this time to Barcelona, where Pablo enrolled in the prestigious School of Fine Arts. His teachers quickly noticed his skills and allowed him to skip two grades. But just as in Málaga, Pablo had trouble adhering to the school’s rules. Before long he was back to his old tricks, cutting class so that he could wander the city streets, sketching interesting scenes that he observed along the way. Pablo repeated this behavior at his next school, the Royal Academy of San Fernando in Madrid. This time, Pablo’s father refused to tolerate his son’s antics and stopped his allowance. At age sixteen, Pablo found himself on his own for the first time, forced to support himself on nothing but his artistic ability. It has been said that the older Pablo grew, the more childlike his art became. During some periods he painted almost entirely in blue or depicted only circus performers.

Interwoven with civilian cities and commercial waterways, this sinew of steel is a world of its own. Even so, its powerful present cannot overwhelm images that upwell from the past: the sails of the French fleet in surprising bloom off Yorktown; the Monitor battling the Merrimack; and within living memory the Battle of the Atlantic, when ships burned offshore and corpses washed up on the sand. From these docks and quays millions left for the World Wars, half a century of Cold War, Korea, Vietnam, and the Middle East.

concentration of naval might in existence. Interwoven with civilian cities and commercial waterways, this sinew of steel is a world of its own. Even so, its powerful present cannot overwhelm images that upwell from the past: the sails of the French fleet in surprising bloom off Yorktown; the Monitor battling the Merrimack; and within living memory the Battle of the Atlantic, when ships burned offshore and corpses washed up on the sand.

This city with remnants of war. The roads glow with an overcharge of streetlights. I smell the ocean's combustion from the window. Inhale the sulphur of post-rain air. The town dissolves inside my body like crumbs, as the slow release of paracetamol into the liver.

The city that Elizabeth looked out on that spring was in the midst of changes far greater than any since the Revolutionary era. During the 1820s, Boston transformed itself from a harbor dependent on foreign imports to one rich in exports from the rising inland mill towns of Lawrence and Lowell. Independent proprietors built new wharves and bridges. A toll road stretching west across swampland between Boston and Brookline was laid out atop an ambitious system of dykes that provided waterpower for scores of new mills. Known as the Mill Dam, this last project served as the underpinnings for future expansion into the Back Bay. In the next decades, Boston, once just a tight fist of land thrust into the Atlantic, would nearly double in landmass: its seven hills were razed and its riverbeds dredged for landfill to support a population swelling past 50,000.

The Kentucky farmer and activist Wendell Berry wrote for The Atlantic in 1991, “The only sustainable city—and this, to me, is the indispensable ideal and goal—is a city in balance with its countryside,” one that would pay “all its ecological and human debts.

told him about the vacation. Eva and I had spent a day at Brimstone Pool, a little bathing place a few miles from Atlantic City. One of the days, while swimming, I had been stung in the arm, but I had thought nothing of it. Anyhow, the lump had soon gone down…

Sometime after dinner, we reached the deserted spot whereon, in summertime, pleasure seekers sought the sun and waves. Without speaking, I led the way down a rocky declivity to a narrow inlet left by the ebbed tide, finally indicated a deep, smooth pool banked around by curious, porous looking rocks. “That’s Brimstone Pool itself,” I explained, glancing up to find Tarp’s lean face within two inches of my own. “I dived in from here, swam right across, and back again, Eva followed a moment or two afterwards…” “Uh-huh, Tarp said pensively, then he stooped and stared into the Pool. It was perfectly clear, but it plainly had nothing in it beyond a few baby crabs and shrimps. Finally he wetted his lips with it. “Normal sea water all right,” he sighed; then as he stared around on the rocks fringing the Pool, he began to frown. “Say,” he breathed, “these rocks aren’t normal. They’re—meteoric!” he finished, kicking one of them. “Large amounts of iron and pumice in them.” I looked at him in surprise. “But I thought you knew that, Tarp! Don’t you remember the meteor of 1942 which fell near Atlantic City? It landed here and broke up—wasn’t very big. All around this Pool is where it dropped. These very rocks are the exploded parts of it—according to Doctor Grantham, anyway, Eva’s father. Hence the name Brimstone Pool.” “Idiot that I am!

He wouldn’t attract flies,’ was the verdict of a club owner invited to book Sinatra for a week of performances. Most believed that and because he’d angered so many people in the movies and recording industry few were willing to help including those who had made good money from his career. His friend Mickey Cohen stepped in with a ‘testimonial dinner’ in early 1951 at the Beverly Hills Hotel, the pink palace standing proudly on that tributary for fading stars, Sunset Boulevard, but it was a disappointing affair. Cohen had to outfit his own bodyguards and assorted other hoods in evening wear to make up the numbers. The invited ‘girls’ got more attention in the hotel’s Polo Lounge. Most of Hollywood thought it was all over for Frank Sinatra but across the country in New Jersey, which has a warm approach to all things Italian, was a pal who always believed the best was yet to come. Paul ‘Skinny’ D’Amato, a maestro of the entertainment business in Atlantic City, a Mafia indulged fixture of the Boardwalk, a gambler, and a fixer and, importantly, an entertaining and loveable man, met Sinatra in 1939. He proved a valuable connection and loyal ally.

dacă vreţi să aflaţi tot. - Dacă crezi că e necesar... - Este. Mai ales dacă vreţi să ştiţi ce trebuie să căutaţi în acele interceptări, replică Burckhardt, şi dacă vreţi să vă faceţi o idee a necazurilor pe care povestea asta le poate aduce Elveţiei. - Dă-i înainte. - Bine. Pe 26 iunie 1940, la patru săptămâni după capitularea forţelor armate belgiene, regele lor, ajuns prizonier al Wermachtului german, i-a trimis un mesaj personal lui Hitler prin care îl informa că, anterior izbucnirii războiului, a fost efectuat un transport masiv de aur aparţinând regatului belgian către Banque de France din Paris, pentru siguranţă. După informaţiile sale, aurul fusese depus într-o ascunzătoare din vecinătatea oraşului Bordeaux. Scrisoarea continua prin a-l în cunoştinţa pe Hitler că el, Leopold al IlI-lea, ar fi foarte recunoscător dacă Hitler ar putea face ceva în sensul returnării aurului către proprietarul de drept. Până aici, toate bune. Mai întâi, cât de mare era acea cantitate de aur belgian? Şi cine îl controla? Conform armistiţiului din 22 iunie 1940 dintre Franţa şi Germania, s-a convenit ca guvernul mareşalului Petain s.l exercite de la Vichy toate prerogativele administrării civile asupra îiu regii Franţe, inclusiv asupra teritoriilor de peste mări, deci şi asupra Acest ordin a fost dat de Roosevelt în Ordonanţa Executivă nr. 8785 (vezi Paul Erdman, ţtviss-American Economic Relations, Basel, Tubingen, 1959, p. Băncii Franţei. In consecinţă, în urma ordinelor lui Hitler, Berlinul a trimis celor din Vichy un mesaj urgent prin care solicitau detalii asupra aurului belgian. Răspunsul a venit imediat şi a depăşit evaluările nemţilor. După cei din Vichy, cantitatea de aur în discuţie se ridica la... Burckhardt se opri, scoase din geantă un dosar, îl deschise şi citi: - 4 944 de lăzi conţinând, în total, 221 730 kilograme de aur pur. În plus, Franţa mai deţinea 57 000 kilograme ale Băncii Naţionale a Poloniei şi 10 000 kilograme ale băncilor naţionale ale Luxemburgului, Lituaniei, Letoniei, Norvegiei şi Cehoslovaciei. Burckhardt închise dosarul. - Problema era că nici un gram din toată această masă enormă de aur nu se mai afla în Franţa. Cu patru zile înainte ca Franţa să capituleze, toată cantitatea de aur - plus cel aparţinând Franţei - fusese încărcată în portul Brest la bordul a două crucişătoare care, ulterior, au dispărut în Atlantic. Planul iniţial, încheiat în urma unei înţelegeri

From the Bridge” by Captain Hank Bracker The Hurricane of 1502 In the time before hurricanes were understood or modern methods of detection and tracking were available, people were frequently caught off guard by these monstrous storms. One of these times was on June 29, 1502. What had started as another normal day in the Caribbean turned into the devastation of a fleet of 30 ships, preparing to sail back to Spain laden with gold and other treasures from the New World. Without the benefit of a National Weather Service, mariners had to rely on their own knowledge and understanding of atmospheric conditions and the sea. Sensing that one of these storms was approaching, Columbus sought shelter for his ships near the Capitol city of Santo Domingo along the southern coast of Hispaniola, now known as the Dominican Republic. The following is taken from page 61 of the author’s award winning book, The Exciting Story of Cuba. “Columbus was aware of dangerous weather indicators that were frequently a threat in the Caribbean during the summer months. Although the barometer had not yet been invented, there were definitely other telltale signs of an approaching hurricane. Had the governor listened to Columbus’ advice and given him some leeway, he could have saved the convoy that was being readied for a return trans-Atlantic crossing. Instead, the new inexperienced governor ordered the fleet of over 30 caravels, laden, heavy with gold, to set sail for Spain without delay. As a result, it is estimated that 20 of these ships were sunk by this violent storm, nine ran aground and only the Aguja, which coincidently carried Columbus’ gold, survived and made it back to Spain safely. The ferocity of the storm claimed the lives of five hundred souls, including that of the former governor Francisco de Bobadilla. Many of the caravels that sank during this hurricane were ships that were part of the same convoy that Ovando had traveled with from Spain to the West Indies. However he felt about this tragedy, which could have been prevented, he continued as the third Governor of the Indies until 1509, and became known for his brutal treatment of the Taíno Indians. Columbus’ ships fared somewhat better in that terrible storm, and survived with only minor damage. Heaving in their anchors, Columbus’ small fleet of ships left Hispaniola to explore the western side of the Caribbean.” Hurricanes and Typhoons, remain the most powerful and dangerous storms on our planet. Hurricane Matthew that is now raking the eastern coastline of Florida is no exception. Perhaps the climate change that we are experiencing has intensified these storms and perhaps we should be doing more to stabilize our atmosphere but Earth is our home and the only place where proven life exists. Perhaps the conclusion to this is that we should take the warning signs more seriously and be proactive in protecting our environment! This is not a political issue and will affect us, our children and grandchildren for centuries!

That made Rudy’s eyes widen. “So? What was that, twenty years ago?” “Seventeen.” “Long time ago. In a place like Atlantic City, it’s a lifetime.” Boy, did that make sense. You live in dog years here. Everything ages faster. And,

Because they were unsure how many days this particular job would take, Ken and Barbie had rented a two-bedroom suite at the sleek skyscraper hotel called the Borgata. The Borgata was supposedly the nicest hotel in Atlantic City, plus it had the added advantage of being away from the Boardwalk, the cesspool strip of gamblers, drug addicts, sinners, carnival barkers, and overall filth. Still,

I wondered what it was like, to gradually lose little pieces of your mind. Maybe it wasn’t so bad if you didn’t know it was happening, if you just kind of slowly sank into oblivion. Papa had celebrated his eighty-fifth birthday in April. He’d had a long, happy turn at life and yet it was still sad to watch it slowly ebb away. Papa continued to regard me with quiet scrutiny while my uncle rocked back on his heels and waited for someone to say something. I didn’t want to stay in this house alone tonight. I really didn’t want to stay here alone with Easton. I opened my mouth to plead with my senile great-grandfather to stay and keep me company. He spoke before I did though. “You’re no fun,” he said in a plaintive, childish voice. “Hear that, Claud?” Rocco teased. “You’re no fun.” “Shut up.” He sighed and turned serious. “I’m just trying to look out for you. I don’t think you should hide forever.” “I was only planning on hiding until Saturday.” That was the day after Jack and Anya were scheduled to return from Atlantic City. It was the date stamped on my return plane ticket. And then I would return to Arizona and go back to hiding out on that side of the country. Rocco wasn’t done prodding me. “Why don’t you go out tonight?” “I can’t find Jack’s car keys.” Rocco crossed the room in three long strides, rattled around in the kitchen for a minute, and returned with Jack’s key ring. “Excuses, excuses,

Leaving Italy Italians have been involved with North America from the time of Christopher Columbus. In the years when Italy was trying to break away from Austria and other outside control, the authorities forced many revolutionaries to leave the country. Many went to the United States to live. As the twentieth century began, thousands upon thousands of people left the poverty of southern Italy for a new life across the Atlantic. Between 1850 and 1910, almost five million Italians emigrated to the United States. Most ended up in New York City. Consequently, Italy and the United States have long had close political and emotional ties.

If the port made New York, the Irish made the port,” writes James T. Fisher in On the Irish Waterfront.15 Many of the dockworkers were refugees from the Great Hunger that immiserated the island between 1845 and 1849, a famine so cataclysmic that nearly 1.5 million people were willing to risk voyage to America on the too aptly named “coffin ships.”16 Most of the workers were desperately poor and more than willing to take the dangerous, miserably paid, erratic jobs on the piers of Red Hook and near the Navy Yard. Some of the earliest arrivals had dug the Erie Canal; nearly 500 of those following them built the Atlantic Docks, and many more simply did the more forgettable work of unloading cargo, repairing masts, and braiding ropes.17 Like urban migrants everywhere, the

The Venetian Republic Venice, the island city, did not exist during the height of the Roman Empire. But by 1100, it had become a thriving city-state that controlled the Adriatic coastline. It became the busiest port city in the world, serving as a midway point between Asia and Europe. Goods shipped from one to the other made a stop in Venice’s warehouses. Venice also became an awesome military power. It produced warships in huge numbers. Many ships heading to the Middle East to fight wars left from Venice. The arrival in the Americas of Christopher Columbus, an explorer from Genoa, Italy, who was working for Spain, led to the end of Venice as a great power. European attention now turned to the west and the Americas. Because Venice had no access to the Atlantic Ocean, the city’s economy began to decline.

Trump’s understanding of his own essential nature was even more precise. Once, coming back on his plane with a billionaire friend who had brought along a foreign model, Trump, trying to move in on his friend’s date, urged a stop in Atlantic City. He would provide a tour of his casino. His friend assured the model that there was nothing to recommend Atlantic City. It was a place overrun by white trash. “What is this ‘white trash’?” asked the model. “They’re people just like me,” said Trump, “only they’re poor.

People still said that “The Sun Never Sets on the British Empire,” even though the Commonwealth was starting to come apart. In spite of the obvious, it was unthinkable that the United States had a colony in Africa; well they had one, and that was where I was headed! World War II had been over for ten years and in Europe they were getting on with things and for now all was well in Africa, and with the World! Unless especially fitted out, aircraft didn’t have the range to cross the Atlantic in one jump, so after leaving Idlewild Airport in New York City, we flew halfway across the Atlantic Ocean to the Portuguese island of Santa Maria in the Azores. After refueling and stretching our legs we continued on to Lisbon. Our layovers were only for as long as it took to take care of business. There were no days built in, for me to have a leisurely, gentlemanly, civilized journey to my destination. Instead my seat was beginning to feel as hard as a rock pile. The engines continued to drone on as the Atlantic Ocean eventually gave way to the Iberian Peninsula. My view of Portugal was only what I could see from the air and what was at the airport. Again we landed for fuel in Lisbon, and then without skipping a beat, headed south across the Mediterranean to the North African desert. The beaches under us, in Morocco and the Spanish Sahara, were endless and the sand went from the barren coastal surf inland, to as far as the eye could see. With very few exceptions there was no evidence of civilization.

When the North Atlantic Squadron steamed into New York harbor on September 29, 1899—its progress upriver marked by a Journal balloon that released showers of colorcoded confetti over Grant’s Tomb—it touched off two days of frenzied adulation.

According again to Harvard’s Shorenstein Center, discussion of public policy accounted for just 10 percent of all campaign news coverage in the general election. Nearly all the rest was taken up by obsessive coverage of controversies such as email. Health care, taxes, trade, immigration, national security—all of it crammed into just 10 percent of the press coverage. The Shorenstein Center found that not a single one of my many detailed policy plans received more than a blip of press coverage. “If she had a policy agenda, it was not apparent in the news,” it concluded. “Her lengthy record of public service also received scant attention.” None of Trump’s scandals, from scamming students at Trump University, to stiffing small businesses in Atlantic City, to exploiting his foundation, to refusing to release his taxes as every presidential candidate since 1976 has done—and on and on—generated the kind of sustained, campaign-defining coverage that my emails did.

The Caribbean is still an exciting destination. I have been to just about every notable island surrounding this sea and have yet to be bored. Some of the islands are administered by other countries like Saint Martín; some are independent countries such as Cuba, Haiti and the Dominican Republic. The languages differ from island to island and include English, French, Spanish, Dutch Haitian Creole and Papiamento although English is understood on most islands. This time I returned to the Dominican Republic, an island nation that I first visited when Santo Domingo was called Ciudad Trujillo in 1955 and have returned numerous times. I have also been to Haiti the country that shares the Island of Hispaniola with the Dominican Republic and I have stood at the mountainous border dividing the two countries. Driving around the country offers magnificent views with every turn in the road. On this visit I enjoyed the northern Atlantic coast named the Amber Coast because of the amount of amber found there. The primary site along the northern coast is La Cordillera Septentrional. The amber-bearing stones named clastic rocks are usually washed down the steep inclines along with sandstone and other debris and are even found in deep water at the end of the run. The Amber Coast of the Dominican Republic has mostly low mountains and beautiful beaches. Overlooking the city of Puerto Plata is Mount Isabel de Torres, which is covered by dense jungles but can be ascended by a cableway. Some of these jungle areas were used as sites for the movie Jurassic Park. A new 30 acre tourist port for Carnival Cruise Lines has been constructed in Amber Cove at a cost of $85 Million. It is one of the newest destinations to visit in the Caribbean and well worth the effort.