Big Daddy Gouda

Now that dad is in the process of setting up his own Facebook page, I figure it’s time to get this story out of the way, before Porkchop realizes what he’s doing and suddenly stumbles upon this Web site through a FB link.

………………………..

In the late 70s, before I could even walk,  over the span of three years, my father had turned our attic into two extra bedrooms, turned our basement into a bar, ( complete with a fishtank built into the wall) and had purchased brand new cars for he and my mother.  The topper, so the story goes, after dad got tired of mowing the lawn in the backyard, rather than pay someone to do it,  he installed an in-ground swimming pool: Eight feet deep, three feet on the shallow end: complete with a diving board and a slide.

Not bad for someone who worked part time at the long defunct Regency Lounge as a bartender for his friend Carmine.

Dad’s bartending gig was similar to Tony Sopranos “waste management” job. It was all for show.

Anyone who was anyone in Torrington knew that my dad, “Gogo” as he was known back then, was the town’s biggest bookie. If you needed to place a bet on a game, then dad was your man.

Working at the bar was the perfect front. What a better way to meet clients: A bunch of drunks spending sunday afternoon bellied up to the bar watching football. All Carmine asked of my father was a little piece of the action. In return, he could use The Regency Lounge as his own personal Bada Bing!

According to Mom, the good life lasted about four years. Then, someone who was in hot water with the local police, flipped on my father to save his own ass.

As soon as the local pigs were turned on to dad they set “Operation Cook The Porkchop” into motion.

Bar patrons were interviewed and threatened.  And, worst of all, dad’s “private” phone line was tapped. I shit you not. The Torrington PD tapped our phones. Years later this made dad laugh, seeing, as he would say, “Half the police force would place bets with me.”

Unfortunately, only a select few were in on the little sting. They kept the whole thing so secret, no one who could have warned dad about the heat had any knowledge of what was going on.

In the days before it all fell apart, Dad was tipped off that something could be going down by our neighbors. Apparently, cops had visited a few of them to ask if they had seen a lot of different people coming and going from Dad’s house during the week. Especially on Sundays!

Of course they had! Who knows about your goings on better than your neighbors! But, as legend goes, not one of them said a thing. Yeah, the cops hit a big ole brick wall when they confronted all the Italians in the hood who would sooner go to jail themselves than rat out a fellow ginny.

It wasn’t until one of dad’s biggest customers/friends squealed. He sung like a canary. Told the cops everything there was to know about dad’s business.

The Police hit The Regency Lounge first and rounded up the usual suspects. Carmine managed to call ahead and warn my dad that he would probably be next.

Dad spent the next few minutes in the basement bar, destroying evidence. Then, the cruisers pulled up and banged on the door.

Dad opened it casually.

“We have a search warrant for John Gogolya,” the officer said.

“He’s upstairs,” dad said, calmly.

And, truth be told, he wasn’t lying. My dad, Pete Gogolya, was actually named John “Peter” Gogolya, named after his father, John Gogolya, who, like dad said, was upstairs.

So, the idiot cops went upstairs to question John Gogolya senior. My grandfather. Dad tried to use the precious extra seconds to get rid of all the gambling tickets and all the excess cash lying around.

I’m almost embarrassed to write this, but dad had a safe built into the floor boards. Invisible to the naked eye. By the time the cops figured out what was going on, Dad had everything that could be considered “incriminating” safely stashed away in the floor safe.

The cops came back down stairs. Angry and unimpressed. Before they could begin questioning him, the phone rang. The basement phone. The one no one in the house was allowed to answer except him.

“Allow me,” the officer said.

“Gogo,” the voice on the line said.

“Yeah,” said the deceptive cop.

“$100 on The Giants,” the voice said.

Dad’s goose was cooked. Within seconds he was in handcuffs. The next day all over the front page of the local papers.

Dad blew all his money on a good lawyer. The lawyer argued that the search warrant was not valid because it had not been signed by the proper authorities.  It worked. Nothing the Torrington Pd obtained from Dad’s house that day could be used against him. He would later say this kept him out of jail. Unfortunately, the testimony given by fellow gamblers, looking to save their own skin, was enough to ruin my dad’s gambling business forever.

He paid some heavy fines and was put on probation for three years, in which time he had to show yearly proof of his income.

Although dad would never admit it, those that know him best, including my mother, would later say those years, “The Gambling Years”, were the best times of dad’s life.

And how could they not be. He was popular. He didn’t have to work a “real job.  And he never had to worry about money.

I remember in 7th grade, a few of us guys decided to run a weekly football pool. Over the weekend Mom found an envelope on my bed, filled with a schedule of all that week’s games and about $20 cash, all in one and five dollar bills.

She called dad to ask what he knew about this. He knew nothing and that was true. I had decided to do this on my own.

That night, I heard Mom remark to my step father about Dad’s response to finding out I was running a weekly football pool in school.

“It must be in his blood,” dad said of my new hobby.

I suppose he’s right. The rotten apple doesn’t fall far from the money tree.

This entry was posted on September 25, 2009 at 3:47 am and is filed under Stories . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.